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https://doi.org/10.1177/0034644620962811 The Review of Black Political Economy2020, Vol. 47(4) 343 –362 © The Author(s) 2020 Article reuse guidelines: sagepub.com/journals-permissions DOI: 10.1177/0034644620962811 journals.sagepub.com/home/rbp Article Black Women in the United States and Unpaid Collective Work: Theorizing the Community as a Site of Production Nina Banks 1 Abstract This analysis discusses the lived experiences of Black American women as the basis for a new theoretical framework for understanding women’s unpaid work . Feminist economists have called attention to the invisibility of women’s unpai d work within the private household but have not adequately considered the unpaid, non market work that women perform collectively to address urgent community needs t hat arise out of racial and ethnic group disparities. As such, racialized wo men’s unpaid, nonmarket work continues to be subject to invisibility. This analysis re conceptualizes Black women’s community activism as unpaid, nonmarket “work” and illustrates that the community is a primary site of nonmarket production by Black wo men and other racialized women. The community is an important site where raciali zed women perform unpaid, nonmarket collective work to improve the welfare of community members and address community needs not met by the public and private sectors. The analysis elevates the community to a site of production on par with the household, thereby calling for a paradigm shift in feminist economic conceptualizations of unpaid work. This new framework enables us to examine intersectional linkages a cross different sites of production—firms, households, and communities—w here multiple forms of oppression operate in structuring peoples’ lives. Compared with additive models of gender and race, this intersectional approach more fully captu res the magnitude of racialized women’s oppression. Keywords African American women, unpaid work, community work 1Bucknell University, Lewisburg, PA, USA Corresponding Author: Nina Banks, Department of Economics, Bucknell University, One Dent Drive , Lewisburg, PA 17837, USA. Email: [email protected] 962811 RBP XX X 10.1177/0034644620962811The Review of Black Political EconomyBanks research-article 2020 344 The Review of Black Political Economy 47(4) Introduction This article proposes a new framework for understanding women’s unpaid, nonmarket work by discussing the unpaid collective work that Black women perform f or their communities. This analysis aims to provide a foundation for further study that gener – ates a deeper and fuller analysis of women’s unpaid collective work by stimulating additional thought and research on the subject. As such, it develops a framework that takes the lived experiences of Black women in the United States as its starting point. In the United States, Black women and other racialized women have always engaged in collective unpaid work through their social activism against racial i njustice. 1 For racialized women, the struggle against racial injustice often overlaps w ith and is insep- arable from gender and class-based disparities. White women’s identity as women, however, is generally not shaped by racial injustice and so they have developed feminist theories of women’s unpaid work that are more attuned to the lived experiences of White women rather than the unpaid work of racialized women. White women’s experiences with gender oppression within their homes have shaped their political consciousness about gender oppression, and this has led them to develop theories of women’s oppression that emphasize private sphere issues between men and women (Hurtado, 1996). Racialized women’s membership in racially oppressed communities, however, both shapes their identities as women and provides them with a sense of shared responsibility to a community that exists beyond the private household sphere. Black women’s community activism, according to McDonald (1997) is “born from a conscious, collective need to resist racist and sexist oppression, [and] is one passed down for many generations by their Black activist foremothers” (p. 774). Despite Black women’s long activist tradition of performing unpaid work for their communities, Black women’s work has suffered from invisibility because they per – form it outside of markets and because Black women often are overlooked as histori- cal subjects, particularly within the discipline of economics. 2 This article, therefore, seeks to develop a broader economic framework for understanding women’ s unpaid work by placing Black women’s experiences at the center of analysis. There are three objectives in this reformulation of women’s unpaid work. The first objective is to reconceptualize Black women’s community activism as unpaid, nonmarket “work.” I define “work” as those activities that produce and reproduce mater ial life. 3 The second objective is to illustrate that the community is a primary site of nonma rket production by Black women and other racialized women. Accordingly, the third objective is to place the community as a site of unpaid production on equal footing with the house- hold as a site of production, thereby leading to a paradigm shift in feminist economic conceptualizations of unpaid work. Organization of Economic Activity This section provides a schematic of the main ways in which economic act ivities are organized: through the market economy, state economy, household economy, and Banks 345 social economy. It discusses both market and nonmarket production of goods and ser – vices within households and the social economy and draws attention to th e omission of collective unpaid work that racialized women perform. Flowchart 1 displays the various ways in which people organize economic activi- ties in the United States. Economic activities of production and consumption or provi- sioning occur through the market, the state, the household, or the socia l economy (Wright, 2010). 4 Neoclassical economists primarily focus on some combination of the first two ways: the market and the state. In their formulation, producti on/consumption and buying/selling of goods and services takes place within the market e conomy or through state provision of goods and services. Within neoclassical theory, the house- hold consumes goods and services and supplies labor to firms. The neoclassical approach to understanding economic activities through markets and state production needs no additional elaboration because it is the main economic approach taught in most universities. Feminist economists generally focus their analysis on economic activities involv- ing the household, state, and market. Women engage in paid labor through state and market transactions and receive services through state provisioning. When feminist Mark et Economy Stat e Economy Household Econom y: Individuals with Gr oup Iden es Social Econo my: Associa ons with Social Objec ves 1) Solidarit yEconomy 2) Social Solidarity Economy (SSE ) a) Domes c Workers b) Inf ormal Ec onomf N O N – b A R K E T Gende red Unpaid Labor b A R K E T S N O N – b A R K E T Racialized nonmarke t unpaid work Self-Help & Sociopoli c al Gr oup s Gendered Collec ve Unpaid Labor ? Social O rganiz a ons: Cooper a ves, butual Aid, ENon -Pro ts Gender ed & Racializ ed Non-barket Wo rk P erformed Collec velf f or Social Objec ves M A R K E T S Chart 1. Ways to organize economic activity. 346 The Review of Black Political Economy 47(4) economists examine unpaid work, they primarily center their analysis on the house- hold. Compared with the neoclassical approach, feminist theorists have b roadened the understanding of economic activities by arguing that the household is not just a place of consumption but also a site of production that involves unpaid labor (Ferguson & Folbre, 1981). Within the household, there is a gendered division of labor with women and girls often producing particular goods and services such as caregivi ng, cooking, and cleaning for other household members. This production is uncompensated. Accordingly, this production does not involve markets because there are no buying and selling activities. The green arrows in the chart signify nonmarket production of goods and services. Nonetheless, the household sometimes participates in markets as a site o f produc- tion. It does so when household members employ domestic workers to produce goods and services in exchange for a wage. The household also participates in markets as a site of production when household members produce goods and services tha t they sell from home. 5 Some heterodox economists focus on a fourth way of producing goods and ser – vices: through the social economy or similar frameworks of Solidarity or Social Solidarity Economy. 6 The social economy consists of work that people perform for social objectives rather than for profit. Social economy activities ofte n provide for pressing community needs that the private market sector and the state fail to meet (Quarter & Mook, 2010). These voluntary associations have members who collec- tively produce goods and services to provide for human needs (Wright, 2010). Work within the social economy, therefore, pulls people together for social objectives such as generating jobs for community members. Voluntary associations that serve collective community needs can be formal, regis- tered organizations such as cooperatives and nonprofit foundations whose activit ies are channeled through factor and product markets (Monzon & Chaves, 2008 ; Poole & Kumar, 2012). They also can be nonregistered, self-help, and sociopolitical groups that consist of people who organize around common interests (Quarter & Mook, 2010). An example of this would be a group of people who come together based on the need for fresh produce within their community. Indeed, people are likely to undertake social economy efforts during periods of crisis when the private and public sectors each fail to provide sufficiently for human needs (Moulaert & Ailenei, 2005, p. 2041). While some nonregistered, self-help groups participate in market transac tions within the informal economy, others do not engage in market transactions. This latter part of the social economy framework (the red area) of inf ormal self- help groups without market transactions has not received as much analysi s as social economy organizations that involve market transactions—that have paid workers and/ or produce goods/services sold through markets. Registered social economy organiza- tions such as cooperatives and nonprofits have wage, labor hours, and sa les data that agencies and researchers can collect for analysis. The pioneering work of Black schol- ars, including Stewart (1984), Haynes (1993), and Gordon Nembhard ( 2014) in uncov- ering and documenting the cooperative tradition among African Americans, is within this category. Similarly, the foundational research of Hossein (2017) that has named Banks 347 and explored work within the Black social economy consists primarily of organiza- tions whose members engage in market transactions. Informal, self-help, and sociopo- litical groups, however, generally do not have paid workers or market transactions of goods and services. 7 As a result, the unpaid, collective production of goods and ser – vices within self-help and sociopolitical groups is undertheorized withi n the social economy framework. Similarly, feminist household frameworks for understanding unpaid work do not focus sufficient attention on work that women perform collectively that does not involve market transactions. When feminists discuss women’s unpaid volunteer work, the focus is on the ways in which unpaid volunteer work adds to women’s overall work burden as members of households. The household, therefore, is the central or primary unit of analysis. The result is that neither feminist household nor social economy theo- ries devote sufficient attention to the nonmarket unpaid work that racialized women perform through collective action to protest injustice, secure resources , and resist mar – ginalization for their communities. However, Black women and other racialized women in the United States have always performed unpaid sociopolitical collective work. They have done so because their communities have always lacked sufficient access to public and private sector resources and because the public and private sectors have engaged in actions that threaten the safety and welfare of communit y members through environmental hazards and state-sanctioned violence. The social economy and household frameworks do not capture the important col- lective unpaid work that racialized women disproportionately perform to challenge inequities and protect their communities. The Black areas of the chart indicate areas that are undertheorized within both the feminist household and social ec onomy theo- retical approaches: nonmarket, unpaid self-help/sociopolitical work of r acialized women in the social economy approach and the collective, nonmarket work of racial- ized women in the household approach. Taken together, the purple area shows the overall theoretical omission with respect to race, gender, and collective work missing from both approaches. 8 Unpaid Collective Community Work We must focus on women’s collective community work because of the role that the community occupies in the lives of racially marginalized groups through their emo- tional and physical attachments to it. Members of racially oppressed gro ups may reside within shared residential locations or they may live outside of racially segregated areas but still identify as belonging to a racialized community. In explaining the significance of the construct of the community to politics, P. H. Collins (2010, p 15) argues that less powerful peoples’ “group-based ethos” and lived experiences inform their grassroots political actions. P. H. Collins (2010) adds that the “ethos lie in addressing social p rob- lems that affect the group by seeing the group as a community that, because it is harmed collectively, is best helped through collective response” (p. 16). This explains why Black women continue to engage in community work even when they no l onger live within racially segregated neighborhoods. Garber (1995, p. 24), i n discussing the 348 The Review of Black Political Economy 47(4) overlap between place and identity, describes women’s involvement in community action as “communities of purpose” because women’s shared circumstances lead them to engage in local political action. This notion of community does not necessarily imply women’s shared physical location because their sense of community develops out of common lived experiences. Nonetheless, women’s political actions often arise out of their collective concerns over place when it intersects with the belief that their wellbeing is connected to others who share the same race, ethnicity, or class position (Garber, 1995, pp. 34, 40). Indeed, Black women’s activism derives from both place and group identity stemming from their lived experiences with racial, ge nder, and class-based oppression. Placing Black women at the center of analysis of unpaid work reveals tha t, due to racial exclusion and segregation, they have long participated in the soc ial economy for the social objectives of providing community assistance and community re vitaliza- tion. Rodriguez (1998) explains the importance of Black women’s community work by noting, “From the enslavement period to contemporary times, African American women’s resistance has been a necessary aspect of survival not only for the wo men themselves but for the entire Black community” (p. 95). During the 19th and early 20th centuries, Black women’s self-help activities included the creation of cooperative associations, fraternal orders, and benefit associations that provided n eeded services to Black community members. For example, middle-class Black women created t he Atlanta Neighborhood Union in 1908 to collect data on community needs so that they could address problems of urban life that White city officials neglected for its Black residents: health services, day care, housing, recreation, and education (Scott, 1990). This is just one of the hundreds of associations that Black women formed and collec- tively operated throughout the country that provided vital services to community members. 9 Since the early 20th century, Black women have continued to engage in community work and have done so to a greater degree than Black men (Gilkes, 1988) . Indeed, gender affects the ways in which men and women become involved in community politics. Women often engage in community work on behalf of children and, because of this, are more active in community “politics” than men are (Ki m, 2013). Black women have been so consistently engaged in community welfare efforts that Rodriguez (1998) characterizes Black women as having an “unrelenting sense of commitment to social and political change” (p. 95). 10 Despite the importance that Black women have placed on performing unpaid work for their communities, their work is of ten unher – alded. In 1924, W.E.B. DuBois noted that Black women’s community work received little attention even though he viewed it as the most effective work in the nation that provided social uplift for the vulnerable. 11 Black women engage in community work to challenge racial disparities tha t affect the wellbeing of their communities. When Black women organize alongside of each other within groups that address private and public sector actions, they often engage in collective action and work. Collective action involves people coming tog ether to tackle problems of shared interest (Coppock & Desta, 2013). Black wome n place demands on the state to provide needed resources and services for Black communities Banks 349 (Rabrenovic, 1995). Black women also come together as members of groups to pro- vide resources for their communities themselves. A few examples of Black women’s diverse and long tradition of performing unpaid, nonmarket community act ivist work include African American women during the Great Depression who organized the Housewives’ League of Detroit. The Housewives’ League was a campaign to support Black businesses to achieve economic growth and employment by keeping mo ney circulating within Black communities (Jones, 1985). The Housewives League began in Detroit but grew to become a national campaign run entirely by volunt eers in more than 25 cities (Barnes, 2013). Professional African American women formed the Women’s Political Council in 1946 and worked to increase voter registration, l obby public officials into taking action against racial discrimination on segregated b uses, publicize and launch the Montgomery bus boycott of 1955, and sustain it by organiz- ing car pools (Bain, 2017; Norwood, 2020). In 1963, Johnnie Tillmon and other mothers within her housing project formed Aid to Needy Children—Mothers Anonymous (ANC-Mothers Anonymous) in Watts, Los Angeles. The group worked to engage and train welfare moms in civil rights activi sm, in welfare disputes and difficulties, and in challenging evictions and aid removals (White, 1999). Black women engaged in grassroots volunteer community a ctivist work to decrease high Black infant and maternal mortality rates through the B irthing Project, established in 1988 (McDonald, 1997). Black women worked to address pu blic housing living conditions and promote antidiscrimination business practices in Tampa, Florida (Rodriguez, 1998). They worked to prevent the construction of an incinerator in the largest African American community in Los Angeles, California, through the formation of Concerned Citizens of South Central LA in 1985. 12 In recent decades, Black women have been especially prominent as both leaders and activists in the envi ronmental and food justice movements. Cheryl Johnson, referred to as the Mother of the Environmental Justice Movement, started a community activist group called People for C ommunity Recovery in 1979 in Chicago, Illinois, in response to quality of life concerns over dete- riorating housing in her community and later over high cancer rates with in the com- munity due to toxic land contamination and industrial pollution (Holmst röm, 2018). These are but a few examples in Black women’s unbroken tradition of working together to challenge racial injustice through unpaid labor. Nonetheless, despite the work that goes into performing community activi sm, the tendency has been to view Black women’s community activism against racial injus- tice primarily as political rather than as economic. This has resulted in overlooking Black women’s activism as actual “work” that maintains and reproduces material life. Gilkes (2001), however, has notably described Black women’s community activism as “work” by stating that African American women’s community work is a process that re-creates and sustains their communities while providing resistanc e to the domi- nant society. Despite Gilkes and others’ recognition that community activism is unpaid “work,” it has not been theorized as such within an intersectional feminist political economy framework. 13 Yet, Black women’s activism involves actual work in addition to politics: nonmarket, unpaid work that takes place within the community— not within a household nor within a firm. 350 The Review of Black Political Economy 47(4) The unpaid work that goes into collective action/community activism agai nst racial disparities varies depending on the issue around which women organize. This unpaid work may involve collecting information from community members, organizing meet- ings, making phone calls to media and elected officials, writing letters and op-eds, publicizing issues, organizing car pools, organizing petition drives, negotiating with public and corporate officials, cleaning garbage from neighborhoods, organizing com- munity patrols, planting seeds and developing community gardens, transpo rting peo- ple to sites of protest or service, registering community members, runni ng awareness campaigns, constructing buildings, monitoring community health, meeting public officials, and cooking food and serving it to community members. Similar to the argument that feminists have made with respect to unpaid household production, if these community activities were channeled through the market—if other people were paid to do them—they would be counted as “work” and their value included as part of national income accounting (Waring, 1988). These nonmarket community actions involve the production of goods and services that wome n under – take to achieve social objectives. Community members receive collective benefits from the results of the unpaid work of women activists. Although this analysis has centered on the experiences of Black American wom- en’s performance of unpaid, nonmarket work, it is generalizable to other ra cialized women within the United States and in countries outside of the United St ates where women collectively challenge group disparities at the community level. 14 Indigenous women in the United States have been active in challenging environmental contami- nations to their lands and communities for generations. The Women of All Red Nations (WARN) was an activist group of women from more than 30 indigenous nations that raised awareness of and provided resistance to uranium mini ng, forced sterilizations, and child removal practices (https://www.womenofallrednations.org/). Indigenous women have been leaders in efforts to block construction of oil pipelines that violate sovereignty treaties, desecrate reservation lands, and unde rmine the safety of local drinking water (Lyons, 2017). The communities’ beliefs about and spiritual connection to land and water have also motivated women’s collective actions. Indigenous women’s activism to prevent the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline in Standing Rock, North Dakota, is a recent example of w omen’s unpaid, nonmarket work through collective action. Mexican American women have mobilized as a collective force within their com- munities in social justice campaigns dealing with toxic waste, prisons, policing, jobs, educational facilities, and recreation centers. In her case study of wom en in Los Angeles communities, Pardo (1998) notes that although Mexican American women’s grassroots activism plays a central role in mobilizing community resources that affect the quality of life within the community, their efforts are overlooked and become “unrecorded politics” (p. 5). She documents the long history of women’s community activism in Los Angeles and focuses on Mothers of East Los Angeles whose unpaid activist work defeated the construction of a prison and a toxic waste in cinerator within their community. Offshoots of the group raised funds to reinvest in the community while also addressing community problems of lead poisoning, access to jo bs, and Banks 351 water conservation. As with Black and Native women, Mexican American women col- lectively perform unpaid work with the goal of improving the welfare of community members. Similarly, as Pardo notes about Mexican American women’s community work, Black and Native women’s unpaid community work is also “unrecorded.” Although racialized communities are aware that women perform community w ork, there are little data on the unpaid work that women collectively perform. This analysis argues for the necessity of both seeing and documenting women’s unpaid collective community work. Outside of the United States, racialized and other marginalized women organize col- lectively at the community level to challenge group disparities and prov ide for unmet community needs. In response to inadequate financial services provided b y state and private banks, Hossein (2013) states that poor women in low-income Car ibbean coun- tries provide services to community members through informal banking sys tems that draw on traditional African lending practices of pooling resources. In so doing, these women prioritize social relations among people over impersonal market re lations in decisions over credit worthiness (Hossein, 2013, p. 424). Hossein’s research discusses the ways in which poor women in Jamaica, Guyana, and Haiti have responde d to the financial needs of Black community members who lack access to credit thr ough the formal, commercial, and state lending apparatus. These women create rotating credit and savings associations (ROCSAs) that enable women to contribute to a common account, and when their turn arrives, they are able to receive pooled mo ney from it. Although some ROCSAs charge small lending fees, those that do not are engaging in collective forms of self-help that are unpaid and nonmarket. Hossein (2 018) aptly describes their activities as not only providing financial coping tools for community members but also engaging in a “form of politics of resistance” ( p. 81). Throughout the world, women engage in a politics of resistance through i nformal self-help and activist groups by working collectively without pay for th e benefit of their communities. These collective work activities include indigenous Kenyan women in the Rendille community who formed groups and engaged in activities to protect their land against outside investors and to educate members on land conservati on and wom- en’s rights (UN Women, 2018, https://www.unwomen.org/en/news/stories/2018/4/ from-where-i-stand-alice-lesepen). It occurs in India when Dalit women organize at the grassroots level to protest their marginalization and form groups to develop ways to empower women (Govinda, 2006). It occurs in Brazil when Munduruku wome n activ- ists organize campaigns against the infringement of the Tapajós River basin by loggers, dam builders, and miners (Watts, 2019). To reiterate, the collective informal and activist activities that women engage in around the world constitute unpaid work not channeled through markets. Nonetheless, the four main models of economic activitie s do not theo- rize these women’s community-based efforts as work activities. The Community as a Site of Production This section illustrates the importance of incorporating racialized wome n’s unpaid, nonmarket work into an analysis of economic activities. It draws on seve ral different 352 The Review of Black Political Economy 47(4) theories of oppression that focus on the reproduction and maintenance of inequalities. It problematizes the emphasis feminists place on the household in women’ s perfor – mance of unpaid labor and argues for the elevation of the community as a nonmarket site of production. Chart 2 provides a new framework for illustrating th e ways in which sites of oppression interact. The chart incorporates elements from Marxian the- ory, heterodox economics, feminist economics, and intersectional feminism. The framework shows the ways in which Black women experience multiple, simul taneous forms of oppression—exploitation, dominance, and exclusion—based o n gender, race, and class processes at different sites of production. 15 Sites of Production According to Wolff and Resnick (1987), in Marxian theory, a “site” refers to a place in society where various processes and social relationships occur. These processes and relations are subject to change because they are “overdetermined” by being constituted by many elements, some of which are contradictory. Although there are no fixed dis- tinctions among sites and some of the same processes may occur within di fferent sites, a site can generally be defined as a “loci” of specific subsets of social processes and relations (Wolff & Resnick, 1987, p. 219). The firm, for example, involves relations between business owners and workers and is a site where goods and servic es are pro- duced and sold through markets. 