Reframing gambling harms as the product of a predatory industry

The framing of public health challenges influences how societies and governments respond to them. This paper suggests that public health professionals counter the claims and influence of harmful community industries by amplifying the reframing efforts of progressive social movements. We engage with Jurgen Habermas’ Critical Theory, which lends theoretical support for this argument, while a practical example is presented of a network which sought to shift gambling harms narratives to focus on harmful industry products and practices. Habermasean constructs inform an analysis of 33 semi-structured interviews, including people with Lived Experience (LE) of gambling harms. Habermas’ ideas, notably his diagnosis of modern social problems as antagonism between the System and the Lifeworld, provide political-economic context to the emergence of a LE social movement. Habermas’ notion of communicative rationality underpins both the internal logic of this movement and public health professionals’ attempt to nurture a ‘counterpublic’ around it: i.e., a space for new ways of thinking and talking about social issues. Paradoxically, the findings reveal the importance and limitations of local collaborations with people affected by harmful industries in the face of those industries’ power, products and advertisements. The findings have implications for the theory and practice of commercial determinants research.