The Record

Still organizing

Current Groups

Parties and caucuses that still argue for collective ownership, planning, and the replacement of capitalism.

7 min read

Twentieth-century regimes mostly fell. Organizations still argue for collective ownership of key industries, suspicion of markets, institutional capture, and the replacement — not the reform — of capitalism. Some say so in the language of democratic socialism. Some still say communism.

Associated symbols

Hammer and sickle

Union of industrial workers and peasants. Still used by CPUSA, PSL, and factional material inside DSA.

Red star

Vanguard leadership. Common in Leninist and Maoist marks, party logos, and protest signage.

Raised fist

Solidarity and class struggle. Frequent at DSA and allied events.

Red flag

Classic banner of revolution. Still flown by explicitly communist organizations.

Largest U.S. socialist organization

Democratic Socialists of America (DSA)

dsausa.org

Describes capitalism as a system designed by the owning class to exploit everyone else, and calls for replacing it with democratic socialism: collective ownership of key sectors and “democratic planning.” It is a big tent. Inside the tent are caucuses that state the older goal without euphemism.

  • Red Star Caucus (Marxist-Leninist): “Our primary goal… is to abolish capitalism and, ultimately, to achieve communism. We do not believe that capitalism can be reformed into socialism — it must be overthrown.”
  • DSA Communist Caucus: “Communism is the movement against class society. We want a stateless and classless society.”
  • Strategy: long march through unions, education, local government, and the Democratic Party. Reforms (Green New Deal, Medicare for All) framed as transitional.

Public statements from DSA-aligned officials

Zohran Mamdani

NYC DSA member, elected official

  • On policing (2020): called the NYPD “racist, anti-queer & a major threat to public safety,” urged defund and dismantle, and said there is “no negotiating with an institution this wicked & corrupt.” Later moderated as a mayoral candidate; DSA criticized him for not going far enough.
  • Linked the NYPD and the IDF in a single image of the boot.
  • “I was elected as a democratic socialist, and I will govern as a democratic socialist.”

Rashida Tlaib

U.S. Representative, DSA member

  • Defended “from the river to the sea” as aspirational; the House censured her in 2023 after October 7.
  • Supports BDS, ending U.S. aid to Israel, and has described Israel as an apartheid regime.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

U.S. Representative, DSA member

  • “Capitalism has not always existed in the world and will not always exist in the world.” “To me capitalism is irredeemable.”
  • Defines socialism as guaranteeing a basic level of dignity. DSA has at times conditioned support over Israel/Palestine.

Cori Bush

Former U.S. Representative, DSA member

  • Defended “defund the police” and called for refunding social services.
  • Argued too many police are “more concerned with protecting white supremacy than serving the communities that pay their salaries.”
  • DSA San Francisco, after October 7, 2023, described Hamas’s attack as “decolonial action.”
  • DSA toolkit language has treated armed struggle as a legitimate form of “liberating colonized land,” and settlers as “military assets.”
  • The Abolition Working Group calls for cutting police budgets annually toward zero and for “freedom for all incarcerated people.”
  • Convention resolutions have pushed endorsed candidates to “openly and proudly identify with DSA and Socialism.”

Other U.S. organizations

Oldest U.S. communist party

Communist Party USA (CPUSA)

cpusa.org

Describes itself as Marxist-Leninist and advocates “Bill of Rights socialism.” Its program calls for replacing capitalism through “struggle, unity, reform, and revolution,” with work in unions and an “anti-monopoly coalition.”

  • Labor, racial justice, environmental activism
  • Local electoral campaigns and progressive alliances

Revolutionary Marxist-Leninist

Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL)

pslweb.org

Explicitly aims to abolish capitalism and the existing state. Runs candidates and is heavily involved in street protest — Palestine solidarity, police abolition, anti-imperialism.

  • “The aim of the PSL is to abolish the corrupt, rotten and anti-people capitalist economy, state and governmental system.”
  • Presidential campaigns including Claudia De la Cruz

Marxist-Leninist (Marcyite)

Workers World Party (WWP)

workers.org

Split from the Socialist Workers Party. Advocates socialist revolution and has a long record of defending historical communist states. Publishes Workers World; active in labor, anti-war, and protest work.

  • “Workers and oppressed peoples of the world unite”

Marxist-Leninist · New Communist Movement roots

Freedom Road Socialist Organization (FRSO)

frso.org

Describes itself as fighting for “Revolution. Socialism. Liberation.” and for building a new communist party in the United States. Labor, community control of police, national-liberation politics.

  • United-front strategy
  • Claims a role in recent protest waves

Revolutionary · international network

Revolutionary Communists of America (RCA)

communistusa.org

States that it is preparing for “the coming American revolution” and the overthrow of capitalism, as part of an international organization.

Anti-revisionist (Hoxhaist)

American Party of Labor (APL)

americanpartyoflabor.com

Marxist-Leninist, anti-revisionist, aligned with international Hoxhaist organizations. Focused on building a vanguard party.

Programmatic ML

Party of Communists USA (PCUSA)

Maintains a detailed program for a transition from capitalism to socialism to communism, with emphasis on unions and cultural institutions.

Beyond the United States

European communist parties

Parties in Greece (KKE), Portugal (PCP), and elsewhere keep Marxist-Leninist platforms, contest elections, and argue for nationalization and, in some cases, exit from NATO/EU structures. Solidarity with Cuba and Venezuela is common.

Latin America

“21st-century socialism” and Bolivarian networks promote heavy state intervention, expropriation, and anti-imperialist rhetoric with a Marxist analysis underneath. Western academic and activist networks often amplify them.

States still ruled by communist parties

China, Vietnam, Laos, Cuba, North Korea — about 1.5 billion people. Markets where useful (China, Vietnam); total political monopoly everywhere in the set.