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- Convenors:
-
Stefan Ouma
(University of Bayreuth)
Faisal Garba (University of Cape Town)
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- Discussant:
-
Serawit Debele
(University of Bayreuth)
- Format:
- Panel
- Stream:
- Political Economy of Extractivism
- Location:
- S46 (RWII)
- Sessions:
- Monday 30 September, -, -
Time zone: Europe/Berlin
Short Abstract:
Is Black capitalism a track for the economic emancipation of the African (diaspora) masses, or is such a project a mere fallacy because capital and capitalism are organically anti-Black? This panel engages with these questions and particularly encourages transatlantic modes of epistemic engagement.
Long Abstract:
The belief that Black capitalism can transform the lives of both Africans and the African Diaspora is at an all-time high. The rise of African capitalist idols (e.g. Aliko Dangote), ideological musings (‘Africapitalism’), cultural productions (‘Wakandaism’), and the surging reconnections of an entrepreneurial African diaspora to the continent bolsters this outlook. The belief that capitalism can liberate Black people is not new. Going back as far as the likes of Booker T. Washington and Marcus Garvey, improvement, entrepreneurialism, and the pursuit of accumulating wealth have been key ideas in the struggle for Black liberation. This can be contrasted, on the one hand, with thinkers who blamed capitalism – in both its colonial and neo-colonial manifestations – for Africa’s and (diaspora) Africans’ underdevelopment and subjugation. This rich transatlantic history of critique stretches from C.L.R. James and W.E.B. Du Bois to Frantz Fanon, Walter Rodney, Kwame Nkrumah, and Amílcar Cabral. On the other hand, we have thinkers such as James Boggs, who reacted to the revitalization of the older thesis that capitalism can do good for the African diaspora and Africa itself by rejecting Black capitalism as an 'irrationality'. These interventions unfold their contemporary relevance not just in light of a proliferation of Black capitalist projects; they also can be read in pair with the increasing popularity of Afro-pessimist ideas, which maintain that both capital and capitalism as organically anti-Black.
We welcome papers that speak to these themes. We particularly encourage transatlantic modes of epistemic engagement, connecting Africa and its diaspora.
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Monday 30 September, 2024, -Paper short abstract:
Using a case study on Black traders in apartheid-era Namibia, I argue that capitalism often provides the means for individual ascent while simultaneously precluding more radical change. While new groups can find new niches, they rarely have a chance to radically transform production processes.
Paper long abstract:
One of the defining features of capitalism is capital owners' ability to structure social and economic relations by organizing the process of production. When asking “whether Black capitalism is a track for the economic emancipation of the African masses”, a good place to start is to ask if Black-owned capital can re-organize processes of production. I take up this question using the case of Black traders in apartheid-era Northern Namibia. Under the conditions of ‘separate development’ since roughly 1950, a substantial group of Black men and women were able to establish themselves as successful traders. Many shops were successful enough to provide traders with the means to build up capital, branch out into different enterprises and form extensive patronage networks. After independence in 1990, however, trade liberalization caused many of these enterprises to crumble. Only in rare cases were successful traders able to transfer their earlier success into other sectors. Far from lastingly transforming production processes, they suffered from changes in capitalist organization over which they had no control. I use this case study to address the panel’s central questions. I argue that, while capital is not per se anti-Black, the long history of capitalist organization of productive relations typically channels the economic success of new groups into niches that rather depend on existing structures than establishing new ones. Capitalist economy as it has historically been institutionalized often provides the means for individual emancipation, but it severely limits possibilities of collective emancipation from existing structures of a racialized economy.
Paper short abstract:
This paper focuses on captains of commerce and industry of African origins' attempts to decolonize/deracialize capitalism in the context of Black Business. It looks at how they have struggled, against ideological and racial odds, to Africanize capital for their own benefit and that of Global Africa.
Paper long abstract:
This paper revisits the intertwined processes of deracialization and decolonization as they unfolded in the context of capitalism and colonialism in the long 20th century. It argues that, although both capitalism and colonialism are racial systems, dismantling them through deracialization, as luring as it is, has been marred with limitations stemming from their colonial coupling. As such, colonial racial capitalism remains intact globally in the 21st century. One of the conspicuous areas in which racial capitalist coloniality continues is that of Black business, despite various attempts by captains of commerce and industry in Africa and its Diaspora across the centuries to Africanize capital and labor relations. Employing radical Black political economy, therefore, enables one to make sense of why and how, historically and contemporarily, ‘Black entrepreneurs of African descent’ worldwide have generally not fared well in establishing and sustaining big business relative to those of ‘Euro-American’ origins.
Paper short abstract:
Using a multi-ethnography (West Africa and South Afric), I will show how the Lions Club is in the footsteps of historical leaders Du Bois and Booker T Washington to create an entrepreneurial elite. Lions Club's freedom of association can be seen as a counter-point to the professional dependence.
Paper long abstract:
W. E. B Du Bois said in The Souls of Black Folks, 1903: "Is it possible that nine million men can make real economic progress if they are deprived of political rights, if they are reduced to a servile caste? For twenty years, the African branch of the Lions Club has been fighting this situation by recruiting African members to create the exclusive group of 30,000 Lions of Africa. These are very talented industrialists who are becoming pan-African political players, to "restore pride to the continent".
The multi-sited ethnography in West ans South Africa will offer a look at the pan-African ethos of the possessing. I will show how the Lions Club follows in the footsteps of historical leaders Du Bois and Booker T Washington to create an entrepreneurial elite. From a critical point of view, freedom of association can be seen as a counterpoint to the professional dependence suffered by individual members. The associative struggle is a prelude to a desire to win back the economy, and the club is a collective offering black empowerment (Tangri and Southal 2008). The wealthy members would forget for a moment to take advantage of their extraversion (Bayart 1999) as industrialists to practise an intra version, an opposite principle.
They show that a liberal dynamic cannot be built in a globalised context, which is always asymmetrical for the South. The continental autochthony they practise at the Lions Club shows that all entrepreneurs must first and foremost be political and therefore pan-African.
Paper short abstract:
This contribution offers a critical engagement with Africapitalism, a concept popularized by Nigerian billionaire Tony Elumelu. It first contextualizes the concept and provides a brief history. It then moves on to discuss four questions that have hitherto received little discussion in the dedicated
Paper long abstract:
This contribution offers a critical engagement with Africapitalism, a concept popularized by Nigerian billionaire Tony Elumelu. It first contextualizes the concept and provides a brief history. It then moves on to discuss four questions that have hitherto received little discussion in the dedicated debate: How does Africapitalism square with other existing visions of Africa’s economic future? Exactly what kind of critique of capitalism does Africapitalism offer? What kind of future does Africapitalism imagine, and what roles does it assign to the state, the citizenry and the private sector? How well positioned is the idea of Africapitalism to tackle Africa’s most pressing problems?