Public Relations Inquiry

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.

Pushing the bounds of public relations theory and research, we explore how institutional texts have produced and reified stigmas around gender transgression and how these texts are bound up in moments of activism and resistance. We considered how different discursive and material functions get “stuck” together by way of texts and how this sticking depends on a history of association and institutionalization. Activism presents opportunities to challenge institutional and structural stickiness, and we argue that public relations can challenge the affective assemblages that comprise and perpetuate these systems, unsettling the historical discourses that have governed institutions by establishing new communicative possibilities.

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).

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.

Public relations research has paid considerable attention to foreign terrorist crises but relatively little attention to domestic ones—despite the growing salience of domestic terrorism in the United States. This study content analyzes 30 years of network television news coverage of domestic terrorism to gain insight into four theoretical issues of enduring interest within the literature on news framing and crisis management: sourcing, contextualization, ideological labeling, and definitional uncertainty. Results indicate that the sources called upon to contextualize domestic terrorism have shifted over time, that ideological labels are more often applied on the right than the left, and that definitional uncertainty has increased markedly in recent years. Implications for the theory and practice of public relations and crisis management are discussed.

The purpose of this paper is to build from the infrastructural approach to risk communication, rethink the internal management of risk communication, and critique the current literature’s discussion of how risks emerge, the role of the risk communication manager, and the decentralization of the risk communication function. Some of the risk communication literature is too general in terms of recognizing the nuance of the locus of risk, and the role(s) of stakeholders and communicators, which limit understanding that could extend and enrich current risk communication literature. In doing so, the conceptualization of where risk may occur broadens and research-based recommendations are developed from varied contexts to offer specific guidelines for future research to better understand the role of “internal” in risk communication and its practice. All of these points are not to diminish previous risk communication scholarship, but rather to refine and complement the current understanding so the management and communication of risk continues to enhance society as a whole.