Dealing With Complaints About Advertising In Australia: the Importance of Regulatory Self-Discipline

Michael Harker and Debra Harker

The regulation of advertising is a controversial and difficult process, and, given the choice, developed countries usually select a self-regulatory approach to deal with unacceptable advertising.

Dealing With Complaints About Advertising in Australia: the Importance of Regulatory Selfdiscipline

Debra HarkerandMichael HarkerUniversity of the Sunshine Coast

Introduction

As the most visible of business practices (Boddewyn, 1989), marketing is criticised by almost everyone, from social critics to public policymakers to political pundits (Rotfeld, 1999). The practices of audience manipulation, market abuse of children, cultural destruction and unacceptable advertising are among the social ills often laid at the door of the marketing business (Rotfeld, 1999). Indeed, advertising in particular has been described as pervasive (Drake, 1988), intrusive (Blakeney and Barnes, 1982) and pernicious, and the...

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