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Report: UK Riots Were Product of Consumerism
Analyst's report points to 'deeply flawed social ethos' and calls for a shift of emphasis 'from material to non-material values'
The recent riots in London and other big cities were the product of an "out-of-control consumerist ethos" which will have profound impacts for the UK economy, a leading City broker has said.
The report by Tullett Prebon warns: "The consumerist ethos, in which a materialist vision is both peddled and, for the vast majority, simultaneously ruled out by exclusion, has extremely damaging consequences, both social and economic."
The report, the firm's global head of research Tim Morgan, the report is part of a series one of in a series put out by in which the brokerage in which it analyses bigger issues for the UK. Last month, the broker Tullett Prebon issued a report on the UK's economic situation as part of Morgan's Project Armageddon.
The report details recommendations to resolve what it sees as a political and economic malaise: new role models, policies to encourage savings, the channeling of private investment into creating rather than inflating assets, and greater public investment.
"We conclude that the rioting reflects a deeply flawed economic and social ethos… recklessly borrowed consumption, the breakdown both of top-end accountability and of trust in institutions, and severe failings by governments over more than two decades."
The note pinpoints the philosophy behind the riots as consumerism, which is also "the underlying message of the advertising and marketing industries, and huge budgets are devoted to pushing a message which, updated from Déscartes, is: 'I buy, therefore I am' ".
A typical internet user sees a hundred adverts an hour, the report says, and the underlying message many receive is: "Here's the ideal. You can't have it." Accompanying this is an inflation of government and private debt, a key theme of Dr Morgan's other work.
"The economy has been subjected to repeated 'boom and bust' cycles, above all in property. The overall pattern has been that an over-consuming west has borrowed and spent the surpluses of the increasingly productive and under-consuming East.
"The dominant ethos of 'I buy, therefore I am' needs to be challenged by a shift of emphasis from material to non-material values. David Cameron's 'big society' project may contribute to the inculcation of more socially-oriented values, but much more will need to be done to challenge the out-of-control consumerist ethos.
"The government, too, needs to consume less, and invest more. Government spending has increased by more than 50% in real terms over the last decade, but public investment has languished. Saving needs to be encouraged, and private investment needs to be channeled into asset creation, not asset inflation."
Dr Morgan adds: "A young person who tries to become the next Alan Sugar or James Dyson is as likely to fall short as if he or she sets out to become the next global football star.
"But… failure to become the next Alan Sugar can still leave a person well equipped for a career in management, finance or accountancy. Failure to emulate James Dyson will leave the aspirant with useful engineering or technological skills."
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31 Comments so far
Show AllConsumerism doesn't affect the poor--how could it?--with no money to spend who cares about buying things? The UK riots were about being poor and hopeless--as well as being disrespected. They weren't about people angry because they could not have what others have, but because they could not have those things without which a good life is impossible.
Riots are being caused by the austerity measures that stop using the funds the working people pay in taxes for programs that make their lives decent. Rich people don't pay taxes, and the taxes the working people pay are used to help the rich get richer. The working people in Europe are rioting and protesting the corrupt governments that are in the employ of the wealthy. Same thing is going to happen here.
People in the United States are suffering in this terrible depression caused by the greed of the banksters. And what does 'our' government do to solve the problem? They gave TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS that the working people paid in taxes and gave it (with no strings attached) to the criminals on Wall St. Instead of going to jail they got dandy bonuses.
It is this behavior of a totally corrupt government that gives the people no choice but to do their best to tear down that rotten government. Watch out all 'honored members' of Congress. You are getting very much richer but it is this greed that will put you in danger. The people are getting angry WITH GOOD REASON. The government is not heeding the voice of the people. Our democracy is in tatters. If the government doesn't do something quickly to create jobs and fully fund our domestic programs, the riots will happen. This could be avoided but I fear that our corrupt government will not pay any attention to the plight of the working people of this nation. Everything is just fine for them and their economic class. Not fine in my neighborhood. Far from it.
How surprising - the people are rioting and in the streets because they have unrealistic expectations and are just spoiled brats that need to grow up and be responsible adults like all the serious people who make arguments like this. The people really have nothing to complain about - stop belly-aching and take your medicine even if it means you have no job, no home, no food no hope for a future. More divide and conquer and blame each other so you don't look at your pocket being picked.
