The Power of Consumer Organisations

Examines consumerism and its causes and also distinguishes the possibilities of improving consumers' position. Stresses the command of purchasing demand functions as a basis of consumers' power, e.g. the greater the purchasing demand the greater the ability to use it in alternative ways through choice or demand flexibility, the greater the potential power of the purchasers over the supplier. Consumers and the extent to which market behaviour can be influences by means of comparative product‐testing and other kinds of information, thus determine the importance of consumer organizations as a social power factor. Mentions two main results regarding analysis: there appears little support for the theory of a hierarchy of effects; and the explained variance was for most of the within‐group analyses considerably lower for members than non‐members.