Randall Robinson (born July 6, 1941) is an

African-American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ensl ...

lawyer, author and

activist Activism (or Advocacy) consists of efforts to promote, impede, direct or intervene in social, political, economic or environmental reform with the desire to make changes in society toward a perceived greater good. Forms of activism range fro ...

, noted as the founder of

TransAfrica TransAfrica (formerly ''TransAfrica Forum'') is an advocacy organization in Washington, D.C. that seeks to influence the foreign policy of the United States concerning African and Caribbean countries and all African diaspora groups. They are a re ...

. He is known particularly for his impassioned opposition to

apartheid Apartheid (, especially South African English: , ; , "aparthood") was a system of institutionalised racial segregation that existed in South Africa and South West Africa (now Namibia) from 1948 to the early 1990s. Apartheid was ...

, and for his advocacy on behalf of Haitian immigrants and Haitian president

Jean-Bertrand Aristide Jean-Bertrand Aristide (born 15 July 1953) is a Haitian former Salesian priest and politician who became Haiti's first democratically elected president. A proponent of liberation theology, Aristide was appointed to a parish in Port-au-Prince ...

. Due to his frustration with American society, Robinson emigrated to

St. Kitts Saint Kitts, officially the Saint Christopher Island, is an island in the West Indies. The west side of the island borders the Caribbean Sea, and the eastern coast faces the Atlantic Ocean. Saint Kitts and the neighbouring island of Nevis con ...

in 2001.

Early life and education

Robinson was born in

Richmond, Virginia (Thus do we reach the stars) , image_map = , mapsize = 250 px , map_caption = Location within Virginia , pushpin_map = Virginia#USA , pushpin_label = Richmond , pushpin_m ...

, to Maxie Cleveland Robinson and Doris Robinson Griffin, both teachers. The late

ABC News ABC News is the news division of the American broadcast network ABC. Its flagship program is the daily evening newscast '' ABC World News Tonight with David Muir''; other programs include morning news-talk show '' Good Morning America'', '' ...

anchorman A news presenter – also known as a newsreader, newscaster (short for "news broadcaster"), anchorman or anchorwoman, news anchor or simply an anchor – is a person who presents news during a news program on TV, radio or the Internet ...

, Max Robinson, was his elder brother. Randall Robinson graduated from

Virginia Union University Virginia Union University is a private historically black Baptist university in Richmond, Virginia. It is affiliated with the American Baptist Churches USA. History The American Baptist Home Mission Society (ABHMS) founded the school as Rich ...

, and earned a J.D. degree at

Harvard Law School Harvard Law School (Harvard Law or HLS) is the law school of Harvard University, a private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1817, it is the oldest continuously operating law school in the United States. Each c ...

. He also has an older sister, actress Jewel Robinson, and a younger sister, Pastor Jean Robinson. Both sisters live and work in the Washington, D.C. area. He and his former wife had a daughter, Anike Robinson, and a son, Jabari Robinson. He is married to Hazel Ross-Robinson and they have one daughter, Khalea Ross Robinson.

Career

Robinson was a

civil rights Civil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' freedom from infringement by governments, social organizations, and private individuals. They ensure one's entitlement to participate in the civil and political life ...

attorney in

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

(1971–75) before he worked for U.S. Congressman

Bill Clay William Lacy Clay Sr (born April 30, 1931) is an American politician from Missouri. As Congressman from Missouri's first district, he represented portions of St. Louis in the U.S. House of Representatives for 32 years. Early life and family ...

(1975) and as administrative assistant to Congressman

Charles Diggs Charles Coles Diggs Jr. (December 2, 1922 – August 24, 1998) was an American politician from the U.S. state of Michigan who served in the state senate and U.S. House of Representatives. He was the first African American elected to Congress ...

(1976). He was a Ford fellow. Robinson founded the TransAfrica Forum in 1977, which according to its mission statement – serves as a "major research, educational and organizing institution for the African-American community, offering constructive analysis concerning U.S. policy as it affects Africa and the

African Diaspora The African diaspora is the worldwide collection of communities descended from native Africans or people from Africa, predominantly in the Americas. The term most commonly refers to the descendants of the West and Central Africans who were ...

(African Americans and West Indians who can trace their heritage back to the dispersion of Africans that occurred as a result of the

Transatlantic slave trade The Atlantic slave trade, transatlantic slave trade, or Euro-American slave trade involved the transportation by slave traders of enslaved African people, mainly to the Americas. The slave trade regularly used the triangular trade route and i ...

) in the Caribbean and Latin America." He served in the capacity as TransAfrica's president until 2001. During that period he gained visibility for his political activism, organizing sit-ins at the

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring coun ...

embassy A diplomatic mission or foreign mission is a group of people from a state or organization present in another state to represent the sending state or organization officially in the receiving or host state. In practice, the phrase usually den ...

in order to protest the

Afrikaner Afrikaners () are a South African ethnic group descended from predominantly Dutch settlers first arriving at the Cape of Good Hope in the 17th and 18th centuries.Entry: Cape Colony. ''Encyclopædia Britannica Volume 4 Part 2: Brain to Cast ...

government's racial policy of discrimination against

black South Africans Racial groups in South Africa have a variety of origins. The racial categories introduced by Apartheid remain ingrained in South African society with South Africans and the South African government continuing to classify themselves, and each o ...