16 The firm, therefore, is a primary site of production. It is a location where employers exploit workers by not compensating them for their full output. Stated differently, business owners appropriate the surplus labor that work- ers produce and this constitutes exploitation. Feminist economists have argued that, similar to the firm, the household is a site of production. Unlike the firm, household production of goods and services is for use within households rather than for sale through markets. Feminists examin e the amount of unpaid labor women and men perform within and around households as we ll as the gendered division of labor between household couples. 17 Socialist feminists draw par – allels with Marxian analysis by examining the ways in which men, as a class, exploit women by appropriating the fruits of their surplus production within hou seholds (Hartmann, 1981). In addition, feminist theorists recognize the ways in which unpaid labor within the private household reinforces and reflects women’s subordination out- side of it. When feminist economists examine linkages between unpaid household work and work performed elsewhere, they usually focus on paid work within firms or women’s work within the informal economy. To the extent that the community enters into feminist economic analysis o f wom- en’s unpaid labor, it does so primarily through an individual householder’s volunteer efforts to a community organization. The volunteer work is often considered in terms of how it adds to women’s overall work burden as members of households (Hook, 2004). Therefore, for many feminists, the household is the primary site of prod uction where women experience exploitation through unpaid work that benefits me n. This, however, is theorizing from the perspective of White women’s lived experiences. Banks 353 As discussed in the previous section, for racialized women, the communit y is also a primary site of production with unpaid labor. Membership in racially oppressed communities informs racialized women’s gender identities and experiences. Although the wellbeing of household members may motivate racialized women’s actions, their emotional ties to their communities also prompt collective community work. African American activist Tamika Mallory expressed this sentiment when she said, “Women are the protectors. We carry the weight of the entire community on our backs” (Whack, 2017). As such, a more accurate framework for understanding women’s work is one that incorporates their economic activities—both paid and unpaid—w ithin multiple sites of production: the firm, household, and the community. Sites of Oppression In heterodox economics, sites of oppression refer to locations that repr oduce oppres- sive social relations and inequitable group outcomes. In Albelda et al.’s (2001) formu- lation, the firm, household, and community are locations/sites where oppressive social relations and outcomes between three counterpart groups occur and reprod uce over time. The counterpart groups are (a) business owners versus workers (b) me n versus women, and (c) Whites versus Blacks. Class, gender, and racial processes facilitate these oppressive social relations and disparate outcomes between counter part groups. Class relations and processes involve the production, appropriation, and distribution of goods and services (or surplus labor within Marxian economics). Gender refers to socially defined differences attributed to males and females. Race refers to presumed biological and behavioral differences between groups of people. As with gender, race is a cultural process involving ideology that uses socially defined gene tic and physical differences to create population groupings. Racial categories have particular meanings attached to them that are always subject to change. Although gender and race are social constructs without a biological basis, they serve the interests o f dominant coun- terpart groups by rationalizing, sanctioning, and enabling disparate tre atment and the development of hierarchies based on ascriptive characteristics. Therefore, gender and racial beliefs, along with class processes, affect material outcomes that persist across generations. Furthermore, social relations between these counterpart groups may invol ve three forms of oppression: dominance, exploitation, or exclusion. Albelda et al. (2001, pp. 114–116) define dominance as relations of coercion and submission, exploitat ion as control over another group’s work for material or monetary gain, and exclusion as physical or social isolation of another group to limit their roles and opportunities. In their analysis, the firm is the primary site of oppression where busines s owners exploit workers and the household is a primary site of oppression where men have dominance over women. The community is the primary site of oppression where Whites carry out racial oppression through a process of geographic segregation (p. 113). Communities, therefore, represent sites where dominant groups use exclusion and viole nce to main- tain and reproduce racial and ethnic disparities (P. H. Collins, 2010). 354 The Review of Black Political Economy 47(4) A New Framework: Firm, Household, and Community as Sites of Production In Chart 2, we can see the interaction of three different sites of production where goods/services are produced. Unlike the Marxian and Feminist approaches, which emphasize production within the firm and/or household, this approach ele vates the community to a primary site of nonmarket production of goods and service s based on racialized women’s unpaid labor. This framework is inclusive of racialized women’s experiences because the community is especially operative in reproducing oppressive social relations and outcomes. Moreover, the elevation of the community to a site of production on par with tha t of the firm and the household enables us to take an intersectional feminist look at women’s production of goods and services, both paid and unpaid. This framework allows us to examine women’s production of goods and services at the individual level within households and at the collective level within communities. The interaction of gender, race, and class processes within each of these three locations—as ind icated by the thin blue arrows—reinforces and magnifies Black women and other racialized women’s oppression. Gender, race, and class processes occur within each site/location (firm, household, and community) that reproduces oppressive relations and outc omes. The arrows coming from gender, race, and class processes indicate simultaneous influences because gender, race, and class are overlapping categories. Furthermore, the arrows show influences in both directions such that the interactive effects of gender, race, and class processes within each of these locations affect gender, race, and class meanings In Loca on that R eproduces Oppr essive Social Rela ons/Outcomes Sites of P roduc on Clas s Firm Gende r Household Household as a Site of Non- Market Production with exploitive social relation s Race/Ethnicit y Community Firm as a Site of Production with exploitive market relations Community as a Site of Non- Market/Unpai dProduction with Collective Benefits Chart 2. Heterodox economics sites of oppression. Banks 355 outside of these sites. This framework is useful in thinking through ways in which racialized women experience multiple, interactive forms of oppression— exploitation, domination, and exclusion differently, depending on the site and on the racial-ethnic group in question. Social relations embedded within each of these locati ons affect rela- tive group positions and outcomes. We can illustrate the interactive effects of gender, race, and class processes along with different forms of oppression within each site. Within the firm, Black women experience exploitation (a class process) as workers by their employer s. Exploitation occurs when business owners are able to appropriate and distribute the s urplus labor that Black women workers produce. Employers also exercise dominance within the workplace by having control over the labor process. The gender wage gap and racial wage gap that Black women experience compared with comparable White workers (White men and White women, respectively) indicate that employers’ control over the labor process enables them to extract more surplus from Black women, on average. Employers’ exclusion of Black women from higher paid, higher status jobs benefits their racial and gender counterpart groups by enabling White women and White men to have favorable access to jobs and pay. The interaction of these processes makes Black women especially vulnerable to workplace dominance and exploitatio n. Gender, race, and class processes also affect social relations and outcomes within households. Some processes may lead to contradictory effects. Black women, like other women who perform unpaid household work that others appropriate, e xperience exploitation within their households. However, compared with other women in the United States, Black women on average perform less unpaid core household work (cooking and cleaning), whereas Black men on average perform similar amounts as other men (Sayer & Fine, 2011). This difference indicates that Black women are less likely to define their gender around performance of household work compa red with other women (Sayer & Fine, 2011). In addition, we can see an interactive effect from the site of the firm due to Black women and men’s low wages. Black women have a higher gender earnings ratio with Black men compared with White women and White men. As a result, it may enable Black women to have more bargaining/decision-mak- ing power and experience less dominance from men within their households . Black women’s exclusion from steady and well-paid jobs, however, undermines the wellbe- ing of Black household members by increasing their precarity. Unlike most White women in the United States, Black women have always had to work outside of their households for pay. White racial views of Black women as workers rather than as mothers with caregiving needs at home have reinforced this pattern. 18 Historically, Black women’s exclusion from jobs within firms meant that they have disproportionately worked as low-wage domestic workers in White households. Within this context, White households become sites of production with market rela- tions and White householders become employers who exploit Black women by appro- priating and distributing the surplus labor that they produce. Social relations between Blacks and Whites based on White racial dominance help to perpetuate the expectation of servile work attitudes and social distance between Black domestic workers and White bosses. Black women’s performance of gendered work involving child care and cleaning benefits White women because it enables them to have time to pursue paid 356 The Review of Black Political Economy 47(4) work and other activities. 19 This means that White women—like White men—are able to participate in market relations within firms because Black women perform house- hold care responsibilities. Accordingly, White women have a material interest in main- taining White patriarchy as a system of control over racialized women’s labor power. White women have a material interest in maintaining racialized women’ s exclusion from better-paid jobs within firms. At the community site, Blacks live in racially isolated and segregated areas due to racial residential and financial exclusions. Black communities experience dominance by both the private and public sectors through their adverse actions and their control over decisions that affect the wellbeing of community members. This includes, for example, the ways in which Black segregated communities struggle with the unequal distribution of environmental burdens and unequal access to vital resources and servi ces. These racial disparities prompt Black women to perform collective unpaid work to improve social welfare. Their unpaid collective production leads to collective community appro- priation and benefits that may include collective goods such as clean ai r and water, safer neighborhoods, and racial justice. As such, their collective production and collective appropriation (a class process) does not result in exploitation by com munity members. 20 Nonetheless, due to gender norms, Black women disproportionately carry t he burdens of collective work. They are also increasingly bearing the cost of social reproduction, give n the reduced spending by the state on social welfare resources needed by the community and given the low wages paid by employers to Black workers. In both case s, the state and the firm have externalized the costs of social reproduction onto Black w omen. This rep- resents higher profits for firms and increased savings by the state. Fin ally, the state exer – cises dominance and control over Black women activists and community mem bers through policing. The criminalization of Black women results in felony convictions that provide high profits to firms that use extremely low-wage, coerced priso n labor. 21 This framework is a starting point for developing a more accurate accoun t of eco- nomic activities that include the unpaid work that racialized women perf orm for their communities. 22 It bridges the analytical gaps within economic theories with respect to nonmarket, unpaid work women perform collectively. This framework enables us to examine intersectional linkages across different sites of production where multiple, intersecting forms of oppression operate in structuring peoples’ lives through overlap- ping race, gender, and class processes. This approach is preferable to simple additive models of gender and race that do not fully capture the magnitude of rac ialized women’s oppression. Elevating the community to a site of production on par with the firm and household allows us to examine the microeconomic and macroeconomic impacts of eco- nomic changes on women’s work. During periods of severe economic crisis or natural disasters or public health crises, women’s unpaid community work increases in response to loss of jobs and services; this framework captures systemic effects on communities. Conclusion Understanding women’s work experiences requires a paradigm shift in our conceptu- alization of women’s unpaid work that moves us beyond a narrow focus on relations Banks 357 between men and women within private households to one that expands our focus to include the unpaid work of women whose collective activism challenges ra cial, ethnic, national, caste, and class-based injustices. Women’s unpaid community work is often linked to factors that affect their paid and unpaid work within firms and households. As Neysmith et al. (2012) state, “The contradictions in women’s lives remain hidden when theory, research, and policy reinforce the separation of the worlds of employ- ment, community, and domestic labour from one another” (p. 3). We can analyze con- tradictions and complementary processes of gender, race, class, caste, and citizenship status only when we have a theoretical framework that encompasses the in teractive effects of these sites of production, particularly within the context of s tate policies. Although this analysis has focused on Black American women’s unpaid collective work, it is applicable to racialized and marginalized women who live in oppressed communities throughout the world. Feminists have articulated the need to make visible, to quantify, and to assign value to the nonmarket work that women perform within the household. This logic must extend to the site of the community where racialized and marginalized women often perform unpaid, nonmarket work because their communities lack sufficient access to public and private sector resources and because of actions taken by the public and private sectors that threaten the wellbeing and safety of community memb ers. This represents an unjust work burden not just of gender but also of race-eth nicity and social class/caste. Making women’s collective nonmarket work visible enables us to theorize women’s oppression and exploitation in a manner that is inclusive of the lives of racialized women. It allows us to more fully and carefully theorize s ocial relations within and across the different sites of production or sectors of the economy and to have a better sense of the amount and type of work that people actually perform. Finally, this framework calls for the need to think through the impact of macro eco- nomic policies not only in terms of their gender effects but also on their racial-ethnic effects. Declaration of Conflicting Interests The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. Funding The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorsh ip, and/or publication of this article. ORCID iD Nina Banks https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2982-5770 Notes 1. This article does not explore other forms of unpaid labor, such as individual volunteer work, that Black women perform for their communities that have social ob jectives because 358 The Review of Black Political Economy 47(4) the focus here is on production that Black women perform collectively. Nonetheless, Black women and other racialized women’s unpaid volunteer work is an understudied subject relative to the volunteer work of White women in the United States. 2. The discipline of economics lags behind other disciplines with respect t o understand- ing African American and other racialized women’s work, both paid and unpaid. There is greater discussion of racialized women’s community activism and work within the disciplines of political science and urban/community sociology and femin ist geography. See, for example, Nadia Kim, “Citizenship on the Margins: A Critique of Scholarship on Marginalized Women and Community Activism,” Sociology Compass 7/6 (2013): 459–470. 3. This definition of work is an adaptation from Marilyn Power’s (2004) concept of social provisioning. 4. This formulation of ways of organizing economic activities is indebted to the arrangement developed by Erik Olin Wright (2010). 5. Households also engage in reproductive labor. This includes the production and socializa- tion of people who participate in market relations as sellers of labor p ower to firms. When this occurs, the firm is the site of production and buyer of labor power . 6. The concept of the social economy has been used since the 19th century i n France, but it became widely used in Europe and other regions during the 20th century ( Zhao, 2013). The practice of collectively providing for community to achieve social objec tives, however, is quite old and existed in ancient African civilizations (Hossein, 2016). In the United States, there has been less focus on the social economy and more attention devot ed to the “soli- darity economy.” Social economy and solidarity economy formulations share a number of similar characteristics, including social enterprises with social justic e values of coopera- tion and democratic participation. The solidarity economy framework is more international in scope than the social economy framework, and it is theorized in the c ontext of global economic restructuring and neoliberalism (Allard & Matthaei, 2010). Ka wano (2013) says that the term “Social Solidarity Economy (SSE)” has begun to be used in North America as a new framework for theorizing and putting into practice an economic sys tem that provides an alternative to capitalism and other authoritarian systems by prioritizing the welfare of people and the planet over profits. Social economy organizations, however, often are situ- ated between the private and public sectors of capitalist economies and may even serve as complements to capitalist production through the services provided. 7. It is important to note that community-based nonprofit organizations that have market interactions often develop out of women’s informal, unpaid collective efforts to challenge injustices and disparities within their communities. For example, S. B. Collins et al. (2011) state that the six nonprofit Canadian community organizations in their study emerged out of women’s struggles for social justice and that the organizations enable women to col- lectively work on issues of food security, housing, racism, employment, and child care. We can think of these nonprofit community organizations that often have paid and unpaid staff members as illustrating what happens when informal collective action groups move into the sphere of long-term community-based advocacy and support. 8. The objective of this article is to foreground the unpaid and nonmarket work that racialized women perform together through informal groups in response to community disparities and injustices and to elevate women’s unpaid community work to be on par with that of the household. Other frameworks that focus on the community as unit of a nalysis do so by examining formal organizations that often participate in market relations as nonprofits. For example, the community economy approach developed by Graham and Cornwell (2009) is in line with traditional social economy studies of organizations rather than of unpaid Banks 359 labor. Graham and Cornwell focus on community organizations that provide services to low-income communities in western Massachusetts. Similarly, Gibson-Graham’s (2008) “Diverse Economies” explores different economic activities according to several binaries for organizing transactions, labor, and enterprises, respectively: market/nonmarket, wage/ unpaid, and capitalist/noncapitalist. Although they view neighborhood work as a form of unpaid labor, they do not have a nonmarket example that encompasses the ways in whic h Black women in the United States transact their economic activities. Nor is it necessarily the case that neighborhood work takes place collectively. Gibson-Graham’s (2006) formu- lation of community economies is broad based and incorporates a variety of actions, deci- sions, movements, and organizations that have the goal of community development and care. Their community economies are similar to solidarity economies in that each seeks to create a more participatory, democratic, and equitable economic arrangement that differs from capitalist economies. It may include, of course, women’s community activism that challenges inequities. As such, those elements of their approach would be consistent with the framework developed here. 9. For discussion of African American thought regarding the social economy and the extent to which they formed cooperative associations, see Bhattacharya (2017) . 10. Noted 20th century Black women activists who led social justice community campaigns include Ida B. Wells Barnett, Mary Church Terrell, Mary McLeod Bethune, Fannie Lou Hamer, Septima Clark, Dorothy Height, Ella Baker, Daisy Bates, Elaine Brown, Angela Davis, Jo Ann Robinson, Rosa Parks, Diane Nash, Assata Shakur, Kathleen Cleaver, Barbara Smith, Florynce Kennedy, and Audre Lorde. 11. “The women of America who are doing humble but on the whole the most effective work in the social uplift of the lowly, not so much by money as by personal contact, are the col- ored women. Little is said or known about it but in thousands of churche s and social clubs, in missionary societies and fraternal organizations, in unions like the National Association of Colored Women, these workers are founding and sustaining orphanages and old folk homes; distributing personal charity and relief; visiting prisoners; hel ping hospitals; teach- ing children; and ministering to all sorts of needs” (DuBois, 1924) . 12. As with many community work endeavors, Concerned Citizens of South Central LA went on to become an incorporated nonprofit organization. 13. The terms “community work” and “unpaid community work” are n ot new. Scholars of community-based research such as S. B. Collins et al. (2011) use the term “women’s com- munity work” to describe the activities of women’s organizations in Canada that provide collective provisions. The objective of this article is the development of a theoretical framework for understanding women’s unpaid/nonmarket collective community activist work and the elevation of this unpaid collective community work to the l evel of unpaid work performed within households. 14. Marginalized women engage in activist collective action work globally when they chal- lenge and mobilize around environmental harms, rising food prices, immig rant abuses, neoliberal practices, sexual and/or racial-ethnic violence, police/milit ary abuses, religious discrimination, and so on. 15. This framework is a starting point around which to think about a variety of ways in which people experience oppression and perform unpaid collective work du e to inequi- ties involving sexual identity, sexuality, citizenship status, religion, nationality, and other factors. 16. The “firm” here may be a private or public sector workplace. 17. The feminist emphasis on “couples,” whether married or cohabiting, same-sex or different sex, privileges this household configuration. We need a more expansive understanding of 360 The Review of Black Political Economy 47(4) unpaid labor and decision-making within households that examines relatio ns between and among household members who are part of other family configurations. These include lone parents, multigeneration, multiple-family, multihouseholds, and so on. 18. This is evident in the exclusion of Black women from cash assistance pro grams for lone, poor mothers for most of the history of the Aid to Dependent Children/AFDC program and the subsequent White backlash when Black women and children were finally able to receive AFDC payments. 19. Black women’s performance of domestic work—reproductive labor—also benefits White men within households because they do not feel pressure from their partn ers to perform this work. 20. Exploitation occurs when someone other than the direct producer—or pr oducers—appro- priate the surplus. In collective production for the community and colle ctive appropriation by the community, exploitation does not occur. 21. Firms’ exclusion of ex-felons from employment enables them to maintain a pool of unem- ployed workers whose existence helps to keep wages low and enables firms to have control (dominance) over their workers. 22. 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1 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF CLIMATE CHANGE IN AFRICA OKOH, A. I. SADIQ 2 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF CLIMATE CHANGE IN AFRICA LAP LAMBERT Academic Publishing Heinrich-Bocking-str. 6-8, 66121 Saarbucken, Deutsc hland, Germany 2013 Germany. ISBN-978-3-659-37311-4 3 DEDICATION This book is dedicated to mama (Justina Oka Okoh) with love. 4 Table of Contents 3 Preface 7 List of Acronyms and Abbreviations 11 CHAPTER ONE: OUR HERITAGE 1.1. Climate Change Science and Policy Interface 18 21 1.2. The Climate as Global Heritage 22 1.3. The Climate as Public Good 25 1.4. Global Common Resources 26 1.5. Tragedy of Commons 29 1.6. Africa and the Tragedy of Commons 32 1.7. Statehood and Climate 36 1.8. Is there a new Social Contract? 39 1.9. Human Rights and Climate Governance 42 1.10 Food Security and Climate Change 47 CHAPTER TWO: CLIMATE SCIENCE: WHAT WE KNOW 2.1. Climate Change Trends 53 2.2. Climate Change Phenomenon 56 2.3 Climate Change Defined 60 2.4. What we know about Climate Change 65 2.5. Is the World Warming? 69 2.6. What is Causing Global Warming? 72 2.7. Millennium Development Goals and Climate Change 81 2.8. Effects of MDGs on Climate Change 83 CHAPTER THREE: CONTENDING PERSPECTIVES ON CLIMATE CHANGE 3.1. The Global Warming Controversy 89 3.2. Environmental Pessimists’ View 90 3.3. Environmental Optimists’ View 91 3.4. The Debate 91 3.5. Conclusion 100 5 CHAPTER FOUR: THEORETICAL ISSUES 4.1. Clarifications of key concepts in Political Ecology 104 4.2. Theoretical Underpinnings 109 4.3. Political Economy and Political Ecology Int erface 112 4.4. Political Ecology Defined 116 4.5. Perspectives on Political Ecology 120 4.6. Significance of the Political Ecology Approach 123 4.7. Capitalism and Nature 126 4.8. From Metabolism to Theory of Metabolic Rift and to Second Contradiction of Capitalism 127 4.9. Conclusion 133 CHAPTER FIVE: CLIMATE GOVERNANCE IN AFRICA 5.1. Climate Governance: What it means? 137 5.2. Pre-Colonial Africa and Climate Governance 140 5.3. Colonial Administration and Climate Governance 145 5.4. Colonial Economy and Climate Governance 149 5.5. Post Colonial State and Climate Governance 155 5.6. Imperatives for Climate Governance in Africa 164 CHAPTER SIX: IMPACTS OF CLIMATE CHANGE IN AFRICA 6.1. Climate Change in Africa 176 6.2. Impacts of Climate Change in Africa 180 6.2.1. Agriculture 183 6.2.2. Human Infrastructure 187 6.2.3. Human Health 187 6.2.4. Hydrology and Water Resource Management 189 6.2.5. Livelihood 191 6.2.6. Eco-system and Bio-diversity 192 6.2.7. Migration 193 6.2.8. Resource Conflicts 194 6.2.9. Employment 194 6 CHAPTER SEVEN: CLIMATE CHANGE REGIME AND AFR ICA 7.1. Perspectives on Climate Regime 197 7.2. Climate Regime in Africa 203 7.3. UNFCCC and Climate Regime 206 7.4. The Role of IPCC 209 7.5. Rio Earth Summit 211 7.6. Kyoto Protocol 215 7.7. Kyoto Controversy 219 7.8. Earth Summit II 220 7.9. Rio+20 and Green Economy 222 7.10 Outcome of Rio+20 226 7.11 CSO and Climate Change in Africa 230 7.11.1. Climate Change and Africa: The score She et 232 CHAPTER EIGHT: CLIMATE CHANGE POLITICS 8.1. Dimensions of Climate Politics 242 8.2. Africa and Climate Change Politics 248 8.3. Climate Politics 251 8.4. Africa and Climate Change Negotiations 254 8.5. COP 17: What was at Stake? 