Postcapitalist Prosumerism: Exploring Simultaneous Practices of Consumption and Production in Community Manufacturing and Community Energy

This paper contributes to the literature on simultaneous processes of production and consumption – otherwise known as ‘prosumerism’ – in the context of sustainability transformations. We argue that prominent work on prosumerism in recent years has exhibited ‘capitalocentrism’ and that addressing this bias can bring alternative economic strategies to light. We proceed to define ‘postcapitalist prosumerism’, outline its potential importance in thinking about eco-social transformation, and identify a number of tentative underlying characteristics, including re-embedding and reterritorialising socio-economic activities, politicising technology, promoting participatory and collaborative governance. Empirical highlights are drawn from two recent projects on prosumer practices related to Community Renewable Energy (CRE) and Community Manufacturing (CM), respectively. We conclude that postcapitalist prosumerism is a heuristic concept which can be useful to explore the transformative potential of sustainable social innovation.