Public Relations Ethics Research Articles

2010 Practice Analysis: Professional competencies and work categories in public relations today

Without question, the profession of public relations has changed greatly over the years, but the practice of that profession has remained unchanged in the last half century. The 2010 Practice Analysis conducted by the Universal Accreditation Board as a follow-up to its 2000 study examines professional competencies and work categories in current public relations practice. Results indicate that knowledge, skills, and abilities (i.e., professional competencies) for public relations practice in 2010 centered on general business skills, media relations, and theoretical knowledge. The strategic planning process of research, planning, implementation, and evaluation, as well as public relations ethics and legal issues, were connected to both general business skills and media relations. Four groupings of work categories in 2010 were public relations management, issues management, corporate communications, and media relations; each of these work category groupings reflected clear areas of extant public relations scholarship, suggesting that the theory and practice of public relations may be closer to each other than is commonly decried.

Characteristics and Dimensions of Ethical Leadership in Public Relations

This study explores the characteristics of leadership in developing and managing ethics in public relations, based on in-depth interviews with 20 public relations executives in the United States. Systematic analysis of the interview data identified multiple dimensions of ethical leadership and ethical knowledge, and suggested that ethical leadership is grounded in personal rather than professional characteristics. Personal ethics, interpersonal behaviors, and articulation of ethical standards emerged as 3 salient characteristics of an ideal leader in facilitating knowledge transfer of ethics in public relations organizations. Ethical knowledge is implicit, intangible, personal, and often difficult to identify or articulate, posing a challenge for the transfer of knowledge through structured and formalized approaches. Theoretical implications and practical recommendations are discussed.

Going Public: Good Scientific Conduct

The paper addresses issues of scientific conduct regarding relations between science and the media, relations between scientists and journalists, and attitudes towards the public at large. In the large and increasing body of literature on scientific conduct and misconduct, these issues seem underexposed as ethical challenges. Consequently, individual scientists here tend to be left alone with problems and dilemmas, with no guidance for good conduct. Ideas are presented about how to make up for this omission. Using a practical, ethical approach, the paper attempts to identify ways scientists might deal with ethical public relations issues, guided by a norm or maxim of openness. Drawing on and rethinking the CUDOS codification of the scientific ethos, as it was worked out by Robert K. Merton in 1942, we propose that this, which is echoed in current codifications of norms for good scientific conduct, contains a tacit maxim of openness which may naturally be extended to cover the public relations of science. Discussing openness as access, accountability, transparency and receptiveness, the argumentation concentrates on the possible prevention of misconduct with respect to, on the one hand, sins of omission-withholding important information from the public-and, on the other hand, abuses of the authority of science in order to gain publicity. Statements from interviews with scientists are used to illustrate how scientists might view the relevance of the issues raised.

The Shadow of Excellence: A Jungian Approach to Public-Relations Ethics

The paper suggests that public-relations (PR) ethics might benefit from the ideas of Carl Jung (1875–1961), suggesting wholeness instead of goodness as an ethical foundation. PR ethics are located in professional ethics, highlighting problems with idealized self-images. The possibilities of a Jungian ethic are then explored, with emphasis on the integration of shadow material. Finally, these ideas are tentatively applied to public relations, asking whether the dominance of the Excellent Persona has fueled the shadow of deceit and manipulation. The paper is written from a hermeneutic perspective, viewing professional ethics through a Jungian lens.

University teachers’ perceptions and evaluations of ethics instruction in the public relations curriculum

This study examined the present state of teaching ethics in university public relations departments in the U.S. and abroad. The results of this online survey indicated that PR teachers ( N = 249) perceived ethics instruction in PR education to be essential, and they believed in a close tie between general morality and professional ethics. However, the results also showed that the higher the participants’ academic rank, the less favorable attitude they held toward the value of ethics education to students.

TÜRKİYE’DEKİ SİVİL TOPLUM KURULUŞLARI WEB SİTELERİNİN DİYALOJİK İLETİŞİM KAPASİTELERİ ÜZERİNE BİR İNCELEME

This article investigates dialogue’s usage through the web sites of non-governmental organizations operating in Turkey to build organization-public relationships which dialogue has a pivotal role in ethical public relations practices in relational public relations approach that is discussed in the context of paradigm shift in public relations. This study is theoretically derived from relationship management perspective and methodologically based on dialogic communication principles of Kent and Taylor (1998) and examines 50 institutional web sites of non-governmental organizations by operationalizing these principles in terms of identification of the relationships of non-governmental organizations and its publics. The findings of the study indicate that the web sites have low dialogic capacity which is defined in the context of building organization-public relationships. This article discusses how to develop this capacity as well.

