Reflections on public relations and propaganda and critiques of the corporate media lie at the heart of Ethical Space: The International Journal of Communication Ethics which in 2025 β remarkably β enters its 22nd year. The opening editorial in late 2003 spelled out its stance clearly, stressing that it was βan academic quarterly with a difference. At its core are the academic papers which over the years will embrace the diverse disciplines and issues that fall under the substantial communication ethics umbrella. But it is also committed to keeping abreast of the news in the field and providing a space for lively, opinionated pieces on topical subjectsβ. The journal was to be inter-disciplinary, international, philosophically and theoretically eclectic and rooted in a determination to approach in original ways the pressing communication, political, cultural and environmental issues of the day. Moreover, one of the journalβs major strands β currently edited by Tom Bradshaw, Sue Joseph, Richard Lance Keeble and Donald Matheson (with David Baines, UK-based reviews editor, also attending monthly Zoom meetings) is to problematise professionalism. It does this, for instance, by focusing on alternative, progressive media and highlighting many of professionalismβs underlying myths.
In keeping with its principle of interdisciplinarity, Ethical Space, over its 21 years, has covered many aspects of communication: journalism, media pedagogy, computer studies, cultural studies, health communication, hactivism, literary studies, international politics, covert and overt intelligence, the sociology of the professions, the ethics of true crime β and Indigenous studies. The journal has also kept in close touch with developments in public relations and propaganda research publishing papers by leaders in the field β some of them collected in the 411-page, second volume of Ethical Space: Journal with a Difference β Celebrating 20 Years (published by Abramis, in 2024).
Propaganda and PR: Beyond the Rhetoric
Building on her highly original PhD work (later forming the basis for her Public Relations Ethics and Professionalism: The Shadow of Excellence, Routledge, 2014), Johanna Fawkes applies the ideas of Carl Jung (1875-1961) regarding wholeness instead of goodness as the goal of the integrated psyche to a critical study of professional ethics β in particular those of public relations. She suggests Jungβs focus on inward dialogue and integration βoffers a new basis for ethical development. It combines a philosophical and psychological approach to the self and highlights the ethical effects of moving away from the ego-defensive split between persona and shadowβ¦β
The Jungian approach to public relations ethics would start by acknowledging its essential propaganda role, βpast and present, without condemnation or judgementβ. Moreover, Jungβs concept of integration βoffers a way forward for the development of a more coherent professional ethics, not only in public relations but for others grappling with issues of ethics in rapidly changing timesβ.
βRadical PRβ was the name given to an international gathering of like-minded academics from Australia, New Zealand, USA, South America, Scandinavia and Europe at the Stirling Media Research Institute (SMRI) in July 2008. They were scholars who approached the subject of public relations from multi- and inter-disciplinary contexts while they also considered the wider political, ethical and cultural issues and social impacts. In her chapter, Jacquie LβEtang traces the history of the group β and ponders its future.
She begins by providing a brief overview of the history of PR as an academic discipline and stresses how it has long struggled with its identity being located in many different academic βhomesβ, including marketing, management, communications, media and journalism.
We sought to liberate the public relations field from its normative, functional, conformist agendas and realise the potential of public relations research to shed new light on contemporary life and inform cultural practice. Our purpose was to establish a network to redress the problems of isolation and generate new bodies of work to replace the current insular body of knowledge centred on narrow positivism that fails to acknowledge the fieldβs power dynamics.
L’Etang ends on a personal note: βI really hoped that others would be interested in taking the discipline along new and different paths and to be creative, as an antidote to the predictable organisation-management focus of most of the literature.β
Bullshit may at first appear an unusual concept for serious analysis. Yet, in 2005, the American philosopher, Harry G. Frankfurt (1929-2023), published his best-selling On Bullshit and the topic suddenly achieved academic respectability. In their chapter, βTaking the BS out of PR: Creating genuine messages by emphasising character and authenticityβ, Kevin Stoker and Brad Rawlins (drawing from Frankfurt) define bullshit as βcommunication that misleads people, short of lying, about the sincerity of the communicator, who is unconcerned and careless about the truthfulness of the message. BS is not false; it is fakeβ. And public relations, when it is reduced to spin and hype, is BS. So how to remove it?
According to Stoker and Rawlins, a βmore authenticβ approach would place responsibility for moral action on practitioners as individuals and organisations as a collective community of individuals. A new stress should also be placed on sincerity: βIf the values communicated differ from the personal values espoused by the communicator, it represents a moral disconnect that deceives the audience as to the communicatorβs true beliefs.β Finally, striving for more authenticity is crucial.
