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Applying sociology to public relations: A commentary
Public Relations Review 33 (2007) 294–300
Applying sociology to public relations: A commentary G¨unter Bentele ∗ , Stefan Wehmeier Universit¨at Leipzig, Institut f¨ur Kommunikations – und Medienwissenschaft, ¨ Lehrstuhl Offentlichkeitsarbeit/Public Relations, Leipzig, Germany Received 17 February 2007; received in revised form 7 May 2007; accepted 17 May 2007
Keywords: Sociology; Public relations; Trust; Legitimacy
1. Introduction The main aim of this special issue is to confront the empiricist and positivist tradition in public relations research by revisiting the works of well-known, and mostly European, sociologists. At first glance this aim seems to be a challenge for a journal, which among other things evaluates the practical relevance of submitted papers. Indeed the articles are neither easy-to-read nor practical but they do offer the open minded reader new insights into the realm of public relations. The sociological perspectives range from Luhmann’s autopoietic systems theory, to Habermas’ normative political philosophy and Foucault’s structuralist theory. Consequently, while this special issue has an inherent diversity on the one hand, there are on the other hand many connections such as those between the concepts of trust and legitimacy, which are central to most of the papers. 2. Habermas Theories by J¨urgen Habermas have already been used in some approaches to develop different PR theories. It seems to be obvious that Habermas’ theory of society, his approach of the structural transformation of the public sphere (Calhoun, 1992; Habermas, 1991) or his theory of communicative action can serve as a profound theoretical basis to reflect the historical development of public relations, different functions of public relations in society, or different communicative styles of public relations: Pearson (1989) for example developed some fundamental thoughts about public relations’ ethics, going back the Habermas’ idea of the “ideal speech situation” and his theory of communicative action, and, in particular, his concept of “discourse” which is connected with the concept of “ideal speech situation” (see Bowen, 2005). This ideal is a “countrafactual” expectation and requirement for factual discussions and dialogues. Habermas (1984) argues that we need this requirement to a certain degree to communicate in reality, although we know that every dialogue and discussion is limited in respect of time and space, although we know the ideal of the ideal speech situation. Burkart (1993, 2005) takes these theoretical elements of Habermas’ theory of communicative action and develops a normative theory of “consensus oriented public relations” (COPR), which gives an interesting approach and one that can guide the work of practitioners. With Burkart’s approach – which we see as a type of practical oriented, normative, middle range theory – it seems to be possible to reflect different dimensions and different phases of ∗
Corresponding author. Tel.: +49 341 9735 730; fax: +49 341 9735 748. E-mail address: [email protected] (G. Bentele).
0363-8111/$ – see front matter © 2007 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.pubrev.2007.05.009
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a practical communication process between organizations and specific publics, and through reflection of this process to try to develop more awareness about the process itself. By making the participants conscious of these different dimensions and phases in an organization’s communication process it seems to be possible to improve the control of such processes, not by one directional communication, but by discussion: through dialogue between the participants in such a process. Unfortunately only one case study has been connected so far with Burkart’s model – the case of a planned landfill in Austria (Burkart, 1993) – as Burkart mentions (in this volume). This model should be applied in other cases, and in other countries, to test the practical value of this approach. As mentioned before, there are also other aspects of J¨urgen Habermas’ writings which could be applied to public relations theory, especially his early thoughts on the functioning of the public sphere (Habermas, 1991), ideas which he has recently developed further (see Habermas, 2006) and which seem to be very useful for developing PR theory in a macro societal context. As far as we can see, Habermas revised his originally highly critical point of view concerning public relations and understands – to mention one example – lobbyists in their societal function parallel to politicians or actors of the civil society. 3. Luhmann The distinction between reflexivity and reflection and its impact on public relations is the central topic of Susanne Holmstrøm’s paper. Holmstrøm gives some insights into the complex systems theory of Niklas Luhmann. Like Parsons, Luhmann prefers non-normative grand theory. His sociological reasoning focuses on the differentiation of self-creating (autopoietic) social systems. Self-creating social systems have specific communicative filters through which the world is recognized and the overwhelming environmental complexity is reduced. As a result of the self-creating process being regulated by internal communicative filters, external control and regulation of social systems are almost impossible to achieve. By highlighting Luhmann’s distinction between reflexivity and reflection Holmstrøm sketches the emergence of public relations in modernity and builds a framework for analyzing PR practices. According to Holmstrøm in the age of reflexivity organizations take their own worldview for a given. Public relations activities spread the organizational truth as the only truth that is relevant. Organizational decisions and organizational communication underlie a functional primate. Organizations see themselves as naturally socially responsible—a perspective, Ganesh termed “organizational narcissism” (2003, p. 558). In reflection however, organizations recognize that their environment is polycontextual. Each individual system has a different worldview and no one is superior to another which produces both uncertainty and a new form of public relations, one in which it is the task of PR to constantly legitimate organizational actions to diverse stakeholders. Gaining trust turns out to be one of the central aims of public relations activities, because trust is a mechanism to reduce uncertainty and complexity. The functional concept of direct control is detached by concepts of context regulation and polycontextualism. This theoretical approach to public relations provides us with a sociological frame for seeing the stages of PR development in a broader societal context. Further it matches with some theories of the middle range that already