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Thomas Schindler and the Social Dimension of Ethics:
Serious Questions for the Public Relations "Culture"
Practitioners and scholars have invested a considerable measure
of time and energy attempting to address the perplexing ethical dilemmas that
periodically confront public relations practitioners. How practitioners can
simultaneously respond to the sometimes conflicting demands of
management/clients and the greater public interest, for example, has been the
subject of a considerable amount of discussion and--one might add--soul
searching.
Illustrative are the comments of the editor of the Public
Relations Journal who, in a column entitled "Putting Ethical Codes into
Practice," states that "the gut issue...is how a public relations professional
can serve the client or organization ethically and protect its best
interests."[1] Veteran public relations practitioner Daniel Edelman argues that
"a major ethical concern involves the handling of dubious and controversial
clients, and defending clients who are indefensible."[2] One also detects what
almost approaches an obsession among some public relations scholars to construct
the most complex of ethical quandaries in this regard and then provide "answers"
as to how a practitioner can/might/should respond.
The consideration of moral dilemmas, of course, has a long and
honorable tradition in the examination of ethical decision making. Many
textbooks and journals devoted to the study of ethics generally highlight the
case study approach. Frequently these case studies are supplemented with
comments from experts in ethics and/or a particular profession intended to
provide the reader with some guidance into how he/she might personally respond
if confronted with such a moral quandary.
Some assert, however, that this emphasis on quandary situations
in the study of ethics can be misplaced. Thomas Lickona contends, for example,
that "momentous moral decisions...are rare events, not the stuff of our
day-to-day moral lives."[3] He believes the "ordinary" occurrences of life
provide "the moral choices that, taken together, determine the quality of moral
life in society. There is a need to cultivate an `ethics of the everyday,' a
morality of minor affairs, that translates respect for persons into small deeds
of kindness, honesty, and decency."[4]
In his book Ethics: The Social Dimension, Thomas Schindler
argues that "most of what we do...is the result of our moral automatic pilot.
We do not stop to think about how we should act; we just carry on according to
the usual patterns of our moral life."[5] He agrees with Lickona in asserting
that most persons face few situations which would qualify as ethical dilemmas in
the strict meaning of that term.
According to Schindler, when ethical quandaries do arise "they
are not the result of the collision of two principles existing outside a
situation that by some accident bump into each other at this time."[6] Instead,
he states, "quandaries happen when we are confronted by situations in which
possible solutions run counter to the role-identities and accepted patterns of
society and to the character we have developed, in which the usual responses for
some reason no longer work or make sense."[7]
Schindler does, however, see ethical quandaries as "important
events both within the historical and cultural framework of a particular society
and in the context of the character of a particular individual....while they
cannot be taken simply at face value, they do provide an occasion for examining
the general thrust of our individual lives and the accepted patterns of
society."[8] In other words, instead of focusing on moral dilemmas, one
concerned about ethical behavior within a particular craft/profession, needs to
look at the culture of that craft/profession as well as that of the larger
society generally--at what might be called the "bigger picture." Schindler
states:
Quandaries for individuals are...closely
related to those existing within society; they
are never merely private personal affairs. As
individuals, we participate in the larger social
order in ways that integrate that order into our
very identity. Therefore, quandaries existing
in the historical and cultural context are
present in our lives as well; and we cannot truly
understand what is happening to us personally
unless we see our situation in terms of the
broader social context.[9]
He cites, as an example, the time and energy persons in business
have expended considering ethical quandaries related to questions revolving
around subjects as diverse as affirmative action and truth in advertising. At
the same time, however, they continue to "accept the basic moral orientation of
the economic and business system as a whole without question."[10] In short,
much of the effort that is spent paying attention to the ethical trees would be
more profitably expended if it were focused on the ethical forest from which the
trees cannot be separated.
The basic trust of Schindler's work has direct application to the
study of ethical decision making in public relations. Too often that effort has
been directed toward examining the complex ethical dilemmas that may
occasionally confront the practitioner, and too rarely toward examining the
public relations culture--from an ethical perspective--within which the
practitioner operates. The intent of this inquiry is to address that reality.