Suicide and mental illness are complex issues with significant social and economic implications and their coverage by the media and journalism educators raises a wide range of challenges. Kate Fitchβs study examines the perceptions of public relations students in Australia towards the ethics of communicating mental health issues. Her findings suggest students recognise the ambiguities around βprofessionalβ ethics in relation to these issues, the need for personal responsibility in ethical public relations practice, that the growth in ethical awareness is incremental and that they learn most effectively through major assignments.
Another Australian academic, Kristin Demetrious, draws on Foucauldian theory to investigate the object of public relations and its ethical implications for late modern society. As a case study, she looks at the implications for PR of the Timberlands controversy in 1999 when New Zealander Nicky Hager and Australian Bob Burton made a formal complaint to the Public Relations Institute of New Zealand about unethical public relations which, they claimed, had been designed to undermine public debate about the future of West Coast New Zealandβs temperate rainforest. Demetriousβs paper discusses socially and politically offensive forms of PR and the tension in the field βwhich need urgent attentionβ. βI believe that reconciling these issues requires innovation and a synthetic approach, drawing on a range of interdisciplinary social, political, communicative and discourse theories…β
Putting Critical Spotlight on the Mainstream
ES was launched in 2003 (essentially as an initiative of Robert Beckett) as the journal of the membership-based Institute of Communication Ethics. This arrangement lasted until Abramis took over distribution and subscriptions after the final, bumper, double issue appeared 2018 β and following the retirement of the brilliant and hard-working administrator Fiona Thompson. Thus ICEβs annual conference, βAnti-social mediaβ in London in October 2018 was to be its last. Those conferences provided the opportunity for members of the ES international community to meet and discuss their new projects and teaching challenges. From those conferences a selection of papers would also be drawn to be carried in the following ES issue. Julian Petleyβs chapter, βRichard Hoggart and Pilkington: Populism and public service broadcastingβ, is based on the presentation he gave to the ICE annual conference of 2014 that celebrated critically the work of John Tulloch, Stuart Hall as well as Hoggart.
In 1962, the Pilkington Committee, of which Hoggart, author of the celebrated Uses of Literacy (1957), was an influential member, produced a report extremely critical of ITV and its regulator, the Independent Television Authority. Petley examines in forensic detail the press critique of the Pilkington Report and suggests it prefigures later press interventions into broadcasting controversies β as well as press responses to the Leveson Inquiry report in 2012. The coverage also anticipates the ever-growing hostility of the national press towards the BBC (particularly following the arrival of Rupert Murdoch as a press proprietor in 1969) and the enthusiasm for new broadcasting technologies (a specialism of The Sunday Times in the 1980s, when Murdoch was establishing his satellite empire). According to Petley, the national press reporting of Pilkington reflected: β¦
β¦ the simplistic assumption that new broadcasting technology and an increased number of channels would automatically entail greater diversity of programming. And a raucous populism which regards the state as only ever the enemy of media freedom (understood implicitly as the right of media owners to do with their media whatsoever they will), never as an enabler of media freedom in the wider sense of helping to make the media more diverse, representative, accessible, accountable, assessable and so on.
Florian Zollmannβs pioneering monograph Media, Propaganda and the Politics of Intervention (2017) builds on critical theory, most notably Herman and Chomskyβs propaganda model, to dissect US, UK and German media reporting of the military operations in Kosovo, Iraq, Libya, Syria and Egypt. In the process, he demonstrates how βhumanitarian interventionβ and βR2Pβ are only evoked in the news media if so-called βenemyβ countries of Western states are the perpetrators of human rights violations. Here, Zollmann analyses UK press coverage of the US attack on the Iraqi city of Fallujah in 2004. Actions by US/Coalition forces that could be regarded as violations of the Geneva Conventions included the deliberate targeting of a hospital and civilians, the shooting at ambulances, the cutting off of power and water supplies, the use of indiscriminate military force, the prevention of a relief convoy to enter the city, the shooting of wounded soldiers, the use of phosphorous rounds β and assaults on the honour of women. Violations by the resistance included the occupation of the main hospital, the deliberate targeting of civilians, the improper use of white flags and the use of mosques for hostile purposes.
Zollmann concludes:
In its coverage of the US assault on Fallujah, the British press instituted the assumption that an otherwise illegal occupation was legitimate. Furthermore, the βoperationβ was largely framed as a military endeavour. Most newspapers did not consider it to be a massacre or a crime. β¦ The ability of the press to describe horrific events and place them in a framework of Western benevolence may also amount to what George Orwell defined as doublethink: βto deny the existence of objective reality and all the while to take account of the reality which one deniesβ.
