Understanding Context and Contradiction in the Concept of Violence: Frantz Fanon, Stokely Carmichael and the Long 1960s.

This article examines the concept of violence through the lens of "contextual shift," a framework that highlights how structural transformations influence the strategic and contested uses of violence by political actors. Focusing on revolutionary movements during the "Long Sixties" (early 1950s to early 1970s), it analyzes how figures like Frantz Fanon and Stokely Carmichael redefined violence amid tensions between competing political commitments, particularly within anticolonial and Black liberation struggles such as those led by the Black Panther Party. The article situates these conceptual changes within broader critiques of capitalism, racism, and imperialism, and explores rhetorical strategies employed by the New Left to challenge dominant, often pejorative, understandings of violence. It argues that understanding violence requires attention to both linguistic conventions and the contradictions political actors navigate, offering a nuanced approach to evaluating the legitimacy and innovation of violence-related discourse.