Whole Foods headquarters.
activist entrepreneurs espoused “partici-
patory economics”: the idea that citizens
could regain power over their lives by
making their daily experiences in capital-
ist society more humane, authentic and
even politically progressive or radical.
Although activist entrepreneurs didn’t
call themselves such, the term conveys
their particular blend of social movement
participation and business ownership.
Activist entrepreneurs re-envisioned the
products, places and processes of Ameri-
can business. First, they sought to intro-
duce products that promoted progressive
and radical politics, as well as cultural
pluralism in the marketplace. These busi-
nesses grew out of the New Left’s “move-
ment of movements,” which included civil
rights, Black Power, feminism, pacifism,
environmentalism, the hippie countercul-
ture and other movements.
Second, these entrepreneurs conceived
of their storefronts as political places or
“free spaces” that incubated a culture of
activism and solidarity. Third, many activ-
ist enterprises re-conceptualized processes
of doing business by promoting shared
ownership, limited growth and demo-
cratic workplaces.
In turn, they rejected capitalist norms of
limited proprietorship, profit maximization,
rational economic behavior and hierarchical
management. Activist businesses accorded
varying levels of importance to these three
factors. Black-owned bookstores and head
shops focused primarily on their products,
but they also emphasized places and, to a
lesser degree, process.
Most natural food stores were con-
cerned with products above all else, but
co-op groceries were also deeply engaged
with process. Feminist businesses came
the closest to placing an equal emphasis
on process, products and places.
Their differences notwithstanding,
activist entrepreneurs partook in a shared
but largely forgotten experiment in the
1960s and 1970s to create small businesses
that advanced the goals of political change
and social transformation. Although social
movements may be best remembered for
marches and mass meetings, activists also
eagerly harnessed small businesses as a
critical tool for disseminating their ideolo-
gies and doing organizing work. A consid-
eration of activist enterprises thus forces
us to rethink the widespread idea that the
work of social movements and political
dissent is by definition antithetical to all
business and marketplace activity.
These businesses furthermore belie
the common but mistaken notion that
22 FINANCIAL HISTORY | Fall 2017 | www.MoAF.org
political activism and counterculture
occupied two separate spheres in the 1960s
and 1970s. Indeed, activist businesses
were both political and cultural institu-
tions. Some activist entrepreneurs under-
stood social change primarily as political,
whereas others understood it primarily
as cultural — but these views represented
two sides of the same coin. And with their
progressive and radical politics, activist
businesses provide a sharp contrast to the
common narrative of business as an over-
whelmingly conservative, profit-making
endeavor in post-war America.
The title of this article, and the book it
is drawn from, highlights a marked tran-
sition away from the collective goals of
political progress that some, although not
most, activist enterprises made between
the late 1970s and the end of the 20th
century. The most prominent and power-
ful retailer to emerge out of the activist
business tradition is Whole Foods Market.
Over the course of the 1980s and 1990s,
Whole Foods abandoned both its initial
enthusiasm for collective political change
through socially-minded commerce, as
well as its skepticism of unfettered capi-
talism. Even though the company selec-
tively employs countercultural, spiritual
and sustainable business practices, it has