"Eventually They'll Have to Move the Factory Out of Detroit or Give It to Us": The Rise and Demise of the League of Revolutionary Black Workers

Taking recent works by Cedric Johnson, Rod Bush, and Max Elbaum as points of departure, this paper argues that the failure of the radical US left to sustain itself in the 1970s as it did in the 1960s can be traced to a failure to think dialectically.  To illustrate this, I examine a series of historical events that changed the objective conditions of society and suggest that, after 1974, tactics and strategies developed by radical activists did not change to correspond with the changing conditions of society—particularly the world-economy.  I call this failure to adjust tactics, strategies, and ideologies to changes in concrete material realities “dialectical illiteracy.”   Beginning with the 1967 Detroit Rebellion and the formation of the League of Revolutionary Black Workers, I examine the influence of Marxist-Leninist thought on the black liberation movement and place it within the context of the world-economy.  Following this I discuss the 1972 National Black Political Convention in Gary, IN, the formation and break-up of the African Liberation Support Committee, the New Communist Movement, deindustrialization, and what Rod Bush has called “the establishment of white left ideological hegemony over the left forces in the Black liberation movement.”  This paper closes by discussing some of the implications of dialectical illiteracy for young activists and intellectuals in the US today.