Summary
Contents
Subject index
Ethics in Public Relations: Responsible Advocacy is the first book to identify universal principles of responsible advocacy in public relations. In this engaging book, editors Kathy Fitzpatrick and Carolyn Bronstein bring together prominent authorities in the field to address theoretic and practical issues that illustrate the broad scope and complexity of responsible advocacy in 21st-century public relations.
Responsibility and Accountability
Responsibility and Accountability
“The Buck Stops Here”
Human beings seek accountability. People want to know who is responsible for certain actions and who is accountable for the consequences of those actions. Harry Truman referred to his famous desk sign on more than one occasion to point out that responsibility, in the end, must be taken by someone—some identifiable person must be held to account. Truman was willing to accept that accountability. Increasingly today, people are more likely to ask, “Where exactly does the buck stop, or does it ever stop?” In the wake of a multitude of recent corporate scandals, commentary has been rife with questions of responsibility and accountability; however, much of that discussion has been carried on without clear knowledge of the definitional differences between the two terms and the significance of those differences. Of public relations in particular it might be asked, “Why weren't you standing guard?” which is a simplified way of asking, “What is public relations responsible for, and for what is it accountable?” Unfortunately, there is no common perception—at least among business leaders, public relations professionals, and scholars—as to exactly what constitutes both responsibility and accountability, and therein lies the rub.
Responsibility versus Accountability
The roles taken on by public relations practitioners imply a responsibility to perform certain functions associated with those roles. Business historian Vincent E. Barry has defined the term responsibility, when used in business affairs, as referring to “a sphere of duty or obligation assigned to a person by the nature of that person's position, function, or work.”1 Responsibility could thus be viewed as a bundle of obligations associated with a job or function. Narrowly defined, role refers to a job description, which, in turn, encompasses, but is not limited to, function. For instance, a practitioner's role may be that of media relations. Function would refer to the specifics of the job, including press release writing and dissemination, as well as the maintenance of good media relations. In this sense, responsibility refers to more than just the primary function of a role; it refers to the multiple facets of that function—both processes and outcomes (and the consequences of the acts performed as part of that bundle of obligations). A responsible actor may be seen as one whose job involves a predetermined set of obligations that must be met in order for the job to be accomplished. For example, the primary functional obligation of someone involved in media relations is the same as cited in the foregoing sentence: to maintain a good working relationship with the media in order to respond to queries and to successfully work with them to “get out the message.” In many cases, simply discharging this primary obligation (the function associated with the role) may be sufficient unto itself; however, responsibility can also include moral obligations that are in addition and usually related to the functional obligations of the role. Thus, responsibility assumes that the actor becomes also a moral agent possessed of a certain level of moral maturity and an ability to reason. It is important to note that as early as Aristotle, moral responsibility was viewed as originating with the moral agent (decision maker), and grew out of an ability to reason (an awareness of action and consequences) and a willingness to act free from external compulsion. For Aristotle, a decision is a particular kind of desire resulting from deliberation, one that expresses the agent's conception of what is good. As Australian ethicist Will Barret points
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