You obviously haven't read the article, or if you did, you didn't understand it. You're just regurgitating talking points.This article is astounding, considering the source. Can you imagine Merrill Lynch signing off on something like this?
I agree, this article is astounding. In a way, it's similar to the Norwegian prime minister calling for more democracy after the mass killings there.
Consumerism may not be the only reason for the riots (and the mass killings), indeed, it may be another symptom, but it is up there in rank as a motivator for discontent and rage. It behooves us to look at motivators along with the end results, including our rapacious culture.
Each crisis has the potential of being a teaching moment...if we are wise enough to want to learn.
This article is probably more candid than astounding, seeing that financial reporting tends not to sugar-coat the news, at least when its primary audience are investors and other similar parties. For example, recent news articles have cited reinsurance companies such as Munich Re and Swiss Re as having concluded that global warming is most likely the cause for catastrophic climactic events that have resulted in their having to pay out substantial sums in recent years. I wouldn't usually regard reinsurance companies as being tree-huggers, but stripped of ideology when having to confront economic reality, they are willing to admit their conclusions.
Noam Chomsky has pointed out that elites can be remarkably blunt and honest among themselves when assessing situations that involve risk to themselves. It's only when those assessments are presented for mass consumption that the prevailing ideology intrudes and produces the appropriate propaganda, which Chomsky has noted is more critical in democratic societies than in authoritarian or totalitarian ones because people have more freedom of information and avenues in which to apply it. For example, and not to wander too far off the track, George Kennan wrote a remarkably blunt assessment of American power in 1948 and global reaction to it: In essence (paraphrasing), he stated that the US had 4 percent of the world's population but controlled 50 percent of the wealth, a situation that couldn't help but engender envy and resentment among other countries, so the "sooner we start dealing in straight power concepts" the better off we'll be. That was direct language for the elites to understand the situation and what his recommendation was. Of course, the story that was given to the US masses was that the Russians are coming because they hate our freedoms, so we need a massive military build-up to stave them off, and if we have to overthrow some Third World governments to defend freedom (and, unspoken to the masses, to protect capitalist interests), then that's the price of liberty. (Don't mean to sound like a disciple, but that's the first example that came to mind.)
What caught my attention in this article was the reference to "Project Armageddon," also produced by the brokerage firm of Tullett Prebon, from which this article appears to have been derived. "Project Armageddon" was an examination of the debt crisis, at least from the British side, done by Tullett Prebon analyst Tim Morgan. I haven't read the entire report, but from the executive summary, Morgan has concluded that Britain's debt crisis is insoluble without sustained growth, and neither the David Cameron coalition government nor the loyal opposition has the full answer. Morgan's conclusion is this:
"Radical solutions are required if a debt disaster is to be averted. All macroeconomic options have been tried, and have failed. The only remaining options lie in the field of supply-side reform. Unfortunately, public opinion may be inimical to the scale of reform that is required."
There you go--a radical solution, but hardly one that hasn't been heard before. Without sounding glib, meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
You can download the report at:
http://www.tullettprebon.com/Documents/strategyinsights/Tim_Morgan_Report_007.pdf
What gets me about the majority of conclusions (especially supply-side economics) as to what to do is that they all feed the beast. They all contribute to the positive feedback loop that is taking us all down.
As Chris Martenson (and others) have said, the three E's (the Economy, the Environment, and Energy) are conspiring to hit us all between the eyes and all people seem to do is to clamor to "join the club." And I don't disagree that the vast majority of people want to be in the club. However, what I have come to see is that the club has a sign over the door, and it reads RMS Titanic.
And to carry (and slightly scramble) the metaphor further, there is a lot of rearranging of deck chairs going on as the band plays "Nearer My Mammon to Thee" and the first-class passengers commandeer enough lifeboats for their escape while leaving the rest of us to plunge into the icy depths to come. (John Jacob Astor isn't going down this time.)
As with the old observation that the villagers were ready to lynch the thief who stole the goose from the village common while remaining oblivious to those who stole the village common from the villagers, we do seem to be seeing the wholesale looting of the coffers by the elites while holding out the specter (and spectacle) of (literally) retail looting by the proles. Nothing like a little misdirection.
