Triple bottom-line capitalism and the 'third place'.

• Jurisdiction: Australia
• Date: 01 January 2002
• Author: Scerri, Andrew

Prominent in the United States for a number of years and emerging in Britain and Australia recently, Borders Bookstores and Starbucks Coffee Company embody a considerable shift in mainstream business practices. These two firms represent the 'caring, sharing' corporations that now aim to engage what were, until the recent past, 'niche markets'. On entering a typical Borders store, along with the books, magazines and periodicals, recorded music and video goods, we notice areas intended exclusively for browsing and, often--via a joint venture with Starbucks--a cafe for relaxing and meeting informally. Here we find the epitome of the 'Third Place'. The Third Place is neither a part of the 'traditional' local bookshop, nor an aspect of the local soda fountain, corner store or take-away. Veritable reading rooms or salons, where browsing and chattering over a latte constitute a 'scene', Third Places combine a frisson of bohemia and a space for us all to experience the pleasures of self-indulgence and social awareness, states of mind that now echo across the 'triple bottom line'.

I

Long the preserve of inner-city niche outlets, like Carlton's Readings bookshop or Haight-Ashbury's famous City Lights, the supply of this type of commercial space in a widely distributed chain-store format represents not merely a shift in the business of consumption, but the emergence of a new cultural form. The arrival of these spaces for 'hanging out' appears at a time when other corporations like McDonald's and KFC seem to be facing increasingly difficult times. These comfortable, easygoing, no-rush places for deep, meaningful experiences exist in stark contrast to the garish fluorescent lights, scripted encounters and moulded plastic seating of McDonald's-style fast-food outlets. Indeed, local and multinational firms across the Anglo-American world now realize the 'benefits' for clients and staff, and of course the bottomline, of creating Third Places in this style.

Motivation for these developments can be found in the idea that 'McDonaldized' forms of consumption are approaching a 'sunset era'. (1) Complementing this has been the growth of cafe culture in the urban, and even, suburban areas of Anglo-American cities over the 1990s. From New York to Seattle, London to Edinburgh, Sydney to Melbourne, a flourishing service economy seems to have created a new ambiance to accompany the emphasis on the consumption of 'me-time'. (2) What began with the gentrification of inner cities came to include suburban shopping malls, village high streets and small-town 'strips' by the early 2000s. Until this time, in the United States the ubiquitous soda fountain and diner were the places where everyday people could 'hang out'. In Britain, the nearest approximation was the pub or the 'greasy spoon' cafe. The latter offered hot breakfast, luke-warm tea and, on occasion, instant coffee that fiction writer Ben Elton has likened to 'the urine of the devil's dog'. (3) In Australian cities, cafes were the preserve of male migrants or later, returnee expatriates longing for some continental verisimilitude. Even though the latest economic bubble has burst the Third Place culture of the Information Age remains prominent,

Practical motivation for this article arose through my reading of media reports over the last decade or so covering the exponential international growth of Borders and Starbucks as representatives of the Third Place and 'triple bottom-line' capitalism. (4) These two companies provide a reference point for initiating a wider critique of changing social conditions. Underlying the ideas presented here is a suggestion that important features of ongoing social reproduction are intertwined with a cultural history of liberal-humanist individualism within the growth-oriented capitalism of Anglo-American countries. This article offers a materialist analysis that sees cultural forms as socially integrative, plastic systems of meaning conditioned around the relations of social reproduction. My main objective is to invigorate discussion about links between consumption, affluent societies and subjectivity in the context of co-present modern and postmodern social forms, and what Ulrich Beck calls 'global risk'. (5) Broadly speaking, I see a need in contemporary social theory for the development of a sustained critique of the social and cultural shifts that informed the rise of global triple bottom-line capitalism, 'Green' consumption, '24-7' work/life practices, deep individualism, commodification and 'consumer society'.

II

In late 2002, California-based, Australian-born architect Julie Eizenberg of the firm Koning Eizenberg told Age journalist Misha Ketchell that she sees Third Places as

public places that are snug and welcoming or informal ... [the] first place is the home, often small, often crowded. The second place is the workplace, a desk, office or factory floor. But the third place is where it's possible to have an...