Black Power
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Black Power is a political slogan which describes the aspiration of those ascribing to varying degrees of black nationalism to acquire full ethnic self-determination of black people. In particular, this regards African-Americans. More generally, the term describes a conscious choice for blacks to nurture and promote their own models of value rather than look for other races to validate them. It calls for blacks to identify their historical struggle and work to help themselves. The first person to use the term Black Power in its political context was Robert F. Williams, a writer and publisher of the 1950s and 60s. It is important to note that black power did not strive for integration but rather to improve black areas.
Mukasa Dada, formerly known as Willie Ricks, is a civil rights activist. He won the support of thousands of working-class Africans when he chanted "Black Power" while Martin Luther King campaigned for what he termed an "integrated power". Mukasa coined this phrase later used by Stokley Carmichael.
Internationalist offshoots of Black Power include African Internationalism, pan-Africanism, and black supremacy. Meanwhile, some Black Power activists within the United States, calling themselves "New Africans", believe that U.S. blacks should have their own independent nation-state made up of the Black Belt, since that contiguous region is already majority-black.
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Background
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC).
The movement for Black Power in the U.S. came during the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s. Many SNCC members were becoming critical of the political line articulated by Martin Luther King Jr., among others, which advocated non-violent resistance to racism, and the ultimate goal of desegregation. SNCC members thought that blacks in the U.S. would be dominated by whites as long as they were citizens of a majority white nation. Because of this, SNCC adopted the principle of self-determination (i.e. Black Power, in the case of black people).
SNCC also saw racists had no qualms about the use of violence against blacks in the U.S. who would not "stay in their place," and that "accomodationist" Civil Rights strategies failed to secure sufficient concessions for blacks. As a result, as the Civil Rights Movement wore on, more radical, violent undertones intensified and began to more aggressively challenge white hegemony. Willie Ricks won the support of thousands whenever he spoke to a crowd of working-class African-Americans, when he chanted "Black Power" — but even as that idea was becoming dominant among the masses, who faced the reality of everyday warfare being waged against them and their community, Martin Luther King continued to campaign for what he termed an "integrated power." The idea of integrated power is that once racism has been broken down, everyone will become "colorblind" and blacks will be able to fully assimilate into U.S. society.
Advocates of Black Power — imilate into American culture but became evermore oppressed, this time partially by "their own" people in a new black middle class — generally argue that the assimilation of integsdga;dfgnadration robs Africans of their heritage and dignity. Omali Yeshitela, leader of the Uhuru Movement ([1]), and Chairman of the African People's Socialist Party, argues that Africans have historically fought to protect their lands and cultures and freedoms from European colonialists, and that any integration into the society which has stolen your people and their wealth is more than the Marxist critique of "uniting with imperialism"; it is actually an act of treason.
The Nation of Islam is perhaps the best-known Black Power group. Also known to espouse most philosophies common to Black Power are the New Black Panthers.
Criticisms of Black Power
More moderate critics of "Black Power" often remark that African-Americans are no longer truly "African," since this group is almost completely Western in its cultural orientations---blacks are indeed "as American as apple pie and baseball," that the toil of their ancestors help to lay the foundations of the United States, and they are citizens who are entitled to all rights guaranteed by being a citizen.
More severe criticisms leveled at Black Power have come from anti-nationalists, communists and others who oppose identity politics. These forces, particularly the communist ones, say that Black Power is dangerous to proletarian internationalism.
See also
- Afro
- Black anarchism
- New Black Panthers
- Black Panther Party
- Stokely Carmichael
- Eldridge Cleaver
- Marcus Garvey
- Huey P. Newton
- Bobby Seale
- SNCC
- Hubert Harrison
- Ben Fletcher
Comparisons
- White Power
- White pride and Black pride
- White nationalism and Black nationalism
- White supremacy and Black supremacy
- White separatism and Black separatism
Further reading
- Breitman, George. In Defense of Black Power. International Socialist Review Jan-Feb 1967, from Tamiment Library microfilm archives. Transcribed & marked up by Andrew Pollack for the Encyclopaedia of Trotskyism On-Line. Retrieved May 2, 2005.
- Carmichael, Stokely. Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee Position Paper: The Basis of Black Power. Retrieved May 2, 2005.
- SNCC Project Group. SNCC Issues: Black Power. SNCC 1960-1966: Six years of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. Retrieved May 2, 2005.de:Black Power