We don’t want to be a bunch of slobs, says the head of the advertising club about the inclusion of Babiš’s marketer Prchal
Just a few hours before the start of the second round of the presidential elections, the Art Directors Club Czech Republic (ADC), a club of advertising professionals, expelled one of the long-time architects of political campaigns, Andrej Babiš, from its ranks.
According to the organization, the current presidential one is immoral and has forced ADC to distance itself from Prchal’s activities. “Using marketing and advertising to spread lies, fear and divide society, even if it’s completely shameless and purposeful, is not only immoral, but also dangerous for the future direction of the industry,” says club president David Suda.
The man, who is also the creative head of the agency WMC/GREY, is heading the club of advertising professionals for the fourth year. However, according to him, the organization was thinking about the exclusion of Marko Prchal long before Wednesday’s decision. “We want to send a clear signal,” admits the club boss bluntly. In the thirty years of its existence, ADC has never excluded anyone for similar reasons.
Why did you decide to eliminate Marko Prchal now, not even two days before the second round of the presidential election?
That question has been on the table for many years. I have been the chairman of the club for four years, but the expulsion of Marko Prchal was already considered as the previous chairman. In connection with the second round of the presidential campaign, the campaign of Andrej Babiš exceeded some tolerable limit. Voices began to be heard inside and outside the club, people wondered how Prchal could still be a member of our club. Of course, the question was whether we would deal with it now or wait until after the elections.
But your club is apolitical, isn’t that against it?
We are aware that this gesture just before the election may be perceived as politics. The second option was to expel him after the elections. But wait to see how it turns out, and only then act? That would only show that we are, to put it simply, a bunch of slobs. That’s why we stuck to our principles even at the cost of making it look like a political gesture.
We are a club that can react to what is happening in the world of advertising and in society, and can solve it. By the way, this solution is provided by the vast majority of our members, it was not a close decision.
What specifically bothers you about Prchal’s work?
One of the questions was whether we consider Andrej Babiš’s campaign to be ethical, and we answered an unequivocal no. But the final decision was not emotional – it was not that we disagreed with the campaigns politically. We decided according to the statutes. They allow us to exclude a member who violates them, and one of the requirements is the obligation to preserve the good name of the club, which Marek Prchal simply did not fulfill.
There were suitable complaints against him both inside and outside the club and in the first we called for his voluntary resignation, which he refused. So in the second step we brought the question of his expulsion before all the members of the club and the quorum majority decided as they decided.
Were the complaints about ethics?
Ethics played a role there, but in a political campaign it was a completely unprecedented situation. If there is a campaign that instills fear in people, uses false claims and includes disinformation, then it is wrong. It’s something new that wasn’t here before, which is why the club has never expelled a member for a similar problem in its thirty years of existence.
What will be the impact of the exclusion?
We want this step to be perceived positively, which is why we take Marko Prchal’s expulsion as the first step. The second will be the compilation of some ethical code that will respond to the mentioned problems in political advertising. Within a few hours of the news appearing in the media, many professionals and academics contacted us to help us with this.
There is an Advertising Council here, which has its advertising code, but it does not deal with political marketing at all. It is time for such principles to be established for him as well.
What about other people who participate in Andrej Babiš’s campaign, could they be members of your club?
That’s an interesting question – because it’s often something that people don’t talk about. Even at yesterday’s members’ meeting, the question arose as to whether we are sure that there are no other campaign creators among us. We don’t know. What we do know is that Marek Prchal is part of Andrej Babiš’s team and is violating the statutes with his actions.
Do you expect any wider impact from your decision?
We will be very happy when the issue of ethics in political advertising begins to be resolved. I’ll admit that I didn’t expect such responses at all – or discussions about whether our solution is too harsh and totalitarian. Rather, I would like to look at the issue from a new perspective, that political communication is developing and new, even unethical, tools are being created that are used in campaigns. And it’s time to talk about how to defend against them.