Advertising and Economy - II - Implications of the Mass Market

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Mass production demands a mass market and a mass distribution system. The very survival of this production system demands it's continuous expansion. Such a expansion means also the expansion of the market, beyond the seats of productions and even beyond the boundaries of the country. This may be called the horizontal, spatial or geo-graphical expansion of the market. Such an expansion is both national and international. AT the same time there is also a vertical expansion of the market. The objective is to bring the entire society within the orbit of the market. This does not mean only providing the individual or the family with resources to purchase goods and services in the market. A disposable surplus is not enough. A 'psychic desire' to consume more and different products has also to be created. Expansion of the market also means the creation of new good and services and making them acceptable to the consumer. Without such continuos expansion of the market, the capitalist economy cannot survive. This is constant process of the renewal and increase of capital passing through the market.

For this, people have to be informed, motivated and persuaded. With a mass market, national and international, this is only possible through a specialized communication system. Thus, modern advertising evolved, to meet precisely this requirement of capitalist economic system. It's social relevance in the industrialist/capitalist system is to direct the desire of human beings, latent and expressed, their needs, in such a way, as to ensure the continuation and expansion of a sales of goods and services, so essential to sustain mass production by accumulated capital. Advertising is thus a integral component of the mass distribution system of industrial capitalism. In the process of bringing consumers in touch with products or services, advertising also helps in create new consumers. Thus. it is involved in the social production of consumers, on which industrial capitalism thrives. Advertising is thus not only a product of industrial capitalism, but also it's promoter.

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