FLEXIBLY SPECIALIZED AGENCIES - REFLEXIVITY, IDENTITY, AND THE ADVERTISING INDUSTRY

In this paper I examine the process of restructuring in advertising, a n image-oriented industry, in the context of debates over flexible spe cialization and reflexive modernization. There have been far-reaching changes in the US advertising industry in the 1980s and 1990s, includi ng the recent expansion of small, flexible, and more creatively based agencies or 'boutiques'. The growth of creative agencies reveals a des ire on the part of advertisers to reroute rising consumer skepticism o f advertising by producing more reflexive, innovative work and signals a heightened apparatus of control. The case of advertising raises que stions about the limits to reflexive consumer subjectivities.