I think we can all agree that Western culture is awash in goods, more than we need, sometimes more than we want. Richard Denniss hopes to promote a cure for affluenza, "that strange desire we feel to spend money we don't have to buy the things we don't need to impress people we don't know." The size of our shopping malls--and the size of our garbage dumps--attest to the widespread infection of affluenza. Denniss, an Australian economist, wants to change the culture of consumerism, not by "chiding people for their current conduct and consumption patterns" but by "creating smarter, more attractive patterns of behavior."


Denniss makes a helpful distinction between materialism and consumerism. Materialism is not the problem. It's consumerism's "love of buying new things" that drives affluenza while leading to a stream of waste. "Consumerism is based on the transient thrill of the new. . . . Materialism is based on love of the old." Materialism is the love of things that encourages us to cherish what we have, to care for them, to repair them, to use them carefully, and enjoy them. This is the opposite of consumerism, which encourages seeking the new and disposing of the old.


This distinction is important to the extent that our economy is driven by consumerism. Denniss criticizes the use of GDP as a measure of economic activity. He says is "like bragging about a car's top speed." It doesn't say anything about the direction of the economy or the sectors of activity. Consumerism boosts GDP, but can be detrimental in other areas of a society's health.


Denniss's case for moving society toward a culture rejecting consumerism is strong and makes a lot of sense. A recurring example is the bottled water industry. Who would have thought that a very inexpensive, easily acquired (in the developed world) commodity like water would become a huge, profitable industry? The bottled water is great for GDP--created jobs, consumers spending money on something they spent very little money on in recent years--but has adverse environmental consequences with the waste created by all the bottles, and redirects billions of assets that could be used for other things. If our culture began to buy less bottled water (as I believe we have begun to see), that small change could have a great impact. Small changes by millions of people, whether buying less bottled water, choosing to drive less, or using and repairing their goods rather than replacing them, can lead to great changes.


While Denniss makes a good case for materialism over consumerism, pointing out the waste and pointlessness of affluenza, he steps too far down the road of centralization and communalism. We in the West love our freedoms. We are free to ride bikes to work, and to promote bike lanes, ride sharing, and other means of reducing urban traffic. But we also want to be free to drive our gas guzzlers. Granted, Denniss talks about gradual changes in culture more than statist decrees. But he seems to be OK with statism, too.


His bottom line still stands: "Just as your stomach should tell you when you have eaten enough, your cupboards and your garage should tell you when you have consumed enough." Denniss overplays the "spending to impress others" angle, but we definitely spend more than we need on stuff we don't need. I'll join him in making those choices in my family to resist the culture of consumerism and promote a culture of materialism rightly understood.




Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the complimentary electronic review copy!

Has good concrete examples of how consumer spending on luxury goods can be shifted in ways that protect the world economy and the planet. Usually books on this topic just explain the problem but are light on actual doable solutions. Curing Affluenza lays out solutions that are possible from small to big steps.