ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses a particular branding strategy in postcolonial studies: anti-capitalism. It investigates how critics consolidate self-brands and brands of postcolonialism by excluding a inferior and primitive economic and/or capitalist 'other'. The chapter focuses on western-centrism in anti-capitalist brand narratives and discusses the characteristics and problems of anti-capitalism as a brand narrative in a series of 'branding cornerstones'. It also discusses whether anti-capitalism can be legitimised as a form of strategic essentialism. In juxtaposing branding and anti-capitalism, the idea is to investigate how the discourse of capitalism, to see how anti-capitalism, and to explore potential pitfalls of this branding strategy. Patrick Williams creates a set of narratives that brand his scholarship and postcolonialism as a radical left-wing project. Positing an essential difference between himself/postcolonialism and 'capitalism, militarism, and religious fundamentalism', Williams advertises his approach/postcolonialism as one of exceptional insightfulness and ethicality, denouncing 'unfettered capitalism' wherever and whenever it makes its appearance.
