Going Shopping: Consumer Choices and Community Consequences. (Political booknotes: the shopping news).

GOING SHOPPING: Consumer Choices and Community Consequences

by Ann Satterthwaite Yale University Press, $39.95

"I UNDERSTAND CLEARLY THE horror, and the reason people are down and depressed, but we have got to pull together and get the economy moving again," Maryland Governor Parris N. Glendening told The Washington Post at the end of September. He and four other governors had just flown to New York City, where they caught a Broadway show and ate Reuben sandwiches and cheesecake at the Carnegie Deli--all to show Americans that "it's okay to go shopping," even in the wake of a calamity.

The Lion King probably wasn't on the mind of Washington, D.C., city planner Ann Satterthwaite when she wrote Going Shopping: Consumer Choices and Community Consequences, but the good-faith efforts of those like Glendening to get people out there spending underscore an idea central to her book--that shopping is a public concern which should be treated as such.

Satterthwaite offers a wide-ranging look at what she considers the social and civic role of retailing, including a history of shopping and a prediction of future trends. Parts of Going Shopping feel a little nostalgic, even though the book is new--not too long ago, the sight of governors urging people to spend would have been strange--it seemed we were shopping too much, not too little. The Smiths were spending themselves into debt to keep up with the Joneses, often at the expense of spending more free time with the family, becoming more involved in the community, or simply enjoying life's ephemeral pleasures. Not only were too many Americans bowling alone, they were spending too much on shiny new bowling balls.

Satterthwaite anticipates the paradox of an economy built on consumption, something we've experienced firsthand since September 11. While shopping (well, too much shopping, anyway) may be bad for the individual, the environment, and, of course, urban planning, it's clearly vital to our nation's fiscal health. "It is hard to determine whether rising aspirations or the economy's need to sell more goods came first," she writes, "but they have been intricately connected."

While Satterthwaite couldn't have anticipated September's attacks, she does recognize that the frenetic consumerism of the 1990s was approaching an end. She warns that if Americans have finally dropped from shopping, "the retail world, whose survival depends on satisfying consumer demands, will have to respond" While no specifics are provided, she does offer one scenario that may make for an instructive parallel. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, retailers responded to the hippie movement not by dismantling suburban consumer culture, but by co-opting hippie fashion--leading one to wonder whether today's retailers might respond to the soul-searching that's followed recent events by appealing to our suddenly "simpler" lifestyle.

As a critic, Satterthwaite is not one of those fusty public scolds who sees shopping as the root of all evil. Rather, she views it as a force behind everything from suburban sprawl to savings rates, and even as a potentially liberating activity. In what now qualifies as a timely aside, she notes that in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, women who visit malls can escape the scrutiny of religious police, remove their veils, and "enjoy some wafts of freedom."

Using shopping as a framework allows Satterthwaite broad latitude to delve into related subjects. Along with consumption, for instance, there's a chapter devoted to urban planning, including retail's prominent role in the designs of preplanned communities like Greenbelt, Maryland, and Reston, Virginia. She also suggests community policies that will ensure the market meets retailing needs, such as reversing retail gentrification by having communities subsidize non-boutique stores.

Though interesting, these sections owe a debt to earlier works, such as James Howard Kunstler's Geography of Nowhere and Joel Garreau's Edge City. But Satterthwaite does demonstrate how edge cities and their mammoth private malls have displaced shopping venues from their once-central role in American civic life. As Satterthwaite's historical material reveals, large department stores once were central to communities: Filene's in Boston sold $51 million in war bonds during World War II. Atlanta's Rich Department Stores let school teachers cash city-issued scrip during the Great Depression, and, after World War II, gave returning servicemen cash advances. The Chevy Chase branch of D.C.'s now-defunct Woodward & Lothrop housed a 300-seat auditorium that outside groups could use for free.

Times change. In 1996, someone circulating a petition for Ralph Nader's candidacy was denied access to a mall until he secured the approval of the New Jersey Supreme Court. So it is no small irony that in light of September's terrorist attacks, spending your money at the mall may turn out to be a statement of civic responsibility.

JOE DEMPSEY is a research associate at the New America Foundation in Washington, DC.