Everybody's Talking About "Generational Wealth": What Ever Happened To Black Economic Empowerment?

By DR. HORACE COLUMBUS NEAL II

A feast is made for laughter, and wine maketh merry: but money answereth all things. Ecclesiastes 10:19

The trendy catchphrase in Black America now is "Generational Wealth."?Although the need for the building of Generational Wealth is manifestly real, for some people the apparent forsaking of the traditional call for collective Black Community Economic Empowerment for the new trend of "Generational Wealth" sounds uncomfortably like a 21st-century version of "I got mine...You get yours." This leaves me wondering: "So, what in the World ever happened to Black Economic Empowerment?"

It seems to me that what happened with Black Economic Empowerment is that the very term "Black Economic Empowerment" may be rhetoric that has never been clearly defined for the People even though the phrase has been thrown around a lot over the decades. Perhaps it will help us to do as Neely Fuller, the author of The United-Independent Compensatory Code/System/Concept Textbook A Counter-Racist Code (1984) recommends, and go back to square one and define our terms.

First, what do we mean when we say "Black"? We cannot possibly mean all Black People of African descent in the United States because there are Black People from other ethnic communities that live in the U.S. that have their own economic agendas which do not pertain to Black Americans, and they apparently have no intention of sharing resources or power with Black Americans when they attain them. Therefore, when Black Americans say "Black Economic Empowerment," it is more logical for us to focus on Black Americans as individuals, families, communities, and as a general population. This distinction must be made because although we are concerned with the economic development of our fellow Black ethnic communities, as well as with the economic development of our Local and State economies, the national economy of the United States, and the Global economy at large, we must take care of our own group's economic interests first...like all other groups take care of their own interests first. From this base, we can go respectably, and diplomatically, to the table of economic and political unity with other Black ethnic groups, and we can engage in respectable trade relations with non-Black communities.

What do we mean when we say "Economic"? According to the Standard Dictionary definition, "Economic" means 'relating to economics or to the economy' it also means 'justified in terms of profitability.' I am going to emphasize the latter definition because the desire for access to financial means is pervasive in Black American communities throughout the country. The Standard Dictionary defines "Empowerment" as the 'authority or power that is given to someone to do something.' "Empowerment is also defined as 'the process of becoming stronger and more confident, especially in controlling one's life and claiming one's rights.'?

For my own clarity, I have come to define "Economic Empowerment." I started by defining the term economic as "Justified in terms of profitability and pertaining to the economic development of persons and businesses." "Empowerment" is the concept that seems to hang us up. Black Americans cannot seem to decide if we want empowerment by way of outside authority given to us by White People (Government, Corporations, Granting Agencies, etc.) or if we want to engage in the internal process of becoming stronger and more confident, especially in controlling our lives and claiming our rights. We tend to engage in this latter process-based definition for our personal empowerment; but, we rely on the outside authority-based definition of empowerment for our communities and our institutions.?At the same time, Black Americans too often do not treat each other very well; so, the trust factor in our communities is quite limited. The general lack of trust in Black communities hinders our ability to work together, which, in addition to limiting our potential for economic growth, also creates security, and public safety, problems in many areas that are populated by Black Americans. This suboptimal mode of community life is inconsistent with our greatest role model for Black Economic Empowerment: Black Wall Street in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Black Wall Street is Black America's popular (and most potent) symbol of Black American economic empowerment. I often hear Black people bitterly invoke the legendary destruction of Black Wall Street, the prosperous Black American community in Tulsa, Oklahoma that was bombed from the air and burned to the ground with over 300 innocent Men, Women, and Children being massacred by jealous White racists, under false pretenses. This genocidal travesty occurred on May 31 and June 1, 1921. We proudly brag about the number of businesses and all of the wealth possessed by the Black People in the Greenwood, Archer, and Pine areas of Tulsa, Oklahoma. We talk about how many times the dollar circulated in the Black Community back then. We hearken back to Black Wall Street...Little Africa, and we say, "If only today's Negroes would wake up and do like our Ancestors. We could resurrect Black Wall Street." What most people do not realize is that the Black folks of Tulsa, Oklahoma rebuilt Black Wall Street within five years after the massacre of 1921. It was actually integration that eventually destroyed Black Wall Street.

Above: Daily life on "Black Wall Street," Tulsa, Oklahoma c. 1921.

But, how often do we contemplate the daily behavior of the Black Americans who built Black Wall Street? How did they relate to each other? How did they treat each other? If you think about it, they must have really loved and trusted each other, believed in each other, as Men and Women, and believed in themselves, as a community.

Doing right by each other empowered the Black folks of Tulsa to take effective, united, and independent action toward manifesting material abundance.

The economic success of Black Wall Street was not the result of the clichéd rhetoric about "Black Economic Empowerment." It was not the result of abstract, feel-good slogans. It resulted from a community of courageous, forward-thinking, Black American People in Tulsa, Oklahoma, deciding to engage in winning behavior. Doing right by each other empowered the Black folks of Tulsa to take effective, united, and independent action toward manifesting material abundance. The people in this community loved themselves, and they generated considerable value, in their local economy through their self-love, which was expressed in the way thought about, spoke to and about, and behaved toward, each other. The value that they generated within themselves gave them the confidence to engage in international commerce in their pursuit of the Good Life. Their culture of winning behavior in every area of their lives, especially in their interpersonal relationships, gave them the wherewithal to generate the money that "answereth all things." And they had a wonderful community life, which they sustained until a younger generation bought into integration.

I propose that when we talk about Black Economic Empowerment, we talk about it comprehensively, as winning behavior, in the true spirit of Black Wall Street, and that we define it simply as: "THE BEHAVIOR OF BLACK AMERICANS THAT IS JUSTIFIED IN TERMS OF PROFITABILITY, THAT MAKES US STRONGER AND MORE CONFIDENT, ESPECIALLY IN CONTROLLING OUR LIVES AND CLAIMING OUR RIGHTS."?

This baseline definition gives us enough discursive space to continue our conversations, and activities, that involve business, entrepreneurship, industry, finance, vertical Integration, etc. As well, it gives us the discursive space to explore, talk about, and engage in, specific behaviors that are Justified in Terms of Profitability in the nine Areas of People Activity: Economics, Education, Entertainment, Labor, Law, Politics, Religion, Sex, and War (also Healthcare, the tenth area of people activity, which was identified by Dr. Frances Cress Welsing). It also gives us the discursive space to talk about Black American interpersonal behavior and its positive and/or negative impact on the economics of Black American Communities.

By making Black Economic Empowerment a behavioral project, we make it accessible, and actionable, for the least of the People in the Black Community who usually get left out of today's conversation about generational wealth. We are all a part of the Black American economy in spite of ourselves. In one way or another Black Americans are interconnected and interrelated. Everyone in Black America can participate in Black Economic Empowerment because everyone can change their behavior, unless they have an uncontrollable problem that needs to be treated with medication and counseling.?

We need an actionable, winning behavior-based understanding of Black Economic Empowerment that generates constructive dialogue, and productive activity, and that engages Black Americans in loving, honorable, and respectable, relationships at the most basic day-to-day level. With such a foundation, starting businesses, patronizing Black-owned businesses, and sustaining effective community institutions will become second nature once again for Black Americans. And, in due time, with God's Help, we will realize our dream of resurrecting Black Wall Street, or of creating something even better!

The Golden Trophy graphic above obviously represents victory. It is my sincere hope that in some way this humble article contributes to someone's victorious thinking.

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