263 8.6. COP 17 and Kyoto Protocol 265 8.7. Africa and the Politics of COP 17 267 8.8. COP 18 and the Endgame of Climate Negotiations 269 8. 9. Doha and the Future of Kyoto Protocol 273 8.10. 2013 and Beyond 276 CHAPTER NINE: NEOLIBERAL POLICY, WTO, TRADE AND CLIMATE CHANGE 9.1. Climate Change and Neoliberal Policy in Afr ica 285 9.1.1. Definitions 286 9.1.2. Policy and Neoliberalism Defined 286 9.1.3. Neoliberalism and Climate Change Policy in Africa 291 7 9.2. WTO, Trade and Climate Change 302 CHAPTER TEN: THE CHALLENGE OF INTEGRATING NATIONAL CLIMATE CHANGE POLICY TO AFRICAN ACTION PLAN 10.1. Imperatives for Mainstreaming Climate Chang e Strategies to African Policy Framework 309 10.2. The Challenge of integrating National Climate Change Policy to African Action Plan 313 10.2.1. Climate Politics 314 10.2.2. Failure of National Policies 314 10.2.3. Institutional Failure 317 10.2.4. Leadership Crisis in Africa 319 10.2.5. Lopsided Relations between Africa and the North 320 10.2.6. Lack of Education and Public Awareness 3 21 10.2.7. Absence of Climate Laws and Climate Change Bill 322 10.2.8. The Paradox of Foreign Aid 323 10.2.9. African Debt Trap 326 10.3 Gender and Climate Change in Africa 327 CHAPTER ELEVEN: LOOKING BACK, LOOKING FORWARD 11.1. Looking Back 333 11.2. Looking Forward 336 11.3. Closing Remarks 343 REFERENCES 347 8 PREFACE The world is increasingly confronted with the twin mutually reinforcing challenge of climate change and extreme poverty. Ex treme poverty is on the rise globally with the increased dependency on fossil energy leading to gradual warming of the planet. The challenges as sociated with global warming are far more magnified in countries of the South especially sub- Saharan Africa where the adaptive capacity to cope with climate stress is non-existent. Consequently, poverty is exacerbated as climate change has pushed the poor to untenable development practices. At the heart of the problem of gradual buildup of poisonous gases are a nthropogenic carbonization of the biosphere and the biogeophysical interests of world powers which determine the nature and scope of all socioeconomic and political interactions on climate change. Finding l asting solutions to the challenge posed by climate change is a major source of politics at the international arena. In climate change negotiations, the scientific inte rpretations have always supplanted political interpretations of the phenomenon leading to the dependency on environmentalists for policy form ulation and implementation. Thus, policy and policy makers are at the mercy of people who are not grounded in politics. For the po licy maker to cope with this challenge he must be abreast with current findings in the science of climate change as any political analysis must be preceded by the science. Understanding the scientific basis is an e ssential starting point both for establishing that there is indeed a proble m and for appreciating the magnitude of the task and for finding enduring policies backed by empirical evidence. To this end, we have carried out a detailed analysi s of the subject illuminating both the politics and science of clima te change which underscores the political economy approach. The urg ency attached to the threats of climate change established by the scienc e points us in the direction of translating what we have uncovered wit h the policy analysis 9 into concrete policy actions. Our primary motive th erefore, is to examine the two-way interactive process whereby policy dire ction within local or international levels have impacted on climate chang e and how the economy in turn is redefining policy towards climat e change. We begin chapter one with a general overview of the subject matter to lay the groundwork for our analysis. The chapter discusses climate as global heritage exploring the link between man and environment. The chapter also explores the tragic perception of this relationship. The science of climate change is extensively explicated in chapter two to foster a better understanding of the human influenc e on the climate change while unearthing the scientific basis of the phenomenon. It addressed the complex terrain of climate science gi ving the reader a detailed view of the problem to be tackled and its implications for human development while chapter three discusses the conte nding issues in climate debate. Chapter four establishes the theoretical foundation , the anchor upon which our boat of political economy sails. We adopt the political economy approach (especially the political ecology variant) not only because of its transdisciplinary focus but as it is the window to understanding the laws governing the political and economic life of society. Chapter five is on climate governance in Africa. In this chapter, we trace the historical background of environmental de gradation with a view to showing how it manifest in climate change in lat er stages of human development especially in Sub-Saharan Africa. We f ollow with the analysis of the impact of climate change on Africa in chapter six. The purpose of which is to locate the cause(s) behind t he currently exacerbated economic and ecological crises in Afric a. The history of modern time opens to a theory of the modern world as ecological regime. In this regard, chapter seven ex amines climate change regime highlighting ecological regime with the view to situating the 10 changing global politics of climate change. In this , chapter we explore the role played by organizations which are part of the climate regime. The purpose of chapter eight is to foster better un derstanding of climate politics to ascertain whether Africa is der iving any tangible benefit from its involvement in global governance i nstitutions and participations at conferences for mitigation and ad aptation to climate risks. Throughout the book, we call attention to puzzles a nd outcomes receiving extensive attention in political economy as well as some not receiving much attention as they ought to. In line with this, we look at neoliberal policies and its consequences for the ec osystem in Africa. In the ninth chapter, we have generalized on the impac t of neoliberal policies as most cut across broad and complex clima te terrain in Africa. The challenge of integrating national climate polic y to African action plan is the focus of the tenth chapter. In m ost states in sub-Saharan Africa there is the challenge of formulating nation al climate change policy which invariably affects the formulation of regional and continental Action Plan. This problem is the focus of the chapter and is painstakingly analyzed in the light of the diminish ing environmental assets. The final part of the book draws the conclusion on a number of themes running throughout the book. Here, the major s points raised are captured. We also look at the future of the world i n the light of current global action on climate change at Rio+20 and attem pt to proffer some solutions for Africa and the world at large. Untying the ‘Gordian knot’ of climate change is of interest to us. In a world where moral suasion have failed to contribu te to the abatement of pollution of the fragile ecosystem; where there is also the absence of any legally binding instrument for enforcing abatement of emission profligacy of developed economies; researchers as conscience o f the world should shine new lights at the murky waters of climate pol itics. 11 It is therefore hoped the book will not only provid e useful information to students, scientists, policy-makers and international organizations on climate politics but will most imp ortantly open new debates about the complex politics of human-induced ecological crises; a debate opening new vistas in climate regime which i n turn will spurn policies for the poor who have no voice and are not consulted on climate change; a debate that will not only transcend cosme tic changes evinced by the greening of growth but will set in motion a reversal of untenable development pathway foisted by overproduction, unde r consumption, financialization and deindustrialization where the threats to mankind is turning us to endangered species in addition to a chain of other species long extinct through our inadequate climate steward ship and lopsided ecological equity and integrity. 176 6 IMPACTS OF CLIMATE CHANGE IN AFRICA CHAPTER SIX: IMPACTS OF CLIMATE CHANGE IN AFRICA 6.1. Climate Change in Africa 6.2. Impacts of Climate Change 6.2.1. Agriculture 6.2.2. Human Infrastructure 6.2.3. Human Health 6.2.4. Hydrology and Water Resource Management 6.2.5. Livelihood 6.2.6. Eco-system and Bio-diversity 6.2.7. Migration 6.2.8. Resource Conflicts 6.2.9. Employment 177 CHAPTER SIX IMPACTS OF CLIMATE CHANGE IN AFRICA In nature there are neither rewards nor punishments —there are consequences. Robert G. Ingersoll (1833 – 1899) U.S. lawyer. Subsistence rain-fed agriculture is the mainstay of most countries in Africa contributing GDPs ranging from 10% to 70%. A frica’s agriculture has the slowest record of productivity increase in the world and is the only major region with a decline in food production per capita during 1980–2000 (Sachs et al., 2004). Africa’s dependence on rain fed agriculture. This means production is vulnerable to climatic variability, severely affecting food, human security and exports . CLIMATE CHANGE IN AFRICA Africa is by far the poorest inhabited continent in the world and, on average many of the countries in it are poorer than they were 25 years ago. Although some African countries recorded some modest growth during the 1990s, this growth only recovered ground lost during the 1980s in most cases. However, the continent still r emains mired in poverty and a strangling debt portfolio. The number of people living below the poverty line has increased by 50% over th e last 14 years (Amoakoh, 2004 cited in Nkomo, et al., 2006). However, the entire continent is not utterly impoverished and there is considerable variation in its wealth. The richest areas are the far north and south of the continent (Figure 6.1). There are also considerable internal variations in economic development within countries. 178 Source: http://www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/file:africa Figure 6.1. African States by GDP per Capita in US Dollars (2002). Climate change is leading to unpredictable climatic conditions as well as proliferation of pest and diseases leading to low y ields, and cost of agricultural produce thereby discouraging agricultu re in the continent, hence leading to the lost of employment and source of livelihood. The gradual yet dramatic disappearance of tropical mountain glaciers such as on Mount Kilimanjaro has been attr ibuted to global warming (IPCC, 2001). An estimated 82 percent of th e icecap that crowned Mount Kilimanjaro when it was first thoroug hly surveyed in 1912 is now gone. A recent projection concludes if recession continues at the present rate, the majority of the glaciers on t he mountain could vanish in 15 years. Glaciers on the other African mountain s are also retreating 179 very fast. The snow and glaciers act as a water tow er, and several rivers are drying out in the warm season due to the loss o f this frozen reservoir. Significant temperature increase in the recent year s is very evident. Observational records have shown that Africa has be en warming throughout the 20th century at a rate of about 0.05 °C per decade, amounting to an increase of approximately 0.5°C (IP CC, 2007). The warming has been more significant in the period Jun e-November each year. Table 6.1 shows the rising trend in mean temp erature over 100 years. The most significant change to Africa’s clim ate has been a long- term reduction in rainfall in the semi-arid regions of West Africa. IPCC (2007) has predicted that in Africa: – By 2020, between 75 and 250 million of people are projected to be exposed to increased water stress due to climate ch ange. – By 2020, in some countries, yields from rain-fed a griculture could be reduced by up to 50%. Agricultural production, incl uding access to food, in many African countries is projected to be severely compromised. This would further adversely affect fo od security and exacerbate malnutrition. – Towards the end of the 21st century, projected se a level rise will affect low-lying coastal areas with large populations. The cost of adaptation could amount to at least 5 to 10% of GDP. – By 2080, an increase of 5 to 8% of arid and semi- arid land in Africa is projected under a range of climate scenarios. In the Nigerian Sahel region, there has been a 25% decrease in precipitat ion on average in the last 30 years (Nkomo et al., 2006). However, the re duction in precipitation has been more moderate in other parts of Africa. Africa is very vulnerable to the current climate variability including the recurrent droughts and floods. Today recurrent extr eme climate events such as floods, cyclones, and droughts are devastat ing most economic, social and environment systems in Africa. The combi ned impact of HIV/AIDS, declining commodity prices and, in certai n areas, conflict, has significantly reduced the capacity of poor hous eholds in Africa to 180 cope with shocks of extreme climate events. SOURCE: (IPCC, 2001) TABLE 6.1 SHOWING MEAN TEMPERATURE IN AFRICA OVER 100 YEARS. In the past 30 years, both droughts and floods have increased in frequency and severity in the continent. The regula rity of drought periods has been a notable aspect of African climate in rec ent years, especially in the drier regions in the north. Well publicized dro ughts in the 1970s and 1980s significantly affected West Africa in the 20t h century and they severely affected large areas of Northern Africa an d the Sahel region. These drought periods are indicative of the large variability in climate across tropical Africa, the most serious effects of which are usually felt at the drier margins of agricultural zones or in the r egions occupied primarily by pastoral groups. In recent years, Africa witnessed more frequent flo ods and cyclone episodes. The coastal areas of Africa have in parti cular seen a marked increase in flooding in the last few decades (Nkomo et al., 2006). Dust storms (which are partly due to changes in land use such as grazing and 181 deforestation) in some parts of the Sahel have also increased, particularly between the 1950s and 1980s. Indeed, most people in Africa still do not have rea sonable access to safe drinking water. An even greater number of peop le lack adequate sanitation. Over 400 million people are expected to be living in at least 17 water-scarce African countries by the year 2010 (Wo rld Water Forum, 2000). Their lack of adequate water will severely c onstrain food production, ecosystem protection and socio-economic development. Sub- regional variations in runoff associated with varia tions in rainfall which ultimately affect river flows have been observed in Africa. IMPACTS OF CLIMATE CHANGE IN AFRICA Climate change is an all-encompassing threat: our f ood and waste supplies, our health, our security, stability and p roperty are all at risk. The vulnerability of different countries in the world t o climate change depends on the economic circumstance and institutio nal infrastructure. Different countries have differing level of vulnera bility. The resilience of some countries especially in developed economies ar e high whereas some countries are more vulnerable especially in SSA whe re economic and institutional circumstances are less favourable. In deed, the implications for developing countries are heightened by their in ability to collate adequate data on its impacts as they are mostly sub jected to multiple climatic and non-climatic stresses. Although scien tific evidence and knowledge of climate variability has improved signi ficantly over the past decades and quantitative evidence can be developed; qualitative projections of the impacts of climate change on any particular system at any particular location is difficult because region al-scale climate change projections are uncertain; understanding of current critical processes is limited (IPCC, 1995). A confluence of rapid increases of population, expl osive growth of urban centers and largely unsustainable agricultura l practices leading to land degradation are set to make sub-Saharan Africa lag behind other 182 regions in development during the 21 st century. This, to Adejuwon (2006), will be compounded by the projected negativ e impacts of potential changes in global climate. Global climate change threat is already having initial tangible impact upon mankind and nature today (IPCC, 2001, WBGU, 2003). However, a global coverage of temperatures in the l ower atmosphere since 1979 reveals the southern Hemisphe re has cooled since then – despite 90% of the ‘cooling’ aerosols having been released in the northern hemisphere which is warming (Foster, 2001) . Reports show that, USA and Europe account for more than half of global GHG emissions, Sub-Saharan 1.59% and the small Island states 0.37% (Spore, 2008). Unfortunately sub-Saharan Africa would be hit parti cularly hard by climate change (IPCC, 2007). The implications for l ivelihoods and agriculture in countries of the South are inversely proportional to the nations’ responsibility for the problem (Ozor, 2009 ). The conclusion of fisher et al., (2007) is the overall effect of mode rate climate change on world food production may be small, as reduced prod uction in some areas is balanced by gains in others. However, it is beli eved vulnerability to climate change is systematically greater in develop ing countries, which in most cases are located in lower, water latitudes. S pecifically, sub-Saharan Africa negative impact by climate variation is indi cative agricultural production, including access to food, in many count ries and regions in Africa is projected to be severely compromised by c limate variability and change with the area suitable for agriculture, the length of growing seasons and yields potentials particularly along th e margins of semi-arid areas, are expected to decrease. This would further adversely affect food security and exacerbate malnutrition in the contine nt. In some countries, yields from rain-fed agriculture could be reduced b y up to 50% by 2020. Figure 6.2 shows risks and impacts of climate chang e and the range of future scenarios and uncertainties as a result of f uture increase in temperature. An instance of natural resource despoliation is in the Congo rain forest. 183 Congo basin forest is a block of tropical rain fore st second in size to the Amazon in Brazil with more than half of it in one c ountry (Democratic Republic of Congo). The rain forest is gradually di sappearing as timber is exported in exchange for much needed foreign exchan ge. Their low income makes it difficult to finance adap tation and as such international community have an obligation to support them in adapting to climate change. And without such suppor t there is the likelihood development progress will be undermined. This view is consistent with the findings of Stern Review Report (2006) IPCC (2007) and WBAU (2003) who all forecast that food producti on in the tropics would be harmed. SOURCE: http://en.wikiped FIGURE 6.2 Risk and Agriculture and agricu Africa above 70% of 2007). The Stern Re contributes about 80% contributes 3 9% to G obtaining income but 184 edia.org/wiki/file:Risks and Impacts of _GlobalWar nd Impact of Global Warming AGRICULTURE riculture related activities are crucial t of the population is engaged in agricult Review (2006) similarly notes the 80% while in countries like Malawi GDP; agriculture provides not only th but most essentially address es the sta arming l to Africa. In ulture (UNDP, e rural sector i rural sector the means for status of food 185 security and its antithesis hunger. However, with i ncreasing incidence of flood, erosion, bush burning, pests and diseases, i ncreased temperature, erratic rainfall and droughts, agricultural product ivity under these conditions in Africa has been very low. While it is true crop yield is a derivative of the primary productivity of agro-ecological systems. However, A dejuwon (2006) postulates productivity as primarily achieved throu gh photosynthesis, a biochemical process in which atmospheric carbon dio xide in the presence of sunlight is combined with water to provide simpl e carbohydrates from which organic substances, whether in plants or anim als are fabricated. A higher concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmos phere is expected to create a gradient that could facilitate increased i ntake of carbon dioxide and therefore increase the rate of photosynthesis. He concludes this will be expected to produce higher yields of crops and h igher levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide also induce plants to be more economical in the use of water. However climate change is changin g the picture. In Africa, 75 to 250 million are exposed to water s tress due to climate change with this situation likely to worsen in future with increase in temperature rise of just 2 0 C, relative to the 1990 baseline (IPCC, 2007). A drop in agricultural productivity is antic ipated with global warming now reaching 2-4 0 C with more devastating effects in the tropics because crops are often close to their thermal opti mum in the region (WBGU, 2003). In many African countries, the areas suitable for agriculture are largely over exploited. This may tr igger regional food crises and further undermine the economic performan ce of weak and unstable states, like Mali, Sudan, South Sudan, Nig er, Angola, DRC, and Sierra Leone. In Nigeria, food crisis undermine eco nomic growth thereby exacerbating destabilization, the collapse of socia l systems and violent conflicts (Ozor, 2009). UNEP (2012) reported some 13 million people in Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia have been experiencing one of the worst humanitarian crises in decades. The region’s most s evere drought in 60 186 years caused widespread starvation and made access to clean water and sanitation extremely difficult. These conditions no t only directly affect local communities today, but also weaken their resi liency to cope with future droughts, diminishing prospects for water an d food security in the years to come (Munang and Nkem 2011). Temperatures in the region are expected to continue rising while rainfall patterns change (Anyah and Qui 2011). The crisis in the Horn of Africa is only one of the events in 2011 that exemplify the challenges to be met in the face of an increasingly variable and changing climate worldwide. Due to change in climatic conditions, crops could be planted earlier than exp ected while some may mature earlier than projected. There is the possibi lity of two or more cropping cycles during the same season. Water deman d and supply to crops will be modified to the detriment of crop yie lds as global warming progresses. However, in areas projected to have inc reased precipitation as a result of climate change, available water may inc rease and crop yields may improve (IPCC, 2001) such area include Equatori al Africa extending northwards to Nigeria and Western Sudan (Adejuwon, 2006). The major areas projected to have much reduced water supply a re all to be found in the southern Hemisphere. These include southern Afr ica, North of the equator, Northern West Africa are expected to exper ience increased acidity. The livestock production of systems in Africa would be vulnerable to climate change in respect to anticipated decreas e in rainfall in Sudan- Saharan zone and consequent reduction in the availa ble pastureland and declining availability of surface water resources f or animals. In fact, climate change leads to decrease livestock producti on resulting in impaired availability of animal protein including m eat, egg, milk and animal products such as hides and skins (Ozor, 2009 ). This has serious implications for food security. Climate change may also have an indirect effect on agriculture in the form of increased pest and disease activities o n farm lands. This is 187 predicated on the fact that moisture and temperatur e determine the occurrence and localization of pests. In general, p est and disease rectors do better when the temperature is higher under cond itions of optimum water supply (Adejuwon, 2006). Global warming is therefore likely to extend the ra nge of distribution of certain pests and diseases pole war ds. There is mutation of pest as agricultural productivity is dependent on p esticides and fertilizers for high yields. Similarly, livestock diseases may be affected by warmer and more humid condition as it enhance growth of ba cteria and mould on many types of stored foods and this would increase food spoilage thereby creating some specific toxicological health hazards . There is no doubt agriculture and agricultural prac tices will have to adapt to changes in the long run to ensure food sec urity for the survival of Man. Such adjustment will be constrained by social, economic, political and technological factors. In 2011 the Dadaab refugee camp in Kenya became the home of 400 000 people fleeing drought and famine. Credit: Linda Ogwell, Oxfam 188 HUMAN INFRASTRUCTURE Climate change will increase the vulnerability of s ome coastal populations of Africa. In IPCC (1995) projection, a bout 46 million per year are currently at risk of floods due to storm s urges and with a rise of sea level to 1- meter about 118 million would be at risk. Given the present state of protection, Africa will be most vu lnerable especially those with higher population densities like Lagos i n Nigeria, Banjul in Gambia and Alexandria in Egypt. This may increase t he number of environmental refugees displaced by natural disaste r. Migration may be one of the major short-term effects of climate chan ge in human settlements, industries and businesses. Crocodile on the street in 2012 floods in Makurdi, Nigeria HUMAN HEATH The health status of millions of people is projected to be affected directly or indirectly through increases in malnutrition; in creased deaths, diseases 189 and injury due to extreme weather events; increased burden of diarrhea diseases, increased frequency of cardio- respirator y diseases due to higher concentrations of ground-level ozone in urban areas related to climate change (IPCC, 1995). Climate change is also projected to bring some bene fits in temperate areas, such as fewer death from cold expo sure and some mixed effects such as changes in range and transmission p otential of malaria in Africa. Climate change may also have direct impact on human health by influencing atmospheric concentration of pollutants . The level of concentration of pollutants in the atmosphere over a place is determined by rates of generalization and the rates of disposa l of the pollutants in the atmosphere. Both may be affected by indirect effect s of climate change which are expected to predominate, including increa ses in cases of malaria, dengue, yellow fever and some viral enceph alitis. Many diseases in Africa such as malaria are known t o be sensitive to climate factors. A study in Ghana by Agyemang-Ye boah (2005) cit ed in Nkomo, et al., (2006) confirms a positive correlation between ma laria, cholera and meningitis, and climatic elements. The strong correlation between malaria epidemics and anomalously high rain fall has also been observed in both the east African highlands and in semiarid areas of Africa (Thomson et al., 2006, IRI, 2005). (See Figu re 6.3.). 