Why Did Du Bois Oppose Monetary Reparations?

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  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 9

Abstract

Scholar-advocates of US reparations have taken much from Du Bois. Across his long career, Du Bois documented the ravages of racism and traced its history back in time to the global formation of capitalism. These insights have deeply shaped how the crimes reparations seek redress for are understood. And yet, in 1916, Du Bois caustically dismissed a plan for monetary reparations that many consider a forerunner to contemporary advocacy. This opposition has received little scholarly notice, but when it has been noted, it is dismissed as rooted in Du Bois's faulty historical analysis of slavery, his ardent revolutionary politics, and his elitism. In contrast, I argue we can understand the theoretical roots of Du Bois's opposition by closely examining his plan for Black separatism and a cooperative economy. The theoretical bedrock of this plan is Du Bois's focus on the habitual construction of Black and white Americans, the latter of which suggests strategic challenges for monetary reparations and theoretical challenges for the Marxism he would more strictly embrace later in life. By clarifying Du Bois's theorizing in reference to his political activity, I demonstrate a praxis approach to specifying Du Boisian theory.

Author

• Tyler Leeds, University of Delaware