New American Movement
The New American Movement (NAM) was an American New Left socialist and feminist political organization established in 1971. The organization continued an independent existence until 1982, when it merged with Michael Harrington's Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee to establish Democratic Socialists of America.
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[edit] Organizational history
The founding activists behind the New American movement were vigorous opponents of the war in Vietnam who sought a new organization to serve as a forum for discussing where and how to redirect their activities. The call to convene was issued by Michael Lerner. Lerner became distant from the organization shortly after it was founded and went on to start the magazine Tikkun.
In its early years, NAM shared much of the political framework of the New Communist Movement, but rejected the strategy of building a "vanguard party", a position prominent NAM members defended in a debate in the pages of the National Guardian. The organization was built around local groups called "chapters," which emphasized Marxist study, discussion of contemporary issues, support of local labor actions, and work in the community to raise awareness.
By the early 1980s, after a great change in the American political climate and the departure of some of its more radical members, NAM had moved away from its original neo-Leninist orientation and adopted a more traditionally social democratic outlook, culminating in a merger with the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee (DSOC) in 1982 to form the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA). [1] At the time of the merger, NAM claimed 2,500 members.[2]
Richard Healey, son of Los Angeles Communist Party leader Dorothy Healey, was a leader of NAM from its founding in 1971. After his mother resigned from the CPUSA in 1973, Richard worked on recruiting her to NAM, which she joined in 1974. In 1975 Dorothy Healey joined Richard on NAM's National Interim Committee, and later became a Vice Chair of DSA in 1982.[3]
The official organ of NAM was a magazine called Movin' On. The independent journals Radical America and Socialist Revolution (later Socialist Review) were also vaguely associated with NAM, as was the weekly socialist newspaper In These Times, which had its share of supporters within NAM, DSOC, and ultimately the DSA.
[edit] Footnotes
- ^ Max Elbaum, Revolution in the Air: Sixties Radicals turn to Marx, Mao, and Che. London: Verson, 2002; pp. 118-120.
- ^ Mike Davis, Prisoners of the American Dream: Politics and Economy in the History of the U.S. Working Class. London: Verso: 1986.
- ^ Dorothy Healey and Maurice Isserman, Dorothy Healey Remembers: A Life in the American Communist Party. New York: Oxford University Press, 1990; pp. 245-249.
[edit] Publications
- Undocumented workers, are they the problem? A NAM pamphlet by Glen Scott.
- Working papers on gay-lesbian liberation and socialism. A NAM pamphlet.
- [http://www.archive.org/details/Anti-racismBulletin.Summer80 Anti-Racism bulletin Summer 1980
[edit] Further reading
- Victor Cohen (ed.) "The New American Movement: An Oral History," Works and Days, Vol. 28, Nos. 1 and 2, whole number 55/56 (Spring/Fall 2010).
- "The New American Movement and the Los Angeles Socialist Community School," Minnesota Review, No. 69 (Fall/Winter 2007).