It will follow Schindler's general admonitions by contending that in order to
formulate a satisfactory ethical model for public relations, one must move
beyond the confines of individualism and consider the "culture" in which the
practitioner functions along with the broader social impact that his/her actions
will have relative to what has traditionally been called the public interest--or
common good.
The Public Relations "Culture"
Public relations practitioners do not operate in a vacuum. From
the moment a college student begins to seriously consider a career in public
relations, a process of what might be called enculturation begins. One public
relations textbook, for example, contends that "the most important
qualifications for a public relations career can be summed up as: an outgoing
personality, self-confidence, an understanding of human psychology, the
enthusiasm necessary to motivate people, a highly developed sense of
competitiveness, and the ability to function as part of a team."[11]
Public relations textbooks also traditionally include a
discussion of the practitioner's role relative to society. What is too often
lacking, however, is any significant questioning of the underlying assumptions
upon which the practitioner's role is predicated. The same textbook cited above
suggests that "at the heart of any discussion of ethics in public relations are
some deeply troubling questions for the individual practitioner."[12] It then
goes on to list several examples including whether or not the practitioner will:
(1) lie for a client, (2) help conceal a hazardous condition or illegal act,
and/or (3) provide information that presents only part of the truth.[13]
Such questions, however, seem to avoid the more important issue.
Why, for example, is whether a practitioner should lie on behalf of a client
such a pressing concern in public relations? Is there something about the
public relations culture that engenders questions of this type? Is the
situation analogous to that in advertising where any effort to address specific
ethical issues is frequently overwhelmed by a need to consider whether
individuals and the public interest are served by the central role advertising
has played in the creation of what is popularly known as the consumer society?
More specifically, public relations practitioners will never
successfully confront the ethical challenges facing the field until they address
more substantively some basic assumptions which have become almost
indistinguishable from the practice itself. The late Edward Bernays, for
example, argued that modern public relations arose out of the insurance industry
scandals when those companies realized that "they were completely out of touch
with the public they were professing to serve, and required expert advice to
show them how they could understand the public and interpret themselves to
it."[14]
In reality, the public relations "culture" was already being
defined. Early practitioners saw themselves as proponents of those whose causes
needed to be "interpreted" to the public. Another public relations pioneer,
John W. Hill, made his position in this regard clear when he declared, "We're
primarily advocates and we draw upon a deep reservoir of experience in
advocating our clients' causes."[15] Widely respected public relations scholar
Scott Cutlip, who continues to exhibit an almost dogmatic faith in the efficacy
of the Miltonian concept of a marketplace of ideas, steadfastly maintains that
"the social justification for public relations in a free society is to ethically
and effectively plead the cause of a client or organization in the free-wheeling
forum of public debate."[16]
Is there, however, something inherent in the way public relations
has evolved as a spokesperson for others into this marketplace of
ideas--something that has become almost intrinsic to the public relations
"culture" itself--that makes it susceptible to misuse and abuse? Speaking to
the career of the legendary public relations pioneer Ivy Lee, Ray Hiebert
suggests that while "Lee was concerned with opening channels of communication to
provide information about the real reputations of his clients....(other) less
ethical contemporaries used his techniques to create an image as a facade to
cover the truth."[17] Hiebert acknowledges that "to be sure, too much public
relations is Machiavellian, concerned with maintaining power regardless of
ethical considerations."[18]
Hiebert ends his work on Lee by noting, optimistically, that
while "his practice has been abused...(one) can hope that a free and open
society will in time devise controls on public relations without destroying its
essential usefulness, in much the same way that it found means to curb the
excesses of business without overthrowing the system."[19]
The continuing failure of public relations to achieve genuine
acceptance as a profession or public acknowledgement of its "essential
usefulness" perhaps is a result, at least in part, of a tendency to focus on
narrow ethical dilemmas that only occasionally confront a practitioner instead
of on the boarder cultural and social questions. More specifically, one might
suggest, any effort at "devising controls on public relations" will never
provide a satisfactory means for achieving an increased sense of ethical
awareness among practitioners. It is in that light that Schindler's work on the
social dimension of ethics begins to take on particular importance for public
relations.
