The Logics of Frugality: Reproducing Tastes of Necessity among Affluent Climate Change Activists

To align with my interests, I designed a questionnaire to screen for three main characteristics: strong beliefs in human-caused climate change, a commitment to some behavioral changes, and high income. I also sought subjects who were 18 or older, living in the USA, had completed their educational years and were no longer in school.

After capturing as large a sample as possible ($N\; =\; 153$), I sorted respondents by household income, climate change beliefs, and high (self-) assessments of behavioral change (i.e., they expressed making behavioral changes due to climate change). From these categories I interviewed those with the strongest beliefs and highest incomes (e.g., $100,000 to $150,000 and over $150,000).³ Some respondents had travelled a long distance to see the Pope, but 21 of the 28 people I finally interviewed lived in metropolitan DC area; most others came from the Northeast, USA.

Though question design was informed by Bourdieusian theory (detailed below), the interviews followed a grounded model with an emphasis on open-ended questions and data collection from “the ground” [49,50]. I then coded each interview, extracting themes, of which frugality was but one. During the interviews, I would generally explain to my respondents that I was interested in the origins of their activism and how they became “who they are as activists” or “what made them tick.” Because of my Bourdieusian interest in social class, the habitus, and social reproduction, I asked respondents to detail their family origins and the education, occupations, and wealth of their parents and grandparents. I sought to probe how current lifestyle might be related to social reproduction and early life socialization [1].

A “Bourdieusian approach” means that I consider how people are socialized and positioned for earning cultural and economic profits in certain fields of struggle. I also observe how people navigate these fields by means of an inculcated or unconscious habitus—an embodied system of dispositions that both reproduces and is a product of these fields. Additionally, the valued phenomena and currencies of a field are considered capitals—economic, cultural, social, familial, and educational. Bourdieu [1] generally considered social space as overlapped with different fields, where individuals and groups sought to accumulate capitals and dominate the most cherished logics of a field—and a role in defining those logics.

Practically speaking, with respect to possible logics and practices, frugality can be considered a cultural capital, a disposition which was bred into and emanates from the habitus. When well matched to a field—of frugal “play,” a frugal disposition will seek to accumulate profits and capitals—distinctions; but when not well matched (i.e., in a consumer culture) frugality may prove a liability.

Though they were relatively affluent, some activists spoke of having grown up in a forced frugality of economic constraint (e.g., being born

into a working-class family, poverty, or the Great Depression). Like Bourdieu's taste of necessity [1,p. 178], families had no choice but to be frugal. However, even as the necessity dissipated, like a type of inertia, some older and now affluent activists still maintained frugal habits.

For example, when I asked Joe, a 54-year-old Rabbi, to detail the education levels and occupations of his parents and grandparents, he responded:

So, my parents grew up... during the Depression.... with a considerable awareness of the need for frugality. And of the difficulty, uh, you know, and precariousness of life. My father's parents were less well off, but managed. They ran a small furniture making and repair and upholstery service in [Kansas]. But it was their own business. And uh, you know, they managed; often, both, both families bartering to some degree.

Joe also detailed a similar frugal “ethic” on his Mom's side of the family...

...my dad's parents had their own small business, and my mom's parents owned a little farm, and then that grandfather was the tractor repair and salesperson. But none of them had college educations, and all of them were extremely frugal and, and believed in fixing things and repairing things. And so that was their ethic, I mean, it was just like, you made do.

Frugality, for Joe, was framed by economic constraint; an effect of being “less well off” and a “precariousness of life.” His parents and grandparents—without college education—made do, bartered, and managed. Other respondents also recounted similar narratives of economic constraint and responding practices of frugality. I conceptualize this forced frugality as more egoistic and semiconscious as it was scripted as a near act of personal survival (though certainly larger collectivities could be subject to it).

Connected to necessity and forced frugality—but with less necessity and economic constraint—was a frugality that tended toward thrift and

cost savings in order to transfer resources toward other purposes.⁹ Some activists spoke of conserving money in one area of their lives for the sake of another. Juan, another respondent, spoke of his frugality in this way. At 27 years old, he was my youngest participant. Juan said he came from a relatively wealthy family in Latin America and except for perhaps impressions from a Catholic mother and a hardworking grandmother, Juan seems to have developed rather than inherited frugality. Though Juan never used the term thrift; when explaining some of his past interactions with people and money, I noted it:

... I've never have had a lot of money,... but I've had everything. So, if that makes sense.... I never went through starvation,... Yeah of course,... I couldn't do everything that my friends did or do, but sometimes they would invite me to their fancy club or their fancy houses. I mean,... I was able to live a wealthy life living in a down to earth household. [laughs]... I never lacked, I never lacked anything.... really, I still do what I want. I, I'm very conscious about money. I save. I am very, I guess, some people call me cheap, I call myself frugal,... and sometimes when it's the time to spend money, I spend money in the spur of the experience and sometimes I just save it. But I still do what I like to do and.... I guess the reason that I have enough money to do what I like is because I never buy clothes and I never buy stupid shit that I don't need.

