Consumption used to be a disease. Now it is the dominant manner in which most people meet their most basic needs and – if they can afford the price – their wildest desires.
In this new book, Ian and Mark Hudson critically examine how consumption has been understood in economic theory before analyzing its centrality to our social lives and function in contemporary capitalism. They also outline the consequences it has for people and nature, consequences routinely made invisible in the shopping mall or online catalogue. Hudson and Hudson show, in an approachable manner, how patterns of consumption are influenced by cultures, individual preferences and identity formation before arguing that underlying these determinants is the unavoidable need within capitalism to realize profit.
This accessible and comprehensive book will be essential reading for students and scholars of political economy, economics and economic sociology, as well as any reader who wants to confront their own practices of consumption in a meaningful way.
By:
Ian Hudson,
Mark Hudson
Imprint: Polity Press
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions:
Height: 216mm,
Width: 137mm,
Spine: 18mm
Weight: 249g
ISBN: 9781509535385
ISBN 10: 1509535381
Series: What is Political Economy?
Pages: 190
Publication Date: 18 December 2020
Audience:
Professional and scholarly
,
Undergraduate
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active
Acknowledgements 1 The Meanings of Consumption What Are We Talking About? Consumption and Political Economy Competing Themes in the History of Consumption The Rest of the Book 2 An Aspiration for All the World: Championing Individual Freedom of Choice Introduction From Classical to Neoclassical Economics: Consumers as Rational Maximizers Friendly Amendments: Alterations to the Theory with Similar Implications Conclusion 3 The System: Capitalist Consumerism Introduction Capitalist Commodity Production: Naming the System Commodity Fetishism Consumption and Jobs The Evolution of Capitalist Commodity Consumption in the US after World War II Conclusion 4 Private Choices, Social Problems Introduction What You Don’t Know Might Hurt You: Information Asymmetry You’re Not as Clever as You Think: Behavioural Economics Relative Consumption Created Wants The Androcentric Consumer Conclusion 5 The Shopocalypse? “Ten Ways to Reduce Your Impact” Blindfolded Bloated: The Problem of Scale Embedded Consumption and the Limits of Consumer Environmentalism Conclusion: Consumption as Ecological Practice Note 6 Consumption, Power and Liberation Class and Consumption Consumers of the World, Express Yourselves! Consumption and Gender 7 Shopping Police Shopping as Power Easy on the Surface, Hard Underneath Terror of the CEO? Saviour of the Worker, Farmer or Forest? Too Much to Bear: The Trials and Tribulations of a Label The Commodification of Politics? Conclusion References Index
Ian Hudson is Professor of Economics at the University of Manitoba. Mark Hudson is Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Manitoba.
Reviews for Consumption
“This book invites readers on a lively tour across the terrain of consumption in a briskly paced guide to mainstream economic theory and critical political economy. It is a highly engaging book that will appeal to those wishing to secure a deeper understanding of what it means to consume.” Bruce Pietrykowski, University of Michigan ""It is a sign of the consumer fetishism that pervades our society that good poiltical-economic works on consumption that do not simply fall prey to their subject matter and that retain a critical perspective are extremely hard to find. This book, though clearly written for classroom use, belongs in the same broad tradition as Thorstein Veblen’s The Theory of the Leisure Class, John Kenneth Galbraith’s The Affluent Society, Michael Dawson’s The Consumer Trap, and Naomi Klein’s No Logo. Highly recommended."" John Bellamy Foster, author of The Return of Nature: Socialism and Ecology
