To Remake Our World: Forging Black – Brown Unity in the Age of Immigrants

[These remarks are adapted from a speech delivered at the Cinco de Mayo Banquet organized by the San Francisco chapter of the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement (LCLAA) on May 5, 2008]

The great Black poet, Langston Hughes – an active participant in the Harlem Renaissance and the Popular Front cultural politics prior to the suppression during the McCarthy Period – wrote a poem titled, “To You”. One stanza goes like this:

I want us to think about these words. What is our dream? How do we want to make our world anew? If we could dream a world…not a utopian world which is unrealistic but an achievable world which is forged from the real world which we live in today…what would it look like?

For me, that achievable world would be one in which a baby’s prospects as an adult would not be limited by his/her class, race or gender or nationality or sexuality at birth. It would be a world in which the ability of an adult or family to satisfy certain basic needs would not be dependent upon class, race, gender, nationality, or sexuality.

One way to describe this world is to call it a truly democratic world where the needs of the majority of people to live decently take priority over the needs of a few to accumulate profit and power. During the 20th Century, there were two great social movements which took powerful strides to achieving this vision. One writer has called the period of the Thirties and Forties, the Age of the CIO because this period gave birth to the Congress of Industrial Organizations that new federation of unions based upon the historic battles of workers in the auto, steel, rubber, meatpacking, and port industries. During this period, these social movements anchored in the struggle of working people and stimulated a radical and egalitarian impulse throughout this country’s politics and culture. As we know, this movement was imperfect because it contained a racial blind spot and the resulting successes of the period reinforced many racial hierarchies.

Moving forward to the late Fifties and Sixties, another writer has called this new period the Age of the Civil Rights Movement, as the upsurge in the Black community led to another democratizing moment. This moment expanded on the gains of the Age of the CIO by challenging policy and cultural limits, first on Blacks and later other racial minorities and women. The Age of the Civil Rights Movement also successfully challenged many elements of the US Empire and created the basis for the support of revolutionary efforts in many parts of the world. Reflecting upon these writers’ thoughts about the Age of the CIO and the Age of the Civil Rights Movement, I wondered what would be the next great social movement that would push us forward toward a more democratic world.

Looking back at the mass mobilizations during the Springs of 2006 and 2007, I realized that we are in the Age of Immigrants and that the energy generated by newcomers from many parts of the Global South, as they struggle for a decent life and dignity, would be the energy that would spark successful challenges to the limitations of US society. However, social movements must always deal with the dead weight of the failures of past movements.

The Modern Civil Rights Movement of the Fifties and Sixties was an incomplete revolution and while explicit legal racial segregation was destroyed, new racial hierarchies emerged. Consequently, the just fight for immigrant rights in this country is occurring at the same time as the equally just fight to end the effects of white supremacy on Blacks in this country is continuing. In the context of today’s corporate globalization and its impact on workplaces, communities, and power, these struggles are seen as competing and lead to complicated relationships between native-born Blacks and immigrant communities. Here in California (and in many other parts of the country), these new dynamics focus upon the ill-named “Black – Brown tensions”. (Without trying to find a better label for these dynamics), I will call this talk:

“To Remake Our World: Forging Black – Brown Unity in the Age of Immigrants”

During the remainder of this talk tonight, I will offer my thoughts on how we can build greater unity between Black and Brown communities in order have a more powerful social movement to transform our world. I will focus on three areas: framing; political analysis; and organizing.

Framing

Since the 2004 elections, the idea of “framing” has occupied greater importance in the mind of progressives as we think about regaining the political offensive. While often the interest in framing or narratives takes on the appearance of a search for the right words or marketing phrases which will magically propel our side to victory, words are important. They convey political meaning and sometimes, the right words can unify. However, sometimes, words can divide and propel us down unproductive paths. I want to suggest three narratives that need to be re-examined if we are to build Black – Brown unity.

First: the immigrant upsurge represents the “new civil rights movement”

Often, immigrant rights advocates proclaim this as a way to convey to the mainstream that their cause is one that all Americans should support. While clearly the treatment of residents of this country is a legal question of civil rights, I think the use of the civil rights movements as a way to make the demands of immigrants more palatable misconstrues the true nature of social movements, misrepresents the key elements of the immigrant rights movement, and tends to push many Blacks away from supporting that movement.

Second: “they are taking our jobs”