No Recount: Consumerism Won Modern America

January 29, 2001

University Park, Pa. -- The culture war between conservatism and liberalism in the United States is already over — and the winner is consumerism, which transformed the country throughout the 20th century, says a Penn State historian in a new book. But he warns against moving toward a consumer planet in the 21st century.

"Consumerism succeeded where other ideologies failed because it concretely expressed the key political ideals of the century — liberty and democracy — and with relatively little self-destructive behavior or personal humiliation," says Dr. Gary Cross, Penn State professor of history and author of the new book "An All-Consuming Century: Why Commercialism Won in Modern America" (Columbia University Press).

"Consumer goods gave people the means to establish new personal identities and to break with old ones without necessarily abandoning family, friends and the common culture," he adds. "For example, cars and clothes gave identity to young and old, women and men, ethnic majority and minority, telling others who they were and how they expected to be treated. Cosmetics and candy expressed both rebellion and authority, letting people define themselves in an unfriendly world."

Throughout the 20th century, the Left longed for popular control over political institutions and workplaces; populists challenged political elites and radical trade unionists took on the power of railroad, mine and steel mill owners. The Right defended authority with appeals to racial and social Darwinian ideas. The Center, in the form of Progressivism, pushed for responsible institutions to bring American democracy into the industrial era, according to the book.

"We have gone through two devastating world wars and a 45-year-year cold war that ultimately made the United States the leading global power, but in the end, the self in society came to be defined by consumption," Cross says.

The Penn State historian documents how and why consumerism met American needs. He contrasts the climate of new technologies, new businesses and new economic realities against the impact of social and political events.

For example, the Model T Ford changed the American automobile from a luxury item to a necessary symbol of a new American way of life. Electricity improvements led to the modern electric motor and subsequent inventions: irons, toasters, vacuum cleaners, light bulbs, telephones, washing machines, stoves and refrigerators. New ways of packaging and preparing items from food and drink to clothes and furniture led to greater efficiency and free time.

Other important influences came from innovations such as retailing, buying on credit, packaging and advertising. Consumer credit accelerated American spending and reduced the distance between the rich and middle class, the book notes.

"Packaging and promotion also evolved to excite and soothe buyers," Cross says. "The cracker in the barrel and the potato by the pound were gradually replaced by precooked soups, TV dinners and boxed cereals."

The end of the 20th century brought yuppies, superstores, the Mall of America, VCRs, personal computers and the Internet, all taking over the family in practical space and time.

In response, there were serious countermovements including those in the 1920s outlawing alcohol, regulating the media and preaching personal simplicity. The Left in the 1960s and the Right in the1980s produced similar movements, but they made little headway and, in fact, removed the remaining barriers to the consumer culture.

"The critics simply misread how spending worked in people's lives. The consuming crowd was not totally passive, leading empty lives," Cross notes. "Doomsayers offered no functional equivalent to consumerism."

However, the triumph of consumerism may not be the definite model for the United States or any country in the 21st century. "Consumer culture has solved many social and psychological problems and helped to stoke economic growth," Cross says. "But the environmental impact of a global culture is frightening."

Conservatives and liberals may need to learn from the failures of past critics of consumerism, while trying to recover its still useful ideas and practices. Proposals will have to be less hypocritical and more willing to recognize that the problem of managing desire cannot be reduced to criminalizing a few "immoral" behaviors. Moderating need is a problem that extends far into respectable society and will be a central question in child rearing, community planning, and personal life decisions in the future, according to the book.

"There is no single answer, but Americans and other citizens of the world must seek a realistic compromise about the need for constraint that will bridge ideological divisions, and find ways of preventing commercialism from absorbing human life," Cross says.

The Penn State historian also is author of eight books including "Kids' Stuff: Toys and the Changing Worlds of American Childhood," and "Time and Money: The Making of Consumer Culture."

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Contact:

Vicki Fong (814) 865-9481 (o)/ (814) 238-1221 (h) vfong@psu.edu

EDITORS: Dr. Cross is at gsc2@psu.edu or 814 863 0181