Sociology of consumption

Sociology of consumption and corporate culture

Academic year 2022/2023 - 2nd semester

Introduction

To understand what characterizes today’s consumer society, one has to keep in mind a series of phenomena which have developed over a long period of time at different speeds and in different places. Our society is the result of a long history. We are consumers because we had the possibility to practice consumption for many years. Not limited to economic phenomena but also social and cultural phenomena.

In all societies, objects accompany human beings throughout their existence. We are surrounded by objects that are important for their cultural and symbolic meaning (the birth of a child is celebrated with gifts etc., the meaning of these presents is to celebrate, and you as a consumer have to know what to buy). To be a consumer you have to know the invisible rules that rule society.

We know things about ancient civilizations through the objects that have been recovered. All the media can become an object of cultural reflection. Our society is the result of many different societies that have been before. There are many stereotypes of consumer society; we liken it to a continuous desire for new, to shopping and production. We are addicted to consumption in a way that makes us slaves of the new, etc.

Consumer society is much more; this kind of definition is due to some scholars who wrote their reflections after the 2nd world war (Baudrillard). We have to consider the real importance of consumption in the construction of our identity from a sociological point of view. Tribal societies used objects to represent power, to distinguish different tribes, etc. The meaning of goods goes beyond the material one. The brand is the demonstration that goods have become more immaterial.

Max Weber

German sociologist. According to him, consumer society is a type of society in which the satisfaction of daily needs is realized through the capitalist mode. This is the main difference between our and the previous societies. It means that in order to satisfy our needs we buy goods in the market at a fixed price. He underlines the fact that there are three different spheres in our society:

• Production
• Consumption
• Exchange connects production and consumption

The world of consumption is characterized by its own places where you can live a specific kind of experience. Industrialization created free time dedicated to leisure; when you are not engaged in work, you spend your free time buying, etc. The world of consumption has the goal of stimulating your needs and your desire. The sphere of exchange is in the middle; goods need to be exchanged on the market at a specific price. Commoditization occurs because goods are transformed into commodities through the monetary economy, everything is transformed into money. The cost of the goods does not depend on the real value but on the value that people give to it.

Georg Simmel

One of the fathers of sociology. Stressed this impersonal and abstract nature of money. Money is able to transform every aspect of social exchange in a quantitative way; everything can be quantified by money. Today we live in a society where digitalization has transformed everything into something that can be quantified. We can witness the infiltration of money in every aspect of our life. Influencers are the demonstration of the fact that even performance related to everyday life can be quantified in money. They are quantified in likes, views, followers, etc. They can have the possibility to be engaged in important contracts.

In a digital society, our life can be transformed into something that generates income, proof of the infiltration of money caused by capitalism. We are surrounded by goods coming from all over the world whose use is unpredictable for us. With the industrial revolution and so on, the meaning of goods needs to be supported by commercial promotion. With modern capitalism, the promotional system has become central through this system; we came in contact with goods that are produced in different countries, etc.

Advertising builds new meanings around products, makes them consumable and desirable, and places them within our structure of needs. At the same time, advertising contributes to the expansion of our desires and modifies our desires. It plays an important role as a way of stimulating desires. The main difference between past societies and our society is the fact that in subsistence economies production and consumption were not separated, and they were not unified by exchange.

The ancient societies rested on the dichotomy between sacred and profane. Today the dichotomy is production and consumption. It’s in this sphere that we experience also the ethical side of our life because consumption has become the main experiential area of our society.

Paradox of consumption

Linked to the fact that human beings need to de-commoditize themselves, they need to preserve their personal identities and relationships in order to protect them from the logic and dynamics of the marketplace. When we give somebody a present, we cancel the price to de-commoditize it to let it become proof of the love you care for the other person. You need to establish a different link with the goods that don’t regard the price but the value you give to it. Human beings transform goods because they become something with a specific meaning and value in order to establish the relationship. Consumption as a social action is related to the way in which through the goods we relate to the world and other people. We build our relationships through goods.

Lesson 1

In the description of capitalism given by economics, the birth of consumer society is strongly linked to production and to the industrial revolution, specifically the second half of the 1920s. We can argue that we can find traces of consumer society in ancient societies that existed before the 19th century.

According to Max Weber, the birth of capitalist societies is linked to the Protestant mentality. It is linked to the ideology supported by Protestantism because according to Protestantism, the bourgeoisie has to live in a frugal way and has to save their money in order to invest them back into their enterprises. This kind of ascetic and calculating mentality favored the birth of capitalism and consumer society because if you are an entrepreneur instead of enjoying the fruit of your activity you invest the money back in your enterprise to expand it; Protestantism favored accumulation.

According to this ideology, people don’t know if they can count on the favor of God. The only way to know if God loves you is to reach success in your life. You don’t have to spend money on superfluous things; you have to invest them in your activity. Protestantism coexisted with hedonism and waste. At the beginning of the 19th century, society was characterized by the existence of two different social classes:

• Nobility tried to differentiate from lower classes through the exhibition of conspicuous consumption
• Bourgeoisie product of the new society born with industrialization

From the 16th century on, society is characterized by mobility; people can improve their social position.

Theory 1 – Grant McCracken

Canadian anthropologist – “Culture and Consumption.” Consumption is a cultural phenomenon. According to him, we can see a consumer boom in Elizabethan England (last quarter of the 16th century). There was a consumer boom because, according to him, Elizabeth had a specific plan; she wanted to transform her reign into a sort of theatre to celebrate the greatness of her reign, it was a way to show the rest of the world her reign.

This splendor was a splendor that wanted to demonstrate the political power of the reign. The political sphere has a very important role in the development of consumption. Because it was very expensive to transform the court into a theatre, Elizabeth was able to engage the nobility in her project; she got the nobility to come down to the court, they had to govern the countryside, etc., better to catch the attention of Elizabeth so that she could invite them to the court. In order to do this, they had to spend money to have things that made them stand out in the crowd; they spent a lot of money. They paid part of the splendor of the court.

People started to spend less for their families and more for themselves. This gave birth to a new system of social competition at the court. At the court, the most important thing was the new, the up-to-date, and the different birth of fashion (a phenomenon that is the engine of the consumer society, regards every aspect of the society). It is also the beginning of the division of the world into different consuming universes. The nobles and their subordinates once lived much the same conceptual universe of consumption; now they began to live in quite different conceptual universes. The new became the new value of nobles.

Concept of patina. This change from old to new is summarized by patina. Patina showed that the family had owned these objects over a long period and so served as a kind of visual proof of status. Patina protected against pretenders.

Productivist and anti-productivist vision

According to the productivist vision, consumer society is an effect of capitalism and the production of the industrial revolution. Consumer society emerged at the beginning of the 20th century as a mechanical reaction to the industrial revolution. Industrialization is seen as responsible for the spread of large quantities of standardized commodities.

From the second half of the 17th century, people of every social class began to acquire their goods through the market. Diffusion of spices, sugar, coffee, cocoa, etc., not for primary human needs, but hedonistic goods. Trading started in the 15th century.