In this script, Juan navigates between not having much money and never being in lack. He also seemed to arrive at a type of self-realization when admitting that the reason he had enough money to do what he wanted was because he never bought “stupid shit.” Juan saved, in a thrifty manner, in one area of his life in order to spend in another. I conceptualize this thrifty frugality as a more deliberative (seemingly planned) and egoistic logic as it was described more as self-concern (though it could include social concerns).

There was a “waste-not” frugality; like a responsibility to conserve for its own sake—a mindfulness/conscientiousness—as if resources were sacrosanct and had a worth of their own. “Waste-not” also engaged a powerful moral sentiment: resources as a common store that other entities (people, animals, or plants) should share. I detected a waste-not logic in a narrative from Elaine, a 70-year-old public health consultant, who grew up on a farm in Iowa; she spoke of a waste-not frugality after I specifically asked her. I include part of our dialogue below:

JB: More than one person has mentioned the Depression, and some people talk about a culture of frugality as far as their behavior and stuff like that. Does that ring a bell with you or anything like that?

Elaine: Yes, I've been called frugal and cheap even. [laughs] So yeah, that, you're right, thanks for bringing that up. Because when I talked about my lifestyle I really didn't mention that. But yeah, I mean I don't, I don't throw things away as long as they're working. Um, you know, I have a little square TV set. [laughs] I just, yeah, it's like, if it works I'll just use it until it falls apart.

Also Bob, a 38-year-old communications officer with a Ph.D. in the history of science, touched upon a waste-not frugality (while also mentioning other motivations)...

I'm just conscientious of wasting resources. I'm just... I don't believe in waste, of any form.... one can, with being conscientious, minimize it, so I think a combination of caring for the environment; like

the less electricity I use the less, um, our power plants need to work, and then, two, just general, being frugal and, and cost savings.

Although I brought up the subject of frugality, Elaine built on it and mentioned a practice of using things to the fullness of their life; while Bob spoke of a conscientiousness and not believing in waste. I conceptualize this waste-not frugality as a more deliberative and social-altruistic logic as it was described with an emphasis on reason and focused beyond the self.

There was a related “waste-not” frugality that was reinterpreted—or reframed—as environmental stewardship: a moral obligation to walk gently on the earth. This was touched upon by Bob above when he mentioned a combined motive of “caring for the environment,” but it is perhaps most dramatically addressed by Gayle, a 77-year-old, who became environmentally active later in life with her first protest action and arrest at a “coal-fired plant” at the age of 72 (by the time of our interview she had been arrested four times in all). I include some of our dialogue because Gayle combines a few logics together—environmental, ideology, and oppositional, (forthcoming below)—when speaking of the lifestyle she has with her husband:

Gayle: Although we have a wonderful life. You know we've... yeah, it's just, it's an ideology with me: I cut my own hair. You know I shop sales. It's just, to me, if I do the other way, I feel stupid.

JB: How do you mean stupid?

Gayle: Well that I fall for the corporate enticement. 'You can have this. This is you.' You know, 'You're worth it.' George Bush said, after the Iraq war, someone said, 'What can we do?' And he said, 'Shop.'

JB: Yeah. He did say that. And so that sounds like a stupid response to you.

Gayle: Beyond stupid, criminal, because we're using the resources of six worlds now.

Though frugality for Gayle was motivationally mixed—and I revisit this further below, she also scripted a moral/criminal argument with “six worlds” seemingly in the balance. By reference to “six worlds” Gayle reveals her knowledge of the literature and the analogy of how many planets would be needed if everyone consumed like an average U.S. citizen [57,58]. Gayle and Bob were not alone in referring to an environmental concern while they explained their motives for frugality. I conceptualize environmental frugality as a more deliberative and biospheric logic as it seemed well reasoned and extended beyond social concerns.

As already touched upon in my conversations with Juan and Elaine, certain respondents admitted to being cheap or called cheap by their friends—like Juan didn't want to buy “stupid shit” and Elaine wanted to use things for their full life. For Bob, being cheap almost seemed to run in the family; he talked to me about his grandfather...

