Surely, we are at a moment of history fraught with new and old fOnTIS of anxiety, alienation, and antagonism; deepening poverty in the midst of increasing wealth; proposals and practices of ethnic cleansing and genocide; pandemic diseases; increased plunder; pollution and depletion of the environment; constant conflicts, large and small; and world-threatening delusions on the part of a superpower aspiring to a return to empire, with spurious claims of the right to preemptive aggression, to openly attack and overthrow nonfavored and fragile governments openly, and to seize the lands and resources of vulnerable peoples and establish "democracy" through military dictatorship abroad, all the while suppressing political dissent at home (Chang 2002; Cole et at. 2002). These anxieties are undergirded by racist and religious chauvinism, by the self-righteous and veiled references of these rulers to themselves as a kind of terrible and terrorizing hand of God, appointed to rid the world of evil (Ahmad 2002; Arnin 2001; Blum1995). At the same time, in this context of turmoil and terror and the use and threatened use of catastrophic weapons, there is the irrational and arrogant expectation that the oppressed will acquiesce, abandon resistance, and accept the disruptive and devastating consequences of globalization, along with the global hegemony it implies (Martin and Schumann 1997). There is great alarm among the white-supremicist rulers of these globalizing nations, given the metical resistance rising up against them, even as globalization’s technological, organizational, and economic capacity continues to expand (Barber 1996; Karenga 2002e, 2003a; Lusane 1997). There is great alarm when people who should "know" when they are defeated ridicule the assessment, refuse to be defeated or dispirited, and, on the contrary, intensify and diversify their struggles (Zepezauer 2002). Certainly the battlefields of Palestine, Venezuela, long suffering Haiti, and Chiapas, Mexico, along with other continuing emancipatory struggles everywhere, reaffirm the indomitable character of the human spirit and the durability and adaptive vitality of a people determined to be free, regardless of the odds and assessments against them. Indeed, they remind us that the motive force of history is struggle, informed by the ongoing quest for freedom, justice, power of the masses, and peace in the world. Despite "end of history" claims and single-super- power resolve and resolutions, these struggles continue. For still the oppressed want freedom, the wronged and injured want justice, the people want power over their destiny and daily lives, and the world wants peace. And all over the world-especially in this U.S. citadel of aging capitalism with its archaic dreams of empire-clarity in the analysis of issues, and in the critical determination of tasks and prospects, requires the deep and disciplined reflection characteristic of the personal and social practice we call philosophy. But this sense of added urgency for effective intervention is prompted not only by the critical juncture at which we stand but also by an awareness of our long history of resistance as a people, because in our collective strivings and social struggles we seek a new future for our people, our descendants, and the world. Joined also to these conditions and considerations is the compelling character of our self-understanding as a people, as a moral vanguard in this country and the world. For we have launched, fought, and won with our allies struggles that not only have expanded the realm of freedom in this country and the world but also have served as an ongoing inspiration and a model of liberation struggles for other marginalized and oppressed peoples and groups throughout the world. Indeed, they have borrowed from and built on our moral vocabulary and moral vision, sung our songs of freedom, and held up our struggle for liberation as a model to emulate. Now, self-understanding and self-assertion are dialectically linked. In other words, how we understand ourselves in the world determines how we assert ourselves in the world. Thus, an expansive concept of ourselves as Africans-continental and diasporan-and as Africana philosophers forms an essential component of our sense of mission and the urgency with which we approach it. It is important to note that I have conceived and written this chapter within the framework of Kausaida philosophy (Karenga 1978, 1980, 1997) Kawaida is a philosophic initiative that was forged in the crucible of ideological and practical struggles around issues of freedom, justice, equalitys, self-determination, conullunal power, self-defense, pan~African- ism, coalition and alliance, Black Studies, intellectual emancipation, and cultural recovery and reconstlouction. It continued to develop in the midst of these ongoing struggies within the life of the mind and stmggles iottbtn the life of the people, as well as within the context of the conditions of the world. Kawaida is defined as an ongoing synthesis of the best of xAfrican thought and practice in constant exchange tuttb tl3e 'U)()ltd. It characterizes culture as a unique, instructive and valuable way of being human in the world-as a foundation and framework for self-understanding and self-assertion. As a philosophy of culture and struggle, Kawaida maintains that our intellectual and social practice as Nricana activist scholars must be undergirded and informed by ongoing efforts to (1) ground our- selves in our own culture; (2) constantly recover, reconstruct, .and bring forth from our culture the best of what it means to be African and human in the fullest sense; (3) speak this special cultural truth to the world and (4) use our culture to constantly make our own unique contribution to the reconception and reconstruction of this country, and to the forward flow of human history.
we are at a moment of history fraught with anxiety, alienation, and antagonism; deepening poverty in the midst of increasing wealth; genocide; pandemic diseases; pollution and depletion of the environment; constant conflicts, large and small; and world-threatening superpower aspiring to a return to empire, with claims of the right to preemptive aggression, to openly attack and overthrow governments openly, and to seize the lands and resources of vulnerable peoples and establish "democracy" through military dictatorship abroad while suppressing political dissent These are undergirded by racist and religious chauvinism in this context of turmoil and terror and the use and threatened use of catastrophic weapons, there is the irrational and arrogant expectation that the oppressed will acquiesce, abandon resistance, and accept the disruptive and devastating consequences of globalization, along with global hegemony globalization’s technological, organizational, and economic capacity continues to expand people should refuse to be defeated and, on the contrary, intensify and diversify their struggles Palestine, Venezuela Haiti, and Mexico continuing emancipatory struggles everywhere, reaffirm the indomitable character of the human spirit and the durability and adaptive vitality of a people determined to be free, regardless of the odds against them the motive force of history is struggle, informed by the ongoing quest for freedom, justice, power of the masses, and peace in the world the oppressed want freedom especially in this U.S of aging capitalism requires the deep and disciplined reflection characteristic of the personal and social practice urgency is prompted not only by the critical juncture at which we stand but also by an awareness of our long history of resistance as a people, because in our collective strivings and social struggles we seek a new future we have launched, fought, and won with our allies struggles that not only have expanded the realm of freedom served as an ongoing inspiration and a model of liberation struggles for other marginalized and oppressed peoples and groups self-understanding and self-assertion are dialectically linked how we understand ourselves in the world determines how we assert ourselves in the world an expansive concept of ourselves as Africans-continental and diasporan-and as Africana philosophers forms an essential component of our sense of mission and the urgency Kawaida was forged in the crucible of ideological and practical struggles around issues of freedom, justice, equalitys, self-determination, conullunal power, self-defense, pan~African- ism, coalition and alliance, Black Studies, intellectual emancipation, and cultural recovery and reconstlouction It characterizes culture as a unique, instructive and valuable way of being human in the world-as a foundation and framework for self-understanding and self-assertion our intellectual and social practice must constantly recover, reconstruct, .and bring forth from our culture the best of what it means to be African and human in the fullest sense and to the forward flow of human history