Abstract This study answers calls for reflexive debate on marketization by re-evaluating its dynamics in the context of a cultural field. As cultural organizations face increased pressures amid diminishing state funding, marketization is often framed as a one-sided dominance of the market logic that risks commodifying art and eroding its intrinsic value. However, the purpose of our research is to rethink marketization by generating a more nuanced understanding of the coexistence of market and cultural field logics. Departing from institutional logics as a method theory, we conduct a systematic literature review of 118 papers to synthesize evidence of how interactions of seemingly incompatible logics can contribute to the cultural field's transformative potential. The study provides two key contributions. First, we draw attention to an overlooked dynamic of generative coexistence, a field-level phenomenon that arises from complex interrelations between cultural field properties, tensions within the field, and actors’ efforts to influence the development of the field. We develop a framework that captures how the generative coexistence of market and cultural field logics occurs when market logic is interpreted beyond pure economic exchange. Second, the framework identifies three forms of purpose-driven market work—the deliberate efforts by actors to (re)interpret and enact market logic in the cultural field without compromising its core values: (1) recognizing cultural products' commercial appeal, (2) adopting entrepreneurialism, and (3) aligning on shared goals rather than means. We conclude by explicating implications for practitioners and future research avenues.

Abstract The concept of consumer responsibilization challenges conventional thinking around responsible consumption, draws attention to its political dimensions, and situates the emergence of responsible consumers within the realm of neoliberal governance. In this article, we critique and amend the theoretical anchoring of consumer responsibilization in the concept of governmentality and the Foucauldian theory of power that underpins it. We argue that governmental theorizing implies flattening the power relationship between the state, the market and consumers, and that it thereby marginalizes and eclipses the top-down exercise of power under neoliberal governance. This produces theoretical inconsistencies in the transformative consumer literature on responsibilization that risk impeding theory development and silencing critical empirical trajectories. At worst, it may end up reifying the neoliberal governance it sets out to scrutinize. We draw on Karl Polanyi’s writings to advance a critical political economy perspective on consumer responsibilization designed to address these concerns. We develop these ideas by introducing the concept of “embedded responsibilization” to the field of consumer research. Theorizing responsible consumption as being embedded in the Polanyian sense will solidify consumer responsibilization as a theoretically consistent transformative research project and encourage necessary trajectories for empirical research on responsibilization.

Marketing is an important function and practice in everyday business. It involves getting potential customers interested in a product or service through value-oriented arguments. In this way, marketing plays a pivotal role in driving the consumption of goods and services. Given the increasing consumption of goods and services, decreasing product lifetimes, and increasing levels of waste in all product categories, it is evident that the practice and theory of marketing needs a radical rethink in light of pressing resource and climate issues. The impact of unsustainable production and consumption patterns has led to this era being referred to as the Anthropocene, in which humans have become the dominant influence on the climate and the natural environment. There is an urgent need to take a new direction to adapt marketing theory and practice to these pressing global needs. In this study, we investigate the following questions: What role should marketing play in the era of the Anthropocene? What concepts, outcomes, tools and theories does marketing offer to support a transition towards Marketing in the Anthropocene? We conduct a scoping literature review based on different research directions and propose a conceptualization for “Marketing in the Anthropocene” as an inspirational, forward-looking concept, tool and practice for marketers and marketing researchers. We highlight relevant marketing tools and theories and provide guiding questions for future research and practice.

Given these challenges, I will attempt to distill key attributes to consider when crafting a conceptual-only article in this editorial. This distillation is designed to help scholars better understand reviewers' expectations of conceptual papers, enhance their theoretical contributions' quality and comprehension, and increase their chances of surviving the initial review screening process. I will approach the task by learning from a sample of Masters in our field. I have sourced a "baker's dozen" or the top 13 conceptual-only papers in marketing as determined by the number of citations. While acknowledging that citations are but one proxy for impact and are dependent on the article's age, I feel that you will agree with me when you review the list that these papers have been very influential in our field. Each of these papers introduced ground-breaking ideas and paradigms that reshaped marketing theory and practice pioneering the research passions of many marketers including myself. Further, their influence has extended to other disciplines beyond marketing.