Public Relations Experts Research Articles

Brevity is the soul of advocacy, experts say

Keep it simple, stupid.” That’s the advice a panel of public relations experts gave delegates to the Canadian Medical Association’s 144th annual general meeting in St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador during a strategic session on how to influence politicians, the media and patients to

Case Studies as Narrative Accounts of Public Relations Practice

This article offers a narrative analysis of competition case studies, a genre of public relations discourse. The aim is to examine the representation of public relations expertise produced by practitioners in cooperation with a professional association. Using narrative concepts such as character, narrative function, plot, point of view, and time, the analysis identifies ways in which the actual experience of practice is narratively transformed, and reflects on the reasons behind this transformation. Findings are presented under 3 main headings: professional work, narrative transformations, and professional legitimacy; and they highlight the interplay of individual experience and professional group aims.

Winning the War of Words: The “Front Group” Label in Contemporary Consumer Politics

When political interest contend for public support, both money and legitimacy are critical resources. Money is especially useful in disseminating ideas, while legitimacy aids their reception and acceptance. In political contests pitting private interest such as large corporations against public interest groups, private interest are relatively well endowed with financial resources. These resources can be used to purchase public relations expertise, plant favorable news articles, conduct push polls,1 and commission self-serving research. In contrast, public interest such as those in the consumer, environmental, and government reform movements tend to have the advantages of legitimacy in the eyes of the public because these purport to represent society as a whole. Thus, a pivotal task for public interest is to mobilize resources (McCarthy and Zald 1212; see also Jenkins), while private interest must either bolster their own legitimacy or undermine that of their public interest adversaries. Private interest often try to build their public legitimacy by employing the technique, that is, delivering their message through the mouth of an apparently impartial or independent party (Bernays 20). These third parties are often scientists working in industry-funded think tanks or journalists who, knowingly or not, uncritically disseminate information contained in company news releases, canned video news reports, or planted editorials.2 Another third-party technique is to establish, fund, and control an artificial public interest group. These are typically designed by public relations firms to look like spontaneous outpourings of grassroots public sentiment. By clothing the arguments of private interest in the mantle of the public interest, these third-party organizations pose a serious challenge to the legitimacy of traditional3 public interest groups. These traditional public interest attempt to delegitimate their artificial competitors by labeling them as astroturf lobbyists4 or, more commonly, groups (Stauber and Rampton 79). The subject of this article is the use of the term as a symbolic weapon in consumer politics. This article begins by locating the study of front group accusations within previous research on the political uses of language. Then the article reviews the state of research on front and some difficulties in defining them. The heart of the article examines the use of the term as a political tool within the domain of consumer politics, asking: Who directs the term at whom, through what channels of communication, and with what apparent effect? The article's final section argues that front group accusations are part and parcel of a dynamic political culture and merit further study. Political Language The study of the political functions of language has a long tradition, especially under the rubric of rhetoric. The word is derived from a Greek word meaning orator (Schiappa 4), so the speeches of political leaders are the most frequent subject of rhetorical analysis. The study of political rhetoric also encompasses the speech of individuals who seek to influence political leaders, such as leaders of social movements and fringe political parties. Rhetorical analysis typically focuses on big blocks of text such as a candidate's speech, an interest group's position paper, or a newspaper's editorial. It then seeks the elements of form and content that contribute to a text's persuasiveness. More recently, best-selling books like George Lakoff's Don't Think of an Elephant! and Geoffrey's Nunberg's Going Nucular have drawn attention to the political functions of individual words or catchphrases, such as pro-life versus pro-choice or affirmative action versus reverse discrimination. These phrases are designed to slant or spin the content of a message. …

Legitimacy, Public Relations, and Media Access: Proposing and Testing a Media Access Model

This study examines how an organization's access to the media reflects two sets of influences—its public relations (PR) expertise and legitimacy. A context of stem cell and the cloning debate is used to test the relationships. Two surveys and a content analysis show that the legitimacy of sources perceived by journalists has an impact on the regularity and valence of those sources' media coverage, whereas the PR expertise of sources does not have an impact on any of the media access indicators. Public relations expertise, however, shows some impact on the legitimacy of sources as perceived by journalists, indicating that legitimacy operates as an intervening variable between PR expertise and media access of sources.

The Art of Perpetuating a Public Health Hazard

Canadian chrysotile (white asbestos) could be a paradigm for those agents that are successfully exploited commercially long after they have been found to be lethal. Mining started in the late 1870s, and reports of disability and death followed in Britain (1898), in France (1906), and Italy (1908), but it was not until 1955 that Canada acknowledged asbestosis in its asbestos miners and millers. Even when shortly after asbestos was shown to be carcinogenic, Canadian Public Relations experts assisted by their scientists exculpated chrysotile by deeming other agents to have been causal. The PR techniques that have been successfully used in the defense of chrysotile are reviewed, to forewarn scientists involved in formulating public health policy for similar agents, as to the tricks that will be played on them.

