Political public relations within foreign affairs: Ireland’s public diplomacy campaign for a security council seat

This study investigates the storytelling discourse in Ireland’s public diplomacy campaign to win a seat on the UN Security Council. It dissects public relations materials to ascertain what system, identity, and issue narratives constructed the narrative component of Ireland’s UNSC campaign. Results of a strategic narrative analysis suggest Ireland built the campaign around themes of Empathy, Partnership, and Independence. System narratives featured Ireland as a revisionist actor seeking to rebalance the UN toward more equal and participatory representation. Identity narratives emphasized Ireland as a small island-state whose past of economic hardship and struggle for independence drives its desire to help those in need globally. Issues narratives highlighted Ireland’s commitment to global peacekeeping, fighting climate change, and promoting humanitarian aid through gender equality, food security, and refugee assistance. Findings elucidate the strategic storytelling role of public relations and public diplomacy communications within foreign affairs.

Calm the farm or incite a riot? Animal activists and the news media: A public relations case study in agenda-setting and framing

The ideological differences between animal activists and primary producers are long-standing, existing long before the advent of social media with its widespread communicative capabilities. Primary producers have continued to rely on traditional media channels to promote their products. In contrast, animal activists have increasingly adopted livestreaming on social media platforms and ‘direct action’ protest tactics to garner widespread public and media attention while promoting vegetarianism/veganism, highlighting issues in animal agriculture and disrupting the notion of the ‘happy farm animal’. This paper uses a case study approach to discuss the events that unfolded when direct action animal activists came into conflict with Western Australian farmers and businesses in 2019. The conflict resulted in increased news reporting, front-page coverage from mainstream press, arrests and parliamentary law changes. This case study explores how the activists’ strategic communication activities, which included livestreaming their direct actions and other social media tactics, were portrayed by one major Australian media outlet and the farmers’ interest groups’ reactions to them.

Dealing with disappointment: How can a ‘coexisting imperatives’ view help us understand the unfulfilled dialogical promise of digital media

The association between the concept of dialogue and the expansion of digital media in public relations started as a theoretical ‘promise’ and was later followed by a feeling of disappointment. This article argues that the dialogic promise of new media was in great measure a consequence of a well-established belief according to which the field was rapidly moving from a ‘functional’ to a ‘cocreational’ approach, whereas in fact both cocreational and functional imperatives persist and coexist in complex manners that need to be disentangled. This idea is explored through a critical analysis of highly cited literature about dialogue and digital technology in public relations. Implications for future theory-building, research and practice are discussed.

Deep canvassing: Persuasion, ethics, democracy and activist public relations

In the run up to the 2020 US presidential elections, some activist groups promoted the practice of ‘deep canvassing political persuasion’ as an inclusive, values-based communication strategy, to turn Trump voters favourably towards left leaning or progressive agendas. Deep canvassing emphasises non-judgemental listening to voters’ stories and emotions, in order to avoid any threat that voters may feel from ‘forms of persuasion employed by traditional political campaigns’. In current conditions, some see it as an antidote to the increased persuasive power of misinformation campaigns. This paper provides a critical description of deep canvassing and investigates its growing appeal as a persuasive activist communication practice in the US, focussing on its justification and ethical orientation. In doing so, it situates the practice as ‘activist public relations’ and discusses its context in relation to democratic models. The paper will field the proposition that deep canvassing should be situated within a broader and more robust discussion of democracy, discourse and power to fully understand its ethical and social implications. This study of contemporary communication in the US contexts will shed light on democratic political cultures and interrelationships of power and language between civil society, business and government that support their distribution and interpretation.

Does your corporation “care”? Exploring an ethical standard for communicating CSR relationships online

A qualitative content analysis of corporate social responsibility (CSR) webpages of top-ranked corporations was conducted to determine the ethical nature of online communications surrounding nonprofit partnerships. Are corporations giving nonprofits their fair share of online publicity? All CSR-related webpages from the top 30 Fortune’s 500 Most Admired Corporations for 2017 were examined. Ethical principles from public relations communications regarding open, honest, and transparent information sharing guided textual analysis. Evidence shows that CSR website communications often engage in self-promotion rather than genuine and mutually beneficial support for nonprofit partners. Through corporate branding of CSR activities, advertising through philanthropy stories, and exploiting employee volunteerism and donations, the balance of CSR relationships tilts heavily in the corporation’s favor. Yet, public relations practitioners have a special calling to be the “ethical conscience” of their organizations. Understanding how corporations can provide ethical communications about their nonprofit partners helps guide ethical voice of the practice. This study is unique for looking specifically at the ethics of corporate CSR communications themselves and for addressing the nonprofit perspective of CSR, which is often overlooked. While nonprofits may benefit from CSR relationships, this article shows that opportunities for mutually beneficial communications about these relationships may be lacking.

