DrinkWise, enjoy responsibly: News frames, branding and alcohol

This article examines the communicative activities and press coverage of the alcohol industry-funded social-change organisation DrinkWise. Established in 2005, DrinkWise funds health research in universities, runs public health campaigns and engages in public relations activities. We use a framing analysis to examine the way DrinkWise frames problems, judgements and solutions related to alcohol consumption and policy. The aim of this analysis is to examine how journalistic practice legitimises DrinkWise and facilitates the organisation’s communicative activities. In addition, we consider how DrinkWise’s representation in the press works alongside the organisation’s array of communicative activities to facilitate the commercial objectives of the alcohol industry. We draw on the implications of this analysis to conceptualise how distinct forms of communicative work – such as academic research, policy-making, journalism and marketing, advertising and public relations – are interconnected