Gilles Lipovetsky analyzed hyper consumption and postmodern society in a talk at UC

The French writer, philosopher and professor at the University of Grenoble, Gilles Lipovetsky, gave a master class at the UC College of Education, in which analyzed the current hyper-consumption, the fragmentation of collective belief models, the individualization of the subject post modern and the role of debate and information in today's societies.

In the talk, which was part of the series of conferences “Implications of living and researching in a hyper-modern world”, the French writer explained that our society increased its consumption capacity after the Second World War. This is because life was modernized with the purchase of goods and new technology.We are no longer in the consumer society, but in the hyper-consumption, applied to postmodernity. In the 50s or 60s, there was one television, one telephone, and one car per family. Consumption was collective, family”, Lipovetsky pointed out and added that currently we have a multi-equipment of homes, “since where there was collective equipment before, now there is equipment per person. We see a hyper-individualization of consumption. Even the homes of the unemployed have up to three televisions.”

The author asserted that this hyper-individualization of consumption occurs because the way of consuming has changed since before it was done to show off. According to Lipovetsky, it was consumed to “impress or seek some status in front of the environment. Today, consumption buys and seeks other gains on a personal level: pleasure, emotion, adventure, communication with others, playful experiences. Today's consumption creates something relational, to be in contact with those around us”.

Thus, we move from production capitalism to cultural capitalism, pointed out the French philosopher. “We went from a status and homogeneous consumer to another consumer of an emotional and atomized type. I no longer buy for others, but for myself. There is a kind of intimization of the act; people want to feel things, live new experiences.

The contradictions of consumption 

This emotional consumption represents a paradox, Lipovetsky added. "Because despite being emotional, This type of consumption is not impulsive, but reflective. Today's hyper-consumer is informed, seeks circuits and cheaper alternatives, it is not purely addictive. The essential thing is a reflexivity before the market, it is informed, it compares, it demands. Therefore, it represents a paradox”.

The philosopher explained that the second paradoxical situation comes from the fact that this neo consumer, the more you buy, the greater ecological awareness and health concern you show. “It comes to be a balance. The consumer cares about the planet and its immediate environment. The excess of circulating information generates a contradiction and a perplexity in the citizen, who instead of buying impulsively, acts with caution and uncertainty in their decisions” he deepened.

The information was making consumption more complex, characterized. “We are in the excess of knowledge, where the proliferation of information has made even the most natural actions more complex. Anxiety increases, andThose that were anthropological behaviors, such as eating, running or playing, were swallowed up by the model until they were also transformed into consumer products. We are facing a comprehensive commodification of all ways of life, even of the things that were the most elementary," he said.

Despite the fact that today's hyper-consumerism faces much criticism, we must not completely demonize, warned the Frenchman. "Of course, Not everything is bad in our post modern societies. It has improved health, education, housing; access to cultural assets has become massive".

The philosopher pointed out that consumption can be detestable when the individual's life revolves around it. “What troubles me is when life revolves around consumption. And that is where education must propose other models of life, different from the one prevailing today. The human being is capable of creating, of loving, of making a family, of making art, and that has nothing to do with consumption. The educational system must be changed so that life is not a slave to consumption, since the central part of life is to think, love, share and create”, he pointed out.

The future of society

For the philosopher, before life options were regulated by the great truths or the State, but today they have been fragmented into individual needs and actions, which means that this trend towards hyper-individualization is irreversible even though there is some resistance. “Never in the world was there so much associative life. I don't count just me and my selfie, nor my narcissism. The more individualism on the market, the more charities and associations seem to emerge. Why there is an individualism that is irresponsible and thinks only of itself, but there is another that also thinks collectively. That is the one who protests against corruption and against inequalities ”, for example

At the same time, the academic pointed out that we are in a complex society with a lot of uncertainty, but that the fight of the future must be responsible, democratic and of a collective nature. "Indeed, we are in societies in conflict and in permanent debate, but that is the price we must pay for living in free societies," he concluded.

Text: Francisco Zabaleta, Faculty of Education.