exist, for example, the theory of public trust (Bentele, 1994). It also has connections to other papers of this special issue, for instance, the paper on Weber (legitimacy and legitimation) and the paper on Giddens (trust in expert systems). However, we do have some critical comments: Some of the ideas presented in this paper can be traced back to other scholars than Niklas Luhmann: The notion of the reflective organization that is able to realize polycontextuality goes back to Heinz von Foerster and his concept of second order cybernetics (Foerster, 1993). The concept of context regulation originates in sociocybernetics (B¨uhl, 1989; Busch & Busch, 1992). Furthermore we challenge the duality of reflexivity and reflection as a distinction that is able to identify the empirical reality. In reflexivity, selfishness prevails while in reflection, social responsibility is an inherent part of public relations. Organizations question their own identity, role and responsibility. This duality is not able to describe modes that are in between. There is evidence that many organizations merely try to appear reflective. They see very clearly that society expects them to be responsible. But by knowing this they try to do both—being responsible in some areas yet remaining 19th century capitalists in other areas. The case of British Petroleum (BP) might exemplify this strategy. BP was very successful in creating the slogan “beyond petroleum”. In a simple way stakeholders got the idea of a refined global player, which nowadays cares for the environment and for the people. But this image was recently deconstructed as half-truth: Due to low security standards BP workers died in an accident. Consequently “beyond petroleum” was transformed in public communication to “beyond safety” (Pitzke,
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2007). While BP’s external communication and inventions in clean technologies showed the mode of reflection, its internal security measures have been on the level of reflexivity. To sum up, we believe that the distinction between the reflexive and the reflective stage is an appropriate tool to describe processes analytically, but that it fails to describe reality. Reality is neither white nor black, but grey. 4. Foucault In their article about the French sociologist and philosopher Michel Foucault Judy Motion and Shirley Leitch apply three central dimensions of Foucaults’ work to public relations: discourse, power/knowledge and subjectivity. Given the functional and positivist dominance in PR research, Foucault is rarely used in public relations theory building. However, Leitch and Motion highlight that his central concerns – the production of meanings, the strategies of power and the propagation of knowledge – belong to the core of public relations communication processes. By focusing on these concerns the authors broaden academic public relations in two ways. First, the organizational meso perspective is broadened to a meso-macro perspective in which the role of public relations in society is highlighted. Secondly, not only the actions and reactions of the organization are analyzed but also the communicative interplay between organizations and stakeholders. Discourse is manifest in “systems of thought that determine what could be said and who could speak” (p. 5). A similar concept is known in the sociology of science as “styles of thought” (Fleck, 1980), which have impact on both, research topics and methods. Motion and Leitch argue that PR practitioners influence, create or transform the systems of thought that shape how we think about things. “Discourse may be contested, resisted or transformed by any discourse actor but this work often falls to public relations practitioners” (p. 6). The questions at hand are: how is discourse transformed and who is able to transform it? This point is highlighted in the next dimension: power/knowledge: “When public relations practitioners deploy successful discourse strategies, the resulting discursive change may achieve hegemonic status,” (p. 6) an outcome the authors describe as “common sense.” The example they give is the shift from the Keynesian to the neo-liberal economic hegemony, which – according to the authors – was accompanied by powerful public relations. More recent examples can be found, for instance, the neo-liberal campaign “new social market economy” in Germany: Since 2000, there has been an attempt by mostly conservative managers, politicians and scholars to change the German mindset, a mindset strongly related to the social market economy introduced in Western Germany after 1945. This social market economy represents a moderate form of capitalism, buffered by a large social net. The initiative tries to change this stance by claiming: ’social is, what accomplishes jobs’. In so doing the term “social” is transformed into a capitalist meaning freed from welfare connotations. While systems theory inspired authors like Ronneberger and R¨uhl (1992) highlight the welfare-oriented function of public relations, Motion and Leitch argue that public relations practitioners establish a common sense of particular truths by virtue of power. At the organizational level, the work of Foucault can be taken to describe a different form of corporate identity: an identity that is not functional and top down installed. Instead, it is subject to the discursive practices of an organization’s members. This concept goes beyond business oriented philosophy and connects corporate identity with ethnomethodology. In Germany, this method is used by historians to describe culture and identity in firms (G¨otz, 2000). In sum, this perspective gives fresh thoughts to public relations theory building. However, we disagree with the authors’ conclusion that “public relations shifts from the discourse domain of business [. . .], to the discourse domain of politics, where it is understood as a power effect that produces and circulates certain kinds of truths” (p. 14) We think that it shifts to the domain of sociology where it can be understood as a power effect that produces and circulates certain kinds of truths in certain fields of society. 5. Bourdieu As noted by Øyvind Ihlen, Pierre Bourdieu has to date rarely influenced public relations theory building. One reason for this situation might lie in the fact that Bourdieu is discussed to a greater degree in Europe and known better in rather “soft” social sciences – parts of sociology, cultural anthropology or cultural science – rather than in “harder” parts of sociology which primarily work by and with empirical studies and which use middle range rather than grand theories. On the other hand, Bourdieu himself was not only the author of many new or newly interpreted concepts and theories; he also conducted a lot of empirical fieldwork, using qualitative and also mathematical methods for his studies.
