Alvin Toffler-The Third Wave-Origins of ‘Prosumer’
Toffler applied a so-called social ‘wave-front’ analysis to the study of human revolution in his book The Third Wave. He draws on the idea of categorising the history of revolution into three major phrases-Agricultural revolutions, the rise of Industrial Civilisation, and Civilisation.
For the purpose of the book, Toffler had given an overall time frame for each phrase of the Wave. He argues that the First Wave had begun ‘sometime around 8000 BC and to have donated the early unchallenged until sometime around 1650-1750. From this moment on, the First Wave lost momentum as the Second Wave picked up stream. Industrial civilisation, the product of this Second Wave, then dominated the planet its turn until it, too, crested. This latest historical turning point arrived in the United Sates during the decade beginning about 1955-the decade that saw white-collar and service workers out number blue-collar workers for the first time. This was the same decade that saw the widespread introduction of the computer commercial jet travel…it was precisely during this decade that the Third Wave began to gather its force in the United States… Today all the high technology nations are reeling from the collision between the Third Wave and the obsolete, encrusted economies and institutions of the Second.’ (Toffler, 1982) Pg 26
First Wave-Agricultural revolution-rise of Prosumer
Toffler summarises the rise of agriculture as the ‘turning point’ for human social development. He describes the people living in this era as these who ‘fed themselves by foraging, fishing, hunting, or herding' (Toffler, 1982). They consumed only of what they had produced. There was no exchange of goods or services available.
Thus, the distinction between producer and consumer was entirely blurred. A new term was giving to this category of people-Prosumers. They were the very first generation of Prosumers, as they produce and consume by themselves.
In order to illustrate the relationship between producer and consumer within this time frame, Toffler has applied two sections of production mode as follows:
Section A-people produced for their own use
Section B- people produced for trade or exchange. Pg 52
Since the First Wave people were of those who lived in small villages as tribes, it is evident that Section A constituted the majority of the population while only a small portion of the population occupied Section B.
This phrase of agricultural had subsided as technology moved on. There was only a small fraction of population (e.g such as South America or Papua New Guinea) that still lived on their own agricultural productions. In Toffler’s term, this phrase had ‘basically been spent’(Toffler, 1982).
Second Wave-Industrial Civilisation-Producer & Consumer split
‘The Second Wave, like some nuclear chain reaction, violently split apart two aspects of our lives that had always, until then, been one.’ Pg 51
From 1955 onwards, the emergence of the Second Wave is seen through the installation of ‘steel mills, auto plants, textile factories, railroads, and food processing plants’ (pg 27). This is the era where factories and cities began to spring up in New England, the mid-Altantic states and all around the world. Goods and services were produced for exchange of value, no longer for self-orientation purposes. A platform was created to allow these value exchanges, it was called the Market.
‘For the Market, properly speaking, is nothing more than an exchange network, a switchboard, as it were, through which goods or services, like messages, are routed to their appropriate destinations.’ Pg 53
Every product produced in the Second Wave was branded with commercial purposes. The outcome achieved by these commercial goods and services were used to measure the nation’s economic growth. Based on this practice, economists had then defined the word ‘economy’ as ‘all forms of work or production intended only for the market’. A clear cleavage between the role of producer and consumer was needed to run the Market. Thus, Prosumers of the First Wave had suddenly become invisible. Almost everyone in the Market consumed on what had been produced by someone else.
‘The two halves of human life that the Second Wave split apart were production and consumption.’ Pg51
Such division had influenced the human race in the following aspects:
1. Culture
The economy generated profit for the producers, money became essential in the chain of the Market. The Second Wave people are
accustomed to the money system and the commercialisation of not only tangible products such as clothing, furniture and food, but also intangible objects such as art, ideas and soul.
2. Politics
Within the Market, a rather contradicting theory exists due to the divorce of Production and Consumption. Producer is on demand for increased profit, increased wages, and increased sale. Consumers on the other hand, wish to obtain highest quality with lowest prices.
Such concept had generated political debates around the world. Consumer Protection policies such as Global Consumer Movement (formed in the March of 1960), or trade policies such as the establishment of Directive on Liability for Defective Products in 1985, or The introduction of Product Liability Act in Japan are just one of the many legislations built around this Second Wave era. (cite 1)
3. Psyches and assumptions about personality
The economy of the Second Wave had also effected on the division of work based on sexuality and gender. The industry automatically assumed man as the ‘objective’, female as ‘subjective’. Such division alternately transformed man to represent work life, and woman to represent home life.