I did indeed read the article and I stand by what I said. There is a problem with consumerism and there are many areas in which to study it and see it, but this article along with others is attempting to downplay the real and understandable anger that the average person is feeling around the world as but a jealous rage against those that have and they are throwing tantrums because they couldn't or wouldn't study/lead their lives better to become more successful and be part of the club. Please do not immediately jump to the ad-hominem thinking you are responding to an idea you don't agree with.
Just so I understand your point - are you advocating for the club? Is that something people should want to join, or not?
No ad-hominems here, just trying to understand.
I am not advocating for people to join "the I buy therefore I am" club. Protests and people in the street are being re-defined by articles such as these to a simplistic Have-nots being jealous of the Haves and taking their stuff through violence. There certainly is an element of that when a small contingent focuses a protest into looting, but I don't believe it is possible to define a large scale event, such as the UK "riots" as just a bunch of materialistic people that have no point and need to learn non-materialism or that their behavior is the result of a philosophy of consumerism. It is a way of taking people power away, just as with the WTO "riots & looting" and many of the civil rights and anti-war protests of the 60's (which I took part in) were reported and analyzed in similar ways. My apologies if I was unclear or continue to be so.
OK, I see. Good points.
But this paragraph says something to me: "The consumerist ethos, in which a materialist vision is both peddled and, for the vast majority, simultaneously ruled out by exclusion, has extremely damaging consequences, both social and economic."
It says that it's more than haves and have-nots. It's about being lied to 24/7/365. It's about knowing, deep down, that we're being lied to, yet also wanting to get in on the action before the ship goes down because that's our cultural story. It's about crazy-making policies emanating from a crazed culture predicated on having infinite resources (or so we are told). It's about lying to our children (who see through the bullshit) then saying "do as I say, not as I do."
You're right, there is more than one cause for the riots in London. But the culture of consumption really is at a pretty high level on the ladder of what's wrong. The question in my mind is - why do we have this culture of consumption in the first place? What is at its root and what can we, personally, do to maintain whatever sanity we have? Thrive, even. I think it's possible. If we're willing to pave a way forward. Us, not our dear leaders and mis-representatives in government. Us. You and me.
Can we do it?
Your problem is that you think one can opt out of a consumerist society just by wanting to, or by practicing some sort of self-control and discipline, but it ain't that easy at all.
Here's a personal example. I have a neighbor who has parked a dog tied to a tree right outside every bedroom window and my porch. The dog is untrained, undomesticated and rather than being a "beloved family pet" it is nothing but a motion-detector attached to a bark, that goes off randomly 24 hrs a day. They hardly feed it or give it water - never any attention -which is why it barks at everything it sees.
It disturbs my work, it disturbs my relaxation and it disturbs my sleep. I've called the animal cops, I've called the regular cops for years and nothing gets done except I'm threatened with arrest for continuously "harassing" my neighbor with complaints.
I'm considered the problem. Why? Because all my neighbors are shut into houses with windows closed with their a/cs blasting 24 hrs a day. Of course when the cops come and ask them if the dog bothers them, they report they don't hear it. How can they, they are hermetically sealed in their homes.
But I hate a/c and want to keep my windows open. Neither can I afford to put a/c in the house or pay for it even if I did have a/c already. I want to sit on my porch in the shade and fresh air with the sea breeze to work. But I can't. Because this dog is parked right next to me, barking at any twig that falls off the tree or leaf that blows by. I'm told it is the dog's "right" to bark!
We've owned this house for 40 yrs and I was working on my porch in the breeze and quiet for 5 yrs before this neighbor rented the house and gave me a dog of his very own. I used to have a nice, sustainable-if-not-lucrative work-from-home business. Now all I got is a hellish dog kennel and a stress-related "disorder". Oh yeah, and a "reputation" with the local sheriiffstry.
The advice I am given: buy a/c and close your windows and the dog won't bother you, either.
So much for opting out of the consumerist culture, eh? I'm given two legal choices - seal myself in the house with a/c or learn to live with a dog disturbing my work, sleep and quiet whenever it feels like.
