An Ethical Research On Symbolic Consumption

People gradually ushered in the era of mass consumption with the rapid development of global economy, consuming is constructing people's daily life and social order powerfully. The people are away from the time lack of matter now, and no longer seek for the basic physiological needs which the use value of the goods bring. Now they are seeking for symbolic significance which the symbolic value of the goods brings.Given the symbolic significance of goods, matter and people, it takes more and more new consuming significance. The happiness of people who surrounded by materials are not thereby strengthen. On the contrary, they are often encountering with many problems, such as spiritual emptiness, human distortion, the plight of environmental pollution. How to understand and deal with this new concept of symbolic consumption in economic circles and ethics has become a major task of community.This paper is divided into four parts, the first introduces background of the concept "symbolic consumption ", primarily the symbolic value of goods come up in the "consuming society ", after by the value system was triggered on commodities symbolic consumption. The second part is mainly from the individual consuming, the body, culture, focuses on three aspects of symbolic consumption of specific performance in society. The third part starts with the consuming characteristics which bring the plight of the people, the focus of symbolic consumption of the ethical issues brought to the people. The fourth part is for the ethical issues raised above, to seek solutions, from the human, economic, ecological principles to construct the consumption of the three principles, so that consumers recognize that consumption is to make a living, but life is not just consumption, in order to select reasonable way of living.