Problems with "the Marketplace"
Many have questioned whether the suppositions underlying the
Miltonian ideal of a marketplace of ideas retain their practical relevance in
contemporary American society.[20] They would, for example, seriously challenge
Cutlip when he contends that "practitioners serve the public interest by making
all points of view heard in the public forum."[21] Critics of the marketplace
theory would particularly object to Cutlip's assertion that practitioners help
make all points of view articulate.
While this is not the place to debate the continued utility of
the marketplace of ideas, it is interesting to note that the latest edition of
Cutlip, Center and Broom's Effective Public Relations concedes that "public
relations gains advantages for and promotes special interests, sometimes at the
cost of the public well-being."[22] This is in line with Jerome Barron's now
classic charge that "the idea of a free marketplace where ideas can compete on
their merits has become as unrealistic in the twentieth century as the economic
theory of perfect competition. The world in which an essentially rationalist
philosophy of the first amendment was born has vanished and what was rationalism
is now romance."[23]
The central concern here is that by placing such emphasis on the
marketplace theory, practitioners will inevitably view, as Schindler suggests,
society as having "merely instrumental value, assisting the individual in
obtaining from nature the fulfillment of his or her interests."[24] The
marketplace of ideas, in fact, is born out of the same philosophical fabric as
the economic marketplace theory made so popular by Adam Smith in his book Wealth
of Nations--which Schindler refers to as "the gospel of the capitalist or free
enterprise system."[25] Schindler argues:
The marketplace...because of its centrality
in society strongly influences the images by which
we understand the self as bounded and separate.
The self-interest the individual pursues tends to
focus on the goods available through the
marketplace. Relations with others are seen as
contractual in nature, based on one's right to
work to fulfill one's interests as long as this
does not interfere with the right of others to
do the same. But these relations are also
competitive since the goods one wants are
sought by others as well.[26]
Because of this focus on the individual rather then society,
ethical questions tend to be narrowly focused. Discussion of public relations
ethics, as noted, tends to focus on dilemmas or moral quandaries. Is it
unethical, for example, for the public relations practitioner to give less then
complete information to the news media? Are practitioners responsible for
putting out the "whole" story? Does not the practitioner fulfill his/her
ethical responsibilities within the marketplace of ideas by representing the
client's position as forcefully and favorably as possible? Must the
practitioner accept some responsibility if the news media fails in its role to
gather and disseminate the "whole" story?
Too frequently public relations practitioners focus on such
narrow questions because the public relations culture has conditioned them to
view society "fundamentally (as) a transaction between individuals, each with a
right to pursue personal interest so long as one does not interfere with
another's pursuit."[27] Many see the practitioner as one who provides the
expertise of a skilled advocate to those who wish to enter into the marketplace.
In performing this role, the practitioner--at least so many maintain--also
serves society because, in Cutlip's words, "it is a basic democratic right that
every idea, individual, and institution shall have a full and fair hearing in
the public forum--that their merit ultimately must be determined by their
ability to be accepted in the marketplace."[28]
The practitioner, in other words, serves society by serving the
particular needs of those who make up society. Adam Smith argued much the same
thing when he asserted that the individual business person "by pursuing his own
interest...frequently promotes that of society more efficiently than when he
really intends to promote it."[29] Society will be served, Smith held, because
the individual in seeking "only his own gain...is in this, as in many other
cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his
intention."[30] Contrary to the way many have interpreted his work, it must be
noted, Smith did not suggest that those in business should be unconcerned about
ethics. Hazlitt, for example, states:
...(some)...have interpreted the `invisible
hand' passage as a defense of selfishness, and
still others as a confession that a free-
market economy is not only built on selfishness
but rewards selfishness alone. And Smith was at
least partly to blame for this latter inter-
pretation. He failed to make explicit that only
insofar as people earned their living in legal
and moral ways did they promote the general
interest....A free economy can function
properly only within an appropriate legal and
moral framework.[31]
Nevertheless the focus clearly was on individual behavior. That
remains too frequently the case for many contemporary public relations
practitioners. Certainly many are concerned about behaving in a legal and--more
importantly--moral manner. The spotlight, however, too often falls on the
individual because what is ethical is interpreted almost exclusively in
individualistic terms. Public relations ethics is defined in terms of the
practitioner having the right to pursue his/her client's position as long as the
practitioner does not interfere with the rights of others to do the same or
purposefully harm them in the process.
