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aling with cons
When, in 1989, Poland overthrew its socialist system to build a consumption-based civilization,
everything seemed straightforward. The years of ideological dictatorship, censorship, and
the lack of basic goods on the market had ended, to be replaced by an epoch of freedom,
democracy and well-being. The bad system was supposed to be replaced by a good one. The
good system was supposed to serve everything. Today, fifteen years later, nothing seems quite so
simple.
We in Poland have democracy, freedom and shops filled with goods. The problem has become how
we are using these goods. At first, after years of making do without, it seemed a fair reaction
that people wanted to buy as much as they could, so as to start resembling the affluent societies
of the West as soon as possible. Today, we are more and more frequently conscious of the
fact that consumption is not just an attitude of individuals, but a global ideology operating on
the awarenesses of the majority of society. This ideology defines purchasing not only as the
appeasing of private needs, but also as a citizen’s duty to help the economy. Vance Packard,
one of the first critics of consumption-based society in the USA, quotes President
Eisenhower in his book /The Waste Makers/ (1960), who, when asked during a press conference
what people should do to fight the recession, responded “Buy.” When he was asked further
“Buy what” he added: “Whatever.” In that same book, Packard recalled slogans directed
at the American public in the 1950’s. One of them was “Buy, buy, buy... It’s your patriotic
duty!” But is it really
The criticism of a consumptive lifestyle which appeared in the USA and Western Europe of the
60’s, though it did not liquidate the system itself, led to fundamental changes in societal
consciousness. There were organizations which proposed alternative lifestyles, protecting
consumer rights, fighting for environmental defense, and demanding concern for values other
than the famed ‘rat race.’ Part of this phenomenon is also the movement against globalization,
understood as an economic model inflicted on the world as a whole, and based on the everturning
engine of production and consumption. A critical or ironical position vis a vis the greedy
amassing of material goods has been taken up by numerous artists, such as Richard Hamilton,
Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, and Jasper Johns.
And how should designers deal with consumption Design as a whole is not an alternative activity,
after all, although in particular cases it not only can, but even should oppose production, if
its sole aim is profit. Yet the designer profession was shaped with the development of a consumption-based
society, they are closely linked, and contemporary design, to a large extent,
has contributed to the success of this socio-economic model. A total critique of the links