Decolonization, Desegregation, and Black Power

As universal in its reach and aspirations as Garveyism, Black Power came to demand the completion and fulfilment of the visions and promises of decolonization and desegregation. It is hardly accidental that Black Power, for all its global impact, resonated most forcefully in the some of the same areas of the black world where Garveyism was most vibrant, namely the United States, Africa (especially Kwame Nkrumah’s Ghana), and the Anglophone Caribbean. Indeed, the two phenomena, Garveyism and Black Power, were often linked organically and personally: a number of groups and individuals with origins in Garveyism would later join Black Power. Writers such as Amy Jacques Garvey and Walter Rodney expanded on Garvey’s work, and Pan-Africanism, the All-African People’s Conference, and Rastafari all owe a debt to Garveyism.