Marketing Social Change is an excellent book in several respects. It provides a uniquely comprehensive yet detailed blueprint for administrators of organizations interested in the promotion of social change. Pertinent examples season the chapters well and help make the often complex notions presented easily understood. The book correctly places primary emphasis on an initial and fundamental understanding of the behavior and values of the targets of change. It provides a series of checklists to aid the most efficient formulation of social marketing programs. Perhaps most essentially, it takes on the issues of ethics directly. I have only two complaints about the book: (1) The author's strong cognitive orientation, which, until the last chapter, virtually ignores emotional and physiological aspects of many of the behaviors addressed and (2) The lumping together of too wide a variety of behaviors targeted for change (e.g., stopping "bad" behaviors and adopting "good" behaviors). These points are further discussed subsequently in the context of summaries of each of the chapters.
In the preface, Andreasen (p. x) defines social marketing more broadly than Petty and Cacioppo's ( 1996) notion of altruistic marketing: "Social marketing is the application of proven concepts and techniques drawn from the commercial sector to promote changes in diverse socially important behaviors such as drug use, smoking, sexual behavior, family planning and child care." He goes on to advocate the manipulation of the traditional 4 P's of marketing in social marketing contexts. Finally, he makes clear his perspective, "The central tenet of the book is that all good social marketing starts and ends with the target customer" (p. xii). On page 5 of the introduction, Andreasen presents the theoretical model underlying his thinking and advice. Behavior change is the dependent variable influenced by four classes of independent variables: (1) the attractiveness of behavioral alternatives, (2) community pressures, (3) the cooperation of critical supporting agencies, and (4) marketing efforts. He then points out the limitations of traditional approaches to promoting social change and explains the advantages of the more comprehensive seven steps of social marketing (listed on page 14). A good portion of the chapter is devoted to a series of seven "success stories" (four are international) that well demonstrate the usefulness of the more comprehensive approach advocated. The author concludes the introduction with concise caveats regarding marketing's unfortunately negative (i.e., exploitative) image among social administrators and the "special obligation" of social marketers to pay careful attention to ethical concerns.