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Introduction
Marketing and democracy
A democratic society is based on a vital and essential basis of general experience, knowledge, discussion and reflection. On this basis, expected much of the population contribute. But what happens when the Democratic base increasingly become under the influence of special interests? When marketing as an institution grows so strong that human habitats and public discourse everywhere begin contain purchased propagandistic messages and an unregulated market established for exposure of these messages? When bright displays emit packaged messages in public and private spaces, movies and songs are full of commercial breaks and trademarks are exposed in all sorts of contexts? Is it innocent phenomenon in democracy?
Marketing is a bought influence of our environment. It spreads appealing packaged information to sell products and upload brands. (And to the extent that political actors make use of marketing techniques in their communication, policies also tend to become a product.) One development that has been going on for decades is that the display area of marketing to people is increasing dramatically. As it has been an ever larger and more intrusive role in the economy, public and social life. The exercise by positioning, constant repetition and a professional packaging of information a strong influence on people’s perceptions and appreciations. The media technology, the weakening of established Marketing and expansion of the purchasable zone of existence and the world are economically powerful institutions of power over millions of people increased greatly. But at the same time there is a strange silence about this movement in public discourse and in the media – even though each of us daily and in just the body and the mind is aware of it. It is probably due to large material interests in supporting this development and that exposure to large amounts of marketing may appear both as a natural feature of an open society and as a natural consequence of the increased opportunities for information dissemination.
In an open society, freedom of expression and all players are in principle able to communicate with all other players. In reality, however, this principle of universal communication too rough: it ignores the essential conditions and essential distinctions that must be made about not losing touch and losing reality in abstract ideas. There are so many different media, mechanisms, locations and types of information, so many situations with players with different roles, intentions and interests, all of which are somehow connected to information. Therefore, it is important to carefully define what information you are talking about and in what respect, and it is natural to think that the rules for the different types and aspects of information should differ. For example, it’s a big difference whether information is given as a break in a television program that folder at a trade fair or in the public street space, whether it is requested or oefterfrågad, if the sender is an institution or an individual, if it is part a commercial, nonprofit or political activity, and if it is available in an archive, can be accessed via active nätnavigering or if exposed medially. Studying marketing, it soon becomes clear that it is a kind of information that has many distinctive characteristics: the reshaping our environment in a particularly aggressive and systematic way. It is inevitable that such a transformation of the habitat affects those who live in it and that the deterioration in the environment is problematic and should be justified. Marketing is one of the social phenomenon that should be considered, discussed and reflected – if we want to have a chance to design a sensible regulatory framework, if we want systems that enhance value, substance and value diversity, if we want a citizen-driven society.
Mental molestation
The fact that it is possible to produce and distribute large amounts of information does not mean that people should be exposed to it everywhere in their daily lives. Exposing – that media provide certain information privileged presence in certain places and times – is a signifi-sefull action: obviously, we are affected by the in-formation exposure we are exposed to, and often it is an assault. Advertising as hit us while we direct our attention to other things and we do the people almost always: it violates our attention. This can be done with more or less success, but as soon as we identify an exposure, it has actually broken into our mind. How can we imagine such phenomenon? Is it reasonable to institutional information, the sender will get mentally molest and manipulate the public almost where, when, how and how much time? Especially when marketing to grow the breadth and depth it’s what happens. How justified such a practice in the community? If we lack knowledge about the world and its products without it? Would our desires and needs of dying without it? Why should we accept that distracting and misleading information to shell us from all directions as we are just trying to live our lives? What’s the point, and whose interests it promotes? Hardly man as a citizen and human being in all cases.
All the phenomena of life and society are part of larger contexts and are associated with entities from which they get their materials and their industrial and social content. The larger whole that marketing draws from the human existence mental abilities as attention, memory and knowledge. It is also known that such greats as marketing exposure aiming for. If you are not satisfied with an isolated observation of a single exposure without raising his eyes and study the aggregate effects of the marketing, so there is much to suggest that the ongoing media resource extraction from humans is extensive. But it’s not always easy to identify. That’s because the marketing phenomena are fragmentary thrown over life and society (so that any link between them tend to be invisible), to the prevailing economic ideology devalues their significance and is often in itself only constitutes a small shifts in society’s mental and physical infrastructure which However, overall gets very large consequences.
But freedom of speech then? In a democratic society, it is well a fundamental right in principle to express themselves freely when you want, where you want and how you want? Yes, in principle. But in all reasonable societies restricted this right to other rights and values. For instance, it is not obvious that it should be free for anyone to willfully bellowing and screaming five meters from a stranger’s funeral, putting up a 60-meter-high sign on his land, destroying the landscape, blocking the public’s vision and force on their private messages or to insert breaks in films on the emotionally or aesthetically most sensitive places. Alongside this fundamental relationship in a society will also limitation of freedom of expression a different aspect of the utmost importance: as both a general democratic basic principle and Swedish constitution will be freedom of speech in the first place individuals (citizens), and only subject to certain institutions. Institutions, legal entities controlled by natural persons, may also have observations rights. But that all institutional actors, including such commercial enterprises, would have an equally strong opinion property rights for all its citizens opinions are by no means obvious. In fact, it is a reasonable assumption that they do not have the same rights as citizens, because it would distort the democratic basis. Institutions are not a democratic society subject and purpose. What rights institutions should have depends fundamentally on what we as citizens think they should have.
Media, economism, consumerism
How is it that today we are so much bestormade of marketing? Many factors have contributed to the development, including new technical possibilities, fierce global competition in the private and public sectors, ideological shifts and changes of life settings. I will not claim to historically explain the origin of our situation, but I want to at least point to three factors as a backdrop. These factors are: (a) the strong further development of the media in data exposure, (b) economism as the governing ideology on the political level, and (c) consumerism as the governing force at the individual level.
