Consumer Trap

Michael Dawson is an adjunct lecturer in the department of sociology at Portland State University

"Big Brother is alive and well and working for Madison Avenue. Michael Dawson tells us what the media won't, how Big Business brainwashes citizens into consumers and undermines democracy. Everyone who fears the Thought Police should read this brilliant exposé."--John Stauber, coauthor of Toxic Sludge Is Good for You: Lies, Damn Lies, and the Public Relations Industry "Michael Dawson's meticulous and illuminating research into marketing theory and practice lays bare some of the most important developments of the twentieth century: the ways in which the sophisticated and self-conscious 'class coercion' designed by and for business leaders passed beyond meticulous management of the workplace to 'manipulating people's off-the-job perceptions and actions.' The goal is to ensure, as far as possible, that the lives of the 'underlying population' (in Veblen's phrase) will be in the hands of the masters of the highly concentrated private economy. Dawson adds new insights to expose still further the mythology of 'consumer sovereignty' and 'free markets,' and sketches directions for a humane alternative to domination by 'corporate overlords' and the state power to which they are closely linked."--Noam Chomsky "This well-documented study is a fascinating read."--Choice