190 FIGURE 6.3: PEOPLE AFFECTED BY NATURAL DISASTERS IN THE PERIOD 1971-2000 With the high economic costs of malaria in Africa, it is expected an increase in malaria incidence and prevalence could lead to an increase in poverty. HYDROLOGY AND WATER RESOURCES MANAGEMENT Impacts of climate change on water resources are ve ry important for all sectors and regions in Africa. Climate change is ex pected to aggravate current stress on water resources from population g rowth and economic land-use change, including urbanization. IPCC (1995 ) models predict between one-third and one-half of existing mountain glacier mass could disappear over the next hundred years. This has bee n observed in the highest mountain in Africa, mountain Kilimanjaro wh ere there is reduced extent of glaciers and depth of snow covers which w ould affect the seasonal distribution of river flow and water suppl y for hydroelectric generation and agriculture (IPCC, 2001). An estimat ed 82 percent of the icecap 0f Mount Kilimanjaro when it was first thoro ughly surveyed in 1912 is now gone. According to recent projections, if recession continues at the present rate, the majority of the glaciers o n the mountain could vanish in 15 years (ICPAC, 2007). Glaciers on the o ther African mountains are also retreating very fast. The snow a nd glaciers act as a water tower, and several rivers are drying out in t he warm season due to the loss of this frozen reservoir Climate change wi ll lead to an intensification of the global hydrological cycle an d can have major impacts on regional water resources in Africa. Lake Chad river shared by 4 nations in Africa namely Nigeria, Niger, Chad and Cameroon is gradually drying up as aerial pictures taken from s atellite show its Nigerian catchment is drying up. IPCC (1995) predic ts by 2080 an increase of 5 to 8% of arid and semi-arid land in A frica is projected under a range of climate scenarios. There will be increas es in rates of evaporation leading to reduced soil moisture storag e and reduction in 191 total animal volume of runoffs. Consequently, there will be changes in demand for water resources both for municipal and a gricultural uses as a result of global warming and climate change. Water consumption will increase with increasing dryness and heat. Overall, an increase in sea level will increase the salinity levels of groundwater in coastal areas as well as the surface water in the coastal areas especially Niger Delta region in Nigeria wher e increasing environmental degradation has undermine eco-integri ty and eco- efficiency giving rise to demands for resource cont rol . Source: ICPAC (2007) Flood in Dire Dawa in August 2006 due to the overfl ow of the Dechatu River LIVELIHOOD Livelihood assets involve people’s means of sustena nce and will be threatened with the increasing effects of climate c hange. With the 192 increased threats to productivity, farmers’ income will diminish and their ability to meet household needs (food, fiber, incom e etc) will be difficult (Ozor; 2009). Oceanic acidification and increase in surface water temperature especially around the coast will affect fish stocks and as a result, threaten the livelihood of small-scale fish ing communities in the area. IPCC (2007) report indicates that climate cha nge will pose great threats to communities that depend on fishing for t heir survival. The loss of lives, livelihoods assets, infrastructure etc fr om climate extreme events will further deepen the vulnerability of the poor. It is also predicted that for I 0 C warming, a significant number of developing count ries appears likely to experience net losses (WBGU, 2003). The p rojected distribution of economic impact is such that it would increase t he socio-economic disparity between developing countries and develope d countries, with disparity growing in step with warming, as impacts will fall disproportionately upon developing countries and th e poor persons within them. ECOSYSTEM AND BIODIVERSITY Global warming and climate variations will have sev ere impact on natural terrestrial ecosystem in different forms. Changes i n temperature, precipitation and relative humidity will cause ecol ogical stresses in marginal areas and will affect the dynamics and dis tribution of plant species and animals insects. IPCC Report (2007) sta tes that the resilience of many ecosystems is likely to be exceeded this ce ntury by an unprecedented combination of climate change, associ ated disturbances (e.g. flooding drought, wildfire, insects, ocean, a nd acidification) and other global change drivers (e.g. land use change, pollution, and fragmentation of natural system, over exploitation of resources). Over the cause of this century, net carbon uptakes by terrestrial ecosystems are likely to peak before mid-century an d then weaken or even reverse, thus amplifying climate change. Accor ding to the AR4, approximately 20 to 30 per cent of plant and animal species assessed so 193 far are likely to be at increased risk of extinctio n if increases in global average temperature exceed 1.5 to 2.5 0C (IPCC, 2007). Furthermore, increases in global average temperature exceeding 1 .5 to 2.5 0C and in concomitant atmospheric C0 2 concentrations will lead to major changes in ecosystem’s structure and function. This will be in the form of changes in species ecological interactions and shifts in sp ecies geographical ranges, with predominantly negative consequences fo r biodiversity and ecosystem goods and services e.g. water and food su pply in Africa. A new report released by environmental experts claim climate change could kill one in ten species by the end of the century i f the impacts of rising temperatures changing patterns of rainfall and incr easing acidity of the oceans are not mitigated. In Africa, any adverse change in temperature and hu midity will affect the wildlife. The fortunes of eco-based tour ism in several countries in East Africa and Southern Africa notably Kenya, U ganda, Botswana and South Africa will be adversely affected. Some of these countries rely extensively on eco-tourism for much needed foreign exchange earnings. With increasing climate variations there has been g radual extinction of species. Thus, many species that are already declin ing presently could become extinct. If things continue as they are, the re would be a lot of extinctions at the end of this century. Global warming and climate change also impact on th e wetland. Wetlands are basically water-logged ecosystems with particular physiochemical and biological processes and charact eristics are also susceptible to the effect of global warming. With c limate change many of the existing wetlands both coastal and continental would probably decrease in size, especially the continental ones ( Ayoade, 2003). There might be a significant change in the distribution p atterns of coastal wetlands due to rises in sea level and rainfall pat tern changes. MIGRATION Migration displaced 3% of the population of Africa since the 1960s 194 (Westing, 1994). Climate change and global warming are likely to have effect on the migration of some categories of peopl e in Africa. As WBGU (2007) states, the number of environmental migrants will substantially increase in future due to the impact of climate cha nge. In Africa, the increase in drought, soil degradation and growing w ater scarcity in combination with high population growth, unstable i nstitutions, poverty or a high level of dependency on agriculture means that there is a particular significant risk of environmental migrat ion occurring and increasing in scale (WBGU, 2007). People living in low lying Islands and deltas face the threat of being submerged by water, hence the only coping strategy will be to move out of the risk sites to m ore habitable areas. As people move from one region to another in search of means of sustenance, there is the likelihood of conflict ens uing over resource control at the transit and destination points. Deri ving from this, hunger, starvation, disease and epidemic would be prevalent . Immigrants dislodged from their comfort zones to unknown terri tories with different ecological stresses will create new stress. A case in point is the constant movement of the Fulani’s in Nigeria across West Afr ica in search of grazing land is evidences of climate change engende red migration and is also a source of many communal clashes over grazing land.. RESOURCE CONFLICTS Climate change induced resource conflicts are antic ipated to increase as a result of struggle over scarce resources. Populatio n growth and resultant increases in supply and demand for resources are ex pected to heighten competition for limited food, water, oil and other resources. The conflict in Sudan is the first globally recognized resource conflict engendered by climate change. In Nigeria, Fulani cattlemen and fa rming communities struggle for grassland and water bodies. For exampl e, Mutumbiu and Mambila highlands in Taraba State and the Furfore c ommunity in Adamawa State. 195 EMPLOYMENT Employment is a component of availability of jobs a nd the necessary conditions for economic activities. However, with t he looming danger of climate change, there is a general decrease in avai lable jobs. Consequently, people tend to downgrade their worth just to take any available job. With the climate stress where all re sources are now experiencing a downward spiral, industries that dep end on environment resources like livestock, agricultural products and fisheries for their raw materials are most likely to receive the initial im pact of climate variations. As this impact persists over time, the industries may adopt the measure of reducing their staff strength to cushion the impact and subsequently short down if the necessary inputs do not appreciate. In a recent research on bees, lovers of honey will have to start looking for alternative if serious action is not taken for the mitigation and adaptation to climate change. Climate change may be playing a role in driving down pollination as it prevents bees from carrying out t he vital job of pollination by upsetting their life cycles. Climate driven mismatch between the times when flowers open and when bees e merged from hibernation is a more important factor. The global communities have put in place an elabourate mechanism for addressing cli mate-driven vulnerability.
Write a 5-7 page paper (double spaced, 12 point font, standard margins) on one of the topics below. Your title page and bibliography (and any other pages that are not writing) do not count towards the
@ 2 021 H ars h a W alia P ublis h ed i n 2 021 b y H aym ark et B ook s P .O . B ox 1 80165 C hic a g o, I L 6 0618 773-5 83-7 884 w ww.h aym ark etb ook s.o rg in fo @ haym ark etb ook s.o rg IS B N : 9 78-1 -6 4259-3 88-4 D is tr ib u te d to th e tr a d e in th e U S th ro u gh C on so rtiu m B ook Sale s an d Dis tr ib u tio n ( www.c b sd .c o m ) an d in te rn atio n ally th ro u gh In gra m Publis h er Serv ic e s In te rn atio n al ( w ww.i n gra m co n te n t.c o m ). T his book w as pu blis h ed w it h th e gen ero u s su pport of L an nan F ou ndatio n a n d W alla ce A ctio n F un d. S pecia l dis c o u nts are ava ila b le fo r bu lk pu rc h ase s by org an iz a tio n s a n d in stit u tio n s. P le a se c a ll 7 73-5 83-7 884 o r em ail in fo @ haym ark etb ook s.o rg f o r m ore i n fo rm atio n . C ove r d esig n b y R ach el C oh en . L ib ra ry of Con gre ss Cata lo g in g-in -P ublic a tio n data is a va ila b le . for Stella August (Nuu-chah-nulth Nation) for Sheung Leung (Popo 婆婆 Sue) for Beatrice Starr (Heiltsuk Nation) beloved elder matriarchs in the Downtown Eastside, a borderland of sorts Con te n ts A ck n ow le d gm en ts F ore w ord b y R ob in D . G . K elle y In tr o d u ctio n P art 1. Displacement Crisis, Not Border Crisis C hap te r 1 . H is to ric E nta n gle m en ts o f U S B ord er F orm atio n Conquest as Border F ormation Border Formation through Indigenous Elimination Anti- Black Controls and Border P olitics State Formation through White Supremacy C hap te r 2 . U S W ars A bro ad , W ars a t H om e War on Drugs: Criminalization, Crackdowns, and Counterinsurgency Detention and Globalized Racial V iolence Neoliberal Impoverishment, Border Militarization, and Carceral Governance Preemptive W ars of Terror Chap te r 3 . D is p osse ssio n , D ep riv a tio n , D is p la ce m en t: R efr a m in g t h e G lo b al M ig ra tio n C ris is Export Processing Zones as Extranational Zones Displacement by Starvation W ages and Rising Seas Global Dispossession through Land Grabs and Climate Change Part 2. “Illegals” and “Undesirables”: The Criminalization of Migration Chap te r 4 . B ord erin g R eg im es F our Border Governance Strategies Externalization as Border Imperialism C hap te r 5 . A ustr a lia a n d t h e P acif ic S olu tio n Colonial Production of White Australia Mandatory and Offshore Detention C hap te r 6 . F ortr e ss E uro p e Imperial Containment Routes of Securitization and Externalization Disrupting Liberal “W elcome” Black Mediterranean Part 3. Capitalist Globalization and Insourcing of Migrant Labor C hap te r 7 . T em pora ry L ab or M ig ra tio n a n d t h e N ew B ra ce ro s Five F eatures of Migrant W orker Programs Domestic Work and Global Care Chains Chap te r 8 . T he K afa la S yste m i n t h e G ulf S ta te s State Development and Gulf Capitalism Kafala as Capture and Control C hap te r 9 . P erm an en tly T em pora ry : M an ag ed M ig ra tio n i n C an ad a Myth of Multicultural Canada Seasonal Agricultural W orker Program Caregiver Program Part 4. Making R ace, Mobilizing R acist Nationalisms Chap te r 1 0. M ap pin g t h e G lo b al F ar R ig h t a n d t h e C ris is o f S ta te le ssn ess White Nationalism, Zionism, Hindutva: Ethnonationalist Bedfellows P enal Populism under Duterte and Bolsonaro European W elfare Nationalism and Imperial Gendered Racism Statelessness in a State-Centric World Chap te r 1 1. R efu sin g R ea ctio n ary N atio n alis m s Class through the Prism of R ace Making of “Foreigner” through Nationalist Identities Flames of Eco-fascism Con clu sio n A ft e rw ord b y N ic k E ste s N ote s In dex C HAPTE R 7 T em pora ry L ab or M ig ra tio n an d t h e N ew B ra ce ro s On Ju ne 2, 2018, a sc o rc h in g su m mer day in It a ly ’s s o u th ern Cala b ria re g io n , Sou m ayla Sack o an d his c o w ork ers gath ere d alu m in um sh eets fo r th eir San F erd in an do t e n t c it y . S udden ly , a c a r d ro ve u p a n d t h e m en in sid e p oin te d a rif le a t S ack o, s h ootin g h im in th e h ea d . T he k il lin g is w id ely b elie ve d t o b e a t a rg ete d a ssa ssin atio n g iv e n S ack o’s org an iz in g as a m ig ra n t fa rm work er fr o m M ali a n d la b or le a d er w it h th e U nio n e S in daca le d i B ase . 1 H is b ru ta l m urd er o ccu rr e d in t h e c o n te xt o f b oth a w ave o f an ti- m ig ra n t a n d a n ti- B la ck v io le n ce a ft e r th e e le ctio n o f fa r-r ig h t le a d er M atte o Salv in i as w ell as ag rib u sin ess b ack la sh a g ain st m ig ra n t f a rm work er o rg an iz in g. O ne-t h ir d o f fa rm work ers in It a ly a re m ig ra n t w ork ers , e a rn in g a n a ve ra g e o f t w en ty t o t h ir ty e u ro s a d ay f o r u p t o fo u rte en hou rs of w ork . 2 M an y w ork ers are re cru it e d th ro u gh th e caporalato (g an gm aste r s y ste m ), u nder w hic h th eir w ag es a re o ft e n w it h h eld , th ey a re c o erc e d to ta k e p erfo rm an ce -e n han cin g d ru gs, a n d t h ey e xp erie n ce r o u tin e vio le n ce by em plo ye rs an d la b or bro k ers . W ork ers are s e g re g ate d o u ts id e t o w ns a n d fo rc e d t o liv e in s h ack s t h ey bu ild fr o m sc ra p m eta l an d ca rd board . T hese m ak esh if t t e n t c it ie s h ave n o r u nnin g w ate r, e le ctr ic it y , h ea lt h ca re , o r sa n it a tio n . W hen a n e n ca m pm en t g ets to o la rg e, o ff ic ia ls r a ze it to th e gro u nd. O ne of th e cru ele st ir o n ie s of ca p it a lis t g lo b aliz a tio n is t h e p ro le ta ria n iz a tio n o f d is p la ce d p ea sa n ts in to m ig ra n t f a rm work ers . I n G han a, f o r e xa m ple , tr a d e lib era liz a tio n p olic ie s h ave c a u se d an in flu x o f c h ea p im porte d It a lia n to m ato pu re e an d th e declin e of lo ca l to m ato p ro d u ctio n . 3 C on se q u en tly , G han a h as b eco m e o n e of t h e w orld ’s la rg est im porte rs o f t o m ato p aste , 9 0 p erc e n t of w hic h c o m es fr o m th e E U , m ain ly fr o m It a ly , w hic h is o n e of th e w orld ’s la rg est to m ato pro d u ce rs . 4 Farm ers fr o m G han a n ow h ave t o p ic k a n d p ro ce ss t o m ato es f o r t h e sa m e It a lia n ag rib u sin esse s th at decim ate d th eir liv e lih ood s. T he e xtr e m e a b u se o f m ig ra n t fa rm work ers in It a ly is lin ked both to It a lia n tr a d e polic ie s an d to re p re ssiv e re fu gee polic ie s. Bord er co n tr o ls , gove rn in g th ro u gh ille g aliz a tio n a n d d ep orta b il it y , s e rv e a c rit ic a l fu nctio n in t h e p olit ic a l e co n om y b y p ro d u cin g p lia b le la b or. B ord er co n tr o ls man ufa ctu re sp atia liz e d dif fe re n ce not to c o m ple te ly exclu de a ll p eo p le b u t to ca p it a li z e o n th em , what N ic h ola s De Gen ova ca lls an “a ctiv e pro ce ss of in clu sio n th ro u gh ‘i lle g aliz a tio n .’” 5 H ere w e s ee th e th ir d b ord er g ove rn an ce str a te g y re fe re n ce d in ch ap te r 4 : th e dis c ip lin in g of la b or th ro u gh im mig ra tio n co n tr o ls an d tr a n sfig u rin g ir re g u la r m ig ra tio n in to w hat is kn ow n in in te rn atio n al p olic y c ir c le s a s “ m an ag ed la b or m ig ra tio n .” I n th e U S, n eo lib era l, p ro –D em ocra tic P arty c o m men ta to r T hom as Frie d m an sa ys ca n did ly , “W e have a re a l im mig ra tio n c ris is a n d … th e s o lu tio n is a high wall with a big gate—but a smart gate” ( e m ph asis i n o rig in al) . 6 W hile man y mig ra n t fa rm work ers in It a ly are u ndocu m en te d , o th ers a re b ro u gh t in th ro u gh th e “s m art gate ” o f te m pora ry a u th oriz a tio n s. U nder It a lia n la w , a n an nual flo w s decre e se ts a qu ota fo r co n tr a ctu al an d se a so n al m ig ra n t w ork ers to li v e a n d w ork fo r u p to n in e m on th s a y e a r. 7 T he r e sid en ce p erm it is c o n tin gen t u pon a fo rm al e m plo ym en t c o n tr a ct t ie d t o a n e m plo ye r, c re a tin g a s y ste m ic to o l of exp lo it a tio n . As Sack o’s co m ra d e A bou bak ar Sou m ao ro writ e s, “S ou m ayla did have a te m pora ry p erm it to s ta y in It a ly . B ut e ve n s u ch a s ta tu s does n ot g u ara n te e s ta b le liv in g c o n dit io n s, fo r it is lin ked to a s p ecif ic w ork c o n tr a ct. T he e m plo ye r c a n a ls o u se t h is a s a fo rm o f b la ck m ail a g ain st th e w ork er w ho d ecid es to s p ea k o u t a g ain st e xp lo it a tio n o r fo rm a u nio n , fo r h e c a n th re a te n n ot o n ly th eir s a ck in g b u t a ls o to p u t a n e n d to th eir p erm is sio n t o r e m ain i n t h e c o u ntr y .” 8 T he e xp erie n ce o f m ig ra n t fa rm work ers in th e fie ld s o f It a ly is neit h er an an om aly nor a re ce n t ph en om en on . B efo re W orld W ar I, a n e stim ate d h alf a m illio n se a so n al fa rm work ers c ro sse d th e b ord er a n nually in to G erm an y. 9 A ft e r W orld W ar II, m ig ra n t work er pro g ra m s were fo rm aliz e d d u rin g t h e r e co n str u ctio n p erio d . O ve r a t w en ty – y e a r p erio d , m illio n s o f m ig ra n t w ork ers , o r Gastarbeiter , m ostly fr o m Alg eria , Gre ece , It a ly , M oro cco , Portu gal, S pain , Tunis ia , Turk ey, an d Yugosla via , work ed in G erm an y, Fra n ce , th e UK, th e Ne th erla n ds, Belg iu m , Sw ed en , an d Sw it z e rla n d. 10 W ork ers en du re d se ve re g eo g ra p h ic se g re g atio n , w ere se q u este re d in to lo w -w ag e in du str ie s, c o u ld n ot b rin g th eir fa m ily m em bers , a n d h ad n o r ig h ts t o p erm an en t r e sid en cy . I n t h e P eo p le ’s R ep u blic o f C hin a in t h e 1 950s, t h e in tr o d u ctio n o f t h e hukou s y ste m o f gove rn m en ta l hou se h old re g is tr a tio n se rv e d as an in te rn al b ord erin g re g im e to b if u rc a te th e n atio n al la b or m ark et by div id in g th e pop u la tio n in to urb an an d ru ra l re sid en ts , e a ch w it h d is tin ctly d if fe re n t e n tit le m en ts . T he te m pora ry m ig ra tio n o f ru ra l su rp lu s la b or to th e u rb an ce n te rs w as c o n tr o lle d th ro u gh th is a d m in is tr a tiv e s y ste m , ch an nelin g m ig ra n t p ea sa n ts in to c e rta in lo w -w ag e s e cto rs a n d w it h ou t th e a cco m pan yin g b en efit s o f u rb an h u kou . C . Cin dy Fan desc rib es th is as a de fa cto m ig ra n t la b or re g im e, en ab lin g “la b or-in te n siv e in du str ia liz a tio n an d urb an deve lo p m en t at lo w co st” to co n so lid ate C hin a’s s o cia lis t m ark et e co n om y. 1 1 T he In te rn atio n al L ab ou r O rg an iz a tio n (IL O ) e stim ate s th ere a re 1 64 m illio n m ig ra n t w ork ers a ro u nd th e w orld t o d ay. 1 2 I u se “m ig ra n t w ork ers ” h ere n ot to re fe r to a ll p eo p le w ho m ove fo r w ork b u t s p ecif ic a lly th ose m ig ra n ts c o n sc rip te d u nder tr a n sn atio n al la b or m ig ra tio n p ro g ra m s. L ib era l elit e s pre se n t la b or m ig ra tio n as a tr ip le w in b eca u se h ig h -in co m e r e ce iv in g c o u ntr ie s fil l la b or s h orta g e n eed s, lo w -in co m e se n din g co u ntr ie s decre a se u nem plo ym en t a n d g en era te r e ve n ue th ro u gh r e m it t a n ce s, a n d m ig ra n ts s u pport t h eir fa m ilie s w it h h ig h er w ag es d u e to exch an ge ra te s betw een se n din g an d re ce iv in g co u ntr ie s. T he G lo b al C om pact f o r M ig ra tio n is t h e f ir s t U N ag re em en t o n a g lo b al a p pro ach to a ll fo rm s o f m ig ra tio n . O ne o f it s c e n tr a l p rin cip le s is to fa cilit a te la b or m ob ilit y t h ro u gh “te m pora ry , se a so n al, cir c u la r, an d fa st-t r a ck p ro g ra m mes in a re a s o f la b ou r s h orta g es.” 1 3 T he c o m pact w as fin aliz e d in 2018 am id rig h t-w in g op posit io n in A ustr a lia , A ustr ia , C an ad a, H ungary , Is ra el, P ola n d, an d th e U S. L ib era l c a p it a lis ts p re se n t te m pora ry a n d c ir c u la r la b or m ig ra tio n a s t h e m ore “ h um an e” ( i.e ., m ark et s u pply – o rie n te d ) alt e rn ativ e to rig h t-w in g ca lls fo r co m ple te m ig ra n t exclu sio n . The Economist arg u es th at den yin g m ig ra n t w ork ers ’ v o tin g r ig h ts , c h arg in g th em e xtr a ta xe s, a n d re str ic tin g th eir a cce ss to p u blic s e rv ic e s is “ h orrib ly d is c rim in ato ry ” b u t s till “ b ette r fo r th e m ig ra n ts th an th e sta tu s qu o, in w hic h th ey are exclu ded fr o m ric h -w orld la b or m ark ets .” 1 4 Mig ra n t w ork ers p ro vid e lib era l c a p it a li s t in te re sts w it h c h ea p en ed la b or w it h ou t alt e rin g th e ra cia l so cia l ord er th ro u gh p erm an en t im mig ra tio n . O f th e te n s o f th ou sa n ds of f a rm work ers c o m in g a n nually t o C an ad a, f o r i n sta n ce , 9 8 p erc e n t r e tu rn to th eir p la ce o f o rig in u pon c o m ple tio n o f th e s e a so n al c o n tr a ct, h op in g t o l e g ally r e tu rn t h e f o llo w in g se a so n ; th ey d o n ot r e m ain a n d b eco m e u n docu m en te d in C an ad a. 1 5 K erry P re ib is c h a rg u es th is fo rc e d ro ta tio n is t h e re a so n fo r Can ad a’s ag ric u lt u ra l mig ra n t work er p ro g ra m ’s in te rn atio n al re p u ta tio n : “T his h ig h d eg re e of ‘c ir c u la rit y ’ i n p olic y -s p ea k —o r c y clic a l l a b or m ig ra tio n t h at d oes n ot r e su lt in p erm an en t s e ttle m en t— is a fu n dam en ta l b en ch m ark fo r whic h th e ‘s u cce ss’ of gu est-w ork er p ro g ra m s is mea su re d .” 1 6 Lib era l dis c u ssio n s ab ou t re fo rm in g C an ad a’s m ig ra n t w ork er p ro g ra m s te n d to b e lim it e d to pie ce m ea l pro te ctio n s fo r m ig ra n t work ers w it h ou t a n aly zin g h ow c a p it a li s m , im peria lis m , e xclu sio n , an d crim in aliz a tio n all sh ap e te m pora ry m ig ra tio n to s im ult a n eo u sly m an ag e la b or p ools a n d c o n tr o l m ig ra tio n flo w s. Can ad ia n m ig ra n t w ork er pro g ra m s, deta ile d in c h ap te r 9 , are str u ctu re d aro u nd m ark et dem an ds fo r ch ea p en ed la b or, an d work ers ’ eco n om ic an d so cia l m ob ilit y is c o n str a in ed b y th e v e ry d esig n o f th e p ro g ra m . W hile m ig ra n t w ork ers a re t e m pora ry , t e m pora ry m ig ra tio n is i t s e lf p erm an en t. In t h e U S, t h e m ost w ell- k n ow n m ig ra n t w ork er p ro g ra m is t h e b ra ce ro p ro g ra m , w hic h o p era te d b etw een 1 942 a n d 1964. In it ia te d d u e to a la b or s h orta g e d u rin g W orld W ar II, th e p ro g ra m allo w ed m illio n s of M exic a n w ork ers to e n te r t h e c o u ntr y le g ally b u t u nder c o n dit io n s o f p re ca rit y . A k ey fe a tu re o f th e p ro g ra m w as th e ty in g o f a b ra ce ro ’s t e m pora ry r es id en cy t o a n in div id u al e m plo ym en t c o n tr a ct. B ra ce ro s d id n ot h ave th e rig h t to p erm an en t re sid en cy , a n d fa m ily m em bers w ere n ot a llo w ed t o a cc o m pan y t h em . The d ep orta tio n o f u ndocu m en te d M exic a n s, a s e xe m plif ie d th ro u gh O pera tio n W etb ack , fu n nele d M exic a n w ork ers th ro u gh th e b ra ce ro p ro g ra m , th u s re ve a lin g th e lin kag es b etw een im mig ra tio n e xclu sio n a n d c o m mod if ie d in clu sio n . E ve n w hile m ore th an 1 m illio n M exic a n s w ere bein g dep orte d fr o m th e U S d u rin g th e 1 950s, 1 7 a s m an y a s 4 .8 m illio n M exic a n w ork ers w ere c o n te m pora n eo u sly b ro u gh t in as te m pora ry bra ce ro s. 1 8 The bra ce ro pro g ra m w as b en efic ia l to th e M exic a n gove rn m en t, w hic h m an ag ed su rp lu s pop u la tio n s th ro u gh la b or exp orta tio n , an d lu cra tiv e fo r U S a g rib u sin esse s, w hic h u se d it a s a to ol o f la b or d is c ip lin e b y c o n tr o llin g b ra ce ro s’ w ag es, g ove rn in g bra ce ro s’ liv in g co n dit io n s, an d usin g bra ce ro s as str ik eb re a k ers a g ain st l o ca l f a rm work ers . A ft e r th e pro g ra m en ded , th e re cru it m en t an d exp lo it a tio n of work ers co n tin ued th ro u gh th e H-2 p ro g ra m , th e co u ntr y ’s old est an d th e w orld ’s se co n d- old est m ig ra n t w ork er p ro g ra m , fir s t in it ia te d to re cru it w ork ers fr o m th e B ah am as, B arb ad os, a n d Ja maic a d u rin g W orld W ar II. 1 9 A s m ore m ostly Ja maic a n w ork ers w ere b ro u gh t in u nder th e H -2 p ro g ra m aft e r th e en d of th e bra ce ro p ro g ra m , s tr ik e w ave s a n d d ep orta tio n s in vo lv in g th ou sa n ds o f H -2 m ig ra n t w ork ers b eca m e c o m mon pla ce , esp ecia lly in F lo rid a’s s u gar in du str y , it s e lf a n o u tg ro w th o f U S im peria l in te re sts a n d c a p it a li s t in ve stm en ts in C uban su gar. As Cin dy H ah am ovit c h exp la in s ab ou t Flo rid a’s s u gar in du str y , “ E xp ro p ria te d C uban s u gar m og u ls a d op te d th e la b or p ra ctic e s p io n ee re d b y th e U S S ugar C om pan y, im portin g m ostly Ja maic a n p ea sa n t fa rm ers a s te m pora ry w ork ers a n d d ep ortin g th ose w ho re fu se d to a cc e p t th eir t e rm s.” 2 0 O n t h e F lo rid a p la n ta tio n o f t h e F an ju l b ro th ers , th e n oto rio u s C uban s u gar b aro n s, C arib bea n c a n e c u tt e rs e n gag ed in a w ork s to p pag e in N ove m ber 1 986 to p ro te st th eir w ag es b ein g lo w er th an th eir c o n tr a cts s tip u la te d . 21 A fe w days la te r, 385 w ork ers on th e pro p erty w ere ro u nded u p a t g u npoin t a n d d ep orte d , s o m e b are fo ot a n d w it h in ju rie s su sta in ed fr o m polic e dog bit e s. 2 2 Tod ay, th ere a re 2 57,6 66 m ostly M exic a n a n d C en tr a l A m eric a n w ork ers in th e U S under th e H -2 A te m pora ry fo re ig n ag ric u lt u ra l w ork er p ro g ra m . 23 T he D ep artm en ts o f S ta te , A gric u lt u re , Lab or, an d Hom ela n d Secu rit y have all a n nou nce d t h ey w ill b e “ s tr e a m lin in g” t h e p ro g ra m t o e a se re g u la tio n s fo r gro w er asso cia tio n s an d en su re la b or fle xib ilit y , a eu ph em is m fo r la b or su per-e xp lo it a tio n an d exp en dab ilit y . Hon esto Silv a Ib arra , a 28-y e a r-o ld f a rm work er o n a n H -2 A v is a , c o lla p se d o n th e S arb an an d F arm s in S um as, W ash in gto n , an d d ie d in A ugu st 2 017. P rio r to h is d ea th , Ib arr a a n d six h undre d o th er w ork ers h ad been giv e n th e ord er: “A l m en os qu e se esté n m urie n do, no fa lt e n ” (U nle ss yo u are dyin g, don ’t m is s w ork ). 2 4 D ays la te r, s e ve n ty o f h is fe llo w w ork ers h eld a s tr ik e to pro te st his dea th an d th eir mis tr e a tm en t, in clu din g la ck of hea lt h an d sa fe ty pro te ctio n s, m ea ls c o n ta m in ate d w it h in se cts , a n d p ic k in g q u ota s. T hey w ere p ro m ptly f ir e d , e vic te d , d ep orte d t o M exic o , a n d b la ck lis te d b y r e cru it e rs f r o m r e tu rn in g. A n um ber o f w ork ers a re n ow filin g c la ss a ctio n la w su it s f o r u n la w fu l t e rm in atio n a n d u se o f d ep orta tio n a s a n i n tim id atio n t a ctic a g ain st o rg an iz in g. T he co n cu rre n t e xp an sio n a n d p riv a tiz a tio n o f th e U S m ilit a ry h as le d to a n in cre a se in m ig ra n t w ork ers in th e m ilit a ry in du str ia l co m ple x. In ad dit io n to th e well- d ocu m en te d , priv a tiz e d killin g mach in e of fo re ig n m erc e n ary arm ie s lik e Bla ck w ate r op era tin g wit h “ im munit y an d im pu nit y ,” 2 5 th ou sa n ds of in vis ib le , lo w – w ag e w ork ers la b or under ou ts o u rc e d co n tr a cts . Sara h S tillm an re p orts th at a se ve n ty -t h ou sa n d-s tr o n g lo g is tic a l arm y of co ok s, cle a n ers , co n str u ctio n work ers , an d bea u tic ia n s s e rv e d th e U S m ilit a ry ’s d ea d ly o ccu patio n s in I r a q a n d A fg h an is ta n . S tillm an r e p orts th at th ese w ork ers were “ro b bed of w ag es, in ju re d w it h ou t co m pen sa tio n , su bje cte d to se xu al ass a u lt , an d held in co n dit io n s re se m blin g in den tu re d se rv it u de by th eir su bco n tr a cto r b osse s.” 2 6 O ne o f th e fir s t c o m pan ie s to b rin g m ig ra n t w ork ers to Ir a q w as H allib u rto n , a ls o t h e f ir s t m ajo r p riv a te p artn er in t h e o ccu patio n o f Ir a q a n d o n e o f th e o ccu patio n ’s la rg est c o rp ora te ben efic ia rie s. Form er U S vic e pre sid en t D ic k C hen ey w as a f o rm er c h air m an a n d C EO o f H allib u rto n a n d still re ta in ed sto ck o p tio n s in th e co m pan y w hen it w as aw ard ed a s e ve n -b illio n -d olla r g ove rn m en t c o n tr a ct. In th e m id -2 000s, w hen o n e th ou sa n d Ir a q is w ere k ille d w eek ly , Ir a q i fo rc e s b eg an ta rg etin g m ig ra n t w ork er co n vo ys to p re ssu re th ir d g ove rn m en ts in to r e fu sin g w ork fo r th e U S m ilit a ry . 