Commentary on Public Health Advocacy to Change Corporate Practices

Abstract

Responsible practitioners who plan programs to promote health and prevent diseases must understand and address those factors and conditions that influence the health status of the population they serve. It is clear that some corporations and businesses promote and sell products and pursue other policies that can have deleterious effects on the public's health. This commentary urges planners and practitioners who seek to redress the actions and polices that lead to corporate disease promotion to consider expanding their working knowledge of (a) the core values that drive corporate culture and (b) how those values are often framed to distort and override the social justice values of public health. Such understanding can serve to strengthen public health professionals' capacity to take discrete steps, including the strategic use of community organizing for power, to heighten public demand for greater corporate social accountability for the health consequences of their actions.

Does public health advocacy seek to redress health inequities? A scoping review

“…); a public mood that values individual responsibility and minimum collective action (Farrer et al . ); influential vested commercial interests (Krieger & Higgins , Breen , Kreuter , Stanley & Daube ); limited opportunities based on the current political radar (Chapman ); ‘political short‐termism’, where health targets are generally short‐term and not amenable to the long‐term action required to improve health equity (Farrer et al . ); insufficient co‐operation between health and other sectors that hamper efforts to advocate for policies that tackle health inequities (McAndrews & Marcus , Farrer et al .…”

“…Although the public health advocacy literature demonstrates an ardent critique of advocacy efforts that focus on the health behaviours of populations rather than socio‐structural, environmental and corporate drivers of inequities (Sapsin et al . , Kreuter , Ungurean & Csiki , Wang & Brownell , Livingston , Raphael et al . ), this critique does not appear to have significantly influenced public health practice.…”

“…Barriers originating outside of public health organisations may include: proponents of political philosophies that undermine health at the expense of economic considerations or that promote the idea of 'equal agency' and equal opportunities for all citizens (Farrer et al 2015); concern by the public and influential minorities about 'nanny' state interference with civil liberties (Chapman 2001, Breen 2004, Moore et al 2015; a public mood that values individual responsibility and minimum collective action (Farrer et al 2015); influential vested commercial interests (Krieger & Higgins 2002, Breen 2004, Kreuter 2005, Stanley & Daube 2009); limited opportunities based on the current political radar (Chapman 2004); 'political short-termism', where health targets are generally short-term and not amenable to the long-term action required to improve health equity (Farrer et al 2015); insufficient co-operation between health and other sectors that hamper efforts to advocate for policies that tackle health inequities (McAndrews & Marcus 2014, Farrer et al 2015; stigmatisation or inequities based on race, social class and gender (Satcher & Higginbotham 2008); academia's focus on publication and grants rather than social change (Chapman 2001, Klugman 2011, Livingston 2011; lack of minority and low-income representation on community advisory boards (Grogan, & Gusmano 2007); remote geography (Snider & Bellamy 2002); constraints imposed by government policy and procedures (Galer-Unti et al 2004); the growing complexity of policy arenas (Yeatman 2002); and the ever-changing social structure that produces the conditions for inequities (Adshead & Thorpe 2009). Gould et al (2010) highlight the predominance of a societal belief that health inequities are the result of poor individual choices and behaviours, which confounds efforts to mobilise action towards redressing the underlying causes of health inequities.…”

Corporate Image and Public Health: An Analysis of the Philip Morris, Kraft, and Nestlé Websites

“…Advocates must determine their relationship with their corporate targets, whether adversarial, cooperative, or a mixture of the two (Kreuter, 2005; Wiist, 2006). How advocates define these relationships can further affect corporate image, as health professionals may be perceived to endorse or oppose corporate actions.…”

Public Health and the Anticorporate Movement: Rationale and Recommendations

“…An understanding of the values underlying corporate culture, how to organize, and how to use political power to advocate are key public health competencies for addressing what have been termed health-damaging corporations. 38 The topics address corporate strategies and include activities of public health advocates. 1 Some of the topics in Box 3 overlap currently recommended competencies, but most students would not likely encounter many of these topics in the current public health curricula.…”