Table 1. Identified Frameworks for Assessing and Monitoring Corporate Impact on Health .
First Author (Year) | Framework | Industry | Method | Findings |
Trochim46 (2003) | American Stop Smoking Intervention Study Model | Tobacco | Concept mapping | Identified four overarching practice clusters: science public relations, issue framing, harassment, and lobbying tactics. |
Wiist42 (2006) | Recommendations for linking public health and the “anti-corporate movement” | All | Expert opinion | Identified 18 measures relating to activity of the corporate entity and 16 public health status indicators. |
Jahiel9 (2008) | Epidemiologic cascade framework | All | Theory based- adaptation of the agent-host-environment model | Five levels of analysis identified: government, corporations, corporate conduits, the environment of the host, and the host itself. Multiple objects of surveillance identified at each level. |
Stillman45 (2008) | Mapping tobacco industry strategies in Southeast Asia | Tobacco | Concept mapping | Eight clusters of industry activities within 4 Southeast Asian countries arranged into four sectors: economics (avoid economic regulation, business/investment strategies), politics (lobbying/political influence, silence/reduce opposition), public relations (self-serving industry youth programmes, marketing tactics/image building) and deception (deceiving public, corrupting and manipulating science). |
Sacks37 (2013) | Business impact assessment - obesity | Food | Theory based- adapted from Access to Nutrition Index | Evaluation of corporations’ commitment to reducing obesity/NCD in the following domains: corporate strategy, relationships with external organisations, product formulation, nutrition labelling, promotion to children/adolescents and product accessibility. |
Baum29 (2015) | Corporate health impact assessment | All | Brainstorming | Identifies three tiers of transnational corporations impact within a country: context (corporate structure, status, political environment, regulatory capacity), structure (size, operational structure including political and business practices, products, distribution, marketing) and health impact (occupational health, social conditions, natural environment, health related behaviours, economic conditions). |
Mialon40 (2015) | Corporate political activity assessment | Food | Theory based-adaptation of Savell taxonomy of corporate political activity | Six overarching strategies of corporate political activity identified: information and messaging, financial incentive, constituency building, legal, policy substitution, opposition fragmentation and destabilisation. Within each strategy multiple practices and mechanisms were identified. |
Ulucanlar47 (2016) | Policy Dystopia Model | Tobacco | Thematic analysis of literature using grounded theory approach | Developed taxonomy of instrumental strategies and techniques used by the tobacco industry. |
Knai48 (2018) | Systems thinking framework | All | Theory based- adaption of systems thinking proposed by Meadows | Identifies market and nonmarket components of UCI strategies. Examines the NCD-genic systems using elements (actors, market access/trade, consumption patterns), interconnections (physical/information flows) and purpose (goals of corporation and government). |
Madureira Lima17 (2018) | Three-dimensional view of power | All | Theory based- Adaptation of Steven Luke’s three-dimensional view of power | Identifies five vehicles of power used by UCIs: political environment, preference shaping, knowledge environment, legal environment and extra-legal environment. |
McCambridge18 (2019) | Systematic review of public health surveillance studies of the alcohol industry | Alcohol | Systematic review | Identified 6 frameworks for public health surveillance of alcohol industry market and political strategies. |
Keshavarz Mohammadi49 (2020) | OSRAH | All | Literature review and focus group discussion | Developed conceptual framework organisation social responsibility and accountability for health which outlined five domains of OSRAH and six aspects of organisations. A tool for assessment against the conceptual framework was also developed and used to assess 95 organisations at a national conference in Iran. |
Wood41 (2021) | Narrative review of commercial determinants of health frameworks | All | Narrative review and synthesis | Identified 22 frameworks describing commercial determinants of health and synthesised to incorporate theories of power. |
Legg36 (2021) | The Science for Profit Model | All | Scoping review and interpretive analysis | Identified eight corporate sectors repeatedly engaging in activities to influence science, including manipulation of scientific methods; reshaping of criteria for establishing scientific “proof”; threats against scientists’ and clandestine promotion of policy reforms that increase reliance on industry evidence. |
Abbreviations: UCI, unhealthy commodity industry; NCD, non-communicable disease; OSRAH, Organisational Social Responsibility and Accountability for Health.