2 7 In on e gru eso m e in cid en t, th ir te e n N ep ale se w ork ers w ere c o n tr a cte d b y a H allib u rto n s u bsid ia ry , u nder fa ls e p re te n se s, t o c o ok a n d c le a n f o r U S f o rc e s. Ne pal h ad alr e a d y b an ned m ig ra n t w ork ers fr o m g oin g to Ir a q a n d th ese w ork ers t h ou gh t t h ey w ere b ein g r e cru it e d t o Jo rd an , bu t t h eir p assp orts w ere c o n fis c a te d u pon a rriv a l in Jo rd an an d a H allib u rto n r e cru it e r fo rc ib ly t r a n sp orte d t h em t o A l Asa d A ir B ase in Ir a q . T here , tw elv e o f th e w ork ers w ere k id n ap ped , sh ot, an d beh ea d ed by th e Ansa r al- S unna A rm y. T he fa m ilie s o f th e s la in w ork ers w ere b arre d fr o m p u rs u in g lia b ilit y cla im s ag ain st th e m ilit a ry co n tr a cto rs a ft e r a US fe d era l ju dge fo u nd th e dea th s occu rre d extr a te rrit o ria lly , b eyo n d U S l e g al ju ris d ic tio n . 28 E ve n th ou gh mig ra n t work ers —p re ca rio u s an d dep orta b le — are s o m e o f th e m ost v u ln era b le d u rin g tim es o f eco n om ic cris is , th ey are th e most li k ely to be sc a p eg oate d fo r “s te a lin g” jo b s an d re so u rc e s. M ig ra n t w ork ers are dis c u rs iv e ly an d ph ysic a lly atta ck ed fo r “c a u sin g u nem plo ym en t” a n d b eco m e th e ta rg ets o f r is in g xe n op h ob ia . T he r e a l c u lp rit s —b osse s r e ce iv in g b on use s o r co rp ora te g ia n ts g ettin g b aile d o u t— get o ff sc o t fr e e. In M ala ysia , fo r exa m ple , mig ra n t work ers mostly fr o m B an gla d esh , In don esia , In dia , Ne pal, Vie tn am , an d M ya n m ar c o n stit u te o n e-f if t h o f t h e c o u ntr y ’s w ork fo rc e . I n a d dit io n to e n du rin g d an gero u s w ork in g co n dit io n s, th ey su rv iv e vig ila n te ab u se at th e han ds of Ik ata n R ela w an R ak ya t M ala ysia (R ELA ), a 500,0 00-s tr o n g para m ilit a ry g ro u p h untin g d ow n m ig ra n ts . 2 9 T his v o lu nte er m ilit ia w as cre a te d in t h e 1 970s t o t r a ck c o m munis ts a n d in 2 005 w as g iv e n le g al a u th orit y t o s to p p eo p le t o c h eck id en tif ic a tio n , ra id h om es, m ak e a rre sts w it h ou t w arra n ts , u se fir e a rm s, a n d e ve n ta k e o ve r m an ag em en t o f d ete n tio n ce n te rs . 3 0 A ft e r s c o re s o f te stim on ie s o f a ssa u lt a n d e xto rtio n , a n ew la w w as p asse d in 2 012 th at lim it s R ELA ’s en fo rc e m en t pow ers bu t m ain ta in s th e m ilit ia ’s ro le in su rv e illin g m ig ra n t w ork ers . A s s u ch , R ELA s e rv e s a k ey fu n ctio n in t h e M ala ysia n polit ic a l eco n om y: m ain ta in in g so cia l an d eco n om ic co n tr o l ove r a la rg e se ctio n of th e w ork fo rc e , d is c o u ra g in g m ig ra n t w ork ers f r o m le a vin g t h e e m plo ye r t o w hom th ey are bou nd, en su rin g fa st dep orta b ilit y in m om en ts of eco n om ic dow ntu rn , an d en tr e n ch in g th e “fo re ig n ness” o f a ll m ig ra n t w ork ers , re g ard le ss o f th eir le n gth o f r e sid en cy a n d l e g al s ta tu s. F iv e F ea tu re s o f M ig ra n t W ork er P ro g ra m s Mig ra n t w ork ers h ave a m yria d o f u niq u e e xp erie n ce s a n d in div id u al su bje ctiv it ie s. H ere I exa m in e th e fo rm s of structural pow er re g u la tin g th e li v e s of millio n s of te m pora ry m ig ra n t w ork ers a n d, h en ce , e xa ce rb atin g th eir v u ln era b ilit y . In an aly zin g la b or mig ra tio n pro g ra m s world w id e, D an ie l C osta an d Philip M artin fin d nota b le s im ila rit ie s acro ss ju ris d ic tio n s. 3 1 Low -w ag e mig ra n t w ork ers a re tie d to o n e e m plo ye r b y c o n tr a cts a n d v is a s an d c a n not b rin g th eir c h ild re n o r o th er fa m ily m em bers . They a re s u bje cte d t o d an gero u s w ork in g c o n dit io n s, f o rc e d la b or, lo n g w ork h ou rs w it h ou t ove rtim e p ay, an d w ag e th eft . M ost w ork ers are in deb te d to re cru it e rs . W ork ers fa ce le g al o r d e fa cto b arrie rs to u n io n iz a tio n , a re d en ie d a cce ss t o la b or p ro te ctio n s a n d s o cia l s e rv ic e s, a n d h ave n o re a l p ath to p erm an en t im mig ra tio n sta tu s. S pea k in g o u t ag ain st ab u se alm ost alw ays re su lt s in re ta lia tio n , te rm in atio n , d ep orta tio n , a n d b la ck lis tin g. A bu se s u nder te m pora ry la b or m ig ra tio n p ro g ra m s a re n ot a co in cid en ce . The m an ufa ctu re d vu ln era b ilit y of m ig ra n t w ork ers is b oth g en era te d b y a n d c o n stit u tiv e o f ra cia l ca p it a lis m ; th e arc h it e ctu re of la b or m ig ra tio n is intended to gu ara n te e ca p it a l accu m ula tio n an d uph old r a cia liz e d gen dere d cit iz e n sh ip . The next tw o ch ap te rs fo cu s o n t h e k afa la s y ste m in t h e A ra b G ulf r e g io n a n d t h e T em pora ry Fore ig n W ork er Pro g ra m in Can ad a. W hile r o u tin ely an d sin gu la rly co n dem ned in th e m ed ia , th e kafa la is not exce p tio n al. Lik e oth er m ig ra n t work er p ro g ra m s, th e kafa la is a fe a tu re of ra cia l- c a p it a lis t sta te cra ft w it h a p ro n ou nce d re lia n ce o n u n fr e e m ig ra n t w ork ers . I n c o m paris o n , t h e C an ad ia n p ro g ra m is u ph eld a s th e fiv e -s ta r m od el fo r la b or m ig ra tio n eve n th ou gh it s o rig in s an d cu rre n t co n fig u ra tio n are ro ote d in th e org an iz a tio n of la b or extr a ctio n w it h in a se ttle r-c o lo n ia l eco n om y. I delv e in to both pro g ra m s in th e fo llo w in g ch ap te rs an d dem on str a te th at th ey are str u ctu ra lly in fo rm ed b y s im ila r g lo b al d yn am ic s o f c a p it a l flo w s, la b or se g m en ta tio n , a n d re g im es o f e xclu sio n ary c it iz e n sh ip , a s d esc rib ed b elo w . Thou gh eve ry ju ris d ic tio n has dis tin ct re g u la tio n s gove rn in g mig ra n t work ers , fiv e ove rla p pin g fe a tu re s ch ara cte riz e m ost m ig ra n t w ork er pro g ra m s aro u nd th e w orld . F ir s t a n d fo re m ost, m ig ra n t w ork er p ro g ra m s a re s ta te – sa n ctio n ed p ro g ra m s o f indentured work. T hese p ro g ra m s ca n b e tr a ce d b ack to th e in den tu re sh ip o f m ore th an 1 .3 m illio n peo p le fr o m th e Sou th Asia n su bco n tin en t, fa cilit a te d b y t h e in te re sts o f e m pir e a n d e m erg in g c o lo n ia l sta te s. 3 2 T he B rit is h E ast In dia C om pan y an d th en th e B rit is h r a j r e g u la te d th e e m ig ra tio n o f in den tu re d w ork ers to su gar, co tto n , ru bber, an d te a pla n ta tio n s an d fo r ra ilr o ad c o n str u ctio n a cro ss th e B rit is h e m pir e , in clu din g to G uya n a, F iji , Ja maic a , K en ya , M ala ysia , M au rit iu s, S ou th A fr ic a , Tan za n ia , Trin id ad , an d U gan da, fo r nea rly on e ce n tu ry . Appro xim ate ly a qu arte r millio n of th ose in den tu re d w ere w om en , m an y o f w hom w ere s e x w ork ers , w id ow ed , or esc a p in g d om estic vio le n ce . 3 3 E ve n th ou gh in den tu re sh ip w as deem ed vo lu nta ry co n tr a ct la b or, th e m ove m en t o f m ostly c la ss – a n d c a ste -o p pre sse d S ou th A sia n in den tu re d la b or th ro u gh ou t th e B rit is h c o lo n ie s, a n d la te r o th er E uro p ea n co lo n ie s, cre a te d so m e o f th e fir s t sta te in te rv e n tio n s in m ig ra tio n a n d fa cilit a te d th e c o n dit io n s o f u nfr e e la b or m ig ra tio n . As part of an im peria l la b or str a te g y in th e a ft e rm ath o f th e fo rm al a b olit io n o f c h att e l sla ve ry , in den tu re d la b or main ta in ed a dis c ip lin ed ra cia liz e d la b or fo rc e su bord in ate d to co lo n ia l- c a p it a lis t p ro d u ctio n . T od ay’s m ig ra n t work ers are sim ila rly bou nd to a desig n ate d em plo ye r or se cto r, an d em plo ym en t is a re q u ir e m en t o f m ig ra tio n . E m plo ye rs c a n d is c a rd m ig ra n t w ork ers th ro u gh te rm in atio n a n d d ep orta tio n w hen th eir la b or is n o lo n ger n eed ed , a ctio n s h avin g m utu al b en efit t o c a p it a l a n d s ta te in te re sts in p ro vid in g a v a lv e to c o n tr o l u nem plo ym en t an d dem og ra p h ic s. M ig ra n t w ork ers are th ere fo re e it h er le g ally o r d e fa cto u n ab le to le a ve th eir e m plo ye r w it h ou t lo sin g th eir im mig ra tio n sta tu s, m ak in g th eir la b or in den tu re d . D avid M cNa lly w rit e s: “ It ’s n ot t h at g lo b al bu sin ess does not w an t im mig ra n t la b ou r to th e W est. It sim ply w an ts th is la b ou r on it s ow n te rm s: fr ig h te n ed , o p pre sse d , v u ln era b le .” 3 4 T his in den tu re sh ip is u nderw rit te n by ab le is m sin ce ca p it a li s m is alw ays u nderg ir d ed by ab le is t id ea s of pro d u ctiv it y . The IL O re co g n iz e s m ig ra n t w ork ers fa ce en dem ic co n dit io n s of co erc e d pro d u ctiv it y : “fo rc e d la b ou r, lo w w ag es, poor w ork in g co n dit io n s, vir tu al ab se n ce of so cia l pro te ctio n , den ia l of fr e ed om asso cia tio n an d un io n rig h ts , d is c rim in atio n an d xe n op h ob ia , as well as so cia l exclu sio n .” 3 5 T he M ig ra n ts ’ T ra d e U nio n in S ou th K ore a , o n e of th e world ’s most activ e mig ra n t work er o rg an iz a tio n s, la u nch ed w it h su sta in ed actio n s ag ain st la b or cra ck d ow ns a n d w ork er d ep orta tio n s. 3 6 C om pris e d m ostly o f S ou th A sia n a n d S ou th ea st A sia n w ork ers , th e unio n a d vo ca te d fo r a n e n d to in den tu re sh ip th ro u gh a n o p en w ork vis a sy ste m an d fu ll im mig ra tio n sta tu s fo r m ig ra n t w ork ers , a n d, in a h is to ric v ic to ry , w on t h e r ig h t t o u nio n c e rtif ic a tio n i n 2 015. S eco n d, mig ra n t work er pro g ra m s are a fo rm of legalized segregation. I n den tu re sh ip f a cilit a te d b y t h e s ta te le g ally sa n ctio n s th e str a tif ic a tio n of la b or ca st as ra cia liz e d ou ts id ers . Desp it e work in g alo n gsid e cit iz e n w ork ers , m ig ra n t w ork ers a re d if fe re n tia lly in clu ded in t h e natio n -s ta te . M ig ra n t w ork ers ca n re tu rn to th e sa m e co m munit y an d w ork p la ce fo r se ve ra l gen era tio n s, bu t bein g le g ally cla ssif ie d as “te m pora ry ” or “fo re ig n ” co n ce p tu ally pla ce s th em ou ts id e th e natio n -s ta te an d ou ts id e th e bou nds of belo n gin g. W ork ers are oft e n sp atia lly an d so cia lly se g re g ate d : th ey are hou se d in s e p ara te la b or ca m ps, th ey are unpro te cte d by natio n al la b or la w s o r u nio n iz a tio n , th ey a re u n ab le to fu lly a cce ss p u blic se rv ic e s su ch as hea lt h ca re , an d th eir fa m ily m em bers c a n not a cco m pan y t h em . T he e n tir e c o st o f s o cia l re p ro d u ctio n is b orn e b y m ig ra n t w ork ers th em se lv e s a n d, as S usa n F erg u so n a n d D avid M cNa lly p u t fo rw ard , “th e so cia l re p ro d u ctio n of th e g lo b al w ork in g cla ss cru cia lly e n ta ils p ro ce sse s of m ig ra tio n an d ra cia liz a tio n th at are in se p ara b le fr o m it s cla ss an d gen der dim en sio n s.” 3 7 M ig ra n t w ork er p ro g ra m s th ere fo re r e p re se n t a n e xtr e m e neo lib era liz a tio n of both im mig ra tio n an d la b or polic ie s, w here th e delib era te desig n of natio n al an d ra cia l d if fe re n ce re su lt s in “in te rn al se g re g atio n in host c o u ntr ie s.” 3 8 T hir d , a s s u ch , m ig ra n t w ork er p ro g ra m s a re a fo rm o f neoliberal insourcing , t h e f lip sid e o f n eo lib era l o u ts o u rc in g. T he den ia l of perm an en t re sid en cy is pre cis e ly what cre a te s an extr a n atio n al se g m en ta tio n of la b or. Eve n th ou gh m ig ra n t w ork ers are la b orin g alo n gsid e cit iz e n s, th eir la b or pow er an d so cia l re la tio n s are org an iz e d to o xy m oro n ic a lly p osit io n t h em a s “ fo re ig n .” T his m ain ta in s a g lo b al d iv is io n o f la b or p ools , r e in fo rc e s a b ord er w it h in t h e in te rn atio n al w ork in g c la ss, a n d s e g m en ts m ig ra n t w ork ers a s “ T hir d W orld ” w ork ers . L ik e t h e o u ts o u rc e d w ork fo rc e i n e xp ort pro ce ssin g zo n es an d maq u ila d ora s, mig ra n t w ork ers a re s u bje ct t o s u ppre sse d w ag es a n d in te n se la b or d is c ip lin e. H en ce , in so u rc e d a n d o u ts o u rc e d la b or a re tw o sid es o f t h e s a m e c a p it a lis t c o in : d elib era te ly d efla te d la b or p ow er im bric a te d w it h h ie ra rc h ie s o f ra ce , c a ste , g en der, s e xu alit y , an d cit iz e n sh ip . Crit ic a lly , mig ra n t work er p ro g ra m s m ak e it c le a r t h at b ord ers d o n ot c o lla p se u nder n eo lib era l glo b aliz a tio n ; ra th er, bord er im peria lis m se g m en ts la b or an d acts as a sp atia l fix fo r ca p it a l accu m ula tio n . 39 M ig ra n t w ork ers th ere fo re re p re se n t th e id ea l, in so u rc e d w ork fo rc e ; th ey are co m mod if ie d an d exp lo it a b le , f le xib le a n d e xp en dab le . F ou rth , m ig ra n t w ork er p ro g ra m s c o n stit u te a distinct mode of racialization , b oth th e re su lt o f a n d re p ro d u cin g ra cis m . C la ss re la tio n s c a n not b e re d u ce d to re la tio n s o f p ro d u ctio n , an d, as B re n na B han dar note s, “[r ]a ce an d ra cis m , g en der, a n d se xu alit y sh ap e th e n atu re a n d fo rm th at cla ss re la tio n s ta k e a n d, sig n if ic a n tly , h ow th ey a re e xp erie n ce d .” 4 0 The deva lu atio n of m ig ra n t w ork ers is a n im ate d by th e sp ecif ic deva lu atio n of th e ra cia liz e d b od ie s p erfo rm in g t h e w ork . M ig ra n t w ork er p ro g ra m s a re n ot o n ly r a cia lly d is c rim in ato ry ; t h ey a re t h em se lv e s a r a ce – m ak in g re g im e. M ig ra n t w ork ers a re ra cia lly c o n str u cte d a n d o rd ere d th ro u gh th e v e ry d esig n o f th ese p ro g ra m s a s a d is tin ct a n d se g re g ate d la b or re g im e. C ap it a li s m re lie s b oth o n th e d iv is io n o f la b or and th e d iv is io n o f la b ore rs . R acia liz e d , a s w ell a s g en dere d , d iv is io n s a re s u pple m en te d b y d iv is io n s b etw een c it iz e n w ork ers a n d m ig ra n t w ork ers , w hat San dro M ezza d ra an d Bre tt Ne ils o n te rm th e “m ult ip lic a tio n o f la b or,” e m ph asiz in g th e h ete ro g en eit y o f la b or b if u rc a te d b y a b ord er. 4 1 T he d en ia l o f p erm an en t im mig ra tio n sta tu s to mig ra n t work ers an d th eir r a cia liz a tio n a s “fo re ig n ers ” n orm aliz e s ra cis m . R ace is a c o n tin gen t s tr u ctu re , a n d t h is d is tin ct o rd erin g o f le g al- b u t- d ep orta b le la b or g en era te s s tr u ctu ra l h ie ra rc h ie s b etw een ra cia liz e d m ig ra n t w ork ers a n d c it iz e n w ork ers , a n d f u rth er a ffix e s r a ce t o c it iz e n sh ip . F if t h , m ig ra n t w ork er p ro g ra m s a re a carceral regime wit h in te n se c o n tr o l, d is c ip lin e, a n d s u rv e illa n ce o f n ot o n ly la b or c o n dit io n s o r im mig ra tio n sta tu s b u t th e to ta lit y o f lif e . C arc e ra l s p ace s a re “ s it e s a n d r e la tio n s o f p ow er th at en ab le a n d in ce n tiv iz e t h e s y ste m atic c a p tu re , c o n tr o l, a n d co n fin em en t of hum an bein gs th ro u gh th e str u ctu re s of im mob ilit y an d dis p osse ssio n .” 4 2 Mig ra n t work ers ro u tin ely re p ort th e co n fis c a tio n of id en tif ic a tio n d ocu m en ts an d passp orts , lo n g w ork hou rs , w ag e th eft , fo rc e d la b or, vio le n ce , im posit io n of cu rfe w s, den ia l of vis it o rs an d ph on e acce ss , fo od dep riv a tio n , an d bein g lo ck ed in an d p re ve n te d fr o m le a vin g em plo ye r-p ro vid ed a cco m mod atio n s— all of w hic h le a ve th em im mob iliz e d . This is partic u la rly heig h te n ed fo r mig ra n t dom estic w ork ers ; a r e ce n t r e p ort o n t h e a b u se o f m ig ra n t d om estic w ork ers in L eb an on is fit tin gly tit le d “T heir H om e Is M y Pris o n .” 4 3 L ik e p ris o n s, m ig ra n t w ork er p ro g ra m s m an ag e su rp lu s pop u la tio n s an d dis c ip lin e la b or th ro u gh ra cia l so cia l o rd erin g, c it iz e n sh ip r e g u la tio n , a n d r e str u ctu rin g o f ca p it a l– la b or re la tio n s in n atio n al la b or m ark ets . W e se e th e lo g ic o f p la n ta tio n r e la tio n s o p era tin g h ere : to c a p tu re la b or w hile a ls o e xce ed in g th e lo g ic o f la b or a lo n e, o r, a s F re d M ote n arg u es, “m ore th an ju st th e co n stit u tiv e o u ts id e o f b ou rg eo is c a p it a li s m .” 4 4 D om estic W ork a n d G lo b al C are C hain s I would get about three to four hours sleep. I would be constantly washing or ironing clothes and if the clothes were not clean enough I would have to wash and iron them again. My hands split and bled because of the work. —M ig ra n t w ork er i n Q ata r, q u ote d i n A m nesty In te rn atio n al, “My Sleep Is My Break”: Exploitation of Migrant Domestic W orkers in Qatar The fiv e fe a tu re s of mig ra n t work er pro g ra m s are e xe m plif ie d in d om estic w ork , w here a g ro w in g p ro p ortio n o f w ork ers are m ig ra n ts in gen dere d , se xu aliz e d , an d ra cia liz e d p osit io n s of p re ca rit y . T he u neve n ly g en dere d w ork o f t h e s o cia l r e p ro d u ctio n o f l a b or w it h in t h e d om estic s p h ere , an esse n tia l co n dit io n fo r th e re p ro d u ctio n of ca p it a lis m , m ea n s t h e p riv a te d om ain o f t h e h om e h as lo n g been a s it e o f s tr u ggle to m ak e th is fe m in iz a tio n o f la b or vis ib le . T he In te rn atio n al W ag es fo r H ou se w ork c a m paig n in t h e 1 970s, le d b y M arx is t f e m in is ts , d em an ded t h at c la ss str u ggle in clu de w om en ’s u npaid d om estic la b or a s a p illa r of p atr ia rc h al c is h ete ro n u cle a r o rg an iz a tio n a n d c a p it a lis t a ccu m ula tio n . W hile th e slo g an fo cu se d on w ag es, th e ca m paig n ers m ad e c le a r it w as a r h eto ric a l d evic e t o m ak e h ou se w ork vis ib le an d hig h lig h t patr ia rc h al so cia l str u ctu rin g u nder c a p it a lis m . R aj P ate l e stim ate s th at th e va lu e o f w om en ’s u npaid w ork c o n stit u te s m ore th an h alf t h e w orld ’s e n tir e la b or o u tp u t. 4 5 In 2 020, th e New York Times p eg ged th e v a lu e o f w om en ’s u n paid la b or a ro u nd th e world at an ove rw helm in g $10.9 tr il lio n . 46 This n atu ra liz a tio n of re p ro d u ctiv e w ork as u n paid , g en dere d w ork la ys th e fo u ndatio n fo r u n derp aid d om estic w ork in t h e w ag e eco n om y. M aria M ie s w rit e s, “W om en are th e op tim al la b ou r fo rc e beca u se th ey are now bein g univ e rs a lly d efin ed a s ‘h ou se w iv e s,’ n ot a s w ork ers ; th is m ea n s t h eir w ork , w heth er in c o m mod it y p ro d u ctio n o r u se v a lu e, i s o b sc u re d .” 4 7 T he racialized , fe m in iz e d natu re of dom estic an d re p ro d u ctiv e w ork fu rth er desta b il iz e s th e m oorin gs of d om estic w ork as w om en ’s “n atu ra l w ork .” P atr ic ia H ill C ollin s arg u es, “T he assu m ed sp lit betw een th e ‘p u blic ’ sp h ere of paid em plo ym en t an d th e ‘p riv a te ’ sp h ere of u npaid fa m ily re sp on sib ilit ie s has neve r w ork ed fo r U S Bla ck wom en .” 4 8 The In te rn atio n al Bla ck W om en fo r W ag es fo r Hou se w ork ca m paig n sp ecif ic a lly lin ked u nw ag ed hou se w ork to re p ara tio n s fo r sla ve ry an d im peria lis m , dra w in g lin ks betw een th e su bsid iz a tio n of ca p it a lis m by fa cto ry w ag es an d un w ag ed la b or in th e hom e an d on pla n ta tio n s, str e n gth en ed th ro u gh im mig ra tio n co n tr o ls an d la w s c rim in aliz in g se x w ork . “B la ck /T hir d W orld w om en in te rn atio n ally , th e m ajo rit y o f th e m ajo rit y o f th e w orld ’s p eo p le , c a rry th e m ajo r b u rd en o f th e w orld ’s w ork a n d g et th e le a st w ea lt h in re tu rn ,” t h ey d esc rib ed . 49 B la ck w om en in th e U S w ere k id n ap ped fr o m t h eir c h ild re n a n d v io le n tly e n sla ve d in h om es, w here th ey w ere f o rc e d t o c o ok , c le a n , a n d c a re f o r a n d a ct a s w et n urs e s f o r w hit e c h ild re n . E ve n a ft e r t h e f o rm al a b olit io n o f ch atte l s la ve ry , M arv e l C ook e a n d E lla B ak er w ro te a b ou t th e h undre d s o f str e et co rn ers in N ew Y ork , w hic h th ey re fe rre d to a s “ s la ve m ark ets ,” w here B la ck w om en w ere h ir e d a s d om estic d ay l a b ore rs b y w hit e e m plo ye rs . 5 0 B efo re s h e w as d ep orte d , C la u dia Jo nes s p en t m uch o f th e 1 940s a n d 1 950s ra is in g th e is su es o f B la ck d om estic w ork ers . S he ch astis e d u nio n s fo r th eir fa ilu re to ce n te r d om estic w ork ers : “ It is m ere ly li p s e rv ic e fo r p ro g re ssiv e u nio n is ts to sp ea k o f o rg an iz in g th e u norg an iz e d w it h ou t tu rn in g th eir eye s to th e p li g h t o f th e d om estic w ork er, w ho, u n pro te cte d b y u nio n s ta n dard s, is a ls o th e v ic tim o f exclu sio n fr o m all so cia l an d la b or le g is la tio n .” 5 1 She arg u ed t h at B la ck w ork in g w om en a re “ th e m ost o p pre sse d str a tu m o f t h e w hole p op u la tio n ” a n d “ fa r o u t o f p ro p ortio n to oth er w om en w ork ers , are th e m ain b re a d w in ners in t h eir fa m ilie s.” 5 2 Jo n es fo cu se d on th e B la ck dom estic w ork er, w hose s u per-e xp lo it a tio n w as ju stif ie d t h ro u gh t h e “w hit e c h au vin is t s te re o ty p e a s to w here h er p la ce s h ou ld b e.” 5 3 D om estic work er str u ggle s have la rg ely been m arg in aliz e d in m ain str e a m fe m in is t a n d la b or m ove m en ts b eca u se of th is his to ry of dom estic w ork as a Bla ck , fe m in iz e d se cto r in th e hyp ers u rv e ille d an d priv a tiz e d d om ain o f th e h om e— ch ara cte riz e d b y a m aste r–s erv a n t, n ot em plo ye r– e m plo ye e , re la tio n an d exe m plif ie d by te rm in olo g y lik e “th e help .” D ue to le g al an d de fa cto s e g re g atio n , 9 0 p erc e n t of B la ck w ork in g w om en in th e so u th ern U S w ere dom estic w ork ers w ho en du re d lo n g hou rs , ea rn ed lo w wag es, an d exp erie n ce d in te n se d is c ip lin e a n d vio le n ce . 5 4 L in kin g sla ve ry o f th e p ast to s e rv it u de o f th e p re se n t, th ou sa n ds o f w ork ers o rg an iz e d fr o m th e 195 0s on w ard , re d efin in g dom estic w ork an d win nin g im porta n t vic to rie s su ch as th e in clu sio n of d om estic la b or in w ag e a n d h ou r la w s. 5 5 P re m illa N ad ase n w rit e s, “D om estic w ork , so re p re se n ta tiv e o f w hit e ra cia l o p pre ssio n f o r t h e A fr ic a n A m eric a n c o m munit y , b eca m e a n im porta n t p la tfo rm f o r t h e p olit ic s o f b la ck l i b era tio n .” 5 6 T he cu rre n t in te rn atio n al div is io n of la b or has als o c re a te d an in te rn atio n al div is io n of dom estic la b or. A cco rd in g t o t h e I L O , a n e stim ate d s ix ty -s e ve n m illio n a d u lt d om estic w ork ers are em plo ye d w orld w id e, of w hom 8 0 p erc e n t are wom en . 57 Six ty -s ix perc e n t of dom estic w ork ers in h ig h -in co m e c o u ntr ie s a re m ig ra n t w ork ers . 5 8 T he exp an sio n of ca p it a lis t re la tio n s an d in tr o d u ctio n of w om en ’s w ag ed w ork h ave tr a n sfo rm ed g lo b al c o n dit io n s of s o cia l re p ro d u ctio n a n d la b or re la tio n s. T he c o n ce p t o f “g lo b al c h ain s o f c a re ” r e fe rs t o t h e t r a n sn atio n al n etw ork s of p aid a n d u npaid ca re w ork , fo rm ed to re p ro d u ce a n d m ain ta in lif e in a r a n ge o f s e ttin gs, fr o m th e p riv a te h om e to th e se n io r hom e. 5 9 T he glo b al ca re ch ain li n ks lo w – in co m e w om en o p pre sse d b y ra ce , c a ste , c la ss, se xu alit y , a n d n atio n alit y t o t h eir e m plo ye rs , p riv ile g ed b y t h ose s a m e hie ra rc h ie s in th e ad va n ce d ca p it a li s t co u ntr ie s of th e G lo b al N orth a n d, in cre a sin gly , a ls o th e G lo b al S ou th . In t u rn , m ig ra n t w ork ers ’ o w n fa m ilie s—o ft e n fo rb id den fr o m acco m pan im en t— are c a re d fo r b y o th er fa m ily m em bers o r an oth er ch ain of dom estic work ers . Care ch ain s are m ult ip lie d as a re su lt of neo lib era l an d str u ctu ra l ad ju stm en t p olic ie s. In h ig h -in co m e, im peria lis t c o u ntr ie s, a u ste rit y m ea su re s h ave p riv a tiz e d s e n io r c a re , h ea lt h ca re , a n d c h ild ca re , t h us s h if t in g f e m in iz e d c a re w ork a w ay f r o m p u blic in stit u tio n s in to t h e p riv a te a n d p riv a tiz e d d om ain o f th e h om e. In m an y c o u ntr ie s in th e G lo b al S ou th , c o lo n ia l le g acie s o f im pove ris h m en t, co u ple d wit h in te n sif ie d ca p it a lis t e xp ro p ria tio n , h ave c o m pelle d c ir c u it s o f la b or m ig ra tio n . For in sta n ce , la b or m ig ra tio n p olic y w as fir s t in tr o d u ce d in t h e Philip pin es under th e US-b ack ed dic ta to rs h ip of F erd in an d M arc o s, an d th e co u ntr y is now on e of th e la rg est la b or-e xp ortin g c o u ntr ie s in t h e w orld . T en p erc e n t of th e pop u la tio n w ork ove rs e a s, an d m ig ra n t dom estic w ork ers c o n stit u te a w hop pin g 7 0 p erc e n t o f a ll m ig ra n t w ork ers le a vin g th e co u ntr y . 6 0 US im peria lis m has in flu en ce d th is exo d u s. Soon aft e r Fre d eric k Ja ck so n T urn er d ecla re d th e a rc h ip ela g o a n A m eric a n fr o n tie r, th e P hilip pin es b eca m e a U S c o lo n y, w hic h it re m ain ed fr o m 1 898 u ntil 1 946. A ppro xim ate ly 1 .4 m illio n p eo p le w ere k ille d du rin g th e Philip pin e-A m eric a n war, where w ate rb oard in g a n d s c o rc h ed -e a rth t a ctic s w ere fir s t b attle – te ste d b y th e U S. 61 U nder c o lo n ia l r u le , w ork ers fr o m th e P hilip pin es w ere r e cru it e d b y t h e H aw aiia n S ugar P la n te rs ’ A sso cia tio n to w ork th e p la n ta tio n s a n d s e rv e U S im peria l in te re sts t h ere . E ve n a ft e r t h e P hilip pin es w on in dep en den ce , c o n dit io n s lik e a fix e d exch an ge ra te b etw een th e p eso an d d olla r w ere im pose d to pro te ct US co m pan ie s. W it h in tw o deca d es, t h e P hilip pin es w as f o rc e d t o f o llo w t h e d ic ta te s o f IM F an d W orld Ban k str u ctu ra l ad ju stm en t pro g ra m s. W orld Ban k le n din g in cre a se d a sta g gerin g eig h tfo ld d u rin g t h e p erio d o f m artia l la w , a n d M arc o s s u bse q u en tly m an date d b u dget a p pro p ria tio n fo r d eb t se rv ic e , m ak in g th e Philip pin es th e on ly co u ntr y in th e w orld w it h an au to m atic deb t ap pro p ria tio n la w . 62 Cau gh t in a deb t sp ir a l, th e im pact was se ve re : pu blic se rv ic e s were p riv a tiz e d , c u rre n cy w as d eva lu ed , u se r fe e s w ere ra is e d , fo od p ro d u ctio n w as in du str ia liz e d a n d g ea re d fo r e xp ort, a n d w ag es w ere d ep re ss e d . T he c o u ntr y a ls o s e rv e d a s a p ilo t pro je ct fo r th e World Ban k’s glo b al urb an d eve lo p m en t s tr a te g y, s la tin g s lu m s f o r r e d eve lo p m en t a n d dis p la cin g poor peo p le , while gen era tin g pro fit s fo r deve lo p ers . 6 3 Again st th is back d ro p , th e in stit u tio n aliz a tio n o f la b or m ig ra tio n b eca m e a m ea n s o f q u ellin g d is se n t, s h rin kin g lo ca l u nem plo ym en t a n d p ove rty r a te s, u sin g re m it ta n ce s to se rv ic e d eb t, a n d p osit io n in g th e P hilip pin es in th e g lo b al e co n om ic o rd er a s a s u pplie r o f r a cia liz e d a n d g en dere d la b or, c o n sta n tly p ro d u ce d a n d dis c ip lin ed . M ig ra n te In te rn atio n al c a lls th e g ove rn m en t’s l a b or e xp ort p olic y “ s ta te -s p on so re d h u m an t r a ffic k in g.” 6 4 T he fe m in iz a tio n o f p ove rty , th e fe m in iz a tio n o f la b or, a n d th e fe m in iz a tio n o f m ig ra tio n , th ere fo re , in te rs e ct a n d are su sta in ed by a m atr ix of ra cia l, im peria l, an d cla ss p ow er. S ilv ia F ed eric i arg u es th at th e la b or of m ig ra n t dom estic work ers co n tr ib u te s to th e accu m ula tio n of w ea lt h fo r m id dle -c la ss an d ric h w om en in ad va n ce d , ca p it a lis t co u ntr ie s, who beco m e “lib era te d ” fr o m h ou se w ork in ord er to clim b co rp ora te la d ders . For F ed eric i, m ig ra n t d om estic w ork ers a re “ a c o lo n ia l s o lu tio n to t h e ‘h ou se w ork p ro b le m .’” 6 5 T his e xp lo it a tiv e d iv is io n o f la b or c e m en ts th e h ie ra rc h ie s b etw een m id dle – a n d u pper- c la ss w hit e w om en in t h e s o -c a lle d p ro d u ctiv e e co n om y a n d lo w -in co m e ra cia liz e d m ig ra n t w om en in th e u nderv a lu ed a n d underp aid eco n om y of dom estic la b or. Brid get A nders o n m ain ta in s th at em plo yin g d om estic w ork ers in t h e h om e c o n so lid ate s s o cia l s ta tu s a n d c la ss, a n d t h at t h e hig h ly exp lo it a tiv e co n dit io n s ass o cia te d w it h dom estic w ork e xis t b eca u se it is “ th e w ork er’s ‘p ers o n hood ,’ r a th er th an h er la b ou r p ow er, w hic h t h e e m plo ye r is a tte m ptin g t o b u y.” 6 6 In re sp on se to th ese exp lo it a tiv e la b or re la tio n s an d ca rc e ra l so cia l fo rm atio n s, th e In te rn atio n al Dom estic W ork ers Fed era tio n brin gs to g eth er dom estic w ork ers ’ u nio n s a n d a sso cia tio n s fr o m A fr ic a , A sia , th e C arib bea n , C en tr a l A m eric a , S ou th a n d No rth A m eric a , a n d E uro p e. T he fir s t g lo b al u nio n o rg an iz a tio n r u n b y w om en , it w on a his to ric D ece n t W ork fo r D om estic W ork ers C on ve n tio n , ad op te d b y th e IL O in 2 0 11. G era ld in e P ra tt a n d M ig ra n te B C pow erfu lly arg u e, “A lt h ou gh dom estic work is f e m in iz e d , th e str e n gth of dom estic w ork er org an iz in g dis ru pts t h e c o n ve n tio n al im ag es o f f e m in in it y a n d m ust b e u nders to od in te rm s o f th e sp atia lit y a n d m ate ria lit ie s o f d om estic w ork ers ’ liv e s.” 6 7 Aro u nd th e w orld , m ig ra n t w ork ers a re sp ea rh ea d in g v it a l la b or, fe m in is t, a n tir a cis t, a n d m ig ra n t ju stic e c a m paig n s c a llin g f o r a n e n d t o p olic ie s o f te m pora ry la b or m ig ra tio n th at fa cilit a te ra cia liz e d , gen dere d in den tu re sh ip base d on cit iz e n sh ip sta tu s. M ig ra n t work er netw ork s su ch as Alia n za Am eric a s, In te rn atio n al Tra d e Unio n Con fe d era tio n , La Via C am pesin a, M ig ra n t F oru m in A sia , P an -A fr ic a n Ne tw ork in D efe n se of M ig ra n ts ’ R ig h ts , an d W om en in M ig ra tio n N etw ork a re m ob iliz in g a cro ss b ord ers a n d d em an din g t h e rig h t to p erm an en t re sid en cy u pon a rriv a l, fu ll a cce ss to s o cia l se rv ic e s, p ro te ctio n o f c o lle ctiv e b arg ain in g rig h ts , a n d l iv in g w ag es f o r a ll.