Locally hired journalists (often dubbed βfixersβ) are increasingly being used by Western media companies abroad to short-circuit newsgathering and gain instant access to local stories and useful contacts. Colleen Murrell analyses data from 20 senior British and Australian television correspondents and from five fixers working in crisis-stricken countries. She finds that the reporters gain a reputation for being able to function well in difficult situations and may go on to reap rewards in terms of promotion, book deals, documentaries featuring their work and access to the lecture circuit. Fixers, on the other hand, will rarely get the kudos of having their name attached to the report, but they may see their experience translated into further paying jobs. And yet, how authentic is the local intervention? Using the social theories of Pierre Bourdieu to examine the βexchange of cultural capitalβ that takes place between the Western correspondent and the fixer, Murrell argues:
Globalisation has made possible this tribe of newsgatherers (be they correspondents or fixers) who have more in common with each other than with the general population of the country being covered. At the end of the day, the correspondent will work with the most effective person who is available and who can deliver the best story for their viewers. In choosing English-speaking professionals, correspondents are broadcasting a tale from abroad, delivered through a filter of Western understanding.
John Tulloch, who sadly died in 2013, was for many years an inspirational speaker at the annual ICE conferences, essayist for Ethical Space and the journalβs reviews editor. In a tribute, published in ES in 2014, Richard Lance Keeble, his colleague at the University of Lincoln and friend, wrote:
His writings and conference presentations over the years covered a vast range of subjects: peace journalism, Indian newspaper history, press regulation, media coverage of the US βwar on terrorβ, the BBC; investigative reporting, literary journalism, journalism education to name but a few. He wrote beautifully: his prose was bubbling with original ideas and wit. He was able to mix subtle theory, even sections of quantitative analysis, with elegant references to some of the many books he had read.
Take for instance, his Ethical Space review of Robert Fiskβs The Age of the Warrior: Selected Writings (2009) in which the author serenades his cat: John took the opportunity to slip in mention other literary cats β of Keats, Christopher Smart and Dr Johnson for instance, complete with apt quotations, of course. John could even include the word βbullshitβ in an academic essay and make it appear both apt and profound! Indeed, there was a cheeky side to his personality that came out in his writings: while constantly critical of the βdumbing downβ of the media he always wanted to celebrate the tabloids for their mischief-making.
Johnβs contribution to the 2012 ICE annual conference which forms the basis for his chapter, was so typical of the man. Amidst all the avalanche of media coverage of the Leveson Inquiry into press practices and ethics, John picked on what he called βthe witchifyingβ of Rebekah Brooks β who might otherwise have been so easily passed over as a Murdoch crony not worth any sympathy or academic attention. So he read carefully from his script:
Last year, Rebekah Brooks positively willed herself to be my subject. She is, as many have seen fit to tell us, hard to resist. Not the Cotswolds-living lady who rides retired police horses, or the tabloid editor and compulsive chum of celebrities. β¦ But the woman in the middle of the bizarre process that seems to happen regularly, when for a short period, they become a subject of press interest, are objectified and, not to be too dainty about it, monstered.
And he continued:
Apart from the too tempting opportunities for portentous moralising, her case is fascinating for what it can tell us about contemporary media culture, the persistence of class-based attitudes and a sexism so engrained into our public life as to appear βnaturalβ, old boy.
Notice the vitality and wit, the subtle shifts of tone and register of Johnβs prose. How elegantly it mixes subtle theorising, journalese and witty vernacular. All of this crammed into just a few score words.
Antonio Castilloβs contribution to ES draws attention to the remarkable social uprising in Chile in 2019, involving thousands of people in street protests and pitched battles between soldiers and demonstrators, which was largely ignored by the Western corporate media. Castillo argues that the coverage by Chileβs corporate media was essentially designed to defend the privileges of the countryβs elite and criminalise mass public demands for social change and justice. At the same time, alternative media emerged and became spaces of activism, dialogue, political education, direct action and collaboration. They included political podcasts (via YouTube and Spotify), current affairs programmes via university-sponsored media channels, femi-journalism digital platforms (established and managed by feminist organisations) and long-established Indigenous and urban poor media collectives. Castillo concludes:
In the context of the social explosion, the position of corporate journalism in the Chilean society was not only ethically questioned but it was also rejected. This was the result not only of the demonising coverage, but also the failure to report the massive human rights violations committed against protestors by the police and the military.