A Greater Means to the Greater Good: Ethical Guidelines to Meet Social Movement Organization Advocacy Challenges

Existing public relations ethics literature often proves inadequate when applied to social movement campaigns, considering the special communication challenges activists face as marginalized moral visionaries in a commercial public sphere. The communications of counter-hegemonic movements is distinct enough from corporate, nonprofit, and governmental organizations to warrant its own ethical guidelines. The unique communication guidelines most relevant to social movement organizations include promoting asymmetrical advocacy to a greater extent than is required for more powerful organizations and building flexibility into the TARES principles to privilege social responsibility over respect for audience values in activist campaigns serving as ideological critique.

Mixed media: moral distinctions in advertising, public relations, and journalism

Introduction CHAPTER 1: What is Media Ethics? * Ethics and the act of communication * Ethics or morals? * The media and morality * Moral Excuses * Can personal ethics become professional ethics? * Media similarities: The common threads * Media differences: A coat of many colors * Forming ethical standards for the mass media * Can the Media Be Ethical? CHAPTER 2: Moral Claimants, Obligation, and Social Responsibility * Relationships among media and their claimants * Ethical applications * What does it all mean? CHAPTER 3: The Media and Professionalism * Are the media professions? * The professional-client relationship * Codes * Profession versus professionalism: If it walks like a duck... CHAPTER 4: Theoretical Approaches to Ethics * Why can't we all be right? The dilemma of relativism * Why we reason the way we do * Social contract theory * The argument over means and ends * Non-consequential ethical theories * Consequential ethical theories * Virtue ethics * The ethic of care * Free speech theories * Liberty-limiting principles * How to choose applicable theories CHAPTER 5: A Checklist for Ethical Decision Making * A Checklist for Moral Decision Making * An Example * What's it all mean? CHAPTER 6: Meta-issues Across the Media * To tell the truth * Truth and the Act of communication * Can We Tell Truth From Fiction? * Avoiding Harm * The Right Thing To Do CHAPTER 7: Meta-issues in Public Relations and Advertising * What's the difference between PR and advertising? * Public relations, advertising, and the first amendment * Ethics and persuasion * Propaganda versus persuasion * What does it all mean? CHAPTER 8: Ethics and Public Relations * What is public relations? * Ethical approaches specific to public relations * Special issues in public relations ethics * What does it all mean? CHAPTER 9: Ethics and Adverting * What is advertising? * Ethical approaches Specific to Advertising * Special issues in advertising ethics * Further use of the means-ends paradigm * What does it all mean? CHAPTER 10: Ethics in News Journalism * Meta-issues in news journalism * Ethical Approaches Specific to News Journalism * Special issues in journalism ethics * What does it all mean?

Communicating for the good of the state: A post-symmetrical polemic on persuasion in ethical public relations

As inarguably one of the most influential theories in public relations scholarship, the symmetrical theory devalues the most common public relations objective, persuasion. This article deconstructs Grunig's work and re-constructs classic rhetoric to provide a post-symmetrical direction for public relations scholarship devoted to influencing behavior. By viewing the practice of persuasion from the perspectives of Aristotle, Plato, Isocrates, Burke, Nietzsche and others, this paper provides ethical and procedural guidelines on how today's public relations scholars can refocus the public relations agenda to focus more on real-world issues.

