Horodnic, I.A., Ciobanu, C.I., Zaiț, A. et al. (1 more author) (2022) Who purchases from the informal economy and why? Frontiers in Psychology, 13. 940076. ISSN 1664-1078
Abstract
In recent decades scholars have acknowledged that transactions in the informal economy have not vanished with modernization and industrialization as expected but rather remain an important contemporary aspect of overall production and consumption across the world, in both developing and developed countries. Yet little is known about the profile of the consumers in this realm or what drives them to purchase from the informal economy. A systematic review of the literature investigating consumption in the informal economy reveals a severely underdeveloped area of consumer studies with significant gaps in terms of its theoretical approaches, methods and regional coverage. The findings of the existing literature is that multiple motives are used by consumers for justifying their purchases in the informal economy beyond the dominant simplistic view that they do simply for financial gain or for a lower price (namely, it identifies social ends and failures in formal market provision in terms of availability, speed of provision and quality). The outcome is a recognition that responsibility to reducing this phenomenon with negative effects on governments, businesses, workers and consumers lies not just with public authorities but also practitioners who need to correct the failures in formal market provision. The significant gaps identified in the literature are then used to highlight a comprehensive future research agenda, which includes the need for the development of an institutionalist theoretical perspective when explaining consumers‘ participation in the informal economy and social marketing interventions.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2022 The Authors. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms. |
Keywords: | consumer behavior; informal economy; institutional theory; rational economic actor; social actor |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Social Sciences (Sheffield) > Management School (Sheffield) |
Funding Information: | Funder Grant number ICF International 330300728 |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 12 Jul 2022 08:32 |
Last Modified: | 10 Jul 2024 14:18 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Frontiers Media SA |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.940076 |
Related URLs: | |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:188936 |