The beverage alcohol industry’s social aspects organizations: A public health warning

Abstract

Over the last twenty years the beverage alcohol industry has set up and funded social aspects organizations to manage issues that may be detrimental to its business. They aim to manage issues by: attempting to influence the alcohol policies of national and international governmental organizations; becoming members of relevant non-alcohol specific organizations and committees to broaden policy influence and respectability; recruiting scientists, hosting conferences and promoting high profile publications; creating social aspects organizations in emerging markets and low income countries; and preparing and promoting consensus statements and codes of practice. Social aspects organizations hold viewpoints which on inspection confirm their overall aim, which is to benefit their funding body, the beverage alcohol industry, rather than to benefit public health or the public good. For example, the view that responsible drinking can be learned and that this should be the cornerstone of alcohol policy fails to recognize that without addressing the social environment in which the alcohol is consumed (including policy on the price, availability and marketing of alcohol products) alcohol policies based on individual responsibility are ineffective in reducing harm. Another example is the view that the marketing of alcoholic beverages should be regulated by the beverage alcohol industry itself is inherently unlikely to work, since the essence of selfregulation is that compliance with codes is voluntary and the industry has blatantly, consistently and extensively broken its own codes in all areas of the world, with no evidence that this has improved over recent years.