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<font size=3><br><br>
</font><font size=2>Free the Land Comrades,<br><br>
This paper was written for a School of Unity and Liberation (SOUL) Sunday
School session to be held at the East Side Cultural Arts Center in
Oakland on Sunday, May 25th. <br><br>
I hope it may be of some use theoretically and programmatically.
<br><br>
In Unity and Struggle,<br>
Kali <br>
-------------------------------<br><br>
</font><font size=4><b>Barack Obama and the New
Afrikan</font><font size=1>(1)</font><font size=4> "National
Question". <br>
Are We Free Yet?<br><br>
</font><font size=2>Written by Kali Akuno<br>
Saturday, May 24th, 2008 <br><br>
</b></font><font size=3><i>*In Honor of the 83rd Birthday of Malcolm X
and the clarity he brought to the New Afrikan revolutionary movement
<br><br>
</i>Since the stunning Iowa victory of Senator Barack Obama in January, a
great deal has been said and written about the declining or ongoing
significance of "race" and "racial prejudice" in US
society and the prospect of a person of Afrikan descent being its
President as proof of its substantive social transformation. While this
discussion must be regarded as an advance over the conservative
moralistic and race-coded discussions that have dominated political
debate in the US since the 1980's, we must acknowledge its critical
limitations. <br><br>
In the main, these discussions individualize the issues and only engage
the behavioral and subjective aspects of inequality and oppression. What
is fundamentally missing is a critical discussion of the structural and
systemic nature of oppression and exploitation within the US and how the
Obama campaign "phenomenon" relates to these structures and
dynamics. <br><br>
This paper seeks to investigate the strategic relationship of the Obama
campaign to the structural dynamics of oppression and exploitation within
the US. In particular, it will focus on the question of New Afrikan
or Black national oppression within the US and how the Obama campaign
addresses this oppression. It also seeks to address certain strategic
questions that progressive forces within the national liberation and
multi-national working class movements must struggle with over the course
of the next six months in order to ensure that our demands and interests
are advanced – regardless of whether Obama wins or loses the Presidential
election in November. <br><br>
Some of the strategic questions this paper seeks to address are: <br>
1. What is Obama's organic relationship to the New
Afrikan or Black nation? <br>
2. What class position, alignment and program does
Obama represent? <br>
3. How does Obama's campaign strategy and program
relate to the historic interests and demands of the Black nation?
<br><br>
<b><i>What is the "National Question"?<br><br>
</i></b>In summary, from a dialectical materialist framework, the
"national question" refers to a) the unequal structural
relationship of colonized and oppressed peoples to international capital,
oppressor nations, imperialism, and white supremacy and b) to the
historic struggles of colonized and oppressed peoples to liberate
themselves from these oppressive systems and forces, either in whole or
in part (as not all of these "peoples" or "national
liberation" struggles have sought to remove themselves from
capitalist relations of production). <br><br>
The inequalities between peoples produced by capitalism are historic.
They are rooted in the development of the capitalist world system through
the colonization and/or subjugation of the globe and its non-European
peoples by the ruling classes of the western European states (i.e.