That is why the article makes sense, and is a back-handed indictment of the capitalist system in general. Because the system feeds off conditioning everyone to believe they are not part of society if they don't have THIS, but then denies the vast majority the ability to afford these things - by design.
I used to wonder why high-end financial instrument, $9000 diamond bracelets and $50,000 automobiles were being advertised on working-class TV shows. But it's no mystery any longer- it's to show the proles what they should want but will never afford! It's to let you know that $5000 IRA @ 1.5%/yr, that rhinestone necklace and that 20 yr old clunker with no door handles is all you'll be allowed, but don't let it stop your mouth from watering, you dog.
Capitalism feeds off envy and the human desire to be just like everyone else while inculcating an economics of scarcity to keep goods profitable. Then it blames the victims for their inability to afford what they are told they need to be considered human.
Remember, I'm the problem, not the neglected barking dog or its owner, because I don't want nor can afford what it is expected I SHOULD have and want. I have been reduced, in the eyes of the "status quo", to below a dog in the pecking order, merely by my personal choice, that I've been told all my life is my right as a human. Yeah, it's your right until you try to exercise it.
Don't you see this breeds resentment a lot faster then corrupt politicians? I'm ready to go out and shoot a damn dog, the thought of which morally appalls me! I've been playing a 500watt/channel 4 channel stereo as loud as it will play 24hrs a day for a month now hoping the cops will come ticket or arrest me so I can get this whole situation before a judge. Though I have no faith that anything will happen except I'll end up with a $150 ticket, more sleepless nights and more cancelled contracts
I have no actionable concern that the local county commission is as corrupted as a sewer. But I look on my personal situation and I'm ready to commit violence against a damn, innocent, neglected animal just so I can sleep at night.
Yeah. maybe they've been lied to, maybe they hate their out-of-control government, but what got them off the couch and into the streets was continued marginalization in their personal lives, and this report describes that in a way the capitalists can swallow. It's not blaming the people, it is blaming the system that gave them no choice but to commit violence in order to show the system they exist.
But you see, Mr. Tullett Prebon, the rich don't get richer if the public and private sector don't spend every last borrowed dime (shilling).
Shillings became obsolete in 1975.
Of course. Now that consumerism has served it's purpose let's stop the propaganda. That way the masses will be content with little to nothing.
Does this article say anything sensical?
Contemporary savage capitalism cultivates -- nay, thrives upon -- hedonistic and materialistic yearnings in the masses. Asking that it do away with that trait amounts to asking for its abolition altogether. We all know that such a proposal would go over really big with our "guberments." Might as well ask Texans to give up creationism.
They have to turn it around and make it the fault of the poor so the real reason(s) don't see the light of day.
This is such rubbish. Consumerism is the product of capitalism, it is inevitable; nay, it is essential for capitalism’s survival and growth. Capitalism must endlessly produce to meet beyond human need, and it continuously ‘creates’ new needs, and spends billions in advertizing to persuade people that they must have something else. Look at the fashion industry: it thrives on discarding what it pushed yesterday as the ultimate so that it can sell what it must today. In the process, to maximize profit, capitalism must strive to pay the workers less and less. So, on the one hand it manufactures unbridled expectation for goods and services, while at the same time creates unspeakable misery for vast number of people, denying them the ability to acquire often what they themselves produce. They are not oblivious to what they are denied (how could they, they are constantly reminded of their deprivation) and what is enjoyed by the privileged few. This internal contradiction of capitalism cannot be resolved within the framework of capitalism; even some of the main-stream economists recognize that. In the process, natural resources are dangerously depleted, and pollution increases nearly exceeding Earth's assimilative capacity. Those who are denied what the media tells them they ‘must have’, occasionally riot; what a surprise, pontification bears no fruit! The dissatisfied considers it not only laughable but criminal when the ideologists of the rich developed countries (for comparison of carbon foot print, a telling measure of consumerism, among nations of the world, see: http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/es803496a?prevSearch=Carbon%2BFootprint%2Bof%2BNations&searchHistoryKey=) advise people not to be consumerist, while they struggle to survive: whether they are the mobs in UK or the villagers in Bangladesh.