Ethics in public relations: a guide to best practice

Ethics in Public Relations: A Guide to Best Practice. Patricia J. Parsons. Sterling, VA: Kogan Page Limited, 2004. 187 pp. $35 pbk. Ethics in Public Relations fills a textbook void by acknowledging, upfront, the inherent dilemmas and conflicts that may arise among practitioners who are faced with ethical situations on the job. The book then provides a breadth of decision-making tools that may be used to grapple with issues and to reach responsible and defensible solutions. The author, who teaches strategic communication and ethics, brings the issues pragmatically to the forefront for examination by future public relations practitioners. Patricia J. Parsons, associate professor and past chair of the Department of Public Relations at Mount Saint Vincent University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, brings a wealth of professional and classroom expertise to the textbook. She has written two other public relations books: Manager's Guide to Projects: A Practical Approach in 2003 and Beyond Persuasion: The Healthcare Manager's Guide to Strategic Communication in 2001. Additionally, she serves as a public relations consultant in the health care arena. After acknowledging the tendency to judge public relations ethics as an oxymoron, Parsons avoids the black-andwhite approach and shows novice practitioners how to navigate through the grey haze of ethical public relations practice. Yes, it can be done. The book is divided into four sections. It does not wax poetically about the great philosophers. Rather, readers will receive a brief grounding in ethical principles, particularly as they relate to this discipline, with the remaining three-fourths of the book devoted to doing ethical public relations. The first part of the text addresses principles of ethical thinking, including roots of professionalism, truth-telling, responsibilities, rights, and loyalties. It's a quick look (forty-seven pages) at the basic foundations, including deontology, utilitarianism, and situational ethics. The second part focuses on the individual's moral sense of self, including moral development, ethics codes, conflicts, and the inherent dilemmas of the practice. The strategies and tactics section delves into those dilemmas more fully and outlines potential strategies for dealing with them. Here, Parsons does an exemplary job shedding light on the nuances of ethical persuasion. In the last section, she focuses on public relations practitioners' roles in the ethics of an organization. It is within this section that various decision-making tools are introduced-the Potter Box, use of PR pillars, Peter Drucker's mirror test, and criteria for second guessing. …

Philosophies of communication: implications for everyday experience

The essays in this volume consider, in multiple ways, how philosophies of communication and communication ethics can shape and enhance human communication. Collectively, this book provides a philosophical and pragmatic orientation to issues that involve interpersonal and organizational communicative contexts from marketplace, political, and feminist perspectives. Chapters explore public attacks of schadenfreude, political communication, communication in pedagogical settings, intercultural perspectives of narrative and memory in communicative engagement, ethical public relations practices, narrative ethics and the feminist voice, the ethics of care, and the rhetorical consciousness of marketing. Philosophies of Communication invites students to develop or improve the critical thinking skills that in turn help them negotiate deeper philosophical and ethical significances within their everyday communicative encounters.

Ordinary People can Reason: A Rhetorical Case for Including Vernacular Voices in Ethical Public Relations Practice

Modern public relations practices have been dominated by appeals to impulses, desires, and images that affect publics defined predominantly in demographic terms. This paper argues that abandoning basic rhetorical assumptions about the ability of ordinary people to engage in practical reason has serious ethical implications for the marketplace as well as for society in general. The study applies recent rhetorical scholarship on issues of public discourse and rhetorical culture to public relations practices, considering how rhetoric can contribute to more effective and ethical public discourse in our dominant modes of marketplace communication.

What Is Third‐Wave Feminism? A New Directions Essay

What Is Third‐Wave Feminism? A New Directions Essay

Ethics in Public Relations: American and Russian Students’ Perspectives on Professional Challenges

This study investigates Russian (n=206) and American (n=204) public relations students’ perceptions of relationships between ethics and public relations practice. The results suggest that, although there are some similarities, students in the two countries view professional public relations ethics and leadership quite differently. Russian participants were more likely than their American counterparts to see obstacles that might hav e prev ented them from ethical conduct. More American than Russian participants reported intentions to confront an unethical decision of superiors.

Ethics in public relations: responsible advocacy

Introduction: Toward a Definitional Framework for Responsible Advocacy Chapter 1: Baselines for Ethical Advocacy in the Marketplace of Ideas - Kathy Fitzpatrick Chapter 2: Responsibility and Accountability - Thomas H. Bivins Chapter 3: The Ethics of Communicating With and About Difference in a Changing Society - Larissa A. Grunig and Elizabeth L. Toth Chapter 4: Negotiating Relationships With Activist Publics - Linda Hon Chapter 5: Responsible Advocacy for Nonprofit Organizations - Carolyn Bronstein Chapter 6: Truth and Transparency - Karla Gower Chapter 7: Responsible Online Communication - Kirk Hallahan Chapter 8: Responsible Advocacy Through Strategic Risk Communication - Michael J. Palenchar and Robert L. Heath Chapter 9: The Ethics of Public Diplomacy - Philip Seib Chapter 10: Advocacy Across Borders - Donald K. Wright

“Order three advertisements and get one news story free”: Public relations ethics practices of Turkish and international companies in Turkey

This study investigates the ethics of communication in print media in Turkey by exploring the potential incidences of publishing custom-made news stories and editorials by newspapers and magazines about Turkish and international businesses for promoting their advertising space. The study establishes that the incidence of corresponding news stories or editorials in newspapers and magazines and related paid advertisements increased by more than 100% between 1994 and 2004. In the second stage of the research, key informant interviews reveal that, in general, business officials and media executives have a teleological view of ethics.