Portugal, Spain, France, England, the Netherlands, Germany, Belgium, and
Italy) beginning in the 15th century. <br><br>
In order to facilitate the process of capital accumulation they initiated
on a world scale, the ruling classes of Europe developed a social system
and ideology that divided world production along several lines, some of
which predated capitalism, some of which developed specifically to suite
capitals historic needs. The pre-capitalist social divisions that were
exploited were religion, ethnicity, nationality and patriarchy. The new
and fundamentally principal divisions developed by and with capitalism
are race and state-bound nationality. <br><br>
The purpose of exploiting and/or developing these inequalities is a) to
facilitate the control of the land, labor, and (material and immaterial)
resources of the subject and oppressed peoples and b) to foster
competition between and amongst these peoples for the material and social
rewards conferred by this exploitative and alienating system. <br><br>
In the United States the "national question" specifically
addresses the structural relationship of colonized, oppressed, and
subject peoples to the European settler-colonial project and the imperial
national-state apparatus that reinforces it. This project is premised on
the genocide and dispossession of indigenous peoples (the First Nations);
the enslavement and colonial subjugation of Afrikan peoples and their
descendents; and the dispossession and colonial subjugation of
Xicanas/os. <br><br>
<b><i>The New Afrikan National Question<br><br>
</i></b>Throughout the history of the US settler-colonial project New
Afrikans have fundamentally been concentrated in the southeastern portion
of the projects possessions. The foundation of this concentration was
historically premised on the utilization of enslaved Afrikan labor to
produce cash-crops like tobacco, cotton, rice, dyes, and sugar, for
international consumption. During the early mercantile stages of
capitalist development the climatic conditions, soil quality, and
strategic location of these possessions facilitated them being
incorporated into the world-capitalist system as a zone of mono-crop
commodity production. This population concentration and the relations of
production exercised in this zone facilitated the formation of the New
Afrikan people as a colonized diasporic Afrikan nation subject to will of
the European settler-colonial project and its capitalist-imperialist
regime between 1619 and 1865. <br><br>
The mechanization of agriculture in the Southeastern portion of the
settler-colonial state in the late 19th and early 20th centuries,
combined with an intense program of labor control and repression during
this period, displaced millions of New Afrikans. In the search for refuge
and jobs, displaced New Afrikans re-concentrated in the urban industrial
centers of the East Coast, Mid-West, and West Coast between the 1910's –
1960's. In the process of this resettlement, millions of New Afrikans
joined the ranks of the industrial working class. However, they did so
fundamentally on an unequal structural basis. Exploiting the subject
status of New Afrikan people, capital, the labor bureaucracy, and the
various European settler communities relegated New Afrikans to the lowest
strata's of the working class, where they were concentrated in the lowest
paid and most hazardous occupations that restricted their ability to earn
and accumulate. This process of development established the social and
economic terms of New Afrikan national oppression throughout the entire
expanse of the US settler-colonial project. <br><br>
Simultaneously, the vast majority of New Afrikans who remained in the New
Afrikan national territory (i.e. the Southeastern portion of the
settler-colonial project) became subject to a new regime of accumulation
and distorted national development. Reacting to the gains made in the
industrial "north" by the multi-national working class movement
between the 1930's – 50's, industrial capital "outsourced"
production to New Afrika to exploit the subjugated status of the New
Afrikan working class. Although the New Afrikan working class was kept
from effectively organizing itself into labor unions, this development
did expand the overall circuit of capital within the New Afrikan nation,
which helped stimulate the rise of the civil rights movement and its
petit bourgeois program of civil inclusion within the legalistic confines
of the settler-colonial project. <br><br>
The limited social and economic gains of the Civil Rights and Black Power
movements set the present terms of national development for the New
Afrikan nation. New Afrika, like all nations and nationalities, is a
class stratified social formation. Like all the peoples and nations
subjugated and colonized by the European colonial powers, capital and
capitalist social relations have articulated New Afrika's social
development. Throughout it's nearly 400 years of development, the
overwhelming majority of New Afrikans have been and are members of the
working classes (either as chattel slaves, peasants, or proletarians).
