Use of evidence to influence alcohol policy: Case studies, the Alcohol Industry...

Jim McCambridge on 'Use of evidence to influence alcohol policy': 

Case studies, the Alcohol Industry and Minimum Unit Pricing

Watch video

Jim McCambridge leads two presenatations. In the first one he discusses a paper, which was published in 2013: 'Industry use of evidence to influence alcohol policy: A case study of submissions to the 2008 Scottish Government Consultation'. Jim examines how research evidence is used in alcohol industry submissions made to a Scottish Government consultation in 2008 to advocate policies in line with their commercial interests. Moreover, he argues that industry actors consistently oppose the approaches found in research to be most likely to be effective at a population level without actually engaging with the research literature in any depth.

In the second talk he discusses another paper 'Alcohol Industry influence on Public Policy: A case study of minimum pricing', where he focuses on corporate political activity. Whilst much of the literature on alcohol policy exhibits a clear assumption that industry actors are extremely powerful, there is relatively little about the processes through which alcohol policy is made and the specific role played by industry actors in these processes. This project aimed to fill this gap by examining the debates around pricing and promotions policy in England and Scotland.