Propaganda

Public relations technique is seen as one of the most persuasive, influential and almost propagandistic ways of getting the audience’s attention. This job also requires for you to create an image for profitable and charitable organisations. Therefore, it is not all about persuasion. 

As it is known, propaganda is a form of persuasion which can manipulate the way people think. It would be more of influencing peoples’ opinions rather than listen to them. Taylor (2001) says that “propaganda is a 'practical process of persuasion'". What he is saying here is that propaganda is a process which can be followed through by using strategies and tactics, but it uses persuasion as a base. In the English oxford dictionary, persuasion is defined as: 1 (noun) "the act of persuading [somebody] to do [something] or to believe [something]."

Next definition is how Grunig & Hunt (1984) sees public relations as a form of propaganda, “Public relations serve a propaganda function in the press agent/ publicity model. Practitioners spread the faith of the organisation involved, distorted or half-true information." This definition is overlooked due to the fact that it generalises all public relations practice which is not all 'distorted and half-true information'.  

It would be foolish to say that PR practitioners only try to persuade people to like something. They also try to make the world better by communicating to the public about any ideas, e.g., a charitable organisation might have regarding donations of clothes. Donating clothes is not a propagandistic action, but rather an ethical one which the society agrees with. 

There are companies such as Tesco who would want to boost their image through helping the homeless. But, they are not creating a fake image of themselves. They are helping out the homeless and increasing likability. This indicated that such actions are also ethical and socially acceptable.  

In conclusion, Public Relations practice not always propagandistic. PR agents might conceal company’s history. For example, during Tesco’s reputation went down when stakeholders found out about selling horse meat in February.  But, company started to help the homeless in October to improve their reputation.