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Øyvind Ihlen focuses his article primarily on three of Bourdieu’s basic concepts: habitus, field and capital and on the importance of the five concepts of institutionalization as well as four types of capital: economic capital, knowledge capital, social capital and symbolic capital. Ihlen shows that these concepts can open new perspectives for questioning and analyzing public relations phenomena. To give an example: The degree of institutionalization of any organization influences the forms of communication or public relations of that organization; the amount of economic capital also influences or determines the possibilities of organizational communication, and the personal or corporate reputation is narrowly connected with the symbolic capital in the meaning. These are all concepts used by Bourdieu. We do not deny here that many of Bourdieu’s concepts can inspire a new perspective on public relations phenomena and the questions Ihlen puts in this context may lead to further insights. It should, however, be mentioned that the conceptual framework offered by Bourdieu seems to be less concrete than that offered by other theoretical approaches. If the statement of Ihlen, that the sociology of Bourdieu would offer a “perspective on public relations . . . that is more realistic than the prevailing theories of the discipline” can be understood in a sense, that a conflict based model can be seen as more realistic than an consensus based model, we would agree with such a position. 6. Goffman Like J¨urgen Habermas, Erving Goffman is seen by most sociologists and many other scientists as a classic in sociology. Many of his concepts – for example, the concepts of impression management and framing – have turned out to be very fruitful and capable of inspiring many analyses not just in sociology, but also in social psychology, communication, and media research. The concept of frame and the approach(es) of frame analyses (Scheufele, 2003) have, in particular, proved to be fruitful for analyzing communicative situations in interpersonal and in mass media communication. Goffman’s (1959) “dramaturgical approach” – originally developed in and primarily for the interpersonal context – seems to have been a rich source of inspiration for the analysis of several phenomena on public relations practice and it, therefore, must be seen as an important theoretical approach for public relations research. Catrin Johansson (in this volume) focuses on four key concepts of Goffman’s theory: impression management, framing, footing, and face. She demonstrates that these concepts can be very useful when analyzing interaction and communication in organizational contexts. As regards the concept of impression management, Johansson argues that this concept “has so far only been studied in relation to organizational crises” (Johannson, this volume). While this assertion may be valid for the English literature, the concept of “impression management” has been applied to public relations in the German context (see Piwinger & Ebert, 1999). Rosumek (2003) analyzed portrayal photography as an instrument of organizational impression management. In another example, Biel (2003) analyzed the staging of the CEO at the annual, general shareholder meeting, his verbal and nonverbal performance, the staging of the stage itself and the general auditorium setting and the similarities with real stage performances. The differentiation between front stage and backstage and the entire metaphorical dramaturgical approach seem to be very well suited to analyzing situations and contexts which involve organizational, but at the same time public, communication with interpersonal aspects. Deekeling and Arndt (2006) have looked at CEO communication and the staging of the CEO in public and/or organizational settings. In conclusion, it can be said that Goffman’s conceptual framework has already demonstrated its fruitfulness for analyses of public relations practice, especially on a micro level. It should be applied to more cases, instruments and communicative situations during the coming years as many other instruments could be analyzed in a similar way. 7. Weber Arild Wæraas makes one very obvious connection to classic public relations thinking and practice by focusing on the concept of legitimacy and legitimation. Some scholars see this concept as the core function of public relations practice (Ronneberger, 1977.) By stating legitimacy as the core function of PR these scholars use systems theory and neo institutionalism as theoretical frames. However, Wæraas reminds us that it was Max Weber who introduced the concept. The author argues: “For Weber, any organization must gain support for a particular myth about itself and cultivate the belief in its own right to exist” (p. 3). If you look at public relations today, practitioners as well as theorists believe that it is very important to have a story to tell and to create myths (Posner-Landsch, 2006). Margot Wallstrøm,
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EU-commissary for communication, points out that its failure to have such a story was one main reason why support of the European Convention is insufficient (Volkery, 2007). Of course, Weber’s theories are more related to the realm of politics, administration and formal bureaucracy, but it is legitimate to broaden this perspective. All organizations, Wæraas argues, even firms, depend on voluntary compliance to be successful. The author focuses primarily on the concept of charismatic legitimation. He argues that public relations plays an important role in creating brands like Apple and Harley Davidson that have not only mere customers but also true fans or believers. Myths and stories are socially constructed. People want to see something behind the mere firm; they want to let brands guide their life and so they believe in what is told and tell others what they believe. But social construction also implies the possibility of deconstruction: The “greening” of British Petroleum (see above) is one such example and the “greening” of Ford and its deconstruction is another (Luke, 2001). Consequently, to become myths, stories have to have a true core. There is one critique we have to make: The rise of charismatic organizational legitimation in our times is based on Wæraas’ assumption that the rational order has declined. We only partially agree with this. This assumption might be true in many parts of society, but in public relations it is not. The rise of the myth and story-driven charismatic organization that is based on emotional intelligence is only one side of the coin. Look, for example, at initial public offerings: The equity story has to be unique; it needs emotion and charisma. But when it comes down to day-to-day business, stockholders do not want to see vision alone; they want to see cash and rational business plans, strategies and tactics. And to give them what they need the organization has to create another myth: the myth of rationality (Wehmeier, 2006). This myth consists of, for instance, showing stockholders that the organization uses the latest controlling inventions like balanced scorecards. The objective is to convince stockholders to believe in the rationality and efficiency of the organization. 