Hannah Arendt and the Negro Question

Introduction

introduction this book’s title echoes richard Bernstein’s Hannah Arendt and the Jewish Question in which he asserts that the Jewish question and arendt’s wrestling with it lef an impression on her thinking and writing.1 Bernstein’s title is quite provocative and he is careful to explain, “‘The Jewish question’ never referred to a single, well-defined, determinate issue or question. on the contrary, it was used to designate a whole series of shifing, loosely related, historical, cultural, religious , economic, political, and social issues, ranging from what rights were due to the Jews as citizens of nation-states to whether the Jews constituted a distinctive people, race, or nation.”2 The concept of the Jewish question, which is thought to have emerged in the middle of the eighteenth century, has european origins and is connected to naturalization, landholding, and fears of Jewish influence through money and the dissemination of ideas.3 There are controversies surrounding the phrase, including how it has been used for the purposes of antisemitism and Jew hatred, as well as whether Jews themselves have uncritically accepted it. My title is also intended as a provocation, using the phrase “the negro question ” to evoke what is alternately referred to as “the negro problem.” The question is enveloped in a myriad of controversies in the americas, europe, africa, and asia that have resulted in large part from the persistent and, some would say, permanent problem of anti-Black racism coupled with long-standing institutions like slavery and colonialism/imperialism throughout these regions.4 Like the Jewish question, the negro question is neither singular nor monolithic, and it too is interwoven with arendt’s thinking about race, slavery, imperialism, totalitarianism , violence, and other dominant themes in her writings.5 The purpose of this book is to acknowledge arendt’s keen philosophical and political insights without ignoring or bracketing her problematic assertions, assumptions , and oversights regarding the negro question. i make the following main arguments: (1) a fundamental flaw in arendt’s orientation toward and claims concerning the negro question is that she sees the negro question as a negro problem rather than a white problem; (2) arendt’s analysis of the Jewish question has implications for her analysis of the negro question, but arendt does not readily connect the two; (3) arendt’s commitment to rigidly distinguishing what is properly political from the private and the social influences her analysis of the negro question in a way that undermines her understanding of and judgments about it. More specifically, arendt’s delineation of the negro question as a social 1 2 | Hannah arendt and the negro Question issue prevents her from recognizing that anti-Black racism (like Jew hatred) is a political phenomenon; (4) arendt’s representational thinking and judgment are flawed and further inhibit her understanding of the negro question. “There isn’t any negro Problem; There is only a White Problem” The negro question is multifaceted. Historically, it has been connected to the emergence of racialized slavery with the transatlantic slave trade and the ensuing debates about abolition and emancipation; the development of race hierarchies and scientific racism used to establish the inferiority of Blacks; contentions about segregation versus integration; efforts at gaining civil and political rights; and debates about full citizenship. it has also entailed questions about access to public transportation, lodging, education, employment, the court system, and political office. a shortcoming in arendt’s approach to analyzing and interpreting the negro question is that she sees the negro question as a negro problem rather than as a white problem. unlike richard Wright—who when asked by a French reporter about the negro problem in the 1940s responded, “There isn’t any negro problem; there is only a white problem”—arendt consistently frames the negro question as a negro problem.6 The “negro question” and the “negro problem” are phrases that have ofen been used interchangeably. The negro question as it pertains to slavery, segregation , colonialism/imperialism, citizenship, equal rights, and so on (or to antiBlack racial oppression more generally, and the means available to identify, confront , and overcome that oppression) has frequently been referred to and thought of as a negro problem. The use of “problem” here can be interpreted in two ways. First, Black people are being conceptualized as the problem. That is, we pose a problem or a burden for whites—and even for ourselves. or, second, anti-Black racism is basically Black people’s problem. That is, anti-Black racism...