PUBLIC RELATIONS ETHICS
A topic that defines public relations and is even more important than the skills that equip PR practitioners. A brief summary of the chapter before heading to practical examples.
'Ethics is about standards of behaviour, specifically, concern for 'good' behaviour and consideration of how our behaviour, as an individual or an organization, affects the wellbeing of others or society as a whole.' - a definition worthy of regurgitation from the text.
The value of ethics can b challenged based on its subjectivity of it all, however, there are universal moral and ethical basis of guidelines to follow. Other than the ten values that Michael Josephson bought forth, being ethical has to be a natural, instinctual process inbuilt in all PR practitioners. In order to achieve this instinctual behaviour, one has to be willing and open to the concept of ethics, know and understand ethics, and develop the skill to behave ethically in all situations.
The ethics schools of thought proposes four theories:
1. Virtue ethics
It view ethical behaviour as one that is guided by an individual's personal values.
2. Deontology
Ethics as set by the law, codes of conduct and agreed principals or regulations set by the client or PR agency.
3. Consequentialism
Ethical or unethical decisions are based on the presumed consequences they will bring.
4. Ethics of inclusion
Decisions are made by consulting a third party's view or taking the perspective from another individual.
Here is a movie that shows an example of conglomerates behaving unethically for greater gain for themselves.
As seen, Dick was unknowingly used as the public face of this unethical behavior of forcing a company into bankruptcy in order for a bigger company to profit from it, ignoring welfare and needs of stakeholders. This shows the importance of PR practitioners' role of upholding honesty and integrity of their clients. Indeed, PUBLIC RELATIONS is termed so as its first priority and loyalty goes to the public. PR practitioners have to do adequate research in order not to commit the same mistake as did Dick. A wrong decision made will result in a snowballing effect and hence consequentialism school of thought and ethics of inclusion come into play.
What are other examples of unethical behaviour in view or public relations? Something that may not seem to have such a big effect as compared to the case of 'Fun with Dick and Jane' or its real-life counterpart 'Enron and Worldcom scandals'?
Hey Joane,
ReplyDeleteAh ethics. I have to say that I find this topic to be most interesting yet extremely annoying at the same time. And this is all due to one simple fact – ETHICS IS SO SUBJECTIVE.
Sure, there is a certain “code of ethics” that has to be followed. Of course, the law is there as well. However, let us look at an example of when ethics becomes debatable.
“Take a guy named Eduardo. Eduardo is a middle class father of two. He takes care of his wife and children and leads a full and productive life. About once every two months, when he has some extra cash, Eduardo will buy some cocaine. The drug never interferes with his marriage, his kids or his work. Eduardo gets pulled over one night, (long story short), Eduardo gets caught with the drugs, convicted and sentenced to X years in jail. There goes a wonderful family synergy, a loving marriage and a great dad.”
(extracted from http://uctaa.net/articles/reflections/ref01/ref016.html)
Now, I'm not saying that Eduardo should not have been arrested. I'm just pointing out that due to the subjectivity of ethics, there will be people who will stand up for Eduardo (or maybe for his family) and try to fight for his freedom. Yes, setting him free would be against the law – which was written based on a code of ethics. But would you call these people who simply wish the best for Eduardo and his family unethical? It is a highly debatable issue.
Anyway, we have debated about these issues in class and what a debate that was, eh? I've really learnt a lot form the points that were brought up. Although ethics may have a lot of gray and uncertain areas, I believe that with experience and enough insight, a good PR practitioner would be able to make good decisions.
- Syaz
I wouldn't say that they are unethical, I would say rather emotional. That is why virtue ethics can never be on its own as people will claim that their perspective is the most 'ethical' one based on an individual point of view. Even as it is true that one's actions are guided by his/her own values, there should be some guidelines in order to have some sort of conformity. We can't have everyone fighting and saying their way of doing things is the correct way. We will probably have World War 3 by then.
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