Reporter Volume 25, No.23 April 7, 1994

By CHRIS SHEA
Reporter staff
Declaring candidly that "I am not an optimist...but I am a prisoner of
hope," a nationally recognized author and expert on race relations
told a UB audience that the key to solving this nation's racial
problems lies not in separatism, but in promoting economic parity and
embracing an attitude which refuses to concede that racial unity is an
unattainable goal.
	Speaking March 24 in Alumni Arena, West, chair of Princeton's
Afro-American Studies Department, and the author of the best-selling
book, Race Matters, presented the Buffalo Federation of Neighborhood
Centers Inc. Centennial Lecture. He told a near-capacity crowd that
"historically, democracies are undermined by economic despair and
poverty." This despair, West argued, leads to distrust and paranoia
between groups and impedes any efforts to achieve racial equality.
	For West, this struggle for racial equality is waged primarily
in the economic marketplace, and it is a struggle many minorities are
losing. West said society is moving closer and closer to a pure
"market culture"Qwhere manipulative mass advertising breeds the
selfish attitude that it's "every person for themselves" and where
television provides diversionary outlets that "let people feel like
they're really alive." In a market-dominated culture, West said,
escapes like drugs flourish and important non-market values like
loyalty, friendship, love and community are undermined.
	"It is these non-market values which are at the core of the
black freedom struggle," West argued. "If they go, the struggle goes."
	However, West said, even with a solid foundation of these core
values, many peopleQespecially childrenQstill may find it difficult to
cope and succeed in today's diverse society due to a deterioration in
their standard of living. He noted that 20 percent of all children,
and 51 percent of black children, currently live in poverty. More than
four of 10 Americans, West added, are moving downward economically.
	West recalled how, as a third grader in Sacramento, Cal., he
was expelled from school and placed in a special education program
after he beat up a teacher. "And I had a loving and supportive family
environment! That's why I won't give up on anyone elseQI've had too
much love, support and caring ever to give up," he said.
	Speaking with a style that alternated between that of the
distinguished academician he isQcarefully choosing each wordQand that
of the Baptist preacher his grandfather wasQfrenetically firing off
sentence after sentence without pausing for a breathQWest said the
combination of a market-oriented culture and the debilitating economic
state of many minorities has led to an atmosphere of "spiritual
impoverishment," where public problems like poverty and unemployment
are saddled onto private individuals, namely the poor.
	Los Angeles, a modern-day "Dodge City," according to West,
perfectly exemplifies such an atmosphere. "When the riots happened,
people's attitude was, 'I'll get my gun, you get yours.'
	"If this is the future of our country," West warned, "then we
are all in deep trouble."
	Although he admitted he is not an optimist by nature, West did
say he foresaw a social movement in the 1990s, similar to the one
which arose in the 1890s, during which great strides would be made
toward racial equality.
	West said this movement will be keyed when people of different
cultures realize they need to have a sense of their own history and a
sense of other people's history. "Having a sense of your own history
allows you to recognize the interconnections and interdependencies we
all share," he said. "And having a sense of other people's history
allows one to develop a sense of empathy for those people."
	He cited the Buffalo Federation of Neighborhood Centers, Inc.
(BFNC), which was itself founded in the mid-1890s, as an embodiment of
his beliefs in using community development to implement social change.
"There's something happening in Buffalo," West proclaimed proudly. "It
(the BFNC) should be a model for the rest of the nation." Today, the
BFNC provides support services like daycare, housing and legal advice
to residents of Buffalo neighborhoods.
	It's organizations like the BFNC, West said, that give him
hope that the black freedom struggle will triumph someday in the near
future. And for West, whose next book, tentatively titled Keeping
Faith, will focus on Black/Jewish relations, hope is what will spur
this triumph. "Hope," West said, "is what galvanizes others to believe
in themselves and to believe that the future is open-ended, even
during these difficult times."