John Urry's "Consuming Places," discusses what Urry terms the "makings of place"--that is, distinctive features of different places which make them either attractive or repellant to consumers, whether visitors or investors. Urry also explores the effects of consumption on these places and their respective local populations.
Urry has been discussing and writing on these and similar issues for the past fifteen years. In "Consuming Places" he gathers together his most significant contributions. Urry begins with an extensive review of the connections between society, time and space, and examines such themes as locality, ruralism, and economic restructuring in relationship to place. The text considers how the development of service occupations and industries have transformed places through the emergence of a post-industrial service class. Urry then directs our attention to the nature of consumption in terms of its implications for place and people, citing natural and environmental concerns and the tensions between commodification and collective enthusiasms.
This wide-ranging book will prove indispensable for enthusiasts of geography, sociology, and urban, regional and cultural studies.

John Urry is Distinguished Professor of Sociology at Lancaster University, UK, where he is Director of the Centre for Mobilities Research. His recent books include Sociology Beyond Societies (Routledge, 2000), Global Complexity (Polity, 2003), Mobile Technologies of the City (with Mimi Sheller, Routledge, 2006) and Mobilities (Polity, 2007).

1. Time and Space in the Consumptino of Place Part 1: Society and Space 2. Sociology as a Parasite: Some Vices and Virtues 3. The New Marxism of Collective Action: A Critical Analysis 4. Society, Space and Locality Part 2: Restructuring and Services 5. Restructuring the Rural 6. Capitalist Production, Scientific Management and the Service Class 7. Is Britain the First 'Post-Industrial Society'? Part 3: Consumption, Place and Identity 8. The Consumption of Tourism 9. Tourism, Travel and the Modern Subject 10. Reinterpreting Local Culture 11. Tourism, Europe and Identity Part 4: Consuming Nature 12. The Tourist Gaze and the Environment 13. The Making of the Lake District 14. Social Identity, Leisure and the Countryside