Status
Checked out
Publication
Harvard University Press (2009), Edition: 1, 392 pages
Description
In the decades after World War II, evangelical Christianity nourished America's devotion to free markets, free trade, and free enterprise. The history of Wal-Mart uncovers a complex network that united Sun Belt entrepreneurs, evangelical employees, Christian business students, overseas missionaries, and free-market activists. Through the stories of people linked by the world's largest corporation, Bethany Moreton shows how a Christian service ethos powered capitalism at home and abroad. While industrial America was built by and for the urban North, rural Southerners comprised much of the labor, management, and consumers in the postwar service sector that raised the Sun Belt to national influence. These newcomers to the economic stage put down the plough to take up the bar-code scanner without ever passing through the assembly line. Industrial culture had been urban, modernist, sometimes radical, often Catholic and Jewish, and self-consciously international. Post-industrial culture, in contrast, spoke of Jesus with a drawl and of unions with a sneer, sang about Momma and the flag, and preached salvation in this world and the next. This extraordinary biography of Wal-Mart's world shows how a Christian pro-business movement grew from the bottom up as well as the top down, bolstering an economic vision that sanctifies corporate globalization. The author has assigned her royalties and subsidiary earnings to Interfaith Worker Justice (www.iwj.org) and its local affiliate in Athens, GA, the Economic Justice Coalition (www.econjustice.org).… (more)
Media reviews
Fascinating... [it] attempt to come to grips with a perplexing economic mystery of our own day: the rapid rise and startling success of megaretailer Wal-Mart.
Moreton’s book answers important questions about why workers have been willing to accept Wal-Mart’s austere compensation package.
Bethany Moreton’s pathbreaking study, To Serve God and Wal-Mart: The Making of Christian Free Enterprise is an invaluable asset...A critical appraisal of how religion, politics, and economics were interwoven in post-Vietnam American culture and society, To Serve God and Wal-Mart is also a bracing
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reminder that we, among the most materialistic people in the world, have turned a blind eye to the impact of material conditions on our actions, attitudes, and beliefs. Show Less
[W]hen the focus departs from Wal-Mart and shifts to education, the book begins to meander... Nonetheless, the book’s first half makes for compelling and provocative reading.
Although Moreton's argument about gender is central and accounts brilliantly (if at times at a stretch) for the political phenomenon of the Sarah Palin–lovin' Wal-Mart Mom, her book is primarily an economic and business history... To understand the lingua franca of today's workplace — with its
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talk of networking, entrepreneurialism, leadership, community service, and, above all, PR and communications — this book is indispensable reading. After all, we all live in Wal-Mart World now. Show Less
Bethany Moreton's fascinating study of the Bentonville, Ark., chain probes the deeper meanings of service in this emerging economy... This book is not a comprehensive history, a paean to Sam Walton or a Michael Moore-style exposé; all of those can be found elsewhere. With verve and clarity,
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Moreton offers something more distinctive: a compelling explanation of how Wal-Mart captured the hearts and pocketbooks of so many Americans. Show Less
Wal-Mart’s folksy illusion relied in part on making store workers feel like family; in particular, on making female workers feel valued as wives and mothers. Moreton does an excellent job of digging beneath Wal-Mart’s carefully imagineered vision of the rural good life. She not only recounts
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labor abuses such as the company’s notorious failure to promote and reward women but also stresses how the company appealed to white Americans’ feelings of entitlement. Show Less
Like all historians who love their craft, Bethany Moreton is a gifted storyteller, and this book offers readers an engaging account of how a discount five-and-dime store conceived in the rural American Ozarks became the template for service work in the global economy.
User reviews
LibraryThing member mjgrogan
I suppose I’d say this book offers what the title promises. It’s a well-researched and consummately written account of how Sam’s empire emerged in concert with the transforming identities of (some) US Christian doctrine and the transformations of the service economy throughout the post-war
I suppose I’d say that this has much of interest. This probably an important book that certainly offers a unique reading of Wal-Mart’s evolution; a reading that encompasses innumerable aspects – local and global - beyond the typical issues often attributed the retailer’s “effect.” It’s also a bit dull if you’re seeking a critical account of the mega-retailer or “free enterprise” or religious universities or whatever. If Moreton offers any critical dimension, it’s definitely below the radar (or way over my head, as the case may be) and, while that’s a respectable scholarly approach, my anti-Wal-Mart leanings leave me wanting more. Perhaps I simply require spectacle or muckraking to hold my interest at this point. At the very least this lacks the snarkiness implied by the rather goof-ball, photoshopped cover image splicing aisle nine with the firmament.