8. Giddens The work of Anthony Giddens is rarely used in public relations theory building. However, attempts have recently been made to apply structuration theory to public relations (Jarren & R¨ottger, 2004; Zerfaß, 2004) and related fields such as environmental reporting (Buhr, 2000). In this issue, Jesper Falkheimer focuses mainly on three areas: • the importance of storytelling, shared meanings and sense making in the entire organizational communication process; • the idea of public relations as a communication system that is constructed by all organizational members—in contrast to the view of public relations as a functional subsystem of organizations; • the view of public relations as an ideological communication force that leads to mere replication of social structures as well as to change and transformation (pp. 9–10). The good thing about these perspectives is that they could broaden, if not shift, the research in public relations from a functional and positivist perspective to a qualitative and ethnomethodoligist one which is very welcome. Less welcome is the fact that the social constructionist perspective of this approach seems to be more grounded in the work of Karl Weick than in the work of Anthony Giddens. A combination of Weick and Giddens might be more fruitful as Giddens’ work relates more related to the forming and changing of social structure at the macro level while Weick focuses more on the micro and meso level of individuals and organizations (Weick, 1979). Falkheimer challenges the open systems perspective of public relations that is used by Cutlip, Center, and Broom (2006) and others. He argues that structuration theory focuses more on describing than prescribing the role of public relations, which in open systems theory is identified as a response system, “especially used towards conflicting publics” (p. 8). Falkheimer criticizes systems theory for modeling organizations as stable entities, trying only to maintain their structures. Instead, structuration theory underlines both the reproduction and the transformation of structures. Public relations is seen as a force that serves to maintain or to change the organization’s dominant ideology. We agree with this position. However, it should be noted that the open systems model is not state of the art systems theory. In more advanced approaches social systems are not perceived as stable but as complex and changing (Busch & Busch, 1992; Luhmann, 1984; Holmstrøm in this issue). When it comes to Giddens’ concept of late modernity, Falkheimer, like Holmstrøm, uses the term reflexivity. However, the meaning they give to the term differs: By focusing on social context, ethics and social responsibility Falkheimers’ reflexitivity is more comparable to Holmstrøm’s reflection. Due to the fact that in late modernity people
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are disembedded from many social realities they have to trust expert systems like the medical and legal professions. Falkheimer suggests that public relations might be such a profession too. Its function is to create trust and legitimacy. To sum up, the work of Giddens (like the work of Luhmann) provides us with a socio-historical explanation of why public relations evolved. Furthermore it challenges (as does the work of Luhmann) the functional understanding of systems theory and its application in PR theory. However, in the end, we agree with Falkheimers’ opinion: “A skeptic, and I would not totally disagree, would say that the structuration theory describes something simple in a very complicated way” (p. 10). 9. Concluding remarks First, it is enlightening and useful to look at these different theoretical approaches – most of them grand and classic theories of sociology – and to think about ways in which to use these approaches to gain new insights into public relations theory and practice. Secondly, it will be necessary to think further along these lines, in order to compare the different approaches and to analyze where they do in fact have commonalities and incommensurabilities. The potential of these sociological approaches seems to be even broader than shown so far and other parts of these theories, but which are not mentioned in the articles, could further inspire public relations theory building. Thirdly, most of these approaches can inspire theory building at a macro level. Although public relations always takes place on an organizational, i.e., a meso level, public relations do have functions for society in general. Habermas, Luhmann and other authors dealt with in this volume have developed theories of society, theories in which certain functional subsystems (the economic system, the political system but also the media) have certain societal roles or functions. For this reason, it might be worth trying to model public relations as a social system in society. Public relations can be seen as a functional social system that provides organizations as well as individuals with legitimacy and trust if – to use the analytical distinction of Holmstrøm – done in a reflective way. But it might be a source of distrust as well, if it is framed in the mode of reflexivity. References ¨ Bentele, G. (1994). Offentliches Vertrauen. Normative und soziale Grundlage f¨ur Public Relations. In W. Armbrecht & U. Zabel (Eds.), Normative Aspekte der Public Relations (pp. 131–158). Opladen, Germany: Westdeutscher Verlag. Biel, B. (2003). Die Jahreshauptversammlung als Inszenierung. In G. Bentele, M. Piwinger, & G. Sch¨onborn (Eds.), Kommunikationsmanagement. Strategien, Wissen, L¨osungen. Neuwied, Germany: Luchterhand. Bowen, S. (2005). Ethics of public relations. In R. Heath (Ed.), Encyclopedia of public relations (pp. 294–297). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Buhr, N. (2000). A structuration view on the initiation of environmental reports. Critical Perspectives on Accounting, 13, 17–38. B¨uhl, W. L. (1989). Entwicklungslinien einer soziologischen Systemtheorie. Annali di Sociologia, 5(2), 13–46. ¨ Burkart, R. (1993). Public Relations als Konfliktmanagement. Ein Konzept f¨ur verst¨andigungsorientierte Offentlichkeitsarbeit. Wien, Austria: Braum¨uller. ¨ Burkart, R. (2005). Verst¨andigungsorientierte Offentlichkeitsarbeit. In G. Bentele, R. Fr¨ohlich, & P. Syzszka (Eds.), Handbuch der Public Relations. Wiesbaden: VS-Verlag. Busch, J. A., & Busch, G. A. (1992). Sociocybernetics. A perspective for living in complexity. Jeffersonville, IN: Social Systems Press., pp. 223–240. Calhoun, C. (Ed.). (1992). Habermas and the public sphere. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Cutlip, S. M., Center, A. H., & Broom, G. M. (2006). Effective public relations (9th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Deekeling, E., & Arndt, O. (2006). CEO-Kommunikation: Strategien f¨ur Spitzenmanager. Frankfurt, Germany: Campus. Fleck, L. (1980). Entstehung und Entwicklung einer wissenschaftlichen Tatsache. Frankfurt am Main, Germany: Suhrkamp. [First published 1935]. Foerster, H. v. (1993). Wissen und Gewissen. Frankfurt am Main, Germany: Suhrkamp. Ganesh, S. (2003). Organizational narcissism: Technology, legitimacy, and identity in an Indian NGO. Management Communication Quarterly, 16(4), 558–594. Goffman, E. (1959). The presentation of self in everyday life. New York: Doubleday. G¨otz, I. (2000). Erz¨ahlungen als Indikatoren f¨ur Unternehmenskultur. In C. Wischermann, P. Borscheid, & K.-P. Ellerbrock (Eds.), Unternehmenskommunikation im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert (pp. 227–244). Dortmund, Germany: Gesellschaft f¨ur Westf¨alische Wirtschaftsgeschichte. Habermas, J. (1984). The theory of communicative action. Vol. 1. Reason and the rationalisation of society. Boston: Beacon Press. Habermas, J. (1991). The structural transformation of the public sphere: An inquiry into a category of bourgeois society. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Habermas, J. (2006). Political communication in media societies – Does democracy still enjoy an epistemic dimension? In Presentation at ICA Annual Convention 2006. Jarren, O., & R¨ottger, U. (2004). Steuerung, Reflexierung und Interpretation: Kernelemente einer strukturationstheoretisch begr¨undeten PR-Theorie. In U. R¨ottger (Ed.), Theorien der Public Relations (pp. 25–45). Wiesbaden, Germany: VS. Luhmann, N. (1984). Soziale Systeme. Frankfurt am Main, Germany: Suhrkamp.