Schindler argues, however, that "we cannot be satisfied simply to
say that we have not harmed someone, that we have not violated another's rights;
nor can we be content to restrict our responsibility to those areas where others
have a judicial claim on us."[32] For Schindler, one must go beyond such narrow
concerns and acknowledge that ethics has a social dimension--that "concern for
human good must include the common good."[33]
Broader Responsibilities
Schindler maintains that one "must work for the common good, that
which contributes to the unity of society and to the needs of that unified
whole."[34] In fact, he insists, "the public sphere of human existence is the
matrix within which our personal life is carried out, and without which our
personal life is impossible."[35] More precisely, one depends on society in
order to fulfill his/her personal, social and economic needs. With that
dependance on others comes an ethical obligation to contribute to the common
good--no man or woman is an island in contemporary society. Further, the common
good is something which cannot be achieved unless each makes his/her
proportional contribution to it. Fagothey makes this point well when he states:
The common good is not an arithmetical
sum of each individual's contribution but
something new resulting from the channeling
of human energy and the mobilization of
nature's resources. The economic products
of an advanced civilization depend on the
genius and labor of thousands of men who
invented the machines, developed the
processes, and continued to work them.[36]
Going further, Schindler holds that one must recognize the common
good in discussions of ethics because to do so "is simply an acknowledgement of
a basic fact of life; without society, we could not exist as persons; we are
simply owning up to a debt that can never fully be repaid."[37] To address this
social dimension of ethics public relations practitioners must consider their
actions from a broad perspective.
The questions must move beyond what practitioners have a "right"
to do ethically in support of a client or management. In examining public
relations ethics it is necessary to move beyond considering the practitioner as
an autonomous moral agent "disconnected from others who reaches moral
conclusions as an independent person isolated from other moral agents at the
moment of ethical decision making."[38] Instead practitioners must address how
well they fulfill their obligations within society because, to paraphrase
Schindler, they bear responsibility for the human flourishing of others and it
is only as they address that responsibility that they and their profession will
flourish.[39]
Practitioners cannot fall back on the marketplace model in this
regard because under that model ethics is perceived primarily as a question of
the individual acting rightly or wrongly within the sphere of his/her personal
relations. Under the marketplace model, the individual has a "right" to enter
into the marketplace because, as Cutlip suggests, that right is basic to the
definition of a democratic society. Schindler asks, however, "what content do
these rights give to human life?"[40] He states:
In and of itself, the possession of rights
is an empty thing. Rights take on meaning,
positive or negative, as they are lived out.
In the case of freedom of speech, for instance,
we can use this right to denounce poverty...or
disseminate pornography. Each of these places
us in a different relation with society and has
a different effect on us personally. In
speaking of the right of free speech, however,
this differentiation is not made. It is simply
stated that each one of us this right. But on
that basis, we can say nothing of who we are;
we remain as empty as the right.[41]
If public relations practitioners view exercising their rights,
and those of management/clients, within the marketplace as their primary--too
frequently exclusive--concern, then far too many practitioners will exhibit a
blindness, as they so often have in the past, of the broader common good. As a
result they will continue to be viewed by the public and the press as pleaders
for special and privileged interests.
Practitioners in too many instances talk "a good game" in
reference to a concern about the common good of society. Some perhaps genuinely
believe that they can constructively contribute to that good "simply" by
representing management or client interests into the marketplace of ideas. It
results too often, however, in practitioners viewing that marketplace as an end
of and in itself. Former Kennedy administration Federal Communications
Commission chairman Newton Minow--most famous for his charge that commercial
television was a "vast wasteland"--rejects the naive "ideological view that the
marketplace will regulate itself" and, thereby, further the public interest.[42]
He agrees that reliance on "the absolute free market approach to the public good
has been gospel in our country."[43] Unfortunately, he notes, in recent years
that reliance has resulted in debacles impacting on everything from savings and
loan institutions to the junk bond financing industry.
