Choice, calculation, and consumer empowerment

Consumer choices are always relationally produced, an outcome of consumers’ inevitable reliance on such entities as choice architectures, calculation tools, discourses, and more. This means that giving consumers choice does not make them free from external influences. But if consumer choice cannot fully liberate consumers, must we abandon choice promotion as a path to consumer empowerment, a widely embraced approach in neoliberal societies? While this seems to be the conclusion of many critics of empowerment-through-choice, this conceptual article argues that choice promotion can still play an important role in empowering consumers. We make our case by developing a Callonian perspective on choice and consumer empowerment, which calls attention to the role of “calculative devices” in configuring consumers as more or less powerful choosers. We identify four qualities of calculative devices that enhance the “calculative power” of consumers: (1) calculative enrichment, (2) calculative stabilization, (3) calculative flexibilization, and (4) calculative contestation. The Callonian perspective opens new ways to study consumer empowerment and offers a critical account of consumer autonomy.