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Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to analyze the Swedish Advertisers’ Association role in institutional development of Swedish international advertising during 1955–1972.

Design/methodology/approach – Qualitative analysis of organizational material to analyze institutional development of collective international advertising.

Findings – A new postwar paradigm that focused on a consumer-oriented brand ideology enabled marketing nexecutives in the Swedish Advertisers’ Association to develop a new discourse on international advertising inSweden, which then was institutionalized within a national network on export promotion. The institutionalization process was supported by a corporatist system typical of smaller export dependent postwar European economies.

Research limitations/implications – While based on a national case, this study points to the importance of understanding how advertising concepts are embedded within other economic, political and cultural systemsthan in those they originated in and how this contributes to a heterogenous implementation of similar ideas andpractices. This study also illustrates how members can use their association to institutionalize a new discourse on marketing and network with other actors to enhance the use and reputation of its ideas and practices.

Practical implications – By highlighting the importance of analyzing both internal and external organizational relations, this study contributes to the research on history of marketing by making salient the importance of an institutional perspective to understand key processes in marketing. In practice neitherthe institutional perspective nor the explanatory power of discourse has received much attention, therefore the study results should be both interesting and valid for practitioners as well.

Originality/value – The study of the historical development of international advertising is limited and often descriptive. This study contributes to the literature by using a theoretical and methodological approach to make salient how the interaction between discourse, marketing associations and other collective actors propelled the institutionalization of international advertising within a specific national context.

The study highlights the importance of business associations in institutional development in a political economy. Utilizing Streeck & Schmitter’s concept of two logics of collective action, in which interest group action is explained by internal relations (logic of membership) as well as external relations (logicof influence), the paper analyzes the Swedish Advertisers’ Association role in the institutional development of Swedish export advertising during 1955-1972.

Using qualitative analysis ofassociational material to trace institutional development, the paper demonstrates that thanks to the logicof membership, expressed in bottom-up member engagement, the association’s leadership together with members established new institutional resources and services for export advertising during the second half of the 1950s. Among the initiatives were educational efforts, knowledge-exchange forums, national trademarks, and registries with information of foreign ad markets.

As the competitiveness of Swedish exports was of national interest, the services attracted external actors, as the government, state agenciesand other business associations. Here the logic of influence, conveyed in increasing contacts between the association’s leadership and external representatives, embedded its institutions in a wider network of stakeholders in export promotion. This process was facilitated by the post-war dominance of corporatism, which emphasized cooperation between collective actors. The contributions of the association grew in size and importance until the formation of the Swedish Export Council in 1972, that redrew the institutional landscape of export promotion by forming a more centralized form of cooperation between the government and the export business community.

Keywords advertising, business association, business interest organization, corporatism, economichistory, export promotion, institutions, marketing history, post-war, Sweden

Purpose – To analyze the Swedish Advertisers’ Association role in the institutional development ofSwedish export promotion 1955-1972.

Methodology/approach – Qualitative method, business interest organization theory, advertisingconcepts related to the historical development of marketing.

Findings – Thanks to bottoms-up engagement of members in the mid-1950s, leading to the formationof the knowledge-exchange committee for members of the association (the E-group), the associationbecame crucial in enabling Swedish companies getting access to marketing resources when competingon foreign markets, as well as becoming a key player in supporting the collective export promotionefforts of the Swedish government. The E-Group increased member participation and knowledgeexchange among members, supporting professionalization and legitimacy of advertising practices.

Limitations/implications – While based on a national case, the study illustrates how marketingassociations act in an institutional system, while being challenged by member demands to supplythem with adequate resources, highlighting the importance of analyzing both the collectiveorganizations and the political system they are part of to understand the historical development ofmarketing.

Originality/ value – The history of export promotion and export advertising is not well studied on aninstitutional level. This study furthers knowledge of this significant aspect of marketing history aswell as the history of political economy, making salient the interaction between the state andorganized business interests in a key aspect of a national economy. This should interest the fields ofmarketing history as well as, business studies, economics and political science.

Keywords – Advertising history, business history, export promotion, business association

Classification – Research paper

Biografisk artikel om industrialisten och entreprenören Assar Svensson.

Biografisk artikel om industrialisten och uppfinnaren John Victor Svenson

The article discusses the impetus and institutional dynamic of marketing regulation in post-war Sweden within the context of political economy, centering on the institutional development leading to the emergernce of a revised marketing law and an introduction of a new market court in 1971. Focus is on key interest groups in the business community (trade oerganization) and the political sphere, as well as the influence of the government and legal experts.

Biografi över forskaren och näringslivsprofilen (Sparkbanken) Sven G Svenson.

This thesis concerns the development of the self-regulation of advertising in Sweden from 1950 until 1971. Self-regulation was initiated in the 1930s due to a business desire to regulate fair competition in marketing, and while it initially was a minor operation, the 1950s and 1960s were characterized by extensive development. When self-regulation was overtaken by state policies in 1971, it included several interlocking systems, of which parts survived the introduction of the state regime. The thesis’ aim has been to analyze how the rapid regime transitions in the self-regulation regime can be understood.

The existing literature identifies four major transitions that occurred during the studied time period. To understand them, the thesis has studied the policy processes leading up to these transitions. Focus has been on the business interest organizations that controlled the regime and their regulatory strategies. Theoretically, the analysis has departed from the hypothesis that tensions between these organizations, due to their members’ different market interests and varying levels of exposure to regulation and public badwill, to a significant degree informed their strategic choices as well as policy outcomes.

The results show that the policy processes preceding the regime transitions were characterized by internal tensions, whereby organizations representing advertisers, and to a lesser degree media carriers, due to their members’ higher level of exposure to regulation and public badwill, successfully supported stronger market policing, while ad agencies, being less exposed, as well as a peak industry organization for the proliferation of marketing largely opposed such measures, preferring a more lenient regulation. However, due to increased exposure to regulation and bad will, the ad agencies finally abandoned their opposition and took the lead in regulatory innovation through the introduction of an extensive clearance program that survived the launch of the state regime, becoming a key component in the co-regulatory structure that followed.

The article suggests a combination of advocay coalition framework and strategic interest theory in analyzing  policy processes where interest groups with opposing regulatory preferences must compete or delibarate on regulation. The model is applied on an empirical case constituting the development of Swedish advertising self-regulation during the postwar era, 1950-1971.

Artikeln åskådliggör den moderna svenska reklamens historiska utveckling och förklarar den utifrån interaktionen mellan marknads- och innovationsutveckling, nya reklamkoncept och påverkan från samhällsdebatt och regleringar.