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Christian Fuentes.

Christian Fuentes

Professor

Christian Fuentes.

Materialiserad moral: smartphones, applikationer och etisk konsumtion

Materialized moralities: Smartphone, apps and ethical consumption

Author

  • Niklas Sörum
  • Christian Fuentes

Summary, in English

Ethical consumption, that is, to make certain consumption choices due to personal moral beliefs and values is a growing trend and market. In this article we analyze three ethical smartphone apps developed and marketed in order to help consumers to make ethical product choices: for example, where to find the nearest café selling Fair Trade coffee, whether the salmon in the store is red-listed or if there are any cleaning products that are certified as environmentally friendly. In this text we argue that such digital consumer technologies have some potential to influence consumer actions. The article critically discusses whether and how technologies may shape ethical consumer culture. We conceptualize the smartphone apps and their suggested consumer actions in the form of four "consumer models”: the selecting consumer; the status seeking consumer; the information seeking consumer; and the social and productive consumer. The purpose of this article is to analyze the waysthat smartphone applications shape ethical consumption in the sense of suggesting particular representations of who an ethical consumer is and how ethical consumption is accomplished. The normative assumptions of these consumer models are discused. Our analysis build on interviews with app developers, marketing texts, and “object ethnography”, i.e. closed up readings and examinations of smartphone apps as intentional consumer objects equipped with scripts for consumer.

Department/s

  • Department of Service Studies

Publishing year

2016

Language

Swedish

Pages

6-15

Publication/Series

Kulturella Perspektiv

Volume

25

Issue

2

Document type

Journal article

Publisher

Föreningen Kulturella perspektiv

Topic

  • Social Sciences Interdisciplinary

Status

Published