MKTG90049 Marketing, Society and Sustainability

How MKTG90049 is assessed

What MKTG90049 covers

MKTG90049 runs as twelve weekly seminars moving from what sustainability and wicked problems mean, through marketing ethics, consumption critiques, social marketing, inclusive marketing and transformative branding, to the circular economy, degrowth and the AI-driven future of marketing.

It is assessed by weekly participation quizzes, a reflective SDG essay, a group presentation and report, and a 40% closed-book final exam of applied short- and long-answer essays. This map turns each mined week into an exam-ready chapter.

Assessment is spread across five components: weekly class participation via entry-and-exit-ticket quizzes (10%), a 1500-word individual reflective essay linking your personal consumption to a chosen UN SDG (15%), a group oral presentation (10%) and a 2500-word group sustainability-intervention report (25%), and a final exam (40%).

The final is a 2-hour closed-book on-campus digital exam sat on the computer via the LMS Quiz, with 15 minutes reading time, worth 100 marks in two sections — Section 1 is three roughly 300-word short-answer questions (45 marks) and Section 2 is two roughly 550-word long-answer questions (55 marks).

No books, notes, calculators or dictionaries are permitted (note the older 2023 paper was open-book; the current rule is closed-book — confirm on Canvas). Every answer rewards the same skill: define a named framework, justify why it matters, and apply it to real or hypothetical examples. Your MKTG90049 mark feeds the Weighted Average Mark (WAM), and an H1 result means 80 or above.

Worked example · free

A model short-answer: circular economy applied to consumer electronics (Section 1 shape)

Key terms

Sustainability (Brundtland / WCED 1987)

Meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. The subject stresses three features: it is intergenerational (about time), interrelated (pursuing one goal must not neglect others), and uncertain — an evolving goal, not a fixed end-point.

Triple bottom line / three pillars

The idea that sustainability balances three pillars — environment, economy and society. The hardest sustainability challenges (a wicked-problem signature) sit at the intersections of the pillars, where a gain on one can be a loss on another.

Wicked problem

A complex problem with incomplete, contradictory and changing requirements: multiple stakeholders with opposing values, no definitive formulation of causes, and solutions that are better-or-worse rather than right-or-wrong. Sustainability issues are wicked problems and are never fully 'solved'.

SHIFT framework (White, Habib & Hardisty 2019)

Five psychological levers for changing sustainable consumer behaviour: Social influence, Habit formation, Individual self, Feelings & cognition, and Tangibility. A behavioural (individual-focused) approach, contrasted in the subject with the social-practice approach.

Circular economy

An economy designed to eliminate waste, keep products and materials in use, and regenerate natural systems, replacing the linear take-make-dispose model. Marketing's role is to identify circular value (circular inputs, product-life extension, resource recovery) and shift consumers from ownership to access.

Purpose-washing

Making empty claims about a social or environmental mission that are not backed by meaningful action — the umbrella term covering greenwashing (environmental claims) and wokewashing (societal claims). Distinguished in the subject from authentic brand purpose and transformative branding.

MKTG90049 FAQ

Questions students ask in each MKTG90049 chapter

Why are sustainability issues called 'wicked' problems?

Because they cannot be neatly defined or definitively solved. They involve many stakeholders with conflicting values, their causes cannot be pinned down completely, and any solution is better-or-worse rather than right-or-wrong. Climate change, plastic pollution and inequality all fit: you can improve them, but you never 'finish' them, which is why the subject frames sustainability as an evolving goal rather than an end-state. Chapter 01 · Sustainable Marketing and Wicked Problems

What is the difference between moral muteness and moral myopia?

Moral myopia is a problem of vision — the marketer cannot clearly see that there is an ethical issue at all. Moral muteness is a problem of voice — the marketer may sense an issue but is unwilling to name or discuss it, often because ethics talk feels awkward or bad for business. Drumwright & Murphy (2004) found both are common; the exam likes you to use them to explain why firms avoid confronting a practice's harms. Chapter 02 · Ethics in Marketing

What is 'critical marketing' and how is it different from normal marketing?

Normal (managerial) marketing asks how to satisfy customers profitably. Critical marketing steps back and asks whether the marketing system is good for society at all — whether it meets real human needs, whether the consumer is genuinely sovereign, who benefits and who pays, and who is excluded. It deliberately looks at marketing's dark side (exclusion, stereotyping, cultural appropriation, manufactured demand) with the aim of societal change, and it is the lens the group report uses to find gaps in an industry's current practice. Chapter 03 · Critiques of Marketing and the Problem of Consumption

What does 'responsibilisation' mean and why does it matter?

Responsibilisation (Giesler & Veresiu 2014) is the process by which firms and governments shift responsibility for social and environmental problems onto individual consumers — turning a structural issue into a matter of personal choice ('just recycle', 'shop consciously'). It matters because the subject argues this lets producers off the hook and can prioritise individual moral effort over binding protections. Recognising it is the key exam insight: telling consumers to be responsible is itself a marketing move, not a neutral solution. Chapter 04 · Consumers and Consumption

Is social marketing the same as social-media marketing?

