Corporate Communications and the Genealogy of Marketing

ABSTRACT This article offers a genealogy of contemporary digital power through exploring the lineage that connects it to modern marketing and the Catholic Church’s Congregatio de Propaganda Fide. This article argues that nineteenth-century corporations, facing the instability of the Long Depression and the limits of classical liberal economics, drew on the relationships of government pioneered by the church to create apparatuses—marketing, public relations, and advertising—to govern markets and their users. Rather than focusing solely on belief, these corporate efforts reshaped environments, habits, and social relations to stabilize demand and manage competition. Building on Foucault, Dean, and Lemke, the article examines how strategies of government migrated from religious missions into the commercial sphere, eventually culminating in contemporary marketing theories such as Service-Dominant Logic. By situating corporate power in the age of digital surveillance, behavioral prediction, and algorithmic control within marketing and a broader history of government, the article provides a new map for their understanding.