The critical spotlight thrown on the mainstream media by Alexandra Wake and Matthew Ricketson focuses on a landmark ruling by an Australian court which put news media companies on notice they faced potential findings of negligence and subsequent compensation claims if they failed to exercise a reasonable duty of care to reporters covering traumatic events. The court ruled that journalist YZ, who worked at one of Australiaβs oldest metropolitan daily newspapers, The Age, be awarded A$180,000 for psychological injury suffered while working between 2003 and 2013. YZ had reported on 32 murders and many more cases as a court reporter. This was in stark contrast to the case from the same newspaper, in 2012, which did not uphold the claim of a news photographer. Wake and Ricketson suggest that the case could have implications for employers not just in Australia but in other countries with similar legal systems. They also consider its relevance for journalism educators who are charged with preparing the next generation of journalists, many of whom will cover traumatic events. And they note approvingly that the World Journalism Education Congress syndicate on journalism and trauma made three broad recommendations on curriculum when it met in Paris in 2019: βimplement classroom training that incorporates theory and practice; provide essential literature, contacts, networks, and resources to students; and promote normalization of reactions to trauma in journalism workβ.
The Brazilian News Atlas is a crowdsourcing, non-profit project designed to map local journalism initiatives and news deserts in Brazil. In their chapter, Marcelo Fontoura and SΓ©rgio LΓΌdtke use the latest data from the Atlas about news deserts, as well as complementary research from the project, to better understand the limitations and challenges to local outlets in Brazil. Their findings highlight a precarious situation in journalism, with the closure of traditional, larger operations, and the emergence of many individual initiatives, mainly in the form of blogs. And they suggest local journalism in Brazil has essentially two major challenges to overcome:
On one hand, it faces the same financial issues as other parts of industry, and on the other, it still has to tackle the heavy influence of local politics and business. The financial troubles of the industry risk increasing the ethical troubles, since they may encourage newspaper owners to establish even closer ties with potential advertisers. In small towns, where advertising space tends to go to the same companies and to local governments, and where professional culture is weaker, this risk is higher.
A number of editorials over the years focused on the plight of WikiLeaksβ founder Julian Assange β held in Belmarsh High Security prison, London, from April 2019 until June 2024 on spurious espionage charges β and the failure of the corporate media to back him. For instance, an editorial in Vol. 17, No. 2, of 2020, headlined βAssangeβs brave campaign to expose state criminalityβ, said that one of the most disappointing aspects of the Wikileaksβ saga had been the way the Guardian, which did so much to publicise Assangeβs early revelations, appeared to have turned against its former source. For instance, the newspaper reported on 27 November 2018 that Assange held secret meetings with President Trumpβs former campaign manager Paul Manafort in the Ecuadorian embassy in London βjust months before emails hacked by Russia were publishedβ. The Guardian had refused to retract the report or provide any supporting evidence.
Alternative Voices
While directing a critical spotlight on the mainstream media, Ethical Space has always aimed to promote the study of alternative voices β and highlight the ethical and political roles of the non-corporate, progressive media within the global alternative public sphere.
Willa McDonald, author of a seminal study of literary journalism in colonial Australia (2023), looks at the prison narrative, No Friend but the Mountains (2018) of journalist, filmmaker and author Behrouz Boochani who had been forcibly detained on Manus Island, Papua New Guinea (PNG), for five years by the Australian government. βThe paradox of Boochani stepping in to fill the place of an Australian journalist writing about Australian government policy and its consequences is that he can only do it because he is an outsider communicating his own outsider status from within the subjective experience of imprisonment.β
Written on a smuggled smart-phone, it was sent out in text messages via WhatsApp to translators in Australia. According to McDonald: βIt is a powerful indictment of Australiaβs immigration policies, particularly as they affect refugees and asylum seekers arriving at Australiaβs north by boat from Indonesia.β No Friend but the Mountains follows in the long tradition of βresistance literatureβ:
As writing from personal experience, it claims a voice, makes a point, establishes a community and retrieves identity. It seeks redress for injustices and advocates the rights of marginalised communities by speaking out about the actual circumstances of a life or lives.
Marian Reid is an Australian writer and communications adviser whose interests include community-led development, culture, nature and climate change. In her chapter, she focuses on the Fataluku community of Lautem, Timor-Leste, investigating the effect community-driven cultural documentation has on the value, perception and visibility of culture by the community. The case study highlights the fact that digital visual communication is a valuable tool through which to open channels of cultural expression and make visible critically endangered intangible cultural heritage.
