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121
Cadernos de Geograa nº 37 - 2018
Coimbra, FLUC - pp. 121-123
The paradoxical happiness – Essay on hyperconsumption society, by Gilles
Lipovetsky. Book review and analysis for work organization, leisure and
consumption concepts.
A felicidade paradoxal – Ensaio sobre a sociedade do hiperconsumo, por
Gilles Lipovetsky. Recensão crítica e análise aos conceitos organização do
trabalho, lazer e consumo
Luís Silveira
CEGOT / Department of Geography and Tourism, University of Coimbra
aviladasilveira@gmail.com
ORCID: 0000-0002-8030-7074
The book has as its original title Le bonheur paradoxal - Essai sur la société d'hyperconsommation. It was
written by Gilles Lipovetsky (philosopher and professor at the University of Grenoble, France), and published
for the first time in 2006. The read book version was Lipovetsky, G. (2014). A Felicidade Paradoxal - Ensaio
sobre a Sociedade do Hiperconsumo. Lisboa: Edições 70. ISBN: 978-972-44-1354-9. It has 357 pages and is divided
in two parts. The first comprises six chapters and the second comprises five chapters.
https://doi.org/10.14195/087-1623_37_10
Part 1 - The Hyperconsumption Society
Chapter 1. The three phases of consumer
capitalism
Chapter 2. Beyond statute: the emotional
consumption
Chapter 3. Consumption, time and play
Chapter 4. The post-Fordism organization of
the economy
Chapter 5. The emergence of a turbo consumer
Chapter 6. The fabulous destiny of Homo
Part 2 - Private Pleasures, Blessed Happiness
Chapter 7. Penia: material pleasures, existen-
tial dissatisfaction
Chapter 8. Dionysus: hedonistic society,
anti-Dionysian society
Chapter 9. Superman: obsession for perfor-
mance, pleasure of the senses
Chapter 10. Nemesis: overexposure of
happiness, regression of envy
Chapter 11. Homo felix: greatness and misery
of an utopia
After the advent of mass capitalism at the end
of the nineteenth century and the society of abundan-
ce, in the post-World War II, the world lives a new
form of consumption. It begun in the last five decades
and is marked by the permanent supply of products
on a global scale. Lipovetsky claims that this time
represents the third stage of capitalism, which he
termed as the Hyperconsumption Society. The times
and the experiences of the leisure are, in this space
of time, valorized, bringing a discussion on different
points of view in relation to the purposes of this
appointed time.
Tourism, at the present time, is already conside-
red a global activity, being responsible for 10.2% of
world GDP (in 2016) and having been of 1,322 million
the international tourist arrivals (in 2017). In order
to explain how tourism (and leisure times) has been
growing and will continue to follow, according to
World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) projections for
the next decades, it´s crucial to understand how
leisure is involving and changing the society. If we’ll
be able to understand these changes, we will be
better prepared to plan and adapt ourselves to the
tourism activity. In order to understand how the
organization of work, Fordism and post-Fordism
leisures, and contemporary leisure in this hypercon-
sumption society are addressed in this book, four
questions will be made as an approach model.
What are the main characteristics of
the new forms of work organization?
The characteristics of the new forms of organi-
zation exist from the follow-up or evolution of the
corresponding systems to previous phases of consump-
tion (phases I and II), and the revolution of informa-
tion techniques, the globalization of markets and
financial deregulation. Companies have made structu-
ral changes in the approach to the market in the
forms of competition and in the supply policies.
Market segmentation, the extreme differentiation of
products and services, the existence of a quality
policy, and the acceleration of the launch pace of
new products take place. Work organization is now
configured for the demand-dominated market to
replace the supply-driven market. Moreover, “the
material-based economy has become a service
Cadernos de
Geografia
122
Luís Silveira
economy: the era of over-consumption is dominated
by intangible supplies and by the service structure'”
(Lipovetsky, 2014: 66).
The time factor has become, at the moment,
primordial for the organization of the labour structu-
re. The aim is to increase consumption through the
renewal of products and goods in smaller time spaces.
Through the seduction and the novelty, the appetite
for the acquisition is stimulated. Through technolo-
gical and organizational evolution, companies reduced
the time of designing and placing new products on
the market, rendering obsolete goods that even had
a short functional life span. As the author points out,
“the challenge is not so much to produce massively
and continuously, but to ensure faster entry of
products into the market, to respond to demand
before the competitors” (2014: 77). Lipovetsky
concludes that this phase III of post-Fordism has, as
determinants factors, the reactivity, the design and
the rapid innovation of the products.
What are the differences and
similarities between Fordism and
post-Fordism leisure?
It was in the Fordism period that economies
grew more, bringing an era of marked consumerism.
With the large increase in wages, purchasing power
has skyrocketed and access to economic goods has
been given to the majority of the working population.
Over time, the share of wages earmarked for the
acquisition of social goods has increased. The author
points out that, “for the first time, the masses have
access to a more psychological and more individua-
lized material search, to a way of life (durable goods,
leisure activities, vacations, fashion) hitherto exclusi-
ve to social elites” (2014: 29).
The Fordism phase “is assumed as a ‘society
of desire’, all daily life is imbued with an imaginary
of happiness achieved through consumption, beach
dreams, erotic fun, ostensibly young fashions"
(2014: 31). The well-being masses cult celebrated in
phase II has begun to undermine the logic of expendi-
ture in terms of social status, promoting an indivi-
dualistic type of consumption. The social classes were
noticed in their differentiation through the purchase
and use of goods that, according to the corresponding
marks, it was possible to affirm the different social
status.