You obviously didn't read the article either.Most of what you say is implied in it. That is why it's important-especially since it comes from within the City hierarchy. Me, I've been waiting for capitalism to collapse since the mid-seventies Post Office strike.
When the first paragraph is such obvious B.S., there's little reason to read the rest.
A reporter for an English news outlet interviewed one of the rioters, pointed to a burning store front, and sardonically asked, "Just what do you think all of this will accomplish?"
The youth replied, "Well, it brought you out here to talk to us, didn't it?"
Those people didn't riot because they wanted loot. They did it to feel drunk with power. People who spent their whole lives believing that they had no hope of doing anything that anybody would ever notice, of saying anything that anybody would ever hear, of ever making a difference... For one incredible weekend, they commanded the attention of the whole world.
So, they used their power to destroy things? What of it? That's no different from what anybody does the first time they taste power if there is no cooler, wiser head present to show them a better way.
When you ask "what's in it for me" you have lost but when you ask "what's in it for the universe" then you have won.
"the underlying message of the advertising and marketing industries, and huge budgets are devoted to pushing a message which, updated from Déscartes, is: 'I buy, therefore I am' ".
__________________I think it's more accurate to say that the underlying message is "I own, therefore I am." Or at least "possess", to avoid spitting hairs over the definition of "own"."Buying" is the preferred, or default, method of acquisition, all things being equal. But when all things are not equal, "buying" may be a luxury that motivated consumers literally can't afford. Other means must be employed to effect much-desired ownership.I agree with comments critics that the report ought to have emphasized that irrational, compulsive consumption and materialism are the effects of capitalism, and not isolated, independent causes of social conflict and disorder.However, these brokerage-house researchers should be commended for at least working through the analysis and picking out some of the pathological mechanisms in play. Ultimately, they may come to realize that the calls are coming from inside the house!
Just listen to the first Quote
http://vimeo.com/27873038
And follow it up with
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/08/20-0#.
I've enjoyed reading the thoughtful comments I've read here about this article and what happened recently in the UK. And I've learned or rather relearned something that I'd like to speak to. It's this, creativity, imagination, beauty, peace, harmony, joy all need space to flourish. Deny people the ability (space) to work, dream, have purpose, and what you get is what we witnessed in the UK.
To blame what happened on consumerism is to blame the fire for burning down the house. There needed first to be heat, oxygen and fuel for a fire to get started and to keep going. What was the heat, the air and the fuel of this rioting in the UK? Investigate that! Blaming this and that for what happened is not necessary to correct what is closing human kind in. The will to truth, however, is. Maybe I missed it, but I saw nothing in the article that addressed the needs of either the many or the one. Thanks for the opportunity to say my piece.
So you believe consumerism equates to " the ability (space) to work, dream, have purpose..."
That is so sad.
Or can't you observe it is the hierarchy of consumerism and materialism - unequal resource distribution for profit - that denies most people " the ability (space) to work, dream, have purpose..."
Remember, in a consumption-based society your purpose is to consume, your dream is to consume, your ability to work is based on your motivation to consume.
"What was the heat, the air and the fuel of this rioting in the UK? "
It was, according to this report - consumerism, or didn't you read, or understand it, either?
Or do you simply feel you deserve to be whipped by your Master for not being able to afford his products?
Thanks Phineas for your reply post.
I think consumerism, the institutionalized pressure put on individuals to buy and buy and buy, degrades people both economically and creatively. As such I think it should be addressed but to say that this was the most important cause of what happened in the UK is a mistake.
Underlying the many individual reasons why people erupted in the UK are lousy economics and the closing off of the public good. People need space and the means to create a purpose for their existence. Absent either they dumb down, become attached to consumerism and die inside.. or explode.
I believe consumerism, such as was identified in the article as the cause of the disturbance, is a red herring designed to take us away from the austere economics and criminal politics of some of the rich that are the real causes.
What do you think?
Good discussion, and on the whole, a good article. This paragraph struck me, though:
"The overall pattern has been that an over-consuming west has borrowed and spent the surpluses of the increasingly productive and under-consuming East."
I'm very interested in knowing what "under-consuming" is. I'm no shirker; if I have some quota of resource-depletion to meet, I'd like to know so I can do my share.