炫耀式消费:一个文化政治学的视角（英文）

The Cultural Politics of Conspicuous Consumption in China

炫耀式消费的概念在19世纪被凡勃伦提出,但作为消费现象,它在中国有着更加深远的历史:管仲和范仲淹都曾倡导炫耀式消费以促进经济的发展。在发展模式及消费方式上,炫耀式消费在当代中国呈现出与西方并不完全一致的特征。经济因素之外,消费活动演变为炫耀行为的主要原因来自于消费品的符号价值,炫耀消费也因着与符号价值的同一性进入公共空间,在消费消费者的同时被围观和工具(政治)化。在身份流动不居的当代消费社会,传统儒家思想中对社会等级和等级消费制度的维护成为了炫耀式消费的文化无意识。

To adequately understand contemporary conspicuous consumption in China,one needs to put it in a historical background and look at it not only from an economic perspective but also from cultural and political points of view. Both China and the West have had the phenomenon of conspicuous consumption at different historical periods,which,in their own ways,have constituted different cultural and political narratives and have demonstrated in them different characteristics. Three Confucian values that affect Chinese people＇s consumption of luxurious commodities—namely,maintaining consistency between behavior and status,family reputation and the awareness of other people＇s influence—are the cultural reasons that distinguish Chinse conspicuous consumption from that of the Western mode.