Young Democratic Socialists - History

History

Formerly known as the Democratic Socialists of America Youth Section, the organization played a significant role in the 1980s in the movements against apartheid in South Africa and U.S. intervention in Central America. It helped introduce many student activists to trade union struggles, with many of the organization's alums going on to become labor organizers and union staff members. In the late 1990s YDS chapters, most notably the ones at Ithaca College and Arizona State University, became heavily involved in the national movement against the prison-industrial complex. Chapters tried to force colleges to cancel their contracts with food service provider Sodexho Marriott because its parent company, Sodexho Alliance, owned stock in Corrections Corporation of America, a for-profit prison company.