Consumption and Social Class Identity - Essay Example

Consumption and Social Identity Introduction: Consumption and purchasing behavior among individuals may be related to the social they belong to. One of the factors that are held to contribute to the development of social identity of the individual is the nature of consumption, since different social classes may exhibit different purchasing patterns. While an increase in consumption was earlier attributed to an increase in the level of production, this does not take into consideration the psychological factors involved in consumption patterns which may also contribute towards the development of social class identity. Definition of consumption: Consumption has been defined as “the process in which goods and services are bought and used to satisfy peoples’ needs.” (Obelkevich, 1994) The elasticity of demand may be used as a measure of the need that generates consumption – goods or services become necessities when the demand for them does not change with changes in consumer income. Consumption has also been defined as an act of destruction and creation (Clarke et al, 2003), and the purchase of goods for personal use. Bobock views the act of consumption as “a social and cultural process involving cultural signs and symbols” (Bobock, 1993:3). Theories of consumption: Marx equates consumption to a “moment of production”, since when an individual produces an object and consumes it, but he returns as a “productive and self reproducing individual.” (Clarke et al, 2003:254). Marx introduces the concept of commodity fetishism in the introductory chapters of his work “Das Kapital” as a state of social relations which arise in complex capitalist market systems, where such relations are centered upon the value placed by people on commodities. As a result, human relations conditioned by the market become so commercial that people become unaware of their social relations and become alienated from their own social activity, because they are so lost in the dynamics of commodities in the market. In a similar vein, Marx has also argued that commodity fetishism demonizes human relations and allows some individuals to profit from and exploit others by using commodities as the controlling element. “The class which has the means of material production at its disposal, has control at the same time over the means of mental production.” (Marx and Engels, 1973:64). By focusing upon commodities and their use as a medium of exchange, people become so involved in the weights and measures of the commodities that they fail to pay attention to the underlying social relationships governing the exchange, so that the labor involved in generating the goods is valued less than the commodity and the social character of labor comes to be viewed merely as the material relationship between things. (Marx 437-8). He points out how economists therefore fail to see that commodities have no value other than what people ascribe to them, and the sum total of the value of the commodities comes from the people who create them. (Marx 442-443). As opposed to this Durkheim views consumption as a social fact, or as a way of acting “which is capable of exercising an external constraint upon the individual.” (Durkheim, 1895). As a result, individuals are components of society, which is greater than the sum of their individual experiences. Applying Durkheim’s view shared, collective experience becomes very important, certain clothes, cultural habits or consumption patterns may become characteristic of particular sections of society. Mauss extended this further in a comparison of western systems to others and demonstrated that capitalist economies are historically and culturally specific. Consumerism involves the circulation of commodities as gifts, since the act of gift giving is related to the power of the individual (Mauss, 1990). According to Weber, consumerism is related to the development of modern capitalism. However, apart from Marx, all these classical theorists treat consumption as secondary to production and they also do not pay much attention to the underlying psychological motivation for consumption or even the reasons for the development of mass consumption. Their views are based upon the premise that consumption increases because of new forms of production, but this may not serve to adequately explain social identify on the basis of consumption patterns. There have been changes in consumption patterns over the course of the centuries. In the 18th century there was a cultural shift from the existing Protestant ethic which favored frugal patterns of consumption to the Romantic ethic which was centered on day dreaming, manipulation of emotions and hedonistic satisfaction of individual desires. The Consumer Revolution has shifted the consumption pattern away from necessities towards luxuries and pleasures. Mass consumption patterns are believed to have begun developing in the 1950s due to the post war influence and the impact of advertising as well as the availability of disposable incomes among young people. Consumption in the modern day has been dramatically affected by the availability of credit, the existence of shopping malls, the Internet and more sophisticated advertising. Consumption and social identity: According to Veblen (1994), fashion dictated consumption trends and as McKendrick points out, “such was the rage to follow fashion that even laborers in the field were recorded……in graceful wide brimmed picture hats.” (McKendrick 1982:12). Consumption was driven by the desire of the lower classes to emulate the upper, hence the “motive that lies at the root of ownership [of consumer goods] is emulation…” and it is this emulation which results in the “development of all those features of the social structure which this institution of ownership touches.” (Veblen 1994:17). This school of thought holds that class is graded according to income and occupation; higher classes continually seek new items to mark their social status, while lower classes then begin demanding the same items in order to imitate their superiors; hence consumption is a continuous cycle of social comparison driven by the desire of the lower classes to emulate the higher classes. Campbell explains this emulation further as a “consequence of a new willingness to give expression to their desire to be regarded as equal in social standing to those who were their acknowledged social superiors."