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Much of public relations scholarship in the last three decades has been dominated by discussions about best practices. Theories developed over the years have often been based on western practices with little focus on emerging economies such as Africa. The growing call for a shift to a new system, especially from a non-western perspective has resulted in scholars examining public relations scholarship and practice in other jurisdictions, particularly in Asia. The onset of globalisation increased the scholarly discussion on public relations theorising, with culture playing a significant role in these discussions. This paper undertakes a review of the various discussions on public relations theorising due to globalisation and discusses its implications for public relations scholarship and practice in Africa.

The paper approaches the issue by examining relevant literature on globalisation and societal changes, public relations theorising, and the African worldview.

The paper concludes by proposing an African public relations framework that reflects the African worldview. The framework proposes that African public relations can be premised on four levels, humanist, relational, communalist, and strategic.

This research is limited in the sense that the proposed framework has not been empirically tested for verification. It offers scholars the opportunity to empirically test it within the African setting.

The framework presents an opportunity for practitioners to review public relations practice within the African context.

The paper's originality is premised on the development of a public relations framework premised on African social values.

The purpose of this research is to present the findings of a longitudinal case study into the professionalisation of public relations practices and the institutionalisation of corporate social responsibility as a legitimate social and business arrangement. In doing so, there are implications for the dynamic relationship between practices and the professionalisation of public relations.

A qualitative longitudinal study is used to examine the social construction of social responsibility in the Australian banking industry from 1999‐2004 across two levels of analysis – societal expectations as institution, and practices of banking and public relations as action.

The study shows that the case organisations shifted their public relations and communication practices during the period of the study. In response to the demands of publics, there was a central shift from a one‐way perspective where organisations sought to influence and persuade publics of the appropriateness of their actions towards a two‐way perspective where organisations needed to consult, negotiate and engage with publics. In doing so, this study suggests that there was a shift in the profession of how public relations was practiced, but also highlighted the changes to institutional arrangements about the legitimacy of social responsibilities of large organisations.

The study uses an interpretive perspective to understand the role and impact of public relations practice on societal change.

This research examines the role of public relations practice in achieving longer term changes for organisations and society. This contributes a first step towards developing a theoretical understanding of the contribution of public relations practice to organisational success and therefore evaluation.

This paper makes two central contributions. Firstly, institutional theory and the social construction of societal and business standards of legitimacy are used in a public relations context. Secondly, this paper shows the effects of the micro‐level of analysis of public relations practices on the macro‐level of the profession.

This paper examines the arrangements made for innovation, research and development in professional service firms, particularly management and public relations consultancies. The paper compares arrangements made in management and public relations consultancies, drawing on the experience of international management consultancies and public relations consultancies in the UK. The paper outlines some of the principles by which the processes of innovation, research and development are managed in professional service firms, and draws conclusions relating to practice development in public relations.

The purpose of this paper is to review recent literature on global public relations in order to scrutinize how contemporary transformations are conceptualized in the field, and what this means for the understanding of public.

The authors offer a critical analysis and discussion of recent publications in order to explore the nexus of “public”, “culture” and “global”, questioning whether the increased interest in a specific understanding of culture actually contributes to the field’s ability to deal with complex and transforming publics in a meaningful manner.

The majority of global public relations literature applies redundant understandings of globalization. It attaches prime importance to the concept of culture and contributes little to the understanding of transforming publics. Few scholars acknowledge the limitations of using “culture” for the definition of publics in global contexts. Alternative approaches to understanding “publics” in global public relations research and practice are hardly offered.

The findings imply that global public relations research would benefit from abandoning monolithic social science categories and from working transdisciplinary in order to refine its understanding of contemporary societal and social transformations and their implications for the understanding of public and relationship building.

The discussion indicates that public relations practitioners could benefit from reorienting their understanding of publics in globalizing societies in order to build and nourish mutually beneficial relationships. The authors apply the insight into contemporary business practices to offer public relations practitioners a starting point for reorientation.

The authors contribute to global public relations scholarship with an alternative approach to the understanding of transforming publics which merges the spatial turn and the practice turn known from wider humanities and social science research, and relevant business practices.

This paper brings together new and existing resource material to provide a detailed profile of the regulatory environments affecting the practice of public relations in the UK, Italy and South Africa. It is hoped that by contextualising the social, political and economic factors specific to each country, readers will be more acutely aware of similarities and differences between PR practices in each country. This approach aims to help drive PR policy development by providing a useful template for further national and continental PR regulatory environment mapping.