Being the subjective character, men were taught to be independent, while women were ‘frequently regarded as incapable of the kind of rational, analytic thought that supposedly went with objectivity. Pg 58
Third wave-Civilisation pg 24-Prosumer emerges, again
In the early 1970s, a new pharmaceutical product was introduced to countries such as France, England, Holland, and other European countries. This product posed a major changing in paradigm to the Second Wave society. The product was called the Do-it-Yourself pregnancy test kit. The traditional way of visiting a doctor for a pregnancy test has now been replaced by a simple kit. The product had gained a huge success in that 15 to 20 million kits were sold to the consumers within one year of its release.
Ever since then, similar do-it-yourself products were developed for consumption. Consumers were no longer passive with the products, but instead, they took on the active role. What the do-it-yourself products had changed was the relationship between these ‘do-it-yourselfers’ and the professionals.
Statistics of 1974-1976 show that
‘For the first time, more than half of all building materials…were purchased directly by homeowners rather than by contractors doing work for them.’
Active Consumers began to perform tasks by themselves, they consume on their own productions. This leads the economy back to the First Wave culture-Prosumer culture.
Two major factors that caused this change in paradigm:
Global Inflection-
Toffler ties this back to the notion of Law of Relative Inefficiency. It provides ‘justice’ to the economy growth as follows
‘The more we automate the production of goods and lower their per-unit cost, the more we increase the relative cost of handcrafts and nonautomated services.’
As the price for these handcrafts and nonautomated services increases, low cost, high efficiency technologies began to emerge. These technologies were seen as Computer Aided Designs, the Web 2.0 and inexpensive manufacturing facilities in countries such China. Referring back to the Politics of the economy in the Second Wave, consumers seeking cheaper alternative for high quality products and services were encouraged to perform and produce for themselves. It is due to this law that the population of Section A began to increase.
Global Recession-
The beginning of Global Financial Crisis that hit the world’s economy in 2008 acted as another key factor to the rise of Prosumer culture.
The economy downturn had caused companies to downsize and forcing them to apply the advantages from Global Inflection to their production line, hence fostering alternative mode of production methods. Our case studies will illustrate how these production methods were adapted by the consumers within the Section A category.
‘Above all, as we shall see, Third Wave civilization begins to heal the historic breach between producer and consumer, giving rise to the ‘Prosumer’ economics of tomorrow.’ (Toffler, 1982)
For the purpose of the book, Toffler had given an overall time frame for each phrase of the Wave. He argues that the First Wave had begun ‘sometime around 8000 BC and to have donated the early unchallenged until sometime around 1650-1750. From this moment on, the First Wave lost momentum as the Second Wave picked up stream. Industrial civilisation, the product of this Second Wave, then dominated the planet its turn until it, too, crested. This latest historical turning point arrived in the United Sates during the decade beginning about 1955-the decade that saw white-collar and service workers out number blue-collar workers for the first time. This was the same decade that saw the widespread introduction of the computer commercial jet travel…it was precisely during this decade that the Third Wave began to gather its force in the United States… Today all the high technology nations are reeling from the collision between the Third Wave and the obsolete, encrusted economies and institutions of the Second.’ (Toffler, 1982) Pg 26
First Wave-Agricultural revolution-rise of Prosumer
Toffler summarises the rise of agriculture as the ‘turning point’ for human social development. He describes the people living in this era as these who ‘fed themselves by foraging, fishing, hunting, or herding' (Toffler, 1982). They consumed only of what they had produced. There was no exchange of goods or services available.
Thus, the distinction between producer and consumer was entirely blurred. A new term was giving to this category of people-Prosumers. They were the very first generation of Prosumers, as they produce and consume by themselves.
In order to illustrate the relationship between producer and consumer within this time frame, Toffler has applied two sections of production mode as follows:
Section A-people produced for their own use
Section B- people produced for trade or exchange. Pg 52
Since the First Wave people were of those who lived in small villages as tribes, it is evident that Section A constituted the majority of the population while only a small portion of the population occupied Section B.
This phrase of agricultural had subsided as technology moved on. There was only a small fraction of population (e.g such as South America or Papua New Guinea) that still lived on their own agricultural productions. In Toffler’s term, this phrase had ‘basically been spent’(Toffler, 1982).
