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Reparations

Reparations for slavery is the idea that some form of compensatory payment needs to be made to the descendants of Africans who had been enslaved as part of the Atlantic Slave Trade. The most notable demands for reparations have been made in the United Kingdom and in the United States, where slavery was the most pervasive. Caribbean and African states from which slaves were taken have also made reparation demands.

Actor Aishe Keita plays the protagonist, Rory, in “Reparations.”

Play ‘Reparations’ explores what makes us whole

By Reparations

By Rick Hellman, The University of Kansas — Playwright Darren Canady shocks audiences by opening his new two-act drama, “Reparations,” with a scene of a lynching. But he leavens that tragedy with later scenes of the love and dedication that sustained African Americans through centuries of trial, even offering an Afro-Futuristic vision of hope. Seattle’s Sound Theatre Company opened “Reparations” Jan. 8 at the city’s Langston Hughes Performing Arts Institute. It…

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Reparations Day march in London, August 2019.

Can Reparations Help us to Re-envision International Development?

By Editors' Choice, Reparations

Reparations activism links today’s vast inequalities with the enormous culpability of colonialism. By Priya Lukka, Open Democracy — ‘Reparations.’ Once I heard that word from a friend, everything I had been taught as an economist was challenged at a fundamental level. As someone working at a large INGO where I have spent years targeting the drivers of poverty, I recognise that development isn’t…

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Collection of Helena Rubinstein

A Letter to President Macron: Reparations Before Restitution

By Editors' Choice, Reparations

In the wake of initiatives to repatriate Africa’s stolen property, the author of this letter asks the French President to repair what his ancestors have broken, before attempting to restore the war trophies of colonial conquest. By Manthia Diawara, Hyperallergic — “All of the elements for a solution to the major problems of humanity existed at one time or another in European thought. But the Europeans did not act on…

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Antonia Eliason

Democrat candidate in Mississippi calls for reparations

By Reparations

Antonia Eliason continues to make waves in her bid for the First Congressional District seat in Mississippi. By Frank Corder — The self-described Democratic Socialist candidate has already voiced support for Medicaid expansion, the Green New Deal, marijuana legalization, and the “Squad.” Now Eliason is pushing for reparations. In a tweet on Tuesday, Eliason wrote, “Reparations for slavery are long overdue. One of the gravest betrayals in American history is the unfulfilled…

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Ta-Nehisi Coates and Danny Glover

One city’s reparations program that could offer a blueprint for the nation

By News & Current Affairs, Reparations

Evanston, Illinois, is levying a tax on newly legalised marijuana to fund projects benefiting African Americans in recognition of the enduring effects of slavery and the war on drugs By Eric Lutz, The Guardian — For years, Robin Rue Simmons watched Evanston, Illinois, “working hard” to resolve its racial disparities – but with little to show for its efforts. “Our gaps were widening,” the city alderman told the Guardian, citing the Chicago suburb’s…

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Deval Patrick

Deval Patrick to unveil reparations as part of black economic agenda

By News & Current Affairs, Reparations

Reparations are popular with black Americans but opposed by most whites and divide Democrats. By Alexi McCammond, Axios — Deval Patrick supports developing a plan for the federal government to provide reparations to living descendants of slaves, a position he’ll make clear as part of an economic platform for black Americans he’s unveiling today, an aide tells Axios. Driving the news: The former Massachusetts governor, one of only two non-white candidates…

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Michael Bloomberg speaks at the Vernon Chapel American Methodist Episcopal Church in Tulsa, Okla.

Michael Bloomberg proposes multi-billion-dollar initiative to provide economic justice for black Americans

By News & Current Affairs

By Shant Shahrigian — Mike Bloomberg took to the site of historic race riots in Tulsa, Okla., on Martin Luther King Jr. Day weekend to propose sweeping plans to redress the economic legacy of generations of discrimination against African Americans. In an initiative similar to calls for reparations for slavery, the Democratic presidential candidate proposed $70 billion in investment in the country’s “100 most…

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