Global Afrikan Congress

Last updated

The Global Afrikan Congress (GAC) is an international umbrella organization created by and for Africans and people of African descent. The GAC's ultimate goals are to justly redistribute global resources and resist continued oppression; it seeks to accomplish these goals by demanding reparations for the exploitation of people of African heritage, supporting policies to combat institutional racism, and working for recognition and respect for Africans and people of African descent. [1]

The GAC has defined reperation and restitution as:

"the process of self-repair, healing and restoring of a people injured because of their group identity, and the violation of their fundamental human rights by individuals, corporation, religious and other institutions, governments and other entities." [2]

The GAC was organized in October 2002 [3] in Bridgetown, Barbados and is a direct outgrowth of the African-African Descendants Caucus (AADC) formed before the 2001 United Nations World Conference on Racism (UNWCAR). After the UNWCAR there was no follow-up on the part of those designated to continue the work of the AADC begun during the preparatory conferences (PREPCOMS) leading up to the UNWCAR. Organized by attorney Roger Wareham, the AADC became the leading voice of Africans throughout the world during the UNWCAR. The AADC was instrumental in getting the Transatlantic slave trade declared "a crime against humanity", and opened the door for a direct, legal assault on nations and corporations that benefited from the trans-Atlantic slave trade.

The GAC continues the AADC's work and is now organized in 35 nations, [3] and is "the largest Pan-African Black Nationalist group in the world." [3] Its constitutional convention, held in October 2004 in Paramaribo, Suriname, ratified a document considered by many to codify the direction in which the Pan-African movement should move during the 21st century. [4]

Related Research Articles

Racism is discrimination and prejudice against people based on their race or ethnicity. Racism can be present in social actions, practices, or political systems that support the expression of prejudice or aversion in discriminatory practices. The ideology underlying racist practices often assumes that humans can be subdivided into distinct groups that are different in their social behavior and innate capacities and that can be ranked as inferior or superior. Racist ideology can become manifest in many aspects of social life. Associated social actions may include nativism, xenophobia, otherness, segregation, hierarchical ranking, supremacism, and related social phenomena. Racism refers to violation of racial equality based on equal opportunities or based on equality of outcomes for different races or ethnicities, also called substantive equality.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Abolitionism</span> Movement to end slavery

Abolitionism, or the abolitionist movement, is the movement to end slavery and liberate slaves around the world.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Atlantic slave trade</span> Slave trade – 16th to 19th centuries

The Atlantic slave trade or transatlantic slave trade involved the transportation by slave traders of enslaved African people, mainly to the Americas. The outfitted European slave ships of the slave trade regularly used the triangular trade route and its Middle Passage, and existed from the 16th to the 19th centuries. The vast majority of those who were transported in the transatlantic slave trade were from Central and West Africa who had been sold by West African slave traders to European slave traders, while others had been captured directly by the slave traders in coastal raids; European slave traders gathered and imprisoned the enslaved at forts on the African coast and then brought them to the Americas. Except for the Portuguese, European slave traders generally did not participate in the raids because life expectancy for Europeans in sub-Saharan Africa was less than one year during the period of the slave trade. Portuguese coastal raiders found that slave raiding was too costly and often ineffective and opted for established commercial relations.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">African diaspora</span> People descending from indigenous Africans living outside Africa

The globalAfrican diaspora is the worldwide collection of communities descended from people from Africa, predominantly in the Americas. The African populations in the Americas are descended from haplogroup L genetic groups of native Africans. The term most commonly refers to the descendants of the native West and Central Africans who were enslaved and shipped to the Americas via the Atlantic slave trade between the 16th and 19th centuries, with their largest populations in Brazil, the United States, and Haiti. However, the term can also be used to refer to African descendants who immigrated to other parts of the world consensually. Some scholars identify "four circulatory phases" of this migration out of Africa. The phrase African diaspora gradually entered common usage at the turn of the 21st century. The term diaspora originates from the Greek διασπορά which gained popularity in English in reference to the Jewish diaspora before being more broadly applied to other populations.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pan-Africanism</span> Movement to encourage and strengthen bonds between people of African ancestry

Pan-Africanism is a worldwide movement that aims to encourage and strengthen bonds of solidarity between all indigenous peoples and diasporas of African ancestry. Based on a common goal dating back to the Atlantic slave trade, the movement extends beyond continental Africans with a substantial support base among the African diaspora in the Americas and Europe.

<i>Maafa</i> Swahili neologism for the Atlantic Slave Trade

The Maafa, the African Holocaust, the Holocaust of Enslavement, or the Black Holocaust are political neologisms popularized since 1988 to describe the history and ongoing effects of atrocities inflicted upon Black people worldwide. Of particular focus are those committed by non-Africans, which continue to the present day through imperialism, colonialism and other forms of oppression.

<i>500 Years Later</i> 2005 US/UK documentary film by Owen Alik Shahadah

500 Years Later is a 2005 independent documentary film directed by Owen 'Alik Shahadah and written by M. K. Asante, Jr. It has won five international film festival awards in the category of Best Documentary, including the UNESCO "Breaking the Chains" award. It has won other awards including Best Documentary at the Pan African Film Festival in Los Angeles, Best Documentary at the Bridgetown Film Festival in Barbados, Best Film at the International Black Cinema Film Festival in Berlin, and Best International Documentary at the Harlem International Film Festival in New York.