Disclosing Special Interests: Constitutional Restrictions on Front Groups

Front groups are controversial public relations techniques used by organizations to influence public opinion and public policy on behalf of undisclosed special interests. This article examines historical and contemporary uses of such third-party efforts and considers constitutionally permissible restrictions on front group practices. We address the specific issue of whether governments may compel organizations to reveal their participation in grassroots lobbying initiatives without violating the First Amendment. We then consider the implications of front groups for public relations ethics and the potential for heightened legal regulation spawned by unethical public relations practices perceived to interfere with the efficient functioning of government.

Moral Development and PR Ethics

Research in public relations ethics has focused primarily on moral philosophy and applied normative ethics. Although these efforts may help to theoretically "ground" ethical behavior, they offer little help in understanding the complex processes by which public relations practitioners reason through moral decisions. This article is designed to introduce moral reasoning theories into public relations ethics research by using the Defining Issues Test to generate baseline data for future research.

Culture influence on educational public relations officers’ ethical judgments: A cross-national study

This paper reports the results of a questionnaire sent to 573 officers practicing public relations in higher education institutions in eight countries–officers from different cultures. The officers were asked to state their opinions on how ethical or unethical were the 25 hypothetical practices used in the study. Based on the findings, difference of culture produced differences in the officers’ ethical judgments. The results of the study enhance the idea of cultural relativism and this is seen as a challenge to globalizing public relations ethics.

Ethics in public relations: a guide to best practice

Part 1 What lies beneath... Chapter 1 Before we begin: new profession... or one of the oldest? Public relations ethics: oxymoron? A tarnished history Defining our terms A profession or professionalism? Aspiring to professionalism Measuring your professionalism quotient Chapter 2 A tangled web: the truth about PR ethics An epidemic of lying The 'truth' in public relations Predicting honesty on the job Truth telling as a principle of behaviour Chapter 3 To do no harm: the issue of trust Truth and trust The limits of organizational responsibility To whom are you loyal? Chapter 4 Whose rights are right? Rights and responsibilities When my right conflicts with yours Conflicting rights in public relations Chapter 5 The trouble with rules Rules rule our lives Those darn deontologists The real trouble with rules 'Situations alter cases' Moral relativism and situations The problem with situations Chapter 6 Robin Hood ethics What the heck is 'utilitarianism? Motives be damned Problems with Robin Hood Part 2 Ethics and the practitioner... Chapter 7 Your staircase to respect R-E-S-P-E-C-T Still the moral child The moral child grows up An ethical litmus test? More than good manners: ethics and etiquette Morality and your level of competence Chapter 8 The good, the bad and the almost ugly: ethics codes Codes as contracts Minimum standards or ideals? Who needs codes, anyway? A global code? Relying on a personal code Using personal values Developing your own code Chapter 9 Sex and the single (or not) PR practitioner: conflict of interest Defining a conflict Sleeping with... the enemy? Practicalities before ethics Outside conflicts Personal relationships and ethical principles Other conflict situations Chapter 10 You... against the world A dilemma you don't need A continuum of tattling How to be a whistleblower Tattling The temptations of moonlighting Part 3 Strategies and dilemmas... Chapter 11 Media relations: breeding ground for ethical problems Ethics of the relationship Honesty in media relations Media access and ethics Journalists have codes, too Aspects of ethical media relations Chapter 12 Persuasion -- or propaganda? Engineering consent Ethical persuasion... an oxymoron? PR for biker gangs? Any client, any time? The advocate arises The 'right' to PR counsel Sneaky propaganda A war of words The pitfalls of euphemism Doublespeak The 'controlled lexicon' The vocabulary of public relations Persuasion by lobby Transparency versus obfuscation Chapter 13 Good causes and bad taste 'Aware' of the issues A staple of community relations From good causes to good taste Chapter 14 PR and plagiarism A PR practice Defining plagiarism Crossing the line Part 4 Organizations, ethics and public relations Chapter 15 The true reality of everyday ethics: making decisions Why make a decision at all? The best you can hope for Ethical dilemmas: not all the same Decision steps Making those ethical decisions in PR A case in point Other approaches Criteria for second guessing PR practitioners as ethical decision-makers The researcher told us so Chapter 16 PR and the corporate ethics programme Organizational ethics/PR ethics: not the same thing Ethics as window-dressing Social responsibility defined Public relations' role Chapter 17 Making business accountable: the 'new breed' of PR Back to the classroom Teaching and learning Learning about ethics Drawing to a conclusion