ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a brief survey of how African American thinkers advance reinterpretations of four important American political ideas—the nature of political thinking, the political power of race, the meaning of power and freedom. Less driven by the aim of exegetical analysis, this synoptic overview—drawing from thinkers across two centuries—is concerned with the political present: to excavate some underappreciated ideas that might be serviceable for developing a more democratic society. Frederick Douglass and Hughes challenge a prominent strain of procedural democratic thinking, which argues that democracy (Dahl 2006) is about individuals exercising their sovereign judgment when electing those who rule over them, and a strain of social democratic thinking, which argues it is about creating a society in which all are allowed to realize their fullest potential. Racial injustice is one of the most salient features of American life.
