Re-examining utopia in contemporary consumption: conceptualization and implications for marketing

Aleksandrina Atanasova ()
Additional contact information
Aleksandrina Atanasova: Royal Holloway University of London

AMS Review, 2021, vol. 11, issue 1, No 3, 23-39

Abstract: Abstract This paper introduces liquid consumer utopias, defined as market-mediated expressions of individuals’ desires to re-imagine and re-construct reality, and to re-frame the present. This conceptual lens illuminates previously untheorized consumption phenomena, which are socially constructed, and often critical, efforts to enact an alternative way of being in an increasingly uncertain and unpredictable world. Three key characteristics of liquid utopias are outlined—immediacy, transience and hyper-individualization––each pointing to liquid consumer utopias’ function to facilitate present-oriented and short-lived re-imaginings of reality. Co-existing alongside the solid and collective utopian consumption of interest to prior research, these emergent forms of liquid consumer utopias articulate a re-imagining of the present (rather than the future), have an emphasis on individual (rather than communal) experiences of betterment, and an orientation toward temporary re-framings of the experienced reality (rather than a pursuit of permanence and long-lasting change). Implications are discussed for retailing, experiential consumption, and consumer self-optimization.

Keywords: Utopia; Liquid consumption; Desire; Escape; Experiential consumption; Retailing (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s13162-021-00193-0 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:amsrev:v:11:y:2021:i:1:d:10.1007_s13162-021-00193-0

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer. ... gement/journal/13162

DOI: 10.1007/s13162-021-00193-0

Access Statistics for this article

AMS Review is currently edited by Manjit S. Yadav

More articles in AMS Review from Springer, Academy of Marketing Science
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().