Neoliberalism and Managed Health: Fallacies, Façades and Inadvertent Effects

Abstract

This response to Gould and Semaan’s (2014) commentary aims to both clarify misinterpretations of and extend the positions taken in our article, “Women’s Bodies as Sites of Control: Inadvertent Stigma and Exclusion in Social Marketing.” Specifically, our response focuses on four areas: the ruse of individual responsibility and choice; the disciplinary and normalizing effects of surveillance; moving beyond micro-level “hot” and “cold” tactics; and the marginalizing effects of healthism. We conclude with a call for greater ethical responsibility in social marketing scholarship and practice, particularly through macro-level engagements at the socio-cultural level as a means of addressing the inadvertent effects of overly simplified campaign messages and images framed through the prism of neo-liberalism that manage and control the bodies of women.