Cluster III — Chapter 34

Consumer Scapegoatism

Aitor Marcos, University of the Basque Country, Spain

Keywords: Agency, blame game, green consumerism, individual behavior change, policy design

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Definition
History
Different Perspectives
Application
Further Reading

Definition

The defining characteristic of consumer scapegoatism is the tendency to assign responsibility for the sustainability transition to individual consumers and citizens, without adequately considering whether they can significantly influence the outcome or the relevant players in the system. A paradigmatic case of consumer scapegoatism is the systematic use of pro-environment claims to encourage the consumption of goods and services, a practice known as green consumerism. The promotion of green consumerism by governments and markets makes consumers responsible for both sustaining economic growth and pushing the socio-economic system toward ecological sustainability – despite consumers’ limited ability to do so.

Consumer scapegoatism arises whenever consumers’ agency is not properly weighted against the urgency, magnitude, and scale of the problem of Earth’s ecological imbalance. Therefore, a policy can be considered a form of consumer scapegoatism if it exaggerates the importance of individual behavior change while obscuring the – more important – role of broader socio-technical context and power systems that ultimately shape ways of living. This kind of reasoning tends to align with market-based regulatory measures and favors efficiency over sufficiency, thereby not challenging the paradigm of continued economic growth.

An example of consumer scapegoatism is the belief that a tax on plastic bags will effectively address the issue of plastic waste. However, this economic incentive fails to tackle the root causes of plastic proliferation. Such market-based measures simply force consumers to adjust their behavior, while failing to force companies to reconsider the economic logic that makes producing vast quantities of cheap, disposable plastic bags financially viable to the point of distributing them for free.

History

The concept of consumer scapegoatism, as it relates to sustainable consumption, was introduced in 2014 by Lewis Akenji in an article titled Consumer Scapegoatism and Limits to Green Consumerism. The concept embodies a critique that gained momentum in the early 2000s denouncing how sustainable consumption, with its focus on increasing “ecoefficiency”, has been poorly used as a policy concept since the Rio Earth Summit in 1992. Thereafter, from the World Summit for Sustainable Development in 2002 to the establishment of Sustainable Development Goal 12 in 2015, sustainable consumption only entered the policy agenda by being increasingly appropriated by corporate marketing. It deliberately conflated sustainable consumption with green consumerism, which refers to the consumption of products and services that claim to be environmentally friendly.

The primary intent and theoretical contribution of the concept of consumer scapegoatism is to clarify that green consumerism and sustainable consumption are different approaches to sustainability (see Table 34.1), despite current policies and mainstream thinking often failing to distinguish between the two.

Akenji argued that promoting green consumerism is a form of consumer scapegoatism because it misses the core idea of sustainable consumption and provides an illusion of progress that distracts from the urgent structural changes needed for the sustainability transition. This timely theoretical distinction between green consumerism and sustainable consumption was welcomed as a response to governments and companies that expected individual consumers to drive the shift toward sustainable consumption and production patterns through their purchasing choices alone.

The uptake of the concept of consumer scapegoatism directly challenges the market-driven axiom that if consumers were aware of the environmental impact of their choices, they would fix unsustainable consumption and production simply by buying differently and pressuring companies with their market power. However, the reality is that the burden of complex choices and everyday decisions further reduces the already little influence of consumers over powerful actors in large corporations and government agencies.

Different Perspectives

Consumer scapegoatism is a useful concept for scholars who want to convey the difference between weak and strong sustainability approaches. In broad terms, weak sustainability is similar to green consumerism, while strong sustainability relates to sustainable living. Weak sustainability involves buying energy-saving, recycled, or recyclable products out of a sense of moral duty. It emphasizes efficiency and new technologies, failing to question an economic growth model fueled by an ever-increasing production of green goods and services. In contrast, strong sustainability aims to understand the root causes of why we consume, emphasizing sufficiency. From this perspective, an excessive focus on promoting weak sustainability and not intervening at a preventive level is consumer scapegoatism.

As Akenji and Bengtsson suggest in their “Triple I framework”, consumers might not be the most influential stakeholder in the value chain – consumers just happen to be the most visible actor. The market and policy emphasis on promoting green consumerism ignores that most consumption decisions are influenced by infrastructure, technology, social norms, and power dynamics within the production-consumption nexus. However, this conceptual flaw persists in popular models like the “ABC framework” and the “i-frame” (see Box 34.1).