In reality, for practitioners to focus on advancing client or
management interests into the marketplace of ideas to the effective exclusion of
other ethical considerations is to practice what--viewed in the most generous
light--is commonly referred to as "enlightened" self-interest, a phrase that
qualifies as something of an oxymoron when one is attempting to clarify how
professionals should approach the process of ethical decision making.[44]
Public relations practitioners interested in achieving genuine
recognition for their field as an ethical calling must be willing to move beyond
self-interest--even the "enlightened" variety--because, as the chief executive
officer of General Foods Corporation insisted, "regardless of how enlightened
that self-interest may be...it's still self-interest. It is neither healthy nor
wise to claim otherwise."[45] A failure to do so will also inevitably result in
their overlooking "the necessary connection between personal and social
morality."[46]
To suggest that practitioners must move beyond an individualistic
approach to ethics, it must be emphasized, is not to relegate the individual to
some secondary status in the process of implementing a collectivist view of
society. To reject an individualistic view of ethics does not mean one must
move to the other extreme. It is to contend, however, that the individual can
reach his/her full potential only within the social sphere and for practitioners
to overlook their ethical responsibilities to society and the common good
is--somewhat paradoxically--to ultimately reject their responsibilities to the
individuals who comprise it. Fagothey speaks to this reality when he states:
The common good is the temporal welfare
of the community, taken both collectively and
distributively. The collectivist stresses the
first element only, making the common good an
entity over and above the individual good, the
former absorbing the latter. The individualist
sees only the second element, making the common
good a mere sum of individual goods. An
adequate view of society and the common good
must find a place between these extremes.
The common good is realized only in the
individuals who make up society, but it is
a good that they could achieve only by the
interaction of many cooperators.[47]
In the end, as in so many other areas of ethical deliberation,
the majority of public relations practitioners will most likely continue to
focus on questions of individual behavior because that is the "easier" and more
"comfortable" thing to do. To question, and sometimes challenge, the broader
social and economic foundations on which the public relations function has been
built--and in the process examine the practitioner's role in relation to
society--is, in fact, to question and challenge much of the culture of that
society of which the practitioner is a member. Questions of personal behavior
are the substance of "safe" church sermons and pious oratory. They do not
present revolutionary challenges to the powerful interests that benefit from the
prevailing suppositions that make up the culture from which such behavior
emanates. Until more people in public relations are willing to challenge some
of these "scared cows," the focus will remain on individual behavior and
progress toward a genuine growth in an awareness of the social dimension of
ethics will remain nothing but an empty dream.
Conclusions
Public relations practitioners interested in improving the
ethical standing of their field must seriously consider the public relations
"culture" in which they operate because without such an examination they will
continue to take as given the "accepted" ways of thinking and behaving that are
common to that culture. Practitioners need to remember that the general culture
in which one lives and works is the "point of departure in considering what
morality actually, concretely means."[48]
Schindler argues that an individual is not a person who simply
happens to make use of a particular culture. Instead, he goes so far as to
maintain that "in a very real way...(culture creates) the type of individual I
am."[49] He holds that the culture of society is "the content out of which our
self-identity and our way of being a part of the social and physical world are
formed."[50] He believes that in the United States the focus on individualism
has blinded Americans to the realities of the social dimension of ethics and
that "the effects of this enculturation reach down much more deeply than
individualism usually leads...(one) to understand."[51] He states:
Culture cannot make me into anything it
wants; for...at birth I am not merely a piece of
modeling clay that can be manipulated into any
shape whatever. I have certain potentialities
and not others. But when these particular
potentialities begin to interact with a
particular culture, certain of them are
developed and certain others are not. And
out of this process our distinctive individuality
emerges.
