New Faces and New Masks of Today's Consumer

In 1995, we proposed that consumption and contemporary consumerism could not be studied or understood separately from the world of work and production. We proposed that contemporary consumerism was built on the back of what we referred to as `the Fordist Deal'. This deal, pioneered by Henry Ford for his employees, was the promise of ever increasing standards of living in exchange for a quiescent labour force accepting alienating work. Since that deal was struck, consumerism came to signify a general pre-occupation with consumption standards and choice as well as a willingness to read meanings in material commodities and to equate happiness and success with material possessions. In this sense, Ford may be seen as the father both of mass production and mass consumption. Since the Fordist high noon of consumerism in the West, mass consumption is widely seen as having fragmented into a proliferation of highly individualized niche products. For its part, a considerable part of mass production has migrated to countries with lower wages and looser environmental and social controls, fueling their own variants of consumerism. In this article, we examine the gradual erosion of the Fordist Deal in the light of developments in the last 10 years or so, seeking to assess the future of consumerism at a global level. We also seek to identify and discuss some emerging conceptualizations of the consumer, some of the new faces and masks assumed by the archetypal character of our types. We analyse some of the tensions and contradictions lurking behind these conceptualizations and try to envisage some of the real choices facing consumers today and some of the processes of social change that hinge on the outcomes of these choices. The article identifies a fundamental paradox between the ubiquity of the consumer in contemporary discourses and the virtual impossibility of generalizing about consumers. We suggest, then, that the consumer may be viewed as one of those `essentially contested concepts' proposed by Gallie that defy domestication. The consumer, we argue, is unmanageable, both as a concept, since no-one can pin it down to one specific conceptualization at the expense of all others, and as an entity, since attempts to control and manage the consumer lead to the consumer mutating from one impersonation to another. It is precisely this paradox that we seek to capture in our article's title. The article concludes with a consideration of three basic challenges that are liable to lead to fundamental reorientation of consumption and production, as well as of our conceptualizations and theorizing about them. These challenges are the outcomes of environmental, demographic and social factors that, we argue, make the current situation unsustainable and will bring about its dissolution

Microeconomic theory

xiv, 498 p.; 24 cm

Microeconomi theory

xiv+498hlm.;23c

Female Employment and Fertility by Cohort, 1950-1974

A time series analysis of aggregate data on cohort and life cycle patterns in women's participation in paid work. Variables are drawn from National Insurance records, commulated past births, economic indicators, and other sources

Welfare Effects of National Taxes in an Economy with Regions

The present paper illustrates that changes in national commodity and income tax rates will affect the location choices of mobile factors of production within an economy. It is also argued that revenue (expenditure) neutral changes in the tax mix, for example, an increase in the commodity tax combined with a decrease in the income tax rate, will affect the domestic distribution of mobile factors, their supply to the economy and social welfare. In other words, revenue neutrality should not be used as a guide to the welfare effects of tax mix changes

The marketing matrix

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to question the role of corporate marketing in society and suggest ways of combating it. Design/methodology/approach – The problems are urgent and the style is polemical. Findings – Marketing is as old as human civilisation; it enables us to engage in the type of mutually beneficial exchange that makes cooperation possible. However, in the hands of the corporate sector, marketing is turning us into spoilt, consumption-obsessed children who are simultaneously wrecking our bodies, psyches and planet. The fiduciary duty of the corporation, which demands a single-minded focus on shareholder value, turns concepts such as consumer sovereignty, customer service and relationship marketing into corrosive myths that seduce us into quiescence, whilst furnishing big business with unprecedented power. Corporate social responsibility, meanwhile, is just a means of currying favour with our political leaders and further extending corporate power. Practical implications – Critical analysis is vital: if we do not want to become the apologists for corporate capitalism we have to research, write and teach about its failings as well as social marketing's potential to do good. We should also present solutions. As individuals we have enormous internal strength; collectively we have, and can again, change the world. Indeed marketing itself is a function of humankind's capacity to cooperate to overcome difficulties and long predates its co-option by corporations. In the hands of social marketers this potential force for good is being codified and deployed. If these talents and strengths can be combined with serious moves to contain the corporate sector, it is possible to rethink our economic and social priorities. Originality/value – The paper urges social marketers to take heed of and address marketing's failures if our discipline is to be taken seriously in debates about health, welfare and sustainability

The natural rate of unemployment Explanation and policy

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