Anthony Zimmerman
tz996419@ohio.edu
What do the International Criminal Court, the Republican Party, the IAE, and PRSA all have in common? They all have the appearance of authority without having any actual power. The International Criminal Court can find a person guilty of war crimes, and nothing will happen. Unless a member country agrees and decides to enforce some consequences on their own. What happens if Republican Party leadership condemns a member of their party for a statement or action they made? Nothing. The offending party will probably send out a fundraising email and be more likely to have a fully funded re-election campaign. What if Exxon Mobile learns about its impact on climate change years before the public and says nothing. What if they even claim it is all a lie while knowing it is true? This is a clear violation of ethical guidelines from the IAE (Principle 1: Advertising, public relations, marketing communications, news, and editorial all share a common objective of truth and high ethical standards in serving the public.), and the PRSA (Ethical practice is the most important obligation of a PRSA member). Nothing happens to them either.
All these organizations rely on the "enforcement" mechanism from the public more than anything. The ICC hopes that a case can be made clear enough and with enough public interest to force a country to act. The Republican Party hopes that their condemnation is enough to sway voters to side with them and punish a candidate at the ballot box. The IAE and PRSA hope that the offending members will be peer pressured into following the rules like most of their members.
The IAE and the PRSA having a set of ethical guidelines is an ineffective way of influencing an industry that has no reason to listen to it. In a crisis simulation that responded to misinformation in the 2020 Presidential election, when one group decided to intentionally push disinformation, the other groups couldn't effectively respond to it. The group providing disinformation put out headlines that got more attention and shaped the news more than any other group. The professor who went "rogue" said that "ultimately the problem wasn’t about truths versus lies or facts versus falsehoods. It was about stability and shared reality versus disorientation and chaos." The overarching takeaway from reading the IAE and PRSA ethical guidelines is to be truthful and keep the public good in mind. This is an excellent standard to aspire to. Still, it is dangerous if it leads to the false assumption that your PR colleagues are also aspiring to that standard. Plenty of companies will pay good money to a PR team to push any narrative that benefits them.
Tony, you raise an interesting point in citing the IAE and PRSA's ethical guidelines as "ineffective."
ReplyDeleteI've thought about my personal ethical code a lot this week, and how, outside of an egregious misstep (such as a DUI), my company has no tangible way of enforcing compliance in this realm. That said, there is an ever-present, albeit, subtle influence at play here. My ethical code has guided and informed a myriad of career decisions. One could argue, had I consistently failed to uphold these values, I would not have achieved what I I have.
Obviously, there are exceptions to this rule, but I 'want' to believe that over the course of a life or career, ethical behavior ultimately results in an upward trajectory.
Now, the political arena is a whole different matter entirely...