Is a ‘new feminist visibility’ emerging in the UK PR industry? Senior women’s discourse and performativity within the neoliberal PR firm

Abstract

Despite persistent gender inequalities, the public relations (PR) industry in the United Kingdom has historically reflected unease with feminism. However, indications of a ‘new feminist visibility’ raise significant questions. Do these feminist moves reflect a blossoming of feminist practice in the PR industry? Or rather, in an occupation that is strongly intertwined with neoliberalism and promotional culture, is the PR industry emblematic of a highly individualised ‘neoliberal feminism’ and a postfeminist sensibility in which ‘multiple and contradictory ideas’ coexist? Adopting Edley’s discourse analysis framework, data drawn from interviews with seven senior female practitioners, supported by observational data, were critically explored in relation to the literature in gender sociology, cultural studies and feminist literature in PR. While the online presence of women’s networks in PR provide evidence of a feminist visibility to address inequalities, the ‘subject positions’ and ‘interpretative repertoires’ in the data were characteristic of neoliberal feminist individualism that calls upon women to provide for their own needs and aspirations through ‘self help’ measures. Furthermore, while sex discrimination in the PR industry featured prominently within the discursive repertoires of some participants, inequalities in everyday agency practice were either left unchallenged in response to client expectations or tackled through individual actions. Contradictory repertoires, including the repudiation of sexism, were indicative of entrepreneurial discourse and a postfeminist sensibility. Senior PR women providing client services appear to have limited scope beyond individualised, performative strategies to challenge the structures that perpetuate inequalities in PR and bring about transformative change. Although findings are limited to a small-scale study, this article contributes a unique perspective of the intersections between neoliberalism, third wave feminism, postfeminism and performativity within the UK PR industry.