Freedom Is a Constant Struggle

This theme is prominent throughout the book as an overarching goal that Davis strives for. Global solidarity is the result of another theme, that is, understanding connections between struggles through the exercise of intersectionality and feminist methodology. Solidarity manifests itself as tangible action or support that has the possibility of eventually producing change or real results. Davis describes the development of global solidarity as a “symbiotic relationship between struggles abroad and struggles at home, relationships of inspiration and mutuality” (114). To Davis, the “Black radical tradition is related not simply to Black people but to all people who are struggling for freedom” (39).

One way Davis incorporates this theme throughout the book is to use it as a call for action or to inspire others to support a particular movement. The Palestinian freedom struggle is the movement that Davis calls for solidarity with most frequently throughout the book as it is one that has not historically received much support, even within social justice circles, until relatively recently. As Davis explores throughout the book, Palestine shares many similarities with other familiar movements. One specific call for action that Davis asks of her audience is solidarity and support for the BDS movement led by Palestinians against Israel. She invokes the memory of Nelson Mandela and compares the South African antiapartheid movement, which involved mass boycott, to the BDS movement.

Another way Davis utilizes this theme is to demonstrate the power that global solidarities can have in creating collective power to create monumental changes or obtain seemingly impossible victories with respect to the struggles for freedom. Davis has personally experienced the benefits of global solidarity or witnessed it herself. For example, in Essay 9 Davis mentions the support she received from those in Asia, Africa, Latin America, and Europe, and in Essay 10 she specifically thanks those in Turkey, who supported the campaign for her freedom when she was imprisoned in the 1970s. She believes that it was global support she received that made her freedom “a victory against insurmountable odds” (131). Likewise, she speaks about numerous political prisoners who have similarly been freed through solidarity.

Davis provides numerous historical examples in Essay 9 that demonstrate the many ways in which Black Americans have received solidarity from others globally. For instance, “Frederick Douglass traveled to Europe to gain support for antislavery abolition,” and “Canada offered sanctuary from slavery” via the Underground Railroad (112-13). Modern-day movements and events have also demonstrated the need for global solidarity. Davis stresses global solidarity has become especially urgent when considering how the “war on terror” and counterterrorism theories have reproduced racism and heightened anti-Muslim racism. In Essay 2, she posits that “Ferguson reminds us that we have to globalize our thinking” (13), because the same tactics used by the Israeli military against Palestinian protestors are replicated in the United States, such as against Ferguson protestors, and thus require global solidarity to combat. Similarly, the rise of mass incarceration and the prison-industrial complex and corporations like G4S also give rise to global connections as many fall within the ever-increasing effects of the prison-industrial complex. Davis details many involvements across the world that G4S has with oppressive institutions.

However, Davis concludes in Essay 10 by praising younger generations for showing that transnational solidarities are indeed possible through all the solidarity that was extended to Ferguson by people everywhere, such as the advice tweeted from Palestinians teaching Ferguson protestors how to protect themselves from tear gas. To Davis, solidarity builds collective power that in turn can create systemic change.

Another recurring theme throughout the entire book is Davis’s strong rejection of individualism, which is a “central ideological component of neoliberalism” (52), and capitalism, which “attempts to force people to think of themselves only in individual terms and not in collective terms” (49). Davis urges readers to reject individualist attitudes, views, and approaches to activism.

Davis discusses this theme in two main but differing ways. First, she speaks of the tendency to create heroic individual leaders, or change agents, who are typically male. This is done at the expense of the real impact of the collective effort of many as a whole in each movement. Davis’s intention is not to dismiss the contributions of such figures as King or Mandela, but rather to bring attention to the efforts of others, like Black female domestic workers, whose true impact during the civil rights movement’s bus boycotts has been relegated to a footnote in history. In fact, she even notes the irony that the very same figures who have been sanctified often rejected such portrayal. For example: “Even as Nelson Mandela always insisted that his accomplishments were collective, always also achieved by the men and women who were his comrades, the media attempted to sanctify him as a heroic individual” (1-2). Similarly, government leaders like President Lincoln cannot be recognized as the ones who brought about some major change as if it were through a single decision they made.

The reason Davis views the need to reject individualism as important is that doing so allows “people today to recognize their potential agency as a part of an ever-expanding community of struggle” (2). Depicting movements as the result of one extraordinary individual creates a perception that such success cannot be achieved by others without the arrival of another such individual to lead the way. This perception risks prohibiting crucial movements from arising or growing. To demonstrate a contrasting example, Davis later praises Ferguson protestors for demonstrating to the world that “a traditional, recognizable Black male charismatic leader” was not needed (85). Ferguson saw the growth of the Black Lives Matter movement, which has been led by Black women who founded it.

Second, Davis explores the ills of individualism in the context of focusing on individual actions of perpetrators or individual issues of victims instead of systemic change or structural issues. Davis criticizes individualism because it misguides our focus on only punishing individual perpetrators, instead of asking what the underlying systemic issues are that need to be addressed. Davis reflects on lessons learned from both the protests that followed George Zimmerman’s trial for fatally shooting Trayvon Martin and the Ferguson protests following the police killing of Michael Brown. She contrasts the two responses. While the former response helped recognize the need for an antiracist movement, people focused too much on the individual perpetrator, George Zimmerman, rather than on structural racism, which is at the root of such killings. However, protestors in Ferguson “refused to disband” (85), recognizing the need to go further than the past in pushing for systemic change.

Davis provides further nuance to this theme by explaining how individuals are also not a solution to systemic problems. She repeatedly emphasizes that racist state violence against Black individuals is not a series of isolated incidents resulting from “bad apples” or racist police officers. Diversity, while important, also does not necessarily mean a solution. A Black woman as a chief of police would not necessarily prevent police violence. Neoliberal ideology drives us to focus on our individual needs or individual victims. Davis cites the power of community and collectivities as a source of strength and motivation for her own activism. For Davis: “It is in collectivities that we find reservoirs of hope and optimism” (49).