Download Pankratova 1 Daria Pankratova The Era of Consumerism: Peak of

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Daria Pankratova
The Era of Consumerism: Peak of Socio-Economic Development or Social Regression
A vast majority of people living in the XXI century cannot imagine their lives without a great
variety of consumer products placed on supermarket shelves. Going to shopping malls, spending a
lot of money on food, clothes, mobile phones, and other consumer goods became normal daily
practices of the majority of world’s urban population.
Social scientists used to refer to this modern culture and lifestyle as consumerism. According
to distinguished American social researchers Erich Wright and Joel Rogers, at the core of
consumerism lies a shared belief that “personal wellbeing and happiness depend to a very large
extent on the level of personal consumption, particularly on the purchase of material goods”
(Wright and Rogers 24). That is, in a consumerist society people try to achieve many goals in life
through acquiring new goods, and devote a lot of time, energy and resources to consuming.
Moreover, mass consumption favored by consumerist culture greatly influences everyday life not
only at the levels of social activities, economic processes, and household structures, but also at the
level of psychological experience, construction of identities and interpersonal relations.
Consumerism, indeed, is a highly contradictory phenomenon that provokes heated debates
between economics and social scientists. Favorably, while studying at university, I have had an
opportunity to become well acquainted with both of the perspectives. Namely, when I was an
undergraduate student, I was majoring in marketing. Looking from economics and management
perspective, market researchers hold a view that the era of consumerism is a peak of socioeconomic development. Consequently, consumerist culture is associated with increased standards of
living, greater life satisfaction and personal wellbeing. However, after changing my specialization
and entering graduate sociology program, I have discovered a point of view which criticizes
consumerist society. In this research article I will introduce and elaborate on both economic and
sociological perspectives on consumerism, highlighting advantages and disadvantages of this
phenomenon. Even though the era of consumerism is said to contribute to economic growth,
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personal freedom and choice, it considerably harms environment, substantially alters social
character, and negatively impacts individual psychological health, leading society to a regression.
To begin with, economy researchers share the view that the era of consumerism delivered
economic prosperity through favoring economic productivity and higher profits. Jennifer Maguire,
one of the consumerist culture researchers, states that according to neoclassical economic theory,
“consumer needs and choices are the prime forces that dictate the economic structure of a society,
and define which goods and services should be produced” (qtd. in Bocock 138). One of the features
of modern capitalism is that many companies compete with each other, trying to find the best ways
to satisfy consumer needs, and, consequently, influence consumer choice in their favor. Such
competition, in turn, puts pressures on them to innovate and introduce more effective technologies,
which increase productivity. When productivity increases, it takes less time to produce a given
quantity of goods; therefore, the possibility to allocate spare time to increasing production of goods
and services arises. As a result, economies grow both in productivity and total output; and
companies make higher profits. However, it is also important to look at other side of the mentioned
processes.
Mass production and consumption favored by consumerism can have serious negative
impacts; the prime example of it is ecological decline. It is well proved that the depletion of
resources and environmental degradation is directly related to consumption of goods and services
(Emerald 174). Manufacturing, packaging, storing, transporting, disposing so many items is
accompanied by air and soil pollution, dumping industrial waste into rivers and seas, and excessive
usage of already scarce resources. This in turn leads to environmental imbalances and natural
disasters that have already impacted lives of a great number of people around the globe. Therefore,
it is reasonable to conclude that even though consumerism favors higher profits and economic
productivity, it is unsustainable; and excessive demand for consumer products is leading global
economy to a point of no return, whereby the planet will no longer be able to support its
functioning.
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Some people concede, that diversity of goods offered by the producers opens up an
opportunity for self-expression. Nowadays individuals can benefit from a great diversity of products
which are developed by marketing specialists, consumer researchers, and designers in order to suit
unique preferences of every individual. Being provided with great variety of tastes, colors, shapes,
and concepts, every person can easily find the most suitable clothes, accessories, and furniture
design that appeal to his or her preferences. Unlike before, in contemporary world people construct
their identities to the large extent in terms of what they consume. As Neal Emerald argues in the
research article “Consumerism, Nature, and the Human Spirit”, merely owning or possessing a
product is all that is required to judge the individual’s value or place in society (Emerald 179).