(Campbell 1987:40). As opposed to this, the consumption patterns of the higher classes are geared towards conspicuous consumption, or the snob effect, where by market demand for a particular product among the higher classes may decrease because others are also purchasing the same product.(Shukla, 2008). There is also a bandwagon effect that may be noted in conspicuous consumption, whereby consumers try and demonstrate their higher class status by purchasing products that their neighbors and class contemporaries are purchasing. As Veblen also points out, “the leisure class stands at the head of the class structure in point of reputability……and its standards of worth therefore afford the norm of reputability for the community.” (Veblen, 1899:84). Veblen thus views consumption as being a key element in the construction of class identity. Members of a particular class are approximately equal in terms of community esteem, socialize among themselves in formal and informal ways and according to Levy(1992), it is this social class which is the source of “outstanding variation in consumer behavior.” Calnan and Cant (1990), in their study also found that patterns of food consumption and dietary intake vary markedly between different social classes and income groups. Williams(2002) in his study demonstrated that purchase criteria differ among different classes; for instance the variation in education, values, attitudes as well as communication styles among various classes may also produce variations in terms of information processing and decision making criteria. One example is that higher class customers may be more concerned about brand identity, durability and reliability as compared to lower class customers. This sociological explanation of consumer behavior has been criticized by McCracken (1988) on the basis that consumer behavior also demonstrates a trickle-up effect. The pattern as set out by Veblen and other theorists does not take into account the fact that lower classes may also develop their own patterns of consumption, which may trickle up, as opposes to a blanket acceptance of the consumption patterns of the higher classes. McCracken does however, support the position that social distinctions on the basis of class, race and occupation is demonstrated through the possession of material objects, and produces a variation in consumption patterns among individuals in different social categories. The wealthy are characterized by their patterns of conspicuous consumption of material goods which may not even be strictly necessary, while the working class is limited in their consumption by a lack of material means and since it is “not bourgeois to possess objects of utility”, they are automatically relegated to a lower class.(Williams, 1987: 323). The working class is considered as the “other” compared to the middle class existence “that is silently marked as normal and desirable.” (Lawler 2005:431). In recent years however, there has been a trend away from the perception of class as being linked to occupation towards the conception of class as a cultural category, which is not fixed but a subjective process. Consumer goods and services are however, still used to produce certain representations of social class groups. Sivadas et al (1997) examined patterns of consumption among various households in order to examine the impact of social class on consumption. They found that where mass marketed products are concerned, there is no significant difference in consumption between middle and working class households. The authors suggest that TV as a medium may have contributed to this blurring of social class in consumption patterns, since messages are broadcast uniformly across households. However, in terms of leisure consumption, the authors found that class differences were evident, since the upper classes preferred activities such as the theatre and museums, while middle classes were more likely to go fishing and camping (Sivadas et al, 1997). This may well be due to the higher levels of disposable income available among the higher classes. Bourdieu (1984), in examining social group membership is of the view that such membership depends on capital, which in turn influences habitus, which in its turn affects the taste of that particular class of people. Economic and cultural capital is very important because it may be used to manipulate social class and identity, such as for example by sending children to a private school and university. The occupation and education of an individual may be related to his/her social class; the manner of socialization of a child may determine the social class level s/he belongs to and may impact upon consumption patterns. For instance higher classes demonstrate a greater degree of independence in buying behavior as compared to the middle classes, where there is a tendency to model consumption patterns on the basis of what others are purchasing and consuming.(Williams, 2002) In a study of middle aged consumers and their patterns of conspicuous consumption, Shukla (2008) points out that their consumption patterns may be motivated by the desire to gain respect and status, being noticed by others due to their display of the symbols of success and enhancement of their image as possessing a great deal of wealth. This corroborates Bourdieu’s view that economic capital contributes to the development of social identity, since the society’s perception of the class an individual belongs to may be conditioned by their possession of economic capital. Bourdieu’s view of social identity as being conditioned by access to cultural or material capital, has however, been criticized as being overly preoccupied with class distinctions, without according due importance to social identity that develops in regard to gender, sexuality and especially race.(Devine-Eller, 2005). For instance, racism may play a role in social inclusion or exclusion, since it is conditioned by existing societal beliefs and discriminatory patterns which may have be in existence. African American children for example, may belong to the middle class in terms of economic capital, but “confrontations with racism may need to be taken into account in thinking about what to expect in the world around them.