The Pan African call for the unification of people of African descent due to common interests bears particular salience at this global moment where the movement for Black lives has catalysed the globe around the pernicious form of racism – anti-Blackness. In this keynote Dr Okech develops ideas originally articulated in a SOAS lecture in the summer of 2020 to think through how “global Blackness” and transnational solidarity can frame collective efforts needed to dislodge the pillars of systemic racism.

Drawing on Panafricanism, Black Power and transnational solidarity scholarship, Okech historicises the structural basis for a shared Black experience and explores pathways for contemporary global Black solidarity.