Coercion

Coercion

Public relations expertise deconstructed

This article deconstructs public relations expertise by presenting the results of extensive empirical enquiries. The data were gathered during participant observation of a three-week commercial training course for international practitioners offered in London in 1998; and from over 100 winning entries to a British PR industry awards scheme over 16 years. Theoretically, the work draws on ideas from the sociology of the professions and Bourdieu’s The Logic of Practice. Professional expertise emerges from the analysis as a body not of abstract, but of practical knowledge. The components of this knowledge are identified, and then the interrelationships of its conceptual frame and professional tools modelled in two figures: ‘Public relations’ domain and lines of intervention’ and ‘Public relations brings together the symbolic and the material’. The conclusion proposes that an understanding of the institution of consultancy, which produces and replicates the occupation’s expertise as revealed here, is a necessary addition to existing management or media studies’ understanding of public relations.

Parties' Diminishing Relevance for Campaign Professionals

The decline of parties in the electorate has not only drastically increased the competition in open electoral markets but also thrown into question the central role of political parties as campaign organizations. Instead of relying on the capacity of the party organization to communicate with voters, party elites may be looking for other means of electoral mobilization like television broadcasts, targeted direct mail operations, phone banks, and media-centered campaign activities planned, designed, and produced by professional political consultants and public relations experts. The campaign professional's view of party organizations for successful campaign operations is the central topic of this comparative study, based on data from a worldwide survey of political consultants and leading party managers from forty-three electoral democracies. Between 1998 and 2000, a sample of 592 campaign professionals were interviewed about their professional experience and role definitions. This article deals with the relevance of political parties in the minds of campaign professionals from a global perspective.

The Reagan Effect: Economics and Presidential Leadership.

The author of this book focuses especially on questions raised in highly polemical debates between conservatives and liberals concerning Ronald Reagan's economic policies. He gives equal time to both sides, showing how liberals were wrong in their predictions of gloom, while conservatives continue to grant Reagan more credit and status than he deserves. The book aims to reveal how failures of Carter administration set stage for Reagan's success, describes how he united diverse conservative factions, and shows how Reagan's personality affected his decision-making style. In examining economic record, it explains how Reagan persuaded Congress to pass budget and tax cuts while funding a costly defence buildup, and it analyzes construction of a policy regime that prolonged growth phase of business cycle by lowering threat of inflation. It also provides insights into Reagan administration's responsibilty for savings and loan disaster and tells how it dealt with trade imbalances. The political success of Reagan's presidency, observes Sloan, can largely be attributed to confined efforts of conservatives, pragmatists and public relations experts. Reagan was a popular anti-intellectual, a former actor who knew how to deliver his message in a way that pleased his audiences and who never allowed the facts to undermine his convictions. Sloan stresses that Reagan's rhetoric functioned to keep conservatives loyal while masking pragmatic compromises. While Sloan suggests that net effects of Reagan's presidency were positive, he is not uncritical. He contends that Reagan's ridicule of attempts to promote social justice ultimately diminish his image as a great moral leader. He also observes that effective government - such as relying on Federal Reserve to control inflation - was an essential component in Reagan's leadership, thus contradicting anti-government stance of many conservatives. Sloan concludes that Reagan's impact, as opposed to his rhetoric, was not to displace liberalism but to weld conservatism to it, and that neither era of big government nor need for effective national public policies is over.

Public Relations Expertise and Organizational Effectiveness: A Study of U.S. Hospitals

A national survey of 191 heads of public relations departments in hospitals measured the departments' expertise or knowledge to practice excellent public relations, as defined by recent research. Utilizing 2 scales original to the study, correlations showed strong and significant relationships between organizational effectiveness and departments with high potential to practice the 2-way symmetrical model, enact the manager role, and participate in strategic planning. Analysis further showed that traditional communication craft, as characterized by 1-way models and the technician role, is a foundation for public relations excellence. Findings can be used to help resolve the current crisis faced by hospitals.

The Mad cow crisis: health and the public good

The announcement that BOSER might cause a fatal human disease Creutzfeldt- Jacob disease CJD triggered enormous media attention, public alarm and government wrangling that threatened the future of European integration.; As Scott Ratzan argues: is my belief that the [BOSER crisis] represents a quintessential case that will go down in history as the Exxon Valdez Union Carbide's Bhopal accident, and other such cases of interdisciplinary study.; This book offers lessons learned from the crisis, with contributions from experts with different viewpoints - veterinarians, Eurocrats, public relations experts, politicians, policy- makers, journalists and representatives of the beef industry.; It also offers a compilation of the key reports from governmental bodies. as a case-study in policy-making, scientific/health discovery and dissemination of information, as well as looking at the issues from the perspective of psychology and media studies.

