From Public Education to Social Marketing: The Evolution of the Canadian Heritage Anti-Racism Social Marketing Program

Social marketing plays a critical role in a multitude of government programs, yet little research has examined how social marketing programs commence and develop over time. Utilizing a casestudy methodology, this article documents the evolution of a large-scale social marketing program-the March 21 Canadian Heritage anti-racism campaign. The research reveals that this program did not begin as a social marketing program, but rather as a public-education campaign. Over the years it took on many, but not all, of the characteristics of a social marketing program. Further research expanding the scope of this study and examining whether this evolutionary pattern is common for government and not-for-profit social marketing programs at other levels, in other sectors, jurisdictions, and countries is recommended. The results are thought to be of interest to those concernedwith both the theory and practice of developing strategies for the marketing of social marketing. (C) 2007 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All rights reserved.