Swedish Consumer Ombudsman on TV advertising to children

[Gary Ruskin <gary@essential.org>]

Commercial Alert			December 2, 1999

Following is a speech regarding television advertising to children by
Axel Edling, Director General of the Swedish Consumer Agency, and the
Swedish Consumer Ombudsman.

Sweden's position "is that TV advertising should not be targeted at
children."

Mr. Edling's views are important because of Sweden's strong efforts to
protect children from TV advertising, and because Sweden will likely try
to expand its ban on TV advertising to children throughout the European
Union when Sweden assumes the EU presidency in January, 2001. Mr.
Edling's speech follows. 

Speech at a conference in London on 23 November 1999 regarding TV
Advertising and Children

Ladies and gentlemen,

I am glad to have been invited here to talk about the Swedish
perspective on the subject of TV advertising and children. The position
in my country is that TV advertising should not be targeted at children.
It has not escaped me that this is a controversial view. Many of you
from industry no doubt want to see greater freedom to advertise within a
framework that applies in a uniform way across the whole European
community.  That I can well understand. But there are also other
considerations as today´s discussions will show.

First a few words on the role of the Consumer Ombudsman and the Swedish
Consumer Agency. We are a public agency monitoring consumer laws
concerning advertising, product safety and unfair contract terms.
Another primary task is to promote consumer education in a wide sense,
and train local consumer advisors around the country. We have close
continuous contacts with the consumer organisations.

By any international standard, Sweden is an open society. Freedom of
information ranks high. Both freedom to receive and disseminate
information. Indeed, Sweden has sometimes been criticized for being too
open. However there are some restrictions that have been discussed very
much in recent years,  one of them being the ban on TV advertising
directed to children under 12. This ban has been in existence since 1991
and is now contained in the Radio and Television Act (Chapter 7 Section
4). Also all kinds of advertising directly before, in the middle of, or
after children´s programs are forbidden under that Act.

It should be added that the ban covers not only advertising of
children´s products such as toys but also advertising of other products
such as food. The ban is not aimed categorically at any specific type of
product. Instead the decisive criteria assessing whether the advert is
created to catch the attention of children or not are things like the
design of the commercial message (participation of children, sort of
language used, cartoon characters etc.), and also in which context the
commercial is broadcasted.

The Swedish restriction on advertsing to children is supported by a
majority of the Swedish population. It is also strongly supported by the
Swedish consumer organisations. In addition, there is support from the
majority of advertising agencies in Sweden, and I will come back to
that.

So why this strong view on the matter?

Because young children do not understand what advertising is. And
according to the commercial community itself, they should. In the ICC
Code of Advertising Practice which is supposed to govern the Industry´s
self-regulation all over the world, one basic principle concerns
advertising identification: advertising should be easily identified as
such. You will find corresponding language in various legal instruments,
for instance the EC "Television without Frontiers Directive" and the
Swedish Marketing Act.

This means that everybody in the target group should be able to
distinguish easily an advertisement from other media content, and also
understand the purpose of it. They should be able to do that in the
context where the advertisement generally occurs, for example as part of
a TV broadcast. 

This is so important because it establishes a basic balance of power
between the consumer and the advertiser. In other words it establishes
the principle of fair play.

Commercial communication is a very special kind of communication. A
business firm commissions a set of very qualified professionals in order
to design a message that should promote the commercial interests of the
firm. The message is intended to persuade the target person to buy the
advertiser's brand of goods instead of that of its competitors. Or to
take up a habit that s/he had otherwise not thought of. 

Sceptical adults will know very well that a commercial does not always
give the whole picture. If I wish to make an informed decision I need
more information. 

But children below a certain level of maturity cannot tell the
difference between TV advertising and other TV programmes. They may
recognize that TV slots have another form than that of other programmes.
But they are generally not sure of what is the objective behind the
advert. 

This is common wisdom of all parents, but it is also underpinned by
research. And, significantly, it is also common wisdom among Swedish
advertising agencies, as a recent investigation shows.

