Consumed: How Markets Corrupt Children, Infantilize Adults, and Swallow Citizens Whole PDF
Preview Consumed: How Markets Corrupt Children, Infantilize Adults, and Swallow Citizens Whole
Further praise for Consumed “In this powerful and disturbing critique, Benjamin Barber takes dead aim at a fundamental fallacy of our time: the equation of capitalism and democracy. No one who cares about the future of our public life can afford to ignore this book.” —Jackson Lears, author of Fables of Abundance and Board of Governors Professor of History, Rutgers University “Barber, the prophetic author of Jihad vs. McWorld (1995), delivers a frightening analysis of the way consumerism is vitiating shoppers in the United States and around the world. Significant work.” —Kirkus Reviews, starred review “As Ben Barber took scholarly pot shots at the relentless efforts of marketers to manipulate the needs and wants of gullible consumers, I applauded. This book is not merely a lament. It is a guide to help us make our way from where we are to where we need to be.” —Bob Kerrey, president, The New School “An alarming study of the ways in which our child-centric culture is changing media…. [Barber’s] observations on the dumbing down of the broader culture are quite troubling.” —Connecticut Post “Consumed should be required reading for college students and all Americans who are concerned about the corruption of our values. Benjamin R. Barber turns his powerful analytical and research skills toward the infantilization of Americans citizens by the unrestricted market. His message simply must not be ignored if we hope to have a peaceful and sustainable future for our children.” —John de Graaf, coauthor of Affluenza “[Barber’s] hypothesis that consumer culture has turned adult citizens into children by catering only to the lowest common denominator rings only too true…. This lifelong study of the effects of capitalism and privatization reveals a pervasiveness of branding and homogenization from which there is no turning back.” —Booklist “[Barber’s] thoughtful, intelligent commentary reveals the tiny, mean-spirited truth behind the facades of seemingly untouchable institutions.…It’s almost guaranteed that at least one of your preconceived notions…will be exploded by the truths in this book, but Barber is never satisfied by laying waste to cultural mores: he always plants newer, stronger ideas in their wake.” —Conscious Choice “Barber is at his best when he bluntly defends capitalism for what it is—a profit-dependent construct…. The wealth of information included here, juxtaposed with Barber’s thoughtful analysis, [is] an enriching experience.” —Tribune (UK) “Every page demonstrates how widely Mr. Barber has read and how deeply he has thought things through. He succeeds in getting you to use your head.” —National Post (Ontario) “Powerful…. In this well-documented book, the author explores how capitalism has evolved from production and its related values of hard work, responsibility, democracy, and citizenship to consumerism (or hyper-consumerism) characterized by inequalities, immaturity, indulgence, and childishness focused on faux needs…. [Consumed gives] hope for achieving the common good.” —Journal of Family & Consumer Sciences “Lucid and readable…. Barber offers a comprehensive look at what’s wrong with modern capitalism, who’s to blame, how we got here and (tentatively) how to fix it…. Chapter One, ‘Capitalism Triumphant,’ should be required reading for anyone with disposable income…. Barber’s analysis is clear, forceful and spot-on… an urgent book about a topic that affects all of us.” —Berkshire Eagle (Mass.) For Cornelia Barber Who knows how to shop, and why shopping isn’t enough ALSO BY BENJAMIN R. BARBER Fear’s Empire (2003) The Truth of Power (2001) A Place for Us (1998) A Passion for Democracy: American Essays (1998) Jihad vs. McWorld (1995) An Aristocracy of Everyone (1992) The Conquest of Politics (1988) Strong Democracy (1984) Marriage Voices (A Novel) (1981) Liberating Feminism (1975) The Death of Communal Liberty (1974) Superman and Common Men (1971) IN COLLABORATION The Struggle for Democracy with Patrick Watson (1989) The Artist and Political Vision edited with M. McGrath (1982) Totalitarianism in Perspective with C. J. Friedrich and M. Curtis (1969) CON$UMED How Markets Corrupt Children, Infantilize Adults, and Swallow Citizens Whole BENJAMIN R. BARBER W. W. NORTON & COMPANY NEW YORK • LONDON Copyright © 2007 by Benjamin R. Barber All rights reserved For information about permission to reproduce selections from this book, write to Permissions, W. W. Norton & Company, Inc. 500 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10110 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Barber, Benjamin R., 1939– Con$umed: how markets corrupt children, infantilize adults, and swallow citizens whole Benjamin R. Barber.