Compromising with Consumerism in Socialist China
Transnational Flows and Internal Tensions in 'Socialist Advertising
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4161997 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Karl Gerth (0000-0003-3341-8940, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2013 |
| Volume | 218 |
| Issue | suppl 8 |
| Pages | 203-232 |
| Publication date | 2013-01-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Past & Present (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0031-2746 • E-ISSN: 1477-464X |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1093/pastj/gts041 |
| OpenAlex | W2107970115 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 6 |
In the middle of the twentieth century, China’s transnational connections flowed through the interaction of two ideologies that throughout the post-war era were at times in direct competition: consumerism and communism. In industrializing countries and their colonies, consumerism had actually begun to take hold during the first third of the twentieth century, as the spread of thousands of new consumer goods, the proliferation of discussions about them and the reorientation of social life around them had contributed to the formation of distinctive consumer cultures in urban settings around the world. But this new culture created tensions with other ideologies. Over the course of the century, ideas of nationalism, anti-imperialism, and ultimately communism were often directly opposed to new consumer lifestyles and individual consumer choices, leading governments to seek to impose limits on choice, a central pillar of consumerism, in the name of a purported higher ideology. In the early twentieth century, for instance, as the new notions of national belonging were applied to commodities, products were labelled ‘national’ and ‘foreign,’ and a nationalistic consumer culture developed around commodities themselves. Across the globe, through mass campaigns urging consumers to buy domestic products, consumption became a politicized act that brought suspicion upon—and even sanctioned attacks against—‘unpatriotic’ consumers who knowingly or even unwittingly bought imports. 1
China · Communism · Consumerism · Economics · Economy · Ideology · Nationalism · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Chinese history and philosophy · Japanese History and Culture · Law
| Unique citing works | 6 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,6 |
| Citation span | 2016 - 2022 (7) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 6 |