Malcolm X’s Unfinished Work
On this day, February 21, in 1965 Malcolm X was assassinated. He was a man who reflected a world encompassing vision. He was concerned not just the plight of Africans/Blacks in the United States and our right to sovereignty and self-determination but also was an ardent critic of colonialism and its denial of these same rights to the global south.
In many ways, his death proved futile as a means of suppressing his vision. The Black Freedom Movement became considerably more radical after his death, as various formations focused on core positions of his, such as territorial sovereignty, cultural reclamation, and revolutionary struggle–all of which were outgrowths of his lifelong commitment to Black nationalism. Further, and largely due to his influence, the vectors of Black consciousness were irrevocably changed, which is evident by the continued interest in his legacy and ideas over the decades since his death.
It should be noted that Malcolm was not an advocate of superficial notions of change, the kind that were fashionable in his day and again in ours. He was an ardent critic of those who would pose tokenism and assimilation as solutions to the global problems that our people face. These are, in his view, simply forms of surrender. He recognized that power was the answer to our problem–power over our collective destiny as an African world.
The struggle that he was engaged in is on-going. His work remains unfinished.
The Times of Trouble, the Salience of Isfet, and the Restoration of Maat: African Spirituality on Crisis and Struggle
Kuumba
“Take what you do best and do it for your people.”
-Dr. John Henrik Clarke
The best of ourselves should always be used to uplift our people. The sixth day of Kwanzaa focuses on the principle of Kuumba (Creativity), which encourages us “To do always as much as we can, in the way we can, in order to leave our community more beautiful and beneficial than we inherited it.” This principle reminds us of the importance of using our talents, skills, and intellect to improve the condition of our community, recognizing, as the Ewe proverb says, that “Your goodness is not for yourself but for others.”
Nia
“When a people lose the knowledge of who they are, that is, their culture, they lose the very foundation upon which their individual existence and their society is based. To combat this loss, each African person must be equipped with a ‘Grand Vision of the Future,’ a vision extending beyond personal interests such that this vision becomes the embodiment of the vital interest and moral centerhod of the entire African World Community. I refer to this vision as The African Principle.”
-Dr. Anderson Thompson
In our ancestral paradigms, the purpose of life was inextricably linked to the collective good. The fifth day of Kwanzaa focuses on the principle of Nia (Purpose), which encourages us “To make our collective vocation the building and developing of our community in order to restore our people to their traditional greatness.” This principle reminds us that in African traditions, the purpose of human existence is to to contribute to the betterment of one’s community. It also encourages us to study the past and to use it as a standard for excellence.
Ujamaa
“The philosophy of black nationalism involves a re-education program in the black community in regards to economics. Our people have to be made to see that any time you take your dollar out of your community and spend it in a community where you don’t live, the community where you live will get poorer and poorer, and the community where you spend your money will get richer and richer.”
-Malcolm X
An economic system provides for the material needs of a community. The fourth day of Kwanzaa focuses on the principle of Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics), which encourages us “To build and maintain our own stores, shops and other businesses and to profit from them together.” This principle compels us to seek to control the economies of our communities and societies. Economic dependency is a basis of enslavement. True sovereignty requires that we provide for our own needs to ensure a prosperous future.
Ujima
Akpata na abọ di mma nkụkọta.
“It is good to join two brooms together when sweeping.”
-Igbo proverb
Cooperation is the lifeblood of community. The third day of Kwanzaa focuses on the principle of Ujima (Collective work and responsibility), which encourages us “To build and maintain our community together and make our brother’s and sister’s problems our problems and to solve them together.” This principle teaches us that our obligations are not limited to ourselves, but that they extend to our community as a whole and our collective well-being.
Kujichagulia
“A revolutionary wants land so he can set up his own nation, an independent nation.”
-Malcolm X
A sovereign people defines its own reality. The second principle of Kwanzaa, Kujichagulia (self-determination), expresses “To define ourselves, name ourselves, create for ourselves and speak for ourselves.” This pinciple necessarily teaches the interrelatedness of self-reliance to self-determination. To determine our own future, we must also be secure within ourselves. This means that we must feed, cloth, house, heal, educate, and defend ourselves. Without these, we are dependent on others and cannot be truly self-determining.
Umoja
Mbooloo mooy doole.
“There is power in a group.”
-Wolof proverb
Unity of purpose is critical for our success as a people. The first principle of Kwanzaa, Umoja (unity), expresses “To strive for and maintain unity in the family, community, nation, and race.” Unity is the basis of any collective success, and enables us to effective practice self-determination, collective work and responsibility, cooperative economics, purpose, creativity, or to have faith in ourselves and our capabilities.
The world, so far away
People like to suggest that there is a separation between US foreign and domestic policy, but this cannot be true, especially in relation to the Black struggle and its interconnections with the struggles of other oppressed peoples. US opposition to the Soviet Union resulted in the suppression of alleged communists, writers, and Black activists including Paul Robeson and W.E.B. Du Bois here.
US support for colonial regimes abroad was intimately connected to the surveillance of leaders such as Malcolm X and Martin Luther King. It is no wonder why the former was targeted for elimination by both the CIA and FBI, and the latter was the subject of a sustained effort to prompt his suicide by the FBI. Further, the violent suppression of Black Power formations such as the Black Panther Party, the Us Organization, the Republic of New Africa and others was linked to a desire—not only to negate Black self-determination, but to also nullify the emergence of a domestic armed struggle analogous to the many that were being waged in both Africa and Asia.
In the 1980s, the murder of leaders like Maurice Bishop, Thomas Sankara, and support for South Africa’s apartheid regime ran parallel to campaigns of destabilization within domestic Black communities, in some cases utilizing similar tactics of repression as in the case of the MOVE bombing in Philadelphia and the toppling of Bishop’s government in Grenada, or South Africa’s arrest and detainment of anti-apartheid leaders and the US’s continued containment of Black political prisoners.
Finally, the continued imposition of neo-colonialism on the people of Haiti (under every president since Clinton), the destabilization of countries in the Americas like Honduras (under Obama) and Bolivia (under Trump), the resource exploitation of Congo, and complicity in proxy wars and mass-killings are all reminders of the depravity of the state, but also actions which have profound consequences for the lives of Africans and other racialized and oppressed groups in the US as the ideological and political aftershocks of these events will result in continued surges in refugees who have been displaced by war, an intensification of resource extraction in vulnerable communities (i.e., oil), the enlargement of the poor due to economic dislocation, continued disinvestment in domestic infrastructure aid institutions in order to support the war industries, the on-going militarization of American policing, the expansion of the surveillance state, the suppression of civil liberties, and the exponential growth of insecurity in the world. Whats more, these things are not simply artifacts of a reality yet to come into being, they are with us at this very moment.
The world is not “out there” in some far flung place. The world is here with us, where our lives will, to greater or lesser degrees parallel what is happening within it. We ignore this to our peril.