Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee
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The Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee (DSOC) was founded in 1973 by the bulk of those members of the Socialist Party of America who opposed the party's takeover by the followers of Max Shachtman. Founded by Michael Harrington, Irving Howe, and Bogdan Denitch, DSOC styled itself as an explicitly socialist pressure group within the Democratic Party and during the 1970s had a small but significant base of support in the Democratic Party, with members in Congress such as Ron Dellums and the support of leaders of such unions as the United Auto Workers, Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America, and the International Association of Machinists.
DSOC ceased to exist in 1982 when it merged with the New American Movement to form the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), though only after a contentious faction fight. The move was favored by DSOC's left wing, led by Denitch and over time winning over Harrington, which hoped to make DSOC into an umbrella organization of the former veterans of the New Left who were in search of a new home. The right wing, led by Howe, urged instead for outreach to larger forces in the labor movement and the Democratic Party and remained unswervingly anticommunist. Since the merger, DSA has been unable to match the success enjoyed by DSOC before it.
