The Red and the Black: The Russian Revolution and the Black Atlantic - Paperback

by David Featherstone (Editor), Christian Høgsbjerg (Editor)

This edited collection explores the inspiration of the Russian Revolution of 1917 for black radicals across the African diaspora. The volume challenges European-centred understandings of the Russian Revolution and the global left and enables new insights on the relations between Communism and various black radical traditions.

Back Jacket

'This ideologically diverse collection is uniformly well-written and exceedingly informative. The inescapable and unavoidable conclusion it renders is that the Russian Revolution of 1917 delivered a mighty blow against colonialism, imperialism and forms of apartheid alike. Simultaneously, by implication it blazes the trail and illuminates the way forward for those seeking to create a better world.'
Gerald Horne, author of Paul Robeson: The Artist as Revolutionary

The Russian Revolution of 1917 was not just a world-historical event in its own right, but also struck powerful blows against racism and imperialism, and so inspired many black radicals internationally. This edited collection explores the implications of the creation of the Soviet Union and the Communist International for black and colonial liberation struggles across the African diaspora. It examines the critical intellectual influence of Marxism and Bolshevism on the current of revolutionary 'black internationalism' and analyses how 'Red October' was viewed within the contested articulations of different struggles against racism and colonialism.

Challenging European-centred understandings of the Russian Revolution and the global left, The Red and the Black offers new insights on the relations between Communism, various lefts and anti-colonialisms across the Black Atlantic - including Garveyism and various other strands of Pan-Africanism. The volume makes a major and original intellectual contribution by making the relations between the Russian Revolution and the Black Atlantic central to debates on questions relating to racism, resistance and social change.

Author Biography

David Featherstone is a Reader in Human Geography in the School of Geographical & Earth Sciences at the University of Glasgow

Christian Høgsbjerg is a Senior Lecturer in Critical History and Politics in the School of Humanities at the University of Brighton