"Integration is a man's ability to want to move in there by himself. If someone wants to live in a white neighborhood and he is black, that is his choice. It should be his rights. It is not because white people will not allow him"

Stokely Carmichael’s words highlight the nuance behind the concept of integration during the Civil Rights Movement and its aftermath. He focuses on individual agency and the right to self-determination, emphasizing that integration should stem from the desires and choices of black individuals rather than being something imposed, controlled, or withheld by white society.

Integration, as Carmichael frames it, is fundamentally about the ability of a black person to make autonomous decisions relating to where to live, whom to associate with, or communities to join. It is not about black people craving acceptance or approval from white communities, but about having equal access and the full set of rights to do as they please. He asserts that if a black person wishes to move into a white neighborhood, it should be by his own volition, not an act forced by law, and certainly not an act dependent on the benevolence or permission of white people.

The denial of that right, when white communities “will not allow him”, underscores the reality that systemic racism and exclusion still exist. In Carmichael’s analysis, the real problem lies not in black Americans seeking to participate in broader society, but in the barriers that white Americans and institutions erect to block that participation. Thus, the core issue becomes one of power: who gets to decide, and whose privileges are upheld.

By linking integration to self-determination, Carmichael distinguishes it from mere assimilation or tokenism. His words respond to critiques that black people should simply want to be “let in,” revealing the deeper injustice of having to seek external validation or permission for access to basic rights. The ideal society he calls for is one in which every individual’s choices, regardless of race, are recognized and protected, and where social progress is measured not just by the mixing of races, but by the universal respect for personal autonomy and justice.