To B(oycott) or not to B(oycott)

There seems a marked reluctance amongst Western leaders to use the word boycott when it comes to addressing Russian aggression. Much preferred is the legalistic phrase ‘imposing sanctions.’ As I write, the E.U. is considering an ‘embargo’ on Russian gas and oil. Many Western companies have pulled out of Russia, denying ordinary Russians of things like Big Macs and Hermes handbags. Such responses are lauded as the right thing to do, but despite that the word boycott is avoided. I have to wonder why. Is it because boycotts are seen as citizen led rather than state sanctioned initiatives? The word boycott has a mixed history, and is tainted with bad connotations. One of the first acts of the anti-Semitic Nazi regime in 1933 was to impose a boycott on Jewish owned businesses. They said this was justified by the anti-German ‘atrocities’ being committed by foreign Jews seeking to harm the Reich. The Nazi government in fevered language decreed a boycott of Jewish businesses on April 1st 1933 (whilst at the same time, implausibly, telling its followers not to physically harm Jews). The reaction from abroad was horror muted by the desire not to add petrol to the inflamed domestic German scene. Suggestions were made in the UK that the German economy in turn should be boycotted, but these were resisted by, e.g. the Jewish Board of Deputies. Their meeting held on the 26th March 1933 was summed up by its chair, Neville Lasky who said of a boycott “The Board of Deputies are taking no part in it. The Board recognise not only as a body, but as individuals composing a body—as every individual must recognise—that feeling in the Jewish community in a time of such crisis must necessarily run high. These boycotts and these meetings are spontaneous outbursts of indignation. They would lose their value if they were organised. It is only because of my official position that I do not take part in the boycott. I stand aside and watch, but as an individual I watch it gladly.” (emphasis added, Times, 27th March 1933).
 
One can understand the desire of anyone aggrieved by the treatment of others not to want to exacerbate their situation—any such move, particularly in this case would give the likes of Goebbels even more grist for his hate fuelled mill. Today Putin seems intent on stoking up the same kind of fear, suggesting that the West has embarked on an economic war designed to destroy Russia, a fear which some in the West seem happy to confirm with their own evermore aggressive rhetoric.
 
It’s this idea that boycotts could be organised outwith their own authority that worries elites. Such things are an affront to state power and in an age of consumerism there is a danger that individuals could equate their consumer power with citizen power. This is not a definition of consumerism that capitalism recognises, since citizens aren’t economic units but are theoretically at least autonomous actors moved by ethical or even moral concerns which exist outside of the market. Boycotts then are exercises of power which can subjugate the market, introducing elements without monetary value but which can have economic effects. Such actions can but not always force the target to respond to arguments they otherwise wouldn’t feel compelled to answer. As Corporal Jones from Dad’s Army might say, ‘They don’t like it up ‘em.’