In part, this was possible because the company aligned itself with the African National Congress (ANC), making a host of moves to help to end apartheid. It then moved its concentrate plant to neighbouring Eswatini, leaving Coca-Cola with no assets or employees in South Africa.Ī Coca-Cola delivery in Soweto, South Africa in 1997. To do this, the company sold all its holdings to a separate business that continued to sell Cokes. Under his direction, the company crafted a unique form of disinvestment that enabled it to do what no other company managed: keep the products in the country while depriving the apartheid state of tax revenue. Coca-Cola executive Carl Ware led the way here. Breaking with established precedent, the company took a stance against the apartheid state. What followed was perhaps the most interesting chapter in the story of Coca-Cola in Africa. A turning point came in the 1980s when, in tandem with activism in the US calling on the company to redress racial imbalances in America, the company was forced to reexamine its racial politics in South Africa as well. For example, the washrooms and lunchrooms in its plants were open to all ethnic groups, unlike the “whites only” facilities established under apartheid. While the company largely attempted to stay out of politics in South Africa, much as it did elsewhere in the world, it resisted certain “petty apartheid” rules. What role did it play in apartheid South Africa?Ĭoca-Cola was entrenched in South Africa before the advent of the racist, white minority apartheid state in 1948. Later chapters explore the routes by which the product spread across the continent, by detailing everything from the co-branding of petrol stations with Coca-Cola, to the rise of Coke beauty pageants, the birth of local forms of Coke advertising, the proliferation of Coca-Cola signage, and much more. This includes green Creme Soda and Stoney ginger beer, both still available for purchase. This included creating a new line of sodas to support the fledgling product called Sparletta. The early chapters of my book detail the often ingenious lengths that bottlers had to go to to get Coke off the ground. It was neither easy nor assured that Coca-Cola would take off anywhere in the world upon its arrival. Its ubiquity thus tells us something about African engagement with a consumer product as well as the many ways in which ordinary people wield power. It bent to the will of Africans in everything from sport to music to healthcare. Coca-Cola is what it is today in Africa, I argue, because it became local. Third, I want readers to see that while we may assume that a multinational company selling carbonated, sugary water is inherently a force for ill, both the history of Coke in Africa and my fieldwork suggest a far more complicated story. This includes the end of apartheid in South Africa and the advent of postcolonial African nations. Arriving in Africa in the early 1900s, it’s a story that is deeply and, often surprisingly, entangled with key moments in African history. It starts with its use of the west African kola nut, from which it takes its name (if no longer its source of caffeine). The second takeaway is that Coke’s story in Africa is an old one. Beyond official jobs, the company has been shown to have a multiplier effect that means that for each official job, upwards of 10 other people are supported. Most estimates put Coke as one of the largest private employers in Africa, if not the largest. The first is that while Africa is largely absent from books on Coca-Cola, the company’s imprint on the continent is enormous. We asked her some questions about the book. It’s a tale of marketing gumption and high politics and is the product of years of research by critical writing lecturer Sara Byala, who researches histories of heritage, sustainability and the ways in which capitalist systems intersect with social and cultural forces in Africa. A new book called Bottled: How Coca-Cola Became African tells the story of how the world’s most famous carbonated drink conquered the continent.
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