Return to the `Consuming West': Young People's Perceptions about the Consumerization of Estonia.

Abstract This article looks at how young people in post-communist Estonia attribute meaning to consumer goods and to the development of consumption during the last decade.The empirical material comprises 45 qualitatively analysed student essays and 25 in-depth interviews.The authors arrange the material onto two main axes: the temporal axis of Estonian transformation and the spatial axis of Estonia (including the memory of Soviet Estonia) versus today’s construct of the West. Also, we look at how ‘Western-ness’ as a socio-cultural reference point is used by young people in representing consumption. We argue that the decoding of Western consumer culture is ambivalent for Estonian youth as it brings up national collective ideals of freedom as well as highly individual distinction-seeking.Value references ranging from more traditional to ‘post-modern’are inextricably interwoven in representations of today’s consumption processes. Plural processes are at work among the studied students: having a strong desire to distance oneself from the Soviet heritage and to view ‘Western-ness’as the only alternative,while at the same time criticizing the adoption of the Western consumer capitalist model.This is manifested in a willingness to ‘outsmart’the Western consumer by using experiences from the Soviet period as well as Estonian ethnocultural heritage. Keywords consumer freedom,consumer goods,consumption,individual distinction,post-socialist transition,Wes