Ethics And Public Relations : How People View Right And Wrong, Good And Bad

The PRSA’s Code of Ethics designates the principles and guidelines that uphold the core values and the ethical practice of public relations. Including advocacy, honesty, loyalty, professional development, and objectivity. The Public Relations Society of America is committed to ethical practices. PRSA members seek a high level of public trust, and members pledge to serve the publics best interest. PRSA have taken on a special obligation to operate ethically. The value of member reputation depends upon the ethical conduct of everyone affiliated with the Public Relations Society of

Public relations serve many positive functions, to radio and television announcements of school closings and community events, they make us aware of what is happening around us. This type of public relations is needed and benefits the public without personal hidden agendas. However, there is a darker side to public relations that seeks manipulate an unsuspecting audience for their own personal gain. It is this type of public relations that the film Toxic Sludge is Good for You is unraveling. Through use of every kind of media communication and technology, public relations firms have set out to convince people that what they are saying is good for us (Toxic Sludge is Good For You [video file] Access to Restricted Library Resources, n.d.).

Early PR practices were deemed "press agentry" and were thought of a group that fell into a comparison with propaganda. This was because of the use of hype and manipulation of information. For the most part during development of the practice, there was little to no ethical boundaries. In the early 1900's however, there was a major focus on using factual information and labeling it public information, though somewhat manipulation, in order to help gain the public's interest or trust. This factual information however, was based solely around one-way communication, where the information was published simply for the knowledge of others, and not necessarily with the expectation that any action would come of the information. Of course the name of the game in public relations was always to convince someone to change or solidify their opinion on a topic or issue, in the

Although codes of ethics have become part of the public relations profession, Newsom et al. (2013, p. 49) state that not all practitioners adhere to their respective standards. Bernays (1998, p. 29) notes that unlike most other professions, public relations lack an ethical code that gives the state the power to restrict the practice of those who breach any such code. Bernays (1998, p. 32) believes the public relations profession should have ‘…registration and licensing by the state…’ so that both the practitioners and publics can be confident in the profession’s ethical standards. The Public Relations Society of America’s code of ethics was first implemented in 1950 but is essentially unenforceable (Fitzpatrick, cited in Sha 2001, p. 122).

Place quotes Fitzpatrick as saying public relation practitioners perform the role of promoting morality and ethicacy when they acknowledge and respect the needs and interests of those with whom they communicate, tell the truth, and maintain a balance of interests (Place, 2010, p230). In the lecture it was mentioned that not everything can be prohibited or permissible by legislation, and that sometimes individuals or tasks requires self-regulation; including PR and advertising. However, this system can cause PR practitioners and advertisers to make taxing ethical decisions, and even be highly criticized for the standards of practice and the choices they make.

Harlow (1976) defines public relations (PR) practice as “the distinctive management function which helps establish and maintain mutual lines of communications, understanding, acceptance and cooperation between an organisation and its publics”. PR plays an important role in organisations because they are representing a broader group of activities, even encompassing all communication activities of an organisation (Lee, 2011). To put in a laymen term, public relations practitioners (PR) work to build long-term relationships among individuals and institutions through planned promotions of goods, services, and images of a company to create a good will for a person, place, and event and also to helps management to be informed and responsive to public opinion to further improve the organisation.

Public Relations include the cancer ribbon awareness, support the troops, and those tear jerking commercials about animals and people in need. In the novel, Media Control The Spectacular Achievements of Propaganda, Noam Chomsky writes “ It's not even a question. It doesn't mean anything. That's the point. The point of public relations

Public Relations in New Zealand is widely useful, practised and builds up an organisation’s relationships with its publics. PR in short, is essentially about communication and relationship building. PRINZ [Public Relations Institute of New Zealand] (2009) defines PR as “The deliberate, planned and sustained effort to establish and maintain mutual understanding between an organisation and its publics.” This essay will deconstruct and critically examine this definition of public relations in relation to PR theories. These theories being Systems Theory, Relationship Management and Excellence Theory will be examined and applied to campaign examples. This will give a comprehensive understanding of the theory’s meanings as well as relationships with aspects of the PRINZ definition of PR. To understand PR theories however, the term publics must first be addressed.

Anyways, through different definitions this essay gives you an overview and a better understanding of what public relations is and does. It shows you the importance and function of public relations in an organization especially in today's world.

