America's Johannesburg Industrialization and Racial Transformation in Birmingham

No American city symbolizes the black struggle for civil rights more than Birmingham, Alabama. In this critical analysis of why Birmingham became such a focal point, Bobby M. Wilson argues that AlabamaAIs path to industrialism differed significantly from that in the North and Midwest. True to its antebellum roots, no other industrial city in the United States would depend so much upon the exploitation of black labor so early in its development as Birmingham. A persuasive exploration of the links between AlabamaAIs slaveholding order and the subsequent industrialization of the state, WilsonAIs study demonstrates that arguments based on classical economics fail to take into account the ways in which racial issues influenced the rise of industrial capitalism.

Bobby M. Wilson is currently Professor of Geography in the Department of government and Public Service at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.