Beyond Black and White: Transforming African-American Politics.

When I was asked to write a review of Manning Marable's latest book, had to chuckle. My first full-time job in journalism was with the St. Louis American, a venerable paper that covered the African-American community in St. Louis. It is also one of the 280 newspapers around the country that carry Manning Marable's social and political commentary, "Along the Color Line."

To tell the truth, I hated Marable back then, in the fall of 1992. 1 had to, on occasion, type his entire commentary into the computer, and Marable likes to write long. Real long. No 700-word op-ed knock-off for him. No, Marable had to go into great detail, several pages front and back, about why he'd taken a stance on one subject or another.

"Who's going to do Manning?" Greta, the editorial assistant, would say when she saw the letter in the mail. Poor Greta, it usually fell on her shoulders to have to do Manning.

All I can remember about his columns was that I didn't particularly pay attention. I was too busy cursing him because I had my own stories to write, and I didn't have a lot of time to waste.

I now wish I had paid more attention. Of all the black intellectuals that the media use as "go-to" pundits, Marable is probably one of the least utilized but most valuable. Yes, his work does tend to become ponderous and academic, full of history and facts, but you'd be hard-pressed to fault his analysis or the sincerity of his writing. He argues tirelessly not just for better days for black America, but for Americans in general.

Beyond Black and White is a collection of Marable's essays written between 1991 and 1995. Marable offers critical analysis on several subjects and events, including Clarence Thomas's nomination to the Supreme Court and the Los Angeles riots.

"The main thesis of the book is that `race' as it has been understood within American society is being rapidly redefined, along with the basic structure of the economy, with profound political consequences for all segments and classes," Marable writes in the preface. He writes about the need to make alliances with Latinos, Asian Americans, Native Americans, working people, gays and lesbians - all who are shut out or run down.

But this book is also about the crisis of African-American leadership since the modern civil-rights movement. In the essays of the book's second part, entitled "African-American Leadership: Society, Education, and Political Changes," Marable analyzes three strains within the black intelligentsia: integrationism, nationalism, and what he calls transformationism. The thrust of his argument is to point out the limits of the first two, and the promise of the last.

In the process, he discusses the dilemma of generational expectations. Those expectations have led to the gulf that separates those who came of age during the civil-rights era from their disenchanted children.

"In the 1960s, when young African Americans were asked the question `What do you want?' we frequently replied: `A black face in a high place.'" That sentiment has helped a number of useless black politicians to maintain office. It was also the impetus behind the movement by several African-American leaders, as well as a few civil-rights organizations, to support the nomination of Clarence Thomas. This support for Thomas underscores the problems with racial-identity politics and integrationism.

"In municipal politics, liberal integrationism's `symbolic representation' means that if the number of African American appointed to the police department increases, or if a black professional becomes police commissioner, working-class black neighborhoods will eventually become safer, or police brutality will gradually be reduced," Marable writes. Any brother on the Court would be a help, not a hindrance, to African Americans, at least that was what was being argued by Thomas's supporters, who included William Raspberry, Juan Williams, Stephen Carter, Maya Angelou, and the leadership of the NAACP. Marable argues, rather poignantly, that their endorsement of Thomas was the "central tragedy" of the whole affair, especially for the young.

The vast majority of African Americans under the age of thirty-five, including myself, find themselves either at odds with, or at least ambivalent toward, the established black elite. The status-quo politics of the older generation are based primarily on the fact that while racism still exists, their lives are considerably better than they used to be. They can live in the suburbs, send their kids to private school, and eat at any lunch counter they want.

This status quo finds nothing wrong with accepting the handouts of the Democratic Party and liberal corporate capitalism. They don't seem to mind the paternalistic attitude that says, "You colored people can't run our companies, but we'll support the NAACP and the United Negro College Fund."

But the expectations of today's youth don't jibe with that political groove. However, they are not embracing principled militancy with a socialist bent, either.

Black nationalism and racial identity politics strike a popular chord with the young. It can be heard in the lyrics of Public Enemy, Brand Nubian, and Sister Souljah, and it can be seen in the support for the neo-fascist politics of Louis Farrakhan.

Marable traces the roots of black nationalism, but shows the folly of the "mythical reconstruction" of Afrocentrism especially in today's America, which is increasingly diverse, with a large Latino and Asian-American population. If the black leadership wants to gain back the youth it has unwittingly turned away, it must reach out to other oppressed groups and transcend racial chauvinism, Marable argues.

According to Marable, the leadership must begin to critique the vast structure of power and privilege that characterizes the political economy of post-industrial capitalist America. "By dismantling the narrow politics of racial identity and selective self-interest, by going beyond `black' and `white,' we may construct new values, new institutions, and new visions of an America beyond traditional racial categories and racial oppression," Marable writes.

Marable doesn't offer any great new insight into what we could do to attain his vision of a multiracial and truly democratic movement. But he has articulated the goal well, a goal the black leadership of today has yet to embrace, or in some cases re-embrace.

For those who like to be privy to in-house squabbles, Marable's critique of Adolph Reed's scathing April 11, 1995, Village Voice article, "The Current Crisis of the Black Intellectual," is chock-full of slaps. Reed blasted the crop of public intellectuals as being opportunists with no constituency. "The children of Booker T. Washington," Reed called them, noting that they were disconnected from the black masses and spouting a brand of self-help politics that was particularly ill-suited to the crisis at hand. In other words, they're all Uncle Toms. This could get you into a fight, even cut in some neighborhoods. In the case of black intellectuals, they write long essays about each other.

Reed went too far with "a series of mean-spirited criticisms," Marable writes, quoting with disfavor Reed's dismissal of bell hooks and Michael Eric Dyson as "hustlers, blending bombast, cliches, psychobabble, and lame guilt-tripping in service to the `pay-me' principle." It was not the "Def Comedy Jam," but Reed's piece got real ugly, real fast. Apparently, even the most intellectual of black folk play the dozen. The only thing Reed didn't do was talk about somebody's momma.

Marable's pen cuts deep at Reed. He accuses him of being irresponsible for attacking Henry Louis Gates, Cornel West, bell hooks, and Michael Eric Dyson, and he says the situation is reminiscent of watching black leaders in his youth attack each other out of jealousy "and a desire for influence with the white elite."

Marable's major point is that Reed should be fighting rightwingers instead of members of the black intelligentsia.

"Many of today's black middle-class scholars are not organically connected to the problems and struggles of the African-American community," Marable acknowledges. "However, Reed should also recognize that West, Gates, and company should not be the primary objects of his political scorn and contempt. At a time when we need to construct a new left-of-center paradigm as an alternative to mass conservatism, we need to engage in a thoughtful civil dialogue among ourselves - not a public mugging of black intellectuals who share democratic, progressive values."

Reed may be the angriest brother on the left, but he has a very sensitive radar for political cant. That he spares no one is part of what makes him worth reading. At this moment, we need clarity and courage, above all, not chumminess.

This spat aside, Beyond Black and White is an important contribution to the crucial discussion of the future of black politics - and the future of progressive politics - in America.