W. E. B. du Bois and American Political Thought

This groundbreaking study of W.E.B. Du Bois simultaneously analyzes the political thought of one of the leading black American intellectuals and activists of this century, provides a model for the study of the history of political thought, and, by examining recent Du Bois scholarship, offers a penetrating interpretation of contemporary black thought. The book departs from existing Du Bois scholarship by locating the sources of Du Bois's thinking in the cauldron ofreform-oriented...
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This groundbreaking study of W.E.B. Du Bois simultaneously analyzes the political thought of one of the leading black American intellectuals and activists of this century, provides a model for the study of the history of political thought, and, by examining recent Du Bois scholarship, offers a penetrating interpretation of contemporary black thought. The book departs from existing Du Bois scholarship by locating the sources of Du Bois's thinking in the cauldron ofreform-oriented American intellectual life at the end of the nineteenth century, and follows the ways that his early commitments persisted in his basic views regarding such pivotal issues as therelation of science and progress, social stratification among black Americans and in general, and rational social organization. W.E.B. Du Bois and American Political Thought's interpretation of Du Bois is also an argument about the connections between Afro-American political debate and broader patterns of political discourse. This argument is linked to a path-breaking critique of dominant tendencies in Afro-American intellectual historiography and their ideologicalfoundations, as well as to an argument in support of an alternative approach to the study of the history of political thought.