Page 9 - The Handbook of Persuasion and Social Marketing

2 The Handbook of Persuasion and Social Marketing

marketing in at least three ways: (1) marketing tools, in contrast to other
methods of social change, are the focus; (2) the emphasis is on influencing
voluntary behavior rather than behavior more generally, including more or
less “persuasion,” whether through “nudges” or more coercive social con-
trol; and (3) the target is the individual rather than a larger social organiza-
tion. In contrast, others enlarge the scope of social marketing, and the
marketing discipline more generally, to include broader sets of tools for
behavior change such as education, political action, and various forms of
social control and behavioral change (Rothschild, 1999). The focus of so-
cial marketing has also widened beyond individual behavior to larger so-
cial entities and to behavior that is not altogether voluntary (Lindblom,
1977; Hastings, MacFadyen & Anderson, 2000; Rothschild, 2001; Grier
& Bryan, 2005).
Even the founding of social marketing is a matter of some debate. Philip
Kotler and Gerald Zaltman (1971) are often considered the founders of
social marketing theory, but Wiebe (1951) raised the possibility of apply-
ing marketing tools and techniques to social issues 20 years earlier. Wilkie
and Moore (2003) argue that marketing has been engaged with societal
issues since the founding of the discipline, and that the early focus of the
discipline was on economic efficacy in service of societal needs. Drucker
(1958) described the important role of marketing as an engine of eco-
nomic development: “marketing is thus the process through which econ-
omy is integrated into society to serve human needs” (p. 253). It may be
more appropriate to suggest that Kotler and Zaltman rediscovered social
marketing and drew heavily on the work of Lazarsfeld and Merton, who
considered the roles of mass media, propaganda, word-of-mouth commu-
nication, and social power in social reform (Lazarsfeld & Merton, 1948).
Thus, even as social marketing has become a significant tool for social
change, it has also acquired a bit of a schizophrenic character. A reading
of the literature on social marketing finds differences in definitions,
philosophical orientation, and purpose. Criticisms of the ad hoc nature of
social marketing as a discipline and means for change exist alongside rich
discussions of specific theories and meta-theory describing the relation-
ships of multiple theories. Examples of applications range from the highly
operational to the strategic.

Purpose of this Set

It is both the growth and the split nature of social marketing that gave rise
to this set. There are many books that describe how to utilize social mar-
keting (Lee & Kotler, 2011; French, Merritt & Reynolds, 2011; Weinrich,