(Un)sustainable consumption: a contested, compelling and critical field

Abstract

We are very pleased to be presenting the second issue of Consumption and Society on (un)sustainable consumption. The thematic focus of this issue recognises the ways in which consumption is both a threat and an opportunity for addressing the societal challenges of the 21st century (Welch et al, 2022). If Warde (2022), in our inaugural issue, argues for a more encompassing approach to consumption studies, the prefix ‘sustainable’ adds yet another layer of complexity. Sustainable consumption can be problematised in different ways. For instance, there are ‘strong’ and ‘weak’ interpretations of sustainable consumption governance (Fuchs and Lorek, 2005), which relate to whether sustainability is understood in terms of efficiency gains, through microand consumer actions at the individual level, or shifting fundamental levels and patterns of consumption through more systemic changes. Oftentimes, the focus is either on environmental concerns on the one hand, or on human wellbeing and justice on the other. For the journal, we see sustainable consumption as an object of study, teaching and research action, which relates broadly to what it means to live ‘a good life’, for all, on a finite planet. We hope to integrate perspectives that take seriously what the idea of sustainability is about, while recognising that ‘sustainable consumption’ is normative, perhaps even utopian, and as such is also ripe for critique. We welcome more critical approaches, specifically through voices that might be currently underrepresented in academic journals, such as those of scholars from the so-called global south. We begin this editorial by outlining how ‘sustainable consumption’ emerged as a field and then present some of the many promising ways forward. The consumption turn in sustainability studies occurred at a time when scholarly Editorial