A Guide to the Systems of Provision Approach

Who Gets What, How and Why

verfasst von: Dr. Kate Bayliss, Prof. Ben Fine

Verlag: Springer International Publishing

Enthalten in: Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik" , Springer Professional "Technik" , Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

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Understanding consumption requires looking at the systems by which goods and services are provided – not just how they are produced but the historically evolved structures, power relations and cultures within which they are located. The Systems of Provision approach provides an interdisciplinary framework for unpacking these complex issues.

This book provides a comprehensive account of the Systems of Provision approach, setting out core concepts and theoretical origins alongside numerous case studies. The book combines fresh understandings of everyday consumption using examples from food, housing, and water, with implications for society’s major challenges, including inequality, climate change, and prospects for capitalism.

Readers do not require prior knowledge across the subject matter covered but the text remains significant for accomplished researchers and policymakers, especially those interested in the messy real world realities underpinning who gets what, how, and why across public and private provision in global, national, and historical contexts.

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Frontmatter

Chapter 1. Introduction and Background to the SoP Approach

Abstract

Across the social sciences academics have long grappled with the question of what drives consumption. This relates not just to shopping habits but also to how basic needs such as housing and education are met to understand who gets what, how and why. The systems of provision (SoP) approach emerged in the 1990s in response to a perceived failing in the siloed social sciences to assess adequately the drivers of consumption. The approach proposes an interdisciplinary framing with consumption deemed to be inextricably linked vertically to processes of production as well as (horizontally) to wider contexts. This chapter traces the trajectory of the approach from early studies on the drivers of consumption norms for consumer durables, through analyses of food consumption to more recent applications in social policy and the grander issues of neoliberalism and financialization. The chapter shows that the approach has evolved to cover not just commodity production but also alternative, including public, production and consumption systems. And this adaptability and progress in part explains its durability over the past three decades.

Kate Bayliss, Ben Fine

Chapter 2. The SoP Approach: Theoretical Background and Empirical Practice

Abstract

This chapter starts with an overview of the theoretical foundations of the SoP approach. The consumer is considered to be located within an extensive web of, often contested, social relations of production and material cultures of consumption. For the SoP approach, it is the interaction of these complex components, dependent on the context and the commodity or provision in question, which needs to be unpacked to understand fully the nature of consumption. The chapter then moves to set out the fundamentals on which SoP research can typically begin to be built. These are: agents in the chain of provisioning and associated context; structures to include the institutional forms attached to the specific SoP and the broader social factors within which it operates (such as gender, class, race); processes which again relate to the specific activities attached to the SoP as well as to more systemic and abstract forms such as globalization, neoliberalization and privatization; relations across the elements of the SoP; and material cultures (covered in detail in Chap. 3). The chapter considers how these complexities can be addressed methodologically, and shows how the SoP approach critically draws upon but diverges from other systems-based approaches.

Kate Bayliss, Ben Fine

Chapter 3. Understanding Material Cultures

Abstract

The SoP approach considers consumption through the lens of (social) norms, which are taken to be identifiable systematic patterns of consumption, clustered across groups. These norms feature extensively in daily life, for example, in decisions ranging from what to eat to where to live. To examine the forces that shape such norms, the SoP approach draws on the notion of material culture which bridges the gap between the materiality of objects and the social and cultural relations to which they are attached. Cultures relate not just to consumption choices but also to the normalization of certain practices. This is illustrated by the ways in which processes of neoliberalism and financialization have become embedded in daily understandings and practices, for example, as ‘citizens’ have been transformed into ‘consumers’. Material cultures are often so ingrained that they are difficult to identify. To assist with this, the chapter sets out a list of criteria for analysing the nature of cultural associations and the way these are formed, known as the 10Cs.

Kate Bayliss, Ben Fine

Chapter 4. Insights from Operationalizing the Systems of Provision Approach

Abstract

This chapter is concerned with applications of the SoP approach in practice and is oriented around the themes of social policy and social reproduction. The chapter first explores some of the contributions of the SoP approach to wider areas of scholarship, including consumption studies and understandings of social policy. The chapter then turns to explore more specific SoP applications focusing on selected areas of everyday life covering housing, water, health services and ‘fast’ fashion. The cases are mostly with reference to UK but with some case study material from South Africa, and the fashion case study relates to global supply chains. The chapter highlights the diversity in the materiality of what is provided, and the SoPs by which each of these reaches consumers or end users, across sectors and locations. This diversity across these cases clearly demonstrates that the drivers of consumption cannot be reduced to simple assumptions that are universally applicable. Furthermore, in the act of ‘consuming’, the consumer engages in an extensive chain of social relations but in ways of which they can be mostly unaware. The SoP approach unveils what is generally hidden from the consumer at the point of consumption.

Kate Bayliss, Ben Fine

Chapter 5. A SoP Approach to Understanding Food Consumption

Abstract

This chapter applies the SoP approach to the consumption of food which has become increasingly dysfunctional, with obesity set to create a global health epidemic. The chapter shows that these outcomes result from the intersections of cultures of food consumption and the systems by which food is produced. Capitalist imperatives underpinning food production create pressures to expand output in the pursuit of profitability, alongside the emergence of financialization which has created structures oriented around speculation alongside production in agriculture. Producers therefore need the food produced to be consumed. Neoliberalized systems of food production intersect with material cultures of food consumption to give rise to consumption norms. The chapter deploys the 10Cs (Chap. 3) to show that cultures are diverse and complex, needing reference to how food beliefs and practices are formed and the role of food producers within these. The chapter shows that the SoP approach offers significant insights regarding the limitations of dietary advice in improving health outcomes without stronger controls over the systemic processes around provisioning.

Kate Bayliss, Ben Fine

Chapter 6. Conclusion: The Contribution of the SoP Approach

Abstract

The SoP approach views consumption as attached to vertical chains of provisioning linked to the materiality of specific goods or services, shaped by the context and the agents associated with the system. This chapter locates the SoP approach within the wider body of systems-based consumption literature such as ‘consumption as practice’, highlighting the distinctive contribution offered. The chapter documents some of the empirical research that has applied the SoP approach often in combination with other theoretical perspectives on consumption. The chapter shows how the SoP approach can contribute to our understandings of some of the gravest threats facing society including climate change and inequality. The chapter concludes with reference to emerging global crises from finance through obesity to the pandemic of Covid-19, and shows how the SoP approach offers significant promise for future academic research and policymaking in these areas and beyond.

Kate Bayliss, Ben Fine

Backmatter

Titel: A Guide to the Systems of Provision Approach
verfasst von: Dr. Kate Bayliss
Prof. Ben Fine
Verlag: Springer International Publishing
Electronic ISBN: 978-3-030-54143-9
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-54142-2
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-54143-9

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Inhaltsverzeichnis

Frontmatter

Chapter 1. Introduction and Background to the SoP Approach

Chapter 2. The SoP Approach: Theoretical Background and Empirical Practice

Chapter 3. Understanding Material Cultures

Chapter 4. Insights from Operationalizing the Systems of Provision Approach

Chapter 5. A SoP Approach to Understanding Food Consumption

Chapter 6. Conclusion: The Contribution of the SoP Approach

Backmatter

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