Chapter 15Does Society Need Public Relations?

Segregation and CongregationBeing Heard

Public Relations LiteracyFinal Thoughts on Public Relations

Does Society Need Public Relations?

• Can make an informed answer after examining the various aspects of PR presented in the book.

• Point is whether or not PR contributes positively to society.

Society Evolves and Segregates

• Agricultural to industrial.• Interpersonal to mediated communication.• Villages to cities.• Small to large collectives of people.• Can create segregation.• Can also provide new means of congregation.

Public Relations as Congregation

• Public relations is about webs of relationships-and connections.

• Public relations can be used to expand and to cultivate those webs.

• Public relations can build connections between people and between people and organizations.

Public Relations as Congregation

• Public relations helps to build ties and bring people together.– Corporate – Activists– Nation building

Public Relations as Congregation

Through Excellence Dialectic• Constituents utilize public relations to build the

web (networks) necessary to establish their power in a relationship.

• Constituents and the corporation connect as they dialogue about the constituents’ concerns.

• Public relations can unite constituents around an issue and connect constituents to their opposition.

Public Relations as Congregation

• Contingency theory.• Conflict is not to be avoided but embraced. • How people respond to conflict in public

relations depends on a set of internal and external factors.

• Does the conflict create a battle over who is right or willing to settle differences?

Public Relations as Segregation

• Public relations can be used to polarize and to divide people.

• Public relations can be divisive by uniting some people against others, a false sense of congregation.

Ideally

• Constituents seek to broaden the web and bring more people into the relationship.

• Broader webs build greater social capital and generally improve the functioning of society.

Ideally

• Public relations cultivates overlapping webs of relationships and they become the strands through which the fabric of society is woven.

• A few will always seek to abuse the process.• Hence, there is a need to be critical — public

relations literacy.

Short Answer

• The potential benefits of public relations to building society outweigh the dangers it presents to disrupting society.

• Still up to people to decide whether or not the potential is fulfilled or wasted.

On Being Heard

• For the marketplace of ideas to work, we have to be free to hear multiple voices.

• Public relations gives people and groups voice in the marketplace of ideas.

• Public relations facilitates people being heard, whether it be corporations, activist groups, or the government.

The Cost of Free Speech

• Public relations is a tool marginalized voices can and have used to be heard in the marketplace of ideas and to move their issues to the public and political agendas.

• But this means we must tolerate all groups using public relations to have their voices heard.

• Censorship of any voice is dangerous.

Consequences for Society: Two Issues to Illustrate a Point

• Rise of Nazism in Germany.• Mobilization of U.S war effort in World War II.– Four Minute Men

• Bernays promoting smoking for women.• Global anti-smoking efforts.Examples show potential to help or to hurt

society with public relations.

The Potential is Always There

• Public relations is instrumental in helping people to become aware of and to take action to correct problems.

• It would be tragic to lose the benefits public relations can offer society because some choose to use public relations for unsavory ends.

Toward Public Relations Literacy

• Noted in Chapter 1.• Parallels idea of media literacy, notion that

people should be critical consumers of the mass media because it can have a significant impact on their lives.

• Public relations literacy is important as well given the ways PR can affect our lives and even shape the media.

Defined Again

• Public relations literacy is the ability to identify, analyze, and evaluate public relations messages.

• To be public relations literate, a person must:– be able to identify when public relations is being

utilized– be aware public relations does impact society and

individuals– have frameworks for analyzing public relations efforts – apply critical thinking skills to the evaluation of public

relations efforts

Application: Activists

Messages from an activist group requireevaluation:1.What does this activist group stand for?2.What are the activist group’s values and

goals? 3.What do they have to gain or lose in this

situation?

Application: Media Relations

Determine if a news story was created by public relations:

1. Do other sources offer a counter-perspective or agree with the general tenor of the article?

2. Does the news story closely resemble a news release from the organization or corporation?

3. What do watchdog groups have to say about the organization or corporation?

4. What does the organization or corporation have to gain from the news story?

Application: New Media Relations

When a message appears online:1.Who is posting the information? 2.What biases might they have? 3.Do they have anything to gain in this

situation?