At the very most this comes off a bit like some kind of apologia for the massive company’s machinations. If Moreton shows any bias, it seems directed towards Wal-Mart’s good deeds: the rescue of intelligent Guatemalan teens from a life of guaranteed poverty aided by the US government; the rescuing of hapless Katrina victims from the incompetence of FEMA; the bestowal of good old consumer choice upon previously ignored Mexican nationals. Beyond mention of the “Made in the U.S.A” propaganda as more “style than substance,” she seems to gloss over anything that might be construed as negative. This may be refreshing in light of all the other anti-big box exposés, but my cynical disposition left me wondering if this book might actually represent a most sophisticated marketing ploy! Has the Home Office managed to infiltrate the scholarship of a major university (and the Harvard University Press)?!? Crazier things have happened.
As I’ve witnessed years of inane TV ads, obviously conceived by an uncreative store associate, I’m not going to read that much into it. But if a typical hard-core Women’s Studies academic could muster up a Wal-Mart cheer, it might sound a lot like this.
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years. This is about how the “Wal-Mart Country” of the Ozarks went from a provincial/rural rejection of the emerging chain-store epidemic to the host of the world’s greatest chain. Something like that.I suppose I’d say that this has much of interest. This probably an important book that certainly offers a unique reading of Wal-Mart’s evolution; a reading that encompasses innumerable aspects – local and global - beyond the typical issues often attributed the retailer’s “effect.” It’s also a bit dull if you’re seeking a critical account of the mega-retailer or “free enterprise” or religious universities or whatever. If Moreton offers any critical dimension, it’s definitely below the radar (or way over my head, as the case may be) and, while that’s a respectable scholarly approach, my anti-Wal-Mart leanings leave me wanting more. Perhaps I simply require spectacle or muckraking to hold my interest at this point. At the very least this lacks the snarkiness implied by the rather goof-ball, photoshopped cover image splicing aisle nine with the firmament.
At the very most this comes off a bit like some kind of apologia for the massive company’s machinations. If Moreton shows any bias, it seems directed towards Wal-Mart’s good deeds: the rescue of intelligent Guatemalan teens from a life of guaranteed poverty aided by the US government; the rescuing of hapless Katrina victims from the incompetence of FEMA; the bestowal of good old consumer choice upon previously ignored Mexican nationals. Beyond mention of the “Made in the U.S.A” propaganda as more “style than substance,” she seems to gloss over anything that might be construed as negative. This may be refreshing in light of all the other anti-big box exposés, but my cynical disposition left me wondering if this book might actually represent a most sophisticated marketing ploy! Has the Home Office managed to infiltrate the scholarship of a major university (and the Harvard University Press)?!? Crazier things have happened.
As I’ve witnessed years of inane TV ads, obviously conceived by an uncreative store associate, I’m not going to read that much into it. But if a typical hard-core Women’s Studies academic could muster up a Wal-Mart cheer, it might sound a lot like this.
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LibraryThing member KelMunger
Wal-Mart as Antichrist might be believable, considering the barely-disguised worship of cheap labor sacrificed on the altar of nonstop consumption. But this book by historian Moreton says it all in the subtitle—*The Making of Christian Free Enterprise*—then proceeds to produce evidence of how
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this unnatural marriage of capitalism and popular Christianity has been accomplished. It’s been a puzzle to those of us who recognize that what little Jesus actually said about economics and politics leans more toward the left, but Wal-Mart is the drive-through chapel featuring an Elvis impersonator where populist Christian capitalism wed, then began to reproduce. Wal-Mart may be the biggest example, but it’s not the only one. Moreton makes her point with a combination of economic and cultural history, offering an explanation for working-class Americans’ continued embrace of beliefs that hurt them economically. Just count the “Honk if you love Jesus!” bumper stickers in a Wal-Mart parking lot. Show Less
LibraryThing member swivelgal
This book was not at all what I expected. The book addresses the Christian beliefs of Wal-Mart's founders and a select few employees. This handful of people are the audience for the book. Not the average Wal-Mart shopper that is looking for God.