Racism in North America and the state of race relations there are described in this article. Racism manifests itself in different ways and severities throughout North America depending on the country. Colonial processes shaped the continent culturally, demographically, religiously, economically, and linguistically. Racism was part of that process and is exemplified throughout North America today but varies regionally.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">International Day for the Remembrance of the Slave Trade and its Abolition</span> International observance

The International Day for the Remembrance of the Slave Trade and its Abolition is an international day celebrated August 23 of each year, the day designated by UNESCO to memorialize the transatlantic slave trade.

In the Arab world, racism targets non-Arabs and the expat majority of the Arab states of the Persian Gulf coming from South Asian groups as well as Black, European, and Asian groups that are Muslim; non-Arab ethnic minorities such as Armenians, Africans, the Saqaliba, Southeast Asians, Jews, Kurds, and Coptic Christians, Assyrians, Persians, Turks, and other Turkic peoples, and South Asians living in Arab countries of the Middle East.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Slave Route Project</span> UNESCO initiative

The Slave Route Project is a UNESCO initiative that was officially launched in 1994 in Ouidah, Benin. It is rooted in the mandate of the organization, which believes that ignorance or concealment of major historical events constitutes an obstacle to mutual understanding, reconciliation and cooperation among peoples. The project breaks the silence surrounding the slave trade and slavery that has affected all continents and caused great upheavals that have shaped our modern societies. In studying the causes, the modalities and the consequences of slavery and the slave trade, the project seeks to enhance the understanding of diverse histories and heritages stemming from this global tragedy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Amos N. Wilson</span> American philosopher

Amos Nelson Wilson was an African-American theoretical psychologist, social theorist, Pan-African thinker, scholar, author and a professor of psychology at the City University of New York.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">First Pan-African Conference</span> International conference held in London, July 1900

The First Pan-African Conference was held in London from 23 to 25 July 1900. Organized primarily by the Trinidadian barrister Henry Sylvester Williams, the conference took place in Westminster Town Hall and was attended by 37 delegates and about 10 other participants and observers from Africa, the West Indies, the US and the UK, including Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, John Alcindor, Benito Sylvain, Dadabhai Naoroji, John Archer, Henry Francis Downing, Anna H. Jones, Anna Julia Cooper, and W. E. B. Du Bois, with Bishop Alexander Walters of the AME Zion Church taking the chair.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Reparations for slavery</span> Political justice concept

Reparations for slavery is the application of the concept of reparations to victims of slavery and/or their descendants. There are concepts for reparations in legal philosophy and reparations in transitional justice. Reparations can take many forms, including practical and financial assistance to the descendants of enslaved people, acknowledgements or apologies to peoples or nations negatively affected by slavery, or honouring the memories of people who were enslaved by naming things after them.

Racism in Canada traces both historical and contemporary racist community attitudes, as well as governmental negligence and political non-compliance with United Nations human rights standards and incidents in Canada. Contemporary Canada is the product of indigenous First Nations combined with multiple waves of immigration, predominantly from Europe and in modern times, from Asia.

Marika Sherwood is a Hungarian-born historian, researcher, educator and author based in England. She is a co-founder of the Black and Asian Studies Association.

The United Nations General Assembly declared the year 2011 as International Year for People of African Descent. That year also marked the 10th anniversary of the World Conference Against Racism, which approved a resolution stating that slavery along with the colonization that sustained it were crimes against humanity.

The International Decade for People of African Descent, 2015–2024, was proclaimed by the UN General Assembly in a Resolution (68/237) adopted on 23 December 2013. The theme of the International Decade is "People of African descent: recognition, justice and development".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Afro-Palestinians</span> Racial group

Afro-Palestinians are Palestinians of black African heritage. A minority of Afro-Palestinians, estimated population between 200-450, reside in an African enclave around the Bab al-Majlis, in the Muslim Quarter of Jerusalem. Some of the community dwell in other areas of Jerusalem such as Beit Hanina and A-Tur.

The African-American diaspora refers to communities of people of African descent who previously lived in the United States. These people were mainly descended from formerly enslaved African persons in the United States or its preceding European colonies in North America that had been brought to America via the Atlantic slave trade and had suffered in slavery until the American Civil War. The African-American diaspora was primarily caused by the intense racism and views of being inferior to white people that African Americans have suffered through driving them to find new homes free from discrimination and racism. This would become common throughout the history of the African-American presence in the United States and continues to this day.

References

  1. "GAC About". Archived from the original on July 19, 2008.
  2. Washington, Teresa N., "The African World in Dialogue: An Appeal to Action!" Oya's Tornado (2016), p. 130, ISBN   9780991073085 Archived 2024-04-23 at the Wayback Machine (retrieved 23 April 2024)
  3. 1 2 3 Bracks, Lean'tin, "African American Almanac: 400 Years of Black Excellence." (The Multicultural History & Heroes Collection). Ed. 2., Visible Ink Press (2023), p. 34, ISBN   9781578598328 Archived 2024-04-23 at the Wayback Machine (retrieved 23 April 2024)
  4. "The GAC Constitution" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on December 17, 2008.