Over the last 50 years the social legitimacy of public relations has improved by standardising and monitoring the education and training of its practitioners. While successful in developing a professional development trajectory from novice to competent practitioner, the profession has struggled to fully understand the development trajectory of its senior public relations practitioners. The diversity of occupational contexts in which public relations is practised, the condition of professional seniority and the knowledge and tools required for working at occupational boundaries is challenging for senior public relations practitioners. It is also a challenge therefore, for the profession to develop and support the learning required for senior practice beyond competency frameworks. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

This paper employs socio-cultural learning theory and supporting empirical evidence gained in semi-structured interviews with senior practitioners in the field to explore what senior practice entails and how senior professionals learn.

Communities of practice is useful for understanding novice practitioner learning but has insufficient explanatory power for understanding senior practitioner learning. There is an urgent need for support for senior public relations learning that moves beyond reified competency frameworks and enables senior practitioners to function autonomously outside the core community of practice. Seniority requires its learners to embrace uncertainty and confront the challenge of creating new knowledges and in the everyday practices of their professional lives.

“Communities of practice” has been influential in the fields of management and organisations (Bolisani and Scarso, 2014). This paper employs the idea of a learning process that takes place in “constellations of practices” (Wenger, 1998) to offer a view of senior practice as boundary dwelling (Engestrom, 2009) rather than boundary spanning and learning as situated (Lave and Wenger, 1991) in the liminal spaces those boundaries provide.

Little is known about the effects of education on the practice of PR. This chapter aims at demonstrating the differences between economics-educated practitioners and communication-educated practitioners. Based on a quantitative survey among 790 practitioners working in non-profits in Austria, the research presented here sheds light on the influences of education on thinking and acting by practitioners in communication practice. Although public relations are not a protected profession, education has become an on-going topic in public relations literature and practice. Furthermore, education for public relations increasingly takes place in various environments. Courses available range from one-day seminars at community colleges to PR-specific studies. Furthermore, public relations are not only a topic in communications-related studies, but also in economics and humanities. The results highlight the differences in practice in relation to the education.

This paper aims to consider whether ethical persuasion can be part of public relations practice.

The paper contends that the critical issue for practitioners is not whether they engage in persuasion, but whether they do so ethically. Accordingly, a definition of ethical persuasion is derived by examining unethical propaganda. The paper then considers what standard might be used to assess the ethics of persuasion. The notion of “the public interest” – ubiquitously linked to ethical practice in public relations – is considered but found to be too elusive to guide the practice individual practitioners. Other more assessable standards are identified, as is a guiding approach to ethics. The approach to ethics adopted in this paper is rule utilitarianism. The methodology of this paper is deductive and derivative analysis, argument and synthesis, drawn from a broad body of literature.

Persuasion can be ethical, and a definition of ethical persuasion is proffered. The public interest is not a standard that individual practitioners can determine, decide, know, or apply to assess the ethics of their practice. Ethical persuasion can, however, be assessed using other standards, discussed in the paper. Consequently, a set of criteria and standards to practicing ethical persuasion is developed.

The paper does not extend into a discussion of practical persuasive techniques. Therefore, an extension of this examination could consider a thorough assessment of the ethics of practical persuasive communication techniques.

Directly relevant to the daily work of public relations practitioners, communicators, adertisers and marketers, who are interested in acting ethically. The paper provide a basis for a guide to assessing the ethics of persuasive practice.

This paper confronts both the question of whether practitioners can use the notion of the public interest to assess the ethics of practice, and also what constitutes ethical (and unethical) persuasion, and considers how persuation can be used ethically.

Examines the role of public relations within the UK retail sector and seeks to determine whether retailers use public relations strategically ‐ as a means of managing their relationships with key stakeholder publics ‐ or simply as a tactical publicity function. Identifies, in an exploratory study conducted in four major UK retail organizations indicative of the different types of retail institutions within the UK, the main characteristics of the public relations functions and compares these with those associated with each of the four models of public relations identified by Grunig and Hunt (1984). Looks at the relationship between the marketing and public relations functions, analysing whether public relations operates as an independent function free of control from marketing or whether it operates simply as a sub‐function of marketing. Considers to what extent public relations can be said to play a strategically important role within the UK retail sector. Highlights the considerable diversity in the way in which public relations is practised within the retail organizations studied, and suggests the need for more extensive research to identify the reasons for this diversity in the way the public relations function operates within the UK retail sector.

This paper reviews organisational culture research and explores how it can aid the understanding of regional television organisations' practice of public relations. A comprehensive review of the organisational culture literature is made and frameworks based upon this understanding are argued by the authors to allow for a fuller appreciation of corporate culture and its implications for public relations policy and organisation. Drawing upon primary research in the UK broadcasting industry, the organisational structure and operations of Granada TV and BBC North are compared and contrasted using the methods outlined. The limitations are discussed and future research is suggested.