This transatlantic study is based on archival research, primarily in the United States and France, that mostly concerns the period from the 1919 Versailles Peace Conference settling the “Great War” to the March on Washington of 1963. The March, which marked a new era in the struggle against Jim Crow or U.S. apartheid, not coincidentally occurred as African and Caribbean nations were surging to independence. In other words, Washington had difficulty competing for “hearts and minds” in the era of decolonization while Americans of African descent were treated so atrociously. Simultaneously, as African Americans gained the ballot and allied rights, they were better able to shape U.S. foreign policy, culminating in the victory over apartheid in South Africa in 1994.
This useful book is notably helpful for Americanists. The author details how Paris was concerned about how the movement led by the Jamaica-born U.S. expatriate Marcus Garvey—and his cry of...