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The key question that the paper addresses is whether Fair Trade, particularly as it enters mainstream markets, provides an exemplar, from within the existing dominant social paradigm, of the kinds of actions that the macromarketing literature suggests are necessary to enable sustainable consumption.

Among the conclusions reached about the process of norm change in contemporary global politics: states and multilateral institutions remain overwhelmingly preeminent; the predominance and persistence of the existing norms on what production considerations are "fair" remain a formidable obstacle to the emergence of a new norm; the role of NGOs in global norm change has evolved in format but not substantially changed in content; and, the slight shift in overall demand in favor of fair trade coffee does not speak to whether or to what extent the change is motivated by principled concerns rather than material interests or other considerations.