BLACK POWER!
It was a phrase that
consumed the American imagination in the 1960s and 70s and inspired a
new agenda for black freedom. Dynamic and transformational, the black
power movement embodied more than media stereotypes of gun-toting,
dashiki-wearing black radicals; the movement opened new paths to
equality through political and economic empowerment.
In Harambee City,
Nishani Frazier chronicles the rise and fall of black power within
the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) by exploring the powerful
influence of the Cleveland CORE chapter. Frazier explores the ways
that black Clevelanders began to espouse black power ideals including
black institution building, self-help, and self-defense. These ideals
challenged CORE’s philosophy of interracial brotherhood and
nonviolent direct action, spawning ideological ambiguities in the
Cleveland chapter. Later, as Cleveland CORE members rose to national
prominence in the organization, they advocated an open embrace of
black power and encouraged national CORE to develop a notion of black
community uplift that emphasized economic populism over political
engagement. Not surprisingly, these new empowerment strategies found
acceptance in Cleveland.
By providing an
understanding of the tensions between black power and the mainstream
civil rights movement as they manifested themselves as both local
and national forces, Harambee City sheds new light on how CORE became
one of the most dynamic civil rights organizations in the black power
era.