The Black Book II: From Hajji Malik Al-Shabazz to Barack Obama

This book seeks to promote a realisticpolitical dialogue between theAmerican national minorities andthe dominant Anglo-Americanmajority. In what American presidents Clinton and Obama have repeatedly called a "one-nation one-state" political system, how will thestate address the unique needs and interests of its historically oppressed national minorities, particularly African Americans? All black officials in the United States government are in the same position asthe president; they are all required to represent first of all the majority's interests. For a national minority to be able to fully address its special needs (when it can find no specific representation in the majority-dominated platform of either political party or the policy agenda of government), it must seek to enjoy not only civil rights, but the full range of human rights, particularly the right to self-determination, to whatever extent may be desired or needed.Hajji Malik Al-Shabazz understood that the African Americans were still in the grip of American domestic colonialism. He feared that the majorityethny would prefer to pursue forced assimilation, possibly leadingto the extinguishing of African Americans' collective identity (ethnocide), rather than to negotiate an equal-status integration of the African American national minority. As the presidency of Barack Obama is demonstrating, electing a Black president who is required to address the state's interest as a whole is not the answer for improving the well being of African Americans.