Get 20M+ Full-Text Papers For Less Than $1.50/day. Start a 14-Day Trial for You and Your Team.

Learn More →

Converging Conventions of Comfort, Cleanliness and Convenience

Converging Conventions of Comfort, Cleanliness and Convenience Many commentators analyse green consumption as if it were an expression of individual environmental commitment. Such approaches suppose that the adoption of more sustainable ways of life depends upon the diffusion of "green" beliefs and actions through society. In this article, the author explores the idea that patterns of resource consumption (especially of energy and water) reflect what are generally inconspicuous routines and habits. Are such conventions evolving or standardising in ways that are increasingly resource intensive? In addressing this question with reference to three domains of daily life: comfort, cleanliness, and convenience, four simple models of change are outlined, two of which imply an inexorable escalation of resource consumption, two of which do not. The purpose of this illustrative exercise is to demonstrate the importance of understanding the systemic redefinition of "normal practice." Rather than taking individual behaviour to be the central unit of analysis, the case is made for an approach that concentrates on the construction and transformation of collective convention. This theoretical reorientation opens the way for programmes of research and policy informed by an appreciation of the technological and the commercial as well as the symbolic and cultural dimensions of more and less resource-intensive ways of life. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Journal of Consumer Policy Springer Journals

Converging Conventions of Comfort, Cleanliness and Convenience

Shove, Elizabeth
Journal of Consumer Policy , Volume 26 (4) – Oct 6, 2004
Download PDF
24 pages
Read Article

Loading next page...
 
/lp/springer-journals/converging-conventions-of-comfort-cleanliness-and-convenience-raGu3S0CIU
Publisher
Springer Journals
Copyright
Copyright © 2003 by Kluwer Academic Publishers
Subject
Law; Commercial Law; Economic Policy; Marketing
ISSN
0168-7034
eISSN
1573-0700
DOI
10.1023/A:1026362829781
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

Many commentators analyse green consumption as if it were an expression of individual environmental commitment. Such approaches suppose that the adoption of more sustainable ways of life depends upon the diffusion of "green" beliefs and actions through society. In this article, the author explores the idea that patterns of resource consumption (especially of energy and water) reflect what are generally inconspicuous routines and habits. Are such conventions evolving or standardising in ways that are increasingly resource intensive? In addressing this question with reference to three domains of daily life: comfort, cleanliness, and convenience, four simple models of change are outlined, two of which imply an inexorable escalation of resource consumption, two of which do not. The purpose of this illustrative exercise is to demonstrate the importance of understanding the systemic redefinition of "normal practice." Rather than taking individual behaviour to be the central unit of analysis, the case is made for an approach that concentrates on the construction and transformation of collective convention. This theoretical reorientation opens the way for programmes of research and policy informed by an appreciation of the technological and the commercial as well as the symbolic and cultural dimensions of more and less resource-intensive ways of life.

Journal

Journal of Consumer Policy – Springer Journals

Published: Oct 6, 2004

References

  • Das Kundenbuch. Menschen und ihr Einkaufsverhalten bei Bekleidung
    Albaum, M.
  • Concise Oxford dictionary
  • Coming changes in the U.S. clothes washer market
    Biermeyer, P.
  • Of bicycles, bakelites and bulbs
    Bijker, W.
  • Clothing care function: Germany, SusHouse Project final report
    Bode, M.
  • Distinction: A social critique of judgement and taste
    Bourdieu, P.
  • Air conditioning America: Engineers and the controlled environment, 1900–1960
    Cooper, G.
  • More work for mother: The ironies of household technology from the open hearth to the microwave
    Cowan, R. S.
  • The invention of comfort
    Crowley, J.
  • Purity and danger: An analysis of the concepts of pollution and taboo
    Douglas, M.
  • Thermal comfort-Analysis and applications in environmental engineering
    Fanger, O.
  • The world of consumption
    Fine, B.; Leopold, E.
  • America calling: A social history of the telephone
    Fischer, C.
  • Objects of desire: Design and society since 1750
    Forty, A.
  • The sociological uses of time-use diary analysis
    Gershuny, J.; Sullivan, O.
  • Nylon: The manmade fashion revolution
    Handley, S.
  • The time bind: When work becomes home and home becomes work
    Hochschild, A.
  • Networks of power: Electrification in Western society, 1880–1930
    Hughes, T. P.
  • Standards for thermal comfort
    Humphreys, M.
  • Dirty linen: Couples and their laundry
    Kaufmann, J. C.
  • Assessing the time-squeeze hypothesis: Hours worked in the United States 1969–1989
    Leete, L.; Schor, J.
  • The bathroom, the kitchen and the aesthetics of waste: A process of elimination
    Lupton, E.; Miller, J.
  • Domestic goods: The material, the moral, and the economic in the postwar years
    Parr, J.
  • Technology and the market: Demands, users and innovation
    Rip, A.; Groen, A.
  • Human choice and climate change: Resources and technology, Volume 2
    Rip, A.; Kemp, R.
  • Time for life: The surprising ways that Americans use their time
    Robinson, J.; Godbey, G.
  • The overworked American: The unexpected decline of leisure
    Schor, J.
  • Comfort, cleanliness and convenience: The social organization of normality
    Shove, E.
  • Strategies for shifting technological systems: The case of the automobile system
    Schot, J.; Hoogma, R.; Elzen, B.
  • Squeezing time: Allocating practices, co-ordinating networks and scheduling society
    Southerton, D.
  • Harried and hurried: Time shortage and co-ordination of everyday life
    Southerton, D.; Shove, E.; Warde, A.
  • The ecological modernisation of production and consumption: Essays in environmental sociology
    Spaargaren, G.
  • Caring consumers: Gendered consumption meanings and the juggling lifestyle
    Thompson, C.
  • Concepts of cleanliness: Changing attitudes in France since the Middle Ages
    Vigarello, G.
  • Convenient food: Space and timing
    Warde, A.
  • Patterns of time in hospital life
    Zerubavel, E.
  • The seven day circle
    Zerubavel, E.

You’re reading a free preview. Subscribe to read the entire article.

Try 2 weeks free now

DeepDyve is your
personal research library

It’s your single place to instantly
discover and read the research
that matters to you.

Enjoy affordable access to
over 18 million articles from more than
15,000 peer-reviewed journals.

All for just $49/month

Explore the DeepDyve Library

or browse the journals available

Search

Query the DeepDyve database, plus search all of PubMed and Google Scholar seamlessly

Organize

Save any article or search result from DeepDyve, PubMed, and Google Scholar... all in one place.

Access

Get unlimited, online access to over 18 million full-text articles from more than 15,000 scientific journals.

Your journals are on DeepDyve

Read from thousands of the leading scholarly journals from SpringerNature, Wiley-Blackwell, Oxford University Press and more.

All the latest content is available, no embargo periods.

See the journals in your area

DeepDyve

Freelancer

DeepDyve

Pro

Price

FREE

$49/month
$499/year

Save searches from
Google Scholar,
PubMed

Create folders to
organize your research

Export folders, citations

Read DeepDyve articles

Abstract access only

Unlimited access to over
18 million full-text articles

Print

20 pages / month

Sign up
for free
Start 14 day
Free Trial