ABSTRACT
The new consumer societies of the twentieth century, such as the postcolonial societies of the Indian subcontinent, parts of Asia and Eastern Europe, are being shaped by many of the same influences that defined the West’s consumer patterns in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The material and ideational dominance of fashion as a consumer force is important because it promulgates more than a propensity to consume and be receptive to marketing campaigns for new products. It is obvious that fashion is more than an economic activity which brings higher standards of living and new trends in consumption. The pursuit of the fashionable entails much more than the simple acquisition of goods. I argue in this chapter that the expansion of a consumer ethic instantiates identifiable patterns of sociality and public conduct irrespective of location in either the West or Asia. This appears to contrast with Robison and Goodman (1996:3-4), in the first volume of this series on Asia’s new rich, who emphasize the specific historical circumstances that characterize each developing capitalist society.