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Justice, Powe R, and Poli tics coedito Rs | Heathe r Ann Thompson and Rhonda Y. Williams edito Rial adviso Ry Boa Rd | Peniel E . Joseph, Daryl Maeda, Barbara Ransby, Vicki L. Ruiz, and Marc Stein The Just ice, Power, and Politics series publishes new works in history that explore the myriad struggles for justice, battles for power, and shifts in politics that have shaped the United States over time. Through the lenses of just i ce, power, and politics, the series seeks to broaden scholarly debates about America’s past as well as to inform public discussions about its future. More information on the series, including a complete list of books published, is available at http://justicepowerandpolitics.com/. Race for P R ofit How Banks and t He Real estate In dust Ry unde Rm Ined Blac k Homeowne RsHI p Keeanga- Yamahtta Taylor tfe unive Rsity of noRtf caRolina P Ress cfa Pel fill This book was published with the assistance of the John Hope Franklin Fund of the University of North Carolina Press. © 2019 Keeanga- Yamaht ta Taylor All rights reserved Designed by April Leidig Set in Garamond by Copperline Book Services Manufactured in the United States of America The University of North Carolina Press has been a member of the Green Press Initiative since 2003. Cover photo: Child on steps of a North Philadelphia row house, August 1973 (photo by Dick Swanson; courtesy U.S. National Archives, photo no. 412- DA-10 279) Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Taylor, Keeanga-Yamahtta, author. Title: Race for profit : how banks and the real estate industry undermined black homeownership / by Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor. Other titles: Justice, power, and politics. Description: Chapel Hill : University of North Carolina Press, [2019] | Series: Justice, power, and politics | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2019014012| ISBN 97814696f3662 (cloth : alk. paper) | ISBN 97814696f3679 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH : Discrimination in housing—United States—History—20th century. | Discrimination in mortgage loans—United States—History—20th century. | Urban African Americans—Housing—History—20th century. | African American women—Housing—History—20th century. | Real estate business—United States— History—20th century. | United States—Race relations—Economic aspects. Classification: LCC HD7288.76.U6 T89 2019 | DDC 363 .f/1— d c 2 3 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019014012 For Lauren contents List of Illustrations ix Abbre viations and Acronyms in the Text xi int Roduction Homeowner’s Business 1 1 Unfair Housing 2f 2 The Business of the Urban Housing Crisis ff 3 Forced Integration 93 4 Let the Buyer Beware 133 5 Unsophisticated Buyers 167 6 The Urban Crisis Is Over— Long Live the Urban Crisis! 211 conclusion Predatory Inclusion 2f3 Ackn owledgments 263 Note s 269 Bibli ography 303 I nd ex 33f int Roduction Homeowner’s Business On September 18, 1970, Janice J ohnson bought her first home in Philadel – phia with a mortgage guaranteed by the Federal Housing Administration ( bHA). In the now voluminous histories documenting the origins, policies, and practices of the bHA , Janice Johnson stands out as an atypical homebuyer. 1 She was a Black single mother on welfare and living about as far from a “racially homogenous” suburb as one could get. Johnson and her eight- year- old son ma de their home in a working- class B lack neighborhood in Northeast Philadelphia in a decay – ing apartment in a building that had recently been condemned by city officials. Now facing eviction, Johnson needed to quickly find a new place to live, when her mother told her of an apartment for rent in the same neighborhood. Johnson called the landlord in anticipation, but her hopes were dashed when he told her that she could not rent the apartment because she was a welfare recipient. 2 All was not lost, however; the landlord suggested that instead of renting, Jan – ice Johnson could buy the house at 2043 West Stella Street. Under the terms of a new program created by the Department of Housing and Urban Development ( HUD ), low- income a nd poor people were now able to purchase homes with a small down payment and a low- intere st, government- insured m ortgage backed by the bHA . Backing from the bHA removed the risk from banks and other lend – ers who for many decades claimed to avoid lending in areas like Janice Johnson’s neighborhood because of the assumption of financial risk in doing so. Lenders could now dispense money freely, as the bHA promised that the federal govern – ment would repay all delinquent loans. Janice Johnson met with the landlord- turned – real- estate – agent, a man recalled as “Mr. Zade,” to look at the house, and she liked it. Mr. Zade assured her that 2 i nt Roduction she was getting a “good house” because it had been “approved” by the bHA . Zade advised Johnson to contact her welfare caseworker because she would need to complete some paperwork to verify her eligibility for the program. Just weeks before Janice Johnson was to move into her new home, however, Zade called to inform her that the floor of the house had collapsed and she would no longer be able to buy it, but he had another house at 2013 West Stella that was “even bet – ter.” Johnson was concerned, but by the end of August she was facing eviction proceedings from her condemned apartment. Johnson, with her young son to care for, was desperate. Within two weeks the transaction was complete. Zade had contacted a mortgage banking company called Security Mortgage Services, and the company approved Johnson for an bHA- backed loan in the amount of $f,800. The widespread access to homeownership across the United States in the af – termath of World War II cemented it as a fundamental feature of the cultural conceptions of citizenship and belonging. This was especially true for African Americans. Indeed, the very first civil rights bill to be enacted in 1866 tethered the right to purchase property to freedom and citizenship: “All persons born in the United States without regard to any previous condition of slavery or invol – untary servitude . . . shall have t he same right, in every State and Territory in the United States, to make and enforce contracts, to sue, be parties, and give evi – dence, to inherit, purchase, lease, sell, hold, and convey real and personal prop – erty, as is enjoyed by white citizens.” 3 This American particularity of property rights as an expression of citizenship was reinforced in the 1948 landmark Shelley v. Kraemer decision that affirmed, “Equality in the enjoyment of property rights was regarded . . . as an esse ntial pre- condit ion to the realization of other basic civil rights and liberties.” 4 Despite the insistence on the rights of property ownership as integral to citi – zenship, African Americans faced numerous obstacles in their efforts to secure homeownership. But in the ascendant and optimistic rhetoric of the postwar period, Black citizens expected to finally be able to share in those rights “enjoyed by whites.” Not only were these expectations shaped by the growing prominence of homeownership as symbolic of the good life in the United States, but they were amplified through the exhortations of U.S. presidents, including Harry S. Truman, who declared a “decent home” 5 as the “goal” of federal policy, and Dwight D. Eisenhower, who described “good housing” as a “major objective of national policy” and stated that it was “necessary for good citizenship and good health among our people.” 6 Neither president was referencing homeownership i nt Roduction 3 in particular, but certainly by the 19f0s, it had become the preferred means of shelter in both public tastes and public policy. For Janice Johnson, though, homeownership was not the fulfillment of the American dream; it was the beginning of an American nightmare. Within days of moving into her new home, the sewer line broke, spewing wastewater all over the basement floor. The electricity for the house was sporadic and haphazard. There were holes and other irregularities in the foundation of the home. All of the windows in Johnson’s new house were nailed shut and inoperable. The floorboards in her dining room were so rotten that she feared her dining room table would collapse through the floor. The compromised structure of the house was not the worst of it. On Halloween night, Johnson’s son, Edward, woke up to find a rat in his bed. Janice saw rats throughout her house, including in the kitchen and bathroom. Apparently, the holes in the basement harbored nests of rats that regularly entered the house. She called Zade to complain about the condition of her new house. He sent workmen out on a couple of occasions, and they even patched the failing plaster in her dining room; but soon after, the real estate agent reminded her that the problems in her house were now her own. They were “ homeowner’s business.” Race for Profit: How Bank s and the Real Estate Industry Undermined Black Homeownership examines the critical turn in U.S. housing policy when the bHA , housed within HUD , ended its long practice of redlining, instead turning to new policies that encouraged low- income A frican Americans to become homeown- ers in the 1970s. After years during which Black citizens’ access to conventional means of financing the purchase of a home had been undermined, the social upheaval and urban rebellions of the 1960s finally forced the federal govern – ment to relent. The low- income h omeownership programs, the first of their kind, utilized federal subsidies, long amortization periods, and mortgage insurance guarantees to entice the participation of the real estate industry while also mak – ing homeownership affordable and accessible to poor and working- class Af rican Americans. These programs generated unprecedented real estate sales in Black urban communities across the country. But the transition from the exclusionary policies of HUD and the bHA to inclusion into the world of urban real estate sales was fraught with problems. In Race for Profit , I argue that this unprecedented public- privat e partnership in the production of low- income housing tethered HUD and the bHA to real 4 i nt Roduction estate brokers, mortgage bankers, and homebuilders. These partnerships were troubled from their inception because of the real estate industry’s long history of racial discrimination against and demonization of African Americans as unfit owners and detrimental to property values. Generous government financial out – lays and the near- satura tion of white homeownership helped the real estate in – dustry overcome its reluctance to sell and lend to African Americans it believed presented a risk or threat to accruing value within the real estate market. The transformation in bHA policy did not immediately change the practices or the beliefs that motivated the practices within the real estate industry—or among agents working within the bHA . The shift did, however, facilitate the participa – tion of broader networks of real estate operatives and lenders who circulated billions of new dollars throughout the urban housing market. The declensional framing of “inner cities” and “urban crisis” in urban studies of the 1960s and 1970s belies the dynamic and innovative methods of financ – ing generated to develop the urban housing market. The tendency to view the postriot city as trapped in the stasis of blight, flight, and the inevitability of decay over time misses how the late 1960s and the 1970s were defined by chang – ing political, social, and economic dynamics, and how the inner city was at the nexus of these processes. New financial instruments, such as mortgage- backed securities, produced an intense demand for more homeowners and more money for home financing, while lax oversight and regulation incentivized unscrupu – lous and predatory targeting of urban communities. Far from being a static site of dilapidation and ruin, the urban core was becoming an attractive place of unparalleled opportunity, a new frontier of economic investment and extraction for the real estate and banking industries. The race for profit in the 1970s trans – formed decaying urban space into what one U.S. senator described as a “golden g hetto,” 7 where profits for banks and real estate brokers were never ending, while shattered credit and ruined neighborhoods were all that remained for African Americans who lived there. 8 When historians have written about the big economic shifts that took place in the 1970s, they rarely consider these changes in the real estate market and how they disproportionately impacted African Americans. As interest rates rose sharply in the late 1960s and early 1970s, the slowed pace of housing starts in the conventional housing market made sales in the government- subsidiz ed low- income h ousing market more attractive than they had ever been. Even while real estate brokers and mortgage lenders were discriminating against women with middle- class j obs and incomes, poor women on welfare, like Janice Johnson, who i nt Roduction f were also disproportionately heads of their households, were sought out as par – ticipants in the low- income h omeownership program.9 The inclusion of thousands of poor Black women in these low- income h ome- ownership programs subverted both racial and gender norms. Real estate and mortgage bankers valued these women, though, because of the likelihood they would fail to keep up their home payments and slip into foreclosure. Black women like Janice Johnson were desired customers because they were poor, des- perate, and likely to fall behind on their payments. Unlike the programs of old, the HUD- bH A gua rantee to pay lenders in full for the mortgage of any home in foreclosure transformed risk from a reason for exclusion into an incentive for inclusion. The struggles of poor Black women provide particular insight into the ways that overlapping patterns of racial and gender discrimination shaped the new inclusive housing market. As historian R honda Williams has noted, “Low- income b lack women[’s] . . . citize nship struggles draw attention to the issues shaping postwar urban residency as well as the character of the liberal state and U.S. democracy.” 10 I describe these and the other new terms on which the real estate industry conducted business within the urban housing market as “predatory inclusion.” Predatory inclusion describes how African American homebuyers were granted access to conventional real estate practices and mortgage financing, but on more expensive and comparatively unequal terms. These terms were justified because of the disproportionate conditions of poverty and dilapidation in a scarred urban geography that had been produced by years of public and private institutional neglect. When redlining ended, these conditions of poverty and distress became excuses for granting entry into the conventional market on different and more expensive terms, in comparison with the terms offered to suburban residents. For example, urban- based re sidents could now use bHA- backed l oans, but big depository banks continued to refuse to lend to prospective homeowners in the urban market, opting for higher interest- rate ret urns on bigger loans and more expensive housing in white suburbs. This relegated most African Ameri – can urban buyers to the use of unregulated mortgage banks, often subsidiaries of the same depository institutions that refused to lend in Black communities, that were indiscriminate in the dissemination of loans because their profits were based on volume sales. Mortgage bank loans relied on costly origination fees and other costs for the particular services they offered. The differences in physi – cal condition, geography, and location of predominately Black housing became the proxies for race where direct references to race were no longer permissible 6 i nt Roduction because of fair housing legislation. These differences, long existent in the urban market, both legitimized the different treatment of Black homeowners and con – tinued to make them vulnerable to predatory real estate practices. Federal fair housing laws had been passed to uproot discrimination in the housing market and held out promises for the unobstructed participation of African Americans in buying and selling homes. But HUD ’s reluctance to enforce civil rights laws preserved the practice and patterns of segregation that had historically driven up the price of substandard properties in predominately Black enclaves. The failure of HUD to systematically root out the segregative impulses throughout the real estate industry meant that these exploitative practices prevailed even as federal redlining fell out of favor. Historian Nancy Kwak describes how the change in policy from federal redlining to inclusion shifted the priorities of civil rights ad – vocates from “fair access to credit” to “access to fair credit.” 11 The continuation of residential segregation after the fall of federal redlining and the passage of federal fair housing created the conditions for predatory inclusion. Here, I argue that the discriminatory “best practices” of the real estate indus – try made it resistant to change in adhering to new fair housing legislation. The benignly named “public- privat e partnership” obscured the ways that the federal government became complicit with private sector practices that promoted resi – dential segregation and racial discrimination. Selling dilapidated homes to poor women who could not afford the repairs, like Janice Johnson, reinforced the idea of unfit Black owners who posed a threat to the quality of a neighborhood. When the federal government guaranteed Johnson’s mortgage, it became impli – cated in the shoddy business practices of private sector agents bent on profiting from the desperation of low- income u rban residents. Racially informed real es – tate practices were not the actions of an industry impervious to change and old in its ways; instead, racial discrimination persisted in the new market because it was good business. Tethering federal policy to the practices of the private real estate industry com – plicated the ability of federal agents to regulate the administration of the new homeownership programs. The paucity of oversight in a housing market deeply ingrained with the belief that the Black population needed to be contained or segregated to preserve property values for white homeowners, combined with unprecedented federal dollars and a mandate to produce more units of housing than ever in American history, was a recipe for nefarious business practices. The end of redlining and the introduction of conventional real estate practices into the Black urban market ended one set of predatory practices, like homes for i nt Roduction 7 sale on land installment contracts (LICs), without fully resolving the conditions that gave rise to those practices in the first place. The result was the continua – tion of older predatory practices in combination with the invention of wholly new means of economic exploitation of African Americans in the U.S. housing market. History weighed heavily on the then-contemporary moment. The past could not be so neatly erased from the new world that was created; instead, the past helped to shape how the new policies and practices were implemented. The 1970s witnessed an enormous shift in how the federal government housed its poor and low- income p opulation. As one writer described it, “A new policy paradigm defined by the free market had emerged to replace that of collective public provision of housing.” 12 Moving from public housing to low- income homeownership was not an issue of whether government or the free market was best situated to respond to the ongoing crisis in affordable housing in the coun – try. Instead, housing policy in the 1970s hinged on the collaborative relationship between public and private sectors. I argue that as a result of this relationship, the federal government was impaired in its ability to aggressively regulate an industry that had employed racial discrimination in its determined pursuit of insatiable profit as a business principle. Sociologist Christopher Bonastia, one of the few scholars to investigate the HUD- bH A hou sing crisis, has rightly drawn attention to the “unwieldly” bureaucratic inefficiencies of HUD along with the conflicting political agendas of those at its helm. 13 But this explanation alone does not account for the powerful influence of the real estate industry in shap – ing the policies and their execution in ways beneficial to the industry and not the public. The continuity of exploitation in the urban real estate market does not suggest that exclusion was preferable. Instead, it compels us to look more closely at the practices of the real estate market and not just inclusion in it. The suggestion that Black equality in the real estate market could be achieved by the formal end to housing discrimination failed to take into account the very ways that racial inequality was structured and embedded within the architecture of the system of buying and selling real estate in the United States. Thus, even when discriminatory policies were formally dismantled, the impulse toward economic exploitation and residential segregation ensued because of the ways that racial discrimination continued to add value to racially exclusive suburbs. The Ameri – can housing market was an expression of the prevailing racial consciousness of the larger society in which it operated. As social scientist Dalton Conley put it, “White housing is worth more, precisely because it is not Black housing.” 14 In general, racial discrimination remained good business for the real estate industry. 8 i nt Roduction The concept of predatory inclusion also captures the failures of racial liberal – ism and its premise that inclusion into American democracy through the vehi – cles of citizenship, law, and free market capitalism could finally produce fairness and equality for its Black citizens. 15 African Americans were afforded formal access to those tools of American democracy, but their function and abilities had been fundamentally distorted by racism. The enduring obstacles faced by African Americans in pursuit of fair housing defy the narrative of the eventual – ity of progress over time in the United States. Racism in real estate has remained resilient and ingrained, demonstrating the limits of inclusion as discrimination, exploitation, and predation continued well after the legal hurdles to fair or open housing had been cleared. The story of the HUD- bH A hou sing crisis of the 1970s is complex. In order for us to grasp its full impact, there is a set of issues that we must reckon with in the pages that follow. These include the formation of risk, the mechanics of the low- income h omeownership program, the role of suburbs in urban housing policy, and the ways that the crisis that erupted within the federally backed low- income homeownership program shaped political discourse, including notions of “urban crisis” and “underclass,” by the end of the 1970s. Risky Business After several decades of refusing to guarantee the mortgages of African Ameri – cans, or those who lived in close proximity to them, the bHA charted a new path. With the passage of the 1968 Housing and Urban Development Act ( HUD Ac t), new provisions were made to encourage low- income home ownersh ip. A fter years of partisan jousting over the creation, placement, and management of public housing programs, President Lyndon Johnson turned to the market to solve the perennial “housing crisis” that had plagued American cities since at least World War II. The private market had largely ignored the regular refrain for more safe, sound, and affordable housing, but the advent of low- intere st mortgage loans with the full backing of the federal government piqued the interest of the real estate industry. For decades, the bHA maintained that the deteriorating housing stock and “inharmonious” racial groups within American cities made them too risky for the risk- averse r eal estate and banking industries. The new legislation induced private sector involvement by removing said risk. Creating a risk- free env ironment for business, though, presented new risks to potential low- income h omeowners. Advocates proselytized the virtues of i nt Roduction 9 ownership, including the creation of stakeholders within otherwise distressed communities. They suggested that the efficiency and speed with which business could produce housing would finally end the perennial scarcity of good urban housing. Private property, then, not only could solve the housing crisis but was presented more broadly as a palliative to an “urban crisis” that had metastasized into annual riots and rebellions throughout the 1960s. The market was cham – pioned as a neutral space where capital or credit flattened or eradicated differ – ence. The market was the great equalizer. The consumer experiences of African Americans, however, painted a much different picture. From the inception of the housing market in the United States, its viability had been structured around a scaffolding of racial knowledge that presumed insight into the speculative elements of “good housing” and “good neighbor – hoods,” which could then be actualized through ascending property values. Transmogrifying real estate into homes and then again into financially accru – ing assets depended on the alchemy of race, place, and the perceptions of the buying public—or “property values are where culture meets economics.” 16 As Frederick M. Babcock, considered an originator of the field of real estate ap – praisal, wrote in his seminal The Appraisal of Real Estate , “It is obvious that there is no absolute iron- clad met hod of computing real estate values . . . becaus e val- ues are a social phenomenon dependent upon human behavior.” 17 The intensely subjective process of determining the value of property or a neighborhood—the pseudoscience of real estate appraisal—was inherently informed by the presence or absence of African Americans. 