I wish I hadn't bought it.
I wish I hadn't bought it.
LibraryThing member Nickelini
My low rating for this book is perhaps unfair and possibly inaccurate, but it reflects my reading experience. Moreton goes into painful detail on the ties between the evolution of Wal-Mart and how "a Christian service ethos powered capitalism at home and abroad." Her research is exhaustive, but I
Part of the problem is that I expected a professor of history and women's studies to present more of a criticism of the retailer and the free enterprise system in general. Instead, at times this read like an apologia, as an earlier reviewer also noticed. Further, she completely lost me on the whole "service" slant to her argument since my admittedly limited experience with Wal-Mart evokes no memories of any service. Still, it's a professional, meticulously researched piece that might appeal to someone looking for an economic and cultural history.
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quickly became exhausted. This was way, way too long and she lost me in the minutiae. There were some interesting bits, but overall I found this very dull.Part of the problem is that I expected a professor of history and women's studies to present more of a criticism of the retailer and the free enterprise system in general. Instead, at times this read like an apologia, as an earlier reviewer also noticed. Further, she completely lost me on the whole "service" slant to her argument since my admittedly limited experience with Wal-Mart evokes no memories of any service. Still, it's a professional, meticulously researched piece that might appeal to someone looking for an economic and cultural history.
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LibraryThing member Scapegoats
This book traces Wal-mart's development from a local store in the Ozarks to the largest corporation in the world. Moreton argues that it does this through adaptable business strategies that incorporated ideas of Christian service, family structure and free enterprise. She starts by showing how Sam
She shows that Wal-mart promoted Christian-style service and then brought in Christian business. This was not because of Walton's religious feeling, which appears to have been lukewarm, but because it made good business sense. Christian merchandise and events made a lot of money, so Wal-mart promoted them.
The book moves onto Wal-mart going national and exerting some influence on culture. It linked with Students in Free Enterprise to indoctrinate students in the value of capitalism and then recruit them into it management system. It helped fund evangelical schools in the Ozarks to promote free enterprise. It funded scholarships for Central Americans to study at those schools and then return how as apostles of the American system (free-enterprise and Christianity).
The section on international scholarships is when Wal-mart started to go global. But its big step was opening a store in Mexico, which Moreton says nearly single-handedly got NAFTA passed by showing how Mexicans wanted to buy American goods. Then she shows how Wal-mart led the way in creating a global supply chain and in opening outlets abroad.
This book is superbly researched, but has very little to link it together except that Wal-mart is in every chapter. It is basically a corporate history, which is useful to people interested in business, but each chapter is only loosely connected to the others so it seems disjointed. It is provides some interesting insight into the Ozarks, but beyond that, it isn't much use. I found her analysis of gender issues in the company to be inconsistent and unconvincing. There were definitely problems of gender there, but she doesn't show much on Wal-mart being different in wanting male executives. The section on NAFTA was interesting, but I will want to find some other analyses of ratification before I'll give too much weight to Moreton's findings.
Overall, I'd say skip it.
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Walton turned the disadvantages of being in Arkansas into advantages. He initially kept ownership to his family, then store managers and then the local areas so to contrast the national chains. He also tapped into the social structure of the area that put men in management and women as store workers. He developed a family structure for each store to develop employee loyalty and morale.She shows that Wal-mart promoted Christian-style service and then brought in Christian business. This was not because of Walton's religious feeling, which appears to have been lukewarm, but because it made good business sense. Christian merchandise and events made a lot of money, so Wal-mart promoted them.
The book moves onto Wal-mart going national and exerting some influence on culture. It linked with Students in Free Enterprise to indoctrinate students in the value of capitalism and then recruit them into it management system. It helped fund evangelical schools in the Ozarks to promote free enterprise. It funded scholarships for Central Americans to study at those schools and then return how as apostles of the American system (free-enterprise and Christianity).
