title: The politics and strategy of industry self-regulation: the pharmaceutical industry's principles for ethical direct-to-consumer advertising as a deceptive blocking strategy.
abstract: As the pharmaceutical industry lobbies European regulators to permit direct-to-consumer advertising (DTCA) of prescription drugs in the European Union, we found that five leading companies violated industry-developed and -promulgated standards for ethical advertising in the United States. Utilizing multiple data sources and methods, we demonstrate a consistent failure by companies that market erectile dysfunction drugs to comply with the industry's guiding principles for ethical DTCA over a four-year period despite pledges of compliance by company leaders. Noncompliance resulted in children being exposed to sexually themed promotional messages more than 100 billion times. We argue that the guidelines are a coordinated effort by the industry to prevent unwanted federal regulation, and we introduce the concept of a blocking strategy to explain company behavior and to advance theoretical understanding of firms' public affairs strategies. We recommend policy responses to prevent deceptive practices, protect children from adult content, and promote genuine health care education.
authors: University of North Carolina, Charlotte, USA.
authors: Denis G
authors: DG
authors: Arnold
authors: James L
authors: JL
authors: Oakley
mesh_terms: D000329:Advertising / Q000191:economics / Q000941:ethics* / Q000379:methods; D003256:Community Participation; D008192:Deception; D004345:Drug Industry / Q000941:ethics*; D006801:Humans; D011057:Politics; D055553:Prescription Drugs; D012927:Social Control, Informal; D014481:United States
chemical_list: D055553:Prescription Drugs