COMMUNICATION AND THE CAPITALIST CULTURE
One need not master The Wealth of Nations or Das Kapital to discern that the character of discourse in America is largely determined by its capitalistic economic system. The question relevant for an Adam Smith or a Karl Marxwhether the impact of commerce upon communication produces a better or worse society need not be addressed now. What is more immediately relevant to our inquiry is the question of how the commercial culture of mass advertising affects the key free speech values identified by the Court and commentators.
One thing is absent from most of the learned legal treatments of commercial speechreality. Few in the law see the need to understand the advertisers' world as the advertisers do. And fewer see the implications of the actual workings of advertising on their visions of free speech. Once seen, the connection of commerce to communication radically alters the views of both the defenders and critics of commercial speech.
