Corporate advertising under scrutiny in France
Image credit: Frederic Bisson (original picture)
France is waking up to the damage caused by advertising and becoming a pioneer in addressing them. Over the last year and half, two new reports in France have set a landmark for assessing the impacts of corporate advertising and suggested pioneering measures including to counter its effects on the climate. The reports come off the back of several successful initiatives to remove adverts in public spaces in French cities like Grenoble, and in towns with populations below 10,000. These efforts benefited from the presence of an established French network of groups who have been campaigning to raise the issue of problematic advertising, who span from guerilla artists to climate campaigners, researchers and active citizens. Here we take a look at the situation in France with regard to the rising backlash against advertising and look at the key findings of the two reports.
SPIM report: a full review on advertising and its impacts
This flagship report was released as part of a research project focused on advertising and the influence of corporations, called SPIM (Système publicitaire et influence des multinationales). It was initiated by R.A.P - the French network against advertising - in 2016 and resulted from a collaboration with Friends of the Earth France, and the NGO Communications sans Frontières. Before publication, a two-day seminar was held at CNRS, a prestigious research centre in Paris, to discuss the political influence of corporate advertising. The event brought together around ten organisations and two media outlets, featuring 30 presentations and eight roundtables.
The report reviews the main problems caused by advertising, mainly its contribution to the ecological and climate crises. through fuelling overconsumption and planned obsolescence in products. It also looks at the role of advertising in giving corporations a platform to influence public policies and popular opinion through corporate social responsibility and marketing strategies. A thorough account is given on why advertising is problematic. It reviews the evidence from the scientific literature and provides case studies for illustration. It also suggests a set of proposals to counter the problematic effects of advertising.
Text in French: Advertising consumes the planet. Illustration Credit: Lucien Ledan • www.communication-utilite-publique.fr (Copyright Osama Jeljeli). Report available in French here.
Among more than 20 recommendations to tackle the influence of corporate advertising, are:
To reduce the most intrusive adverts in public spaces (digital adverts), limit their size (50x70cm) and limit their density (1 per 2000 inhabitants)
To ban advertising directed at young people and limit their exposure in educational materials
To commit corporations to be transparent about their budgets allocated to marketing strategies and campaigns
To regulate the sums corporations spend on advertising proportional to their market value
To create an independent authority with binding powers to regulate the advertising sector
To tax corporate advertising and marketing strategies in light of the “polluter-pays” principle, whereby revenues would help finance preventative campaigns against the negative climate and social impacts of different sectors, such as the automobile or fast fashion industry.
The Greenpeace & R.A.P. report: a climate law against advertising
Following the recommendations of the French Climate Citizens’ Assembly last June, environmental campaign group Greenpeace in collaboration with the NGO Climate Action Network and R.A.P released a new report calling for a climate law to ban the advertising of high carbon goods.
Text in French: Advertising: the case for a Climate Evin law. Image credit: Kevin McElvaney / Greenpeace. Report available in French here.
Already introduced in France 1991 was the so-called Loi Evin (Evin law), to ban the advertising of tobacco and alcohol products on the basis of public health matters. The authors of the report argue that given this precedent, it would be feasible to introduce similar legislation specifically to tackle advertising from the transport sector, airline and fossil fuel industries, considering their disproportionately large climate impacts.
Besides the rationale to ban advertising on climate grounds, implementing such a law would bode well in the French context, where public opinion is particularly opposed to the monopolising effects of advertising. In addition, according to recent research from Greenpeace, 65% of French people would support banning advertising from industries which contribute to climate breakdown (such as the automotive, airlines and fossil fuel industries).
The report also makes the point that the French political context is favourable to the introduction of a climate law to tackle advertising. It would build on the different initiatives put forward on the issue in recent years, such as a proposal for a ban on high-carbon activities and goods by 2023, which was listed under the recommendations from the French Climate Citizen Assembly.
On several occasions the French advertising watchdog authority (ARPP) used its discretionary power to ban adverts, such as those from carmakers Ford, Yamaha and Suzuki, for misleadingly featuring cars in natural backgrounds. The French penal code actually prohibits the use of vehicles outside of the public roads dedicated for traffic.
Example of a car ad featured in a natural background
This report stresses the importance of implementing an advertising ban given the failure of industry self-regulation. Where the industry sets its own targets, policies to curtail advertising have very limited impacts. The World Health Organisation itself concluded that, with respect to marketing for junk food products, voluntary initiatives are not enough to limit the negative health impacts of such products.
The French network working for controls on problem advertising
The French network - R.A.P or Resistance à l’Agression Publicitaire - which is working for controls on problem advertising, was created in 1992 with the objective of tackling the negative impacts from advertising in France. The organisation is made up of 28 local member groups in different cities across the country. Its manifesto declares a preference for culture, natural landscapes, social initiatives, freedom of expression and arts over advertising, whose only purpose is to serve narrow, commercial interests.
Image credit: Résistance à l’Agression Publicitaire (R.A.P) https://antipub.org/asso/presentation/
In 2016, the organisation won two victories against corporate advertising by opposing a proposal from French President Emmanuel Macron to extend advertising’s reach and supporting a ban on advertising targeting children on public tv and radio channels.
The French context has proven itself particularly favourable to new controls on problem advertising in public spaces, backed by both popular and political opinion and it finds a precedent in the Loi Evin prohibiting adverts for tobacco and alcohol products. The linked recommendations from the French Climate Citizen Assembly - to stop advertising of the most high-carbon industries - automotive, airlines and fossil fuels - further supports these findings and offers a strong direction for political change.