Culture, then has the power of selection as
well as of actualization. It in a very real way
selects which of our potentialities will be
realized. Certainly, nothing can be actualized
unless its potentiality exists. But not every
potentiality we have necessarily becomes a reality
in our life. And the particular form and
orientation that potentiality assumes depend upon
the specific configurations of the culture.[52]
The contention here is that the public relations "culture," with
its emphasis on individualism and the marketplace of ideas as a justification
for the societal utility of what it is practitioners do, has resulted in
practitioners and public relations scholars not paying sufficient attention to
the social dimensions of public relations ethics. Too frequently practitioners
and public relations scholars have not been sufficiently attentive to a need to
transcend a narrowly defined personalistic vision of public relations
ethics--whether or not individual practitioners, for example, should conceal
important information from the public--and critically consider whether the way
in which the field has generally evolved contributes to the common good and why,
one must add, there are so many who believe that it does not. Why, for example,
do widely respected communications scholars such as Don Pember maintain that:
When public relations is practiced by
the book, few have serious criticisms with
the field. In fact, the public relations
specialist performs a valuable function to
his or her employer or client and to the
community. But more often than not PR is
not practiced by the book. Even those in
the field acknowledge that.[53]
The individual practitioner will be able to practice his/her
craft in a genuinely more ethical manner only if the public relations culture
itself becomes more ethical. Practitioners will find it very difficult to
practice even a personalistic morality within a craft/profession that does not
devote sufficient attention to the ethics of its own environment because "the
virtuous individual needs a virtuous environment; and, to be virtuous, an
individual must pursue a virtuous environment."[54]
This means that public relations practitioners and scholars must
move beyond a focus on the ethical dilemmas that occasionally impact on the
individual practitioner. They need to examine why issues of deception so
frequently become a concern in public relations. They need to ask why
management and clients hire public relations practitioners in the first place.
Newsom, Scott, and VanSlyke Turk, for example, suggest that:
There will always be some people in the
business word who are convinced that all they
need is a lawyer to keep them out of jail and
a PR practitioner to keep bad news out of the
paper.[55]
Haberman and Dolphin make almost the identical point when they
argue that "many managers and leaders still look upon PR people as
organizational firefighters and troubleshooters. When disaster strikes, the
public relations firefighters, otherwise left to play checkers, are summoned by
an alarm to speed to the rescue."[56] If these quotations are accurate, the
"cleansing" of the public relations culture must go beyond those who claim the
occupational title--it must extend to those who hire them as well. If that does
not occur, efforts to build a profession in which ethics are placed on the
"front burner" is, unfortunately but realistically, doomed to failure.
Public relations practitioners and scholars concerned about
raising the ethical consciousness of the field would do well to pay attention to
people like Susan Weiner who argues that "making moral choices is not like
choosing a flavor of the week....those who truly internalize ethics demonstrate
them naturally."[57] But, she also maintains, those ethical values are
internalized in a particular environment and the environment in which one
lives--and, it might be added, practices--is the ground in which are planted the
seeds of moral development. Which is similar to the point Schindler makes when
he states:
It is not just that what we do has broader
social consequences. We cannot know ourselves
unless we also know our culture. We cannot
examine our conscience in any depth unless we
first bring to consciousness the specific
values our culture holds. For, like it or not,
our culture is a part of us; and the more we
deny that fact or refuse to take it into
consideration, the more we fail to see who
we are and what we are about.[58]
Endnotes
[1] Susan F. Bovet, "Putting Ethical Codes into Practice,"
Public Relations Journal, 49(11), 1993, p. 4.
[2] Daniel J. Edelman, "Ethical Behavior is Key to Field's
Future," Public Relations Journal, 48(11), 1992, p. 32.
[3] Thomas Lickona, "What Does Moral Psychology Have to Say to
the Teacher of Ethics?" in Ethics Teaching in Higher Education, edited by Daniel
Callahan and Sissela Bok (New York: Plenum Press, 1980), p. 131.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Thomas F. Schindler, S.S., Ethics: The Social Dimension
(Wilmington, DE: Michael Glazier, 1989), p. 281.
[6] Ibid., p. 282.
[7] Ibid.
[8] Ibid., p. 282, 284.
[9] Ibid., p. 285.
[10] Ibid., p. 283.
