Negro Digest - Freedom Archives

liberation struggle against European
colonization . It illustrates the types
of revolt that African people have
waged, spiced with interpretive comments
to probe the meaning of the
revolts . James writes "The African
bruises and breaks himself against
his bars in the interest of freedom
wider than his own" (p . 100) .
Brother James has focused on the
Pan-African revolt to demonstrate
that world revolution of tomorrow
is inextricably connected with the
African struggle today . He is quick
with insight, as a man who works
within a clearly defined ideological
framework, although he chooses not
to clarify the theoretical notions
guiding his analysis. This work is
clearly a primer for historical understanding,
because James limits
himself to analysis by illustration
rather than comprehensive coverage
of all relevant events and actions .
There are several questions that
must be raised in order to focus in
on basic issues . The first question is
about the meaning of Pan-African .
After calling the U.N.LA . "pitiable
rubbish," Brother James says of
Garvey : "He made the American
Negro conscious of his African origin
and created for the first time a feeling
of international solidarity among
Africans and people of African descent"
(p . 82) . But earlier he wrote
of Black people in America : "There
is no question here as in Africa of
alien civilizations . The American
Negro, in language, tradition, and
culture is an American ." Viewed
after the revelation of the 1960's, we
must question this conclusion because
recent research has documented
the viable cultural basis of a
Black reality . African people are the
same people all over this planet .
A second major question has to do
with the study of Pan-African action .
James suggests several important in-
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gredients for this type of analysis.
He clearly sees the need to analyze
particular events within the life of
the colonial nation, but carefully includes
the necessity of examining the
metropolitan country as well as Pan-
African action within other colonial
settings . He correctly places the revolt
of Santo Domingo within the
context of revolt in France, as well as
the internal dynamics of the island,
" . . 1789 is a landmark in the
history of Negro revolt in the West
Indies . The only successful Negro
revolt, the only successful slave revolt
in history, had its roots in the
French Revolution, and without the
French Revolution its success would
have been impossible ." The early experience
of slave revolt in the United
States gives a good example of how
Black struggle has been a part of the
changing forms of western capitalism,
how Black struggle in the Caribbean
islands (e .g ., correspondence
between Denmark Vesey and Haiti),
and how the internal contradictions
of western powers have been exploited
by the slaves' need for
support .
But it is clear that James is working
with categories that have been
generated by revolution in the West .
He is concerned with how closely the
African basis of social organization
for struggle approximates the European
prolatariat, or merely the extension
of a native bourgeoisie . This
question is central to what constitutes
the correct road to revolution,
according to what James calls "fundamental
laws of revolution ." James
appears not to be totally restricted by
ideological doctrine, and suggests
that so long as something is organized
for the people against their oppression,
to that extent it is progressive .
He suggests that whatever Black
organization can articulate concrete
grievances of the people, demands
March 1970 NEGRO DIGEST