However, a very limited New Afrikan bourgeoisie has existed since at
least the mid-19th century. Throughout much of New Afrikan history, this
extremely small, typically service based petit-bourgeoisie has tended
politically to be more progressive than reactionary in its political
outlook and program. In the main this bourgeois class has provided
leadership to and support for the primary historical demands of the New
Afrikan national liberation movement. In summary these demands have been
and are:<br>
1. Land for self-determining or autonomous development
and accumulation. <br>
2. Equal treatment before the law of the
settler-colonial state. <br>
3. Equitable distribution of the social surplus
distributed throughout the settler-colonial state. <br>
4. Self-determining political power. <br>
5. Self-reliant and self-sustaining economic
development. <br>
6. Reparations. <br><br>
However, the accumulation gains (meager as they were) of the Civil Rights
and Black Power movements combined with major shifts in the relations of
production on a worldwide scale, transformed the relationship of the New
Afrikan bourgeoisie to the whole of the New Afrikan nation from the
1970's to the present. The two dominant features of this process of
transformation are a) the phenomenal rise of the comprador bourgeoisie in
the 1970's and 80's, and b) the rapid transformation of this comprador
bourgeoisie into a trans-national bourgeoisie from the 1980's to the
present. As will be argued throughout this paper, this
transformation not only changed the overall structural composition of the
New Afrikan bourgeoisie, it has forever altered its political worldview
and program. <br><br>
</font><font size=4><b><u>Part 1 – The Interrogations<br><br>
</u></font><font size=3><i>Interrogating the "National"
Question<br><br>
</i></b>Barack Obama has asserted on several occasions a) that race
doesn't matter and b) that there is only "one" America.
<br><br>
The implication of these statements, even if only stated for strategic
affect, is that the national contradictions within the US
settler-colonial project have been negated and resolved. Even a cursory
glance at the socio-economic inequalities between the various
nationalities in the US reveals that these assertions are blatantly
false. However, the unprecedented success of Obama's campaign and the
ground it has broke as it relates to a "Black" candidate
appealing to white voters on a national level revels that something
qualitative has changed in this country. The question is what is
it?<br><br>
I argue that the source of the qualitative change lies in the changing
composition of class throughout the US settler-colonial project. The
advance of global capital and its transformation of production and
accumulation throughout the capitalist world-system generated this
compositional shift. I posit that the process of transformation popularly
called "globalization" has created a trans-national bourgeoisie
and growing multi-national or "cosmopolitan" trans-national
service and working classes. It is my position that Barack Obama is a
member of and represents the political and economic interests of the
trans-national bourgeoisie and the social interests of the growing
trans-national classes. More specifically, Barack Obama is a product of
the New Afrikan trans-national bourgeoisie, which emerged in the main
from the comprador or neo-colonial sector of the New Afrikan bourgeois
class between the 1970's to the present. <br><br>
The fundamental question regarding this new class composition for
progressive and revolutionary forces within the New Afrikan national
liberation movement is how to strategically relate to Barack Obama and
this trans-national bourgeois class? Is this class (or class fraction) a
friend or a foe of the New Afrikan national liberation movement? I argue
three things: <br>
1. That the material basis for the traditional class
collaboration theory of the united and/or national liberation front
strategy of oppressed peoples and nations in general, and of its historic
application to the New Afrikan national liberation movement in
particular, no longer applies.<br>
2. That the left has not developed a general or
particular theory of how to strategically relate to these new class
forces. <br>
3. As a result, we are presently ill equipped
theoretically and programmatically to address the Obama phenomenon and
seize the historic opportunities it presents to advance the interests of
the national liberation and multi-national working class movements.
