广告中断:为什么限制广告损害言论自由

J. Shackleton
{"title":"广告中断:为什么限制广告损害言论自由","authors":"J. Shackleton","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3893611","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Advertising – ‘commercial speech’ – is a form of communication which brings considerable benefits to the economy and society, and restrictions on it need clear justification. Until the mid-1950s advertising was for the most part unregulated, subject only to laws relating to fraud and defamation which also affect other forms of speech. Since then, direct government restrictions have grown, and are still growing, in an attempt to serve public policy objectives of one kind or another. Some of these interventions may achieve little gain at excessive cost, but at least they are discussed in Parliament. However, many restrictions come from what is ostensibly industry self-regulation by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA), a private body which has morphed from concern with ensuring that advertising is ‘legal, decent, honest and truthful’ to a much wider and more problematic brief. Today the ASA does not simply respond to complaints; it proactively seeks out breaches of its own rules. Moreover it deliberately attempts to change public attitudes through forbidding representation of certain types of otherwise lawful behaviour which may give offence to some groups. The ASA is an unrepresentative body which imposes its own attitudes on the advertising industry and thus on the general public. Its interpretation of ‘offence’ and ‘harm’ appears to differ from the view taken by others concerned with regulatory issues, such as Ofcom and Clearcast. As a consequence, creative expression which is permissible in television and films, YouTube, the theatre, books and newspapers is in effect forbidden in advertising. Rules are continually being expanded to cover more areas of our society and culture, and the ASA recently argued that even political manifestos should be regulated. We should reflect much more carefully on the often unthinking way in which we have acquiesced in restrictions on commercial speech while permitting similar material under the banner of entertainment or intellectual free speech. As Nobel prize-winning economist Ronald Coase discerned, the case for free speech is indivisible. If certain types of speech and imagery are forbidden in advertising, it may not be long before there will be pressure to forbid them in the arts, entertainment and politics.","PeriodicalId":11797,"journal":{"name":"ERN: Regulation (IO) (Topic)","volume":"56 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2021-06-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":"{\"title\":\"Ad Break: Why Curbs on Advertising Harm Free Speech\",\"authors\":\"J. Shackleton\",\"doi\":\"10.2139/ssrn.3893611\",\"DOIUrl\":null,\"url\":null,\"abstract\":\"Advertising – ‘commercial speech’ – is a form of communication which brings considerable benefits to the economy and society, and restrictions on it need clear justification. Until the mid-1950s advertising was for the most part unregulated, subject only to laws relating to fraud and defamation which also affect other forms of speech. Since then, direct government restrictions have grown, and are still growing, in an attempt to serve public policy objectives of one kind or another. Some of these interventions may achieve little gain at excessive cost, but at least they are discussed in Parliament. However, many restrictions come from what is ostensibly industry self-regulation by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA), a private body which has morphed from concern with ensuring that advertising is ‘legal, decent, honest and truthful’ to a much wider and more problematic brief. Today the ASA does not simply respond to complaints; it proactively seeks out breaches of its own rules. Moreover it deliberately attempts to change public attitudes through forbidding representation of certain types of otherwise lawful behaviour which may give offence to some groups. The ASA is an unrepresentative body which imposes its own attitudes on the advertising industry and thus on the general public. Its interpretation of ‘offence’ and ‘harm’ appears to differ from the view taken by others concerned with regulatory issues, such as Ofcom and Clearcast. As a consequence, creative expression which is permissible in television and films, YouTube, the theatre, books and newspapers is in effect forbidden in advertising. Rules are continually being expanded to cover more areas of our society and culture, and the ASA recently argued that even political manifestos should be regulated. We should reflect much more carefully on the often unthinking way in which we have acquiesced in restrictions on commercial speech while permitting similar material under the banner of entertainment or intellectual free speech. As Nobel prize-winning economist Ronald Coase discerned, the case for free speech is indivisible. If certain types of speech and imagery are forbidden in advertising, it may not be long before there will be pressure to forbid them in the arts, entertainment and politics.\",\"PeriodicalId\":11797,\"journal\":{\"name\":\"ERN: Regulation (IO) (Topic)\",\"volume\":\"56 1\",\"pages\":\"\"},\"PeriodicalIF\":0.0000,\"publicationDate\":\"2021-06-02\",\"publicationTypes\":\"Journal Article\",\"fieldsOfStudy\":null,\"isOpenAccess\":false,\"openAccessPdf\":\"\",\"citationCount\":\"0\",\"resultStr\":null,\"platform\":\"Semanticscholar\",\"paperid\":null,\"PeriodicalName\":\"ERN: Regulation (IO) (Topic)\",\"FirstCategoryId\":\"1085\",\"ListUrlMain\":\"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3893611\",\"RegionNum\":0,\"RegionCategory\":null,\"ArticlePicture\":[],\"TitleCN\":null,\"AbstractTextCN\":null,\"PMCID\":null,\"EPubDate\":\"\",\"PubModel\":\"\",\"JCR\":\"\",\"JCRName\":\"\",\"Score\":null,\"Total\":0}","platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"ERN: Regulation (IO) (Topic)","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3893611","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"","JCRName":"","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0

