Radical Matter

Until the early nineteenth century, political philosophy and economics were dining companions. Both took up fundamental questions of how we should feed one another. But, with the rise of corporate capitalism, modern economics lost sight of its primary task and turned away from the complexities of real people's sustenance in favor of the single-minded pursuit of money.

Police killings of unarmed Black people have ignited a national and international response unlike any in decades. But differing from their civil rights-oriented predecessors, today's activists do not think that the institutions and values of liberal democracy can eradicate structural racism. They draw instead on a Black radical tradition that, Terrence L. Johnson argues, derives its force from its unacknowledged ethical and religious dimensions.