Africa in Jamaica: W. A. Domingo, George Padmore and Public Opinion

This chapter focuses on the Jamaican Public Opinion in the 1950s and 1960s, notably its role in supporting Jamacia’s transition to independence and its coverage of anti-colonial struggles in Africa. Building upon earlier twentieth-century Pan-Africanist movements – Marcus Garvey’s Universal Negro Improvement Association, Rastafarianism, the Ethiopian World Federation, and the Afro-West Indian Welfare League – Public Opinion located Jamaica’s struggle for independence in close synchrony with contemporaneous African anti-colonial struggles. Quoting from articles in Public Opinion by George Padmore, W. A. Domingo, Roger Mais and Paul Robeson, the chapter demonstrates how the periodical hosted, publicised and animated debates about Jamaican politics. Public Opinion hosted a range of anti-colonial opinions, including Padmore’s Marxist internationalism and Domingo’s Garveyite Africanism, as well as the complicated attitudes towards the Soviet Union, which juggled appreciation of its support for anti-colonial movements and disapproval of its Stalinist authoritarianism. The reception of Public Opinion in Jamaica was also complicated: middle-class readers were in broad sympathy with its moderate Pan-Africanism, whereas poorer Jamaican readers were drawn to the violent anti-colonial struggles of the Mau Mau in Kenya.