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Consumer activism
Consumer activism is a process by which activists seek to influence the way in which goods or services are produced or delivered. Kozinets and Handelman define it as any social movement that uses society's drive for consumption to the detriment of business interests.[clarification needed] For Eleftheria Lekakis, author of Consumer Activism: Promotional Culture and Resistance, it includes a variety of consumer practices that range from boycotting and ‘buycotting’ to alternative economic practices, lobbying businesses or governments, practising minimal or mindful consumption, or addressing the complicity of advertising in climate change. Consumer activism includes both activism on behalf of consumers for consumer protection and activism by consumers themselves. Consumerism is made up of the behaviors, institutions, and ideologies created from the interaction between people and the materials and services they consume. Consumer activism has several aims:
Historian Lawrence B. Glickman identifies the free produce movement of the late 1700s as the beginning of consumer activism in the United States. Like members of the British abolitionist movement, free produce activists were consumers themselves, and under the idea that consumers share in the responsibility for the consequences of their purchases, boycotted goods produced with slave labor in an attempt to end slavery. Other early consumer activism included the creation of consumer cooperatives in Northwestern England in 1844 as a measure against local monopolies and high commodity prices.
Activism on behalf of the consumer began around the 20th Century in the United States, in what scholars Tim Lang and Yiannis Gabriel term the "value-for-consumer" wave, and which sociologist Hayagreeva Rao calls the antiadulteration movement. At this time consumer organizations emerged in the United States, starting with a Consumers League in New York in 1891 which merged with other regional branches to form the National Consumers League in 1898. One of the first consumer protection laws in the United States and worldwide, the Pure Food and Drug Act, was passed in 1906 during the first wave of the U.S. consumer movement. More legislation around the world followed. During this time consumer-led activism like boycotts continued, largely in response to domestic and international socio-political concerns.
The publication of Unsafe at Any Speed by Ralph Nader in 1965 gave rise to a new type of legal-focused, anti-corporate activism. Whereas past activism had focused on the consequences of consumer actions and the protection of consumers, Lang and Gabriel argue the activism inspired by Ralph Nader and others is more confrontational toward the market. By the 1980s and 1990s, consumer activists increasingly turned to labels and certification schemes (organic, fair trade, cruelty-free, carbon footprint, etc.) as tools to promote ethical consumerism. These market-based campaigns reframed private purchasing decisions as a form of political and ethical activism. From the 1990s and into the 21st century, consumer activism has been closely associated with sharp critiques of globalization and the damaging effects of concentrated corporate power.
Consumer activism seeks to change how goods or services are produced in order to make the production process safer, more ethical, more environmentally friendly, and to make the products themselves safer and of better quality, or more available to consumers. Consumer activism challenges corporate practices in order to effect a change in production, or attempts to modify the behavior of consumers themselves. More recently, the politics of race and gender have taken centre-stage in consumer activism campaigns.
Scholars Robert V. Kozinets and Jay M. Handelman find that consumer activism needs three factors: "a goal, a self-representation, and an adversary." In this model, the goal is the change consumer activists wish to effect in the way goods or services are produced or in the way consumers approach consumption. Consumer activists may frame the purchase of a good or service as a moral choice, with the consumer partly responsible for aspects of the production. In this way, consumer activists attempt to influence the behavior of consumers by getting them to consider their consumption choices in an ethical light, and portray consumer activism as a movement among consumers, themselves included, for a common good. Consumer activists may also be part of various consumer organizations or portray themselves as members of a larger consumer movement.
The targets of consumer activism are often corporations that support causes or practices consumer activists find unethical. Corporations face consumer activism because of the way they do business or because of organizations they choose to support, financially or otherwise. Consumer activism may also target the state to encourage it to implement some form of regulation for consumer protection.
Consumer activist tactics can include boycotts, petitioning the government, media activism, and organizing interest groups. Boycotts are especially prevalent among consumer activists within environmental and animal rights activist groups. According to research from Eastern Michigan University, boycotts that are media-orientated rather than marketplace-orientated are preferred[clarification needed]. A media-oriented boycott does not target actual consumption, by demonstrating in front of a storefront for example, but instead demonstrations are oriented to getting media attention, for example by demonstrating in front of the rival headquarters. Consumer boycotts damage a brand's reputation and can result in short term dips in a company's stock prices. While these dips may be forgettable in terms of the company's overall revenue, especially when the company may be among the top global brands, these boycotts can quickly gain attention and cause fast mobilization[who?] due to the rapid pace of information spreading across the internet and even be successful in causing policy change or restructuring of leadership if the boycott represents a major societal issue or movement instead of an isolated, independent effort. Daniel Diermeier, writing in the Harvard Review, argues that boycotts are most effective when the issue the boycott is targeting is simple and easy to understand, with low cost of mobilization and many alternatives for consumers to turn toward. Boycotts are occasionally criticized for being ineffective but the media appeal and a few big successes from groups like PETA have sustained their popularity. Consumer boycotts have also been an effective strategy for African Americans to gain equality in employment, access to public spaces such as shopping centers, or other various political objectives. As mentioned above the use of storefront sidewalks and window displays as a means for consumer activism can also be noted. Suffragists in San Francisco used these public spaces to access the vast network of consumers shopping in the downtown boutiques in order to “sell” suffrage to both the men and women of California. Using the displays and advertising techniques employed by retailers, the women of San Francisco were able to successfully use consumer spaces to campaign for their suffrage.
