Race, Politics, and Economic Development: Community Perspectives

Offering both black nationalist and Marxist critiques of black social and economic development, this provocative collection of essays by economists, political scientists and activists takes issue with the currently predominant liberal and neoconservative ideologies. Jeremiah Cotton downplays recent gains of the black middle class and argues that race, not class, remains the most significant barrier to upward mobility. He proposes that blacks must resume the civil rights protest tactics of the 1960s and consider forming a new political party. Lloyd Hogan takes solidarity further, calling for black efforts to advance ``the demise of the capitalist mode.'' Others are more pragmatic. Julianne Malveaux documents the omission of black women from most studies of women in the workplace and argues that a focus on the feminization of poverty ignores the complex roots of the problem. Mack Jones critiques the widespread use of the term ``underclass,'' suggesting that emphasis on the behavior of the poor obscures the ``routine operations of basic societal forces.'' Jennings, a political scientist, co-authored From Access to Power. (Nov.)