Interesting article from a magazine called Church Executive.
TEANECK, NJ-Treating groups such as students, patients and religious followers as "customers" is having a serious negative impact on America’s schools, churches, hospitals, media and government, according to marketing professor James G. Hutton.
"Every parent, teacher, policymaker and leader should be concerned about the impact that customerization is having on American institutions and on Americans," Hutton said, "because the effects are much more profound than most people realize."
In his new book, The Feel-Good Society, Hutton explains that the idea of being a customer has tremendous intuitive appeal to most Americans because that implies greater accountability.
"Unfortunately," he said, "when institutions like schools, hospitals and churches treat their students, patients and members as customers, the result is almost the opposite – those institutions almost inevitably begin to pander to their audiences, becoming more responsive, but to the wrong things. They lose sight of their basic mission and ultimately become less accountable."
In education, for example, Hutton’s research found that axioms such as "keeping the customer happy," and "the customer is always right" have led to a variety of problems, including a lack of discipline, a dumbing down of standards, cheating and other forms of dishonesty, social promotion of underqualified students, out-of-control grade inflation, a focus on self-esteem rather than character-building, and a tendency to tell students what will make them happy rather than what will make them educated.
In the healthcare arena, Hutton found that the commercialization and customerization of the American healthcare industry has not brought the benefits that were promised. "If anything," he said, "concepts such as managed care, health maintenance organizations (HMOs) and the privatization of hospitals have created more problems than they have solved, adding new layers of costs and bureaucracy, and often taking medical decisions out of the hands of people qualified to make those decisions."
At the heart of the overall problem, Hutton said, is that everywhere Americans used to use the word "citizen," they have substituted the word "customer" or "consumer." "The implications are profound, because citizens have rights and responsibilities, but consumers have only rights, with virtually no responsibilities," he said. "Thus, we have become a nation overrun by lawsuits and victimization, where fewer and fewer people take responsibility for their own behavior."
That is an interesting insight that viewing ourselves as customers puts the onus on others with no responsibility for ourselves. This is true especially in regards to religion as practiced by our society. The very term church shopping reflects this consumerist attitude. That the Church much change to satisfy us and never the other way around. Too many parishes treat the parishioner as always right and tries to keep them happy by neglecting what should be done. As he notes when this happens accountability is lost and it happens on both sides. There is a tendency for priests and other teacher of the faith to worry more about offending some body rather than preaching the truth. Hard truths just get left unsaid to ensure that no one might squirm in their pew or even to be offended. Contrast this to John 6 where Jesus’ teaching on the Eucharist scandalized some disciples who walked away. Homilies on contraception are rarer than sensible statements from Howard Dean. Knowing that the majority of Catholics are contracepting and are objectively committing grave sin and receiving the Eucharist unworthily would perhaps spark a homily or two on the subject. Yet the opposite happens since you can’t upset your customer, I mean parishioner.
Now I admit that I also have a consumerist mentality towards my local churches. After all I don’t normally go to the parishes closest to where I live, but instead go to a church downtown. Because some parishes have catered to the consumer instead of being obedient to the norms of the liturgy this is a sad consequence.
8 comments
I think there is a radical difference between shopping for a Parish that caters to your personal opinions, and traveling to a Parish where God is catered to: where the teachings and Sacraments of Holy Mother the Church are upheld and proclaimed. This is nothing new of course, people flocked from miles around to the Church of the Cur� of Ars, and that is only one small example among many.
After moving here some years ago we looked and looked for a parish that was somewhat traditional. No where, not even close. We were suppose to go ta a Church nick named, “Our Lady of Liberal Lourdes”. I just couldn’t do it. Even my kids, who where young at the time, said, the church was weird. So, thankfully, my sister introduced me to a parish over the river, and in an other state. We have been going there for 11 years now. My husband even converted because of what the Church offered. Much to the dismay of his family.( He has now joined the ranks of the gutter snipes of the world. ) I guess we shopped for a church, but the outcome has been awesome.
The consumerist notion in the main article is all trendy nonsense. There is flawed logic to the premise and its conclusions. In the health care field, to take but one example, the problem is that the advent of HMOs have totally removed all decison-making from the hands of the consumer. The HMO will tell you what drugs you can have (if you’ve ever heard the term “drug formulary” you know what I’m talking about), what procedures can be done and so on. In a consumer-based system, the consumer would make these decisions (in consultatiuon with his or her doctor), not the HMO.
The consumerist idea does not translate well to the educational realm, either. My family lives in highly rated school system that offers just about everything, and yet there are a number of glaring weaknesses and flaws, but they do not stem from treating students as customers. They arise instead because students are treated more like raw materials that need to be standardized and melded into some uniform unit of production. So, I seriously question the correctness of the author’s analysis.
Oddly enough, however, there is some merit to the detrimental effect of “consumerism” in parish life. I joke that our family members have been “nomadic Catholics,” since we’ve often found it necessary over the years to attend services at churches miles away from our “home” parish. Sometimes this was for reasons of convenience, such as a late Sunday Mass or more convenient time. Other times it was for reasons of pure interest – the choir is better at one parish, while another has a more welcoming decor. But sadly, sometimes it was for reasons of doctrine – error in the conduct of the service, such as standing through consecration – that made us seek services elsewhere. It would have been better, perhaps, if we had stayed put and insisted on a correct Mass, but it was so much easier just to go elsewhere. So, as applied to parishes, consumerism can have a nagative impact.
Jeff’s dialogue sure hits home to me. I am no consumer, I still go to a church that is all about catering to the consumers, but I am on the liturgy committee, so pray for me, I have a meeting tonight.
Kale,
Might I recommend a minor exorcism after the liturgy meeting? I’m afraid you are taking martyrdom too far. 😉
We are the customers, and Jesus is the “Divine Underwriter of Our Personal Happiness.” That summarizes the attitude of many towards church. Even in those traditionally strict protestant denominations this is happening.
mark
This is fascinating to me, since our diocese is training its “leaders” in ServantLeadership. (I know, worry when they butt two words together while maintaining the capital.) The word shows an inherent attitude of serving the “consumer” (i.e. Catholic person) as opposed to serving the Truth. As could be expected, this sort of training came straight out of Industry.
Mick,
I agree that your experience in the education system is not very rare, but it does not disprove the negative impact of the customer approach. The latter may not appear explicitly, but it does have its negative effects sideways, sometimes just in unwritten and unspoken beliefs.
I have made it a habit, everytime some colleagues in the education world talks about using the “customer model” or the “client model” or the “facilitator model”, to ask “why not use the student/teacher model?” What’s wrong with that?