International Efforts
From Social Justice Wiki
Given the global scope of the trans-Atlantic slave trade, reparations for the crime are clearly a worldwide issue. Indeed, organizations all throughout the world are currently waging battles for economic compensation for the violence and oppression Africans underwent at the hands of Europe and the United States. For more information about the international fight for reparations, see the Africa Reparations Movement website.
Even from a United States’ perspective, the struggle for reparations has often been waged within the international community. Since before the Civil War to the present day, one frequently successful way to combat U.S. oppression and racism has been to attempt to hold the U.S. government accountable to a world body and to expose the conditions that African Americans experience here to the world. Activists and thinkers from W.E.B. DuBois to Malcolm X have spoken of this evident need to have the international community judge and condemn U.S. actions in order to effectively change the racist status quo.
One of the international institutions with the most global clout is undoubtably the United Nations. Thus, black activists have often tried to bring their case against the U.S. government before governing bodies at the U.N. This work came to the fore in 2001, when the UN held the World Conference Against Racism in Durban, South Africa. A large coalition of US activists attended the conference and, together with reparations advocates from Africa and around the world, they achieved one of their central goals: they got the trans-Atlantic slave trade officially recognized as a Crime Against Humanity -- maybe even the most significant Crime Against Humanity in the last 500 years. The final declaration from the conference read, "Slavery and the slave trade were appalling tragedies ... a crime against humanity, and should always have been so."
Despite this victory, the conference was not a total success for reparations activists. Firstly, the US delegation walked out even before the slave trade was officially denounced, siting anger over how the Palestine-Israel conflict was being handled. Secondly, the conference neglected to call for specific reparations, but instead argued vaguely for the need of remedial measures. It was not clear that these measures would necessarily entail anything aside from the continuation of programs like Affirmative Action and Equal Opportunity.
Thus, the fight on an international level continues. African countries and US activists (including Millions for Reparations and the December 12th Movement) have pledged to continue pressing for an outright apology from European nations and America -- and thus a formal acknowledgment of their part in this massive Crime Against Humanity -- and concrete monetary reparations.
Articles:
Africa Recovery article by Jullyette Ukabiala
NPR Report on the conference