REPARATIONS, EQUALITY, AND MEMORY

Through an interpretation of Du Bois's ([Reference Du Bois1935] 1992) Black Reconstruction in America, Balfour's (Reference Balfour2011) Democracy's Reconstruction aims to show that by resurrecting the vision of ex-slaves during the Reconstruction era we can learn lessons for contemporary politics and political theory. She emphasizes the meaning of liberty for the former slaves and the necessity of their having a material basis (capital and land) for real freedom and democratic participation. She also proclaims the universal significance of Black subaltern experience: by exploring what subjugated Black subjects need for full citizenship, we can learn what all citizens need in a just and well-functioning democracy; were we to reform our institutions so that they provided Blacks with what they need to be full citizens, everyone in the society would benefit. Balfour believes that we can use the language of reparations to think through contemporary questions of distributive justice. However, I have serious doubts about the value of this approach. My concern is not with the validity of Black reparations claims. Nor is my principal worry about the feasibility of getting White Americans to recognize these claims. Rather, I think compensatory justice and distributive justice, while compatible, address different concerns and should not be conflated.

The concept of reparations is fundamentally about rectifying past wrongs. In particular, it is about repairing the damage done by past injustice, restoring the victims to their condition prior to the injustice or, if this isn't possible, compensating the victims for their losses. Whether such restitution or compensation would help bring about material equality or democratic inclusion is irrelevant. Of course, provided they were not merely symbolic (e.g., a formal apology), reparations would make Blacks more equal to Whites. But there is no intrinsic connection between the aim of reparations and the goals of material and political equality. Reparations might further these progressive goals, but if so, only as a by-product.

No doubt, there is a connection between current material inequality and the uncompensated injuries of slavery: because the injustices of slavery were never fully rectified, the resulting material inequality the former slaves were forced to endure partly explains the economic disadvantages of their descendants. But contemporary economic inequality is objectionable on grounds of distributive justice, and we must be careful not to blunt the force of this objection by casting it in the language of reparations.

Du Bois offers two distinct arguments for the redistribution of land and capital in favor of the former slaves. One of these is a reparations argument, one based on charges of exploitation and unjust enrichment (Balfour Reference Balfour2011): Slave labor was the source of White southern wealth, and many outside the South profited from the cash crops that slaves produced. But the slaves were not (adequately) paid for their labor, and these economic losses should therefore be compensated.

But Du Bois also provides an argument based on political equality. Even if the ex-slaves were granted their civil rights under the Constitution, formal equality has limitations. Quite apart from whether there were past injustices that warrant compensation, no citizen could have real political equality in the absence of the resources needed for economic self-sufficiency. Economic redistribution was therefore called for on democratic grounds. I read Du Bois as arguing that the United States missed the opportunity to compensate ex-slaves for the lost wages and injuries they suffered under slavery, an opportunity that cannot be recouped by us now, generations later. But the opportunity to create genuine democratic equality, including within the economic sphere, remains.

Balfour interprets Du Bois as claiming that the ex-slaves had “earned” the right to the resources necessary for economic independence through their unpaid labor and contributions during the war (Reference Balfour2011, p. 29). But if Du Bois's argument on grounds of political equality is sound, shouldn't the former slaves' citizenship and continuing willingness to contribute to society alone give them a claim on such resources? If, as Du Bois suggests, capital and education are among “the basic equipment of citizenship,” (Balfour Reference Balfour2011, p. 30) then why, in a society committed to equal citizenship, must they be “earned”?

Balfour further suggests that reparations in the form of a massive investment in poor Black communities could serve as a basis for critiquing existing economic inequality. However, if poor Blacks need greater resources to achieve full citizenship, then they are owed this investment regardless of whether their ancestors were enslaved. Their entitlement to redress does not rest on unpaid reparations claims but on distributive justice and democratic principles. In fact, were we to create a more egalitarian society—one in which there were no serious racial disparities, wealth was equitably distributed, and quality education was available to all—I doubt that many African Americans would be interested in pressing claims for reparations. In short, the underlying worry I have about emphasizing reparations as a response to current Black disadvantage is that it obscures the validity of egalitarian critiques of American society. Being made “whole” is not the same as being made equal.

But Balfour is not just concerned with payment for past wrongs or contemporary inequality. Her meditations on slavery and Reconstruction are also meant to highlight the importance of collective memory, not only of wrongs committed, but of Black contributions to making America more democratic. And she thinks the language of reparations is helpful here, too. Again, I have my doubts.

Let's agree that Blacks have made invaluable contributions to making the United States more just (or less unjust) and these contributions have gone largely unrecognized by Americans. Unless Balfour thinks these contributions merit compensation, I don't see what work reparations talk is doing here. Publicly remembering slavery and reconstruction is a way of bearing witness to Black suffering and Black struggles for justice. We might want to do this even if reparations claims had been paid. We can forcefully argue for the need to memorialize slavery and publicly honor slaves without invoking claims of reparations.

LEADERSHIP, EQUALITY, AND DEMOCRATIC ACCOUNTABILITY

In the Shadow of Du Bois (2009) presents Gooding-Williams' argument that Du Bois is committed to a conception of Black leadership as the practice of elite rule or governance. Du Bois is also said to defend “political expressivism,” the view that Black politics should express Black spiritual identity (p. 4). And Gooding-Williams claims that Du Bois thought that White supremacy was fundamentally an illegitimate form of social exclusion, both from full citizenship and from integration into modern social life. These three tenets constitute Du Bois's “politics of expressive self-realization” (p. 4). Moreover, Gooding-Williams argues that there is a paradox at the heart of Du Bois's thought: on the one hand, the Black folk ethos is the source of the authority and effectiveness of Black leadership; on the other, it is the role of Black leadership to uplift and modernize the masses by directing them away from their traditional folkways.

