W.E.B. Dubois

Abstract

E.B. DUBOIS is by all accounts acentral figure in the history of Afro-American political activity, a major contributor to a halfcentury's debate over the condition of and proper goals and strategies for the black population. Yet little scholarly work has concentrated on the specifically political component of his thinking. Moreover, such attention as has been given to DuBois's political ideas either is ancillary to some other intellectual purpose-for example, general biography-or is simply hagiographical.1 The paucity of systematic analysis has coincided with his longevity and persistent intellectual engagement to make DuBois appear as a champion who can be appropriated on an equal basis by any and all political tendencies. There is little need to rehearse the various appropriations. Against Washington, DuBois has been understood as a defender of radical activism and a pristine idealist. Against Garvey, he appears as an elitist integrationist, even though he was within a few years to leave the NAACP in part as a result of the latter's rejection of his proposals for organizing the race behind segregation's walls. Communists claim him, his elitism notwithstanding, as do anticommunist Pan-African nationalists. Yet among prominent Afro-American political actors in this century, DuBois is perhaps the most systematic thinker (at least insofar as coherent writing is the expression of systematic thought). Therefore, one might expect less eclecticism among categorizations of his place in black thought. What bases are there for the anomaly that DuBois should be more variously interpreted than less explicit writers?