Institution

An institution manifests itself in the context of Consumerium Services several ways:

• a source of terminology, e.g. standard labels
• a set of institutional buying criteria it applies to its own purchases
• entities like Slow Food that define and encourage local purchasing
• the origin or authoritative position-definer of a faction, e.g. Catholics would generally look to the Vatican, an institution, to define their position, while Greens might look to the Global Greens, and Blues to the WTO, Purples to the World Bank.