Book review: Consumption in China, by LiAnne Yu
Talk of China's growing middle class and rising domestic consumption is enough to send economists and CEOs into fits of excitement
by LiAnne Yu
Polity Press
3 stars
Talk of China's growing middle class and rising domestic consumption is enough to send economists and CEOs into fits of excitement.
LiAnne Yu, an anthropologist who has also worked as a consumer consultant for multinationals looking to break into China, has put together a thorough examination of the issues surrounding the mainland's growing consumer base.
She draws on extensive research and also on her own experiences, opening with an anecdote about being barked at by an unfriendly shopkeeper while studying in Beijing in 1990: her request to see a hot-water thermos kept behind the counter annoyed the merchant.
It is an illustration of the central thrust of this book - that the growth of a consumer culture is the most remarkable repercussion of China's opening up, a trend that will continue to accelerate over the coming years.
As if to hammer this point home, Yu writes that just a decade after her encounter with the inhospitable shopkeeper, a Starbucks opened on the grounds of the Forbidden City. Despite closing in 2007 due to uproar that the culturally significant site was being sullied by commercialisation, it's a perfect illustration of some of the contradictions at the heart of the consumer rise on the mainland.
