Chris Holden

The Limits of Corporate Social Responsibility: Techniques of Neutralization, Stakeholder Management and Political CSR.

Since scholarly interest in corporate social responsibility (CSR) has primarily focused on the synergies between social and economic performance, our understanding of how (and the conditions under which) companies use CSR to produce policy outcomes that work against public welfare has remained comparatively underdeveloped. In particular, little is known about how corporate decision-makers privately reconcile the conflicts between public and private interests, even though this is likely to be relevant to understanding the limitations of CSR as a means of aligning business activity with the broader public interest. This study addresses this issue using internal tobacco industry documents to explore British-American Tobacco’s (BAT) thinking on CSR and its effects on the company’s CSR Programme. The article presents a three-stage model of CSR development, based on Sykes and Matza’s theory of techniques of neutralization, which links together: how BAT managers made sense of the company’s declining political authority in the mid-1990s; how they subsequently justified the use of CSR as a tool of stakeholder management aimed at diffusing the political impact of public health advocates by breaking up political constituencies working towards evidence-based tobacco regulation; and how CSR works ideologically to shape stakeholders’ perceptions of the relative merits of competing approaches to tobacco control. Our analysis has three implications for research and practice. First, it underlines the importance of approaching corporate managers’ public comments on CSR critically and situating them in their economic, political and historical contexts. Second, it illustrates the importance of focusing on the political aims and effects of CSR. Third, by showing how CSR practices are used to stymie evidence-based government regulation, the article underlines the importance of highlighting and developing matrices to assess the negative social impacts of CSR.

Corporate Social Responsibility and Access to Policy Elites: An Analysis of Tobacco Industry Documents

Gary Fooks and colleagues undertook a review of tobacco industry documents and show that policies on corporate social responsibility can enable access to and dialogue with policymakers at the highest level.

Industry Use of Evidence to Influence Alcohol Policy: A Case Study of Submissions to the 2008 Scottish Government Consultation

Jim McCambridge and colleagues analyze industry submissions to a Scottish Government consultation on whole-population approaches to alcohol policy.

Alcohol industry influence on UK alcohol policy: a new research agenda for public health

The British government has been criticised for according industry interests too much weight in alcohol policy-making. Consequently, it has been argued that alcohol strategy in the UK is built around policies for which the evidence base is weak. This has clear implications for public health. The purpose of this commentary is to map recent developments in UK alcohol policy and related debates within the alcohol policy literature, thus laying the foundations for a systematic examination of the influence of the alcohol industry on alcohol policy. It highlights the changing structure of the industry and summarises what is known about the positions and strategies of industry actors towards alcohol policy. In so doing, it aims to contribute not just to debates about alcohol policy, but to a broader understanding of health policy processes and the relationships between government and other stakeholders. It advances a new research agenda focused on the role of corporate actors in the field of alcohol policy and public health more broadly.

Framing the alcohol policy debate: industry actors and the regulation of the UK beverage alcohol market

This article explores alcohol industry attempts to frame the debate about pricing and promotions policy in the United Kingdom. Framing theory, it is argued, offers us important insights into the dynamics of the policymaking process as a contest between competing conceptualizations of both problems and solutions. Drawing on a documentary analysis and a series of interviews with policymakers, public health advocates and alcohol industry actors, it argues that industry actors framed the policy debate in ways which were consistent with their underlying commercial interests. A clear challenge was posed to the industry by the shift towards whole-population interventions favored by the Scottish government. This led to a reassertion of the industry frame in which alcohol-related harm is limited to a small minority of the population and which advocates targeted interventions.

The Business-Social Policy Nexus: Corporate Power and Corporate Inputs into Social Policy

It is increasingly impossible to understand and explain the shape and delivery of contemporary social policy unless we consider the role of business. Several factors have been at work here. First, many of the changes in social policy introduced since the 1970 sh ave been in response either to business demands or more general concerns about national competitiveness and the needs of business. Second, globalisation has increased corporate power within states, leading to transformations in social and fiscal policies. Third, business has been incorporated into the management of many areas of the welfare state by governments keen to control expenditure and introduce private sector values into services. Fourth, welfare services, from hospitals to schools, have been increasingly opened up to private markets. Despite all this, the issues of business influence and involvement in social policy has been neglected in the literature. This article seeks to place corporate power and influence centre-stage by outlining and critically reflecting on the place of business within contemporary welfare states, with a particular focus on the UK. Business, it argues, is increasingly important to welfare outcomes and needs to be taken into account more fully within the social policy literature.