The section on international scholarships is when Wal-mart started to go global. But its big step was opening a store in Mexico, which Moreton says nearly single-handedly got NAFTA passed by showing how Mexicans wanted to buy American goods. Then she shows how Wal-mart led the way in creating a global supply chain and in opening outlets abroad.
This book is superbly researched, but has very little to link it together except that Wal-mart is in every chapter. It is basically a corporate history, which is useful to people interested in business, but each chapter is only loosely connected to the others so it seems disjointed. It is provides some interesting insight into the Ozarks, but beyond that, it isn't much use. I found her analysis of gender issues in the company to be inconsistent and unconvincing. There were definitely problems of gender there, but she doesn't show much on Wal-mart being different in wanting male executives. The section on NAFTA was interesting, but I will want to find some other analyses of ratification before I'll give too much weight to Moreton's findings.
Overall, I'd say skip it.
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LibraryThing member drbrand
The formation and growth of Wal-Mart in the heart of a state like Arkansas represents a paradox of populism and corporatism. In actuality, Wal-Mart capitalized on southerners’ traditional fear of outside corporate chains and foreign entrepreneurs by billing themselves as in line with the
The hierarchy of the stores was modeled after traditional rural familial structures in the area, as opposed to the military organization used by other corporate chains. In order to combat the stereotype of the feminized store clerk, Wal-Marts hired males (treated as adults even if young) in supervisor roles, and woman in subordinate positions. This family structure also bred an atypical level of interdependence, as well as a new work ideology of service that permeated Wal-Mart culture. This reorganization resulted not only in better customer relationships, but better relationships between managers and coworkers as well. All of these major changes in the chain structure made by Walton allowed the emerging Christian Right to attach moral Christian family values to the structure of Wal-Mart—its clean aisles and service ethos were able to recreate a sanitized version of small town life within the store itself. Interestingly, Wal-Mart was never openly aligned with the Christian Right, but served as a model of conservative Christian business practices and morality by recognizing their primary customers shifting needs and desires.
Wal-Mart became heavily aligned with revaluing women’s position in the home, subtly reinforcing the Christian service notion of women as selfless shoppers, as well as the male dominated workspace. Adjusting to the feminization of the workspace, maculating the “servant leader” ideal allowed a successful corporate culture to be established by Wal-Mart, while not necessarily giving the kind of benefits one would expect from a large successful company. Also, by recognizing the desires of its employees and customers and intertwining them with traditional management tactics, Wal-Mart successfully created an environment of growth in which they were able to go out into the surrounding Christian colleges to find new conservative business leaders to manage and represent their new stores. These changes in managerial structure occurred with technological innovations both in evangelical culture and Wal-Mart culture.
To the detriment of the liberal arts, the 1970s also saw a reactionary conservative emphasis on business and economics in secondary schools and colleges (especially Christian schools) to combat the antibusiness sentiments of the previous decade. Universities and colleges that did not refocus towards a more business minded curriculum faced funding problems, while schools that did shift their focus saw increased federal spending. Organizations like Students in Free Enterprise (sponsored by Wal-Mart) began to focus on encouraging students in new evangelical colleges to pursue careers in conservative business by creating competitions and fellowships. Its connections with private evangelical institutions served to reinforce a Christian conservatism in the upcoming generation of Sun Belt businessmen—the future leaders of Wal-Marts. These students became evangelists of free enterprise in a time of deficit and began fighting rampant government spending, sending SIFE into the public sphere of electoral politics. Wal-Mart executives, including Jack Shewmaker, began politicking through SIFE in order to encourage economic education and a restructuring of congressional and business practices.
With the fall of the USSR, Wal-Mart began internationalizing and leading the way towards economic globalization and a redistribution of worldwide labor. The company brought technology, American business practices, evangelical Christianity, and rural family values to places all across the globe—their free-trade ethos was now what many countries knew of the United States. Initially, Wal-Mart was primarily interested in overseas production, but eventually found that it could expand its retail market all over the world, thereby bringing this gospel of free trade with them. Wal-Mart formed a complicated relationship with world trade organizations, and after the formation of NAFTA, began buying up retailers around the globe to expand its vision of American identity, Christian values, and corporate globalism into the twenty-first century.
