International Relations

Irresistible Empire

Irresistible Empire
the Statess Advance by dint of Twentieth-Century Europe

VICTORIA DE GRAZIA

The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press Cambridge, Massachusetts London, England 2005

Copyright © 2005 by Victoria de Grazia All rights reserved Printed in the United States of the States Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data De Grazia, Victoria. Irresistible empire : Americas advance through twentieth-century Europe / Victoria de Grazia. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-674-01672-6 (alk. paper) 1. Consumer behaviorEurope munimenttwentieth century. 2. ConsumersEuropeAttitudesHistory20th century. 3. Consumption (Economics)EuropeHistory20th century. 4. companionable setEuropeHistory20th century. 5. Social valuesUnited StatesHistory20th century. 6. United StatesCivilization20th century. I. Title. HF5415.33.E85D4 2005 306.3?094?0904dc22 2004059943

To Al and Jill on the shores of Lake Michigan

Contents

Introduction: The Fast bearing to peaceableness 1. The Service Ethic
How Bourgeois Men Made Peace with Babbittry

1

15

2. A Decent Standard of Living
How Europeans Were Measured by the American Way of Life 75

3. The Chain Store
How Modern Distribution Dispossessed commerce 130

4. Big-Brand Goods
How Marketing Outmaneuvered the Marketplace 184

5.



Corporate Advertising
How the Science of Publicity Subverted the humanistic discipline of Commerce 226

6. The Star System
How Hollywood Turned Cinema market-gardening into Entertainment Value 284

7. The Consumer-Citizen
How Europeans Traded Rights for Goods 336

8. Supermarketing
How Big-Time Merchandisers Leapfrogged over Local Grocers 376

9. A fashion model Mrs. Consumer
How Mass Commodities Settled into Hearth and Home 416

Conclusion: How the heavy Movement Put Perspective on the Fast Life
Notes bibliographical Essay Acknowledgments Index

458

483 547 557 561

Irresistible Empire

Introduction
The Fast Way to Peace

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