Document outlines an “action agenda” for the future
New York, June 9, 2023 — Today, the Institute of the Black World 21st Century (IBW) released the “Baltimore Declaration,” a comprehensive document which summarizes the issues and topics addressed by the participants in the 5th State of the Black World Conference organized by IBW in Baltimore, MD from April 19-23, 2023. IBW’s first State of the Black World Conference was held in Atlanta, GA in 2000.
This declaration also represents an action agenda outlining the way forward for the ongoing civil rights, human rights and reparatory justice movements across the global African community. Priority action items include addressing the catastrophic crisis in Haiti, supporting the global reparations movement and combating gentrification as a state of emergency in Black America.
The document contains synopses of selected speeches and presentations delivered at this historic gathering of hundreds of people of African Descent who convened in Baltimore from cities and states across the USA, and from countries in Africa, the Caribbean, Latin America and Europe.
In reflecting on the historical significance of the Baltimore conference, Prof. Sir Hilary Beckles, Chairman of the CARICOM Reparations Commission, said, “This conference will mark an historical inflection point for reparations. Now, we can begin to transcend the many disconnected reparations initiatives and projects manifesting in various geographical areas into a global reparations movement where we connect the dots from the USA, the Caribbean, Africa, Europe and Latin America into a network of communications, collaborations and joint actions, united in an overarching strategic objective of reparatory justice for the historical crimes of chattel slavery. This global reparations movement will grow in the years ahead into the most powerful human rights movement in the 21st Century.”
On the final day of the conference, LaTosha Brown, co-founder of Black Voters Matter asked the audience “What will America look like without racism, What would a new world look like where all people feel valued and respected. If we don’t envision, we will not create a new world….let’s pay more attention to the twin anchors in our humanity: Black Love & Black Power. Our politics should be an expression of our humanity, our politics should support our black humanity….there is no Black Power without Black love for ourselves and each other.”
Dr. Julius Garvey, son of the Hon. Marcus Mosiah Garvey, said, “This has been an amazing conference and we must congratulate Dr. Ron Daniels for organizing this gathering where we can meet and talk to each other and share our love.”
Dr. Julianne Malveaux, Black America’s preeminent political economist, also commended Dr. Daniels and his IBW team for organizing the conference into a series of in-depth town halls, plenary sessions and workshops that examined a wide range of issues and topics affecting the Black world today.
In accepting IBW’s Legacy award for his tireless work on reparatory justice, Ambassador David Commissiong, Barbados’s ambassador to CARICOM, stated: “This award is coming from an institution of integrity, from a very important Pan-African institution. This conference is a continuation of the great Pan-African Congresses from 1900 through the 20th Century and now into the 21st Century……you are the inheritors of that tradition and we thank you for the opportunity for representatives from across the entire Black world to come together, to continue to make plans together. The momentum is with us. We are marching on towards reparatory justice and we in the Caribbean are reaching out to our African American sisters and brothers to march with us to victory. Failure is not an option.”
And, former Jamaican prime minister, Hon. PJ Patterson, who spoke on the first day of the conference opined, “It is in the renewed pursuit of our eternal struggle that the great Frederick Douglas spoke about, we must engage all during our conversations at this conference so that Global Africa unite as one to raise with one loud voice to secure at long last, reparative justice and from that healing balm, empower its people wherever they live to rise above yonder horizons to realize One Aim, One Destiny, One Love.”
Read the Baltimore Declaration here
