Black Scare / Red Scare: Theorizing Capitalist Racism in the United States

A radical explication of the ways anti-Black racial oppression has infused the US government’s anti-communist repression.

In the early twentieth century, two panics emerged in the United States. The Black Scare was rooted in white Americans’ fear of Black Nationalism and dread at what social, economic, and political equality of Black people might entail. The Red Scare, sparked by communist uprisings abroad and subversion at home, established anticapitalism as a force capable of infiltratin...