Drawing on Frederick Douglass's ([Reference Douglass and Smith1855] 2003) My Bondage and My Freedom, Gooding-Williams sketches an alternative model of Black politics. Douglass, according to Gooding-Williams, has a conception of Black politics that rejects politics as elite rule, political expressivism, and assimilation. This rival political model emphasizes open debate among equals who freely act in concert to remake the republic in accordance with ideals that need not have much if any social currency.

Gooding-Williams is most critical of Du Bois's conception of Black politics as elite rule. Educated Black elites are supposed to “rule” the masses (i.e., ordinary Black folk) to foster group development (pp. 9–13). The critique rests on a distinction between “politics as the practice of leadership and rule” (pp. 20–37) and “politics as collective debate, deliberation, and action” (pp. 9–13, 211–217). Leadership and rule involves would-be Black leaders issuing “orders” and “commands” and claiming a right to be obeyed by the Black masses (pp. 9, 32). However, on my reading, the talented tenth is not supposed to be issuing any commands or orders. According to Du Bois, they are to lead by persuasion and through example, and have no power to “rule” beyond this. A command is not much of a command without the threat of sanctions, without the power to back it up, and the Black elite does not have the power to impose sanctions or to otherwise control the behavior of rank-and-file Black folk.

Du Bois, Gooding-Williams notes, does not suggest that the Black elite should use the threat of force to back up their commands. With this concession, however, I don't see the point of treating Du Bois's model of leadership as a form of governance. Moreover, Du Bois hates demagogues who use emotional appeals or personal charisma to sway the gullible. In his view, elite leadership is never to resort to deception, cult of personality, or beguiling myths. No doubt influence over others is a form of power. But when this influence is brought about through rational persuasion and personal example, I fail to see why it is objectionable.

At moments, Gooding-Williams (Reference Gooding-Williams2009) suggests that Du Bois's view of Black leadership is not just undemocratic but antidemocratic (p. 31). But though the masses are expected to view the talented tenth as guides, they are not expected to follow the Black elite's direction without question. On the contrary, in his famous critique of Booker T. Washington's leadership, Du Bois ([Reference Du Bois, Blight and Gooding-Williams1903] 1997) articulates the following democratic principle: “Honest and earnest criticism from those whose interests are most nearly touched,—criticism of writers by readers, of government by those governed, of leaders by those led,—this is the soul of democracy and the safeguard of modern society” (pp. 64–65).

Gooding-Williams acknowledges that Du Bois puts forward a “criticism model” of democratic accountability in Souls (Reference Gooding-Williams2009, pp. 54–58). But despite the fact that Du Bois does not explicitly disavow the criticism model, Gooding-Williams insists that Du Bois abandons it for an expressivist model. The main reason for this change, he speculates, is that Du Bois's view that the masses are backwards led Du Bois to conclude that they were not equipped to offer criticism worth taking seriously. However, whether the alleged backwardness of the masses would push Du Bois away from the criticism model depends crucially on what the criticism model entails.

Gooding-Williams (Reference Gooding-Williams2009) seems to think that the model means that legitimate leaders should allow themselves to be “instructed” and “guided” by those they lead (2009). Now it is clear that Du Bois would have dismissed the idea that the Black masses should instruct and guide the Black elite. Still, the very idea of leadership is incompatible with leaders being guided by those who follow them, which suggests that Gooding-Williams' interpretation of the criticism model cannot be correct.

A plausible alternative interpretation is that legitimate leaders should be subject to the public critical scrutiny of those whom they would lead and should always be responsive to the criticism of their followers. This means that leaders should take the criticisms of those they lead seriously—listening carefully to the criticism, never suppressing or ignoring such criticism, changing course if the criticism warrants, and replying patiently to honest but mistaken criticism. As Du Bois often emphasizes, the masses may not be able to provide an adequate assessment of their social environment and may only “dimly” grasp the ideals they should follow; but their criticisms may nevertheless have merit if based on an interpretation of their immediate needs and their intuitive feel for the essence of Black ideals.

I believe that Du Bois's conception of elite leadership—the talented tenth doctrine—requires only that the Black elite be qualified to lead and efficacious in their leadership. It does not require that they have the right to rule or that the Black masses have a duty to obey. Du Bois defends the legitimacy of the Black elite's claim to lead by pointing to their education and achievement. He believes that the modern world is so complex and changing so rapidly that those with a liberal arts college education are best prepared to navigate it. This group of Blacks, Du Bois contends, has always led and uplifted the masses of their people. And they falsify the ideology of Black inferiority by demonstrating the capacity of Black folk to flourish under modern conditions even in the face of racism. Their leadership role is justified, then, on the grounds that they are, educationally, best prepared to lead, historically they have shown themselves to be excellent leaders, and through their example they show that Blacks are capable of self-development.

There is no question that Du Bois's vision is unjustifiably elitist: Du Bois assumes that the masses have much to learn from the Black elite but that the Black elite have little or nothing to learn from the masses. And we might justly complain that a liberal arts college education should not be a requirement for leadership. But even if these leaders were arrogant enough to think that they had a monopoly on wisdom, their attempts to lead by persuasion and example would not be a form of domination and the masses would always remain free to reject their leadership—as in fact they often do. Indeed, in his critique of Washington, Du Bois emphasizes the importance of people freely choosing their leaders, rather than having them imposed. The masses are always free not to follow if they conclude that Black elites are not fit to lead or no longer effective leaders. If the Black elite had actual authority over the masses, then were the Black masses to rebel against elite leadership, this would not just be folly but wrong.