ABSTRACT
The origin of this book was a roundtable discussion in London in January 2008. It was organized by Glasshouse Forum (https://www. glasshouseforum.org), an international network devoted to a critical scrutiny of capitalism. This gathering was part of the project “A consumed society?”, which among other things aims to investigate alternatives to a continuously increasing level of consumption. In the roundtable discussion, the ambiguity of the concept of consumption was highlighted; it has many different meanings and is often elusive. In media and in the general debate, categorical claims about consumption are made that often rest on weak empirical and theoretical foundations. There is a need for more analytical rigour and empirical evidence in the debate.