<br><br>
How does the trans-national bourgeoisie differ from other bourgeoisie
classes, particularly amongst oppressed nations like the New Afrikan
nation? The general theory of national liberation maintains that there
are two primary fractions of the capitalist or bourgeois class (that is
the class that owns and controls the means of production). These are 1)
the national, progressive, or "anti-imperialist" bourgeoisie
and 2) the comprador or "sell-out", "Uncle Tom", or
neo-colonial bourgeoisie. <br><br>
The national or anti-imperialist bourgeoisie is theoretically a
progressive force drawn from the organic, inner driven life of the
oppressed nation that is materially compelled to promote the development
of the productive forces of the nation for its own self-interests and to
resist the incursion of imperialism and its suppression of this
autonomous national development for these self-same interests. <br><br>
The comprador or sell-out bourgeoisie is theoretically a reactionary
force also drawn from the organic, inner driven life of the oppressed
nation, which is conversely compelled to collaborate with imperialism to
retard the autonomous or self-determining development of the oppressed
nation. <br><br>
The fundamental difference between these two bourgeois fractions and the
transnational fraction is their organic relationship to the oppressed
nation. The national and comprador bourgeoisies are dependent upon
relations of production within the social and political life of the
oppressed nation. Meaning they are both dependent on the working masses
of the oppressed nation for their very existence, and hence can be held
accountable to the working classes within it in various ways. The
trans-national bourgeoisie on the other hand, even though it emerged
primarily from the comprador fraction in New Afrika and elsewhere, is not
dependent for its existence upon the oppressed nation and its relations
of production. The trans-national bourgeoisie, as its name implies, is
not a national or national-state bound entity. Its basis for existence
lies in exploiting the peoples and working classes of the globe, and it
is generally only accountable to or held in check by its fractional
partners and rivals (largely through their financial control of various
capital markets as exhibited by their deflation of various national-state
markets like Mexico in the early-1990's; Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia,
and South Korea in the late 1990's; and Brazil and Argentina at the turn
of this century). <br><br>
Now, while I posit that this understanding of Obama's positioning helps
us to understand his relationship with the New Afrikan nation and its
historic demands, I argue that we still do not completely understand at
this point, how it relates to his mass appeal to white voters in many
instances who are not part of this trans-national formation. This I
argue, we as progressives and revolutionaries, have to interrogate
further to gain a deeper understanding of its strategic potential.
<br><br>
<b><i>Interrogating the Campaign <br><br>
</i></b>Despite what one may personally think of Obama and the principle
merits of his campaign, what we have to acknowledge is that his actions
and his campaign are deeply rooted in a particular analysis of how to
address national oppression in the US. This analysis is rooted in the
"integrationist" and "beloved community" narratives
of the New Afrikan petit bourgeois leadership of the Civil Rights
Movement and its white liberal bourgeois patrons. The strategy behind
this narrative appeal is to highlight the commonalities between the
oppressor and oppressed peoples, rather than address their contradictions
and differences. <br><br>
This strategy is rooted in the reality that the road to victory goes
through the white electorate and its sheer numerical strength. Based on
this reality, I argue there are two historical dynamics that have
fundamentally shaped the Obama campaign and its strategy. <br>
1. No Democratic candidate has won a majority of white
voters since 1964. For a Democratic candidate to win, they are going to
have to win a sizeable portion of, if not the majority of, the white
settler vote. <br>
2. The Jesse Jackson campaigns of 1984 and 1988. These
two campaigns serve as the primary negative examples for the Obama
campaign. They illustrate what NOT to do as an Afrikan candidate running
for President, which has determined key aspects of his strategy,
particularly his methods of appeal to white and Jewish voters in
particular. <br><br>
Based on these realities, the Obama campaign made a deliberate and
strategic choice NOT to base his candidacy in the institutions (like the
Black church, civic organizations, unions, and the media) or historic
demands (see demands) of the New Afrikan nation. In order to give himself
the opportunity to win, Obama must avoid being viewed as a
"Black" candidate buy any and all means. This explains in part,
why he has distanced himself from the likes of Jesse Jackson, Louis
Farrakhan, and Jeremiah Wright – the "traditional"
representatives of the "progressive" New Afrikan bourgeoisie.
