The Consumer Revolution, 1650–1800

The production, acquisition, and use of consumer goods defines our daily lives, and yet consumerism is seen as increasingly controversial. Movements for sustainable and ethical consumerism are gaining momentum alongside an awareness of how our choices in the marketplace can affect public issues. How did we get here? This volume advances a bold new interpretation of the 'consumer revolution' of the eighteenth century, when European elites, middling classes, and even certain labourers purchased unprecedented quantities of clothing, household goods, and colonial products. Michael Kwass adopts a global perspective that incorporates the expansion of European empires, the development of world trade, and the rise of plantation slavery in the Americas. Kwass analyses the emergence of Enlightenment material cultures, contentious philosophical debates on the morality of consumption, and new forms of consumer activism to offer a fresh interpretation of the politics of consumption in the age of abolitionism and the Atlantic Revolutions.

FACTORS INFLUENCING ADOPTION OF A HALAL APP IN A SMALL ISLAND DEVELOPING STATE (SIDS). A CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK.

The fourth technological revolution is here, tailgated by stratospheric advances in emerging technologies meant to improve the daily lives of individuals which come with various functionalities, uses and varieties. We are talking of smartphone applications or Apps and they are a rage nowadays given the unrivaled degree of informativeness, convenience, connectivity and networking opportunities they offer, and have been developed to address the needs of consumers in various sectors namely, banking, shopping, travel, fitness and health, food delivery, mapping, news and education, just to name a few. At the same time, the growing demand for Halal consumption fueled by the boom in the global Halal industry and ethical consumerism, consumers are in dire need of a one-stop medium where information about Halal products is available within reach so as to safely maintain their religious commitments and dieting requirements. Therefore, given the uniqueness of Halal-based Apps and more so the peculiar requirements of Halal consumers, it has become imperative to have studies which investigate the factors which influence Muslims to adopt Halal-based Apps, and the literature clearly lacks in terms of such assessments. Hence, the present research is one of the very first to come up with a conceptual framework which can be used to study the predominant factors which would motivate users to adopt Halal-based App. This research has taken the case of a Halal-based App, named HalaalMoris in a Small Island Developing State (SIDS) like Mauritius.

Exploring Antecedents to the Attitude-Behavior Gap for Sustainable Fashion Consumption in Germany

Climate change is a major concern today. This concern has led to the emergence of pro- environmental market trends, such as ethical consumerism. Although many consumers hold positive attitudes toward purchasing sustainable brands, their actual behavior is often inconsistent with their attitudes. This phenomenon, referred to as the attitude-behavior gap, has been an ongoing topic in many research papers. However, this gap with regards to sustainable fashion consumption has received limited attention and few researchers have identified potential marketing tactics to bridge the gap. The first purpose of this study is to gain insight on reasons behind the attitude-behavior gap for sustainable fashion consumption in Germany. The SHIFT framework is then applied to identify potential marketing tactics that could help reduce this gap. Fourteen interviews of German consumers, who expressed concerns about environmental degradation and stated that they had changed at least some of the their consumption behaviors in line with those concerns, were conducted to better understand attitudes toward purchasing sustainable fashion as well as factors that may impede behavior consistent with those attitudes. Interviews were analyzed using the grounded theory method. Analysis revealed the following potential contributors to the attitude-behavior gap for sustainable fashion: price, lack of presence, information, fashionability, self-over-sustainability and powerlessness. Based on these findings and the SHIFT framework, marketing tactics that could potentially influence sustainable fashion consumption were then identified. These tactics may prove useful for marketers in the sustainable fashion sector.

