Every defeat produces a hundred different analyses of what happened and why. When it comes to Labour’s 2019 General Election defeat, most of these analyses have focused on failures of communication or strategy, on Brexit, or on the immense weight of the forces aligned against the Left. All of these are right, to some extent.

But in the essential search for answers to why we lost, we often miss the simple truths. Strategy, external events, and how leaders react to them matter, but in the case of the Labour Party under Jeremy Corbyn, we simply weren’t big enough.

Our movement spanned a party of half a million members, trade unions, Momentum, and a range of Labour left and campaigning organisations. Twice we won the Labour leadership and we made spectacular gains in the 2017 General Election. But the leap from there to a socialist Labour Government—and one that could withstand the pressures of global capital and the political and media establishment—was and is substantial.

While we came up short in the end, much of what we’ve built along the way is here to stay. Both election manifestos are full of fresh and timely ideas for a better society that remain popular with large numbers of the public, and that have even influenced the Conservative government. The last five years have also seen the emergence of many new and dynamic organisations fighting for economic and social justice. Our own organisation, Momentum, is one of these.

Momentum has tens of thousands of members and groups in every corner of the country, active in the Labour Party and in their communities. Together we have won campaigns and helped to elect socialists at every level, and our organisation will continue to impact UK politics for decades and for the better. While it might not feel like it in the current moment, the Left is significantly stronger than it was before 2015. The big question, though, is what next?

At Momentum, we are starting the next chapter of our story with the launch of our new organisational strategy document: Socialist Organising in a New Era. In it, we outline the role Momentum will play in building a movement for socialism capable of delivering a socialist Labour government, and the many ways our members can get involved in our organisation.

Momentum’s strategic focus is threefold: building left power in the Labour Party and electing socialists; campaigning in communities and supporting working class struggle; and popularising socialist ideas and politically educating.

Despite mass dissatisfaction with Keir Starmer, our focus still needs to be on the Labour Party, and winning AGMs and electing socialists remain key priorities. With its roots in the trade unions and with its rich history of socialist struggle, a transformed and democratised Labour Party is our best chance of delivering meaningful change in government. The failures of the current leadership do not change this basic reality.

Our attention is already on 2024 and the battles we will have to win to ensure that Labour goes into that election with socialist candidates and policies. We are under no illusions about the uphill struggle we face and the work required, especially considering the factional aggressiveness of the Labour bureaucracy and the likelihood of stitch-ups to keep popular socialist candidates off shortlists. We are seeing this already.

But we also know that our approach to organising in the Labour Party and as Momentum needs to go beyond simply winning positions in the party and asking for votes when election time comes. While this is essential, it isn’t enough, and in the past it has failed to deliver either a truly socialist Party or government.

Our politics needs to go beyond the transactional. We must organise in a way that builds deep connections with working class communities, as we have seen in CLPs like Walton and others. We have to be there when it matters, campaigning alongside working class communities to challenge the political and economic status quo or simply to survive, from the picket line to the foodbank. Practical solidarity is the glue that holds any socialist movement together.

This means we will support Momentum local groups and members to kickstart or get behind community campaigns to protect public services or resist evictions. It means Momentum members everywhere will be encouraged to link up with trade unions and workplace struggles.

Momentum is proud to have affiliate trade unions such as the CWU, BWAFU, FBU, and TSSA, but we need to deepen our relationship with trade unions at every level. Projects like our soon-to-be-launched Trade Unionists Network will be at the heart of this, and we believe that every Momentum member should be active in a trade union. There is no route to socialist change without a mass, class-conscious, and confident trade union movement.

As we make clear in Socialist Organising in a New Era, we see Momentum as being a key driving force that can popularise a socially-oriented organising model, building power and shifting how the Labour Party works. As we move on from the era of Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership, there is a real opportunity to do things differently. Without a snap election hanging over our heads, we now have space to truly focus on movement building.

By this we don’t just mean increasing Momentum’s size, but more importantly providing opportunities for members to develop their skills as organisers, as well as their strategic and theoretical capabilities. Momentum has excelled in using Big Organising techniques and new technology to mobilise our membership for general elections, but we have not yet been able to focus enough energy on supporting our members to organise effectively all-year round, and to become the next generation of socialist leaders.

So whether organising inside the party or in support of trade union and community struggles, we at Momentum will have our attention firmly focused on leadership development and on skilling-up our members. We’ll achieve this by supporting our local groups to become engines of political education, and through flagship projects such as our Future Councillors Programme and our Leadership Development Programme.

If we are to succeed as an organisation and deliver on our strategic priorities, every Momentum member must become an organiser. We see it as our responsibility as the elected leadership of Momentum to make this a reality, and this will require a shift in our entire organisational model.

Through projects such as Refounding Momentum, we are moving away from a top-down way of working to one where we use our resources to empower local groups and members to organise themselves and others. Our vision is for an organisation in which local Momentum groups take the lead and where they decide on the candidates and issues they campaign for.

This is taking the principles of Big Organising, but combining them with greater democracy and a long-term strategy for movement building and all-year-round campaigning. Ultimately, our goal is to strengthen the movement in preparation for the next major opportunity for socialist advance.

There are no shortcuts to succeeding in the challenges we have set ourselves. But if we do, we might just be big enough after all.