<br><br>
However, his campaign has also relied upon the staunch support of the
Democratic Party by New Afrikan people. New Afrikans have been the most
consistent base of support for the Democratic Party since the 1964
election of Lydon B. Johnson. In fact, New Afrikans have voted
consistently for Democratic Presidential candidates in the range of 80 –
90% since 1956. This fact however, should not be surprising. Democratic
candidates can and do take the New Afrikan vote for granted because in
the main, New Afrikans have no other genuine political option to
represent their interests. Knowing this, Obama and his campaign know that
they have to make few special appeals to New Afrikans and most of the
other oppressed peoples within the "traditional" Democratic
Party coalition to garner their votes (certain "Latino"
populations it can be argued might constitute exceptions). <br><br>
<b><i>Interrogating the Popular Forces<br><br>
</i></b>Regardless of how marginalized New Afrikan demands and
institutions are to the Obama campaign, the fact is that since Obama's
Iowa victory in January, New Afrikans have turned out in near record
numbers to support his campaign for the Democratic nomination. How do we
explain this outpouring of support despite his lack of engagement with
New Afrikan demands and institutions? <br><br>
Further, how do we explain his victories in states like Iowa, Kansas,
Oregon, Colorado, Connecticut, Nebraska, Vermont, and Wyoming where the
vast majority of the electorate are white settlers who are not
substantively incorporated into the trans-national nexus of production?
<br><br>
Part of the answer I believe lies in the trans-national class
developments spoken of earlier. The other part of the answer I believe
lies in the popular response to the last 7 years of the Bush
regime. As a direct result of the failed occupations of Iraq and
Afghanistan, the accumulation of unprecedented debt, the partisan
management of the economy, the exposed lies and deceit, and the hostile,
belligerent, and dictatorial "style" of management, this
election is in many ways serving as a popular anti-Bush referendum.
<br><br>
The popular, multi-national, multi-class forces engaging the Obama
campaign are clearly clamoring for a change of management. This was first
evidenced in the elections of 2006 and has been further illustrated in
several off-term Congressional elections in Illinois, Louisiana, and
Mississippi where Democrats took elections in long-held Republican
districts. Barack Obama, for reasons of personal history (including his
newness to Capital Hill), style (particularly his cultivated charisma and
flair for the optimal, however programmatically empty it may be), and
strategy (including a tacit exploitation of cultural stereotypes about
New Afrikan people being good listeners and empathizers) has thus far
demonstrated that he would be a profoundly different manager than either
of his remaining Democrat or Republican rivals. <br><br>
What I think progressives and revolutionaries have to be clear on in
relating to these popular forces is that a clamoring for a change of
management does not equate to a clamoring for a fundamental change of
program. It is on the question of program that I would argue that the
national question strongly reenters the fry and could perhaps fracture
the broad multi-national, multi-class alliance thus far mobilized by the
Obama campaign. <br><br>
For instance, the historic demands of New Afrikan people are not going to
go away without a revolutionary transformation of the US settler-colonial
state. In fact, as the mortgage crisis deepens over the course of the
next 2 to 4 years, some of the demands, like economic development and
reparations perhaps, are only going to become stronger. <br><br>
Likewise, the trans-national capital interests supporting Obama's
campaign have no intentions of stopping their accumulation mission.
Rather, they are trying to expand it through the application of a
friendlier management approach of their primary regulating instruments –
namely the US military, treasury, and Federal Reserve Bank. And further,
many of the white service and working class voters who are supporting
Obama are not demanding an end to imperialism and globalization, but a
return to the high standards of living they are accustomed and feel
entitled to as settlers, i.e. "Americans".<br><br>
<b><i>Interrogating the Moment <br><br>
</i></b>This is an extremely unique moment in human history, one that
should not be slept on by progressives and revolutionaries anywhere, let
alone in the US. <br><br>
There are three general things that make this moment particularly unique:
<br>
1. The rapid collapse of the ecological systems that
support human civilization as a direct consequence of the capitalist
world-systems need for constant growth and expansion and its dependence
on a petro-chemical driven system of mass industrial production to
stimulate and sustain this growth. <br>
2. The declining hegemony (in both its geo-political
and Gramscian connotations) of the US imperial state and the shift to a
multi-polar geo-political world order. <br>
3. The comparative weakening of the US national economy
and the deepening of trans-national production and accumulation.