Discordant storytelling, ‘honest fakery’, identity peddling: How uncanny CGI characters are jamming public relations and influencer practices

This article critically explores whether and how computer-generated imagery (CGI) characters are jamming public relations and influencer practices. We use Miquela, a virtual character with 3 million Instagram followers as a case study. We examine Miquela’s (and her creators’) communication strategies to identify what makes her so appealing to postmillennial audiences, luxury and indie brands, and civil rights activists alike. Valued at USD125 million, Miquela is algorithmically moulded as a fashionista, singer and civil rights warrior to maximise visibility, influence and emotional release. ‘Her’ discordant, uncanny human/nonhuman ethos simultaneously attracts, intrigues and defies. To study Miquela’s case we built a four-tiered theoretical framework (parasocial relations, identity influence, culture jamming, and algorithmic branding) using the Freudian concept of ‘the uncanny’ as connecting thread; and a mixed method that includes digital ethnography, textual and sentiment analysis. We aim to make a contribution to studies on the use of digital media in PR.

Rethinking crisis dynamics from the perspective of online publics: A case study of Dolce & Gabbana’s China crisis

On November 18, 2018, the Italian fashion house Dolce & Gabbana (D&G) released a controversial video on all their social media channels. The video triggered an instant outcry from the general Chinese public, who called the video a racist caricature of Chinese culture. D&G responded to the crisis with several image repair strategies. This study examines D&G’s crisis communication efforts in the wake of this incident. Departing from corporate-oriented perspectives prevalent in the field of public relations, this study employs a dynamic, public-oriented view of crisis communication, which focuses on the dynamic, interactive process of crisis development from the standpoint of the publics. By analyzing communicative behavior on Twitter (an increasingly influential alternative public sphere in China) and in particular, comments and responses toward the crisis communication strategies employed by D&G, we have identified four prominent themes, or ways that publics framed their key messages against the corporation: “Apology not enough”; “Apology done badly”; “Call to unite against D&G”; and “Sarcasm, mockery, and abuse.” And they can be interpreted as a number of crisis communication strategies of the global, online publics. Based on our analysis of the D&G case, we discuss the theoretical implications of a dynamic, public-oriented perspective (DPOP) on crisis communication, highlighting its key areas of difference from the corporate-oriented perspective (COP).

Strategic problematization of sustainability reframing dissent in strategic communication for transformation

Involving stakeholders in organizational decisions is essential in the present sustainability movement, associated with the social license to operate and specific forms of communication in, from and about organizations with an impact orientation. This paper introduces a concept of strategic problematization of sustainability for transformation as innovative approach to Public Relations (PR), acknowledging the plurality of agonistic voices in stakeholder engagement processes in social, cultural and environmental transformations and challenging the normative concept of dialogue and solution- and consensus-oriented approaches to date. The article discusses the transformative potential of PR by reframing dissent and introducing problematization as ability to agonize and, therefore, as key process of constructive strategic communication for sustainable development. Three conversational procedures in water (scarcity) management on a local, national and international level were chosen to explore the potential of strategic problematization in relation to sustainability as normative framework of today’s society. The implications of the case studies and the conceptual framework expand existing engagement theories with a critical perspective and manifest the transformative potential of PR for a sustainable future.

Silencing the virus? Government communication and MMR vaccination campaigns – the Australian case

In this paper I analyse a series of Australian MMR (measles-mumpsrubella) vaccination campaigns and policies from the last decade. Using the Bruno Latour’s Actor Network Theory (ATN), I locate human and non-human mediators – including the virus and vaccine – in the complex pro-vaccination alliance led by government campaigners. I identify the vaccine hesitant parents – a large group that ‘sits on the fence’ between the ‘vaccine confident’ and ‘vaccine refusing’ parents – as the main target of pro-vaccination campaigns. PR literature on pro-vaccination campaigns has applied ATN to the independence of the media as network agents. This paper contributes with the problematisation of several more actors such as the health workers, medical experts and the vaccine hesitant parents themselves. Even when they are keen members of a pro-vaccination network, they cannot be taken for granted. This is where understanding of stigma, silence and voice helps. To align their group interests and discourses, government should know how to communicate strategically – including how to communicate indirectly, avoiding stigma and keeping certain internal affinities and communicative distances intact. In conclusion, I make suggestions about strategic communication in pro-vaccination campaigns. Communication of statistical risks and side effects should be central. It is a winning strategy because it establishes a more credible balance between individual rights and collective obligations in achieving herd immunity. And mandating vaccination cannot replace communication. Research shows that legislating compulsory vaccination may have short-term and relatively small effects. They are almost negligible in the long run. Mandate may trigger compliance, but it also causes anger and mistrust. Mandating vaccine has negative side effects. It punishes with economic and cultural sanctions the socially disadvantaged, who are not active refusers. It also has the opposite effect on vaccine hesitant parents. It does not weaken but rather strengthens their resistance to the vaccine and pushes them to the lager of antivaxxers.