"In this long-awaited book, acclaimed historian, activist, and writer Manning Marable challenges us to rethink the meaning of race in America. Marable offers his unique take on the history of structural racism since the 17th century, revealing its strange and stubborn adaptation to every age in the form of slavery, Jim Crow, and the modern ghetto.

On this foundation he builds a stunning critique of contemporary racial politics, and looks beyond the impasse of liberal strategies such as affirmative action to new ideas that will fulfill the promise of what Martin Luther King, Jr. called "the great wells of democracy.""--BOOK JACKET.