ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the ways in which privatization is expressed in modern life in general through examining the changing character of three human activities that once pulled people out of their private spheres and into the public domain: work, shopping, and leisure. In view of the powerful forces of privatization, one additional indicator of the breakdown of the public realms in metropolitan communities should come as no surprise. In the capitalist economies of metropolitan societies, organizational loyalty to workers is continually discarded in the search for higher corporate profits, and worker loyalty to organizations is greatly compromised by the strong emphasis placed on individual advancement and therefore job mobility. These traits are of course more evident in the American than in the Swedish system. Metropolitan life is split between formal connections, such as work and relations with government authorities, and private connections, the latter providing at their best bastions of intimacy and identity for individuals apart from the outside world.
