New book chapter: Mortgage debt as ordinary consumption

IMCA's Associate Professor Léna Pellandini-Simányi and co-author Zsuzsanna Vargha (ESCP Business School, Paris) have contributed a chapter to the newly published Research Handbook on the Sociology of Consumption, edited by Jennifer Smith Maguire (Edward Elgar Publishing). The chapter applies practice theory to the study of household debt, theorising credit consumption as "ordinary consumption", akin to everyday utilities such as water or electricity. The authors trace how specific credit products act as interfaces between households and larger financial infrastructures, and how the co-evolution of these infrastructures with everyday practices shapes credit use. The chapter also reflects on methodological approaches that combine consumer and institutional perspectives in practice theory research.

Read the full chapter: Research Handbook on the Sociology of Consumption, 2026