The Romantic Ethic And The Spirit Of Modern Consumerism [Paperback]

This important book aspires to complement Max Weber's The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. Specifically, just as Weber provided an historical account for the rise of "instrumental rationality" that drives the sphere of production, Campbell offers an historical account of the rise of "imaginative hedonism" that drives modern consumption.

His central theme is that pleasure itself was redefined in the 18th century. In former times, it was sought through the senses: food, sex, music, laughter. Thus, elites had banquets, harems, musicians, and clowns while the masses had carnivals, their annual taste of the same. The modern economy, according to Campbell, replaced the sensory experience of the body with the emotional experience of the imagination - daydreams of finer lifestyles, novel consumer goods, exotic experiences et al. Centrally important, these images are created or modified by the individual for self-consumption. In other words, it is not the buying, owning or consuming but the imagining - "the ability to create an illusion known to be false but felt to be true" - that pleasures us. Moderns became adept at what Campbell calls "autonomous imaginative hedonism" long before there was media or advertising; it's not our wants but our wanting that is insatiable.

The book is organized in two parts. The first half is critical and dissects the inadequacies of economic explanations of wants and their origins in terms of increasing population, increasing standards of living and other macro trends and of sociological explanations that rely on emulation effects. The second half is historical. Like Weber Campbell anchors his account in the Calvinist strain of 17th century Protestantism but the legacy that he follows leads to the 18th century pietistic cults of sensibility and melancholy, then on to Sentimentalism (sensibility + Christian benevolence), culminating in 19th century Romanticism and finally democratizing as bohemianism in the early 20th century.

Densely argued and quite long, this is not an easy read. Moreover, those who prefer their historical explanations anchored in a society's organization of power and wealth will not likely be convinced by a history of ideas based sermons, novels and philosophy. Finally, the scope is limited largely to Great Britain with some attention to France and Germany.

Those weaknesses pale when compared with this volume's three important contributions. First, the argument makes room for the pursuit of pleasure along side the pursuit of wealth in understanding the evolution of modern society. Similarly, it makes room for emotion along side reason in that evolution. Second, it explains why we embrace rather than reject an everyday life diffused by the shimmers of advertising. Finally, it puts the consumer as the active and creative force at the center of consumerism.

Len Ellis' review of this book is excellent, so I will try not to overlap his review too much. Also, given this book's scope and depth, the following comments are inevitably highly generalized and superficial.

The Romantic Ethic is ostensibly divided into two sections, but is better understood as consisting of four. First, there is the presentation of the central thesis, viz., that the Industrial Revolution was driven by the sudden development of consumer demand in the 18th Century (as opposed to the traditional theory that the Industrial Revolution was driven by a revolution in production). This growth in demand was due to changing social mores, namely the development of an emotional, expressive social persona ("sentimentalism") that emphasized feelings and the public expression of those feelings.

Second, Campbell discusses how modern consumerism is a product of individuals' fantasies and imagination ("imaginative hedonism"). The most salient point in this section is that the modern individual can obtain pleasure from fantasies. Therefore, the non-realization of a desire may be just as pleasurable as the realization of that desire because non-realization allows the continuation of the pleasurable fantasy. Ironically, realization of the desire may be less pleasurable because it involves the substitution of reality for the fantasy and the reality may turn out to be less desirable that the continuation of the fantasy. This process of attaining goods that supply less pleasure than the fantasies of attainment provided inevitably leads to frustration, alienation and the creation of new fantasies with the associated desire for fulfillment of the new fantasies.

Third, there is a fairly long discussion of the development of religious and social thought in 18th Century England. The central theme of this section is tracing the rise and fall of sentimentalism and its relation to the Puritan ethic that preceded it.

Finally, Campbell links the development of sentimentalism in the 18th Century with that of Romanticism and then Romanticism with the development of modern consumerism or "imaginative hedonism" discussed above.

This is a very, very dense book and is not a light read. Arguments are built upon arguments which then lead to more observations and more arguments. That said, it is extremely well written and argued and it is a rewarding read if you are interested in the subject matter. The section on modern consumerism was fascinating -- essentially a long essay on the psychological underpinnings of our consumer society. However, the section on the development of sentimentalism in 18th Century England may only appeal to those with an interest in the subject matter. If you're not interested (I'm not), you'll probably find this section tedious (I did).

Campbell doesn't quite fulfill the ambition of his central thesis, but the final chapter does an excellent job of tying our modern ethos -- and modern consumerism -- back to its Romantic origins. In the end, The Romantic Ethic is a very well written, reasoned and rewarding book, but one that requires a great deal of focus and one that doesn't quite fulfill the ambitions of its central thesis.