Collective Courage

A History of African American Cooperative Economic Thought and Practice

Jessica Gordon Nembhard

• Publisher: Penn State University Press
• Year: 2024
• eBook ISBN: 9780271100180
• Edition: 0
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Economic History
• Index: Social Sciences

First published in 2014, Jessica Gordon Nembhard's Collective Courage quickly became an important tool for understanding the history of cooperative economic enterprises in the African American community. This now-classic work recounts how African Americans benefited greatly from cooperative ownership and democratic economic participation throughout the nation's history.

Many of the players in this story are well known—among them W. E. B. Du Bois; A. Philip Randolph and the Ladies' Auxiliary to the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters; Nannie Helen Burroughs; Fannie Lou Hamer; Ella Jo Baker and George Schuyler of the Young Negroes' Co-operative League; the Federation of Southern Cooperatives; and the Black Panther Party. Drawing on media reports and co-op records, Gordon Nembhard uncovers the challenges they faced and highlights their hard-won victories.

This tenth anniversary edition of Collective Courage features a substantial preface that expands on material in the first edition and addresses the development of the Black co-op movement through the second decade of the twenty-first century. It remains an indispensable resource for readers interested in the history of the struggle for African American economic freedom and equity.

Table of contents

• COVER front
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Preface to the Tenth Anniversary Edition of Collective Courage
• Notes
• References
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction: A Continuous and Hidden History of Economic Defense and Collective Well-Being
• Part One
• Chapter 1: Early black economic cooperation: Intentional Communities, Communes, and Mutual Aid
• Chapter 2: From economic independence to political advocacy: Cooperation and the Nineteenth-Century Black Populist Movement
• Chapter 3: Expanding the tradition: Early African American–Owned “Cooperative” Businesses
• Part Two
• Chapter 4: Strategy, advocacy, and practice: Black Study Circles and Co-op Education on the Front Lines
• Chapter 5: The young negroes’ co-operative league
• Chapter 6: Out of necessity: The Great Depression and “Consumers’ Cooperation Among Negroes”
• Chapter 7: Continuing the legacy: Nannie Helen Burroughs, Halena Wilson, and the Role of Black Women
• Chapter 8: Black rural cooperative activity in the early to mid-twentieth century
• Part Three
• Chapter 9: The federation of southern cooperatives: The Legacy Lives On
• Chapter 10: Economic solidarity in the african american cooperative movement: Connections, Cohesiveness, and Leadership Development
• Time Line of African American Cooperative History, 1780–2012: Selected Events
• Notes
• Index