18 The American Institute of Real Estate Ap – praisers ( AIREA) said as much when its professionalization materials maintained that “the clash of nationalities with dissimilar cultures . . . contri bute[s] to the destruction of value. When a new class of people of different race, color, nation – ality and culture moves into a neighborhood . . . old inhab itants think that the neighborhood is losing desirability.” 19 Segregating African Americans into deteriorating urban neighborhoods and then starving those communities of resources and other investments greatly lim – ited their access to better- paying j obs and well- resour ced public schools, while pushing them into substandard housing. 20 Poverty and segregation led to over – crowding in Black housing, thus hastening its deterioration. These conditions were then spun into evidence that African Americans were unfit as potential homeowners and deleterious to property values within the housing market. These were justifications for confining African Americans to Black- only ne igh- borhoods where they could not “infect” the larger housing market. The scarred 10 i nt Roduction geography of these developing Black neighborhoods was the physical evidence invoked to legitimize keeping African Americans out of predominately white communities. As Babcock wrote, “There is one difference in people, namely, race, which can result in a very rapid decline. Usually such declines can be partially avoided by segregation and this device has always been in common usage in the South where white and negro [sic] populations have been separated.” 21 The racial logic permeating the real estate market was not an invention of the bHA , even if that agency was a willing recipient of the inheritance. Long before the formation of the bHA , real estate brokers had already established rules encouraging the physical isolation of African Americans from white neighbor – hoods. By 1924, the National Association of Real Estate Boards ( NAREB) prom- ised punishment and revocation of membership to any broker who disrupted patterns of racial homogeneity on a given block or neighborhood. 22 These ideas and practices were then codified into policies created by the bHA . Frederick Bab- cock, as one example, developed his theories of property appraisal during his time as a real estate agent in Chicago in the 1920s. Babcock went on to author the bHA ’s underwriting criteria that determined coverage within the federal mortgage insurance program. So while it is true, as Richard Rothstein has most recently argued, that the federal government played a critical role in expanding the logic and practices of residential segregation with the invention of its housing policies in the 1930s, government agents did not act in a vacuum, nor did they act alone. 23 When antipodal objectives of public interest were melded with private en – terprise in the American housing market, those policies were bent to satisfy the market demands of real estate. The political and financial influence of private sector actors was outsized compared with the influence of individual homeown – ers simply trying to secure their housing by obtaining a mortgage. The interests of real estate inevitably meant that the racial practices at the very heart of real estate and mortgage lending practices were then grafted onto public policy. If the real estate industry required segregation to preserve profitability, then what would prevent housing policy from reflecting that same priority? It was not just the influence of private sector operatives within public agen – cies that shaped U.S. housing policies, but the public and private collaboration produced tension- filled ho using policies strained between meeting a public need while also acting to preserve the economic interests of private enterprise. The tension was born in the conflict between exchange value and use value, or more intimately, the difference between real estate and a home. 24 If these values i nt Roduction 11 are not irreconcilable, they often operate at odds with each other. These con – tradictory objectives of real estate and home—one a commodity and the other intimating a place of belonging—also reinforced reactionary racial norms and deepened the perception of dual housing markets working at dual purposes. Midcentury narratives of normative whiteness embodied in conceptions of the suburban- based n uclear family shaped the perceptions of home as an expression of use value within white communities. Conversely, developing narratives con – cerning perceived domestic dysfunction within Black living spaces—whether nonnormative family structures or poverty or dilapidated living structures— cast Black dwellings as incapable of achieving the status of home , thus reducing them to their base exchange value . Where white housing was seen as an asset developed through inclusion and the accruable possibilities of its surrounding property, Black housing was marked by its distress and isolation, where value was extracted, not imbued. These racialized narratives of families, communities, and their built environments reinforced and naturalized the segregative practices among real estate brokers, mortgage bankers, and the white public. 25 Indeed, these perceptions of insurmountable difference steeped in the permanence of blood, race, and culture constituted the underwriting criteria that determined who was to be excluded and who should be included. Racial real estate practices, then, represented the political economy generated out of residential segregation. The real estate industry wielded the magical ability to transform race into profit within the racially bifurcated housing market. The sustenance and spatial integrity of residential segregation, along with its appar – ent imperviousness to civil rights rules and regulations, stemmed from its prof – itability in white as well as African American communities—even as dramati – cally different outcomes were produced. In the strange mathematics of racial real estate, Black people paid more for the inferior condition of their housing. They referred to this costly differential as a “race tax.” Real estate operatives confined each group to its own section of a single housing market to preserve the allure of exclusivity for whites, while satisfying the demand of housing for African Amer – icans. This was evidence not of a dual housing market but of a single American housing market that tied race to risk, linking both to the rise and fall of property values and generating profits that grew into the sinew binding it all together. As Arnold Hirsch wrote, “The rise of ‘second ghettos’ in the postwar era and the suburban boom were . . . organi cally linked.”26 A “white housing market” would have actually been unintelligible without its Black counterpart; both relied on the other to become legible. 12 i nt Roduction fomeowne Rsfi P fo R tfe Poo R By the end o f the 1960s, the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders, known as the Kerner Commission, had left no doubt that substandard housing was a recurring factor in the annual bout of riots that roiled American cities. Identifying segregation at the root of raging Black communities, the commis – sion’s findings called for a historic change in American housing policy. In the spring and summer of 1968, after the release of the Kerner Commission’s final report, federal fair housing was passed, and a landmark Supreme Court decision in Jones v. Mayer removed any doubt about the illegality of housing discrimi – nation. Recalling the 1866 Civil Rights Act and the Thirteenth Amendment, the justices held that “when racial discrimination herds men into ghettos and makes their ability to buy property turn on the color of their skin . . . then it . . . is a reli c of slavery.” 27 The passage of the HUD Act in August 1968 buttressed the antidiscrimination edicts with a mandate to produce 10 million units of new and rehabilitated housing within a decade. Separately these legislations and the judi – cial decision responded to two significant issues that constrained Black housing opportunities: residential segregation and available housing. The HUD Act was intended to produce record amounts of housing where there had been historic shortages since the World War II era, and federal fair housing was to allow for housing choices beyond segregated ghettos. This program, however, was not con – sidered to be typical of the largesse of the Johnson administration. Instead, the HUD Act represented a new direction in housing poor and low- income p eople. For decades, federal officials relied on public housing to shelter poor and low- income people. But by the end of the 1960s, public housing had become politi – cally untenable, with endless jousts over its maintenance, location, and inhab – itants. The private real estate industry vacillated between charges of socialism and profligacy in its denunciations of public housing. It opposed a government program that it claimed competed with private enterprise in the housing market. A policy vacuum was created when it came to housing for the poor, which suf – fered from a mixture of government neglect and shrinking tenancy because of the conditions endured by residents and the constant pressure to exclude anyone other than the poorest tenants. The HUD Act changed this by creating the means for poor and low- income p eople to purchase their own homes. With the turn to private property, federal officials were hoping for a cheaper program with smaller outlays and the social stability that, they proselytized, came with property ownership. As with any partnership, the private sector had i nt Roduction 13 its own expectations, including the infusion of subsidies and federal mortgage guarantees in a moment of incertitude within the housing market. Private sector actors welcomed the pioneering role of HUD and the bHA in forging a risk- free ve nture in the new urban housing market. There were other expectations as well.Placing homeownership at the heart of the nation’s low- income h ousing poli- cies ceded outsized influence and control to the real estate industry over dwell – ings intended to serve a disproportionate number of African Americans. The implications of this policy shift were that the steep involvement of the real estate industry would make African Americans vulnerable to the practices of an in – dustry whose wealth was largely generated through racial discrimination. The profitability of the real estate industry was contingent on “best practices” that actively encouraged racial segregation, and the public policies that grew from the partnership between property assessors, brokers, bankers, and federal policy – makers reflected the logic of the housing market. Even when the policies were in response to prolonged social protest, as was the case in the 1960s, the outcomes still reflected terms that were favorable to private sector actors. Historically, African Americans had called on the federal government to intervene on their behalf in articulating both rights to and rights from when it came to developing a legal regime in response to unchecked racial discrimination within the private sector. What would it mean for the protection of African Americans from ra – cial discrimination in the private sphere if the state ceded to private entities its responsibility to deliver goods and services, as the homeownership program did? unlock inb tfe suBuRB s A key to Bla ck housing inequality had been how residential segregation cir – cumscribed space, inferred inferiority through spatial isolation, and incentiv – ized substandard maintenance and care from property owners, while driving up the costs relative to the better housing options for white residents. Despite the simultaneity of fair housing legislation and favorable court decisions ban – ning racial discrimination, they were not acted upon, as private sector agents continued to insist on isolating fair housing from the housing production man – date. In other words, while the real estate industry celebrated the passage of the HUD Act, it vociferously denounced “fair housing” as “forced integration.” This attitude was certainly not representative of the private sector in its entirety. Homebuilders and mortgage lenders, looking to benefit financially from the housing mandate, became enthusiastic backers of expanding housing choices 14 i nt Roduction for African Americans into the suburbs while also capitalizing on the expan – sion of the urban housing market. But real estate brokers were the first line of encounter for African Americans who hoped to use the homeownership subsidy. And it was real estate brokers who were most adamant in their opposition to fair housing. While a source of vigorous scholarship in social sciences concerning what Gregory Squires, Kevin Fox Gotham, and others describe as “privatism” or “the underlying commitment by government to help the private sector grow and prosper,” these conflicts of interest at the heart of this public- privat e partnership deserve more scrutiny in housing historiography in terms of their consequence for African American consumers and our understanding of the stubborn ques – tion of why fair housing has not worked. 28 Improving the housing opportunities for low- income A frican Americans was contingent on transforming the practices of the real estate industry. Given the dueling objectives of different sectors within the real estate industry, federal regulators in HUD , newly empowered in this role by the Fair Housing Act (as the Civil Rights Act of 1968 came to be known), would have to take responsibility for implementing the new legislation in fair and equitable ways. By 1968, though, the federal and local governments had a poor record of enforcing the fair housing laws already on the books. As early as 1960, dozens of fair housing ordinances in cities across the country had already been passed, but none had a perceptible impact on stopping housing discrimination. The 1962 executive order signed by President John F. Kennedy ordered a ban on racial discrimination in any new, federally subsidized hous – ing. The order fulfilled a long- standi ng campaign promise to wipe out housing discrimination with the “stroke of a pen.” Because the order was not retroactive, though, it was limited to a small percentage of the actual housing market. Even within this limited scope, the enforcement mechanisms of the executive order were ineffective, calling only for “public or private hearings for . . . complia nce, conciliation and persuasion to cure violations by any person, firm, state or local a genc y.” 29 The 1964 Civil Rights Act banned discrimination in any federally subsidized housing with an important exception: homes purchased with an bHA – backed l oan. Omitting the bHA from the scrutiny of federal racial regula – tors exposed not only the suffocating influence of the real estate industry but also the servile reluctance of government officials to seriously confront racism in the housing market. The 1964 Civil Rights Act also included Title VI, allow – ing federal officials to withdraw federal funds as a form of punishment against i nt Roduction 1f municipalities or localities engaging in discrimination. It was another tool that inspired the illusion of progress against discrimination without deploying spe – cific enforcement requirements that would encourage action. But perhaps the most egregious example of the self- imposed i mpotence of the federal government regarding discrimination involved not housing but edu – cation. The response to the 19f4 Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision provided ample evidence of federal reluctance when it came to the state enforcing its own laws against discrimination. For years after the Brown deci- sion, courts and local officials stood idly by while southern officials established all- white “s egregation academies” in a blatant flouting of the Court decision. It was not until 1968 that the Supreme Court ruled in Green v. County School Board of New Kent County that states must dismantle segregation “root and branch.” If the federal government lacked the will to confront and undo racism within the domain of the public sector, where its authority was overwhelming, what were the chances that it would aggressively confront racist practices in the private sphere of the politically influential and financially connected world of real estate and mortgage lending? The federal government was not suffering from letharg y or even malicious intent, but its delayed response reflected political con – siderations and deference to market sensibilities that disavowed government in – tervention in business matters. Even as federal actors moved at a glacial pace in enforcing their own rules banning discrimination, the formal changes in legislation also indicated the ac – ceptance of the right of African Americans to participate in the conventional housing market. The policy demands against racial discrimination, at least for – mally, broadened the scope of those who could now expect to participate in the evolving housing market. This opening was created through a combination of upward and downward pressures. From above, federal legislation, judicial deci – sions, and direct intervention from the executive branch formally excised the language of racial exclusion from the policies of the federal government. Within business, agents of private enterprise who also explored the possibilities of a new market while seeking to minimize their exposure to risk shared this perspec – tive of reform. From below, Black protests targeted the different sectors of the real estate industry to pressure them into allowing Black participation. Activism and other forms of civic pressure from organized African Americans and oth – ers demanded inclusion in the “affluent society.” The persistence of second- class c itizenship evidenced by trenchant housing discrimination, among other badges 16 i nt Roduction and indices of inferiority, provoked protests, demonstrations, and eventually urban uprisings. As a result of migration by African Americans from rural areas into American cities, incomes rose and homeownership became a tangible pos – sibility for an unprecedented number of Blacks. Prompted by protests led largely by African Americans, successive political actions produced greater numbers of legal protections against housing discrimination. The urban turn in homeownership policies reflected the conflicting agendas of government officials and private actors in the housing market. New public policies encouraged homeownership, but there was lax enforcement for the frac – tious demand of fair housing. Indeed, NAREB denounced the Fair Housing Act, but the organization strongly backed the passage of the HUD Act, which came four months after Fair Housing. Real estate agents welcomed the economic op – portunities presented by the far- reachi ng legislation, while still demanding that segregation be preserved as a prerogative of white homeowners. Even as fair hous – ing and the production mandate were passed within months of each other, the legislations operated within different spheres. The reluctance to leverage the new fair housing legislation against the excite – ment of the housing production mandate represented shifting political priorities. Even though both of these legislations were created in the twilight of the John – son administration, they were policies that would ultimately be implemented and administered by the administration of President Richard M. Nixon. Nixon appointed former Michigan governor and noted racial liberal George Romney to be secretary of HUD . But Nixon had run on a campaign that stoked the racial resentments of his white suburban constituency that he cohered into a white “si – lent majority” on the promise of preserving the racial exclusivity of white subur – ban communities. The Nixon administration contorted the legislative demands for “fair housing” into charges of “forced integration,” while deflecting criticism of the president’s position by describing his actions as respecting the choices of whites and African Americans in selecting their neighborhoods and communi – ties. Nixon appealed to some African Americans by championing Black capital – ism and pledging to finance Black business ventures, which amounted to prom – ises to “gild the ghetto” and not just confine African Americans to it. Nixon had a weak standing in African American communities, but as desegregation seemed less attainable or even desirable among African Americans, his prom – ises amounted to financial incentives aimed at relegitimizing a murky politics of “separate but equal.” 30 i nt Roduction 17 PRedato Ry inclusion S ince the exclusionary practices of the bHA had been such a focal point in ex- plaining the distressed condition of Black communities, the logical solution, then, was inclusion. The logic flowed from the ways that the market had created middle- class st atus for white homeowners. Given the tumult at the center of urban life through the 1960s, the hope was that property ownership could tame the Black rebellion coursing through cities across the country. It was also hoped that opening homeownership possibilities for African Americans in cities would curtail their demands for entry into white suburban communities. In a classic formulation of postwar racial liberalism, exclusion from the normalizing institu – tions that governed life for white America was situated as the central problem for African Americans. Racial liberalism posited inclusion as the antidote to the crises created by exclusion. 31 The “American dilemma” was how to make the American dream accessible to African Americans as a step toward finally fulfill – ing the promise of the American creed or American exceptionalism. American exceptionalism was conflated with the free market, and access to both was pro – moted as the solution to the problems faced by African Americans. The inclusion of African Americans could unlock the market’s true potential in creating social stability and middle- class st atus and facilitating the accumulation of personal wealth. It was what Janice Johnson was banking on when she decided to buy a home when renting was no longer an option. Inclusion, however, would be conditional, contingent, and tiered. Racism and the economic exploitation of African Americans was the glue that held the American housing market together and would necessarily need to be overcome to fully include Black buyers in the real estate market. But inclusion did not bring an end to predacious practices; it intensified them. Take the end of federal redlining as an example. The bHA stopped its redlining practices even before the passage of the Fair Housing Act, meaning that their cessation was not necessarily linked to the federal government’s prohibition on racial discrimination in the housing market. Indeed, bHA redlining was simply dismissed as a problem of location and not of race. The bHA claimed it decided to exclude urban areas from its insurance because of the age and condition of the structures in those areas. bHA officials, of course, failed to take into account their own references to race as part of the underwriting criteria used to determine eligibility for mortgage insurance. It was not the case that African Americans and other unworthy racial 18 i nt Roduction and ethnic groups were in the wrong place at the wrong time, but the condi – tions of distress and dilapidation within those communities were attributed to the race and ethnicity of the people who lived there. In the earliest days of the bHA , theories of eugenics and racial inferiority informed its policymaking with regard to Black people. African Americans were regarded as a pestilence or as a contagion that necessitated containment or quarantine for fear of its ability to destroy value surrounding it. Coming to terms with the racism embedded in past federal practices was not about redress, restitution, or repair; instead, it was necessary to contextualize the conditions found in African American communities. Identifying racially inscribed policies, such as redlining, from an earlier era was also critical to im – plementing new policies that aspired to open up and improve Black housing opportunities. Instead, by ignoring race, new practices that were intended to facilitate inclusion reinforced existing patterns of inequality and discrimina – tion. For example, poor housing and neighborhood conditions caused by earlier bHA policies became the basis on which new lenders, in the new era of bHA colorblindness and an end to redlining, could still continue to treat potential Black homeowners differently. African American neighborhoods were given the racially neutral descriptor “subprime.” This distinction allowed for certain kinds of lenders while justifying the continued inactivity of other lenders. Though race was apparently no longer a factor, its cumulative effect had already marked Black neighborhoods in such ways that still made them distinguishable and vulnerable to new forms of financial manipulation. Inclusion was possible, but on predatory and exploitative terms. New bHA backing created a market dominated by mortgage bankers. Mort – gage banks were not like ordinary depository banks; instead, they were unregu – lated institutions that relied on originating and maintenance fees and volume sales to make their profit. Mortgage bankers had no stake or interest in the areas in which they were lending; they just wanted to rack up sales. The bHA ’s g u a r a n- teed mortgage, the subsidized interest rates, and the captured segregated housing market incentivized market actors to speculate that the poverty and desperation of Black urban residents, especially Black women, would drive them toward the low- income h omeownership market. In an earlier era, risk had been the pre – text for excluding potential Black homeowners; by the late 1960s, risk had made Black buyers attractive. In fact, the riskier the buyer, the better. Janice Johnson was desired as a homeowner because of the likelihood of her failing to keep up with her mortgage payments. With the new bHA – insured h ome mortgages in i nt Roduction 19 Black neighborhoods, mortgage banks and other lenders were able to parlay fore – closures into profits as the homes went back onto the market and the process was repeated over and over again. The Federal National Mortgage Association, known as Fannie Mae ( bNMA), which was made a private organization as part of the HUD Act, sweetened the deal even more by promising to purchase all bHA loans at face value. The loans that were purchased by bNMA were then packaged and sold to long- term inv es- tors, and that money was made available to lenders to continue to ply this devel – oping housing market. There was also the added benefit that poor homeowners such as Johnson could revive “zombie properties,” or those dwellings that were economically unviable, into profitable ventures. Johnson’s new home should have been condemned; instead, her desperation for housing in combination with her mortgage brought the house back to life. A web of actors benefited from this act of resuscitation. With this series of transactions, including the person from whom Janice Johnson purchased her house, the mortgage lender that extended her a loan, and the service people she called to fix the never- ending def ects in her home, the more Johnson poured her meager monies into her dilapidated home, the more other people benefited from her investment. Abandoned real estate, cheap mortgage money, drive- by appra isals, quick home sales, defaults, fast foreclosures, and the race for profit all greased the wheels of predatory inclu – sion. Inclusion on predacious terms was not only about banking and real estate, but it raised deeper questions about the progress and triumphalism that pervade the discourses of racial liberalism and uplift so central to the U.S. narrative of progressive change over time. uRB an cR ises The f ederal government’s subsidization of homeownership among African American urban residents had a decidedly different outcome compared with the homeownership programs that had been promoted a generation earlier. Instead of creating a bedrock of middle- class pr osperity, as the homeowning boom of the 19f0s had done for ordinary white people, the urban homeownership programs of the 1960s and 1970s reinforced the optics of urban crisis while simultaneously appearing to confirm the role of African Americans in perpetuating it. The ra – cial liberalism that had animated much of the Johnsonian welfare state, with its insistence on opportunity and inclusion in American prosperity, eventually gave way to the colorblind universalism that became the calling card of the Nixon 20 i nt Roduction administration. The conservative- inspir ed discourse of colorblindness and its erasure of “race talk” did not actually eliminate the invocation of race to make meaning of the shifting social, economic, and political context of the 1970s; it just changed how race was invoked. 