Beginning in the 19th and 20th century, during the United States’ reconstruction era that followed the American Civil War, an important debate emerged in this country. It was during the era after slavery was officially abolished — after Union troops arrived in Galveston, Texas on June 19th, 1865 — what we now commemorate as Juneteenth — to spread the word. The debate, that in many ways is still alive and well, went something like this: what is the best way to end class and racial injustice in the United States and what is the role of Black leadership in this?

Two leaders of the Black community during this period , W.E.B. Du Bois and Booker T. Washington, can be seen as the two main voices of this debate representing each side.

Booker T. Washington believed that Black people should concentrate on elevating themselves through hard work and material prosperity. His beliefs were very much rooted in a belief of individualism and working within the capitalist system to build Black wealth.

On the other side, W.E.B. Du Bois rejected Washington’s strategy. Instead, he advocated political action and a civil rights agenda — a much more systemic and collective vision of a path forward.

This debate is still very much alive in this country and has been taken up by many individual thinkers and organizations. The bifurcation can largely be seen as a disagreement on whether or not racial justice is achievable under a capitalist system — whether Black capitalism can lead to the liberation of Black people in the United States.

Du Bois’s legacy was picked up by many more radical thinkers in the mid-20th century, such as the Black Panther Fred Hampton, who argued that: “We don’t think you fight fire with fire best; we think you fight fire with water best. We’re going to fight racism not with racism, but we’re going to fight with solidarity. We say we’re not going to fight capitalism with black capitalism, but we’re going to fight it with socialism.”

Another thinker who carries the legacy of Du Bois and Hampton is Francisco Pérez, Executive Director of the Center for Popular Economics, who has recently written a piece that furthers the arguments against Black capitalism and for a more socialistic, solidaristic, and collectivist approach to Black liberation.

In his piece, Pérez argues that there is a broad conflation within our present-day capitalist society between the success of individual members of certain oppressed and marginalized groups and their collective success and liberation. This is particularly true when it comes to Black people and their liberatory struggles. Too often, the successes of individual people — Oprah, or LeBron James, for example — or their rise to certain leadership positions, take Barack Obama — are seen as collective successes, whereas, when it comes to the material conditions of all Black people, these individual successes don’t have a significant impact.

What are the dangers of this conflation between individual and collective success? Can Black liberation be achieved through individual successes within capitalism — through Black capitalism — as Booker T. Washington suggested? Or can true liberation for Black people in the United States only emerge through a collective struggle against racial capitalism?

Francisco Pérez is the Executive Director of the Center for Popular Economics and author of the recent piece in Nonprofit Quarterly, “How Do We Build Black Wealth? Understanding the Limits of Black Capitalism.”

You can listen to the full Upstream Conversation below to dive deeper into this topic and learn about what building real Black wealth could look like.

This article originally appeared on Shareable.net.

Teaser photo credit: Bust of W. E. B. Du Bois at Clark Atlanta University. 

By Hildabast – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=58794420







ERIC EJ905153: The W. E. B. DuBois and Booker T. Washington Debate: Effects upon African American Roles in Engineering and Engineering Technology

https://archive.org/details/ERIC_EJ905153

The messages of Booker T. Washington and W. E. B. DuBois could not have been more diverse. The philosophical rivalry between Washington and DuBois has deep historical roots. To be on the same side fighting for the same purpose, progress, and uplifting of the Black race, these two Black intellectuals harbored radically divergent views on how to assist African Americans to free themselves from their often subhuman conditions. Both men were aware that technological advancement was of foremost importance to the advancement of African Americans. Washington's (1901) "Up From Slavery" and DuBois' (1903) "The Souls of Black Folks" were immediately hailed as classic commentary due to their efforts to address the then "Negro" problem in America. There were a number of Black Americans who made a valiant effort to mitigate poverty, illiteracy, racial discrimination, high mortality rates, and other desolate conditions that plagued many African Americans, particularly at the turn of the century. However, due to their influential appeal among certain constituencies, both Washington and DuBois garnered ample attention from many segments of the American intelligence, many of which were European in ethnic origin. Thus, acknowledgment from the White power structure (this was particularly true in the case of Washington) provided both men a platform to promote their message. In this article, the authors discuss the effects of the debate upon African American roles in engineering and engineering technology. Both Washington and DuBois were aware that the need for African Americans to become technologically literate was paramount. However, whereas Washington advocated a hands-on external approach, DuBois promoted a paternalistic form of advancement of the Black race. Both men's philosophies are still being argued and applied in the technological arena today.

ERIC ED041974: A Syllabus for the Study of Selective Writings by W. E. B. Dubois.

https://archive.org/details/ERIC_ED041974/page/n23/mode/2up

This syllabus or teacher's guide to the life and works of Dr. W.E.B. Dubois has the following organization. An introductory section provides eulogies and tributes from important black and white leaders focusing on his stature as an educator, editor, sociologist, historian, statesman, social prophet, and race leader. The main body of the syllabus details references to writings of major importance, such as his 21 books, Atlanta Studies, editorials, essays, and creative work, and to major topics, such as peace, class struggle, lynching, education, civil rights, race pride, black power, colonialism, and voluntary separation. Aphorisms and short quotations are also included in this section. The address delivered by the Rev. William H. Melish at the Memorial Service of the late Dr. Dubois in Accra, Ghana, on Sunday, September 29, 1963 completes this section. An appendix carries a chronology of Dr. Dubois' life and accomplishments, and a bibliography grouped as books, magazine articles, pamphlets, chapters in anthologies, the 21 books, unpublished works, and biographies. (RJ)