The Black Reparations Project

This groundbreaking resource moves us from theory to action with a practical plan for reparations.
 
A surge in interest in black reparations is taking place in America on a scale not seen since the Reconstruction Era. The Black Reparations Project gathers an accomplished interdisciplinary team of scholars—members of the Reparations Planning Committee—who have considered the issues pertinent to making reparations happen. This book will be an essential resource in the national conversation going forward.
 
The first section of The Black Reparations Project crystallizes the rationale for reparations, cataloguing centuries of racial repression, discrimination, violence, mass incarceration, and the immense black-white wealth gap. Drawing on the contributors’ expertise in economics, history, law, public policy, public health, and education, the second section unfurls direct guidance for building and implementing a reparations program, including draft legislation that addresses how the program should be financed and how claimants can be identified and compensated. Rigorous and comprehensive, The Black Reparations Project will motivate, guide, and speed the final leg of the journey for justice.

William A. (“Sandy”) Darity Jr. is the Samuel DuBois Cook Professor of Public Policy, African and African American Studies, Economics, and Business and founding director of the Samuel DuBois Cook Center on Social Equity at Duke University.
 
A. Kirsten Mullen is a folklorist and the founder of Artefactual, an arts consulting practice, and Carolina Circuit Writers, a literary consortium that brings expressive writers of color to the Carolinas. Her most recent book is From Here to Equality: Reparations for Black Americans in the Twenty-First Century.
 
Lucas Hubbard is an associate in research at the Samuel DuBois Cook Center on Social Equity at Duke University. His writing has appeared in INDY Week, Duke Magazine, Paste, and Deadspin; he is also one of the editors of The Pandemic Divide: How COVID Increased Inequality in America.

List of Illustrations

Introduction 
William A. Darity Jr., A. Kirsten Mullen, and Lucas Hubbard

PART ONE: THE CONTEXT AND CASES FOR REPARATIONS

1 Where Does Black Reparations in America Stand?
William A. Darity Jr. and A. Kirsten Mullen

2 Wealth Implications of Slavery and Racial Discrimination for African American Descendants of the Enslaved
Thomas Craemer, Trevor Smith, Brianna Harrison, Trevon D. Logan, Wesley Bellamy, and William A. Darity Jr.

3 Unequal Housing and the Case for Reparations
Walter D. Greason

4 Educational Inequities and the Case for Reparations
Malik Edwards

5 The African American Health Burden: Disproportionate and Unresolved
Keisha L. Bentley-Edwards

PART TWO: THE PATH TO REPARATIONS AND RELATED CONSIDERATIONS

6 Learning from Past Experiences with Reparations
A. Kirsten Mullen and William A. Darity Jr.

7 Considerations for the Design of a Reparations Plan
Trevon D. Logan

8 Reparations and Adult Education: Civic and Community Engagement for Lifelong Learners
Lisa R. Brown

9 The Children of Slavery: Genealogical Research and the Establishment of Eligibility for Reparations
Evelyn A. McDowell

10 On the Black Reparations Highway: Avoiding the Detours
William A. Darity Jr. and A. Kirsten Mullen

Appendix A. List of Documented Massacres and Instances of Mob Violence Perpetrated against Black Individuals, Civil War through 1950 
Appendix B. Sample Pedigree Chart and Family Group Sheet from Sons & Daughters of the United States Middle Passage

The Reparations Planning Committee

Index