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Luke, T. (2001). SUVs and the greening of Ford. Organization & Environment, 14(3), 311–335. Pearson, R. (1989). A theory of public relations ethics. In Unpublished doctoral dissertation. Athens/Ohio: Ohio University. Pitzke, M. (2007). Das BP-Inferno. Spiegel online. Retrieved 17 January, 2007 from http://www.spiegel.de/wirtschaft/0,1518,460234,00.html. Piwinger, M., & Ebert, H. (1999). Impression Management: Zur Selbstdarstellung von Personen und Institutionen. PR Forum, 5(1), 15–19. Posner-Landsch, M. (2006). Story telling – story selling. K¨oln, Germany: Herbert von Halem Verlag. Ronneberger, F. (1977). Legitimation durch Information. Germany: N¨urnberg. Ronneberger, F., & R¨uhl, M. (1992). Theorie der PR. Wiesbaden, Germany: Westdeutscher Verlag. Rosumek, L. (2003). Auffallend gut: Portraitfotos als Instrument des Impression Management. In G. Bentele, M. Piwinger, & G. Sch¨onborn (Eds.), Kommunikationsmanagement. Neuwied, Germany: Luchterhand. Scheufele, B. (2003). Frames–Framing–Framing-Effekte. Wiesbaden, Germany: Westdeutscher Verlag. Volkery, C. (2007). Der EU fehlt die Story. Spiegel online, Retrieved January 17, 2007 from http://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/ 0,1518,459792,00.html. Wehmeier, S. (2006). Dancers in the dark: The myth of rationality in public relations. Public Relations Review, 32(3), 213–220. Weick, K. (1979). The social psychology of organizing. Addison-Wesley Publishing. Zerfaß, A. (2004). Theorie der Unternehmenskommunikation (2nd ed.). Wiesbaden, Germany: VS Verlag.
Applying sociology to public relations: A commentary G¨unter Bentele ∗ , Stefan Wehmeier Universit¨at Leipzig, Institut f¨ur Kommunikations – und Medienwissenschaft, ¨ Lehrstuhl Offentlichkeitsarbeit/Public Relations, Leipzig, Germany Received 17 February 2007; received in revised form 7 May 2007; accepted 17 May 2007
Keywords: Sociology; Public relations; Trust; Legitimacy
1. Introduction The main aim of this special issue is to confront the empiricist and positivist tradition in public relations research by revisiting the works of well-known, and mostly European, sociologists. At first glance this aim seems to be a challenge for a journal, which among other things evaluates the practical relevance of submitted papers. Indeed the articles are neither easy-to-read nor practical but they do offer the open minded reader new insights into the realm of public relations. The sociological perspectives range from Luhmann’s autopoietic systems theory, to Habermas’ normative political philosophy and Foucault’s structuralist theory. Consequently, while this special issue has an inherent diversity on the one hand, there are on the other hand many connections such as those between the concepts of trust and legitimacy, which are central to most of the papers. 2. Habermas Theories by J¨urgen Habermas have already been used in some approaches to develop different PR theories. It seems to be obvious that Habermas’ theory of society, his approach of the structural transformation of the public sphere (Calhoun, 1992; Habermas, 1991) or his theory of communicative action can serve as a profound theoretical basis to reflect the historical development of public relations, different functions of public relations in society, or different communicative styles of public relations: Pearson (1989) for example developed some fundamental thoughts about public relations’ ethics, going back the Habermas’ idea of the “ideal speech situation” and his theory of communicative action, and, in particular, his concept of “discourse” which is connected with the concept of “ideal speech situation” (see Bowen, 2005). This ideal is a “countrafactual” expectation and requirement for factual discussions and dialogues. Habermas (1984) argues that we need this requirement to a certain degree to communicate in reality, although we know that every dialogue and discussion is limited in respect of time and space, although we know the ideal of the ideal speech situation. Burkart (1993, 2005) takes these theoretical elements of Habermas’ theory of communicative action and develops a normative theory of “consensus oriented public relations” (COPR), which gives an interesting approach and one that can guide the work of practitioners. With Burkart’s approach – which we see as a type of practical oriented, normative, middle range theory – it seems to be possible to reflect different dimensions and different phases of ∗
Corresponding author. Tel.: +49 341 9735 730; fax: +49 341 9735 748. E-mail address: [email protected] (G. Bentele).