<br><br>
In order to be properly contextualized, the Obama campaign and
corresponding "phenomenon" must be situated as a direct
response to this unique moment in history. As has been argued earlier,
his campaign is clearly a factional response, one fundamentally serving
the interests of the trans-national bourgeoisie and its means and
instruments of accumulation and rule. The two fundamental questions
stemming from this assessment are, 1) is this class and the alliance of
forces it has amassed strong enough to contain the contradictions it has
unleashed and 2) can it continue its accumulation program and political
project without a major transformation away from petro-chemical dependent
production? <br><br>
I argue that the answer to both questions is emphatically, NO. Returning
to our focus of analyzing the Obama campaign in relation to the New
Afrikan national question, there are several examples that clearly
illustrate why. <br><br>
The trans-national program of accumulation is fundamentally driven by a
finance driven post-Fordist, intelligence dominated system of production.
The intense mechanization of this production regime is rapidly
dislocating millions, if not billions, of workers, worldwide. The New
Afrikan working class was one of the first and most devastated sectors of
the international proletariat hit by this accumulation regime. Since the
1970's, millions of New Afrikans have been economically dislocated and
physically displaced by this transformation, which is only set to worsen
with the crisis of finance (witnessed with the mortgage crisis that
robbed millions of New Afrikans of their merge capital equity) and the
deepening of global production. What is also clear is that the options of
absorbing this surplus labor into the low-wage service economy or
warehousing (i.e. incarcerating) it, is reaching its political and
financial limits. The likely outcomes of the escalating crisis are:<br>
1. More intense economic dislocation<br>
2. More intense physical displacement and forced
relocation (New Orleans being a clear precedent) <br>
3. More intense and concentrated New Afrikan
resistance<br>
4. An escalation of the demands made on the state and
capital by New Afrikans<br><br>
As a representative of the trans-national bourgeoisie, its production
regime, and the US imperial state, how would Obama be compelled to
address these contradictions? I argue that he would fundamentally have to
exercise the Nixon option as it related to the New Afrikan nation (and
other oppressed nations within and beyond US national-state boarders).
Plainly stated the Nixon option is the calculated employment of
"carrot and the stick" stratagems. Obama's carrot would be to
ameliorate or buy off a sectors of the New Afrikan bourgeoisie and
working class by offering a set of concessions, primarily in the realm of
loan forgiveness (for the mortgage crisis) and job training programs
(more than likely for "Green Jobs" and the like). The stick
would be the strategic application of state repression against resistant
and non-compliant forces within the New Afrikan working class. The
purpose of the Nixon option now, as during his Presidency in the late
60's and early 70's, would be to fracture the political unity of the New
Afrikan nation against the trans-national bourgeoisie and its program.
<br><br>
Staying with our analysis, it is also clear that the Green transformation
option is a dead end for the trans-national bourgeoisie and its program.
