The self-determination policy lived and died with each CPUSA leadership shift

Evidence

The policy of Negro self-determination has lived twice and died twice. After overthrowing Lovestone’s “revisionism,” Browder made self-determination one of the cardinal articles of faith of his leadership. In November 1943, long after it had ceased to show any signs of life, he delivered a funeral oration over the corpse of self-determination; he explained that the Negro people had already exercised the historical right of self-determination—by rejecting it. After overthrowing Browder’s “revisionism,” Foster made self-determination one of the cardinal articles of faith of his leadership. In 1946 self-determination was reincarnated in a slightly watered-down version—as a programmatic demand and not as an immediate slogan of action. — Cedric J. Robinson, Black Marxism_ The Making of the Black…, 1068

Categorization

• XREF: Concrete instance of the Soviet-nationalism synthesis thesis from the prior paragraph, and part of the broader book narrative on Black radicalism’s co-optation by white parties.