My grandfather grew up in the Great Depression, he was cheap his entire life. I'm sure he died with a couple million dollars despite the fact he was a machinist and had eight kids. He's never spent any money. My dad learned from his dad how to save money. He grew up in the 1950s and 60s, one of eight kids that had no money. Um, his dad like built a car in their garage [laughs] because it was cheaper than like buying a new one.

It seems then that cheap could be interpreted as wisdom or necessity or misery and lacking generosity, but the “cheap script” usually

engaged one of the other logics. For instance, being cheap could be seen as miserly in its own right or being cheap could engage economic necessity, mindfulness, or environmental stewardship. Though a cheap frugality could be scripted with some social concerns, I conceptualize it as a more egoistic and semiconscious logic as it sounded more self-centered.

There were two types of oppositional frugality: (i) one that sought to avoid the manipulative grasp of institutional others and (ii) a related but more intense rebellious/spiteful frugality: resistant and almost combative at the hint of being complicit in injustice—this could be against consumer culture, corporations, or the human causes of climate change. For instance, Bob spoke of not wanting to give money to corporations when he explained his experience of living in group houses:

I've lived in group houses for the last 17 years and every group house I've been a part of I was the one who paid utilities. So, electricity, water, gas. So, I've always been very mindful of that and I always think, you know, I work hard to make money, why should I give my money to utility companies?... they have plenty of money. They do just fine....

This resistance/opposition was scripted as protecting one's hard earned money from those who had enough. There was also the more intense opposition as described by Gayle: her resistance to the "corporate enticement" or criminal use of "six worlds." Additionally, there was Juan and Elaine's opposition to buying things they did not need. There was an "us and them" logic embedded in these scripts, and on a grander scale they engaged old clashes between establishment and anti-establishment forces; consumers versus corporations, or people and the environment versus profits. For some activists, these tensions cut to the core of their concerns. I conceptualize oppositional frugality as more egoistic and semiconscious as it was more reactive (though it could include social concerns).

One interviewee, Juan, spoke of a frugality grounded in social movements toward downshifting and downscaling the economy: de-growth and buen vivir—which is Spanish for "living well" [59–62]. These movements promote frugality for purposes of environmental preservation and conviviality. After a year in Spain, my respondent, Juan, was inspired by the social activism of Los Indignados (the Spanish version of Occupy Wall Street) and both the writings of Serge Latouche and de-growth economists, who propose new ways for humans to be, relate, behave, and consume on a finite planet. Juan explained his adopted world view by recounting an anecdote:

...[Latouche is] saying.... we cannot just grow perpetually.... what if we talk about de-growing in the economy and there's a tale I guess or a legend or something like that.... these indigenous people live in the Amazon and.... their like life support activity was to cut trees to provide heat and.... food and.... all the things that they were able to get out of wood. So they would cut trees and then—I don't know, where I got this story from but I think this is where the chip really changed.... these guys were in the middle of the Amazon or any jungle and a group of white people, westerners or whatever come down there and they say, 'Oh' they start studying them.... and they say, um, 'Well listen, we have here a high tech blade where you can cut 10 times as fast as you were cutting before and.... the indigenous people are like, "Oh, this is incredible, this is the blade that we were waiting for, God exists pretty much." Uh, the white guys.... the westerners come back to their civilization and they come back to the jungle after a year and they say, 'So, how did it go with the blade? I hope.... instead of cutting one tree every day, you're cutting 10 trees

every day' and um, the chief of indigenous people says, 'No, no, no. We still are cutting one tree every day, but we have... ten-times more time with our family.'

Juan claimed that this story caused a shift in his consciousness—this is what he meant by "I think this is where the chip really changed." Frugality for Juan, then, was not just an avoidance of waste or unnecessary consumption, but a reemphasis on human relationships. Gayle also related to this dynamic in a narrative further below. The intent of a convivial frugality is to simplify one's life—with its multiple benefits—in a tradeoff for time with family and friends. Similarly, Bourdieu [1,p. 179] theorized a "convivial indulgence" which he attributed to the lower classes and their taste for necessity; simply put, those of modest means have more personal time for social interactions and therefore more social fun. I conceptualize convivial frugality as mixed deliberative/semiconscious and social-altruistic as it could be both planned and habitual and emphasized social concerns.