No — this is a favourite exam trap. Social marketing is the systematic use of marketing concepts to achieve behavioural goals for social good (reducing smoking, increasing recycling), and it can be run by governments, not-for-profits or firms. Social-media marketing is simply marketing on platforms like Instagram. They are unrelated ideas that happen to share a word; the subject expects you to define social marketing as behaviour change for social benefit and explicitly distinguish it. Chapter 05 · Social Marketing and Behaviour Change

What does 'market exclusion' actually mean?

Market exclusion (Burgess et al. 2017) is when people face barriers to participating in the market relationships and activities that are available to most others — being refused service, offered only inferior options, ignored or stereotyped in advertising, or blocked by access barriers (information, geography, language, physical accessibility). Food deserts are a classic example. It matters because exclusion restricts choice and autonomy and harms self-concept, and it is the problem that inclusive marketing sets out to address. Chapter 06 · Market Exclusion and Inclusive Marketing

What is the difference between brand purpose and transformative branding?

Brand purpose is a long-term central aim that transcends profit — it gives the brand direction. Transformative branding (Spry et al. 2021) is broader: it is a dynamic capability that organises the whole firm around hybrid logics (combining market/financial logics with social logics) to co-create brand meanings and drive systemic change in consumers, markets and society. In short, purpose is the aim; transformative branding is the organisational capability that pursues it. The exam often asks you to state exactly this nesting relationship and then list transformative branding's outcomes. Chapter 07 · Transformative and Better Branding

What are the three principles of a circular economy?

Design out waste and pollution; keep products and materials in use; and regenerate natural systems (Ellen MacArthur Foundation; Esposito, Tse & Soufani 2018). They replace the linear take-make-dispose model, in which waste and externalities pile up at the end. In the exam you define these three, justify pursuing them (cost, risk, regulation, SDG 12), and then give distinct ways an industry creates circular value — via circular inputs, product-life extension and resource recovery, plus shifting from ownership to access. Chapter 08 · Green Growth, Degrowth and the Circular Economy

What is the privacy paradox?

The privacy paradox is that consumers say they value their privacy yet routinely share personal data in exchange for access and benefits — personalisation, convenience, discounts — behaving in ways that contradict their stated concerns. The subject links it to embeddedness: the more integrated digital technology becomes in our lives, the more data we share, and the higher our concern and our ethical expectations of companies rise. For a marketer the lesson is not to stop collecting data but to manage the exchange fairly. Chapter 09 · Critical Issues in Digital and Technology Marketing

Is Week 12 on the MKTG90049 exam?

the material flags Week 12 (the recap 'future of marketing' week) as not directly examined on the 2026 exam, so you should confirm the examinable scope for your own offering on Canvas. That said, its concepts recur — the analytical-versus-generative AI distinction, VUCA, scenario archetypes and the consumers-and-AI concerns show up as context in other answers, and they are directly useful for the forward-looking recommendations in the group report. Treat it as consolidation and application material rather than a standalone exam topic. Chapter 10 · The Future of Marketing

How is the MKTG90049 exam structured and marked?

It is a 2-hour closed-book digital exam (sat via the LMS Quiz) with 15 minutes of reading time, worth 100 marks and 40% of the subject. Section 1 is three roughly 300-word short-answer questions worth 45 marks (about 15 each), following the define-justify-apply shape. Section 2 is two roughly 550-word long-answer questions worth 55 marks, usually a critique-scenario (a/b/c) and a case brief where you take and defend a position. Marks reward naming the correct framework, course-linked justification and distinct applied examples — and content beyond the word limits is not marked, so keep answers tight. Chapter 11 · Exam Technique and Written Assessment Toolkit

How to study for the exam

Treat MKTG90049 as a framework-recall-and-apply subject, not a reading subject, and rehearse weekly rather than cramming through SWOTVAC.

For each week, write a single index card with the named framework, its components, and the key author (for example: SHIFT = Social influence, Habit, Individual self, Feelings & cognition, Tangibility — White, Habib & Hardisty 2019; circular economy = design out waste, keep materials in use, regenerate nature — Esposito et al. 2018). Because the exam is closed-book, drill recall until you can name every component without notes.

Then practise the two exam moves separately: the Section 1 define-justify-apply short answer (about 300 words, three distinct examples) and the Section 2 case brief where you take a position and defend it with three or four course concepts (about 550 words). Rotate the industry each time — apply the circular economy to electronics, then furniture, then food — so you can transfer a framework to any prompt.

Keep to the word limits, since content beyond them is not marked. Cover breadth first (be able to start every week's topic) then deepen the frameworks you find hardest. When a concept won't click, ask Sia to explain it a different way and set you a fresh practice prompt in the same style; it teaches the method and checks your structure, and never substitutes for your own graded work.

Confirm the exam date, venue and open/closed-book status on Canvas and the University of Melbourne exam timetable.

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