While on the ground in Ferguson, Missouri following the failure to indict Darren Wilson for the shooting death of Mike Brown, Hiram College professor Jason Johnson was quoted by the International Business Times in the article “Ferguson Riots Underscore Lack of Modern Day Black Leadership.”
For Jason Johnson, a professor of political science at Hiram College, the actions of protesters in Ferguson have been spurred not by calls from local leaders but by a lack of guidance from within the city.
“That is endemic of what is going on in Ferguson,” Johnson told International Business Times. “The reason you have 50 million people showing up here…is because there is a vacuum of indigenous African-American leadership. Even the people who you see out protesting, most of those leaders are coming up from St. Louis, they’re coming in from other locations.”
Johnson pointed to Rep. Lacy Clay, the Democrat who represents Ferguson in the U.S. House of Representatives, as one example of absent leadership in the city. He is not-so-affectionately known as “Lazy” Clay in the area, a resident of nearby Florissant told IBTimes.
Click here to read “Ferguson Riots Underscore Lack of Modern Day Black Leadership.”