That other problem of the compensation

One of the elements of the American contradiction is this of reparation for damages associated with slavery; which may be incomprehensible to non-Americans, even if black, because of the issues it introduces. Indeed, the practice of slavery has an economic origin, which aggravates racial tensions within any political structure; especially if this structure, like any other, resents the adjustment of the progressive integration of that originally segregated social segment.

In a context of non-segregationist racism, such as in Cuban culture, this problem may be incomprehensible; because the African origin of the slave trade, on which American slavery is based, being Africa therefore partially responsible. The problem here is that we are mixing two very different phenomena, in addition to decontextualizing them both; first, by failing to distinguish this trade from slavery itself as a production system; second, by observing it outside the context of American culture, which is deeply legalistic.

In the first sense, it is true that black communities do not hold Africa accountable for its role in the slave traffic; but it is also true that this refers to their own identity problems, different than the Cuban case, to use the same example. In the Cuban case the racism is integrationist, so it allows and stimulates the recognition of blacks as Cubans; otherwise in the American case, blacks are not recognized in that culture because of their segregationist structure. 

It does not matter the contributions of the black race as a social segment to American culture, as its productive base; the structure refuses to recognize them as elements of their identity, even more radically than with respect to indigenous natives. Let us not forget that economic attribution was one of the failures on the process of emancipation, both in Cuba and the in United States; with many cases of mortal retaliations and legal tricks when blacks succeeded owning property.

The second sense is probably more important, referring to American legalism; which is one of the most substantial contributions of American culture to modernity, in the codification of the political fabric. Indeed, the capitalist basis of society relies on the codification of effective power in culture; which happens in money, as the allocation of capital to its various elements, so related because of its ownership.

That would be what allow constant oversight, on the functional relationships in which society is structured; supervised by the economic contradictions in which the interests are negotiated; which concerns not only specific and legal individuals, but also their political status and attributions. This would be one of the great changes that the struggle for civil rights in the United States can bring to the world; not as an allusion to a retroactive rights, but precisely as a responsibility for the political structure over each and every one of its elements.

In this way, compensation for damages associated with slavery could be the definitive step to racial integration; recognizing in this attribution of property the recognition of blacks, as citizens of full rights and individual responsibility. This is due to this origin of American culture in modernity, and not in feudal authoritarianism like Cuban; because with that it is constantly redetermined, in the social relations in which it is organized, originating in capital; contrary to the Cuban case, in which capital was the result of authority and not the other way around, and therefore was not an element of integration.