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Synopsis
The history of the black struggle for civil rights and political and economic equality in America is tied to the strategies, agendas, and styles of black leaders. Marable examines different models of black leadership and the figures who embody them: integration (Booker T. Washington, Harold Washington), nationalist separatism (Louis Farrakhan), and democratic transformation (W.E.B. Du Bois).
Publishers Weekly
Despite the title's promise, this collection of academic essays has a more limited goal, according to Columbia historian Marable (Race, Reform, and Rebellion): to "profile the ideas and leadership" of Booker T. Washington, W.E.B. DuBois, Harold Washington and Louis Farrakhan. Actually, even that schematic seems strained, as Marable includes four essays about DuBois, and only one each about the other three. The essays on DuBois add up to an interesting prcis of his multifaceted influence on black culture, his radical religious faith, his spur to Pan-Africanism and his "critique linking racism, war, and peace." The title also could have indicated Marable's incisive leftist analysis: Booker T. Washington's accommodationist strategy sacrificed black workers, he writes, while Chicago mayor Washington's reliance on personal charisma meant no organization could succeed him. While Farrakhan's "black fundamentalist nationalism" invokes conservative economics and alliances with the likes of Lyndon LaRouche, Marable sees the empowerment of black workerswithin a reformed labor movementas the best source of progressive politics beyond the Democratic Party and civil rights community. (May)