0363-8111/$ – see front matter © 2007 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.pubrev.2007.05.009
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a practical communication process between organizations and specific publics, and through reflection of this process to try to develop more awareness about the process itself. By making the participants conscious of these different dimensions and phases in an organization’s communication process it seems to be possible to improve the control of such processes, not by one directional communication, but by discussion: through dialogue between the participants in such a process. Unfortunately only one case study has been connected so far with Burkart’s model – the case of a planned landfill in Austria (Burkart, 1993) – as Burkart mentions (in this volume). This model should be applied in other cases, and in other countries, to test the practical value of this approach. As mentioned before, there are also other aspects of J¨urgen Habermas’ writings which could be applied to public relations theory, especially his early thoughts on the functioning of the public sphere (Habermas, 1991), ideas which he has recently developed further (see Habermas, 2006) and which seem to be very useful for developing PR theory in a macro societal context. As far as we can see, Habermas revised his originally highly critical point of view concerning public relations and understands – to mention one example – lobbyists in their societal function parallel to politicians or actors of the civil society. 3. Luhmann The distinction between reflexivity and reflection and its impact on public relations is the central topic of Susanne Holmstrøm’s paper. Holmstrøm gives some insights into the complex systems theory of Niklas Luhmann. Like Parsons, Luhmann prefers non-normative grand theory. His sociological reasoning focuses on the differentiation of self-creating (autopoietic) social systems. Self-creating social systems have specific communicative filters through which the world is recognized and the overwhelming environmental complexity is reduced. As a result of the self-creating process being regulated by internal communicative filters, external control and regulation of social systems are almost impossible to achieve. By highlighting Luhmann’s distinction between reflexivity and reflection Holmstrøm sketches the emergence of public relations in modernity and builds a framework for analyzing PR practices. According to Holmstrøm in the age of reflexivity organizations take their own worldview for a given. Public relations activities spread the organizational truth as the only truth that is relevant. Organizational decisions and organizational communication underlie a functional primate. Organizations see themselves as naturally socially responsible—a perspective, Ganesh termed “organizational narcissism” (2003, p. 558). In reflection however, organizations recognize that their environment is polycontextual. Each individual system has a different worldview and no one is superior to another which produces both uncertainty and a new form of public relations, one in which it is the task of PR to constantly legitimate organizational actions to diverse stakeholders. Gaining trust turns out to be one of the central aims of public relations activities, because trust is a mechanism to reduce uncertainty and complexity. The functional concept of direct control is detached by concepts of context regulation and polycontextualism. This theoretical approach to public relations provides us with a sociological frame for seeing the stages of PR development in a broader societal context. Further it matches with some theories of the middle range that already exist, for example, the theory of public trust (Bentele, 1994). It also has connections to other papers of this special issue, for instance, the paper on Weber (legitimacy and legitimation) and the paper on Giddens (trust in expert systems). However, we do have some critical comments: Some of the ideas presented in this paper can be traced back to other scholars than Niklas Luhmann: The notion of the reflective organization that is able to realize polycontextuality goes back to Heinz von Foerster and his concept of second order cybernetics (Foerster, 1993). The concept of context regulation originates in sociocybernetics (B¨uhl, 1989; Busch & Busch, 1992). Furthermore we challenge the duality of reflexivity and reflection as a distinction that is able to identify the empirical reality. In reflexivity, selfishness prevails while in reflection, social responsibility is an inherent part of public relations. Organizations question their own identity, role and responsibility. This duality is not able to describe modes that are in between. There is evidence that many organizations merely try to appear reflective. They see very clearly that society expects them to be responsible. But by knowing this they try to do both—being responsible in some areas yet remaining 19th century capitalists in other areas. The case of British Petroleum (BP) might exemplify this strategy. BP was very successful in creating the slogan “beyond petroleum”. In a simple way stakeholders got the idea of a refined global player, which nowadays cares for the environment and for the people. But this image was recently deconstructed as half-truth: Due to low security standards BP workers died in an accident. Consequently “beyond petroleum” was transformed in public communication to “beyond safety” (Pitzke,
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2007). While BP’s external communication and inventions in clean technologies showed the mode of reflection, its internal security measures have been on the level of reflexivity. To sum up, we believe that the distinction between the reflexive and the reflective stage is an appropriate tool to describe processes analytically, but that it fails to describe reality. Reality is neither white nor black, but grey. 4. Foucault In their article about the French sociologist and philosopher Michel Foucault Judy Motion and Shirley Leitch apply three central dimensions of Foucaults’ work to public relations: discourse, power/knowledge and subjectivity. Given the functional and positivist dominance in PR research, Foucault is rarely used in public relations theory building. However, Leitch and Motion highlight that his central concerns – the production of meanings, the strategies of power and the propagation of knowledge – belong to the core of public relations communication processes. By focusing on these concerns the authors broaden academic public relations in two ways. First, the organizational meso perspective is broadened to a meso-macro perspective in which the role of public relations in society is highlighted. Secondly, not only the actions and reactions of the organization are analyzed but also the communicative interplay between organizations and stakeholders. Discourse is manifest in “systems of thought that determine what could be said and who could speak” (p. 5). A similar concept is known in the sociology of science as “styles of thought” (Fleck, 1980), which have impact on both, research topics and methods. Motion and Leitch argue that PR practitioners influence, create or transform the systems of thought that shape how we think about things. “Discourse may be contested, resisted or transformed by any discourse actor but this work often falls to public relations practitioners” (p. 6). The questions at hand are: how is discourse transformed and who is able to transform it? This point is highlighted in the next dimension: power/knowledge: “When public relations practitioners deploy successful discourse strategies, the resulting discursive change may achieve hegemonic status,” (p. 6) an outcome the authors describe as “common sense.” The example they give is the shift from the Keynesian to the neo-liberal economic hegemony, which – according to the authors – was accompanied by powerful public relations. More recent examples can be found, for instance, the neo-liberal campaign “new social market economy” in Germany: Since 2000, there has been an attempt by mostly conservative managers, politicians and scholars to change the German mindset, a mindset strongly related to the social market economy introduced in Western Germany after 1945. This social market economy represents a moderate form of capitalism, buffered by a large social net. The initiative tries to change this stance by claiming: ’social is, what accomplishes jobs’. In so doing the term “social” is transformed into a capitalist meaning freed from welfare connotations. While systems theory inspired authors like Ronneberger and R¨uhl (1992) highlight the welfare-oriented function of public relations, Motion and Leitch argue that public relations practitioners establish a common sense of particular truths by virtue of power. At the organizational level, the work of Foucault can be taken to describe a different form of corporate identity: an identity that is not functional and top down installed. Instead, it is subject to the discursive practices of an organization’s members. This concept goes beyond business oriented philosophy and connects corporate identity with ethnomethodology. In Germany, this method is used by historians to describe culture and identity in firms (G¨otz, 2000). In sum, this perspective gives fresh thoughts to public relations theory building. However, we disagree with the authors’ conclusion that “public relations shifts from the discourse domain of business [. . .], to the discourse domain of politics, where it is understood as a power effect that produces and circulates certain kinds of truths” (p. 14) We think that it shifts to the domain of sociology where it can be understood as a power effect that produces and circulates certain kinds of truths in certain fields of society. 5. Bourdieu As noted by Øyvind Ihlen, Pierre Bourdieu has to date rarely influenced public relations theory building. One reason for this situation might lie in the fact that Bourdieu is discussed to a greater degree in Europe and known better in rather “soft” social sciences – parts of sociology, cultural anthropology or cultural science – rather than in “harder” parts of sociology which primarily work by and with empirical studies and which use middle range rather than grand theories. On the other hand, Bourdieu himself was not only the author of many new or newly interpreted concepts and theories; he also conducted a lot of empirical fieldwork, using qualitative and also mathematical methods for his studies.