Post-Fordism leisure thus arises in the context
of the process of reducing expenses due to status
issues. The individualistic premise is, at this stage,
the characteristic factor and, in addition, it differs
from the previous phase. The diversification of supply,
and the democratization of comfort and leisure
occurred, the access to the novelties available in the
market became a commonplace, class regulations
have been disintegrated, and new aspirations and
new behaviours emerged. "It is the era of hypercon-
sumption, phase III of the modern commercialization
of needs, orchestrated by a deinstitutionalised,
subjective, emotional logic" (2014: 36). In phase II,
an example would be a social demarcation through
the possession of a personal computer. In phase III,
the access to this property is generalized /
mass-oriented; the characteristic individualization
occurs through the creation of a profile in a social
network and a new return to the collective through
belonging to a thematic group within it. Post-Fordism
leisure "translates a new relationship of individuals
with the items that establish the primacy of sensation,
the change of the social and individual significance
of the consumption universe that accompanies the
individualization impulse of our societies" (2014: 39).
What is the impact of post-Fordism on
the structuring of times and leisure
spaces?
At the end of the (19) 60's decade of the
twentieth century emerges the rupture with the
technocratic and authoritarian society. "Instead of
discipline, family and work, a new culture celebrates
the consumption and present life pleasures”. With
this introduction, “a generation that opposes authori-
ty and war, puritanism and competitive values, calls
for sexual liberation, for the direct expression of
emotions, for the psychedelic experiences, and for
different forms of life in common" (2014: 177).
The central zones of the former industrial cities
are transformed (after Fordism) into spaces of distrac-
tion, organized around the values of environment,
animation and spectacle, as the author affirms, "the
old building is recovered, converted into a museum,
hotel or cultural centre (...). There are cafes and
restaurants everywhere, clothing and handicraft
shops, exhibition galleries (...). It is the time of the
city dedicated to idle conviviality, to buy for pleasure"
(2014: 180). Lipovetsky also points out that, “the
private pleasures of leisure activities consumption
took place over the collective pleasures of the united
community. Travel, tourism, sports, television,
cinema, outings with friends: what dominates is the
dissemination and pluralisation of pleasures chosen
according to the tastes and aspirations of each one"
(2014: 182).
nº 37 - 2018
123
Notas, notícias e recensões
The hyperconsumption society
presented by the author extended
consumerist principles to all spheres
of social and individual life. To what
extent do contemporary leisure
practices socialize and educate
subjects' subjectivity to the
hyperconsumption society?
The striking individualistic characteristic of the
hyperconsumption society is, itself, permissive of a
self-sustaining cycle. In this society, the author claims
that “people tend to situate their interests and their
pleasures, first and foremost, in family and sentimen-
tal life, rest, holidays and travel, leisure activities
and other associative activities” (2014: 227).
The hyperconsumption society, filled with the
leisure practices that instil in the population the
development of individual fitness, health, sexuality
and beauty, expects a constant intensification of
these same objectives. "The individual must build
up, distinguish himself, expand his capacities: the
'performance society' tends to become the prepon-
derant image of hypermodernity" (2014: 223-224).
The author points out that "more and more
material pleasures, more and more trips, more
amusements, greater life expectancy - and, after
all, none of this has opened the doors to the joy of
living" (2014: 127). It is in this context that parado-
xical happiness arises today to each person when
have the freedom to choose and obtain the goods
and services with what they wish to fill the existen-
tial void. But then, after their limited time success,
an unceasing desire to new consumption rebirths,
and the snowball effect follows with an undefined
horizon.
Lipovetsky's book characterizes and explains
the process of change in the globalized society in
which the world we live in today has become.
However, there are some elements that constraint
the way we must see this society's evolutionary
process of hyperconsumption. The author began his
discourse with the systematization and characteri-
zation of the three phases of consumer capitalism.
It would have been pertinent to contextualize the
different phases into the territories in which it was
inspired. He identifies the French and North American
example and more rarely, the English case. He also
encompasses other countries, but which are not
identified.
Both space and time will have varied in each
country, being difficult to make a generalization as
it did. For instance, the Portuguese case in which
there was never a settled process of industrialization
making the idea of the existence of Phase I to be
impossible.
The work organization notion, referred to as
being set up in Phase III for a sense of supply rather
than demand, does not encompass some societies,
among them the Portuguese, where the population
not triggered itself the demand but, primarily, the
competition between Portuguese and foreign
companies in the context of the European Single
Market, have brought this new concept and organi-
zational philosophy.
The author highlights the almost complete
disappearance in Phase III of consumption based on
the social status (characteristic of Phase II). We must
not neglect the importance of not taking tendencies
or majorities as absolute truths. Today, both in
Portugal and in Finland (geographically and culturally
opposed), access is possible, for example, to the
acquisition of well-known brands of handbags, yet
economic access to and possession of a Louis Vuitton
bag remains a status differentiator. The access to
portable computers or mobile phones is now massified
but the acquisition of an Apple laptop or phone can
be a differentiation, again, with the existence of
social motivation nuances in some societies.
The human body worship is referred to as one
of the standards for the hyperconsumption society.
However, the high percentages of obesity, never seen
before among the populations of the most consuming
countries, were discarded.
In sum, if we assume the paradox of individual
happiness in the present, we also must highlight the
presence of a society with huge contradiction levels.
Reference
Lipovetsky, Gilles (2014). A felicidade paradoxal – Ensaio
sobre a sociedade do hiperconsumo. Lisboa: Edições70.