he civil rights movement prior to WWII and immediately after it looked at the issue of racial oppression as a global issue. African-American groups allied with African associations to advocate an end to colonialism. While this included the "Double V" slogan, it also included aggressive advocacy for the decolonization of Africa. Lobbying groups went to San Francisco for the UN conference as well as trying to influence State Department policy. The UN, in particular, was important in African-American strategy, as well as that of non-whites globally. Prior to 1946, the UN app[eared a potentially vibrant organization for justice and change. It's eventual emphasis on accepting the sovereignty of all nations severely limited its ability to have an impact in colonialism, but that took some time to become apparent.

After 1946, African-American organizations dramatically changed their strategy. The limitations of the UN was not a direct cause of this change, but was a symptom of underlying issues that would provoke the shift in priorities. The fact that the UN had little power reflected the growing conflict between the US and USSR. That conflict, which would eventually be termed the Cold War, forced African-Americans to limit criticism of US foreign policy so that they would maintain some credibility to advocate domestic change. Although there was significant disagreement among the African-American community, Walter White, head of the NAACP, eventually pushed his view into a dominant position, which was to present an appearance of loyal supporters of the US in the Cold War. Such was the dominance of the Cold War consensus that when later African-American groups, such as the Black Panthers and the Nation of Islam, challenged it, they were essentially forced to reinvent the wheel. Established African-American groups had almost completely cut-off contacts with global issues. ( )