Within the Caribbean and Africa a reparations motion is rising: so why is Britain pretending in any other case? | Kenneth Mohammed

A few minutes in the past, I used to be interviewed for a forthcoming ebook about reparations by a black British comic and his co-writer. I approached it with modest expectations. It’s a critical topic for me as a Caribbean man, and I puzzled whether or not the complexity is perhaps flattened or trivialised within the course of.

I acquired to learn the ebook this week. In The Large Payback, Lenny Henry and Marcus Ryder take a fancy, controversial and deeply contested topic and do one thing each uncommon and vital: they break it down into its constituent components and clarify – debunking and demystifying alongside the best way – why so most of the inventory objections to reparations are intellectually incoherent, traditionally illiterate or politically evasive.

They handle this with out sacrificing rigour or heat, weaving cautious evaluation with Henry’s trademark humour, a crimson pea soup recipe and even a brief play – reminding the reader that ethical seriousness and artistic generosity are usually not mutually unique.

As 2025 attracts to an in depth, the ebook has landed at a second when the topic of reparations, lengthy handled as a fringe or rhetorical difficulty in Europe, has caught hearth elsewhere. It’s tough to disclaim that this has been a pivotal 12 months for the worldwide reparations motion – not as a result of any consensus has been reached, however as a result of the query itself has been mobilised.

On one facet, Caribbean states, African governments and diaspora actions are consolidating claims. On the opposite, Britain continues to blithely bat the problem away. The hole between the 2 positions is now the story.

In November, the Caricom Reparations Fee, led by Sir Hilary Beckles, visited the UK. The delegation met civil society teams, teachers, church buildings, activists and a few parliamentarians. The reception at Westminster was distinctly underwhelming. There have been no senior ministers accessible, no dedication to talks and no indication that reparations can be handled as a reside coverage query by the British authorities.

It might be simple to learn this as a snub – and plenty of within the Caribbean do. However you will need to recognise what the go to achieved: dialogue was opened; reparations have been mentioned not as an summary ethical plea however as a concrete political declare rooted in legislation, economics and historical past. Even restricted entry helped mobilise the decision. Silence, in any case, is just not the identical as stasis.

When requested beforehand about reparations, Keir Starmer made it clear that his authorities wouldn’t be drawn into what he described as “lengthy, countless discussions about reparations on the previous”. The prime minister’s phrasing issues. It frames reparations as indulgent and backward-looking somewhat than as a declare arising from the foundations of the trendy British state.

That is exactly the framing that The Large Payback examines. Henry and Ryder insist reparations are usually not about guilt or inherited blame, however about historic accountability and modern benefit. Slavery was not an unlucky ethical aberration. It was an financial system that financially catapulted Britain’s rise and formed its establishments however left enduring inequalities in its wake all through the worldwide south. Inequalities that also exist at the moment manifesting inside a broader spectrum of racism. To disclaim reparations is to disclaim historic causality.

The drained chorus that “nobody alive at the moment owned slaves” is irrelevant when states, firms, monetary establishments and landed estates persist as authorized and financial entities that straight benefited from enslavement. The declare that reparations can be too complicated collapses beneath the burden of historic precedents – from Holocaust reparations to post-colonial compensation schemes – whereas the concern that reparations can be socially destabilising is uncovered as a projection rooted extra in political discomfort than empirical proof.

Reparations can not stay an emotional argument and are usually not a single cheque, however a long-term course of geared toward repairing programs as a lot as compensating individuals. Eventually there are indicators of the problem being taken critically, with some how reparations may work: by funding in schooling and well being, institutional reform, wealth-building mechanisms, cultural restore and apologies backed by materials commitments.

The African Union (AU) declared 2025 to be the 12 months of Reparations, placing the problem on the centre of its collective agenda for the primary time. Leaders, civil society organisations and diaspora actions got here collectively to affirm that this was not a symbolic demand, however a matter of justice, dignity and improvement.

African leaders shortly recognised that one 12 months was not sufficient. In July 2025, the AU formally endorsed 2026–36 because the Decade of Reparations. This 10-year dedication builds on many years of mental and political groundwork – from the Abuja proclamation of 1993, by the Durban declaration and programme of motion in 2001, to the Accra declarations of 2022 and 2023.

Over the subsequent decade, the AU has dedicated to mobilising international assist, working with civil society and the diaspora, selling schooling and analysis and creating insurance policies across the lasting impacts of slavery, colonialism and exploitation.

On this context, Britain’s insistence on “transferring ahead” begins to look out of step. Whereas Africa and the Caribbean are institutionalising reparations as a improvement and justice agenda, the previous colonial metropoles stay caught on the stage of avoidance. The result’s an asymmetry: one facet is constructing frameworks whereas the opposite is providing silence.

This asymmetry is strengthened by the hollowing out of the Commonwealth itself. As soon as imagined as a discussion board for post-colonial dialogue and shared accountability, it now struggles to even outline post-colonial relations. That the problem of reparations has not secured a spot on the Commonwealth agenda speaks volumes concerning the establishment’s limits when confronted with points that problem historic energy hierarchies.

Immigration coverage additional exposes these contradictions. Lately, the UK and components of Europe – taking cues from the hardening of immigration regimes within the US – have allowed more and more punitive approaches to migration, disproportionately affecting African, Caribbean and Latin American international locations.

The rise of far-right politics has helped push immigration coverage in the direction of restriction and deterrence, fostering division at residence whereas eroding the ethical language of partnership and shared historical past that when underpinned relations with former colonies.

Many African and Caribbean international locations proceed to face stringent UK visa necessities regardless of shared histories and Commonwealth ties. This appears like a bitter irony: descendants of enslaved and colonised peoples encounter fortress borders from the very state that when claimed unrestricted entry to their lands, labour and assets. Set towards the disgraceful unresolved legacy of the Windrush scandal, visa restrictions deepen the sense that Britain’s post-imperial relationship with the Caribbean and Africa is more and more transactional.

None of this implies reparations are inevitable, or that settlement is imminent. The UK and Europe’s issues – about fiscal precedent, political backlash and authorized publicity – are actual and can form how the talk unfolds. However what 2025 has made clear is that reparations are now not a marginal or episodic demand. They’re being organised, internationalised and normalised as a part of a broader reckoning with slavery, colonialism and international inequality.

The Caricom go to, the African Union’s Decade of Reparations and the rising alignment between Caribbean, African and diaspora voices all level in the identical path. Reparations or restorative justice, as The Large Payback makes clear, are usually not about dwelling up to now. They’re about deciding what sort of future relationship Britain, as a former colonial energy, is prepared to create – one constructed on selective reminiscence and managed silence, or one grounded in reality, restore and a willingness to confront the foundations on which trendy Britain nonetheless stands.

Britain’s leaders say they need to look ahead. The Caribbean and Africa are asking a extra sincere query: ahead from the place, and on whose phrases?