Week 5
When Mr Legal meets Ms Ethics.
Halo...Greetings fellow classmates.....
This week’s readings convene two contrasting principle of Law and Ethics with Public Relations acting as the match- maker. In my opinion, Law uses case based reasoning to solve complex problems through analysis and diagnosis of an agreed social framework. On the other hand, ethics lean their case on inductive arguments based on human personality and principles of the marketplace.
Mr Law is staunch and argues by a set of regulations laid out that had been formulated and encrypted in the gigantic books. Ms Ethics dances to the tune of philosophy, embracing diverse chorus of opinion on what constitute as right or wrong.
Public Relations in the Legal Environment
The readings made me think about Public Relations practice in relation to law as something necessary for the practitioner to be acquaintance with to protect reputation. The understanding on the workings of law would help PR professionals to avoid pitfalls and blind spots whilst navigating through their work.
I think that the 3 main areas covered, mainly tort of defamation, intellectual law and contract law, whilst not mutually exclusive may be more relevant to different specialisation area of Public Relations.
Tort of defamation may concern PR technicians churning out publications that may directly or indirectly expose other parties to “hatred, contempt or ridicule”. This would include the use of words, pictures, graphics and cartoons which could be summed up by the use of semiotics.
Intellectual Property law comprehension helps PR practitioner protects their creative works through copyrights and patents. In addition, it reminds PR designers to the respect creative work of others before effortlessly displaying items such as logos or pictures.
Contract law reminds PR strategist to deliver good on what is promised. It is important to come to a clear agreement with their clients on specific terms and definition. In the articulation of contracts, the focus should then be on outcomes and its measurement rather than on its process.
Generally, PR professionals should be aware of the legal environment from which they operate. But I believe that the complex nature of law requires PR practitioners to seek advice and work hand in hand with specialised lawyers in different field when they are handling different projects. By familiarising themselves with at least the basic concepts of law, PR operators would be better equip to communicate effectively with the lawyers.
Public Relations and Ethical Practice
The readings made me think about Public Relations practice in that the circularity of ethical issues emphasises the thought process of the decision maker rather than the importance of the conclusion. It involves questioning everything with a non- guarantee of gaining anything concrete.
Hence I became interested in attempts by thinkers to provide a scientific approach to at least set a framework or methodology to dole up such a subjective subject.
To sum it up, I believe that:
An ethical issue requires choosing the right logic from different premises in the real life context.
The Potter Box provides an analytical tool to resolve conflicts but I am not surprised by the mention that applying it would not necessarily result in the most ethical decision.
The use of other ethical doctrines- deontology, teleology and Aristotle’s Golden mean while differ in perspective approach, I believe is rooted in religious and moral ideologies.
The ‘declaration of principles’, issued by Ivy Lee in 1906 makes me ponder on the use of ethics to churn out reasoning for support of one’s profession.
In retrospective, I see the development of ethical codes as a contributing factor to the role of Public Relations as the corporate conscience. The emergences of corporate governance witness the PR practitioner in leadership position to guide organisation through their policies.
I would like to add about the growing acceptance in the West of triple bottom line reporting social, environmental, as well as economic performance as an encouraging development.
Nevertheless, the Opinion piece: Ethical issues in practising public relations in Asia, made me contemplate about the importance of recognising the dynamics of business practices in different setting before drawing up of ethical guidelines. The article provided 10 defined categories in classifying ethical issues.
I believe that if an ethical code is too idealistic, it risks being reduced to slogans and not action.
I think the key points to remember from this week's readings were the importance placed on the legal aspects of Public Relations and its implications that would follow in failure to recognise it. Unlike the constraints of law, ethics requires a more disciplined approach in the process of arriving to a conclusion and call upon personal moral judgements instead of an imposed rules.
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2 comments:
"On the other hand, ethics lean their case on inductive arguments based on human personality and principles of the marketplace."
I am not so sure and would like to clarify whether ethics is based on 'human personality', if it means morals as morals are based on personal values.
I have the impression that ethics is more to what people THINK is right rather than what they FEEL is right.
Dear Marilyn,
Thank you for your comments
I shall attempt to clarify my position and hope it shall ignite further discourse.
In the sentence sooner than the one you just quoted, I mentioned that:
“Law uses case based reasoning to solve complex problems through analysis and diagnosis of an agreed social framework”.
By this I meant that law formulates its arguments or its thought process based on the premise of a set of written law agreement that have been moulded into a formal social contract.
For example: A lawyer defending a murderer has to think and argue his case in line with what has been stated in the common law.
He cannot tell the judge that because his client has a violent personality, he should be spared from the gallows.
Instead the lawyer has to implicitly state that it was a crime of passion thus it falls under the category of section xxx which is voluntary manslaughter as oppose to section xxx which is the first degree murder.
I mentioned this to draw a distinction between the thinking process of law and ethics.
Conversely, ethics is not bounded by these constraints and draws its inspiration from diverse sources. Ethics exercises its thinking process and makes its case through extensive observations. This includes taking into account of “human personality” which on a larger context refers to the collective cultural characteristic of different individuals.
I concur on your point that ethics involves the thinking process. In fact, I had emphasised on the issue.
A further probe into my blog reveals that I had mentioned that:
“the circularity of ethical issues emphasises the thought process of the decision maker rather than the importance of the conclusion”.
Subsequently, I explained that “an ethical issue requires choosing the right logic from different premises in the real life context”.
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