Mass-consumption as an activator of sustainable consumerist potentials

This chapter focuses on the relation between mass-consumption and sustainable consumption.Mass-consumption concerns the omnipresent role of consumption in contemporary societieswith its problems of excessive resource use in current practices of consumption. The latemodern context and forces of mass-consumption can both trigger and prevent sustainableconsumption as well as shape its outcome. Through a literature review, both the examples ofalternative consumption (e.g. buycotts) and various kinds of anti-consumption, which involvepolitically motivated ambitions to cut down on consumption, are addressed. The chapteraddresses different ways in how mass-consumption activates sustainable consumeristpotentials, including sentiments towards anti-consumption. It also shows how massconsumptionmakes people unable to link consumption to political considerations, and enterspaths towards political anti-consumerism or realise their ambitions. Finally, the chapteranalyses possibilities and difficulties transforming niche sustainable consumerist initiatives tothe mainstream in a society dominated by mass consumption