Page 269 - The Handbook of Persuasion and Social Marketing

Public Support for Regulating the Public 245

motivation, opportunity, and ability (MOA) within individuals. Often,
downstream efforts assumed that the absence of adequate information
about the problem behavior and its consequences impeded people’s ability
to make the “right” choice. More recently, attention has turned to the con-
ditions that affect motivation and opportunity, such as the availability and
presentation of alternatives to the “bad” behavior.
Upstream marketing views the process of effecting change as “political.”
With upstream marketing, the underlying assumption of the process is
that behavior (and related MOA) is embedded in an environment that
shapes and creates meaning for the behavior (e.g., smoking is a ritual for
young adults when partying, smokeless tobacco is embedded in baseball
and rodeo environments). The motive for political action stems from the
view that these problems result from a lack of power between consumers
and marketers, not a lack of information. Marketers have the power and
resources to shape consumer environments, create product/brand tribes,
and so on. While the downstream approach argues that individuals can
resist a specific choice in such environments, the upstream view argues
that it is fundamentally hard to even envision a “decision” when one is
embedded in an environment and surrounded by norms shaped by a mar-
keter’s hand (e.g., it is hard to resist the matrix when you are in the ma-
trix). Thus, the process of change must involve reshaping the environment
through political means and influencing powerful parties through public
opinion, pressure, and debate.
Downstream marketing tactics can be framed in terms of manipulating
one or more of the four marketing “P’s” (promotion, product, place, and
price). The P’s are manipulated to alter the perceived and actual benefits
and costs associated with a behavior, and as such alter a person’s motiva-
tion, opportunity, and ability to engage in (or avoid) the behavior
(Rothschild, 1999). In contrast, upstream marketing can be framed in
terms of either a push or pull strategy. A push strategy (such as lobbying)
is one where the marketer seeks to directly influence a key organizational
decision maker in order to create conditions that encourage (push) the
appropriate behavior onto consumers (e.g., increase the state sales tax on
“sin” products). A pull strategy (such as media advocacy or public will) is
one where the marketer seeks to influence organizational decision makers
by directly influencing public opinion. Then, ideally, an individual or so-
ciety-driven desire is created that advocates for changed conditions to pro-
mote pro-social behaviors. Public health scholars (Wallack & Dorfman,
1996; Siegel & Lotenberg, 2007) argue that utilizing a pull strategy such
as media advocacy (using mass media as a “political” tool) should be a
critical feature of the new public health. This view is based on the