Leisure and Consumption
Leisure and consumption have always been intimately linked, in the same way as work and production are. During the industrial Protestant era, consumption and leisure were seen as indulgent, decadent, feminine pursuits not worthy of serious intellectual analysis. One reason for this was that production, commerce, and industry were embodied in the concept of work, emphasized by the dominant culture of the time as central to the development of good character. Consumption, however, was seen as an inconsequential activity engaged in during one's leisure time. 
 
 
Keywords: 
 
commodity; 
leisure and recreation; 
sociology of leisure and tourism
Identity and the commodification of leisure
This paper examines the effect commodifying leisure has on its perceived quality for the individual. We argue that leisure has a great deal to contribute to individual identity in urban industrial society, but that this is being overshadowed in a market economy which commodifies leisure and produces it for a large number of people, with a focus on profit. This idea leads us to examine the conformity and gender stereotyping potentiality of leisure to act as a restrictive rather than a liberalizing influence on identity thus devaluing the experience of leisure. Finally, we suggest that leisure providers can redirect leisure policy to ensure access to leisure outside of a purely commercial realm, a leisure that is potentially self-exploring, self-determining, rather than purchased.
Deliberative Democracy and the Resource Curse: A Nationwide Experiment in Tanzania
Oil and gas discoveries in developing countries are often associated with short-sighted economic policies and, in response, calls to insulate resource management from populist impulses. We report on a randomized experiment testing methods to overcome this apparent tension between sound resource governance and democratic politics. Soon after Tanzania’s discovery of major natural gas reserves, we invited a nationally representative sample of voters to an intensive public deliberation of policy options featuring nationally recognized experts and small-group discussions. Democratic deliberation reinforced the public’s strong preference for rapid spending of gas revenues, but also increased support for various prudential and economically orthodox measures, including independent oversight of gas revenues, limits on government borrowing, and selling gas abroad rather than subsidizing fuel at home. These effects were driven by deliberation per se, rather than a pure information treatment, and show no evidence of contamination by facilitatoror peer-effects in group deliberations. www.cgdev.org Justin Sandefur, Nancy Birdsall, James Fishkin, and Mujobu Moyo