32 “Urban crisis,” as a description of infrastructural and complex policy prob – lems in the built environment in the early 1960s, was absorbed into a pattern of coded speech used to describe those who lived in distressed urban communi – ties. 33 Coded speech was, of course, invoked to communicate ideas that could no longer be spoken of freely on their own terms. The new uses of “urban crisis” were a means of articulating the perception of crisis in American cities without using race as its catalyst. Ending race talk was important because the “rights revolution” of the 1960s introduced new rules and regulatory bodies that were statutorily empowered to address explicit acts of discrimination. These new legal tools helped to spur the spate of antidiscrimination litigation throughout the 1970s. Ordinary citizens made sense of the new rights through multiple law – suits. By shedding reference to race, public and private institutions could shield themselves from the threat of lawsuit. Removing references to race also assisted in tempering the response of civil rights organizations that had become more attuned to the power of litigation than the coercive power of street protests. Indeed, the persistence of racial inequality well into the 1970s dampened the expectation that continued mobilizations and protests were effective means to combat discrimination, compared with lawsuits and deeper involvement in elec – toral politics. In a similar vein, as the Nixon administration looked for opportu – nities to fund segregated urban development, naked appeals to racism threatened to put pressure on Black operatives either to reject the overtures of the Repub – lican administration or to publicly back activist responses to public displays of racism. Perhaps of most consequence was how the rhetoric of colorblindness confirmed the critiques of racial liberalism. Colorblind universalism fulfilled the dream of racial liberals in their insistence that removal of racial language was evidence of inclusion. Racial liberals relied on the trace of representation or the physical presence of those who had been previously excluded as proof of change. 34 Thus, it was radicals who coined the phrase “institutional racism” to critique the inadequacy of representation and presence as clear measures of racial equality or racial repair. 35 The new world of the 1970s was complicated by African Americans armed with new rights and raised expectations, the emergence of electoral conservatism, i nt Roduction 21 and the unanticipated and sudden collapse of the postwar economic engine. This contentious environment evidenced by clashing political agendas created even more ideological pressure to explain a rapidly changing economic world. The Republican Party at the helm of the country was bent on undoing the archi – tecture of social welfare that had significantly altered the public expectations of government. It did this in multiple ways, including directing an aggrieved white public to focus their apprehensions about the changing world on the dis – proportionate number of African Americans who were recipients of federal aid. Republicans were also adept at recasting the insufficiencies, gaps, oversights, and other problems in public programs as the problem of government intervention. This was particularly effective as public cynicism about the role and function of government began to increase with the escalation of the Vietnam War and other evidence of government manipulation and malfeasance. These relatively new dynamics overlapped with much older, persisting discus- sions about deserving and undeserving poor people and who, if anyone, was en – titled to social welfare. 36 The HUD- bH A low- income homeownership crisis began to unfold in this charged atmosphere. The HUD crisis was wielded to confirm two truths. The first truth was that only the market, as opposed to government, could handle the gargantuan problems rooted in American cities. The Johnson welfare state was declared a failure because, despite the “War on Poverty,” pov – erty still existed. From complaints of red tape, never- ending de lays, and numer- ous other inefficiencies was spun a tale that government was the problem. This critique of the state was then mapped onto an evolving, racially motivated cyni – cism that denounced urban problems as worsening and potentially altogether intractable. This fatalist discourse of state abnegation was not prompted by the HUD- bHA cris is, but the devolution of the programs aided the narrative. While HUD’s homeownership problems were concentrated in a relatively small number of cit – ies, media coverage of the crisis transformed it into a national story of conse – quence. In an age of investigative journalism, HUD and the bHA provided ample opportunity to uncover local stories of fraud, graft, and corruption. The HUD- bHA crisi s was front- page new s in publications across the country by the early 1970s, and in 197f the Chicago Tribune won a heralded Pulitzer Prize for its cov – erage. In the examination of these programs, the role of private enterprise and the potential mismatch of attaching market principles to the crucial effort to provide housing for low- income a nd poor African Americans were sidelined for the more 22 i nt Roduction sensational focus on the program participants and their fitness as homeowners. While race was almost never mentioned, profiles of poor Black women, many of whom were welfare recipients, were highlighted in media coverage. Political operatives within the Nixon administration seized upon these stories as proof that government was, indeed, the problem. This was explained in the midst of a deepening crisis in American cities. Rising crime rates, an emergent drug crisis, and growing poverty were heralded as proof that Johnson’s Great Society had failed, creating an opening for championing market solutions to urban problems. The arguments against perceived social welfare benefits flow – ing to supposedly undeserving African Americans were not confined to HUD ’s problems but were part of a generalized attack on the fragile American welfare state. In the realm of housing, this attack culminated in the Nixon adminis- tration declaring a moratorium on all subsidized housing in 1973. HUD- bH A’s ho meownership crisis provided a powerful visual component to unending urban crisis as emptied homes, crumbling properties, and abandoned buildings, tens of thousands of which now belonged to HUD , pockmarked Black urban neighbor- hoods across the country. In turn, the neglect of cities in the United States added further legitimacy to the stereotype that poor and working- class B lack people posed a threat to the property values of white property owners. There was no need to state what seemed so obvious as urban crisis faded into an urban malaise—a prelude to the drug wars of the 1980s. A popular refrain from conservatives in the 1970s and certainly by the 1980s was that antipoverty programs and social welfare created the crisis in the first place. The HUD and bHA homeownership programs were not exactly welfare, even though thousands of people who used the programs were on public assistance. The critiques of government malfeasance were certainly warranted, but the primary role of the private sector in the HUD- bH A pro grams has been lost to history. Meanwhile, the promotion of public- privat e partnerships and, indeed, the regular exhortations on the primacy of the private sector to perform all tasks and provide all services are assumed. In the face of this, the role of poor Black women, many of whom were welfare recipients, in exposing this particular mani – festation of fraud and corruption in the low- income h omeownership programs deserves to be known and understood. 37 These women braved the indignity of having their personal lives and abilities to maintain a household scrutinized in public hearings, by elected officials, and by other agents of the state, as well as in media outlets that insisted on identifying them as “unsophisticated buyers.” i nt Roduction 23 Their willingness to utilize the services of Legal Aid and to endure the stress and uncertainty that surely accompanied the risk of class- action l awsuits uncovers yet another tool that poor and working- class wo men wielded in their fight for their rights in the 1970s. It would be incorrect to label these struggles as “hid – den.” More than that, they have been marginalized and forgotten. In some ways, they have been forgotten because of a larger narrative of failure in resolving this country’s persisting legacy of housing discrimination. The decades- long sear ch for safe, sound, and affordable housing has been impervious to the country’s triumphalism concerning the inevitability of “progress.” But over the course of the 1970s, dozens of Black women who were the named plaintiffs in civil lawsuits against HUD, the bHA, and other related agencies represented tens of thousands more women like themselves in asserting their right to a decent home. The par – ticular role of banks and the real estate industry in undermining Black home – ownership, which reinforced the racist idea that African Americans lower prop – erty values, cannot be understood as clearly without these women. The cheating of Black communities and homeowners continues to skew economic outcomes and shape racist housing policies. These women fought back, and by exposing what happened to them in interviews with journalists, and through lawsuits, their story can now be told.
Write a 5-7 page paper (double spaced, 12 point font, standard margins) on one of the topics below. Your title page and bibliography (and any other pages that are not writing) do not count towards the
1/4/23, 12:49 PM How Do We Build Black Wealth? Understanding the Limits of Black Capitalism – Non Profit News | Nonprofit Quarterly https://nonprofitquarterly .org/how-do-we-build-black-wealth-understanding-the-limits-of-black-capitalism/ 1/5 A pril 2 7, 2 022 H ow D o W e B uild B la ck W ealt h ? U nd ers ta n d in g t h e Lim it s of B la ck C ap it a lism Fra n cis c o P ére z   In t h e w ake o f t h e m ass m ove ment a g ain st a n ti- B la ck r a cis m t h at a ro se in 2 020 f o llo w in g t h e p olic e m urd ers o f B re o nna T a yl or, G eo rg e F lo yd , a n d c o untle ss o th ers , b oth f o und atio ns a n d c o rp ora tio ns h ave p le d ged t o m ake a m end s by in ve stin g in B la ck b usin esse s. A cco rd in g t o M cK in se y & C om pan y, c o lle ctive ly th e n atio n’s le ad in g 1 ,0 00 co rp ora tio ns p le d ged . E ve n if m uch o f t h at m oney is s im ply a o f p re -e xis tin g d olla rs , a t le ast so m e o f it r e p re se nts n ew in ve stm ent. H op efu lly , t h ese in ve stm ents w il l h ave s o m e p osit ive im pact, b ut h is to ry enco ura g es u s t o b e c a u tio us. A s ig nif ic a n t p ortio n o f r e ce nt in ve sto rs in B la ck b usin esse s t a ke B la ck c a p it a lis m a s t h eir o p era tin g t h eo ry—t hat is , t h ey assu m e th at t h e p ath t o r a cia l e q ualit y is p ave d w it h B la ck b usin ess s u cce ss. If r a cis m h as le ft B la ck A m eric a n s w it h le ss c a p it a l th an w hit e A m eric a n s, t h en t h e s o lu tio n is t o h elp B la ck A m eric a n s e ve ntu ally ow n b usin esse s a s la rg e a n d p ro fit a b le a s th o se o f w hit e A m eric a n s. C ap it a lis m , in t h is c o nce p tio n, is “ ra ce n eutra l” —b usin ess is b usin ess. A cco rd in g t o t h is p oin t o f vi ew , t o a ch ie ve r a cia l ju stic e , t h e e xis tin g e co no m ic s ys te m d oes n o t n eed t o f u nd am enta lly ch an g e. T he p ro b le m is s im ply one o f s h if t in g o w ners h ip a n d c o ntro l o f t h e e co no m ic s ys te m s o t h at s u ch o w ners h ip a n d c o ntro l is n o t e njo ye d b y pre d om in an tly w hit e p eo p le b ut is in ste ad e q uit a b ly dis trib ute d a cro ss r a ce s. T he a p peal o f is u nd enia b le . A nd c e rta in ly no o ne w ould a rg ue t h at r e p re se nta tio n is u nim porta n t. N oneth ele ss, s u ch a s im ple f o rm ula tio n m is se s a lo t, in clu d in g t h e f a ct t h at s u ch in ve stm ent p ra ctic e s have b een t rie d b efo re —a nd f a il e d m an y tim es b efo re . T he n o tio n o f B la ck c a p it a lis m h as a lo ng p ed ig re e. It a p peare d in s o m e o f t h e w rit in g s o f f r o m t h e 1 890s a n d b eca m e d urin g P re sid ent R ic h ard Nix o n’s ad m in is tra tio n. $200 b illio n re la b elin g B la ck f a ce s in h ig h p la ce s B ooke r T . W ash in g to n U S f e d era l p olic y 1/4/23, 12:49 PM How Do We Build Black Wealth? Understanding the Limits of Black Capitalism – Non Profit News | Nonprofit Quarterly https://nonprofitquarterly .org/how-do-we-build-black-wealth-understanding-the-limits-of-black-capitalism/ 2/5 R ic h ard N ix o n s a d m in is tra tio n. W hy did t h ese a p pro ach es f a il? There a re m an y re aso ns, b ut t h e w ork o f t h e la te B la ck p olit ic a l s c ie ntis t, , o ff e rs a p artic u la rly co g ent e xp la n atio n. In h is b ook, B la ck Ma rx is m , p ub lis h ed in t h e e arly 1980s, R ob in so n co nte nd ed t h at w e s h o uld t h in k o f t h e g lo b al e co no m ic s ys te m n o t m ere ly as “ ca p it a lis m ” b ut a s “ ,” a rg uin g t h at r a cis m is n o t a “ b ug ” o f t h e g lo b al c a p it a lis t e co no m y. R ath er, r a cis m is a c o re p art o f c a p it a lis m ’s D N A.   T he E nd urin g A ppeal o f B la ck C ap it a lis m The U S h as a lo ng a n d b lo od y his to ry of r a cia l t e rro ris m t a rg etin g B la ck -o w ned b usin esse s. T his h is to ry in clu d es t h e ra cis t p og ro m t h at d estro ye d T u ls a ’s “ B la ck W all S tre et” in 1 921 , w hic h w as w id ely co m mem ora te d la st ye ar d urin g it s c e nte nnia l. T he im plic a tio n o f t h ese m em oria ls w as t h at, w it h o ut t h e e ve r- p re se nt s p ecte r o f r a cis t vi ole nce t h at ch ara cte rize d J im C ro w , B la ck A m eric a n s w ould h ave s im ila r le ve ls o f in co m e a n d w ealt h t o w hit e A m eric a n s t o d ay. P ro m otin g B la ck c a p it a lis m h as b een t h e p re fe rre d a p pro ach o f b oth m ajo r p olit ic a l p artie s s in ce N ix o n u nve ile d a p ro g ra m o f t a x in ce ntive s f o r B la ck b usin esse s in a n e ff o rt t o h ead o ff m ore m ilit a n t a lt e rn ative s. F o r a n atio n t h at ve nera te s e ntre p re neurs h ip a n d d eif ie s b usin ess le ad ers , t h is vi sio n h o ld s g re at a ttra ctio n. A s M ehrs a B ara d ara n , au th o r o f , o utlin es in t h e , “ B la ck ca p it a lis m w as s o p olit ic a lly ap pealin g , e ve ry ad m in is tra tio n s in ce M r. N ix o n’s h as a d op te d it in s o m e f o rm . B la ck ca p it a lis m m orp hed in to R onald R eag an ’s ‘e nte rp ris e z o ne’ p olic y, B ill C lin to n’s ‘n ew m ark e t t a x c re d it s ,’ a n d B ara ck O bam a’s ‘p ro m is e zo nes.’” D onald T ru m p’s 2 017 T a x C uts a n d J o b s A ct a ls o in clu d ed s im ila r “ o p portu nit y zo nes.”   B la ck C ap it a lism ’s Sho rtfa lls D esp it e r e p eate d p ro m is e s b y US p re sid entia l a d m in is tra tio ns s in ce 1 970 t o k ic k sta rt B la ck c a p it a lis m , it h as f a ile d t o t a ke -o ff , a n d r a cia l in co m e a n d w ealt h g ap s h ave r e m ain ed f r u stra tin g ly pers is te nt. R ese arc h b y th e , a p ro g re ssive t h in k t a n k, s h o w s t h at r a cia l in co m e in eq ualit y has c h an g ed lit tle s in ce t h e c ivi l rig hts m ove ment. T he m ed ia n in co m e o f B la ck h o use ho ld s h as h o ve re d a t a ro und 5 5 p erc e nt o f t h at o f w hit e h o use ho ld s s in ce 1 968, w hile t h e a ve ra g e in co m e o f B la ck h o use ho ld s h as b een a b out 6 0 p erc e nt o f w hit e h o use ho ld s. W illia m “ S an d y” D arit y an d D arric k H am ilt o n—t wo le ad in g e co no m is ts s tu d yi ng r a cia l in eq ualit y , a lo ng w it h a h o st o f oth er c o lle ag ues—a sse rt in a 2 0 18 p ap er t h at t h e r a cia l w ealt h g ap is t h e b est m easu re o f t h e b urd en t h at h is to ric a n d o ng oin g r a cis m h as im pose d o n B la ck A m eric a n s. T he U rb an In stit u te r e p orts t h at in 1 983, t h e m ed ia n w hit e f a m ily had e ig ht t im es t h e w ealt h o f t h e m ed ia n B la ck f a m ily . In 2 019, t h e g ap w as t h e s a m e! C ed ric R ob in so n ra cia l c a p it a lis m T he C olo r o f Mo ney: B la ck B an ks a n d t h e R acia l W ealt h G ap N ew Y o rk T im es W ash in g to n C ente r fo r E quit a b le G ro w th h ttp s:/ /e q uit a b le g ro w th .o rg /w p-c o nte nt/ u p lo ad s/2 018/0 8/m ad uca -fig -1 -1 080× 762.p ng 1/4/23, 12:49 PM How Do We Build Black Wealth? Understanding the Limits of Black Capitalism – Non Profit News | Nonprofit Quarterly https://nonprofitquarterly .org/how-do-we-build-black-wealth-understanding-the-limits-of-black-capitalism/ 3/5 B la ck A m eric a n s m ake u p 1 3 p erc e nt o f t h e p op ula tio n b ut o w n a n e stim ate d o f U S w ealt h . H ouse ho ld s th at f a ll w it h in t h e t o p o ne p erc e nt o f w ealt h ie st A m eric a n s a re a n d o nly 1.4 p erc e nt B la ck . A s a r e se arc h t e am le d b y Darit y , F ed era l R ese rve d ata f r o m 2 016 in d ic a te t h at t o b e in t h e t o p o ne p erc e nt o f w ealt h ie st w hit e A m eric a n s, yo u n eed $ 12 m il lio n in n et w orth , w hile a m easly $1.5 74 m illio n g ets yo u in to t h e B la ck o ne-p erc e nt c lu b . W hy have d eca d es o f o ff ic ia l s u p port f o r B la ck c a p it a lis m f a ile d t o c lo se t h e r a cia l w ealt h g ap ?   C ap it a lism a n d In eq ualit y O ne p ossib le e xp la n atio n is t h e “ P ik e tty prin cip le ,” n am ed a ft e r t h e F re nch e co no m is t, , w ho d ocu m ente d r is in g c o nce ntra tio ns o f w ealt h in h is m ag num o p us, C ap it a l in t h e 2 1 C entu ry . P ik e tty fa m ously arg ues th at t h e r a te o f r e tu rn o n c a p it a l h as b een h ig her t h an t h e r a te o f o ve ra ll e co no m ic g ro w th in m ost r ic h c o untrie s f o r m ost o f t h eir h is to ry . If c a p it a l r e tu rn s—p ro fit s , d ivi dend s, in te re st, a n d r e nts —r is e f a ste r t h an o ve ra ll in co m es, t h en hig h a n d r is in g w ealt h in eq ualit y is in evi ta b le . P ik e tty dem onstra te s t h at r e d uctio ns in w ealt h in eq ualit y are e xce p tio nal, t h e r e su lt o f p olit ic a l in te rve ntio n. W ealt h in eq ualit y in W este rn E uro p e f e ll w hen t h e w orld w ars d estro ye d t h e f o rtu nes o f m an y ric h E uro p ean s. S o cia l d em ocra tic r e fo rm in t h e w ake o f W orld W ar II—e sp ecia lly pro g re ssive t a xatio n a n d h ig h le ve ls o f u nio niz a tio n—a ls o c o nta in ed w ealt h in eq ualit y . T he r is e o f s in ce t h e 1 980s, h o w eve r, h as o nce a g ain c a u se d in co m e f r o m p ro p erty to g ro w m uch f a ste r t h an o ve ra ll in co m e, le ad in g t o t o d ay’ s e xtre m e le ve ls o f w ealt h a n d in co m e in eq ualit y . If la rg e f o rtu nes g ro w f a ste r t h an s m alle r o nes a n d w hit e A m eric a n s s ta rt w it h m ore w ealt h t h an B la ck A m eric a n s, it f o llo w s t h at t h e r a cia l w ealt h g ap w ill b e s ta g nan t a t b est a n d , a t w ors t, w ill in cre ase o ve r t im e. “ F re e m ark e ts ” le ft t o t h eir o w n d evi ce s w ill n eve r c lo se t h e r a cia l w ealt h g ap . A s D arit y et a l, , “ B la ck s c a n no t c lo se t h e r a cia l w ealt h g ap b y ch an g in g t h eir in d ivi dual b ehavi or—i .e ., b y assu m in g m ore ‘ p ers o nal r e sp onsib ilit y’ o r a cq uir in g t h e p ortfo lio m an ag em ent in sig hts a sso cia te d w it h ‘f in an cia l li t e ra cy’ —i f t h e s tru ctu ra l s o urc e s o f r a cia l in eq ualit y re m ain u nch an g ed .” T here a re s im ply “n o a ctio ns t h at b la ck A m eric a n s c a n t a ke u nila te ra lly th at w ill h ave m uch o f a n e ff e ct o n re d ucin g t h e r a cia l w ealt h g ap .” B la ck c a p it a lis m w it h it s e m phasis o n in d ivi dual a ctio n is u nlik e ly to s u cce ed . A s Bara d ara n c o nclu d es in h er N ew Y o rk T im es o p -e d : “ If t h e r o llo ut o f t h e B la ck c a p it a lis m p ro g ra m h ad d em onstra te d an yt hin g , it w as t h at e co no m ic p ow er c o uld n o t b e a ch ie ve d w it h o ut g ove rn m ent h elp .”   C an R acia l C ap it a lis m B e R efo rm ed ? Eve n if it w ere p ossib le f o r B la ck w ealt h t o g ro w f a ste r t h an w hit e w ealt h d esp it e t h e h ead w in d s id entif ie d b y Pik e tty , it w ould still ta ke unb eara b ly lo ng .Last ye ar, E llo ra Dere no nco urt, an eco no m is t at Prin ce to n Unive rs it y , an d th re e http s:/ /w ww.u rb an .o rg /s it e s/d efa u lt / file s/2 021-0 2/w ealt h b yra ce -m ed .p ng 2 .6 p erc e nt 96.1 p erc e nt w hit e w ro te T ho m as P ik e tty st n eo lib era lis m e xp la in 1/4/23, 12:49 PM How Do We Build Black Wealth? Understanding the Limits of Black Capitalism – Non Profit News | Nonprofit Quarterly https://nonprofitquarterly .org/how-do-we-build-black-wealth-understanding-the-limits-of-black-capitalism/ 4/5 it w ould s till t a ke u nb eara b ly lo ng . L ast ye ar, E llo ra D ere no nco urt, a n e co no m is t a t P rin ce to n U nive rs it y , a n d t h re e co lle ag ues a t  G erm an u nive rs it ie s t h at e xam in ed t h e e vo lu tio n o f t h e r a cia l w ealt h g ap sin ce t h e e nd o f t h e U S C ivi l W ar. T he p ap er’s a u th o rs e stim ate t h at e ve n if B la ck a n d w hit e w ealt h g re w a t t h e s a m e ra te —t hat is , w it h e q ual c a p it a l g ain s, r a te s o f r e tu rn , a n d s a vi ng s r a te s, a ll u nlik e ly outc o m es o f a s ys te m w here h avi ng m oney help s g enera te m ore m oney—i t w ould t a ke o ve r 2 00 ye ars t o c lo se t h e r a cia l w ealt h g ap ( 2 ). U sin g m ore re alis tic a ssu m ptio ns t h at p ro je ct f o rw ard t h e e co no m ic p atte rn s o f t h e p ast 5 0 ye ars , t h e a u th o rs a d d t h at t h e a n sw er to w hen t h e r a cia l w ealt h g ap w ill c lo se , “ strik in g ly , is n eve r” (1 5). I n r e sp onse t o t h ese d ir e p re d ic tio ns, t h at t h e f e d era l g ove rn m ent p ro vi de e ach c h il d t h at d oes no t a lr e ad y have a t ru st f u nd w it h s u ch a f u nd u p on b ir th . C hild re n b orn t o f a m ilie s w it h t h e le ast w ealt h w ould g et t h e b ig gest e nd ow m ents , u p t o $ 60,0 00. W hen t h ey tu rn 1 8, a cco unt h o ld ers c o uld a cc e ss t h e f u nd s f o r in ve stm ent—t o pay fo r c o lle g e, b uy a h o m e, o r s ta rt a b usin ess. W hile t h is w ould c e rta in ly m ake a s ig nif ic a n t d ent in t h e r a cia l w ealt h g ap , it d oes n o t d ir e ctly ad dre ss t h e P ik e tty prin cip le : s o lo ng a s w hit e f o rtu nes a re g ro w in g f a ste r t h an B la ck o nes, t h e ra cia l w ealt h g ap w ill p ers is t. D arit y an d h is c o au th o r, A . K ir s te n M ulle n, h ave m ad e a f o r B la ck A m eric a n s f o r s la ve ry , J im C ro w , a n d c u rre nt r a cia l d is c rim in atio n. T his p ro p osa l c a lls f o r t h e U S f e d era l g ove rn m ent t o m ake d ir e ct p ayme nts , t o ta lin g $ 10 t o $ 12 t rillio n, t o e ach B la ck d esc e nd an t o f A fr ic a n s e nsla ve d in t h e U S (c o ntro ve rs ia lly , t h e p ro g ra m w ould e xclu d e B la ck im mig ra n ts ). P uttin g a sid e w heth er s u ch a p ro p osa l w ill e ve r g ain m ajo rit y su p port in C ong re ss, w ould it a ctu ally clo se t h e r a cia l w ealt h g ap f o r g oo d ? W hile it w ould im med ia te ly clo se th e w ealt h g ap , s u ch a p ro p osa l w ould n o t g uara n te e t h at t h e r a cia l w ealt h in eq ualit y would n o t r e -e m erg e. A gain , s o lo ng a s t h e r e tu rn s t o w hit e w ealt h r e m ain h ig her, t h en w hit e w ealt h w ill e ve ntu ally outp ace B la ck w ealt h . T he p ro b le m , as P ik e tty dem onstra te s, is t h at c a p it a lis m is a n in eq ualit y- pro d ucin g m ach in e. O ne o f t h e t h re ad s u nit in g t h e B la ck r a d ic a l t ra d it io n is t h e a sse rtio n t h at it is im possib le t o a ch ie ve r a cia l e q ualit y in a c a p it a lis t s o cie ty . F o r a t le ast a c e ntu ry , B la ck M arx is ts li k e , , a n d h ave a rg ued th at c a p it a lis m c a n no t s u rvi ve w it h o ut r a cis m , w hic h a llo w s c a p it a lis ts t o “ d ivi de-a n d -c o nq uer” t h e w ork in g -c la sse s. E m phasizi ng r a cia l d ivi sio ns h in d ers w ork e rs f r o m o rg an iz in g s tro ng er u nio ns, lo w erin g t h e w ag es o f b oth w hit e a n d B la ck w ork e rs .  W it h o ut r a cis t id eas t o ju stif y gla rin g s o cia l in eq ualit ie s, a c a p it a lis t s o cia l o rd er w ould b e a lo t m ore u nsta b le a n d s u sc e p tib le t o r a d ic a l c h alle ng es. A s h is to ria n a n d p ris o n a b olit io nis t R uth W ils o n G ilm ore , “ca p it a lis m is n eve r n o t r a cia l. ”   Wh at D o R acia l a n d E co no m ic Ju stic e R eq uir e ? Eve n if p ro m otin g B la ck c a p it a li s m c o uld c lo se t h e r a cia l w ealt h g ap , is o ur vi sio n o f a ju st s o cie ty in t h e U S s im ply one w here t h e t o p o ne p erc e nt is —i e, o ne w here t h e e lit e lo oks m ore li k e t h e m ass o f w ork e rs it e xp lo it s ? Is m assive w ealt h in eq ualit y ju stif ie d so lo ng a s it is n o t r a cia lize d? Are p ove rty wag es le ss m is e ra b le b eca u se yo ur b oss is B la ck ? Is s u b sta n d ard h o usin g le ss d an g ero us b eca u se yo ur la n d lo rd is B la ck ? Are m ono p oly pric e s a n y m ore a ff o rd ab le b eca u se t h e c o m pan y is B la ck o w ned ? There is s o m eth in g d eep ly ah is to ric a l u nd erlyi ng c u rre nt e ff o rts t h at ig no re a n d in d eed r e p ro d uce p re vi ous e ff o rts t o c o m bat r a cia l in eq ualit y by em plo yi ng t h e s tra te g ie s o f B la ck c a p it a lis m a s t h e p rim ary path . E ve n if B la ck c a p it a lis m c a n u lt im ate ly “d elive r” r a cia l e q ualit y , t h e d ata s u g gests it w ould t a ke c e ntu rie s d o s o . M ore o ve r, o ur h o riz o n f o r so cia l ju stic e s h o uld b e f a r m ore p ro fo und t h an s im ply dive rs if y in g t h e e lit e . A s lo ng a s c a p it a lis m r e m ain s a n “ in eq ualit y pro d ucin g m ach in e,” it w ill p re ve nt r a cia l e q ualit y . F re d H am pto n, t h e ch aris m atic yo ung le ad er o f t h e C hic a g o c h ap te r o f t h e B la ck P an th er P arty who w as m urd ere d b y Chic a g o p olic e a n d th e F B I in 1 969, e xp la in ed t h is s u ccin ctly: “ W e’r e n o t g oin g t o f ig ht c a p it a lis m w it h B la ck c a p it a lis m , b ut w e’r e g oin g t o fig ht it w it h s o cia lis m .” B la ck c o m munit ie s h ave lo ng p urs u ed a n a lt e rn ative a p pro ach t o r a cia l e q ualit y fo und ed o n c o lle ctive o w ners h ip a n d d em ocra tic m an ag em ent o f b usin esse s a n d h o usin g . A s e co no m is t J e ssic a G ord on N em bhard d eta ils in h er b oo k, , B la ck c o op era tive s a re r o ote d in t h e m utu al a id e ff o rts o f t h e f o rm erly ensla ve d d urin g R eco nstru ctio n. W hile B ooke r T . W ash in g to n w as p re ach in g B la ck ca p it a lis m , W EB D uB ois p ub lis h ed a b ook in 1 907 t it le d , a d vo ca tin g fo r m ore Bla ck co op era tive sSeve ra lp ro m in ent le ad ers of th e civi lrig hts m ove ment lik e Ella Bake r an d Baya rd Rustin r e le ase d p re lim in ary re se arc h H am ilt o n h as p ro p ose d m ore a m bit io us p ro p osa l a d vo ca tin g f o r r e p ara tio ns W EB D uB ois C LR J a m es C la u d ia J o nes sta te s b lu ntly r o ug hly 13 p erc e nt B la ck , 1 8 p erc e nt L atin x, s ix p erc e nt A sia n , a n d 1 .5 p erc e nt N ative A m eric a n C olle ctive C oura g e: A H is to ry of A fr ic a n A m eric a n T ho ug ht a n d P ra ctic e E co no m ic C oop era tio n A m ong N eg ro A m eric a n s 1/4/23, 12:49 PM How Do We Build Black Wealth? Understanding the Limits of Black Capitalism – Non Profit News | Nonprofit Quarterly https://nonprofitquarterly .org/how-do-we-build-black-wealth-understanding-the-limits-of-black-capitalism/ 5/5 fo r m ore B la ck c o op era tive s. S eve ra l p ro m in ent le ad ers o f t h e c ivi l r ig hts m ove ment, lik e E lla B ake r a n d B aya rd R ustin , w ere m em bers o f t h e . N ow g ro up ed u nd er t h e b an ner o f t h e “ ,” t h ese in it ia tive s p ro m is e d a m ore e g alit a ria n s o cie ty by dir e ctly ch alle ng in g c a p it a l’s c o nce ntra te d o w ners h ip . A m ove ment t h at s e eks e co no m ic ju stic e w it h o ut a d dre ssin g r a ce a n d o th er f o rm s o f in eq ualit y would s u re ly fa ll g ro ssly sh o rt o f t h e m ark . B ut t h at ve ry sa m e o b se rva tio n, I c o nte nd , a ls o a p plie s in r e ve rs e : e m plo yi ng B la ck ca p it a lis m a s t h e p rim ary path f o r a ch ie vi ng r a cia l ju stic e is c e rta in t o d is a p poin t. L ib era tio n w ill o nly co m e if w e a re e xp an sive e no ug h in o ur vi sio n t o a d dre ss in eq ualit y in a ll it s f o rm s. F ra n cis c o P ére z is t h e D ir e cto r o f t h e C ente r f o r P o p ula r E co no m ic s, a n o np ro fit c o lle cti … A BO UT T H E A UTH O R Yo ung N eg ro C oop era tive L e ag ue in t h e 1 930s so lid arit y eco no m y Fra n cis c o P ére z