If you look at the last 40 years and see the rising number of Black elected officials, but the stagnation - if not devolution - of conditions in Black communities, then it says this electoral game is not actually addressing the central issues of poverty and racism in African American communities. And maybe it's not set up to, because maybe poverty and racism and inequality are actually systemic features of American capitalism.

African American studies scholar Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor examines the persistent inequalities facing Black Americans generations after the contradictory political gains of the Civil Rights Movement, and explains how the Black Lives Matter movement has the potential to challenge not just police brutality, but America's political leadership and the pervasive roots of inequality itself.

Keeanga is author of From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation from Haymarket Books.