explaining conspicuous consumption 27
who experience status anxiety, mostly as a result of sudden social mobility,
are expected to be among the most enthusiastic consumers of expensive
status goods. Actors who inhabit a marginal position in the social hier-
archy, on the cusp of becoming a great power (or losing that status) or
just about to gain (or lose) membership in a coveted club, are also likely
to exhibit enhanced prestige- seeking behavior. The theory also identifies
several structural conditions that can affect the proclivity of actors to en-
gage in conspicuous consumption: the size of the relevant group of com-
petitors, the general level of social mobility, and the degree of intersub-
jective communal agreement regarding the qualities that deserve prestige
are some of the conditions discussed so far.
Finally, the theory posits several core mechanisms that should generate
repeated patterns of behavior across space and time. Pecuniary emulation
and invidious comparison, for example, should lead to constant instabil-
ity of status symbols as snobs and bandwagoners engage in an endless
game of imitation and distinction. The logic of costly signals, another cor-
nerstone of the Veblenian approach, should lead to a coupling of cost
and claims of prestige. As the potlatch demonstrates, when taken to the
extreme, as in the case of pure Veblen goods, claims for prestige may be
associated with overtly wasteful and extravagant consumption.
In order to explore whether conspicuous consumption offers a more
plausible account of why international actors pursue certain policies, I
focus on four issues.
1. price. Conspicuous consumption employs the logic of costly signals.
Consequently, establishing the relative costliness of consumption is an
important first step in establishing the plausibility of the argument. Cost
can come into play in several ways. It can be measured in absolute terms
(how much does a carrier cost?), it can be measured vis- à- vis possible
substitutes (the cost of the F- 20 in contrast to that of the F- 15 ), and it
can be demonstrated through extravagance and waste (burning one’s own
property in a potlatch).
2. conspicuousness. The preference for conspicuousness stands at the
heart of the theory. When prestige is in play, we expect actors to prefer
conspicuousness often at the expense of other dimensions of consump-
tion. Hence, we expect a conspicuous act of consumption to be preferred
over a less conspicuous one even if (and, at times, especially if ) it is more
expensive or less functional than the alternative. Equally, we expect actors
