Robert Parris Moses: A Life in Civil Rights and Leadership at the Grassroots

by Laura Visser-Maessen

Overview

One of the most influential leaders in the civil rights movement, Robert Parris Moses was essential in making Mississippi a central battleground state in the fight for voting rights. As a leader of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), Moses presented himself as a mere facilitator of grassroots activism rather than a charismatic figure like Martin Luther King Jr. His self-effacing demeanor and his success, especially in steering the events that led to the volatile 1964 Freedom Summer and the formation of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, paradoxically gave him a reputation of nearly heroic proportions. Examining the dilemmas of a leader who worked to cultivate local leadership, historian Laura Visser-Maessen explores the intellectual underpinnings of Moses's strategy, its achievements, and its struggles.

This new biography recasts Moses as an effective, hands-on organizer, safeguarding his ideals while leading from behind the scenes. By returning Moses to his rightful place among the foremost leaders of the movement, Visser-Maessen testifies to Moses's revolutionary approach to grassroots leadership and the power of the individual in generating social change.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781469666501
Publisher:	The University of North Carolina Press
Publication date:	05/01/2021
Pages:	456
Product dimensions:	6.12(w) x 9.25(h) x 1.02(d)

About the Author

Laura Visser-Maessen is assistant professor in African American history, American Studies, and Transatlantic Studies at Radboud University Nijmegen in the Netherlands.

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

A brilliant assessment of the complexities of social movement leadership. Visser-Maessen superbly explores the story of how a leader helped to shape the civil rights movement without imposing his own will, and by encouraging grassroots activists to make their own decisions.—William H. Chafe, author of Hillary and Bill: The Clintons and the Politics of the Personal

Bob Moses of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) broke new ground in the struggle for voting rights in Mississippi by daring to go where few activists and organizers before him dared to go. This first substantial examination of his work and ideas is essential reading for anyone seeking understanding of the 1960s civil rights movement. Nuanced in its analysis not just of Moses but also of a movement far more complex than many realize, it gives us insight into the still practically invisible Moses while opening a window onto the still largely misunderstood grassroots organizing work of SNCC in the Black Belt South.—Charlie Cobb, author of This Nonviolent Stuff'll Get You Killed: How Guns Made the Civil Rights Movement Possible and On the Road to Freedom: A Guided Tour of the Civil Rights Trail

Laura Visser-Maessen has written a deeply researched, thoughtful study on one of the most compelling figures of the civil rights movement. Her account presents the most complex and accurate portrayal of Bob Moses and makes a great contribution to the literature by trying to reconcile his impact with the inherent contradictions of his leadership style.—Chris Myers Asch, University of the District of Columbia

Editorial Reviews

02/22/2016
Robert Parris Moses, a legendary figure in the civil rights movement and founder of the Algebra Project, an educational foundation for disadvantaged children, has led many lives, merged into a single life of service. Visser-Maessen, a Dutch historian specializing in the civil rights movement, eschews the trappings of conventional biography and focuses on Moses’s activities (the best-known of which are the Mississippi-centered voter registration drives, the Freedom Summer Project, and the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party) and philosophical influences (chiefly Albert Camus and Quaker pacifism). Given Moses’s commitment to grassroots-based activism, Visser-Maessen pays close attention to his daily activities as a self-effacing organizer. Sometimes the detail overwhelms, but it allows the author to delineate the roles of significant activists less known to the general public, such as Ella Baker and Amzie Moore. It also conveys the pervasive racial terror in Mississippi in the mid-20th century. While focusing on Moses’s civil rights work, Visser-Maessen conveys that his subsequent work in education was not a departure, but a meaningful step forward. Of special value is the final section, a comprehensive critique of Moses’s treatment in civil rights historiography. 10 illus. (June)

Publishers Weekly

While focusing on Moses's civil rights work, Visser-Maessen conveys that his subsequent work in education was not a departure, but a meaningful step forward. Of special value is the final section, a comprehensive critique of Moses's treatment in civil rights historiography.—Publishers Weekly

An intriguing character study of one of the most profoundly impactful local organizers of the civil rights era. . . . This compelling biography will be sought after by scholars of civil rights history and local organizing.—Library Journal

[This] carefully researched, well written, and nuanced account of Moses's life. . . . sheds new light on a man and a movement whose lessons could not be more valuable today.—Mike Miller, Dissent Magazine

Skillfully tracks the evolution of Moses' leadership, no matter how reluctantly he might have wielded it.—Chicago Tribune

Exemplifies the new strain of historical inquiry that transcends simple narrative, examining the ideas and lived values of civil rights and social justice and not merely the personalities or politics of the time. Essential.—CHOICE

A thought-provoking study that not only illuminates Moses's activism, Mississippi freedom struggles, and SNCC history, but also invites scholars to investigate and probe further the underlying themes and issues involved in local community organizing and local civil rights struggles.—American Historical Review

An extensive and thoughtful examination of Bob Moses. . . . An extraordinary and useful picture of the frozen political, economic, and social system of white supremacy in Mississippi in the mid-twentieth century.—H-Net Reviews

Visser-Maessen's insightful biography of Robert Parris Moses. . . . paints a precise and multilayered analysis of the internal and external forces that shaped the life of a very private and introspective figure.—Journal of African American History

From the Publisher

03/15/2016
In this debut work, Visser-Maessen (American studies, Utrecht Univ., Netherlands) brings together an intriguing character study of one of the most profoundly impactful local organizers of the civil rights era. Through the author's new scholarship, we see Robert Parris Moses (b. 1935) develop as an activist and become a necessary bridge among grassroots organizations and disenfranchised Southern blacks experiencing hardship from Jim Crow laws designed to prevent all but the most affluent and educated from voting. Moses held a unique stature as an organizer, if not always outright leadership roles in the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). After discovering his calling in local campaigns in Mississippi, Moses was influential in encouraging deprived Southern residents to register to vote. While such an effort had also been advanced by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), it was Moses who was able to seek regional collaborators and advance community voices in his pursuit of voting rights. VERDICT This compelling biography will be sought after by scholars of civil rights history and local organizing.—Jim Hahn, Univ. Lib., Univ. of Illinois, Urbana

Library Journal