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The consumer in public services: Choice, values and difference

Online ISBN:
9781447303725
Print ISBN:
9781847421814
Publisher:
Policy Press
Book

The consumer in public services: Choice, values and difference

Richard Simmons (ed.),
Richard Simmons
(ed.)
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Martin Powell (ed.),
Martin Powell
(ed.)
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Published:
15 April 2009
Online ISBN:
9781447303725
Print ISBN:
9781847421814
Publisher:
Policy Press

Abstract

This book challenges existing stereotypes about the ‘consumer as chooser’. It shows how we must develop a more sophisticated understanding of consumers, examining their place and role as users of public services. The analysis shows that there are many different ‘faces’ of the consumer and that it is not easy to categorise users in particular environments. Drawing on empirical research, the book critiques established assumptions surrounding citizenship and consumption. Choice may grab the policy headlines, but other essential values are revealed as important throughout the book. One issue concerns the ‘subjects’ of consumerism, or who it is that presents themselves when they come to use public services. Another concerns consumer ‘mechanisms’, or the ways that public services try to relate to these people. Bringing these issues together, with contributions from a range of leading researchers, the message is that today's public services must learn to cope with a differentiated public.

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