Black Forward

A strategic plan for the fight against the new Jim Crow and a passionate call to get involved.

From attacks on voting and civil rights to the wholesale defunding of Black institutions, Black America is facing a massive, generational attack that amounts to Jim Crow 2.0. Roland Martin argues that if we want to move forward against this backlash, we must look back at the Civil Rights movement and regain some of the solidarity and interdependence that brought Black organizations together to defeat the first Jim Crow.

Recognizing that we can only have power in groups, Black Forward builds off Martin Luther King Jr.’s final book Where Do We Go From Here, which lays out the “structured forces that can serve as the basis for building a powerful, united front” for liberation.

With chapters based on each of these structured forces, Martin mixes unforgettable stories from his own life with his inimitable and urgent style of blistering truthtelling as he lays out marching orders for Black neighborhoods, Black churches, Black media, Black social organizations, and Black businesses, showing how each has been deployed for Black liberation in the past and pointing out its potential for today. 

After reading this book we don’t get to sit out another election. We stop spending blindly and start supporting Black business, build Black institutions, and boycott those that do not work for our common good. No more rage without strategy. No more waiting on Washington—it’s time to turn our communities into our battlefield and make change where we stand.

Black Forward maps out a galvanizing plan that starts with your own block and reaches outward through our barbershops, church basements, and boardrooms toward a renewal of Black civic life.