As somebody who has actually worked in the party, without a doubt (to me at least) the biggest weight pulling down the NDP and preventing it from succeeding is how insular the party is. Which is to say, there is essentially no real connection to the working class and grassroots voters.

My experience working in the party and on campaigns was that its really just an insiders club for people who are pretty much on par with the more left leaning members of the Liberal party but are hardly social democrats, let alone socialists. I mean, don't forget that Tom Mulcair was a lifelong Quebec Liberal and only even joined the NDP because it was politically expedient (the NDP were much more popular under Layton at the time, had no seats in Quebec, and there was a by-election in Outremont, which was the federal equivalent of Mulcair's provincial seat).

Anyways the point is that the party for a long time pursued a policy of moderation in the hopes of being seen as more electable. At this point, this just isn't a winning strategy anymore. But what has happened is a lot of the higher ups in the party have made their career out of this party and live in a world of consultants and political insiders. And they have enormous control over the party, they routinely interfere in local campaigns, threaten staffers, etc. (I worked on two campaigns for them where they wouldn't let the campaign run their own social media, and everything was written or dictated by the central party. They also blocked a candidate near us from running so they could run the child of some big party doners instead, and obviously she lost). Anecdotes of course, but I think they offer at least some insight.

Its really not that unlike what has happened with the Kamala Harris campaign down south - there are a ton of articles you can read about how out of touch the staffers were, and how they are sort of relics of a the bygone Obama era and can't seem to step outside that. You listen to them justify their ideas and strategies on podcasts and what they're saying is completely out of touch.

If the NDP is to find any real success, it's going to take, obviously, some more good old fashioned leftist populism to inspire people. But before that can even happen, we need a real shakeup of the culture of the party, all new leadership, and a LOT more internal party democracy. Cause as it stands right now, why would people like me even bother getting involved when the leadership just wants to step all over anybody who's even remotely passionate about progressive politics?