Schools, Corporations, and the War on Childhood Obesity: How Corporate Philanthropy Shapes Public Health and Education

211 Pages·2019·6.745 MB·English

by  Darren Powell

“There are many organisations and actors who purport to be taking action
for children and healthy lifestyles but who on closer examination turn out to
be part of the problem as much as any solution. In Schools, Corporations, and the
War on Childhood Obesity, Darren Powell draws on research and scholarship to
tenaciously address that most crucial of questions: whose interests are being
served? This will be an uncomfortable book for many who work in this area,
but it is a compelling wakeup call for our times”.
Professor Martin Thrupp,
School of Education, University of Waikato, New Zealand
“Dr Powell has written a powerful and urgent book that traces the way mod-
ern schools manage or mismanage their entangles with corporations, gov-
ernment, charities, and the like. I particularly found his work with school
students moving. Sometimes, students will tell you the most interesting,
astounding, and critical interpretation of what going on education today.
Dr Powell also mixes his ethnographic, analysis, and literary skills to produce
a thoughtful, patient and, in the end, crucial book”.
Associate Professor Michael Gard
(author of The End of the Obesity Epidemic), School of Human Movement and
Nutrition Sciences, University of Queensland, Australia
“This book makes a unique and invaluable contribution to this body of work
through its comprehensive ‘disentangling’ of the activities of corporations
and selling so-called ‘solutions’ to the ‘obesity epidemic’. Filled with rich
ethnographic data, this volume provides a very readable and convincing
account that needs to be read by all parents and teachers”.
Emeritus Professor Jan Wright,
School of Education, University of Wollongong, Australia
“Darren Powell shows through evidence from his own ethnographic research
in schools the worrying trends and increasingly blurred lines between edu-
cation, entertainment and advertising. This excellent book is a must read
for all teachers (especially health and physical education teachers) and school
administrators who are looking to unscramble and resist the corporate peda-
gogies that are reshaping primary school education – and children”.
Emeritus Professor Richard Tinning,
School of Human Movement and Nutrition Sciences,
University of Queensland, Australia

SCHOOLS, CORPORATIONS,
AND THE WAR ON
CHILDHOOD OBESITY
Challenging the idea that the corporate ‘war’ against childhood obesity is
normal, necessary, or harmless, this book exposes healthy lifestyles education
as a form of mis-education that shapes how students learn about health, cor-
porations, and consumption. Drawing on ethnographic research and studies
from across the globe, this book explores how corporations fund, devise, and
implement various programmes in schools as ‘part of the solution’ to child-
hood obesity.
Including perspectives from children, teachers, school leaders, and both
public and private external providers on how children’s health and ‘healthy
consumption’ is understood and experienced, this book is divided into eight
accessible chapters which include:
• Schooling the childhood obesity ‘crisis’;
• The corporate ‘gift’ of healthy lifestyles;
• ‘Coming together’ to solve obesity;
• Learning about health, fatness, and ‘good’ choices; and
• Shaping the (un)healthy child-consumer
Schools, Corporations, and the War on Childhood Obesity is the perfect resource
for postgraduate students and academics working in the public health or edu-
cation field, or those taking courses on the sociology of education, health and
physical education, curriculum, pedagogy, ethnography, or critical theory,
who are looking to gain an insight into the current situation surrounding
obesity and health in corporations and schools.
Darren Powell is a senior lecturer in the School of Curriculum and
Pedagogy in the Faculty of Education and Social Work at the University of
Auckland, New Zealand.
CRITICAL STUDIES IN HEALTH AND EDUCATION
Series Editors: Katie Fitzpatrick, Deana Leahy,
Michael Gard, and Jan Wright
Critical Studies in Health and Education explores the sociological, critical, and
political approaches to health-related issues in education. The series under-
scores the discussions and debates surrounding the practice of health educa-
tion and the development of solutions to the new ethical, practical, political,
and philosophical questions that are emerging within the field.
SCHOOLS, CORPORATIONS, AND
THE WAR ON CHILDHOOD OBESITY
How Corporate Philanthropy Shapes Public Health and Education
Darren Powell
SCHOOLS,
COR POR ATIONS,
A N D TH E WA R ON
CHILDHOOD OBESIT Y
How Corporate Philanthropy Shapes Public
Health and Education
Darren Powell
First published 2020
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2020 Darren Powell
The right of Darren Powell to be identified as author of this work has
been asserted by them in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced
or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other
means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and
recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without
permission in writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks
or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and
explanation without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A catalog record has been requested for this book
ISBN: 978-0-8153-5514-4 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-0-8153-5512-0 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-351-13059-2 (ebk)
Typeset in Bembo
by Cenveo® Publishers Servies
For Maddy, Harvey, and Matilda

CONTENTS
Acknowledgements x
1 Corporations and the ‘war on childhood obesity’ 1
2 Schooling the childhood obesity ‘crisis’ 11
3 The corporate ‘gift’ of healthy lifestyles 29
4 ‘Coming together’ to solve obesity 54
5 The new ‘experts’ in children’s health and education 80
6 Learning about health, fatness, and ‘good’ choices 108
7 Shaping the (un)healthy child-consumer 134
8 Conclusions 160
Methodological appendix: A critical ethnography 174
Index 188
ix