DescriptionOver the past three decades, the market has come to take an increasingly central role in public, as well as private, life. This shift has in many ways impacted political participation, with citizens turning to the market to address serious political issues in greater numbers and intensity than the past. While political citizenship remains a relevant aspect of public life, market-based consumer citizenship, of which political consumerism is representative, signals the diffusion of citizenship into hitherto private arenas. Using political consumerism, consumer activists organize collectively, subverting institutions of the market to effect social change. The questions engendered by a more market-based form of citizenship and political engagement, as well as collective action responses to it, challenge understandings of social movements and present opportunities for advancements in theory. While scholars have begun to more seriously explore political consumerism and its implications, it remains undertheorized. This thesis provides a conceptual framework with which scholars can better understand political consumerism, and how it relates to central concepts of social science.