A number of my respondents told narratives which had a nostalgic character; and some of these narratives seemed more nostalgically charged than others. I found nostalgia present, for example, in the hanging of one's laundry or the wearing of tattered clothes reminiscent of one's mother. Carol, a 71 year old retired editor-writer, seemed to be indelibly marked by a nostalgic frugality. She explained how her grandparents struggled as immigrants; her dad died when she was seven and her mom "was a product of the Depression." Carol did have an economically constrained childhood, but her extended family's practice of frugality marked her with a deeply meaningful set of behaviors. For instance, Carol detailed resurrecting a memory and practice from her past which combined frugal, environmental/green, and nostalgic scripts: hanging her laundry....

I hang up the laundry, um, for the first time since I was a kid. I got that suggestion from.... Sandra Steingraber.... I think she's our generation's Rachel Carson.... she grounds everything in family and, and everyday, everyday stuff.... I'd done it as a little girl, because my mother told me to, but it hadn't occurred for me to do it as an adult.... and I got a huge thrill out of that.

For most of my frugal respondents, like Carol, their frugality smacked of deep meaning attached to cherished memories: Carol was now "thrilled" by hanging her laundry (it was as if she opened an old box from her attic and found a precious but forgotten gift). Carol also talked about the simplicity of the "everyday": family and "everyday stuff." There was also something of an animist devotion in the practice of a nostalgic frugality: an offering to the gods of one's memory. Additionally, as alluded to earlier, some respondents conflated frugalities: Carol could re-live her childhood while reducing her carbon footprint. She articulated this herself when she told me, "What I realize now is that so many of the things that people are being told to do for the environment were things that we grew up doing to save money" [emphasis hers]. I conceptualize this nostalgic frugality as more egoistic and embodied as it was driven by more personal memory.

There was an idealist frugality imbued with high institutional ideals. Though it might seem a contradiction to treat communism and religion/spirituality together, for one of my respondents they were compatible. Anne, a 74-year-old retired social worker, librarian, and active Quaker, mentioned—while laughing—"my parents actually met at a communist summer camp." Her mother was the daughter of a lawyer and a teacher; her father the son of a Jewish immigrant—but "raised in an orphanage." Anne insisted, "We were very frugal." She detailed how she conflated her parent's communism and frugality with the Quakerism

she developed later in life.

“...my parents both, in very, very, very different ways—very, very different personalities—both believed totally in equality and justice and fairness and that um... wealth is theft and, you know, a lot of property is theft [laughs]. So I mean, if you had, if there's a thing called having too much and it's not good for you and it's not good for anybody else, and this is all very, very, 100 percent consistent with Quaker ideals.

Anne claims to have fused her Quaker ideals with her anti-religious childhood (she explained earlier in our interview that her ‘father was hostile to religions’); she retrieves and embraces ideals from both her early communist and later religious/spiritual lives. As she said, they were “100 percent consistent.” An idealist frugality—or perhaps an “isms” frugality—can also be seen to intertwine with other logics; like convivial or environmental. I conceptualize idealist frugality as mixed deliberative/semiconscious and social-altruistic as it was not clearly rational and was both appropriated from and extended outwardly beyond the self.

Similar to a nostalgic frugality was a loyal frugality or a frugality for its own sake: a learned frugality that departed from necessity and sense and became habit. Gayle brought this to my attention after I repeated what I thought I heard her say about her husband's and their grown children's frugality:

JB: So you would say that three of your children are more frugal than the one, but then none of them are as frugal as the two of you are?

Gayle: Right, yes. [extended laughter] Although we have a wonderful life. You know we've... yeah, it's just; it's an ideology with me: I cut my own hair. You know, I shop sales. [emphasis hers]

On the surface, Gayle no longer had concrete reasons to be frugal; she did not struggle economically—she and her husband owned three properties. However, she is dedicated and loyal to a number of behaviors which were part of her frugality. Though she was able to give “reasons” for her frugality; her frugality was also outside the realm of reason: ideology. It could drive itself; for-its-own-sake. I conceptualize this frugality as a more egoistic and embodied as it seemed to stem primarily from the habitus.

Though nearly all of these frugalities could be framed morally, and they were often referred to with moral—though not explicit—implication, Gayle detailed a story which deeply framed the morality in her frugality. Though she often spoke of her frugal practices in a transparent and playful way, she did at times get serious...