摘要

广告——“商业言论”——是一种为经济和社会带来可观利益的传播形式,对其加以限制需要明确的理由。直到20世纪50年代中期,广告在很大程度上是不受管制的,只受与欺诈和诽谤有关的法律的约束,这些法律也影响到其他形式的言论。从那以后,政府的直接限制增加了,而且还在增加,试图为这样或那样的公共政策目标服务。其中一些干预措施可能以过高的代价收效甚微,但至少它们在议会中得到了讨论。然而,许多限制来自于广告标准局(ASA)表面上的行业自律,这是一个私人机构,它已经从关注确保广告“合法、体面、诚实和真实”转变为一个更广泛、更有问题的摘要。今天,ASA不仅仅是回应投诉;它主动寻找违反自己规则的行为。此外,它还故意试图通过禁止代表某些可能冒犯某些群体的合法行为来改变公众的态度。广告标准局是一个不具代表性的机构,它把自己的态度强加给广告业,从而强加给公众。它对“冒犯”和“伤害”的解释似乎与其他关注监管问题的人(如Ofcom和Clearcast)的观点不同。因此,在电视和电影、YouTube、剧院、书籍和报纸中允许的创造性表达实际上在广告中是被禁止的。规则正在不断扩大,以覆盖我们社会和文化的更多领域,ASA最近提出,即使是政治宣言也应该受到监管。我们应该更仔细地反思,我们常常是不假思索地默许了对商业言论的限制,同时又允许类似的材料打着娱乐或知识分子言论自由的旗号出现。正如诺贝尔经济学奖得主罗纳德•科斯(Ronald Coase)所指出的,言论自由是不可分割的。如果在广告中禁止某些类型的言论和图像,那么在不久的将来,在艺术、娱乐和政治中禁止它们的压力可能就会出现。
本文章由计算机程序翻译,如有差异,请以英文原文为准。
Ad Break: Why Curbs on Advertising Harm Free Speech
Advertising – ‘commercial speech’ – is a form of communication which brings considerable benefits to the economy and society, and restrictions on it need clear justification. Until the mid-1950s advertising was for the most part unregulated, subject only to laws relating to fraud and defamation which also affect other forms of speech. Since then, direct government restrictions have grown, and are still growing, in an attempt to serve public policy objectives of one kind or another. Some of these interventions may achieve little gain at excessive cost, but at least they are discussed in Parliament. However, many restrictions come from what is ostensibly industry self-regulation by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA), a private body which has morphed from concern with ensuring that advertising is ‘legal, decent, honest and truthful’ to a much wider and more problematic brief. Today the ASA does not simply respond to complaints; it proactively seeks out breaches of its own rules. Moreover it deliberately attempts to change public attitudes through forbidding representation of certain types of otherwise lawful behaviour which may give offence to some groups. The ASA is an unrepresentative body which imposes its own attitudes on the advertising industry and thus on the general public. Its interpretation of ‘offence’ and ‘harm’ appears to differ from the view taken by others concerned with regulatory issues, such as Ofcom and Clearcast. As a consequence, creative expression which is permissible in television and films, YouTube, the theatre, books and newspapers is in effect forbidden in advertising. Rules are continually being expanded to cover more areas of our society and culture, and the ASA recently argued that even political manifestos should be regulated. We should reflect much more carefully on the often unthinking way in which we have acquiesced in restrictions on commercial speech while permitting similar material under the banner of entertainment or intellectual free speech. As Nobel prize-winning economist Ronald Coase discerned, the case for free speech is indivisible. If certain types of speech and imagery are forbidden in advertising, it may not be long before there will be pressure to forbid them in the arts, entertainment and politics.
求助全文
通过发布文献求助,成功后即可免费获取论文全文。 去求助
来源期刊
自引率
0.00%
发文量
0
×
引用
GB/T 7714-2015
复制
MLA
复制
APA
复制
导出至
BibTeX EndNote RefMan NoteFirst NoteExpress
×
提示
您的信息不完整,为了账户安全,请先补充。
现在去补充
×
提示
您因"违规操作"
具体请查看互助需知
我知道了
×
提示
确定
请完成安全验证×
copy
已复制链接
快去分享给好友吧!
我知道了
右上角分享
点击右上角分享
0
联系我们:info@booksci.cn Book学术提供免费学术资源搜索服务,方便国内外学者检索中英文文献。致力于提供最便捷和优质的服务体验。 Copyright © 2023 布克学术 All rights reserved.
京ICP备2023020795号-1
ghs 京公网安备 11010802042870号
Book学术文献互助
Book学术文献互助群
群 号:481959085
Book学术官方微信