Overview

Black Natural Law offers a new way of understanding the African American political tradition. Iconoclastically attacking left (including James Baldwin and Audre Lorde), right (including Clarence Thomas and Ben Carson), and center (Barack Obama), Vincent William Lloyd charges that many Black leaders today embrace secular, white modes of political engagement, abandoning the deep connections between religious, philosophical, and political ideas that once animated Black politics. By telling the stories of Frederick Douglass, Anna Julia Cooper, W. E. B. Du Bois, and Martin Luther King, Jr., Lloyd shows how appeals to a higher law, or God's law, have long fueled Black political engagement. Such appeals do not seek to implement divine directives on earth; rather, they pose a challenge to the wisdom of the world, and they mobilize communities for collective action. Black natural law is deeply democratic: while charismatic leaders may provide the occasion for reflection and mobilization, all are capable of discerning the higher law using our human capacities for reason and emotion.At a time when continuing racial injustice poses a deep moral challenge, the most powerful intellectual resources in the struggle for justice have been abandoned. Black Natural Law recovers a rich tradition, and it examines just how this tradition was forgotten. A Black intellectual class emerged that was disconnected from social movement organizing and beholden to white interests. Appeals to higher law became politically impotent: overly rational or overly sentimental. Recovering the Black natural law tradition provides a powerful resource for confronting police violence, mass incarceration, and today's gross racial inequities. Black Natural Law will change the way we understand natural law, a topic central to the Western ethical and political tradition. While drawing particularly on African American resources, Black Natural Law speaks to all who seek politics animated by justice.

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9780199362189

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Instead of conceiving of natural law in terms of individualized reason, black natural law understands human nature as a complex mix of reason, emotion, and imagination. To discern this combination, black natural law appeals to communal and political contexts in which they intertwine in endlessly varied forms. These sites of discernment are crucial for Lloyd, framing human nature in terms of fighting against injustice. Lloyd's work is not simply imaginative; it is provocative. Lloyd invites all to give priority to the black natural law tradition. Highly recommended for all undergraduates, graduate students, and faculty. --<em>CHOICE</em>

This is a book about justice, at once a historical study and a constructive contribution to our current social and political moment. --<em>Rain Taxi</em> Instead of conceiving of natural law in terms of individualized reason, black natural law understands human nature as a complex mix of reason, emotion, and imagination. To discern this combination, black natural law appeals to communal and political contexts in which they intertwine in endlessly varied forms. These sites of discernment are crucial for Lloyd, framing human nature in terms of fighting against injustice. Lloyd's work is not simply imaginative; it is provocative. Lloyd invites all to give priority to the black natural law tradition. Highly recommended for all undergraduates, graduate students, and faculty. --<em>CHOICE</em>

Author Information

Vincent W. Lloyd is Associate Professor of Theology and Religious Studies at Villanova University and the author of ""The Problem with Grace""

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