RACISM AND THE CLASS STRUGGLE: Further Pages From a Black Notebook Worker's

by James Boggs ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 10, 1970

A number of political currents propel this book, notably a cliched Marxism and a rather grandiose community-control species of black nationalism. Boggs is a Detroit auto worker and the author of The American Revolution: Pages From a Negro Worker's Notebook (1963). Marxism provides many of his categories (opportunism, class collaboration, ""scientific concept,"" etc.) and his objections to black capitalism, race-pride nationalism, and ""spontaneity"" views of revolution. The content of these essays, however, promotes new-leftish, black-power notions like ""internal colony"" or white workers as oppressors of black people. Boggs calls, it is hard to say how seriously, for black majority power in cities and Southern counties. Then what, he doesn't explain, though he seems to favor a parallel white revolutionary movement. The denunciations of white activists' ""slavish allegiance to 'black and white, unite and fight,'"" are dated, of course, but the arguments are still pertinent. When he finally appraises the Panthers, it is in opaquely sectarian terms of ""small mass"" rather than revolutionary vanguard party structure. Though its strategic conceptions are undeveloped and its critical ideas imperfectly assimilated, the book is rich and sporadically insightful enough to dwarf commonplace tracts on racism.

Pub Date: Aug. 10, 1970

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Monthly Review

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 1970

Categories: NONFICTION