My father was in a partnership with his brother before the Depression, in an automobile business. And when the Depression hit, there was a $50,000 debt, which my uncle was going to declare bankruptcy and my father thought that was immoral; so he went court to be allowed to pay that debt back. And for 10 years, they... he had a good job, which many people did not, so they paid that debt back. My mother would wear a dress until it tattered and then she'd wear it as a nightgown. She didn't eat meat for years, just because she ate dried beans and whatever.... so that after 10 years, that debt was paid. And that happened, you know, much of it, before I was born. So I don't remember it.... And there was never a rift in the family, with my uncle because it was my father's choice to do, and we always kept family relationships with that other family. So that was a bit hard.

This frugality that Gayle detailed might also be termed an honoric frugality. Though some nostalgia and loyalty can be discerned, the practices that her mother adopted were initiated by a desire to maintain family integrity in order to honor social, economic, and moral relations and to avoid any related backlash or possible stigma. Though a generation before Gayle, she admitted—in other narratives—a consequent triangular character to her frugality—with tensions between economic solvency, avoiding waste, and maintaining good social relations. She also qualified that she and her husband would not financially assist someone if they thought this person was living a wasteful life. A dimension of moral performativity can be discerned in this frugality; a frugality scripted at the nexus of economic, relational, and ethical domains. I conceptualize moral frugality as social-altruistic and more semiconscious, as it could extend to the biosphere and also a less “reason-able” realm.

There was a playful or competitive frugality; practiced for fun or sport. Carol excitedly touched upon this during our interview:

My sisters and I love it,.... most of my clothes are from yard sales and church basements. And I, it's not because I can't, couldn't afford other things, but I, I get a kick out of that. And my sisters and I do too. We compete for who has the cheapest outfit when we're, the cheapest decent-looking outfits, you know. I mean that there, there is pride and pleasure in that and satisfaction.

Perhaps Carol can be seen as a stereotypical bargain shopper, but in this narrative, she scripts the joy of having a shared comradery in competition, sport, or a hobby. This speaks to the multifaceted logics of practice, and a shifting from a more serious or moral tone to a playful one. I conceptualize this competitive frugality as more semiconscious and between the egoistic and social-altruistic domains, as it had a less reasoned social component.

Reminiscent of the stereotypical notion of a compulsive shopper, there were hints of a compulsive/neurotic frugality. After Carol mentioned the links between her frugal, nostalgic, and environmental practices and her mother's (Great) “Depression conditioning,” she said to me, “My daughter looks at the ‘sell by’ dates on the.... items in her refrigerator, and actually throws things away. And I just have to, you know, keep my head from exploding. I use every last scrap.”

Though I am not prepared to diagnose Carol as compulsive and/or neurotic, she did seem fixated on some of her frugal habits. As people can have “little addictions” or compulsive behaviors, I found evidence for frugality being performed this way. I conceptualize this compulsive/neurotic frugality as more embodied and egoistic as it seemed to stem from unconscious habit.

Like the flipside of an oppositional frugality, I also identified a conformist frugality: those following the crowd—the “frugal crowd.” This was described by Carol when she explained how her consumption practices affected those around her—for example, her husband adjusted. She explained:

Oh yes, my husband, ... He accepts it now. Um, because we're crazy in love after 50 years. But it really frustrated him that I, that he couldn't give me things.... once in a while, just as a present to him, I'll let him go buy me a dress. [Laughs] I mean he really, you know, he wants to, he wants to show me off. He wants me to wear, um,... expensive things, and I, I can't be comfortable, in something expensive. I really, I really can't. I wouldn't feel good in it. Um, so

it's... And I, I took his mother's diamond ring, and fished it out of the back pocket of my jeans, and put it in a safe deposit box at one point, because I couldn't stand wearing it.

Thus, Carol's husband apparently adjusted to not buying Carol things and her not wearing a wedding ring; he conformed. A conformist frugality could also be seen in the constraining dimensions of economic necessity. Those born into frugal environments had to—for the time being at least—conform to the realities of family frugality. I conceptualize a conformist frugality as mixed semiconscious/embodied (partially habitual, following the lead of others) and having the potential to extend across all ethical domains (depending on those being followed; the “frugals” or the consumers).

These numerous logics are derived from those who greatly identified with frugality, but not all my respondents did so: some gave it little or no narrative attention, whereas others scoffed at it. One respondent explained that since he was now free from his resource constrained childhood, he wanted to go out to eat when he wanted and vacation where he wanted; as if to make up for lost experiences or enjoyments. Those who scoffed at frugality—very few respondents—scripted it as a miserly and pointless enterprise. Nevertheless, these reported findings of frugal logics are a testament to the complexity of the human person and the creative possibilities in rationalizing one's behavior.