In 1994, the Swedish sociologist Erling Bjurström published a
comprehensive survey of international research on the effects of
TV-commercials on children. 

He concluded that even if some children can distinguish between
advertising and programmes as early as age 3 or 4, in most children this
ability does not develop until the age of 6 to 8, and it is only by age
10 that practically all children have developed this ability. 

Even if children see the difference between commercials and programmes
that doesn't mean that they understand why the advertising is there,
that the TV commercial has been put there by somebody who wants to
persuade the viewing child to buy toys or magazines or candy or
something else that children like. According to the study some children
understand the purpose of TV advertising as early as 5 years of age.
There is much evidence that it is only by the age of 8 to 10 that most
children have developed a fundamental understanding of the purpose of
advertising. It appears that a more complete understanding develops only
after the age of 12. 

So, a TV commercial that I as an adult can easily unmask as an attempt
to persuade children to pester for new toys or new brands of sweetened
yoghurt, to many children is a piece of product information or an
instruction film on how to play with the new gadgets.

I have already mentioned the attempts to self-regulation by the
commercial community. The guidelines state that advertising would be
easily recognisable as such. 

I suggest to you that if advertisers really took the business codes
seriously they should not target TV advertising at small children. But a
glance around the world reveals that this is just what they do. 

This is why the Swedish legislator in 1991 decided not to rely on the
business  self-regulation. Instead an outright prohibition of commercial
advertisements that has the purpose of attracting the attention of
children under the age of 12 was introduced. 

This is not the first time that I have been called upon to explain the
Swedish legislation, so I have heard some arguments against this
position. I guess that some of the other speakers will let us hear them
in detail, so I will only comment on some of them briefly.

1. The first argument is that TV advertising funds programmes, and
without TV advertising to children there would be no children's
programming on commercial television. 

To me this argument is not very relevant. If there are compelling
reasons why TV advertising should not be targeted at young children it
shouldn't do so, regardless of how the advertising income is spent. In
any case there is a strong motive for supporting public service
television where programming is scheduled for the needs of the public
and not for the value that a particular audience has for the
advertisers. 

2. Sometimes advertisers defend their right to advertise freely by
referring to the notion of "commercial freedom of speech". 

This raises the question of the scope and applicability of the European
Convention on Human Rights, Article 10. I will not address that question
now but merely acknowledge the difference that surely must be
acknowledged between the highly respected principle of freedom of
expression in political, religious, scientific and artistic matters and
the right of a merchant to promote the sale of certain products. 


3. It is sometimes argued that children understand these things much
better than their parents think they do. So, goes the argument, as the
parents are old-fashioned and uncomfortable with the modern media
landscape, it is essential that someone else takes on the burden of
introducing children in the modern world of commercial communication.
And who would be better placed to do that than advertisers?

It is true that measuring the awareness of young children is not an
exact science. Children are different and so are social scientists. But
I am convinced that most parents are perfectly well-equipped to judge
the needs of their children. They want to take responsibility themselves
for bringing up their children. They would be likely to say "no thank
you" to any offer from the advertising industry to take over the media
education of their children. 

I am also convinced that, if they would have a chance to choose, parents
would opt for a television free from advertising targeted at children.
At least this appears to be case for Sweden.

One last point. What about children´s need? Is there no scope for
advertising children´s product on TV in Sweden? Yes, there certainly is.
Provided that you don´t address the kids directly. In order to help
define when a commercial is directed to children under 12 there is now a
document worked out between Konsumentverket and the Swedish Trade and
business represented by Industry Delegation for Market Law (NDM). This
document is entitled Interpretative Advice and is intended to help
advertisors shape their advertising in a manner which does not risk
contravening the law. I am very pleased that we could create this
document together with business. As for the contents of this document I
would like to refer you to our website www.konsumentverket.se and "In
English" (Interpretative Advice on the Prohibition of Commercial
Advertising to Children on Television).

So there is in fact plenty of room for advertising children´s products
quite legally on TV in Sweden. You are free to let the commercials speak
to parents, grandparents or any other grown-up with a full understanding
of what it is all about.

Thank you.

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