Application: Social Marketing

When message is sponsored by a corporation:1.What does the organization have to gain from

this?

Application: Social Marketing

When message is from a non-profit organization:1.What other constituencies could benefit but

are missing from the social marketing efforts? 2.Why is the social marketing restricted to its

current targets? 3.Were the target constituents a part of the

design process or just targets?

Application: Reputation Management

When reputation building efforts are observed:1.Is the organization really doing what it says it

is doing? 2.Why would the organization want to be

associated with these issues or values? 3.Are the changes cosmetic or embedded in

who the organization is and what it does?

Application: Reputation Management

4. How does the organization embody these issues or values in their actions or policies?

5. What constituents benefit from the reputation building efforts?

6. Are important faults of the organization being overlooked by shiny reputation messages?

Application: Issues Management

When reviewing issues management efforts:1. Who are the sides in the issue? 2. What does each side have to gain or lose?3. What voices dominate the issue discussion?4. What relevant voices are absent from the

discussion? 5. Are any of the vocal actors really front groups?6. How will the proposed outcomes of the issues

management effort affect various constituents?

Application: Risk Management

When examining a risk management effort:1. How much risk information is being provided? 2. Is it the type of risk information constituents

really need and want? 3. How does the organization’s risk communication

compare to the information provided by its critics and watchdogs?

4. How are biases affecting the various presentations of risk information you are finding?

Application: Risk Management

Evaluate online health risk information:1.What does the group or organization have to

gain or to lose from the risk? 2.How can shaping your behavior relative to a

risk help or hurt the group or organization? 3.What are the credentials of their “experts?”

Application: Crisis Management

When reviewing a crisis management effort:1.Does constituent safety seem to be a priority? 2.What action is the organization taking to

ensure public safety? 3.How concerned does the organization seem to

be with crisis victims?

Application: Crisis Management

4. Is this level of concern consistent with the crisis situation?

5. Are substantive efforts being made to identify and to correct the cause of the crisis?

6. Does the crisis response seem to be distracting people from the cause and the need to redress the cause of the crisis?

Application: CSR

When considering CSR actions:1. How is the CSR effort being assessed? 2. Is a third party involved in assessing the CSR

effort? 3. Does the evaluation of the CSR effort extend

beyond corporate benefits? 4. What constituents are benefiting from the CSR

efforts? 5. How are they benefiting?

Application: CSR

6. Are CSR efforts cosmetic or embedded in corporate policies and practices?

7.Are CSR efforts distracting constituents from important corporate flaws?

8.What does the activist or watchdog group have to gain from criticizing the CSR efforts?

Application: Public Diplomacy

When reviewing public diplomacy actions:1.Why is a country receiving positive coverage?2.What does a country have to gain from the

positive coverage? 3.Why is a country receiving negative media

coverage? 4.Does the media coverage reflect what other,

credible sources say about the country?

Application of Public Relations Literacy

• Notice the heavy reliance on questions people might ask in their evaluation process.

• Questions are highlighted because public relations literacy is about inquiry.

• We need to question public relations messages rather than simply grant quiescence to them.

• A public relations literate individual will be a more critical consumer of public relations messages.

Public Relations Literacy

• Relates to transparency, process of looking into PR messages.

• Requires motivation.• Requires tools to critically evaluate PR actions.• This chapter merely highlighted some of the

key ideas that can be used to evaluate various public relations efforts — the groundwork for public relations literacy skills.

Thoughts on Public Relations

• It is complex.• It is more than media relations.• It should embrace its use of influence.• It must recognize and cope with power. • It is activist as well as corporate.

Remember

• A field benefits from reflection and attempts to understand its own flaws.

• An over-zealous defense serves to stunt a field’s development, not to enhance its growth.

• Public relations is neither all good nor pure evil, it provides both for society.

• Ultimately public relations can provide a valuable means of helping to knit the fabric of society if people choose to utilize it in that way.

Reflection Points

• Why is it a problem to only examine the good points of public relations?

• What challenges are there to creating public relations literacy?

• What benefits can be derived from a society that has a public relations literate population?