Trinidadian historian Cyril Lionel Robert James (1901–1989) was one of the most influential intellectual advocates of Pan-Africanism as a solution for colonialism and racial discrimination. In 1938 he published a moving, powerful, and meticulously documented history of the Haitian Revolution, The Black Jacobins, to present a history of successful black resistance to white domination that could inspire others. His aim was to demonstrate to his contemporary brethren that they stood atop a proud tradition of resistance as they fought for decolonization in the twentieth century. In 1969 James published A History of Pan-African Revolt, a revised edition of his 1938 History of Negro Revolt, to engage with the black freedom struggles reshaping Africa and the Americas. In the 1969 edition of A History of Pan-African Revolt, James reflected on the significance of black liberation movements and civil rights movements around the world.

Africa

“The dozen years that have unfolded since the winning of independence by the Gold Coast in 1957 are some of the most far-ranging and politically intense that history has known. African state after African state has gained political independence in a tumultuous rush that was not envisaged by even the most sanguine of the early advocates of independence. . . . What is to be noted is that Kenyatta, Nkrumah, Banda, to take the best-known names, were all imprisoned by the British Government and had to be released to head the independent states. The British Government, as did the French and the Belgian, found that despite their soldiers, their guns and planes, they could not rule. The colonial mentality having been broken, the only way to restore some sort of order . . . was to transfer the man in jail to be the head of state. In no other way could the African people once more accommodate themselves to any social structure.

They accepted the African leader and his African colleagues. But that is precisely why in African state after African state, with almost the rapidity with which independence was gained, military dictatorship after military dictatorship has succeeded to power. . . . What are the reasons for this rapid decay and decline of African nationalism? . . .

The states which the African nationalist leaders inherited were not in any sense African. With the disintegration of the political power of the imperialist states in Africa, and the rise of militancy of the African masses, a certain political pattern took shape. Nationalist political leaders built a following, they or their opponents gained support among the African civil servants who had administered the imperialist state, and the newly independent African state was little more than the old imperialist state only now administered and controlled by Black nationalists. That these men, western-educated and western-oriented, had or would have little that was nationalist or African to contribute to the establishment of a truly new and truly African order was seen most clearly by the late Frantz Fanon. . . .”

The United States

“Summer after summer has seen tremendous struggles by the Black masses, led by unknown, obscure, local leaders. Perhaps the most significant was that which followed the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, the world-famous Black leader. The American government placed a cordon of troops around the White House and government buildings and areas in Washington. They then abandoned the city, the capital of the United States, to the embittered and insurgent Blacks, who constitute a majority of the Washington population. The question to be asked: what else could the government have done?

One can only record the question most often and most seriously asked: can any government mobilize the white population, or a great majority of it, in defence of white racism against militant Blacks? The only legitimate answer lies in the continuing militancy or retreat of the Black population. This population is at least 30 million in number, strategically situated in the heart of many of the most important cities in the United States. If the Black population continues to resist racism, the militants and youth actively and the middle classes sympathetic or neutral, then the physical defeat of the Black struggle against racism will involve the destruction of the United States as it has held together since 1776.”

Source: C. L. R. James, A History of Pan-African Revolt (1969; repr. Chicago: Charles H. Kerr, 2005), pp. 127–129, 135–136. Used by permission of PM Press, Inc.

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