From Consumerism to Guilt: About Disciplinary Effects of the Economic Crisis

Abstract

The economic crisis that Spain has been facing since two years ago is showing significant effects in the way citizens are dealing with consumption. Beyond decreases in the sales, there is a rising anxiety about the sustainability of the current consumption patterns as well as a concern related to new tendencies towards responsible consumption which face new challenges and opportunities. The paper we are presenting here is based on an empirical research project whose main goal has been to map necessities and consumption practices in Spain, trying to assess the impact of the crisis. To do so, our perspective has been to deepen into these complexities from the discursive side, in a qualitative sociological research whose methodology has been based on focus groups. In this work, we will discuss the analysis of the results focusing on the relationship between the act of consumption and a certain set of imposed limits that, in the pre-crisis moment -and according to the focus group participants-, have been surpassed. This has helped to develop a peculiar discourse on consumption whose main axis is guilt