Corporate philanthropy, lobbying and public health policy

To counter negative publicity about the tobacco industry, Philip Morris (PM) has widely publicized its philanthropy initiatives. While corporate philanthropy is primarily a public relations tool, contributions may be viewed as offsetting the harms corporate products and practices cause. That such donations themselves have harmful effects has been little considered. To explore philanthropy undertaken as part of Philip Morris's “PM21” image-makeover, we searched for and analyzed approximately 800 PM documents available on the Legacy Tobacco Documents Library electronic archive. Iteratively reviewing documents, we assembled a case study. Results: PM explicitly linked philanthropy to government affairs, using contributions as a lobbying tool against public health policies. Through advertising, covertly solicited media coverage, and contributions to legislators' identified “pet causes,” PM improved its image among key voter constituencies, influenced public officials, and divided the public health field as grantees were converted to stakeholders. Tobacco industry philanthropy functions to extend corporate marketing and lobbying activities which are detrimental to public health. PM recognized the integral links between philanthropy and core business objectives. We propose policy options for addressing the links between philanthropy and lobbying and discuss how public health professionals can expose these links and identify ways to counter them.