Black Power Ideologies An Essay in African-American Political Thought

9781566391450

1566391458

In a systematic survey of the manifestations and meanings of Black Power in America. John T. McCartney analyzes the ideology of the Black Power Movement in the 1960s and places it in the context of both African-American and Western political thought. He demonstrates, through an exploration of historic antecedents, that the Black Power versus black mainstream competition of the sixties was not unique in American history. Tracing the evolution of black social and political movements from the eighteenth century to the present, the author focuses on the ideas and actions of the leaders of each major approach. Starting with the colonization efforts of the Pan-Negro Nationalist Movement in the eighteenth century, McCartney contrasts the work of Bishop Turner with the opposing integrationist views of Frederick Douglass and his followers. The author points out that themes that seemed novel in the 1960s--Black Power, African independence, and black cultural dignity--can be traced to the Pan-Negro Nationalists. McCartney examines the politics of accommodation espoused by Booker T. Washington; W.E.B. Du Bois's opposition to this apolitical stance; the formation of the NAACP, the Urban League, and other integrationist organizations; and Marcus Garvey's reawakening of the separatist ideal in the early twentieth century. Focusing on the intense legal activity of the NAACP from the 1930s to the 1960s, McCartney gives extensive treatment to the moral and political leadership of Martin Luther King, Jr., and his challenge from the Black Power Movement in 1966. The author proposes three terms to describe distinct groups within the contemporary Black Power Movement: Separatist, Counter-Communalist, andPluralist. Examining similarities as well as differences among the factions, McCartney presents the perennial conflict and competition between Black Nationalist sympathizers and their integrationist opponents in the African-American experience.