Mass Communication Talk

What is public relations? At the outset of a chapter on the history and origins of public relations, a definition of the topic is needed. How does it differ from advertising, publicity, propaganda and other forms of persuasional or promotional communication? There have been innumerable attempts to define public relations. Harwood Childs offered one early but still insightful attempt: ‘Public relations is not the presentation of a point of view, not the art of tempering mental attitudes, nor the development of cordial and profitable relations. [. . .] The basic problem of public relations is to reconcile or adjust in the public interest those aspects of our personal and corporate behaviour which have a social significance’ (Childs 1940: 3 and 13). In the mid-1970s, the social scientist Rex Harlow (1977) identified more than 400 versions or variations. Since then, more have been proposed, discussed and, in some instances, dismissed. Watson […]

The formation of public relations as a practice will be traced from its earliest indications in the ancient world through two millennia and up to the end of the twentieth century. There are many antecedents of public relations, mainly methods of promotion and disseminating information. It was not until the nineteenth century that the term ‘public relations’ was first used although public relations-like practices (also called proto-public relations) were already evident.