—1st ed. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references. 1. Consumption (Economics)—United States. 2. Consumer behavior—United States. 3. Child consumers—United States. 4. Capitalism—United States. 5. Materialism—United States. 6. Mass society. 7. United States—Social conditions—1980– I. Title. II. Title: Consumed. III. Title: How markets corrupt children, infantilize adults, and swallow citizens whole. HC110.C6B324 2007 339. 4'60973—dc22 2006039751 ISBN: 978-0-39307039-2 W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 500 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10110 www.wwnorton.com W. W. Norton & Company Ltd., Castle House, 75/76 Wells Street, London W1T 3QT CONTENTS Acknowledgments PART ONE The Birth of Consumers 1 Capitalism Triumphant and the Infantilist Ethos 2 From Protestantism to Puerility PART TWO The Eclipse of Citizens 3 Infantilizing Consumers: The Coming of Kidults 4 Privatizing Citizens: The Making of Civic Schizophrenia 5 Branding Identities: The Loss of Meaning 6 Totalizing Society: The End of Diversity PART THREE The Fate of Citizens 7 Resisting Consumerism: Can Capitalism Cure Itself? 8 Overcoming Civic Schizophrenia: Restoring Citizenship in a World of Interdependence Notes ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Consumed has consumed not only a great deal of my time, but the time and energy of a number of hardworking research assistants. I am grateful to Gary Smith and the American Academy of Berlin for the Berlin Prize Fellowship in 2001–2002 that enabled me to inaugurate research on the book. At various times during the four years I have been at work, significant research contributions were made by Josh Goldstein, Tom Ellington, and Rene Paddags at the University of Maryland. Josh Karant, a brilliant young scholar who worked with me at Rutgers University and the University of Maryland, made substantial research contributions, and my intellectual interactions with him sharpened my own scholarly insights. My niece Kate Barber, who works in the magazine industry, has been a constant source of pertinent leads on marketing and advertising stories that strengthened the sections on children’s marketing. Kate’s father, my brother Willson Barber, did a final proofread even as he assessed the book’s arguments with his sharp critical eye. In the final two years of work, when the book was actually written, Patrick Inglis acted not only as my primary research assistant, copyeditor, and fact- checker, but as a sounding board for ideas and as a thoughtful critic of my arguments in ways that significantly improved the book. That he did this even as he was conceiving his own doctoral dissertation and also contributing to my Interdependence Day project attests to his discipline and scholarly focus as well as his infinite good will. My editor at Norton, Alane Mason, with whom I have now worked on three books, offered sound editorial judgments about the architecture and substance of my arguments. She cannot be blamed for remaining flaws, but deserves much credit for the coherence and continuity of the manuscript. Finally, my youngest daughter, Cornelia, fifteen at the time I completed the book, contributed research, as well as critical judgments about materials I was drawing on, from her own reservoir of experiential knowledge. Her age and her shopping know-how make her a primary target of the marketing industry. Much more importantly, however, it gives me hope for the future: for Cornelia knows how to shop and takes pleasure in it, but she also knows the limits of shopping, how to shop and takes pleasure in it, but she also knows the limits of shopping, and has the will and insight that allow her along with many others in her generation to mount a resistance to a hyperconsumerist society from within. Among her qualities is a thorough understanding of how she is being marketed to and why that marketing is often a violation of rather than a tribute to the freedom and dignity she seeks. For this reason, and because she harbors a beautiful soul that can only delight her parents and everyone else who knows her, I dedicate this book to her—our “Nellie.” —Benjamin R. Barber New York, January 2007
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