The Unmanageable Consumer: Contemporary Consumption and its Fragmentation

`By distilling a mass of scholarship into nine main themes and then carefully tracing their lineage and development, the book provides a superb guide to twentieth century ideas about consumption. Its value lies in documenting so much in one volume and, more importantly, in making it all accessible. A good deal of the source material comes from texts which can be obscure, baffling, or even plain whacky, and Gabriel and Lang have done us a great service in translating it all into the language used by normal human beings. The authors start with a valuable and sobering examination of the term consumerism, teasing out several current usages of the word.... When dealing with cultural studies the authors excel at bringing high theory down to earth.... Not only are the ideas explained elegantly, but so is their historical development.... Another reason why this theoretical tour makes for a comfortable read is its comprehensiveness: consumption is examined from so many angles that there is a fragment of theory somewhere in the book to match exactly the way you experience just about every consumer transaction. I would be surprised if anyone will read the book without often feeling intrigued and embarrassed about the explanations and explorations of their own consumer behaviour and saying, yes, that is exactly how I feel! .... The wealth of analysis in the cultural theory chapters is matched in the chapters on consumer politics. However, the latter also contain a useful account of the development of the various strands of the western consumer movement, from the birth of the modern cooperative movement in the nineteenth century, through the growth of second wave consumer organisations pursuing value for money, then Naderism, and on to the alternative consumer campaigns of recent years: green and ethical consumerism.... an excellent volume which guides the reader through some of the most impenetrable thickets of consumer theory, safely negotiating the weird as well as the familiar. It is often engrossing, never lifeless, and always illuminating' - Consumer Policy Review

`This is the most important book I have read on consumer protection for a considerable time. It gives us a stock-taking of where we are after some 30 years of sustained legislative activity and provides a framework for thinking about where we go in the next 30. I recommend it to expert and layperson alike' - Ross Cranston, London School of Economics

`This is an important and highly topical book. Taking a long hard look at the contradictions of Western consumption, it sets out some of the key challenges of society - and for the consumer movement - at the turn of the century' - James Firebrace, Director General, Consumers International

`Choice has become the great fetish of Western societies to such an extent that every party and interest group now wants to speak for the consumer. Tim Lang and Yiannis Gabriel have done an exemplary job in analysing the nature of consumerism, in setting out where consumerism goes from here and in showing why choice may not be the unalloyed marvel that it is sometimes made out to be' - Geoff Mulgan, Director, Demos

`Wide-ranging and thought-provoking.... It makes for arresting... reading.... All in all, this is a thoughtful and unusual survey' - Tomorrow

`[An] extremely subtle, as well as remarkably argumented and documented book, whose iconoclastic perspective will be a breath of fresh air to all those whom political correctness in any domain, including consumer policy, sickens' - INFO-C

`Students of consumer studies, marketing and allied areas should be jumping with joy at the publication of... The Unmanageable Consumer by Yiannis Gabriel and Tim Lang. In such a broad subject area as consumer studies, which encompasses so much, it is difficult for tutors to find texts that cover such a broad curriculum at an affordable price.... Tim Lang will be well known to those working in the area of consumer policy-making and this book will add to his reputation.... The book is well written and has extensive references that the serious scholar can use to examine his or her own ideas' - The Times Higher Education Supplement

`Most of the text is a dispassionate, excellent and well-referenced introduction to the available literature' - The Ecologist