Walter Rodney

Walter Rodney, a leading historian of Africa, a political activist and Caribbean intellectual before his untimely death in 1980, taught African History in Jamaica at the University of the West Indies Mona Campus in the late 1960s. Lewis article revisits Rodneys political activism during this period within the context of pre-existing social movement among the urban poor and Rastafarian brethren. Rodney was expelled from the island in 1968 by the Jamaican government. Lewis argues that his expulsion was based on the fear that Rodneys interactions with the urban poor and Rastafarian brethren could lead to the emergence of a radical political ideology which would pose a threat to the Jamaican political system and its power structure. This republication, along with Walter Rodneys Intellectual and Political Thought (The Press UWI 1998), also by the same author, is timely as it marks the 30th anniversary of Rodneys expulsion from Jamaica on 16 October 1968.