Around the world, Black people are experiencing violence at the hands of colonialism, capitalism, and white supremacy. Today, May 25, marks three years since George Floyd was murdered by the state. This murder was felt by Black people around the world, as we have a unified struggle against the violence of imperialism. Through our grief, it’s become harder to ignore that Black people in the United States live in the imperial core and it is imperative that we interrogate the ways that we have internalized carceral culture and end the ways that we rely on state sanctioned methods of public “safety” through policing, prisons and mass surveillance. 

Abolition should move us beyond not only defunding agencies that make us less safe, but also towards a society that ensures we are all seen and valued for our full dignity and humanity. This also means interrogating the ways we have internalized homophobia and othering within our own communities – forces of division with European roots. The historically organized white supremacist looting from our communities and promotion of oppressive mindsets begets communal competition and violence. We must, now more than ever, seek to restore intergenerational villages of mutual aid and care. We, at the Black Solidarity Economy Fund, believe that building solidarity economies will lend to that goal.

It is a bitter truth that the United States stabilizes its global economic and political power through anti-Black subjugation and violence, through prisons, policing and military, and thus we see our struggles as connected. Weakening the internal/domestic processes for extraction and exploitation, transforming the economy, undermines the capacity of the US to determine Black futures globally. Though domestic imperialism may manifest in things like eminent domain, gentrification, mass incarceration, incessant surveillance and police violence, we know imperialism has different consequences for Africans across the globe. 

In many ways, the military industrial complex and the prison industrial complex stabilize one another. With efforts like the 1033 program, a program that allows local police to access “excess” military equipment, military investment translates to local militarized police. It is no wonder, then, why the police can’t stop killing us in a mechanized, militarized fashion. As police departments seek to increase their reach and power domestically, the US has also moved to expand military presence in Africa, for example, through their US Africa Command (AFRICOM). Black Alliance for Peace (BAP) is stewarding a campaign to #ShutDownAFRICOM. Abolitionist and anti-imperialist struggles are paired in lockstep by Black radical organizers. 

On this African Liberation Day, we assert that global Black resistance against capitalism, imperialism, and white supremacy is central to building a solidarity economy that seeds Black self-determination. 

In solidarity,

The BSEF Team

LINKS TO FOLLOW:

• Black Alliance for Peace: https://blackallianceforpeace.com/usoutofafrica
• AFRICOM fact sheet: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1l2dePf6ui5RQn2rlzJp4MsPlLFHHjgFH/edit
• African Liberation Day: https://africanliberationday.net