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If ‘buying is voting’, does this mean that internalized the logic of liberal capitalism
the person who chooses to be completely dis- (CEPS, 2007). These are the same individu-
connected from the system of mass con- als who are presented as being so liberated
sumption is not making a political statement? and reflexive. Without a critical sociology of
University research on this emerging phe- responsible consumerism, we run the risk of
nomenon also urgently needs to assemble presenting as anti-establishment acts that may
more precise and plentiful data about these in fact only be a new form of participation in
‘political consumers’. Who are they? What and reproduction of the capitalist system of
are their occupations? Do they mostly belong oppression.
to the middle class or upper-middle class, as
we suspect? What about their local inclusion
in social networks? Along the same lines, we
need to go further than opinion surveys and NOTE
factual questionnaires and get the political
consumers themselves to speak. We need 1 The French expression Jacques Ion uses is
to reconstruct the meaning that they give to ‘engagement distancié’, which implies commitment
to a cause without being committed to a particular
their actions and evaluate the real effects of
organization.
these acts. Concretely, this will involve ana-
lyzing the life course of people who openly
call themselves ‘political consumers’in order
to understand how such people, as members REFERENCES
of social networks and spheres of life, build
their personal identities. To what collective
Allen, Patricia, FitzSimmons, Margaret,
discourses, collective identities and frame- Goodman, Michael and Warner, Keith
works for collective action, do they refer in (2003) ‘Shifting Plates in the Agrifood
order to situate their own acts? Do they Landscape: The Tectonics of Alternative
express and claim this identity of political Agrifood Initiatives in California’, Journal of
consumers elsewhere and in other ways? Do Rural Studies, 19: 61–75.
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Buttel, Frederick H. (1997) ‘Some Observations on
Because we are not satisfied with the
Agro-food Change and the Future of
current dominant explanations that establish
Agricultural Sustainability Movements’, in David
an equation between a purchase and a vote,
Goodman and Michael J. Watts (eds.)
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Globalizing Food: Agrarian Questions and Global
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and practice of democracy. In my opinion, Collectif d’étude sur les pratiques solidaires
this equation between a purchase and a vote (CEPS) (ed.) (2007) La consommation respon-
shows that contemporary individuals have sable. Entre bonne conscience individuelle et