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Øyvind Ihlen focuses his article primarily on three of Bourdieu’s basic concepts: habitus, field and capital and on the importance of the five concepts of institutionalization as well as four types of capital: economic capital, knowledge capital, social capital and symbolic capital. Ihlen shows that these concepts can open new perspectives for questioning and analyzing public relations phenomena. To give an example: The degree of institutionalization of any organization influences the forms of communication or public relations of that organization; the amount of economic capital also influences or determines the possibilities of organizational communication, and the personal or corporate reputation is narrowly connected with the symbolic capital in the meaning. These are all concepts used by Bourdieu. We do not deny here that many of Bourdieu’s concepts can inspire a new perspective on public relations phenomena and the questions Ihlen puts in this context may lead to further insights. It should, however, be mentioned that the conceptual framework offered by Bourdieu seems to be less concrete than that offered by other theoretical approaches. If the statement of Ihlen, that the sociology of Bourdieu would offer a “perspective on public relations . . . that is more realistic than the prevailing theories of the discipline” can be understood in a sense, that a conflict based model can be seen as more realistic than an consensus based model, we would agree with such a position. 6. Goffman Like J¨urgen Habermas, Erving Goffman is seen by most sociologists and many other scientists as a classic in sociology. Many of his concepts – for example, the concepts of impression management and framing – have turned out to be very fruitful and capable of inspiring many analyses not just in sociology, but also in social psychology, communication, and media research. The concept of frame and the approach(es) of frame analyses (Scheufele, 2003) have, in particular, proved to be fruitful for analyzing communicative situations in interpersonal and in mass media communication. Goffman’s (1959) “dramaturgical approach” – originally developed in and primarily for the interpersonal context – seems to have been a rich source of inspiration for the analysis of several phenomena on public relations practice and it, therefore, must be seen as an important theoretical approach for public relations research. Catrin Johansson (in this volume) focuses on four key concepts of Goffman’s theory: impression management, framing, footing, and face. She demonstrates that these concepts can be very useful when analyzing interaction and communication in organizational contexts. As regards the concept of impression management, Johansson argues that this concept “has so far only been studied in relation to organizational crises” (Johannson, this volume). While this assertion may be valid for the English literature, the concept of “impression management” has been applied to public relations in the German context (see Piwinger & Ebert, 1999). Rosumek (2003) analyzed portrayal photography as an instrument of organizational impression management. In another example, Biel (2003) analyzed the staging of the CEO at the annual, general shareholder meeting, his verbal and nonverbal performance, the staging of the stage itself and the general auditorium setting and the similarities with real stage performances. The differentiation between front stage and backstage and the entire metaphorical dramaturgical approach seem to be very well suited to analyzing situations and contexts which involve organizational, but at the same time public, communication with interpersonal aspects. Deekeling and Arndt (2006) have looked at CEO communication and the staging of the CEO in public and/or organizational settings. In conclusion, it can be said that Goffman’s conceptual framework has already demonstrated its fruitfulness for analyses of public relations practice, especially on a micro level. It should be applied to more cases, instruments and communicative situations during the coming years as many other instruments could be analyzed in a similar way. 7. Weber Arild Wæraas makes one very obvious connection to classic public relations thinking and practice by focusing on the concept of legitimacy and legitimation. Some scholars see this concept as the core function of public relations practice (Ronneberger, 1977.) By stating legitimacy as the core function of PR these scholars use systems theory and neo institutionalism as theoretical frames. However, Wæraas reminds us that it was Max Weber who introduced the concept. The author argues: “For Weber, any organization must gain support for a particular myth about itself and cultivate the belief in its own right to exist” (p. 3). If you look at public relations today, practitioners as well as theorists believe that it is very important to have a story to tell and to create myths (Posner-Landsch, 2006). Margot Wallstrøm,
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EU-commissary for communication, points out that its failure to have such a story was one main reason why support of the European Convention is insufficient (Volkery, 2007). Of course, Weber’s theories are more related to the realm of politics, administration and formal bureaucracy, but it is legitimate to broaden this perspective. All organizations, Wæraas argues, even firms, depend on voluntary compliance to be successful. The author focuses primarily on the concept of charismatic legitimation. He argues that public relations plays an important role in creating brands like Apple and Harley Davidson that have not only mere customers but also true fans or believers. Myths and stories are socially constructed. People want to see something behind the mere firm; they want to let brands guide their life and so they believe in what is told and tell others what they believe. But social construction also implies the possibility of deconstruction: The “greening” of British Petroleum (see above) is one such example and the “greening” of Ford and its deconstruction is another (Luke, 2001). Consequently, to become myths, stories have to have a true core. There is one critique we have to make: The rise of charismatic organizational legitimation in our times is based on Wæraas’ assumption that the rational order has declined. We only partially agree with this. This assumption might be true in many parts of society, but in public relations it is not. The rise of the myth and story-driven charismatic organization that is based on emotional intelligence is only one side of the coin. Look, for example, at initial public offerings: The equity story has to be unique; it needs emotion and charisma. But when it comes down to day-to-day business, stockholders do not want to see vision alone; they want to see cash and rational business plans, strategies and tactics. And to give them what they need the organization has to create another myth: the myth of rationality (Wehmeier, 2006). This myth consists of, for instance, showing stockholders that the organization uses the latest controlling inventions like balanced scorecards. The objective is to convince stockholders to believe in the rationality and efficiency of the organization. 