Although elements of the trans-national bourgeoisie are clearly leading
the charge for the development of "green" capitalism, it is
not, and in fact cannot, advocate for the transformation of scale needed
to curb the production of greenhouse gases to stall or reverse climate
change without bankrupting itself. As a result, it cannot and will not
generate enough "Green Jobs" to reincorporate the millions of
New Afrikans that have been economically dislocated by trans-national
production. <br><br>
Yet in still, what we can posit with confidence at this moment is that
capital is going to go to extreme lengths to extend its life and barbaric
domination over human civilization. Conversely, as the events of the last
7 years have illustrated, we should also expect to see an escalation and
diversification of resistance. <br><br>
</font><font size=4><b><u>Part 2 - Outlining a Framework to Seize the
Moment<br><br>
</u></b></font><font size=3>So, how should the New Afrikan and
multi-national liberation and working class movements strategically
engage this historic campaign and critical moment? <br><br>
One of the first priorities of engagement is theoretical development. One
of the principle things the New Afrikan and multi-national left movements
must figure out is how to engage to the trans-national bourgeoisie. As
stated earlier, as of now, our movements do not have a general, let alone
united, perspective on this question. In fact, I would argue that most of
our forces are still utilizing the traditional united or national
liberation front theory to determine their positions and courses of
action. <br><br>
I argue that because the trans-national bourgeoisie cannot be easily
pressured by the national liberation and working class movements within
the US setter-colonial project, these movements should not invest the
majority of their time and energy engaging an "inside" strategy
of critical engagement with the Obama campaign. I argue that thinking
strategically, these forces should concentrate their energy on building
autonomous political movements and institutions (like the Reconstruction
Party) within the US national-state that seek to build a broad
multi-national united front of oppressed peoples and workers that makes a
principle of building strategic links and alliances with the autonomous
national liberation, international working class, global justice, and
environmental movements throughout the world. As the trans-national
bourgeoisie thinks and acts globally, we must also think and act globally
to advance our own interests. <br><br>
However, as the vast majority of our peoples and forces are going to
support the Obama campaign and potential Presidency, in the short-term we
tactically have to invest a critical degree of time and energy engaging
them, if only to try and win a considerable portion of these forces to a
left perspective and program. And it is here that we need theoretical
clarity. How do we offer a radical critique of Obama, his class position,
interests, and program without alienating ourselves from the popular
masses? How do we move these forces to engage in autonomous
self-determining action outside of the Democratic Party? How do we
educate and move the white settler forces mobilized by Obama to actively
engage an anti-racist, anti-imperialist perspective and program?
<br><br>
To these ends, a hard-pressed counter campaign against Obama I would
argue is not the most effective or productive way to engage these popular
forces from this point forward. Rather, I think the multi-national left
must seek to highlight the contradictions of Obama's campaign and program
through a combined "outside-inside" strategy that seeks to
advance a coherent set of principle demands and push him and the forces
he has mobilized sharply to the left. Again, I think the formation of an
autonomous "outside" political force should be primary.
However, what is perhaps most tactically critical is that both the
"outside" and "inside" forces aggressively promote
and propagate these common demands; vigorously dialogue and debate in a
principled, non-sectarian manner; and openly communicate and collaborate
whenever and wherever possible. <br><br>
Some of the primary strategic demands that must be raised are drawn from
the historic demands of oppressed peoples, particularly New Afrikans,
combined with the demands of the multi-national working class, women's,
and environmental justice movements. The combination of these demands
will expose not only the limits of the trans-national bourgeoisie and its
production regime, but of US imperialism itself and its inability to make
good on its democratic promises, either at "home" or abroad.
Some of the most critical of these demands
include(</font><font size=1>2</font><font size=3>): <br>
1. The full and immediately ending of the occupations
of Iraq and Afghanistan. <br>
2. The full and unqualified support for Palestinian
self-determination and the Right to Return. <br>
3. The full and immediate Right of Return for the more
than 250,000 New Afrikans displaced from their homelands in New Orleans
and the Mississippi Gulf Coast. <br>
4. The repeal of the "war on drugs" and
mandatory minimum sentencing that has resulted in the imprisonment of
more than 2.5 million people, the vast majority of whom are New Afrikans.
