ABSTRACT
In recent decades large masses of consumers in the Western world have moved into relatively affluent and secure positions. Their increased purchasing power has given them the opportunity to embroider upon basic needs with a sense of individual taste and creativity, as they search for a style of life rather than for security. Style of life, in this case, refers to the conscious and carefully developed sets or patterns of individual preferences in personal consumer behavior. Increases in disposable income and leisure time have permitted types of personal explorations that have made possible the rise of huge new industries devoted to cultural, recreational, and sports products. At the same time political ideologies based on conflict between the economic classes have all but disappeared, 1 and minority groups are looked at with almost as much interest in their innovations in consumption (for example, how they dress and play) as in their political views. 2 Because the potential variation in consumer behavior is now quite suddenly at a level far over and above that which was once economically dictated, the consumer's search for a personalized style of life becomes mankind's first large-scale nongovernmental, spontaneous, and awkward groping with the problem of economic freedom. The idea of this type of freedom has been appreciated in many lands, even in politically unfree lands where affluence and security do not exist. While it is too early to say what political consequences may emanate from the new consumer ideal, the apparently vast possibilities open to consumer exploration now demand the serious attention of the social sciences in a way that they did not before.
