The Black Alliance for Peace Solidarity Network's Prisoner Support Committee has released a Black August Teach-In Guide to help people host in-person teach-ins. Find everything from locations to choose, how to do outreach, how to organize the teach-in and how to follow up with attendees to build out the movement to free our political prisoners. Download the guide.

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#BlackAugust

Joining the Black Alliance for Peace (BAP) Solidarity Network helps non-Africans materially support anti-imperialist African/Black people, whose analysis as an oppressed nation is crucial to building a stronger anti-imperialist movement throughout the United States and the world.

HISTORY

BAP launched on April 4, 2017. That day marked the 49th anniversary of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s assassination. It also was the 50th anniversary of his Riverside Church speech, in which he railed against the three pillars of U.S. society: Materialism, militarism and racism. King came out in that speech against the establishment by denouncing the U.S. war on Vietnam. It is in the spirit of continuing the Black Radical Peace Tradition that King and our forebears belong to that BAP launched with a handful of individuals and organizations, along with a founding Coordinating Committee to steer the way. 

BAP was initiated as part of the decades-long process of building Black Left Unity after the U.S. state decimated the Black Liberation Movement of the 1960s and ‘70s. Today, BAP counts almost 600 African members and close to 40 member organizations that reflect the political diversity of the Black left. Our work has put on loudspeaker the impact of the U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM), has helped the U.S. public develop a greater understanding about the impact of U.S. imperialism in Nuestra América (Our America, which counts the whole Western Hemisphere as one landmass), and has provided analyses on Afghanistan and the Indo-Pacific to counter the media silence on the ongoing war.

BAP is an alliance of organizations and individuals spanning the left and, therefore, has drawn varying viewpoints into the alliance. Neither being a cadre organization nor a political party, BAP has only required members adhere to BAP’s Principles of Unity and pay annual membership dues.

WHAT IS THE SOLIDARITY NETWORK?

The African/Black anti-colonial and anti-capitalist movement has always strived to build effective coalitions with all colonized people and all who identify with the struggle for global transformation. While BAP’s membership is centered in African/Black people and organizations, we recognize that anti-colonial struggle supported by all oppressed and working-class peoples is an absolute necessity. In that tradition, the Solidarity Network was launched in August 2020 as a way for non-Africans to contribute to BAP’s work. As of summer 2023, the network includes about 200 individuals and 19 organizations in Canada, Europe, Mexico and the United States.

HOW TO GET INVOLVED

The requirements for being a Solidarity Network member are simple: If you agree with the Principles of Unity, you or your organization belong in BAP. Non-Africans are asked to demonstrate solidarity by contributing an annual amount with their online application. After the application is accepted, you will be added to a private listserv for Solidarity Network members. Plus, the network’s coordinators will reach out to you for a conversation to find out how best you can plug in. You also will be looped into regional organizing. Every other month, we hold a virtual meeting for members to learn about BAP’s work and connect with each other. Members can choose to join committees that specialize in Afghanistan, Fundraising, Prisoner Support and Propaganda. Individuals and organizations have relayed they have developed ideological and political connections from being in conversation and contributing to the work.

Not Ready to Join?

Banner photo: BAP members and Solidarity Network members gathered after a Haiti solidarity rally on March 15, 2021, in Chicago.