ABSTRACT
It is in Baudrillard’s major sociological work, Consumer Society (1970) that the immense vistas of his sociology become visible, and the problems dealt with in the earlier book are situated in a more general theory. It is true that the writing of the Consumer Society develops without a formal structuralist apparatus, and there is no appeal to the semiological niceties of Roland Barthes. This text is written in a more accessible and modest way, yet its analyses have a lucid and brilliant character. Many commentators have suggested that this is Baudrillard’s most successful effort, yet despite its very directness very few have grasped its true theoretical force and originality. Thus it is somewhat ironic that, while many other moderate works of Parisian social theory of this period have been translated into English, this one, still popular in France, has been ignored. Parts of it, however, are now included in English translations in collections of Baudrillard’s writings, but these translators are replete with errors which arise from a lack of familiarity with the theoretical terminologies on which Baudrillard draws.
