CONSUMPTION AND THE CITY, MODERN AND POSTMODERN

Whilst consumption has frequently been associated with the postmodern city, insufficient regard has been paid to the systemic logic of consu mption. It is argued here that consumption takes on an increasingly si gnificant role in this respect. Specifically, we have been witness to a profound social transformation whereby the active repression once ce ntred on the city as a locus of production has given way to a new mode of social integration, which accords to the logic of seduction. By tr acing the development of the modern city in terms of the imposition of the law and its transgression - figured in terms of cognitive space a nd the 'spectral presence' of the stranger - the significance of the p ostmodern is theorized in terms of the systemic appropriation of an ae sthetic space initially traced out by the flaneur. The ludic existence of the flaneur has thus been translated into the general condition of a society oriented around consumption. This condition implies a new f orm of cybernetic control, governed by the aleatory play of the code, rather than the direct surveillance characteristic of the modern city. As a consequence, urban space has itself undergone a transition, whic h we might begin to address in terms of a 'posturban' hyperspace.