A 'native intellectual', suggested Frantz Fanon, the great freedom fighterfrom Martinique, is essential to the development of any great nation as it comesinto its own after decades of colonization. Fanon, a complex thinker by nature,evolved a whole theory of how intellectuals could and should participate in thelife of their country. They had to find ways to engage with ordinary people andtheir aspirations and to think about the many meanings of freedom, justice anddemocracy beyond simply replacing white rulers with black or brown ones. Nativeintellectuals would need, above all, to discard their smug complacency, learn tobe self-critical and forge international alliances with like-minded others.(Though from Martinique, he himself worked alongside the Algerian anti-colonialmovement).