Extravagant display of one’s possessions, ways of eating meals, house decoration, and other
patterns of consumption are used by specific groups, often individuals from particular
socioeconomic classes, to determinate their distinctive way of living, and to mark themselves off
from other. A good example of such identity construction through consumption are the rich, who
substantially overpay for expensive cars, yachts, resorts, watches with diamonds, and other
luxurious products just because these products and services convey a symbolic meaning, and
constitute their belonging to the upper-class.
The question arises, however, whether personal self-expression through consumption is really
beneficial for individuals as well as for society as a whole. According to sociologists, consumptionbased identities construction and extravagant display leads to greater social alienation and lost of
true self (Bocock 265). It is a well known fact that people are used to identify themselves relatively
to other. For instance, when a person from a poor of lower-middle class families excessively
subjected to advertisement and commercial promoting affluent people’s lifestyles, he or she might
feel deprived and alienated. Another example are people from developing countries that are hooked
into desiring to consume the goods of capitalism, which are presented in a broad variety at
economically-developed countries. As for loosing true self, some social researchers argue, that
desire for increased level of consumption and acquisition of more goods is an unconscious way of
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compensating personal emptiness. Particularly, an American social scientist Erich Fromm argues,
that people identify themselves in terms of material belongings to such a high extent, that they has
lost their natural self left behind these possessions (Fromm). In one of his most famous books To
have or to be, Erich Fromm poses a question that greatly reflects the contradiction of this issue,
namely, “If I am what I have, and if I lose what I have, who then am I?” (Fromm 96). Given the
above-mentioned arguments it is reasonable to conclude that what people refer to as self-expression
through consumption has a great underlying problem of personal identity construction through
acquisition of material goods, alienation, and lost self.
Finally, with regard to individual well being, consumerism is believed to contribute to higher
level of happiness by effectively satisfying personal needs. Consumerist culture favors the
development and production of all kinds of goods which make individual lives more enjoyable,
comfortable and fulfilling. Different tastes of yogurts, fashionable clothes, electronic devices, and
other goods are considered to greatly contribute to personal well being and happiness. However,
very often consumerism promotes items, which objectively people may not need at all (Emerald
190; Bocock 117). Creating false needs is a common practice among marketing experts. In order to
maximize profits, companies try to use well-elaborated strategies of persuasion to influence
consumer choice in their favor, and make people buy products that a company produces, but which
they do not necessarily need at first place. Social researchers argue, that as long as any falsehood is
repeated frequently enough, and no matter how absurd it is, people will believe it (Bocock 120).
Everyday mass media communicates a thousand of messages that promote consumption as an
answer to many life’s problems. It tries to persuade people that consumption is a cure to illnesses,
loneliness, boredom, and job dissatisfaction. Examples of such false needs persuasions include
advertisements which convey the idea that the right diary products will contribute to happy
marriage or the right toothpaste will make you more successful. Despite the fact that it is quite
obvious that advertisements substantially exaggerate and distort the reality, people continue buying
these products, often unconsciously. Therefore, it is reasonable to doubt whether personal needs that
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consumerist culture promises to satisfy are indeed individual, but not created artificially by
marketing experts.
To conclude, the era of consumerism can be examined from two different standpoints.
Looking from economy perspective, the era of consumerism has brought increased economic
productivity, higher business profits, great variety of goods and services that contribute to a higher
level of individual happiness and provide freedom of choice and variety of possibilities for selfexpression. However, all these benefits pale before the negative impacts of consumerism on human
life, which are profoundly elaborated by sociologists. This include not only environmental
degradation and resource depletion, which in turn might lead to great economic crises, but also
personal alienation, lost of identity, manipulation and creation of false convictions. It is important to
be aware of these sides of consumerist culture, try to alter behavior, consume less and more
efficiently, explore spiritually fulfilling aspects of life, and not measure life by material goods one
owns.
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Works Cited
Bocock, Robert. Consumption. New York: Routledge, 1993.
Emerald, Neal. “Consumerism, Nature, and the Human Spirit.” Annual Review of Sociology 30 (2004):
173-197.
Fromm, Erich. To have or to be. New York: Continuum, 1997.
Wright, Erich, and Joel Rogers. American Society: How it Really Works. New York: W.W.
Norton&Company, 2010.