(Lewis, 2004:841) Role of gender in a consumer society: Gender plays a significant role in an examination of consumption and social identity, since women have been central to the development of a consumer society (Lury, 1997). By viewing the development of social identity purely as the outcome of economic capital, Bourdieu(1984) does not accord enough significance to the shaping of social identity on the basis of gender. Housewives have been important purchasers, buying goods to produce things in the home and to fashion the home as a private sphere and oasis for the family. Women are thus the backbone of the consumer economy and the chief consumers. Their identities in society were conditioned by their roles as good wives and mothers and as a result, they have a distinct orientation in regard to consumption patterns and consumer purchase behavior. To some extent, women have also been commercialized through the role of the media; their bodies have become commodities, such that the social identity of ordinary women may be conditioned by the use of commodities that promote their body image on par with those presented in the media. McKinnon describes the various kinds of inequality that restrict the lives of women and force them to assume an identity that society shapes for them, especially through the commodification and exploitation of the sexuality of women, stating that women are thus “systematically treated worse than others.” (McKinnon, 2005:66). Department stores may thus serve as women’s areas, providing them with a plethora of consumer goods that they can play with and use in fashioning an independent identity for themselves, exclusive of the one fashioned for them by men. The kind of consumption patterns among women may thus be different from men, contributing to the development of their unique identity as a form of rebellion from the social identity thrust upon them by men. Consumption patterns among men may be centered around traditional representations of masculinity, such as sports goods, cars, etc. However, in recent times, social identity of men is also changing on the basis of changing patterns of sexuality such as the emergence of the class of homosexuals. These individuals have a distinct identity and consumption pattern and may not fit into the preconceived notion of class on the basis of economic and cultural capital.(Beynon, 2002). Where gender is concerned, there is thus an important issue that is raised, i.e, the notion that consumption patterns and social identities may be conditioned by place, since the department store may function as the exclusive domain of feminism. The relation of social identity with space raises the question of tourism as a means of leisure consumption, which in turn may be conditioned differently depending upon gender and the class of an individual. This may be noted in particular in the development of the British seaside resort. Consumption patterns vary across different classes; while the working classes may frequent tourist hostels and holiday camps, the middle class gravitates towards hotels and the upper classes seek exclusive five star accommodation (Shaw and Williams, 1997). With increasing globalization, the nature of the seaside resort has changed; whereas it represented mass consumption in earlier days, at present, it is fragmented with leisure tourism activities being diverted away towards gambling and other past times. Conclusions: Classical theories on consumption have focused on levels of production as being the determining factor governing consumption. It was only Marx who was able to relate production with social class, pointing out that it was often the class that controlled production, which was also able to control other aspects and governed society and the development of its values. With the development of mass consumption, consumer behavior was later explained on a sociological basis by authors such as Veblen (1889), positioning the upper classes as the trend setters in terms of consumption. The lower and middle classes try to emulate the upper classes and match their standards, while the latter constantly seeks to maintain its novelty by utilizing new products and demonstrating conspicuous consumption patterns, geared towards attracting attention and flaunting wealth. Bourdieu (1984) has made a significant contribution to the examination of the development of social class identity by pointing out that this identity is conditioned through the use of economic and social capital. On this basis, it is therefore possible for an individual to change his/her class by virtue of a change in the economic and cultural capital. Since the upper classes may stand apart from the working class due to their education, they are also likely to be more independent in their consumption patterns, as opposed to the middle classes who are more likely to demonstrate the bandwagon effect. While consumption patterns revealed distinct divisions of social class earlier, it also appears that these distinctions may be getting blurred due to the prevalence of TV which dictates consumption patterns uniformly across classes. The development of social identity may thus be a function of education and income levels of an individual, which will be manifest in his or her consumption patterns. While an upper class individual may seek novel products and demonstrate conspicuous leisure and consumption patterns, a middle class individual is likely to strive to emulate the consumption patterns of the rich. The working class consumption patterns may be limited to utilitarian items, however with the decline sin the manufacturing sector and the emergence of service industries, the social class distinctions on the basis of different consumption patterns are slowly blurring, and this effect is further heightened through the influence of the TV. As noted above, an examination of social identity on the basis of consumption patterns cannot be restricted only to economic and cultural aspects, because this would be too simplistic representation of social identity, Gender and race may also play a significant role. Women have been exploited commercially, but being primary purchasers, the department store may have developed as an arena where they are able to express their individual identity independently of the one that men choose to impose upon them, through the nature of their consumption patterns. Similarly, in the case of men as well, consumption patterns are shifting from the traditional male bastion of sports goods and cars to an evolving identity which may be governed by the changing sexuality of some men who are homosexuals. Similar changes are also occurring in mass consumption patterns on leisure, with new forms of consumption such as gambling, globalization and the attendant cheap flights, etc reshaping leisure consumption and bringing about a further flux in social identity as it has been recognized thus far. 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