What do you think?
Rate this book
The Myth of Black Capitalism
Earl Ofari, a black activist on the West Coast, delivers a broadside against the notions that capitalism can work for blacks when it hasn't worked for whites, that there is any value in trading white exploiters for black exploiters, that capitalism in any form can play a role in black liberation. Ofari argues that the blacks' legacy of African communalism was subverted by their American experience, so that even before emancipation free blacks were attempting to make it in the capitalist system, deluding themselves that black business success would erase racism and neglecting or even exploiting the poor black masses. He singles out the Free African Society of 1787, Booker T. Washington's National Negro Business League and Colored Merchant's Association, Marcus Garvey's Negro Factories Corporation and Black Star Steamship Line, and black businessmen's 1930 Buy Black drives and Double-Duty Dollar Plan as examples of the ""patterned misleadership of a black elite that persisted in wasting the valuable time, energy, and meager resources of the black masses trying to compete with white America's burgeoning monopoly capitalism."" Whatever one's sympathies with Ofari's historical thesis, the supporting material is so sketchy and selective, the assertions so bald, that it is by no means a satisfying demonstration. Ofari is on firmer ground when he derides current exponents of black capitalism like CORE, ""the newest black organization to combine black capitalist pursuits with a black nationalist verbal orientation."" One chapter deals with the role of black churches in promoting black business and criticizes the Black Muslims for advocating a self-sustaining American black national economy. Ofari discusses and rejects such recent economic concepts as rebate plans, economic cooperatives, and reparations, reviews the experience of African nations that have tied their economic development to Western capitalist interests, and concludes with a plea for a revolutionary class struggle, a black liberation movement based on humanist-socialist internationalism. Much stronger on denunciation than affirmation, this is a provocative polemic.
Unknown Binding
1 person is currently reading
309 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 of 1 review
November 18, 2019
You ever read something that hits you so hard, you find yourself wanting to get up and cheer for liberation and yell "All Power to the People!"? This is one of those books. Holy shit.
"Only when state political power is genuinely in the hands of an aroused and conscious american people, and economic imperialism is ended, will the liberation struggles of Black & Third World peoples be fully successful. For it is an acknowledged fact that the united states now occupies the odious position of being the center of world reaction.
The struggle of the Black masses for liberation will spur other oppressed people to fight for their liberation; it already has. Black capitalism certainly has no place in this struggle."
Earl Ofari was just 25 years old when he wrote this [and it sucks because he has since become a supporter of Hillary Clinton and seemingly adopted moderate liberal politics], and you'd think this was written by someone who had been studying this for five or six decades. Ofari takes on many notable and celebrated Black people in this book, and exposes the contradictions of their economic and social thought; he takes on Marcus Garvey, Booker T. Washington, Elijah Muhammad, Jesse Jackson, Amiri Baraka, W.E.B. DuBois, etc. And questions all of their responses to the economic disparity that has attacked Black people for centuries.
Ofari, using Marxist-Leninist analysis, questions the legitimacy of Black nationalism and its origins of capitalism, a white supremacist system; he questions the Nation of Islam, of early Black capitalists dating back over 100 years ago, and even takes on the questions surrounding the use of Black capitalism in the then-current Black Power movement. Nothing goes without criticism. His conclusion is simple: a socialist revolution, not integration into capitalism, is the struggle that the Black masses should take.
He also elaborates on the history of u.s. colonialism throughout Africa, concentrating especially on Liberia, and its origins as a u.s. neo-colony. He also criticizes African neo-colonial leaders.
An absolutely stunning read. One of the best books I've read in a long time.
"Only when state political power is genuinely in the hands of an aroused and conscious american people, and economic imperialism is ended, will the liberation struggles of Black & Third World peoples be fully successful. For it is an acknowledged fact that the united states now occupies the odious position of being the center of world reaction.
The struggle of the Black masses for liberation will spur other oppressed people to fight for their liberation; it already has. Black capitalism certainly has no place in this struggle."
Earl Ofari was just 25 years old when he wrote this [and it sucks because he has since become a supporter of Hillary Clinton and seemingly adopted moderate liberal politics], and you'd think this was written by someone who had been studying this for five or six decades. Ofari takes on many notable and celebrated Black people in this book, and exposes the contradictions of their economic and social thought; he takes on Marcus Garvey, Booker T. Washington, Elijah Muhammad, Jesse Jackson, Amiri Baraka, W.E.B. DuBois, etc. And questions all of their responses to the economic disparity that has attacked Black people for centuries.
Ofari, using Marxist-Leninist analysis, questions the legitimacy of Black nationalism and its origins of capitalism, a white supremacist system; he questions the Nation of Islam, of early Black capitalists dating back over 100 years ago, and even takes on the questions surrounding the use of Black capitalism in the then-current Black Power movement. Nothing goes without criticism. His conclusion is simple: a socialist revolution, not integration into capitalism, is the struggle that the Black masses should take.
He also elaborates on the history of u.s. colonialism throughout Africa, concentrating especially on Liberia, and its origins as a u.s. neo-colony. He also criticizes African neo-colonial leaders.
An absolutely stunning read. One of the best books I've read in a long time.
Displaying 1 of 1 review