Dilemmas of Care (Re)Allocation: Care and Consumption in Pandemic Times

Studies into the ethical aspects of consumption tend to focus on a limited class of actions that are explicitly understood as “ethical consumption”. The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic provided a context in which other ethical issues and questions of for whom we should care first suddenly and dramatically gained salience. This article draws on the care literature to explore the reconfiguration of consumption decisions and dilemmas during this period. Building on twenty-eight in-depth interviews, it considers the temporal and spatial dimensions of care and consumption and examines various ethical and ideological considerations that arose, particularly with regard to allocating care in the face of competing demands. We show how these considerations are entwined within participants’ dilemmas of care allocation. Subsequently, the article problematises mainstream accounts of ethical consumption, arguing for the consideration of a plurality of ethics that are present within decisions about consumption. It concludes with a call to incorporate a more capacious understanding of care in broader discussions of ethics in consumption.