Solutions to Plastic Pollution: A Conceptual Framework to Tackle a Wicked Problem

There is a broad willingness to act on global plastic pollution as well as a plethora of available technological, governance, and societal solutions. However, this solution space has not been organized in a larger conceptual framework yet. In this essay, I propose such a framework, place the available solutions in it, and use it to explore the value-laden issues that motivate the diverse problem formulations and the preferences for certain solutions by certain actors. To set the scene, I argue that plastic pollution shares the key features of wicked problems, namely, scientific, political, and societal complexity and uncertainty as well as a diversity in the views of actors. To explore the latter, plastic pollution can be framed as a waste, resource, economic, societal, or systemic problem. Doing so results in different and sometimes conflicting sets of preferred solutions, including improving waste management; recycling and reuse; implementing levies, taxes, and bans as well as ethical consumerism; raising awareness; and a transition to a circular economy. Deciding which of these solutions is desirable is, again, not a purely rational choice. Accordingly, the social deliberations on these solution sets can be organized across four scales of change. At the geographic and time scales, we need to clarify where and when we want to solve the plastic problem. On the scale of responsibility, we need to clarify who is accountable, has the means to make change, and carries the costs. At the magnitude scale, we need to discuss which level of change we desire on a spectrum of status quo to revolution. All these issues are inherently linked to value judgments and worldviews that must, therefore, be part of an open and inclusive debate to facilitate solving the wicked problem of plastic pollution.

Ethical Consumerism and its effect on Purchase Decision: Evidence from Fashion Industry of Pakistan

In recent years, customer’s increasing awareness of ethical consumption has become increasingly important for the business environment and one’s lifestyle. Although it is observed that consumers are influenced by their ethical concerns but ethical consumptions lack from a consumer perspective. The theoretical framework of the paper portrays the multifaceted and complex ratio of the concepts of ethical consumption and the complexities that exist in the relationship between purchase influence and consumption in general. The study took a quantitative approach to find out how consumer purchase decision is affected by four antecedents namely, Ethical Knowledge, Environmental Concern, Personal Values, and Price Factor. Data was collected through a self-developed questionnaire and distributed among 200 respondents in Karachi, Pakistan. Multiple regression was applied through SPSS in the data. The results of the study show that all other variables show a significant effect on purchase decision except Ethical Knowledge. Therefore, it implies consumers are uncertain about which products and firms follow ethical rules and which do not. This study has theoretical and practical contributions in the fashion industry context. This research might encourage fashion brands to willfully take on green exercises and give strategic guidelines to advertisers and retailers about their sustainable retail practices.

Blood Diamonds and Ethical Consumerism: An Empirical Investigation

Although ethical consumerism has witnessed significant interest in recent years, most studies have focused on low-value, commoditized product categories such as food and beverage and apparel. Despite its significance, the research on ethical consumerism in luxury product segments such as diamonds is relatively scant. This formed the motivation of this study, which examined the ethical buying behavior of consumers and the moderating effects of their income levels in the diamond industry. Four hundred eightteen responses toa structured questionnaire were collected. The framework comprising of four constructs, namely ethically-minded consumer behavior, willingness to pay more, ethical concerns regarding country of origin of diamonds, and ethical buying behavior of diamonds was first validated, and then the hypothesized relationships between the constructs were assessed using structural equation modeling. Overall, ethically minded consumer behavior had a significant positive impact on willingness to pay more, ethical concerns regarding the country of origin of diamonds, and ethical buying of diamonds. Additionally, ethical concerns regarding country of origin positively influenced the ethical buying of diamonds, while the willingness to pay more had no significant impact on ethical diamond purchases. The multi-group moderation test results revealed that the income levels of buyers do affect the relationships between constructs. For instance, for the middle income group, generic ethically-minded consumer behavior did not translate into the ethical buying behavior of diamonds. The findings provide useful insights for practitioners and policy-makers regarding ethical consumerism in the diamond industry and help to highlight the issues facing the industry, such as its poor supply chain transparency, human rights abuses, child labor, money laundering, bribery and corruption, and environmental degradation from mining activities.

Je na Slovensku záujem o vinárske podujatia?

Wine is a specific product with a high level of differentiation according to the attributes on the basis of which consumers decide on its choice. These attributes include taste, price, brand, country of origin or vine variety. At present, ethical consumerism is gaining prominence and consumers are more interested in the impact of their behavior on society and the environment, which is another factor in their wine purchasing decisions. Opportunities for winemakers can also be the use of experiential marketing tools, which allows consumers to directly experience an unconventional brand experience. The aim of the paper is to point out current trends in the wine industry and to present the results of a survey focused on knowledge of wine events. The aim of the survey was also to create a typology of consumers in terms of their attitudes to wine and to identify interest in events organized by wine producers in Slovakia.