Dr. Y. N. Kly may be one of the most significant African American political theorists since W.E.B. DuBois.
This selection of his writings seeks to encapsulate Dr. Kly's groundbreaking presentation of the systemic situation of black Americans in the United States within the context of the norms and practices of international law. It represented a paradigm shift in the understanding of African American rights, including but moving beyond the customary American view of civil rights, i.e. nondiscrimination, equality before the law, and the right to vote, to those more expansive systemic rights elaborated in international human rights law as it concerns minorities and peoples.

This publication is germane to what may be an epochal moment in American history, when the struggle for power between two mainstream American political parties, reflected in the accusations of white supremacy leveled at the Trump presidency and the rise of the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement, has brought the issue of African Americans' present and historical grievances to the fore.
Moreover, it is a moment when Civil Rights has been tested and not only found to be inadequate by African Americans, but is again being challenged by the dominant majority and the US Supreme Court as it concerns affirmative action.
It is a moment when, post the 2020 deaths of Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor and George Floyd, African Americans are flocking to their heritage institutions, the Historically Black Colleges & Universities (HBCUs), seeking safety in their collectivity and freedom from the complexities of their integration into predominantly white institutions of higher learning.
Dr. Kly's work was recognized within his lifetime. Two of his books International Law and the Black Minority in the United States and A Popular Guide to Minority Rights won the prestigious Gustavus Myers Center for the Study of Bigotry and Human Rights Award, sponsored by major civil rights US organizations such as the NAACP, the National Bar Association and the Unitarian Universalist Church. He was awarded the National Bar Association's International Human Rights Pioneer Award in 2007. Endorsers ranged from the American Journal of International Law to black nationalist Kwame Ture (Stokely Carmichael) and political prisoner, Mumia Abu Jamal.
He was the keynote speaker at a groundbreaking conference held at Hamline University in 1993, on the Right of African Americans to Self-Determination.