[11] Otis Baskin and Craig E. Aronoff, Public Relations: The
Profession and the Practice, 3rd ed. (Dubuque, IA: Wm. C. Brown, 1992), p. 470.
[12] Ibid., p. 88.
[13] Ibid.
[14] Edward L. Bernays quoted in Baskin and Aronoff, Public
Relations, p. 31.
[15] John W. Hill quoted in Scott M. Cutlip. The Unseen Power:
Public Relations. A History (Hillsdale, N.J.: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates,
1994), p. xiii.
[16] Cutlip, The Unseen Power, p. xii.
[17] Ray E. Hiebert, Courtier to the Crowd Ames, IA: Iowa
State University Press, 1966), p. 316.
[18] Ibid., p. 317.
[19] Ibid., p. 318.
[20] An extended discussion of problems related to using the
"marketplace of ideas" theory as a social justification in public relations is
contained in David L. Martinson, "A Question of Distributive and Social Justice:
Public Relations Practitioners and the Marketplace of Ideas," in preparation.
[21] Cutlip, The Unseen Power, p. xiii.
[22] Scott M. Cutlip, Allen H. Center and Glen M. Broom,
Effective Public Relations, 7th ed. (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall,
1994), p. 133.
[23] Jerome Barron quoted in Donald M. Gillmor, Jerome A.
Barron, Todd F. Simon and Herbert A. Terry, Mass Communication Law, 5th ed.
(St. Paul: West, 1990), p. 495.
[24] Schindler, Ethics: The Social Dimension, p. 34.
[25] Ibid., p. 35.
[26] Ibid., p. 36.
[27] Ibid., p. 103.
[28] Cutlip, The Unseen Power, p. xii.
[29] Adam Smith quoted in Henry Hazlitt, The Foundations of
Morality (Princeton, NJ: D. Van Nostrand, 1964), p. 310.
[30] Ibid.
[31] Hazlitt, The Foundations of Morality, p. 310-311.
[32] Schindler, Ethics: The Social Dimension, p. 103.
[33] Ibid.
[34] Ibid., p. 105.
[35] Ibid., p. 106.
[36] Austin Fagothey, S.J., Right and Reason: Ethics in Theory
and Practice, 6th ed. (St. Louis, C.V. Mosby, 1976), p. 248.
[37] Schindler, Ethics: The Social Dimension, p. 105.
[38] Marilyn Martone, "What Families Can Teach," America,
172(11), 1995, 15.
[39] Schindler, Ethics: The Social Dimension., p. 103.
[40] Ibid., p. 53.
[41] Ibid.
[42] Newton N. Minow, "How Vast the Wasteland Now?" Media
Studies Journal, 9(1), 1995, p. 6.
[43] Ibid.
[44] David L. Martinson, "Enlightened Self-Interest Fails as an
Ethical Baseline in Public Relations," Journal of Mass Media Ethics, 9(2), 1994,
p. 100-108.
[45] Edward R. Trubac, "Economic Guidelines for Corporate
Decision-Making," in Donald J. Kirby, The Judeo-Christian Vision and the Modern
Corporation (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1982), p. 50.
[46] Schindler, Ethics: The Social Dimension, p. 161.
[47] Fagothey, Right and Reason, p. 248.
[48] Schindler, Ethics: The Social Dimension, p. 157.
[49] Ibid., p. 159.
[50] Ibid., p. 161.
[51] Ibid., p. 159.
[52] Ibid.
[53] Don R. Pember, Mass Media in America, 6th ed. (New York:
Macmillan, 1992), p. 407.
[54] Schindler, Ethics: The Social Dimension, p. 162.
[55] Doug Newsom, Alan Scott and Judy VanSlyke Turk, This is
PR: The Realities of Public Relations, 5th ed. (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 1993),
p. 233.
[56] David Haberman and Harry A. Dolphin, Public Relations:
The Necessary Art (Ames, IA: Iowa State University Press, 1988), p. 9-10.
[57] Susan Weiner, "The ABCs of Character," The Miami Herald,
March 16, 1995, p. 19A.
[58] Schindler, Ethics: The Social Dimension, p. 161-162.