Photograph by Nathaniel St. Clair

In his book The Return of Black Nationalism and the Death of White Supremacy, Vincent Adejumo defines Black power as self-determination: “What power means for Black people in America is that Blacks would have more autonomy and not be forced to beg other groups for basic needs and survival.” (233) He precedes that definition by insisting that Black power does not mean the subjugation of other ethnic and racial groups, unlike existing white supremacy which depends on that subjugation for its grip on power. His definition is one founded in the history of Black people in the United States, from the Reconstruction to Marcus Garvey and onward to Tulsa, Oklahoma’s “Black Wall Street,”the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense and beyond. The path he suggests based on this history is one that would install economic autonomy leading to self-governance and then liberation.

In the two hundred or so pages preceding the above quote, Adejumo discusses the similarities and differences between pan-Africanism and African internationalism using the writings and statements of WEB DuBois (among others) to explain the former and those of Kwame Nkrumah to explain the latter. He........

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