DEPENDENCY THEORY AND THE EFFECTS OF ADVERTISING BY FOREIGN-BASED MULTINATIONAL-CORPORATIONS IN LATIN-AMERICA

Dependency Theory is a major paradigm of developmental economics that differs sharply from classical economic theory on a number of points. According to Dependency Theory, the ongoing economic, political, socia l, and cultural transformations within Latin America bring with them a greater reliance on an expanding capitalistic world system. Through t his world system, advanced nations extract surplus value from underdev eloped nations, thus keeping the latter underdeveloped and condemning them to perpetual class conflicts and oppressive governments. This the ory, which is accepted by many educated Latin Americans, largely expla ins the chilly reception that many foreign-based multinational corpora tions have received in Latin America. After a short introduction, four tenets of Dependency Theory are considered that are relevant to consu mer advertising by foreign-based multinational corporations. Then, the evidence for and against seven propositions are considered: four of w hich concern conspicuous consumption, unhealthy lifestyles, and local cultural values, and three of which concern the dominance of U.S. ad a gencies in Latin America, the prevalence of foreign programming and ad s, and the extent of advertising clutter.