Propaganda in the modern world

It is often said that we now live in an Information Age, an age in which control of and access to (and, perhaps, strategic concealment of) information is an important determinant of peoples' fates and a major basis of the operation of economy and society. But even as the amount and spe cialized nature and importance of information increases, we witness the expansion of professionals and experts to mediate between us and that in formation, to interpret it for us and shape its meaning. We are treated to an unrelenting stream of spin doctors, advertisements, pundits, fund raisers, editorialists, public relations experts, lobbyists, radio talk show hosts, news analysts, and others?all seeking to ensure that we receive the "right" in formation and that we understand it "correctly" (i.e., as they do). Virtually all information with which we are presented is pre-packaged by one or another of these "information managers" in accordance with their own in terests and agendas or those of the institutions that hired them. Under these circumstances, our Information Age is perhaps more accurately char acterized as an Age of Propaganda. It is hardly unique to our times that advocates of some particular in terest or issue would attempt to present their position in the most favorable way and to persuade others of its merits. What is unique in the contem porary case is the unprecedented sophistication of techniques of presenta tion, combined with a much more exact understanding of how the opinions of the public (now usually subdivided, on the basis of careful research, into target audiences) can be touched and shaped. In modern mass societies, individual attitudes, understandings, and sentiments are routinely rationally manipulated and orchestrated by large-scale agencies and institutions, a de velopment so pervasive that it poses a significant challenge to liberal ideals of individualism and democracy.

Meinungsbildner und Multiplikatoren

Summary Exceptionel, social functions of readerships make a readership analysis of two communication professional magazines most interesting. The readers are journalists and public relations experts. The subscribers were asked in written form in two structural surveys as to their reading habits and estimation of the topics with regard to the professional magazines „Journalist“ and „PR Magazin“. The first one is the official publication of the German Organization of Journalists DJV, the second is published in close cooperation with the German Public Relations Society DPRG. The data concerning a normal structural survey of the readers is upgraded because professional magazines were examined which are made by respectively created with the assistance of two recognized professional institutions. It gives the possibility to get some information about journalists and public relations experts who are the opinion leader in Germany.

SOUTHAMPTON VERSUS OUT‐OF‐TOWN SHOPPING CENTRES

Hardly a day goes by without a report about one of the great traditions of British dissent: a small group protesting at the demolition of a cottage; a lone crusader chaining him or herself to a tree to prevent its felling; or a band of enthusiasts standing in the way of a bulldozer as it attempts to fill in a duckpond. Yet that same culture, which has bred a stubborn tradition of activism in the cause of a manageable and human‐centred environment, is curiously silent in the face of a threat that will involve the demolition, potentially, of hundreds of cottages, thousands of trees and scores of duckponds. Additionally, it will involve the desecration and impoverishment of the urban landscape that city‐dwellers are only now beginning to learn is every bit as fragile and in need of care and attention as our natural heritage. This is the looming threat of the giant multi‐purpose out‐of‐town retail centre. Whether it be for a large clear span warehouse, for a retail ‘farm’ of several similar centres selling stratified lines in bulk, or the establishment of an entire alternative High Street in the middle of nowhere, most urban centres and particularly free‐standing centres, face a plethora of applications and a wash of finance and public relations expertise in the drive to persuade, cajole or bully local authorities into accepting planning applications of monumental consequences for the established retail centres of those authorities. In South Hampshire alone there are currently 18 applications under consideration for out‐of‐town shopping centres which together total in excess of 4,000,000 sq. ft. (To put this figure into real context, Southampton City Centre currently has 1,500,000 sq. ft of retail.)

Marketing education on a shoestring: A model

Few educators envision themselves as marketing or public relations experts, yet economic reality is forcing many academicians into these roles. Over the past four years, the Eastern Washington University Department of Education has developed a successful marketing model for educators. The model begins with a successful reform of department programming and includes research, publication, public relations, internal communications and marketing ideas. This article details each of these areas as well as supplying a rationale for the marketing of educational coursework.

The Stalinist Mentality and the Higher Learning

“Mentality” has become a fashionable term among historians, as a supposedly neutral way of pointing to a pattern of beliefs that are typical of a particular group. “Mentality” seems to avoid the metaphysical mystery of phrases like “the spirit of Russia,” or the Marxist anger in the term “ideology,” which carries a charge of grandiose delusion, of self-interest disguised as universal truth. In deference to fashion and to the goal of irenic discourse, let us use the word “mentality,” though we know that new words do not remove old difficulties.A central difficulty is the facile assumption that ideology and practicality are elemental contraries, that the conflict between them shapes the evolving mentality of communist regimes. This essay on Soviet history rests on a different assumption: that practicality is itself an ideological concept which can be understood only by reference to particular historical contexts. It is an illusion to imagine that practicality can be defined by reference to technics, a supposedly autonomous force that pulls all societies into a single anthill system. That technological fantasy has subverted the grand ideological theories of previous centuries and increasingly undermines even academic theorizing about human beings. Ideologists become servile functionaries — “public relations experts,” as we say in the West — while academics are reduced to other forms of technical expertise and to purely decorative functions. Soviet history presents an extreme version of that characteristic triumph of “pragmatism” in the twentieth century. To a large extent, I shall try to show, such “pragmatism” is mythic self-delusion, a way of avoiding dangerous threeway conflicts of forthright political rule, openly avowed ideological prophecy, and relentlessly quizzical higher learning.