Discovering Democracy in the Work of Frantz Fanon

This book offers a unique re-reading of Frantz Fanon as an affirmative proponent of radical democracy. It is the discovery of a Fanon who is occupied with creation, not destruction, and who insists that people must retain their power and use it to manage their lives together. This aspect of Fanon is often overlooked as other dimensions, such as colonialism, race, and power, are at the forefront. The re-reading of Fanon staged in this book sets out to recover the important motif of democracy in Fanon as a crucial contribution to brokering social change and action in the face of democratic erosion today.

The book proposes democracy as a new, creative way forward. But it insists that we understand democracy radically, as a way of life in which we do not destroy what we are against. Instead we create, together, new democratic lives in common. As such, it will be an important resource not only for researchers, students, and instructors in cultural and postcolonial studies but also social theory, contemporary sociology, American politics, and race and ethnicity studies.