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Consumer activism
Consumer activism is a process by which activists seek to influence the way in which goods or services are produced or delivered. Kozinets and Handelman define it as any social movement that uses society's drive for consumption to the detriment of business interests.[clarification needed] For Eleftheria Lekakis, author of Consumer Activism: Promotional Culture and Resistance, it includes a variety of consumer practices that range from boycotting and ‘buycotting’ to alternative economic practices, lobbying businesses or governments, practising minimal or mindful consumption, or addressing the complicity of advertising in climate change. Consumer activism includes both activism on behalf of consumers for consumer protection and activism by consumers themselves. Consumerism is made up of the behaviors, institutions, and ideologies created from the interaction between people and the materials and services they consume. Consumer activism has several aims:
Historian Lawrence B. Glickman identifies the free produce movement of the late 1700s as the beginning of consumer activism in the United States. Like members of the British abolitionist movement, free produce activists were consumers themselves, and under the idea that consumers share in the responsibility for the consequences of their purchases, boycotted goods produced with slave labor in an attempt to end slavery. Other early consumer activism included the creation of consumer cooperatives in Northwestern England in 1844 as a measure against local monopolies and high commodity prices.
Activism on behalf of the consumer began around the 20th Century in the United States, in what scholars Tim Lang and Yiannis Gabriel term the "value-for-consumer" wave, and which sociologist Hayagreeva Rao calls the antiadulteration movement. At this time consumer organizations emerged in the United States, starting with a Consumers League in New York in 1891 which merged with other regional branches to form the National Consumers League in 1898. One of the first consumer protection laws in the United States and worldwide, the Pure Food and Drug Act, was passed in 1906 during the first wave of the U.S. consumer movement. More legislation around the world followed. During this time consumer-led activism like boycotts continued, largely in response to domestic and international socio-political concerns.
The publication of Unsafe at Any Speed by Ralph Nader in 1965 gave rise to a new type of legal-focused, anti-corporate activism. Whereas past activism had focused on the consequences of consumer actions and the protection of consumers, Lang and Gabriel argue the activism inspired by Ralph Nader and others is more confrontational toward the market. By the 1980s and 1990s, consumer activists increasingly turned to labels and certification schemes (organic, fair trade, cruelty-free, carbon footprint, etc.) as tools to promote ethical consumerism. These market-based campaigns reframed private purchasing decisions as a form of political and ethical activism. From the 1990s and into the 21st century, consumer activism has been closely associated with sharp critiques of globalization and the damaging effects of concentrated corporate power.
Consumer activism seeks to change how goods or services are produced in order to make the production process safer, more ethical, more environmentally friendly, and to make the products themselves safer and of better quality, or more available to consumers. Consumer activism challenges corporate practices in order to effect a change in production, or attempts to modify the behavior of consumers themselves. More recently, the politics of race and gender have taken centre-stage in consumer activism campaigns.
Scholars Robert V. Kozinets and Jay M. Handelman find that consumer activism needs three factors: "a goal, a self-representation, and an adversary." In this model, the goal is the change consumer activists wish to effect in the way goods or services are produced or in the way consumers approach consumption. Consumer activists may frame the purchase of a good or service as a moral choice, with the consumer partly responsible for aspects of the production. In this way, consumer activists attempt to influence the behavior of consumers by getting them to consider their consumption choices in an ethical light, and portray consumer activism as a movement among consumers, themselves included, for a common good. Consumer activists may also be part of various consumer organizations or portray themselves as members of a larger consumer movement.
The targets of consumer activism are often corporations that support causes or practices consumer activists find unethical. Corporations face consumer activism because of the way they do business or because of organizations they choose to support, financially or otherwise. Consumer activism may also target the state to encourage it to implement some form of regulation for consumer protection.
Consumer activist tactics can include boycotts, petitioning the government, media activism, and organizing interest groups. Boycotts are especially prevalent among consumer activists within environmental and animal rights activist groups. According to research from Eastern Michigan University, boycotts that are media-orientated rather than marketplace-orientated are preferred[clarification needed]. A media-oriented boycott does not target actual consumption, by demonstrating in front of a storefront for example, but instead demonstrations are oriented to getting media attention, for example by demonstrating in front of the rival headquarters. Consumer boycotts damage a brand's reputation and can result in short term dips in a company's stock prices. While these dips may be forgettable in terms of the company's overall revenue, especially when the company may be among the top global brands, these boycotts can quickly gain attention and cause fast mobilization[who?] due to the rapid pace of information spreading across the internet and even be successful in causing policy change or restructuring of leadership if the boycott represents a major societal issue or movement instead of an isolated, independent effort. Daniel Diermeier, writing in the Harvard Review, argues that boycotts are most effective when the issue the boycott is targeting is simple and easy to understand, with low cost of mobilization and many alternatives for consumers to turn toward. Boycotts are occasionally criticized for being ineffective but the media appeal and a few big successes from groups like PETA have sustained their popularity. Consumer boycotts have also been an effective strategy for African Americans to gain equality in employment, access to public spaces such as shopping centers, or other various political objectives. As mentioned above the use of storefront sidewalks and window displays as a means for consumer activism can also be noted. Suffragists in San Francisco used these public spaces to access the vast network of consumers shopping in the downtown boutiques in order to “sell” suffrage to both the men and women of California. Using the displays and advertising techniques employed by retailers, the women of San Francisco were able to successfully use consumer spaces to campaign for their suffrage.
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