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wholesome local country store, not the corporate chain. The origins of the chain depended on a correction of the corporatism criticized by populists in the area, as well as taking advantage of government funding for new corporate ventures. In fact, Wal-Mart positions its origins in the communal response of local businesses banding together to combat larger chains and discount stores. Its expansion began primarily in what came to be known as Wal-Mart country—the area of northern Arkansas and southern Missouri that saw the stores take hold in smaller towns with federal money coming in. Sam Walton’s small-town mentality towards hiring and presentation, as well as his entrepreneurship and gift of expansion, allowed him to fill the region with larger chains that had a distinctly non-chain feeling. The hierarchy of the stores was modeled after traditional rural familial structures in the area, as opposed to the military organization used by other corporate chains. In order to combat the stereotype of the feminized store clerk, Wal-Marts hired males (treated as adults even if young) in supervisor roles, and woman in subordinate positions. This family structure also bred an atypical level of interdependence, as well as a new work ideology of service that permeated Wal-Mart culture. This reorganization resulted not only in better customer relationships, but better relationships between managers and coworkers as well. All of these major changes in the chain structure made by Walton allowed the emerging Christian Right to attach moral Christian family values to the structure of Wal-Mart—its clean aisles and service ethos were able to recreate a sanitized version of small town life within the store itself. Interestingly, Wal-Mart was never openly aligned with the Christian Right, but served as a model of conservative Christian business practices and morality by recognizing their primary customers shifting needs and desires.
Wal-Mart became heavily aligned with revaluing women’s position in the home, subtly reinforcing the Christian service notion of women as selfless shoppers, as well as the male dominated workspace. Adjusting to the feminization of the workspace, maculating the “servant leader” ideal allowed a successful corporate culture to be established by Wal-Mart, while not necessarily giving the kind of benefits one would expect from a large successful company. Also, by recognizing the desires of its employees and customers and intertwining them with traditional management tactics, Wal-Mart successfully created an environment of growth in which they were able to go out into the surrounding Christian colleges to find new conservative business leaders to manage and represent their new stores. These changes in managerial structure occurred with technological innovations both in evangelical culture and Wal-Mart culture.
To the detriment of the liberal arts, the 1970s also saw a reactionary conservative emphasis on business and economics in secondary schools and colleges (especially Christian schools) to combat the antibusiness sentiments of the previous decade. Universities and colleges that did not refocus towards a more business minded curriculum faced funding problems, while schools that did shift their focus saw increased federal spending. Organizations like Students in Free Enterprise (sponsored by Wal-Mart) began to focus on encouraging students in new evangelical colleges to pursue careers in conservative business by creating competitions and fellowships. Its connections with private evangelical institutions served to reinforce a Christian conservatism in the upcoming generation of Sun Belt businessmen—the future leaders of Wal-Marts. These students became evangelists of free enterprise in a time of deficit and began fighting rampant government spending, sending SIFE into the public sphere of electoral politics. Wal-Mart executives, including Jack Shewmaker, began politicking through SIFE in order to encourage economic education and a restructuring of congressional and business practices.
With the fall of the USSR, Wal-Mart began internationalizing and leading the way towards economic globalization and a redistribution of worldwide labor. The company brought technology, American business practices, evangelical Christianity, and rural family values to places all across the globe—their free-trade ethos was now what many countries knew of the United States. Initially, Wal-Mart was primarily interested in overseas production, but eventually found that it could expand its retail market all over the world, thereby bringing this gospel of free trade with them. Wal-Mart formed a complicated relationship with world trade organizations, and after the formation of NAFTA, began buying up retailers around the globe to expand its vision of American identity, Christian values, and corporate globalism into the twenty-first century.
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LibraryThing member LudieGrace
This book is poorly argued, and I don't think that Moreton demonstrates the connections she is trying (I think??) to make. However, she avoids -- for the most part -- a "what's the matter with Kansas" type of argument, so that, at least, is refreshing; and if nothing else, she holds differing sets
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of values up for comparison in a way that could even be useful for discussion. I'm still not sure what her aim and intended audience were, though. Show Less
Awards
Frederick Jackson Turner Award (Winner — 2010)
Language
Original language
English
Physical description
392 p.; 9.3 inches
ISBN
0674033221 / 9780674033221