The Draft Children's Advertising Code seeks to protect children from the excesses of advertising on TV. However, protection of the more commercial-free areas throughout the landscape of childhood needs to be stressed, writes Olivia Freeman.
Recent debate around the Broadcasting Commission of Ireland (BCI) Draft Children's Advertising Code has seen issues such as "pester power", child obesity, "nanny statism" and corporate exploitation of children thrown yet again into the spotlight.
Debate to date has centred on television advertising. Will advertisers take their budgets to non-Irish stations? Should there be an all out ban on television advertising to children?
However, discussion surrounding the draft code points to a much broader concern: the issue of children's cultural space.
Increasingly marketing budgets are being spread across wider areas of the childhood landscape, namely schools and public play areas, as advertisers engage in product placement and sponsorship often in the name of social responsibility.
There is an increasing recognition that children are part of a global consumer culture; critically, however, their lives are lived and played locally. Their peers, their parents and their immediate surroundings hold the greatest influence over them. This fact is not lost on advertisers as they recognise children's cultural space including educational and play space as a blank canvas for branding.
It seems for educators or local authorities a small price to pay when what are offered in exchange are often badly needed financial resources. What's the harm in having a Nike emblazoned basketball court or corridors adorned by Ribena ads? Children spend up to six hours a day looking at the teacher; maybe teachers could endorse certain clothing brands!
Argument surrounding the draft code has centred on the extent to which advertising exploits children's innate gullibility. Many representing the advertising industry itself have argued that the advertising medium in fact empowers children. They argue that it is an integral part of consumer culture and that children's exposure to advertising sits rather harmlessly along side visits to shopping centres and the saving of pocket money in their socialisation as consumers.
In light of the fact that children do live in a culture where consumption is so highly valued and where exposure to advertising is so all encompassing, many would ask what's the harm in one more ad, be it in the classroom or on the see-saw.
What are the effects of branding this space? Marketers might explain them in terms of "cradle-to-grave" strategies centred on creating brand awareness and loyalty. Not all corporate sponsorship of educational or play space comes from companies targeting children, but they want to be top of mind in terms of these future consumers.
For others, the sponsorship comes with a more immediate pay off. For example, soft drinks companies in America battle for exclusive distribution of their products in schools and funding will often depend on the sale of certain quotas of the product. This has led to the installation of drinks machines in the classroom itself.
Advertisers battle with each other to gain coverage and stand out in a cluttered landscape of traditional media. Their entry into the educational space represents an invasion into an area which should be devoted to the development of creative and independent thinking. The extent to which its presence serves to hinder creativity is impossible to quantify.
However, the American example serves to illustrate the exploitative and anti-educational nature of much of this sponsorship. The "gently gently" approach of a number of American corporations has seen them gain large scale input into curricula and textbooks of primary level schools. Lifetime Learning Systems, America's largest marketer and producer of corporate-sponsored teaching aids, claim that more than 52 million students use its publications every year.
Its website reads: "Having created over 2,000 programmes, Lifetime Learning Systems knows how to link a sponsor's message to curriculum standards and create a powerful presence for your message in America's classrooms with informative and engaging materials." The purpose of these publications is not to open children's minds but to fulfil marketing objectives resulting in reported widespread bias in the content of the learning material.
I attended a recent Mundy gig where he described the creation of his latest album as akin to playing with "marla", to which the crowd of 20-something's revelled in his nostalgia. The Irish word for plasticine brings children of the 80s back to the classroom awakening memories of duffle coats and leg warmers!
Children today embrace global consumer culture playing with globally branded toys such as Yu-Gi-Oh! trading cards or Hasbro Bey Blades. However, what has changed to a lesser extent is the localised nature of children's play. Much of the space children play in - specifically the educational environment and public playgrounds - have remained commercial free, their own murals often identifying that space as theirs.
According to the Department of Education, the acceptance of corporate sponsorship of educational equipment or school buildings is a decision which is left to the discretion of individual boards of management.
Dublin City Council does not have a policy on corporate sponsorship of public playgrounds but would welcome funding from what they refer to as "appropriate" companies, i.e. not alcoholic drinks companies but possibly a company such as Lego.
The proposed curtailments set out in the draft code, coupled with lacking financial resources on the part of schools and local authorities, leaves educational and play spaces in a very vulnerable position to potential exploitation from large corporations.
If we endorse the regulation of advertising to children through television, emphasis must now be placed on the continued maintenance of other areas of children's cultural space as free of commercial clutter. Responsible campaigns such as the Tesco Computers for Schools are a welcome bonus to any school's resources, but let's avoid moving the ads from the television to the play ground. Let this code represent a progressive step towards recognition of a child's right to an area of cultural "space" that is void of commercialism.
Olivia Freeman is a lecturer of consumer behaviour at the School of Marketing, Dublin Institute of Technology.