The Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of Consumption and Consumer Studies

Needs, True and False

GEORGIOS PATSIAOURAS

University of Leicester, UK

DOI: 10.1002/9781118989463.wbeccs181

Human needs vary considerably across different historical periods, cultures, and economic contexts. Traditionally, the conception of fundamental and “economic” human needs has been approached, examined, and classified via hierarchical order (Maslow 1943) and ontological taxonomy (Max-Neef 1989), among other perspectives. From the mid-twentieth century, several scholars associated with the Frankfurt School began to discuss an emerging distinction between “true” and “false” needs which could be found primarily in advanced capitalistic and industrial societies. With a focus on the US context, members of the Frankfurt School highlighted the gradual replacement of individuals' “true” needs by “false” ones through their observations of the rise of consumer culture, conspicuous consumption practices, mass production, marketing techniques, and advertising as means of creating new desires, consumption lifestyles, archetypes, and increased consumer demand.

The German philosopher and sociologist Herbert Marcuse elaborated on how one can identify the difference between true and false needs. Marcuse (1964) suggested that there are few essential human needs that should be satisfied in every society, arguing that “the only needs that have an unqualified claim for satisfaction are the vital ones – nourishment, clothing, lodging at the attainable level of culture” (p. 5). The satisfaction ...