In his novel The Committee, Sonallah Ibrahim dramatizes the transition from Egypt’s industrializing economy under Nasser to the open-door economic policies of Sadat. Yet rather than focusing on the political stakes of these policies, Ibrahim offers a view from the perspective of the consumer. This involves a dual emplotment: on the one hand the consumer is presented as an individual whose desires are cultivated or manipulated to motivate her forms of participation in the market. On the other hand, market systems operate on a collective scale to coerce consumers, manufacture their wants, and exploit political opportunities to expand their own frontiers. Ibrahim explores these mechanisms on the level of the multinational corporation that seeks to limit its own liability while externalizing costs, many of which Egyptian consumers are made to bear. Coca-cola is emblematic in the novel for the way desire has both social and individual functions. For example, the narrator finds himself compulsively drinking the soda despite understanding the critical role the corporation had in creating conditions of scarcity for potable water in the country. My paper explores Ibrahim’s satirical critique of the financial imperialism of the US in Egypt in the 1970’s, putting it into conversation with Marxist political economists like Samir Amin. Ultimately, Ibrahim suggests that personal and national forms of sovereignty are always limited by the mechanisms and growing influence of global finance. This paper is part of a larger project considering the historical impact of financialization on the Global South.