10.19 Tobacco industry lobbying—overview
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While in the market place the tobacco companies are fiercely competitive, when it comes to protecting their collective patch—preserving corporate viability—they have demonstrated strategic and financial collaboration at the highest level. In Australia and internationally, the tobacco industry has developed a comprehensive, multifaceted, multi-level approach to defending its interests. These have included creating ways to undermine the credibility of the medico-scientific community and public health interests, the development of networks of influence throughout the business community and the political world, permeating community interest groups and charities, and the mobilisation of smokers, retailers, hoteliers, trade organisations and other potential supporters of tobacco industry objectives.
The capacity of the tobacco industry to wreak havoc with tobacco control legislation has been identified as a major barrier to the introduction of health measures. In the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, Article 5.3 (which outlines the general obligations of members) states that 'In setting and implementing their public health policies with respect to tobacco control, Parties shall act to protect these policies from commercial and other vested interests of the tobacco industry in accordance with national law.'250 [48]
Analyses of tobacco industry tactics based on many years of observation been published, such as those by Sweda and Daynard,251 Saloojee and Dagli252 and most recently, Trochim et al.253 Trochim et al categorise industry strategies into eight broad bands of activity.[49] These are presented in Table 10.21.
Table 10.21
Industry tactics used to counter tobacco control measures
|
1 |
Lobbying and legislative strategy |
Including by: influencing content, pre-empting by devising voluntary codes of conduct, political donations, activation of wider lobby of supporters, promoting legislation likely to be ineffective, using delaying tactics |
|
2 |
Legal and economic intimidation |
Including by: funding, or threatening to withdraw funding, from supporting organisations, engaging in expensive legal proceedings, infiltrating official regulatory organisations, adopting an overt legal stance to intimidate, cutting the price of tobacco to undermine taxation policy |
|
3 |
Usurping the agenda |
Including by: creating their own programs (such as youth prevention campaigns) to avoid stricter regulation, limiting tobacco control issues to youth smoking, shifting blame from the industry to third parties (such as retailers, young people) |
|
4 |
Creating the illusion of support |
Including by: using the law to counter regulatory initiatives, using independent 'experts' to argue against measures, creating pro-tobacco lobby groups in the community |
|
5 |
Harassment |
Including by: intimidation through the courts, silencing industry whistleblowers, overwhelming opposition with financial resources, infiltration of tobacco control groups |
|
6 |
Undermining science |
Including by: supporting research and paying scientists to counter mainstream medical views, fostering confusion, creating scientific forums as a vehicle for disseminating industry views, infiltration of scientific literature |
|
7 |
Media manipulation |
Including by: influencing content, taking advantage of 'equal time' to promote its own science, ghost-writing material for the media, misrepresenting facts when there is no time to verify, acknowledging that tobacco causes harm but minimising the magnitude |
|
8 |
Public relations |
Including by: charitable works, embracing concepts of corporate responsibility, arguing that the industry is economically vital, casting tobacco control measures as victimisation of smokers, overcomplicating issues |
Source: Summarised from Table 1 in Trochim
et al.253 p 142–3
The following sections discuss some of the ways in which the industry has worked towards its goals. The subject has been extensively explored in the medical and public health literature and references cited in the following pages provide the interested reader with a wealth of further information.
[48]Of course, the FCTC has itself been the object of intense tobacco industry lobbying. See Section 10.21.2.3 below.
[49] The study by Trochim et al conceptualises a model for tobacco industry strategies to undermine tobacco control programs, based on the experiences of a number of US-based tobacco control efforts and ranked in importance. Generally, the industry seems to engage in public relations and usurping the agenda on an ongoing basis, moving towards the more covert realms of harassment and legal and economic intimidation as required. Readers are referred to Trochim et al253 for further information.
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