USC PubD Senior Fellow Benjamin Barber talk on new book - Consumed: How Markets Corrupt Children,This is a featured page

  • early Protestant ethos: hard entrepreneurial work and altruism. While capitalism is fundamentally about creating more wealth, pre-21st Century American were willing to do the hard work, defer gratification and behave altruistically within their immediate communities.
    • Capitalism works well when it meets the core needs and wants of the larger populace. It succeeds out of business interest.
    • Post-civil war capitalism met a great many of needs with real goods, especially for white middle class (Barber not mentions this distinction).
      • What of audio culture?
  • Consumer phase of capitalism: a focus on trademarks and brands reveals fundamental shift not of manufacturing to goods, but of manufacturing needs to sell goods that people didn't see themselves as wanting or needing.
    • Who really need an Apple iPhone compared to what they currently have.
    • Shift from work to shopping. Lifestyle is key.
    • Kids must be consumers or consumers must become kids. American society has developed a core identity combining infantile and adolescent qualities (Barber doesn't emphasize this level. How sexual gratification comes from adolescent urges and consumer desires).
      • A clear dumbing down of American, and thus, global culture.
        • Look at Larry King any night.
  • Marketeer's Argument: Freedom is about letting consumer decide what they want
    • "Hollywood" industry's line - we produce what people want.
      • This is true. People freely choose to buy Hummers. There is no false consciousness.
      • BUT there are different kinds of freedom.
        • When buy a Hummer, consumer sees himself as making private choice.
          • Doesn't recognize public consequences of private consumer choices.
          • Individuals face "civic schizophrenia".
        • Do we highlight civic or private good?
          • But infantalist ethos emphasizes private ethos.
          • Chase "freedom" credit card - private freedom. Credit has public consequences too.
  • Global Perspective: People have deeper needs. Can capitalism re-gear itself to address the real needs of real people on a global level.
    • "Bottled" water - utterly fabricated. Also 10 billion business plus environmental pollution for transportation costs.
    • But in rest of world outside West, especially US, there is a water-crisis. What if people realize the ethical dimension of not buying any bottle water?
  • Democratic institutions must rise to the challenge.
  • Capitalism left to its own devices created anarchic, wild, simultaneous exploding and imploding realities.
    • Refashioning of synergistic relationship between the "state" and "government"
      • This is a bottom-up democratic state revitalization.
        • Philanthropy is working on gift model. Never gift people what they should work for and eventually create local economy for.
    • If not, our important "family values" will continue to be destroyed.

  • Q & A: American ecomoy is 70% based on trade based on consumption (goes back to 1954). Americans simply can not save. To produce things instead of producing desires. Isn't this an incredibly wrenching experiences that you're calling for?
    • Yes, it will be wrenching crisis. Revolution in politics will be required. A lot of people don't like society that's emerged. Yuppied don't like it (and buppies).
  • Suburbanization is a part of this. The trend for urban living signals small cause for hope. Check out work of Hernando de Soto - to legalize "off-the-grid" wealth. There is work being done on how to break self-imploding cycle. For example, ten years ago GM had a hybrid model ready. GM says no, Toyota went for it, lost money and went for it. The rest is history. Toyota is taking over GM's market share. Intelligent risks and innovation is deferred by dominant US corporate model.
  • Where do we draw line over who determines what are our needs and can be deferred? If what you need requires that you be treated like a child (and I'd say an adolescent). Do we really need our music albums to be redigitized and reproduced entire archives of music? LPs worked better. Minor improvements in software (not sure that's even true), but massive consumer hassle. The consumer equipment being produced satisfies no need other than the need to shop and satisfy oneself - "shopping addiction" (is a clear medicalized addiction).

Link to PubD page on talk.


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