We are starting to see a number of organisations realising that the issues they are facing are too great to be resolved by their own actions. They need help. They need to share the pain, even the guilt in the public sphere. The method which seems to be developing is by commissioning a report from an outside expert or organisation and by doing so opening up problems and agendas to public debate.
This is what might be termed an emerging form of public sphere communications which Inger Jensen from Roskilde University anticipated in her 2001 paper titled Public Relations and emerging functions of the public sphere. To gain legitimacy, companies need to "launch problems in public as being of common concern."
We are seeing this develop most noticeably in the banking sector.
While in contrast, these are very different from the process which has been inflicted on the poor Co-operative Bank with major government and regulatory enquiries heaped upon it. There is no sense that the Co-op Bank is in control of the gathering debate even terminal crisis facing the brand at least in banking. A media firestorm created around the Chairman of the bank has influenced the Treasury and government to use the bank as a political football which may do immense damage to the mutual sector in the UK. A very different form of communicative process with very little rational discussion at the heart of it.
This is an area which I am wanting to explore in my doctorate and I would welcome input from practitioners and academics.
This is what might be termed an emerging form of public sphere communications which Inger Jensen from Roskilde University anticipated in her 2001 paper titled Public Relations and emerging functions of the public sphere. To gain legitimacy, companies need to "launch problems in public as being of common concern."
We are seeing this develop most noticeably in the banking sector.
- In 2012 Barclays commissioned Anthony Salz, to lead an external review of Barclays' business practices.
- This approach has now been followed by RBS which following receipt of the Lending Review Report which it commissioned from Sir Andrew Large, a former Deputy Governor of the Bank of England has today commissioned a further report from Clifford Chance to investigate further.
While in contrast, these are very different from the process which has been inflicted on the poor Co-operative Bank with major government and regulatory enquiries heaped upon it. There is no sense that the Co-op Bank is in control of the gathering debate even terminal crisis facing the brand at least in banking. A media firestorm created around the Chairman of the bank has influenced the Treasury and government to use the bank as a political football which may do immense damage to the mutual sector in the UK. A very different form of communicative process with very little rational discussion at the heart of it.
This is an area which I am wanting to explore in my doctorate and I would welcome input from practitioners and academics.
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