Towards a hegemonic consumption-based model of shopping-tourist-residential territory (consumpnity)

A comparative case study in China, Mexico, Spain, and the United Arab Emirates

Abstract

This article introduces the socio-spatial category of consumpnity (a neologism combining the words “consumption” and “community”) based on the comparative study of four shopping-tourist-residential territories located in China, Mexico, Spain, and the United Arab Emirates. We aim to describe and interpret a combination of six elements that have allowed us to generate the above category: consumpnities are communities of residents; the space they occupy is private property; they have a clearly demarcated area; the access of any person to the space is controlled in some way; they provide superfluous commercial services; and they are an attractive tourist destination. We developed our research through a combination of methods: documentary research, content analysis, ethnographic fieldwork, and cartographic representation. Our text aims to contribute significantly to the academic debates on the logics of capitalist accumulation: in a new way, in its intensity and accelerated speed, dominant economic groups generate a pattern of socio-spatial exploitation –consumpnity– that elevates consumption to a hegemonic form of relationship.