Global responsibility through consumption?: Resistance and assimilation in the anti-brand movement

Abstract

Purpose-The purpose of the paper is to question the possible reach of anti-brand movements and, by extension, those movements that criticize capitalism via consumption, in order to reflect on the impasse in critique, given the new formats that capitalism has assumed. Design/methodology/approach-This paper takes as the object of its analysis the book No Logo and it is supported by qualitative research into the production of the discourse about the responsible consumer in the business media, as well as in books and articles published about the assimilation of resistance, and especially about anti-consumption and anti-brand movements. Findings-The relationship between the empirical findings of the research 2 the production of the responsible consumption discourse, in the period before, and after the anti-brand movements-and theoretical articles about empowerment and consumer accountability in the modern day shows how the assimilation of resistance occurred, via the responsible consumption discourse and also draws attention to its limits. Although the qualitative research used in the article was not initially planned for use in it, its findings were incorporated because they are widely applicable to what was being proposed. Originality/value-The papers originality lies in the fact that it shows the point that a criticism movement has reached after ten years. Although this was already clear to the author in 1999 when No Logo was written, a decade later it is possible to state that the movement has been assimilated by the market, especially since the appearance of the discourse of "responsible consumption". What is completely novel in this article is this co-relation. At the end, the article also points to the social risks of attributing a large degree of accountability to individuals for consumption.

The construction and controlling effect of a moral brand

“…Indeed many writing on brand and brand management refer to the need for 'authenticity' (Hatch & Schultz, 2003) and the consequences of inauthentic brand meanings (Thompson & Arsel, 2004;Thompson, Rindfleisch, & Arsel, 2006). Such concerns are heightened when espoused values have a 'moral' (typically green, sustainable, or socially responsible) dimension (Brunk, 2010); part of the growing market where social good and consumption is connected (Fontenelle, 2010;Kotler & Lee, 2005). In these cases the values can have a significant effect on "the expectations, choices, behaviors, and the lifestyles of their core consumers" (Kay, 2006: 754) through their strong values and 'missionary ideology' (see Mintzberg, 1989).…”

Corporate social responsibility as cultural meaning management: a critique of the marketing of ‘ethical’ bottled water

“…That is, if CSR is treated politically within a tripartite and genuinely shared setup, then we get away from the widely articulated accusations that CSR is often simply a management fashion (Crouch 2006), an ideological technique for selling more products (Banerjee 2007(Banerjee , 2008 or a manipulative regime for 'greenwashing' (Brennan & Binney 2008). Scherer & Palazzo's (2007) framework also deals with the claim that several CSR models are geared towards individuals' responsibilities and 'doing good,' for example, through individual consumption (Fontenelle 2010). …”

Organizing resistance movements: contribution of the political discourse theory

“…These studies have focused their debates on: resistance in the workplace (Contu, 2008;Contu, Palpacuer, & Balas, 2013;Mumby, 2005;Willmott, 2005); PDT's implications for organization theory (Böhm, 2006); organizational identity (Brown and Coupland, 2005), organizational change (Spicer & Sewell, 2010), learning in organizations and communities of practice (Contu & Willmott, 2003;Contu, Palpacuer & Balas, 2013); entrepreneurship (Jones & Spicer, 2005); and the use of PDT for an understanding of organizational discourse and narrative analysis (Mumby, 1997;Boje, 1995;Cederström & Spicer, 2013). There is also a set of debates that focus on the relationship between Laclau and the psychoanalytic readings of Lacan (Müller, 2013;Fontenelle, 2010;Böhm and Batta, 2010;Contu, 2008;Contu, Driver & Jones, 2010). Jones & ten Bos, 2007), it has particularly been the PDT approach that has allowed OS scholars to conceptualize organization as a broad process of power and politics, which is embedded in wider social antagonisms and struggles for hegemony (Böhm, 2006).…”

“…For us, and a growing number of organizational scholars, this broader understanding of organization includes the study of resistance movements (Misoczky & Vecchio, 2006;Misoczky, 2010;Hoffmann, Silva, & Dellagnelo, 2009;Fontenelle, 2010;Spicer & Böhm, 2007;Böhm, Dinerstein, & Spicer, 2010). This paper discusses the possibilities and limits of a joint articulation of organization studies (OS) and, what has been called, political discourse theory (PDT), which is a body of literature that has been analyzing social resistance movements for some time.…”

“…Specifically, we have engaged with a number of PDT publications by the 'Essex-school' -a range of studies produced by University of Essex-based scholars who have used and reframed the original works by Ernesto Laclau (Howarth, 1994(Howarth, , 1997Griggs and Howarth, 2000, 2004 -as well as works produced by OS scholars (Böhm, Dinerstein & Spicer, 2010, Otto & Böhm, 2006, Levy, 2008, Levy & Scully, 2007, Fontenelle, 2010, van Bommel & Spicer, 2011Contu, Palpacuer & Balas, 2013). We have read and analyzed these studies closely by identifying: (1) the main theoretical categories used; (2) the way these categories were applied to the empirical studies; (3) the main analytical outcomes that were put forward; and (4) the gaps or non-answered questions that we see in connection to the way resistance is organized in these empirical settings.…”