The fight for freedom and against racism must be international and intersectional.

The subtitle of work is Ferguson, Palestine, and the Foundations of a Movement. This wording seeks to directly link social movements not just in Ferguson, Missouri, and in Palestine, but everywhere by establishing that all struggles for freedom are interconnected. Davis argues that the demands of protesters in Ferguson who sought an end to police brutality mirror the demands of Palestinians, who seek to end Israeli occupation. Davis asserts that since the fight against injustice and for freedom is the same everywhere, activists must join forces to support one another.

Davis stresses that, historically, Black activists, like members of the Black Panther Party, have remained keenly aware of the struggles of their fellow freedom fighters, such as those resisting South African apartheid, drawing inspiration and lending aid when possible. She also expands the definition of intersectionality to include an international lens, noting that not only are race, class, gender, and sexuality interconnected, but global identities are as well. Davis asserts that this intersectional awareness also helps people understand different struggles within their communities, urging Black activists to support trans and queer communities in their shared fight for equality and justice.

When one adopts an international perspective, it becomes clear that the fight for freedom is necessarily constant and ongoing, Davis says. By liberating oneself from a myopic view of freedom and expanding one’s view to include the many concurrent fights for freedom across the globe, it becomes clear that the work for freedom is never done, says Davis. No matter what progress has been made, it can always be undone. To back up this point, she notes that, though progress was widely celebrated with the election of Barack Obama, the first Black President of the United States, the country also saw a concurrent increase in police violence against Black people. Focusing too closely on local achievements can obscure the ongoing need to fight for freedom elsewhere. Echoing the words of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., Davis asserts that injustice anywhere cannot be tolerated, no matter where it occurs. The condition of freedom must be shared absolutely in order for its full meaning and promise to be realized.

Mass incarceration, police brutality, and systematic racism are new forms of slavery.

Mass incarceration, police violence, and systemic racism are, Davis insists, not only linked to enslavement, but are a continuation of its primary goals. She argues that, like slavery, these practices deny Black Americans full freedom, subject them to surveillance and fear, and create degrading conditions that make it difficult to even imagine other ways of living. She observes that 25 percent of all the incarcerated people in the world are imprisoned in the United States, a statistic that complicates the claim that America is the home of the free. The militarization of police forces and the transformation of schools into prison-like institutions, patrolled by armed officers or managed by private security firms, create what Davis calls “carceral trajectories,” meaning that Black people are on their way to incarceration even when they are at home or school. Racist structures embedded in laws, policing and security practices, and societal norms support these trajectories. Davis’s argument implies that anti-Black racism is not only, or even primarily, the work of individuals, because it is woven into the very organization of society.

Radical political change is necessary to advance the cause of freedom.

Even as she praises the work of the American civil rights movement of the 1960s, Davis insists that civil rights are not enough to make people free. She contends that while civil rights provide important protections for individuals in society, people also must have safe housing, employment, education, health care, and the basic protections provided by civil society in order to be truly free. Food insecurity is incompatible with freedom, Davis observes, as is living under surveillance or in a state of constant fear—either from other individuals or from the state. She adds that stateless persons—those who do not belong legally to a particular state—do not always benefit from civil rights, which also illustrates the limitations of these rights. In Five: Closures and Continuities, Davis references Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,” agreeing with his famous assertion that “injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” For both Davis and King, no one can be truly free until everyone is free. Because Davis grounds much of her thinking on this premise, she urges people fighting for freedom to align their movements with others around the globe. 

The rejection of capitalism and its emphasis on individualism is also fundamental to Davis’s definition of freedom. A committed Marxist, Davis repeatedly insists that freedom will not be achievable without a radical revision to how societies distribute resources. Education, food, housing, and health care should not be privileges, she argues, but are instead the basic rights of every person. A society that allows the few to hoard what should be shared by all is a society organized around inequality, and thus, Davis concludes, it cannot be truly free. She embraces and defends political principles associated with socialism and communism, including prioritizing the group rather than the individual and finding metrics for success that do not depend on private accumulation.

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