Section 1: The Ethical Landscape: An ethical dilemma occurs when elements of a moral system conflict, but it can be thought out rationally. Given this definition there has to be a guideline for professionals to follow who deal with ethical dilemmas on a daily basis. Usually ethical dilemmas do not have a happy ending, but there has to be a way to make the situation better. There are many guidelines or codes professionals have to abide by to keep an outstanding reputation and their job. I delve into the ethical landscape of public relations. The code of ethics for public relations can be found on the Public Relations Society of America website. The website states, “PR can present unique and challenging ethical issues, but protecting integrity and public trust are fundamental…” The code of ethics indicates that someone in the field of public relations should hold advocacy, honesty, expertise, independence, loyalty, and fairness above all else. If the public relations professionals are honest and accurate in their communication most of the ethical guidelines will be met. (www.prsa.org/aboutprsa/ethics/#.VBdPKvldX-s).

Press agentry, public information, two-way asymmetric public relations, and two-way symmetric public relations are four models of public relations theory devised by Grunig and Hunt (1983). In this essay, the author goes on to identify an example each from current public relations business practices that goes on to show the four public relation models in action. Further stress is provided to ensure that the examples have all been taken place within last twelve months in the Australian media and justification of selection is to be done by comparing it with real world examples that are chosen.

Media relations can be defined as one of the most significant areas of the practice of public relations. (Shaw&White, 2004) It enhances the practice of public relations by serving a systematic, strategized and mutually beneficial relationship between journalists and the public relations practitioners to build credibility, understanding and respect between the two parties. (Supa&Zoch, 2009) It is essential to cultivate a positive and healthy relationship between public relations practitioners and journalists because journalists tend to look at public relations practitioners in a negative way where they believe that they spin information to get free publicity which making it difficult for journalists to report legitimate news and at the same time, against the basic rules of news writing. (Fedler and DeLorme, 2002) Another study by Kiranjit and Halimahton (2006) also suggests that public relations practitioners and journalists are very much sceptical about each other’s role and the relationship between two of them is doubtful and uncertain. From the point of view of public relations practitioners, they complaint that journalists do not understand the role of public relations. On the other side, journalists tend to think that public relations

The theory explains that the value of public relations in organization and society lies in socially responsible managerial decisions and quality organization to public relations. Organisations must behave in ways that solve the problems and satisfy the goals of the stakeholders as well as the management in order to be effective. Good relationship with organisation’s strategic publics is helpful in developing and achieving goals desired by both the organization and its publics, reducing costs of negative publicity, and increasing revenue by providing products and services needed by stakeholders. Practitioners identify publics who are affected by or affect organizational decisions and communicate symmetrically with them to build high quality long term relations.

The public relations tactics in relation to the corporate context will now be examined. Customer relations can be associated with the monitoring of attitudes of key publics and stakeholders especially in regards to any negative incidents that have the potential to effect the organisation’s reputation and consumer trust (Wilcox, 2013, p.312). For Malaysian Airlines, this is evident given the potential for consumer boycotts with the missing aircraft’s (Crossman Communications, 2015, p2). Having over 12, 000 employees, employee relations are important for the organisation. Employee relations consist of monitoring employees’ attitudes and beliefs towards the organisation (Wilcox, 2013, p316) as there is potential for negative word of mouth by employees essentially damaging the company’s reputation. This is evident as according to Malaysian Airlines, they offer a “dynamic exciting environment that nurtures a diverse talented team that work to make great things happen” (2017). Finally, media relations are vital in a corporate context as “negative coverage can cause a corporation’s reputation to plummet” (Wilcox, 2013, p. 310). Having said that, it is important as public relations professionals to establish positive relationships with those who operate in the media industry. Kimberly Blessing argues the two fields (public relations and journalism) have an important working interrelationship with “60% of PR

Only recently being recognized as a discipline in itself, modern day professional public relations practices can trace its roots to the early 1900s where the first public relations firm, the Publicity Bureau, was founded in Boston. In 1923, Austrian-American public relations pioneer, Edward Bernays, identified three fundamental concepts of public relations. In 1984, American theorists, Grunig and Hunt, conceptualized the now-famous four models of public relations and the excellence theory that were generally adopted by public relation agencies across the globe. With so many significant milestones and theories of public relations established in the United States, it stands to reason that public relation practices would naturally adopt a western perspective.