(A) Media technology. Since long are systematically developed media technical arrangement that allows for information to senders everywhere expose the public to targeted messages. In recent decades, these events strengthened radically through digital technology breakthrough which has meant a major social transformation. Media Technology gives us access to tremendous information loads and allows unprecedented opportunities to produce, multiply and mediate information, but shift the full extent and consequences, we can still only imagine. It seems at least very likely that media and information technology equipment, mechanisms and opportunities will play an important role in the future of society. The framväxta digital networks allowing instant global dissemination of massive data loads. It breeds opportunities for people, society and culture, but also brings risks. Here one must not overlook the fact that it is basically no other way than the political, if by rationality and responsibility to manage all the various interests and values and establish good social laws and regulations. In this situation, it is of course relevant to discuss the rules of marketing, as also the use of the new opportunities, and it is extremely offensive. (B) In addition to the technical and economic space medial arrangement opens up ideologies represent a powerful force for institutions impact on society. ”Economism” as an ideological core principle of social organization in all areas is based on the existence, nature and society overall wholes affidavit salable units – ”products” – part of the markets with the task of managing all important values and whose guiding goal is maximization of trading activity . In connection with the exclusion of everything that has product form, and therefore also human, natural and social entities and values of significant influence on the organization of society. The economy is on its supply of raw materials critically dependent on them.
Some examples of significant human, natural and political values are: balance in the ecosystem, species diversity and landscape configuration (nature), interpersonal trust, courage and political virtues (society), and knowledge, reflectivity and attention (human). These forms and functions is not a once and for all defined without changing, and not least, the dependence of the economy forms, mechanisms and limits. A remarkable fact with economism is that according to their design is not to write these comprehensive wholes no independent value. Nature’s parts and the whole, society’s parts and the whole, the parts of human existence and wholeness – nothing has value except possibly indirectly and remade the way. Thus valued in Economism only what has product shape. All worldviews have a starting point and a categorization, but not everyone has an equally narrow shape that economism. No wonder then that the political decisions, which today largely or entirely based on economic calculations according to neoliberal assumptions, often becomes so severely distorted that they are a drain on human, natural and social entities and values. (C) ”op-Semitism” is ultimately a consumer attitude and lifestyle of individuals who strive to constantly acquire so many fine packaged products as possible, at the expense of various individual and collective values. For the system to be able to realize their highest and only value, consumption maximization, it must be the consumers of their consumption demand can buy the products. Here you will also find marketing itself as a force that increases the product of human desire. Economist liberalism and consumerism are in their basic assumptions compatible and closely interlinked: consumerism is a maximizing economistic system from the consumer’s position, it is eco-mismens human form in a desinformerat democratic system.
Aims and operations of the text
This text is a political-philosophical treatise with both theoretical and political purpose. The theoretical purpose to it on philosophical and sociological way to increase knowledge and awareness of the advertising and marketing community. There is a lot of literature about marketing, but it is usually designed for marketers and practical. And the theory is based on the rule from the sender’s interest and without joining on to the dominant economic theory assumptions of economistic and konsumistisk character. But one approach based marketing and reflexive can see that it is quite possible to construct a different perspective on it, and that it is still far from fully understood and described. In the present text, I try to reach a deeper and more consistent understanding by connecting three theoretical operations to an effective whole. It is (a) a fundamental analysis of marketing theory and practice. The theory given above all in Part 1, while the practice is particularly presented in Chapter 3 of Part 2. Mar-keting interpreted as exposure of packaged messages that disrupt and mislead about their content with the objective of influencing the recipient to certain behavior. In so doing, the perspective is therefore the recipient, not the sender. In Chapter 3, I do a number of analyzes of phenomena and environments in today’s society that exemplifies marketing misinformation. These analyzes supplies the entire survey with an empirical material to provide the theoretical moments substance, milestones and concrete examples. For the most part, the material is either new or original. It consists largely of observations that all of us who live in this society are forced to make in our everyday lives but rarely measured the importance that they deserve. Further holds the text (b) the insertion of advertising in a broader social context and a demonstration of marketing’s relationship with his human and social environment. This text surgery is mostly located in Part 2, Chapter 3 of the societal ”topikerna” is more empirically while the later chapters are rather analytical. It is a social philosophical or sociological critique of marketing as a part of today’s life-world and a study of its impact on the conditions for any value realization, not only for rea-sourcing of product values (the normal procedure in the economic substance). I take the help of sociologists, philosophers, media theorists, advertising researchers and other thinkers. Finally there is a third theoretical operation (c) of constructive and forward-looking nature. It presented ideas for changing exposure rules that leave people’s minds more at peace, and the important consequences that this would have implied. Whether changes are possible to realize would ultimately depend on political will. These more utopian ideas presented in the concluding part 3.
In policy terms, the book is aimed at a democratic front defense against attacks from the ”exposure system”. It wants to keep the systematic harassment and deception of people the exposing marketing based, and advocates public system resources to achieve far better conditions for a qualitative opinion, and a vital, essential and widespread public discussion than is possible in one of disinformation permeated society. It is my belief that it is the central condition, in addition to the rule fundamentals, to the ordering of society and the development shall be determined by a qualified democratic will-formation. This also includes a life-world in which people are happy and experiencing meaning. We live near our terms: bad life, knowledge, reflection and conversation conditions does a poor public discourse which in the long run will result in a bad social system. We have many human and social impulses, levels and mechanisms of us – as we all know even aggressive, anti-rational and problematic ones – and what may be realized and flourish depends largely on conditions in our environment and the prevailing ideological regime. Which system will prevail and what världsåskåd solutions that regulations should encourage and discourage should thus be determined by processes that can break through the illusion and manipulation because of misinformation.
