David Austin - Moving Against the System: The 1968 Congress of Black Writers and the Making of Global Black Consciousness

The Congress of Black Writers marks one of the most important gatherings of radical intellectuals in the twentieth century... Where else can you find the likes of C. L. R. James, Walter Rodney, Richard B. Moore, James Forman, Stokely Carmichael, Robert Hill and others, talking revolution to an engaged and sometimes combative crowd? I couldnt put the book down.

ROBIN D. G. KELLEY, author of Freedom Dreams: The Black Radical Imagination

Moving Against the System is a carefully constructed montage of the leadership, dynamics, and substance of what became an international Movement. It is a revelatory portrait of the past that is no less revealing of the political dynamics and potential of todays Black Live Matter, #MeToo, and other activist efforts. A must read.

HARRY EDWARDS, Ph.D., Prof. Emeritus, Univ. of California, Berkeley; Consultant: NFL, NBA

Austin provides a wonderful contextual and critical Introduction making the contributions of C. L. R. James, Robert Hill, Walter Rodney, James Forman, Stokely Carmichael and many others not only relevant to but also very much alive for contemporary movement theory and practice. A must read for all those concerned with anti-racist revolutionary social transformation today.

GARY KINSMAN, gay liberation and anti-capitalist activist, co-author of The Canadian War on Queers: National Security as Sexual Regulation

Moving Against the System powerfully reminds us of the depth and breadth of the Black radical tradition and its profound, enduring contributions to anti-imperialist thought and action. But more than this, at a time when such acute insights are badly needed, Austin suggests critical ways to engage with these ideas and histories, to educate and inform todays struggles to change the system.

AZIZ CHOUDRY, Canada Research Chair in Social Movement Learning and Knowledge Production, McGill University

Like Stokely Carmichael and so many others who participated in the 1968 Congress of Black Writers in Montreal, David Austin seeks to transform the paradigm... With this book, Austin further establishes himself as a leading light within that tradition.

STEVEN HIGH, Department of History, Concordia University

It is simply extraordinary to read, 50 years later, this collection from the Congress of Black Writers in Montreal in 1968. Not only has David Austin gathered and expertly introduced the interventions of some of the twentieth centurys most important intellectuals and militants, these texts remind us of a time when the struggles against racism, capitalism, and imperialism converged on a global scale and advanced a project for liberation... a project which remains central and necessary today.

ASAD HAIDER, author of Mistaken Identity: Race and Class in the Age of Trump

This remarkable collection gathers electric essays from a critical site of the making of a global 1968. Masterfully introduced, it includes the work of leading pan-African thinkers and freedom fighters gathered at the most important North American intellectual event of that critical year. The histories and dilemmas that they dissect are ones with which we still very much live.

DAVID ROEDIGER, author of Class, Race, and Marxism

This collection is a treasure chest of Canadian, Caribbean, and African diasporic history. And David Austin is a remarkable archivist, curator, detective and analyst of this decisive moment.

KAREN DUBINSKY, Professor, Global Development Studies and History Queens University

With the ground-breaking publication of key selections from the 1968 Congress of Black Writers and David Austins in-depth explanation of the gatherings context and significance Moving Against the System speaks to us across five decades with great eloquence and power.

MAX ELBAUM, author of Revolution in the Air: Sixties Radicals Turn to Lenin, Mao and Che

Reading Moving Against the System as an activist and organizer is to experience time folding in on itself... much of our struggles today are informed in part by some of the men whose speeches and arguments appear here... the documentation of this incredibly important Congress in an accessible book format is sure to remain relevant and instructive for years to come

SANDRA HUDSON, co-founder of Black Lives MatterToronto

MOVING
AGAINST
THE
SYSTEM

Black Critique

Series editor: Anthony Bogues

We live in a troubled world. The rise of authoritarianism marks the dominant current political order. The end of colonial empires did not inaugurate a more humane world; rather, the old order reasserted itself.

In opposition, throughout the twentieth century and until today, antiracist, radical decolonization struggles attempted to create new forms of thought. Figures from Ida B. Wells to W.E.B. Du Bois and Steve Biko, from Claudia Jones to Walter Rodney and Amlcar Cabral produced work which drew from the historical experiences of Africa and the African diaspora. They drew inspiration from the Haitian revolution, radical black abolitionist thought and practice, and other currents that marked the contours of a black radical intellectual and political tradition.

The Black Critique series operates squarely within this tradition of ideas and political struggles. It includes books which foreground this rich and complex history. At a time when there is a deep desire for change, black radicalism is one of the most underexplored traditions that can drive emancipatory change today. This series highlights these critical ideas from anywhere in the black world, creating a new history of radical thought for our times.

Also available:

Red International and Black Caribbean Communists in New York City,
Mexico and the West Indies, 19191939
Margaret Stevens

A Certain Amount of Madness:
The Life, Politics and Legacies of Thomas Sankara
Edited by Amber Murrey

First published in Canada in 2018 by Between the Lines, Toronto, Canada

www.btlbooks.com

First published in the UK 2018 by Pluto Press

345 Archway Road, London N6 5AA

www.plutobooks.com

Copyright David Austin 2018

The right of the individual contributors to be identified as the authors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN 978 0 7453 3866 8 Hardback

ISBN 978 0 7453 3865 1 Paperback

ISBN 978 1 7868 0378 8 PDF eBook

ISBN 978 1 7868 0380 1 Kindle eBook

ISBN 978 1 7868 0379 5 EPUB eBook

This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the environmental standards of the country of origin.

Typeset by Stanford DTP Services, Northampton, England

Simultaneously printed in the United Kingdom and United States of America

In memory of Franklyn Harvey

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

There are far too many people who are part of this book in one form or another to mention, and I am bound to forget some of you. Please know that I appreciate the many big and small ways that you have been helpful.

I would like to thank Between the Lines Managing Editor, Amanda Crocker, for her support and patience when I proposed the publication of this bookfor this year, at the eleventh hour. I would also like to thank Marg Anne Morrison for her sensitive editing of the entire book; Jennifer Tiberio, BTLs Art Director and Production Manager; and the rest of the team at BTL who carried