TY - BOOK
T1 - Advertising at War
T2 - Business, Consumers, and Government in the 1940s
AU - Stole, Inger L.
PY - 2012
Y1 - 2012
N2 - This book challenges the notion
that advertising disappeared as a political issue in the United States
in 1938 with the passage of the Wheeler-Lea Amendment to the Federal
Trade Commission Act, the result of more than a decade of campaigning to
regulate the advertising industry. The book suggests that the war
experience (World War II), even more than the legislative battles of the
1930s, defined the role of advertising in U.S. postwar political
economy and the nation’s cultural firmament. Using archival sources,
newspapers accounts, and trade publications, the book demonstrates that
the postwar climate of political intolerance and reverence for free
enterprise quashed critical investigations into the advertising
industry. While advertising could be criticized or lampooned, the
institution itself became inviolable. During the war, there were ongoing
tensions between advertisers, regulators, and consumer activists. It
was advertisers who turned a situation, that should have been
disadvantageous to them, into an opportunity to cement their place in a
postwar society defined by advertising and the consumer products it
promoted. The book aims to uncover the significant political and
economic forces that shaped the industry and the use of advertising to
bolster the corporate system behind the products.
AB - This book challenges the notion
that advertising disappeared as a political issue in the United States
in 1938 with the passage of the Wheeler-Lea Amendment to the Federal
Trade Commission Act, the result of more than a decade of campaigning to
regulate the advertising industry. The book suggests that the war
experience (World War II), even more than the legislative battles of the
1930s, defined the role of advertising in U.S. postwar political
economy and the nation’s cultural firmament. Using archival sources,
newspapers accounts, and trade publications, the book demonstrates that
the postwar climate of political intolerance and reverence for free
enterprise quashed critical investigations into the advertising
industry. While advertising could be criticized or lampooned, the
institution itself became inviolable. During the war, there were ongoing
tensions between advertisers, regulators, and consumer activists. It
was advertisers who turned a situation, that should have been
disadvantageous to them, into an opportunity to cement their place in a
postwar society defined by advertising and the consumer products it
promoted. The book aims to uncover the significant political and
economic forces that shaped the industry and the use of advertising to
bolster the corporate system behind the products.
KW - advertising industry
KW - United States
KW - 1938
KW - Wheeler-Lea Amendment
KW - Federal Trade Commission Act
KW - war experience
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84894815439&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=84894815439&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.5406/illinois/9780252037122.001.0001
DO - 10.5406/illinois/9780252037122.001.0001
M3 - Book
AN - SCOPUS:84894815439
SN - 9780252037122
T3 - The History of Communication
BT - Advertising at War
PB - University of Illinois Press
ER -