The Consumer Story only took shape much later, in the late 19th Century, and only became dominant across the world after the two World Wars, taking on its full form at the end of the last century and beginning of this. As the story took hold, consumption ceased to be just one act among many, and instead the why and the how and the what of every asp

This doesn’t mean we can easily abandon them though, but rather that marketing, social pressure, the expectation that our identity be expressed through consumption (and the evisceration of other avenues for its expression) conspire to make these ‘needs’ feel urgent and deep.

in the early 21st Century, the Consumer Story is collapsing under the weight of its own contradictions, and the Citizen Story is emerging. People are dissatisfied with being mere Consumers, yearn for deeper agency even though we lack the words to express it, and have an innate if imprecise sense that authentic participation holds the key to a brigh