, a personal

hunger strike A hunger strike is a method of non-violent resistance in which participants fast as an act of political protest, or to provoke a feeling of guilt in others, usually with the objective to achieve a specific goal, such as a policy change. Most ...

aimed at pressuring the

United States government The federal government of the United States (U.S. federal government or U.S. government) is the national government of the United States, a federal republic located primarily in North America, composed of 50 states, a city within a feder ...

into restoring

to power after the short-lived coup by

General A general officer is an officer of high rank in the armies, and in some nations' air forces, space forces, and marines or naval infantry. In some usages the term "general officer" refers to a rank above colonel."general, adj. and n.". O ...

Raoul Cédras Joseph Raoul Cédras (born July 9, 1949) is a Haitian former military officer who was the '' de facto'' ruler of Haiti from 1991 to 1994. Background A mulatto, Cédras was educated in the United States and was a member of the U.S.-trained ...

, and dumping crates filled with bananas onto the steps of the United States Trade Representative in order to protest what he views as discriminatory trade policies aimed at Caribbean nations, such as protective

tariffs A tariff is a tax imposed by the government of a country or by a supranational union on imports or exports of goods. Besides being a source of revenue for the government, import duties can also be a form of regulation of foreign trade and po ...

and import

quotas Quota may refer to: Economics * Import quota, a trade restriction on the quantity of goods imported into a country * Market Sharing Quota, an economic system used in Canadian agriculture * Milk quota, a quota on milk production in Europe * Indi ...

. In 2001, he authored the book ''The Debt: What America Owes To Blacks'', which presented an in-depth outline regarding his belief that wide-scale

reparations Reparation(s) may refer to: Christianity * Restitution (theology), the Christian doctrine calling for reparation * Acts of reparation, prayers for repairing the damages of sin History *War reparations **World War I reparations, made from ...

should be offered to African Americans as a means to redress centuries of de jure and de facto discrimination and oppression directed at the group. The book argues for the enactment of lineage-based reparation programs as restitution for the continued social and economic issues in the African-American community, such as a high proportion of incarcerated black citizens and the differential in cumulative wealth between white and black Americans. In 2003, Robinson turned down an honorary degree from

Georgetown University Law Center The Georgetown University Law Center (Georgetown Law) is the law school of Georgetown University, a private research university in Washington, D.C. It was established in 1870 and is the largest law school in the United States by enrollment and ...

. Robinson began teaching at the

Dickinson School of Law Penn State Dickinson Law, formerly Dickinson School of Law, is a public law school in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. It is one of two separately accredited law schools of The Pennsylvania State University. According to Penn State Dickinson Law's 201 ...

at Penn State University in the fall of 2008.

Emigration

In 2001, Robinson quit his position as head of TransAfrica and decided to emigrate to

– where his wife, who is a member of a prominent Kittitian family, was born – a decision chronicled in his book ''Quitting America: The Departure of a Black Man from his Native Land''. Robinson's decision to emigrate was caused by what he describes as his antipathy towards America's domestic policies and foreign policy, both of which he believes exploit minorities and the poor.

References

Publications

* * * '' An Unbroken Agony: Haiti, From Revolution to the Kidnapping of a President'', Perseus Books Group, 2007. * ''Quitting America: The Departure of a Black Man From His Native Land'',

Plume Books Plume is a publishing company in the United States, founded in 1970 as the trade paperback imprint of New American Library. Today it is a division of Penguin Group, with a backlist of approximately 700 titles. References External links Plume ...

(Reprint), 2004. * ''The Reckoning: What Blacks Owe to Each Other'', Plume (Reprint), 2002. * ''The Debt: What America Owes to Blacks'', Plume, 2001. * ''Defending the Spirit'', Plume, (1999).

External links

*
Randall Robinson interviewed on ''Conversations from Penn State''

Randall Robinson on ''Democracy Now''

Huffington Post biography

African American Registry biography

"Randall Robinson: Aristide Says 'Tell the World It Is a Coup'"
Interview by

Amy Goodman Amy Goodman (born April 13, 1957) is an American broadcast journalist, syndicated columnist, investigative reporter, and author. Her investigative journalism career includes coverage of the East Timor independence movement, Morocco's occupation ...

on ''

Democracy Now! ''Democracy Now!'' is an hour-long American TV, radio, and Internet news program hosted by journalists Amy Goodman (who also acts as the show's executive producer), Juan González, and Nermeen Shaikh. The show, which airs live each weekday at ...

'' * *
''In Depth'' interview with Robinson
February 3, 2013
Review of Randall Robinson, Alex Dupuy, and Peter Hallward books on Haiti
NACLA, 2008 {{DEFAULTSORT:Robinson, Randall 1941 births Living people African-American lawyers African-American non-fiction writers American non-fiction writers Activists for African-American civil rights American human rights activists Historians of Haiti Harvard Law School alumni Virginia Union University alumni Norfolk State University alumni Lawyers from Richmond, Virginia People from Saint Kitts American emigrants to Saint Kitts and Nevis Recipients of the Order of the Companions of O. R. Tambo Saint Kitts and Nevis people of African American descent Norfolk State Spartans men's basketball players American men's basketball players American reparationists Hunger strikers 21st-century African-American people 20th-century African-American people