Privileged Goods: Commoditization and Its Impact on Environment and Society

by Jack P. Manno

What are the obstacles in the way of effectively solving the environmental crises of our time? What can we do to overcome them? These may be two of the most important questions heading into the 21st century. Organized human societies have the ability to completely change the world. While we have excelled at building, destroying and rebuilding, we have not succeeded at conserving, preserving, and sustaining.
Priviledged Commoditization and Its Impact on Environment and Society suggests that our propensity toward environmental destruction - a tragic flaw of the modern economy - can be understood as a result of hidden economic forces. These forces drive social and economic development towards increasing mobilization of energy and material beyond what is actually needed to achieve general prosperity and meet basic human needs. The author explains the complex concept of commoditization using examples from key sectors of society.
Interdisciplinary in scope, Privileged Commoditization and Its Impact on Environment and Society will appeal to a wide variety of environmental professionals. It explains the key concepts, discusses the history of public policy, analyzes the "appropriate technology" movement of the 70s and compares it to the sustainable development movement of today.

280 pages, Hardcover

First published October 25, 1999

Reviews

[Keith Akers · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is most excellent, and I don't know of any other book, even with the field of ecological economics, which is quite like it. It's academic, but is easier to read than Daly and Farley's textbook "Ecological Economics."

What it shows is that commoditization has profound effects on society and how we value things. Something that is easy to make into a commodity will get all the support, just because someone can make money by selling it; things which are harder to turn into commodities (and Manno explains what these are and why they are that way), will not get support. So our society is turning into a society of commodities. It also shows what we need to do to get out of this trap.
So when is this going to come out in paperback? Right now you're best bet is to find this in a library, because even used copies at $50 are hard to find. Too bad, because it's quite good and deserves a wider audience. (UPDATE May 2017: you can now get used copies for under $5.)

[Karen · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent, accessible read looking at the impacts of the logic of commodification. From social oppression, to the ecological consequences, to the skew in human development towards products and away from systemic or people-centred solutions...plus a fantastic chapter on decommoditization. It's policy-oriented. I used this as the primary resource for a paper on decommoditization and collaborative consumption.