Cigarettes, inc. : an intimate history of corporate imperialism / Nan Enstad.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Enstad, Nan, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

British American Tobacco Company--History.

British American Tobacco Company.

British-American Tobacco Co. (China)--History.

British-American Tobacco Co. (China).

Cigarette industry--United States--History.

Cigarette industry.

Cigarette industry--China--History.

History.

China.

United States.

Genre:

History.

Physical Description:

xiii, 333 pages ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Chicago ; London : The University of Chicago Press, 2018.

Summary:

Traditional narratives of capitalist change often rely on the myth of the willful entrepreneur from the global North who transforms the economy and delivers modernity--for good or ill--to the rest of the world. With Cigarettes, Inc., Nan Enstad upends this story, revealing the myriad cross-cultural encounters that produced corporate life before World War II. In this startling account of innovation and expansion, Enstad uncovers a corporate network rooted in Jim Crow segregation that stretched between the United States and China and beyond. Cigarettes, Inc. teems with a global cast--from Egyptian, American, and Chinese entrepreneurs to a multiracial set of farmers, merchants, factory workers, marketers, and even baseball players, jazz musicians, and sex workers. Through their stories, Cigarettes, Inc. accounts for the cigarette's spectacular rise in popularity and in the process offers nothing less than a sweeping reinterpretation of corporate power itself.

Contents:

Preface: Who counts in the corporation?

Introduction

The bright leaf cigarette in the age of empire

Corporate enchantment

The bright leaf tobacco network

Making a transnational cigarette factory labor force

Of Camels and Ruby Queens

The intimate dance of jazz and cigarettes

Where the races meet

Conclusion: Called to account.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780226533285

022653328X

9780226533315

022653331X

OCLC:

1028591185