Second Wave-Industrial Civilisation-Producer & Consumer split
‘The Second Wave, like some nuclear chain reaction, violently split apart two aspects of our lives that had always, until then, been one.’ Pg 51
From 1955 onwards, the emergence of the Second Wave is seen through the installation of ‘steel mills, auto plants, textile factories, railroads, and food processing plants’ (pg 27). This is the era where factories and cities began to spring up in New England, the mid-Altantic states and all around the world. Goods and services were produced for exchange of value, no longer for self-orientation purposes. A platform was created to allow these value exchanges, it was called the Market.
‘For the Market, properly speaking, is nothing more than an exchange network, a switchboard, as it were, through which goods or services, like messages, are routed to their appropriate destinations.’ Pg 53
Every product produced in the Second Wave was branded with commercial purposes. The outcome achieved by these commercial goods and services were used to measure the nation’s economic growth. Based on this practice, economists had then defined the word ‘economy’ as ‘all forms of work or production intended only for the market’. A clear cleavage between the role of producer and consumer was needed to run the Market. Thus, Prosumers of the First Wave had suddenly become invisible. Almost everyone in the Market consumed on what had been produced by someone else.
‘The two halves of human life that the Second Wave split apart were production and consumption.’ Pg51
Such division had influenced the human race in the following aspects:
1. Culture
The economy generated profit for the producers, money became essential in the chain of the Market. The Second Wave people are
accustomed to the money system and the commercialisation of not only tangible products such as clothing, furniture and food, but also intangible objects such as art, ideas and soul.
2. Politics
Within the Market, a rather contradicting theory exists due to the divorce of Production and Consumption. Producer is on demand for increased profit, increased wages, and increased sale. Consumers on the other hand, wish to obtain highest quality with lowest prices.
Such concept had generated political debates around the world. Consumer Protection policies such as Global Consumer Movement (formed in the March of 1960), or trade policies such as the establishment of Directive on Liability for Defective Products in 1985, or The introduction of Product Liability Act in Japan are just one of the many legislations built around this Second Wave era. (cite 1)
3. Psyches and assumptions about personality
The economy of the Second Wave had also effected on the division of work based on sexuality and gender. The industry automatically assumed man as the ‘objective’, female as ‘subjective’. Such division alternately transformed man to represent work life, and woman to represent home life.
Being the subjective character, men were taught to be independent, while women were ‘frequently regarded as incapable of the kind of rational, analytic thought that supposedly went with objectivity. Pg 58
Third wave-Civilisation pg 24-Prosumer emerges, again
In the early 1970s, a new pharmaceutical product was introduced to countries such as France, England, Holland, and other European countries. This product posed a major changing in paradigm to the Second Wave society. The product was called the Do-it-Yourself pregnancy test kit. The traditional way of visiting a doctor for a pregnancy test has now been replaced by a simple kit. The product had gained a huge success in that 15 to 20 million kits were sold to the consumers within one year of its release.
Ever since then, similar do-it-yourself products were developed for consumption. Consumers were no longer passive with the products, but instead, they took on the active role. What the do-it-yourself products had changed was the relationship between these ‘do-it-yourselfers’ and the professionals.
Statistics of 1974-1976 show that
‘For the first time, more than half of all building materials…were purchased directly by homeowners rather than by contractors doing work for them.’
Active Consumers began to perform tasks by themselves, they consume on their own productions. This leads the economy back to the First Wave culture-Prosumer culture.
Two major factors that caused this change in paradigm:
Global Inflection-
Toffler ties this back to the notion of Law of Relative Inefficiency. It provides ‘justice’ to the economy growth as follows
‘The more we automate the production of goods and lower their per-unit cost, the more we increase the relative cost of handcrafts and nonautomated services.’
As the price for these handcrafts and nonautomated services increases, low cost, high efficiency technologies began to emerge. These technologies were seen as Computer Aided Designs, the Web 2.0 and inexpensive manufacturing facilities in countries such China. Referring back to the Politics of the economy in the Second Wave, consumers seeking cheaper alternative for high quality products and services were encouraged to perform and produce for themselves. It is due to this law that the population of Section A began to increase.
Global Recession-
The beginning of Global Financial Crisis that hit the world’s economy in 2008 acted as another key factor to the rise of Prosumer culture.
The economy downturn had caused companies to downsize and forcing them to apply the advantages from Global Inflection to their production line, hence fostering alternative mode of production methods. Our case studies will illustrate how these production methods were adapted by the consumers within the Section A category.
‘Above all, as we shall see, Third Wave civilization begins to heal the historic breach between producer and consumer, giving rise to the ‘Prosumer’ economics of tomorrow.’ (Toffler, 1982)
