Corporate Campaign Theories

The concept of corporate campaign theories can be discussed from at least two major perspectives: promotional product or service advertising campaigns, most relevant to the field of marketing, or the less visible corporate issues campaigns, most relevant to the field of public relations and issues management. This entry explores the corporate issues campaigns perspective and associated theoretical frameworks.

[Page 205]In the corporate environment, issues campaigns focus on either opportunities or threats. Every corporation wants to function as autonomously as possible in its economic environment. In that environment, an issue that could result in additional regulatory, legislative, or legal restriction is perceived as a threat to the organization's ability to function, and the organization attempts to resolve the issue before these restrictions become necessary. In a parallel scenario, when the regulatory, legislative, or legal outcome is perceived as beneficial to the organization, the organization will attempt to further these actions. Whether beneficial or restrictive, corporate efforts frequently take the form of management-level information campaigns that could involve coalition building, mass media or interpersonal contact, and usually behavior change in the relevant organization.

Because these issues campaigns frequently involve or potentially involve regulatory agencies, legislative bodies, or court decisions, the issues both attract and compete for attention in the public arena, including media coverage. An issue may also attract activist interest groups. Management of these corporate issues campaigns therefore involves negotiation with activist groups, included in the theoretical framework of powerful stakeholders. The concept has been tied directly to at least five theoretical frameworks: systems theory, issue life-cycle theory, legitimacy-gap theory, powerful stakeholder theory, and social exchange theory.

The concept of corporate issues campaigns and their resolution draws on several disciplines, most notably the public policy side of political science and business management, and includes much of public relations' emphasis on management-level communication that prepares and negotiates. But the concept as a unit was strongly positioned theoretically in the field of communication first through Robert Heath and Richard Nelson's 1989 book, Issues Management: Corporate Public Policy Making in an Information Society. Heath's 1997 book, Strategic Issues Management: Organizations and Public Policy Challenges, brought the concept into the management boardroom through concern for issue anticipation and established corporate issues management campaigns as an academic field in communication. The emphasis moved to corporate campaigns in anticipation and prevention of issue development, including negotiation with relevant stakeholders, changes in corporate behavior, and communication of these changes. This latter academic approach is of interest here.