Date of Submission
Fall 2020
Academic Program
Economics; Global and International Studies
Project Advisor 1
Robert Culp
Project Advisor 2
Sanjaya DeSilva
Abstract/Artist's Statement
The Chinese skincare market distinguishes itself with an inelastic consumer demand during the COVID-19 pandemic. This project employs the endogenous preferences economic framework and a sociohistorical lens to analyze the social forces that sustain the resilient beauty market. Through setting up a socially embedded framework for economic analysis, this project highlights the active role of marketers, which are omitted in mainstream economics, in fostering a bond between consumers and skincare products. With a comparative analysis of both the colonial and the COVID-19 pandemic contexts, this project demonstrates how marketers connect consumers to skincare products through reference to the system of social values and priorities that are inscribed in that historical context – the color hierarchy in the colonial period and the reviving emphasis on health and hygiene during the COVID-19 pandemic. In other words, this project unfolds innovative ways that marketers leverage to cultivate and perpetuate a consistent consumption pattern for goods that resonate with certain desirable habitus related to race, gender, and class ideologies.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Recommended Citation
Chen, Siren, "Viewing the COVID-19 Resilient Skincare Market through a Sociohistorical Lens: The Patterning of Conspicuous Consumption Mediated by Marketing" (2020). Senior Projects Fall 2020. 34.
https://digitalcommons.bard.edu/senproj_f2020/34
This work is protected by a Creative Commons license. Any use not permitted under that license is prohibited.
