Brewing a Boycott is the most thorough, analytically rich study of a single boycott—or, more properly, related sets of boycotts, from the 1950s through the 1990s, against Coors—that I have ever read. While a history of the Coors boycott might seem like a narrow focus, Brantley’s book ranges far and wide, using it as a prism to examine many elements of the politics and culture of the 1970s, in particular. If anything, the subtitle of this book sells its findings short: this is indeed a superb analysis of “consumer activism,” but it covers many other forms of grassroots politics. This impressive book sheds new light on the history of intersectional activism and conservative politics, as well as labor and business history. It is one of the most clarifying, empirically rich analyses of post-1960s activism ever written.
Boycotts against Coors, which began in 1957, were a form of labor solidarity, but...
University of California Press