Ethical consumption and Sustainable Development 

There is broad agreement that achieving sustainable development requires profound changes in consumption patterns. Yet consumption is notoriously resistant to change, as it is deeply embedded in social identities, lifestyles, and structures of inequality. My research therefore examines the social foundations of ethical consumption. What motivates individuals to adopt sustainable practices such as fair trade or vegetarianism? How does ethical consumption shape political participation and contribute to the reproduction of social inequalities in contemporary societies? And how can we account for the striking global disparities in the prevalence of sustainable consumption? By uncovering the social drivers and barriers of ethical consumption, my work seeks to contribute to more effective pathways toward sustainable development.

Important publications:

Schenk, Patrick, Jörg Rössel, and Manuel Scholz (2018). Motivations and Constraints of Meat Avoidance. Sustainability 10:1-19.

Schenk, Patrick (2019): A Matter of Principle: Comparing Norm-Based Explanations for Fair Trade Consumption. Journal of Consumer Policy 42(3): 397-423.

Rössel, Jörg, and Patrick Schenk (2018). How Political is Political Consumption? The Case of Activism for the Global South and Fair Trade. Social Problems: 266-284.