8. Giddens The work of Anthony Giddens is rarely used in public relations theory building. However, attempts have recently been made to apply structuration theory to public relations (Jarren & R¨ottger, 2004; Zerfaß, 2004) and related fields such as environmental reporting (Buhr, 2000). In this issue, Jesper Falkheimer focuses mainly on three areas: • the importance of storytelling, shared meanings and sense making in the entire organizational communication process; • the idea of public relations as a communication system that is constructed by all organizational members—in contrast to the view of public relations as a functional subsystem of organizations; • the view of public relations as an ideological communication force that leads to mere replication of social structures as well as to change and transformation (pp. 9–10). The good thing about these perspectives is that they could broaden, if not shift, the research in public relations from a functional and positivist perspective to a qualitative and ethnomethodoligist one which is very welcome. Less welcome is the fact that the social constructionist perspective of this approach seems to be more grounded in the work of Karl Weick than in the work of Anthony Giddens. A combination of Weick and Giddens might be more fruitful as Giddens’ work relates more related to the forming and changing of social structure at the macro level while Weick focuses more on the micro and meso level of individuals and organizations (Weick, 1979). Falkheimer challenges the open systems perspective of public relations that is used by Cutlip, Center, and Broom (2006) and others. He argues that structuration theory focuses more on describing than prescribing the role of public relations, which in open systems theory is identified as a response system, “especially used towards conflicting publics” (p. 8). Falkheimer criticizes systems theory for modeling organizations as stable entities, trying only to maintain their structures. Instead, structuration theory underlines both the reproduction and the transformation of structures. Public relations is seen as a force that serves to maintain or to change the organization’s dominant ideology. We agree with this position. However, it should be noted that the open systems model is not state of the art systems theory. In more advanced approaches social systems are not perceived as stable but as complex and changing (Busch & Busch, 1992; Luhmann, 1984; Holmstrøm in this issue). When it comes to Giddens’ concept of late modernity, Falkheimer, like Holmstrøm, uses the term reflexivity. However, the meaning they give to the term differs: By focusing on social context, ethics and social responsibility Falkheimers’ reflexitivity is more comparable to Holmstrøm’s reflection. Due to the fact that in late modernity people
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are disembedded from many social realities they have to trust expert systems like the medical and legal professions. Falkheimer suggests that public relations might be such a profession too. Its function is to create trust and legitimacy. To sum up, the work of Giddens (like the work of Luhmann) provides us with a socio-historical explanation of why public relations evolved. Furthermore it challenges (as does the work of Luhmann) the functional understanding of systems theory and its application in PR theory. However, in the end, we agree with Falkheimers’ opinion: “A skeptic, and I would not totally disagree, would say that the structuration theory describes something simple in a very complicated way” (p. 10). 9. Concluding remarks First, it is enlightening and useful to look at these different theoretical approaches – most of them grand and classic theories of sociology – and to think about ways in which to use these approaches to gain new insights into public relations theory and practice. Secondly, it will be necessary to think further along these lines, in order to compare the different approaches and to analyze where they do in fact have commonalities and incommensurabilities. The potential of these sociological approaches seems to be even broader than shown so far and other parts of these theories, but which are not mentioned in the articles, could further inspire public relations theory building. Thirdly, most of these approaches can inspire theory building at a macro level. Although public relations always takes place on an organizational, i.e., a meso level, public relations do have functions for society in general. Habermas, Luhmann and other authors dealt with in this volume have developed theories of society, theories in which certain functional subsystems (the economic system, the political system but also the media) have certain societal roles or functions. For this reason, it might be worth trying to model public relations as a social system in society. Public relations can be seen as a functional social system that provides organizations as well as individuals with legitimacy and trust if – to use the analytical distinction of Holmstrøm – done in a reflective way. But it might be a source of distrust as well, if it is framed in the mode of reflexivity. References ¨ Bentele, G. (1994). Offentliches Vertrauen. Normative und soziale Grundlage f¨ur Public Relations. In W. Armbrecht & U. Zabel (Eds.), Normative Aspekte der Public Relations (pp. 131–158). Opladen, Germany: Westdeutscher Verlag. Biel, B. (2003). Die Jahreshauptversammlung als Inszenierung. In G. Bentele, M. Piwinger, & G. 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