VIDEO: Professor John Quelch of Harvard Business School on marketing's social and economic functions

Quelch, a non-executive director at WPP and author of numerous books and articles on marketing including ‘Greater Good: How Good Marketing Makes For Better Democracy’, argues that marketing plays an important role in society in terms of accelerating the pace of economic development.

He suggests that the billions of transactions that occur every day in China provide a social glue that bonds people in a collaborative effort of mutual trust. “Marketing-based exchanges are hugely important as a vehicle for bring societies and communities closer together and having them trust one another on an individual basis,” he says.

Quelch also touches on the more negative aspects of marketing, pointing out that problems are often down more to who is doing the marketing rather than marketing itself. “What that means is that it is very important in China for there to be a regulatory environment where consumers are protected against abusive marketers,” he adds.