In 1792, the first consumer boycott was organised to
protest against the inhumane treatment of slaves in
the production of sugar in the West Indies. In his
comic novel of the time, Melincourt, Thomas Love
Peacock (1817) wrote of the trade in sugar that it was
‘economically superfluous, physically pernicious,
morally atrocious and politically abominable’. Much
the same could be said of ‘Conditional Cash Transfers’
(CCTs) today.