Barbie is a rare winner in the corporate culture wars

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“We don’t want Disneyland to train our military.” Those were US House of Representatives Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s words last week at a press conference in which he and other Republicans defended inserting “anti-woke” provisions in a military spending bill that were designed to curb abortion rights, diversity training and transgender healthcare. The fact that he name-checked Disney, which has suffered mightily in Florida after its executives stood up to governor Ron DeSantis’s “don’t say gay” bill, is telling. Unlike the defence department, corporate America has been in the cross hairs of the country’s culture wars for years.

Think not only about Disney, which has to deal with conservative lawsuits, a special corporate oversight board in Florida loaded with political operatives picked by state Republicans, and even the chance that the state will build a giant prison near its theme parks — all of which has forced the company to pull major investments in a top market. Think about Bud Light, which lost its market-leading position after sales plummeted this past spring following a row over a transgender influencer (paid by the company) who posted support for a brand-sponsored contest. Or the online backlash faced by the outdoor gear maker North Face after releasing a drag queen video for Pride month. Indeed, there are dozens of examples of companies struggling unsuccessfully to win the culture wars.

In some ways, the linking of activism and commerce is as American as apple pie. Boycotts of British goods in Boston, New York and Philadelphia were a precursor to the Revolutionary War. Consumer boycotts were also part of the labour struggles of the late 19th century (unions saw them as a cheap but effective protest method), as well as the civil rights struggles of the 1950s and 1960s, and the women’s movement of the 1970s and 1980s. Campaigns against corporations that use child labour or have poor environmental standards have been around for decades. 

But today’s “woke capitalism” is different — in several ways. First, it requires companies to navigate multiple politically divisive issues at once. There are the identity issues, driven in large part by the Black Lives Matter movement, which began in 2013 and gained steam following the murder of George Floyd in police custody. That event led big corporations such as Apple, Google, Hasbro, Estée Lauder, Walmart, Adidas, Reebok and many others to announce big diversity initiatives and spend hundreds of millions on racial justice.

But there are also the pressures around ESG and “stakeholder” capitalism, which have grown following BlackRock founder Larry Fink’s 2018 call for companies to make “a positive contribution to society” as well as profits. This rallying cry wasn’t accompanied by any particular metric. But it’s come to include everything from gender and racial diversity on boards, to supply chain sustainability, to more industry-specific concerns such as sugar consumption, gun sales, immigration policy and surveillance capitalism, particularly as it relates to children online.

That’s a lot for companies to navigate, and very few are managing it well. A few years back, the airline Delta tried to quell consumer concerns about gun control by pulling corporate discounts for the National Rifle Association. It ended up losing a $38mn tax break from its headquarter state of Georgia. Sports brand Under Armour got pushback from progressives for its chief executive’s positive comments about President Donald Trump. Then it was lambasted by Republicans for pulling out of Trump’s American Manufacturing Council after racial tensions and violence in Charlottesville in 2017.

These pressures are amplified by social media at a speed that’s impossible to keep up with. I suspect the landscape will only get more complicated as multinational organisations deal with the national sensitivities inherent in global “de-risking” (or decoupling, depending on who you talk to).

Remember Beijing’s refusal to broadcast National Basketball Association games in China after the Houston Rockets’ manager expressed support for pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong? Or Chinese consumer boycotts of H&M, Nike and Adidas for refusing to buy cotton grown in Xinjiang, given concerns over forced labour? As capital flows between the two countries become an area of regulatory focus, I wouldn’t be surprised to see BlackRock and other big financial institutions come under pressure.

Can any company win the culture wars? Maybe. Mattel seems well on its way to making Barbie, a 64-year-old brand that literally turns women into dolls, into something representing postmodern feminist cool. The trick was hiring art-house director Greta Gerwig to produce a film that sends up the whole idea of woman-as-object, while still allowing us to enjoy Barbie lookalike Margot Robbie on the big screen. Satirising your own product to sell more of it? That’s brilliant marketing.

Of course, Barbie has a lot going for her in today’s world. She comes in 35 skin tones and nine body types. There are hijab-wearing dolls, Barbies with Down syndrome, vitiligo, prosthetic legs and wheelchairs. And of course, there are no glass ceilings in the Dreamhouse. Barbie may have a strange propensity for pink, but she can still be an astronaut and a doctor. Luckily for Mattel, she generally can’t talk or share any contentious political beliefs.

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