The challenge corporate lobbying poses to reducing society's alcohol problems: insights from UK evidence on minimum unit pricing.

Background There has been insufficient research attention to alcohol industry methods of influencing public policies. With the exception of the tobacco industry, there have been few studies of the impact of corporate lobbying on public health policymaking more broadly. Methods We summarize here findings from documentary analyses and interview studies in an integrative review of corporate efforts to influence UK policy on minimum unit pricing (MUP) of alcohol 2007–10. Results Alcohol producers and retailers adopted a long-term, relationship-building approach to policy influence, in which personal contacts with key policymakers were established and nurtured, including when they were not in government. The alcohol industry was successful in achieving access to UK policymakers at the highest levels of government and at all stages of the policy process. Within the United Kingdom, political devolution and the formation for the first time of a Scottish National Party (SNP) government disrupted the existing long-term strategy of alcohol industry actors and created the conditions for evidence-based policy innovations such as MUP. Conclusions Comparisons between policy communities within the United Kingdom and elsewhere are useful to the understanding of how different policy environments are amenable to influence through lobbying. Greater transparency in how policy is made is likely to lead to more effective alcohol and other public policies globally by constraining the influence of vested interests.

Vested interests in addiction research and policy. The challenge corporate lobbying poses to reducing society's alcohol problems : insights from UK evidence on minimum unit pricing

Background There has been insufficient research attention to alcohol industry methods of influencing public policies. With the exception of the tobacco industry, there have been few studies of the impact of corporate lobbying on public health policymaking more broadly. Methods We summarize here findings from documentary analyses and interview studies in an integrative review of corporate efforts to influence UK policy on minimum unit pricing (MUP) of alcohol 2007–10. Results Alcohol producers and retailers adopted a long-term, relationship-building approach to policy influence, in which personal contacts with key policymakers were established and nurtured, including when they were not in government. The alcohol industry was successful in achieving access to UK policymakers at the highest levels of government and at all stages of the policy process. Within the United Kingdom, political devolution and the formation for the first time of a Scottish National Party (SNP) government disrupted the existing long-term strategy of alcohol industry actors and created the conditions for evidence-based policy innovations such as MUP. Conclusions Comparisons between policy communities within the United Kingdom and elsewhere are useful to the understanding of how different policy environments are amenable to influence through lobbying. Greater transparency in how policy is made is likely to lead to more effective alcohol and other public policies globally by constraining the influence of vested interests.

Decommodification and the Workfare State

Two related concepts have been used to understand the welfare state – ‘decommodification’ and the ‘workfare’ or the ‘competition’ state, as it relates to processes of ‘recommodification’. I show how these related literatures may be integrated in order to enhance our understanding of current labour market policies. Applying these concepts to an analysis of the ideas and policies of New Labour leads to the conclusion that state welfare services are being reconfigured to serve more effectively the needs of the market, through a process of ‘administrative recommodification’.

‘Whisky gloss’: The alcohol industry, devolution and policy communities in Scotland

Debates on devolution in the UK have been concerned both with the extent to which this has led to policy divergence and with whether devolved institutions have facilitated a more open policy style, which allows easier access to policy makers for a greater range of actors. Further questions have been raised about the extent to which devolution has strengthened territorial boundaries, making it difficult for interest groups to circumvent devolved institutions. Drawing on a series of interviews with a range of policy actors, we investigate the impact of the minority Scottish National Party (SNP) government in Scotland between 2007 and 2011 on alcohol policy and the alcohol policy community, with specific reference to debates about the introduction of minimum unit pricing (MUP). We show that the Scottish policy style did allow extensive access to policy makers, but that the election of the SNP government disrupted the formerly prevailing equilibrium within the Scottish alcohol policy community. The industry was unable to escape the implications of a change in Scottish law for its interests, but industry arguments that MUP is contrary to European Union law indicate that there is still some scope for venue shopping.