Why do we consume and how can we change?

I found the Jackson, Jager & Stagl (2004) chapter from the book The Ecological Economics of Consumption useful in structuring my thinking about social psychological theories of why we consume as we do. The authors identify 3 distinct perspectives for understanding human needs. 


Firstly there is the mainstream economic model, based upon Rational Choice Theory, which assumes that the needs of consumers are unending, linked to the assumption that growth is good and should continue. Furthermore, attempts to distinguish between needs, wants and preferences are unimportant in the marketplace. Though arguably the basis for most social marketing , this model can be critiqued not only from an ecological perspective - even if consumer 'needs' are infinite the planet most definitely is not - but also for its explanatory power - if needs are inseparable from wants and preferences, then why does consumption vary so much between different social contexts?


The second perspective gives the concept of 'needs' an important structural role in understanding well-being, represented by the work of psychologists like Maslow and Max-Neef, who we have looked at in lectures. This perspective offers a direct critique of the mainstream economic model from ecological and sociological standpoints, leading to the belief that it would be possible for us to live better lives by consuming less (the so-called 'double dividend'). Maslow's hierarchy of needs (1954) suggests that we have different levels of needs, each of which needs to be fulfilled before we start to perceive higher needs. Food and shelter are basic human needs, followed by the need for safety and security. The third tier is the human need for love and belonging, followed by needs for self-esteem and the respect of others. At the top of the pyramid are our self-actualisation needs for things like morality and creativity. The main criticism of this hierarchy is that it assumes that people in situations of poverty, where their basic needs for shelter and food are not met, will therefore not require that their higher 'needs' for love and belonging, or even self-actualisation needs to protect the environment around them, to be met. Furthermore, this is really only a model of individual needs satisfaction at the expense of society, culture and the environment. Max-Neef's (1991) matrix of needs arguably better captures the complexity of human needs. He posits that there are nine needs: subsistence; protection; affection; understanding; participation; creation; leisure; identity; and freedom. And each of these needs has to be met through being, having, doing and interacting. The consumption of economic goods could therefore satisfy multiple needs dependent upon context. 


The third perspective, often asserted by mind-bending structuralist and post-structuralist thinkers, holds that the needs-based approach of Maslow and Max-Neef is rhetorical, naive and moralistic. We consume good not only to meet material needs, but also because they play vital social roles in our lives, for example as an identity statement. Instead of writing this off as 'consumerism', we should perhaps accept the importance of symbolic consumption for finding meaning in our lives and for the creation of cultural capital, which enhances social resilience. These meanings are constantly negotiated and renegotiated, however such processes are outside of the control of any individual consumer. By attempting to distinguish between needs and desires in the needs-based approach we perhaps come to ethically dubious conclusions, as “no one person is in a position to identify with authority what the needs of any other person might be”(Jackson et al, 2004: 101). I think this final perspective shows how strategies of self-righteous environmentalists, who pride themselves on their self-denial and lack of material needs, may not be successful in reaching the mainstream. This final perspective does present a problem, however, as if any intervention in consumption is moralistic, what can be done about the very real environmental and social pathologies caused by consumption?


Here I find Csikszentmihalyi's (2006) article from the Earthscan Sustainable Consumption Reader useful. Reflecting a needs-based perspective, the author asserts that we have not only existential needs, as identified by Maslow and Max-Neef, but also experiential needs to always be conscious, active, and doing. This helps to explain why we often end up wandering aimlessly around the shops or mindlessly channel surfing on the TV. Csikszentmihalyi also suggests that we should carefully consider the costs and benefits of our consumption of different goods, balancing the entropy (the breaking down of natural products and processes) caused, against the fulfilment of existential and experiential needs. This would lead us to reinvent consumption to prioritise the goods which use the least energy for the needs which they fulfil; here the author envisages an economy based upon the workers like craftspeople, teachers, gardeners, poets, dancers and artists, who produce fulfilling yet low energy goods. This is also linked to the idea that the consumption of material goods only improves well-being up to a point. Therefore we can consume goods which add symbolic meaning to our lives, but only up to the point where the ecological and social costs of the goods start to outweigh their ability to fulfil our 'needs'.