Clarence Lusane

"This work examines the roles played by Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice in the construction of U.S. foreign policy, exploring the ways in which their racial identity challenges conventional notions about the role of race in international relations." "Neither Powell nor Rice consciously allowed their racial identity to substantially influence or characterize their participation in the defense and projection of U.S. hegemony, Clarence argues, but both used their racial identity and experiences strategically in key circumstances to defend Bush administration policies.". "Locating Powell and Rice within the genealogy of the current national security strategy, and within broader shifts under George W. Bush, Lusane argues that their racial location in the context of the construction of U.S. foreign policy is symbolic, and that it serves to distract from the substantive part they play in the ongoing reconfiguration of U.S. global power. Criticism of their policies, for example, is often blunted by race. Black liberals may be reluctant to condemn them; white liberals may be afraid criticism could be interpreted as racial bias. Lusane tackles these difficult issues along with others, asking whether there is a black consensus on foreign policy and, if so, what its dimensions, driving forces, and prospects for stability are."--BOOK JACKET.

The Nazi era in Germany and all of its accompanying atrocities is one of the most documented periods in history. However, this documentation is incomplete in one important area: the history and experiences of people of African descent in Nazi Germany. Did Afro-Germans and other blacks suffer under Nazism? The answer to this question, to the degree it has been asked at all, remains vague even for those scholars and researchers familiar with the Nazi era and the Holocaust in particular. Drawing on interviews with the Black survivors of Nazi concentration camps and archival research in North America, Europe, and Africa, this book documents and analyzes the meaning of Nazism's racial policies towards people of African descent, specifically those born in Germany, France, England, the United States or Africa, and the impact of that legacy on contemporary race relations in Germany, and more generally, in Europe. The book also specifically addresses the concerns of those surviving Afro-Germans who were victims of Nazism, but have not generally been included in or benefited from the compensation agreements that have been developed in recent years. -- Publishers description.