<br>
5. The full support for the rights of women and the
LGBTQ communities, including full support for initiatives like the Equal
Rights Amendment and "gay" marriage. <br>
6. The full and immediate repeal of the various Patriot
Acts and other undemocratic anti-terror laws and Executive Orders. <br>
7. The full, complete, and unconditional amnesty for
the millions of migrant and displaced workers in the US. <br>
8. The full and unqualified commitment to reduce the
carbon imprint of the US by 80% or more by 2016 to stem the production of
climate changing greenhouse gases.<br>
9. The commitment to the public financing of
alternative solar, wind, aquatic, and organic energy to sustain the
economy, and the elimination of all nuclear energy and hard metal
extraction. <br>
10. Reparations for Indigenous, New Afrikan, Xicano,
Puerto Rican, Hawaiian and other peoples and nations colonized by the US
(including Guam, Alaskan natives, etc.). <br><br>
</font><font size=4><b><u>By Way of Conclusion<br><br>
</u></b></font><font size=3>Although the road ahead may not be clear, and
the outcome of our actions far from certain, the New Afrikan national
liberation movement, and the movements of all oppressed and exploited
peoples, must seize this critical moment. The survival of humanity
demands that we must act, and act in our own interests. Barack Obama nor
any other bourgeois messiah is going to liberate us. We must liberate
ourselves. <br><br>
</font><font size=4><b><u>Reference Materials and Resources<br><br>
</u></b></font><font size=3>1. "The New
Imperialism: Crisis and Contradictions in North/South Relations", by
Robert Biel. Zed Books, 2000. <br>
2. "Saviors or Sellouts: The Promise and Peril of
Black Conservatism, from Booker T. Washington to Condoleezza Rice",
by Christopher Alan Bracey. Beacon Press, 2008. <br>
3. "We Are Not What We Seem: Black Nationalism and
Class Struggle in the American Century", by Rod Bush. New York
University Press, 1999. <br>
4. "Locked in Place: State-building and late
industrialization in India", by Vivek Chibber. Princeton University
Press, 2003. <br>
5. "Reviving the Developmental State? The Myth of
the 'National Bourgeoisie'", by Vivek Chibber. Printed in Socialist
Register 2005, edited by Leo Panitch and Colin Leys. Published by Monthly
Review Press, 2004. <br>
6. "A Brief History of Neoliberalism", by
David Harvey. Oxford University Press, 2005. <br>
7. "Revolutionaries to Race Leaders: Black Power
and the Making of African American Politics", by Cedric Johnson.
University of Minnesota Press, 2007. <br>
8. "Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice: Foreign
Policy, Race, and the New American Century", by Clarence Lusane.
Praeger Press, 2006. <br>
9. "The Darker Nations: A People's History of the
Third World", by Vijay Prashad. The New York Press, 2007. <br>
10. "A Theory of Global Capitalism: Production,
Class, and State in a Transnational World", by William I. Robinson.
John Hopkins University Press, 2004. <br>
11. "Transnational Conflicts: Central America,
Social Change, and Globalization", by William I. Robinson. Published
by Verso, 2003. <br>
12. "Global Capitalism: the New Leviathan",
by Robert J. S. Ross and Kent, C. Trachte. State University of New York
Press, 1990. <br>
13. "The Transnational Capitalist Class", by
Leslie Sklair. Blackwell Publishers, 2001. <br>
14. "Double Trouble: Black Mayors, Black
Communities, and the Call for a Deep Democracy", by J. Phillip
Thompson, III. Oxford University Press, 2006. <br>
15. "A Nation within a Nation: Amiri Baraka and
Black Power Politics", by Komozi Woodard. University of North
Carolina Press, 1999. <br><br>
</font><font size=4><b><u>Footnotes:<br><br>
</u></b></font><font size=3>1. A New Afrikan is a person of Afrikan
descent, particularly those historically enslaved and colonized in the
Southeastern portion of the North American continent, that presently live
under the colonial subjugation of the United States government. New
Afrikan is the connotation of the national identity of this Afrikan
people that recognizes their political aspirations for self-determination
and independence.<br>
2. See also the demands articulated in the "Draft Manifesto for a
Reconstruction Party" by the National Organizing Committee for a
Reconstruction Party and "Hillary and McCain: the White Block that
must be stopped" by Eric Mann. <br><br>
<b>Send all feedback and commentary to
<a href="mailto:kaliakuno@gmail.com">kaliakuno@gmail.com</a>. <br><br>
<br><br>
<br>
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