Box 34.1. Social science frameworks highlight the lack of consumer agency

The “Triple I framework” in sustainable consumption

Akenji and Bengtsson’s Triple I framework helps to identify consumption drivers and power distribution among stakeholders in a value chain, and points for policy interventions. The “I”s stand for each stakeholder group’s Interest, their Influence upon one another, and the Instruments they use to exert power. The Triple I framework can be used to assign responsibility based on each stakeholder’s capacity, rather than their visibility. This framework assumes that if the most influential stakeholder is targeted by policy, it can drive positive changes throughout the value chain due to its influence.

Moving beyond the “ABC framework” in the social sciences

The “ABC framework” is a dominant way of thinking in the social sciences that focuses on influencing individual behaviors to combat climate change by targeting Attitudes, Behaviors, and Choices. The emphasis on educating people, incentivizing ecofriendly actions, and promoting voluntary behavior changes often favors the shift of responsibilities away from governments and avoids addressing broader structural changes. Elizabeth Shove calls for moving beyond the ABC framework to critically consider social practice theories, recognizing that household consumption depends not only on consumer attitudes but also on the broader socio-technical context.

The “i-frame” and “s-frame” in behavioral science

Behavioral science has biased public policy toward addressing societal problems at the individual level without system changes. The “i-frame” approach, focusing on individual behavior, has shown modest results and diverted attention from systemic solutions. Chater and Loewenstein (2023) recommend designing systemic solutions (adopting an “s-frame”) for more effective public policy, which can be applicable to a wide range of issues, from climate change to obesity.

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The concept of consumer scapegoatism also resonates with ecological economists, particularly those who challenge the idea of green growth (i.e., progressively decoupling economic growth from environmental impacts). These voices argue that with an overemphasis on individual action, consumers are put in a delicate place: responsible for sustaining economic growth while burdened with steering the system toward sustainability. Degrowth scholarship, for instance, argues that expecting consumers to solely drive the sustainability transition through the market and better technologies oversimplifies the need for systemic changes. This exaggeration of consumer agency is fundamental to consumer scapegoatism. Moreover, consumer scapegoatism complements ecological economics’ critique of the economic growth paradigm by identifying consumers as powerless actors, yet responsible for maintaining economic growth through their ever-increasing consumption.

Application

Consumer scapegoatism provides a blueprint for the type of reasoning to avoid when designing sustainable consumption policy. The Attitudes-Facilitators-Infrastructure (AFI) framework was developed to assist policymakers in steering clear of consumer scapegoatism when promoting sustainable consumption (see Box 34.2).

Box 34.2. The Attitudes-Facilitators-Infrastructure (AFI) framework

The three elements of the AFI framework enable a systemic approach to sustainable consumption policy design while avoiding consumer scapegoatism:

Fostering pro-environmental attitudes.
Establishing facilitators of access to sustainable options while restricting unsustainable ones.
Developing the necessary infrastructure and product options for living sustainably.

By integrating these three elements in policy design, policymakers can simultaneously address drivers of consumer behavior, consider and influence other relevant stakeholders, and promote products and services to meet both individual and societal needs.

Policymakers following the AFI framework are better equipped to tackle issues such as:

The attitude-behavior gap in consumer choice.
Behavior change being restrained by lock-in to prevailing systems and infrastructure.
Macro-level social and physical factors influencing consumption patterns.

The AFI framework can help guide a more holistic approach to sustainable consumption policy by redirecting policymakers’ attention to reforming the systems and infrastructure, predetermining consumers’ degree of flexibility in adopting sustainable lifestyles. This holistic approach avoids fully blaming consumers for a consumption process not fully in their control. For instance, the promotion of recycling can perpetuate the myth that minor post-consumption lifestyle changes and educated purchases of recyclable items are enough for sustainable living. In reality, recycling is a resource-intensive process that, without the required infrastructure, may significantly increase pollution.

Lastly, the notion of consumer scapegoatism serves as a warning that sustainable consumption policies risk being biased toward efficiency and market-based solutions. For example, incenti- vizing the adoption of a new generation of energy-efficient appliances, such as refrigerators or air conditioners, may initially seem like a sound policy, as these products typically consume less energy. However, rewarding the exchange of previously purchased appliances with discounts on similar products ultimately promotes further consumption, while failing to encourage the extended use of older, still functional appliances. Although consumers may benefit financially through discounts and energy savings, the potential ecological benefits are undermined by the ongoing cycle of consumption.