Judith Townend examines the question: could the charitable funding of media help reinvigorate topics neglected by the commercial media? Her study takes in the organisations Full Fact and The Conversation UK, the Maidenhead Advertiser, a newspaper run by the private limited company Baylis Media Ltd owned by the Louis Baylis (Maidenhead Advertiser) Charitable Trust, and openDemocracy, a website published by a private limited company and wholly owned by a private not-for-profit, the openDemocracy Foundation for the Advancement of Global Education, and partially supported by a charity, the OpenTrust. At a local level, the Ambler, the Burngreave Messenger and the Lewisham Pensionerβs Gazette are considered.
Townend writes: βThese charitable initiatives share one striking similarity: they all provide content neglected in commercial environments, perhaps because this content does not drive enough traffic to attract online advertising, or is considered unlikely to appeal to paying subscribers and readers.β But there are problems. For instance, it is difficult even for a non-partisan journalism organisation to secure charity status. Indeed, advocates of charitable journalism have suggested that charity law should be capable of recognising the broad public benefit in certain forms of public interest journalism. Townend concludes:
Charitable status is not a magic bullet for the media industry. Being a charity places particular burdens on organisations as well as granting them reputational and financial benefits. But certain (existing or future) non-profit news organisations, especially those working in local geographic communities, on investigations and specialist topics such as law could greatly benefit from a regime that recognises specified forms of journalistic and news activity as charitable, to a greater extent than it does already.
The accompanying 411-page Volume 1 of Ethical Space: Journal with a Difference β Celebrating 20 Years (published by Abramis in 2023) carries 27 chapters under five headings: βCommunication ethics: Philosophical and theoretical reflectionsβ, New media, new ethical challengesβ, βProfessionalisation and media ethics: Beyond the rhetoricβ, βCommunication ethics and pedagogyβ with a final section βSpeaking out on ethicsβ comprising four powerfully argued chapters: in one Jake Lynch, of Sydney University, defends John Pilgerβs journalism on Israel and Palestine. Indeed, the journal is not fixed on carrying only academically rigorous papers (mostly of around 7,500 words). It regularly publishes shorter articles (think-pieces in the journalistic jargon) which provide a space for contributors to sound off on an issue of concern. So a special 2007 issue on βCommunication ethics and the internetβ was able to feature not only four papers on the central theme but six βViewsβ (such as Ann Dunn on ethical crises and broadcasting training and Karen Sanders on a convicted bomberβs call for peace) plus an editorial by Donald Matheson together with the text of Valerie Aliaβs inaugural lecture at Leeds Metropolitan University and a book review by Sarah Maltby.
Internationalism: At the Heart of the Journal
Another major feature of the journal is its international focus. To give an idea, a special double issue on βThe ethics of local media across the globeβ (Vol. 18, Nos 3 and 4) edited by Tom Bradshaw and guest editor Paul Wiltshire, covered Denmark, Russia, the USA, Australia, Brazil and France. In 2017, a special issue on βEthics of covering vulnerable peopleβ (guest-edited by Sallyann Duncan and Jackie Newton) had a piece written by officers for the Medical Health Foundation in Scotland plus papers by academics in Auckland, New Zealand, Vienna, Oslo, Sydney, Melbourne and Perth. The journal has benefited from a close link-up with the Lugano-based European Observatory of Journalism (EOJ). For many years, EJO director Stephan Russ-Mohl and his colleagues contributed fascinating articles to the journal: for instance, in Vol. 4, No. 3 in 2007, a piece titled βAn overview of media research in an era of globalisationβ. A special issue on the global coverage of Covid-19 followed on from a conference jointly organised by EOJ (with City, University of London, operating now as its UK base). The journal has close ties with many universities and research establishments across the globe: for instance, the 2022 conference on the ethics of true crime emerged from a collaboration between ES and Newcastle as did the 2024 special issue on the coverage of refugees.
Crucial in helping ES in its mission to be a lively, up to date journal (and one that operates a rapid peer-review process) are brothers Richard and Pete Franklin who run the Bury St Edmunds-based Abramis Publishing so graciously and so efficiently. If we send them copy on, say, a Monday, by Wednesday we will have the first PDF proof back. The editorial team may spend ten days checking the PDF and collating the proofing responses from the contributors. A revised PDF is then sent to Abramis who will return, again, extremely quickly for a final check. We doubt there is a publishing company anywhere who could match that efficiency.
- Ethical Space: Journal with a Difference β Celebrating 20 Years, Vols 1 and 2, available from ASK House, Northgate Avenue, Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk IP32 6BB; tel: 01284 700321. For subscriptions to the hard copy of ES, see http://abramis.co.uk/ethical-space/. The journal is also published free via the internet at ethicalspace.pubpub.org
(Featured Image: “2022.06.26.” byΒ yiykwrfa22Β is marked withΒ Public Domain Mark 1.0.)
