ABSTRACT
This chapter will show how consumption was inextricably bound up with the development of modernity and hence its most potent symbol of progress and achievement-the modern city. It is in the modern city that consumer culture and the core political, economic, social and cultural institutions, organisations, and the infrastructure of modern life are brought together to a degree and extent never seen before. For example, the strengthening and formalisation of local municipal government power, planning regimes and service provision emerged from the political and economic dominance of industrialists over the development of the modern city. Similarly, the expansion and increasing internationalisation of stock, goods exchanges and markets ensured that cities were increasingly a nexus point for flows of money, goods and people from all over the world. This economic, social and cultural milieu was aligned with, and was integral to, the rapid proliferation of shops, banks, sports clubs, cinemas, theatres, pubs, cafés, restaurants and a mix of urban dwellers from an increasingly diverse range of social and ethnic groups. It is this complementary strengthening of political institutions and organisations and economic growth (and a parallel development of cultural and consumption-oriented activities) that dramatically impacted on the development of the modern cityscape.
