This paper examines the symbiotic relationship between social, commercial, and critical marketing thought. Marketers seek to influence consumer behaviour. Much ill health and many social problems are caused by human behaviour. Social marketing puts these two phenomena together and uses marketing insights to address social behaviours. In the process both arms of the discipline can benefit, and this paper illustrates this using the examples of exchange theory and relational thinking. Social marketing also recognizes environmental influences on behaviour and that commercial marketing can be an important part of this influence. The case of tobacco is used to show that this influence can be malignant, and that as a result marketing has come under unprecedented scrutiny. Social marketing’s understanding of both the commercial and social sectors puts it in a unique position to provide realistic critiques of marketing and identify intelligent solutions. The paper concludes that socialmarketing will flourish by exploiting its twin understanding of the good and the bad that marketing can bring to society.

To date, the discourse about service dominant (S-D) logic has been largely theoretical, with the main focus on exploring the foundations for an integrating general theory of markets and marketing. Little attention has been given to the role of theorizing, and how empirical evidence can be used to inform the theoretical development. This paper explores the bridging role of middle range theory in this process. First S-D logic is examined as a foundation for general theory. This leads to a discussion about the use of middle range theory to link general theory and empirical findings. The following sections examine the role that contemporary marketing practices (CMP) research plays in providing a bridge between S-D logic and empirical evidence. The paper concludes by considering implications for further research.

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The recognised complexity of the innovation process not only makes it difficult to manage, explain and study, but also presents problems for the development of a generalised model.Cooper's recent article in 'R&D Management' suggests that the construction of a generalised model is inappropriate because there appear to be a number of different types of innovation processes. However, many of the studies of innovation postulate or assume a general model which represents the stages involved in the firm. This paper reviews the models of the innovation process which have been proposed and the author classifies them according to his taxonomy of different types:(a) Departmental-stage models (b) Activity-stage models (c) Decision-stage models (d) Conversion process models (e) Response models The advantages and disadvantages of each approach are discussed and the conclusion reached is that still more research needs to be concentrated on the nature of the innovation process within the firm itself. The absence of a definitive model compounds the problems of semantics and definitions when discussing innovation.

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