ABSTRACT
Public relations is such a pervasive activity in our society today that it is impossible for a citizen or consumer to avoid. The establishment and the political class have taken to it with enthusiasm. The Queen has had a Communications Secretary since 1998 and the brief for the job was one that puts PR right at the centre of the establishment: ‘to devise a PR strategy for the Queen and the other Royals’.1 The world’s richest man, Bill Gates, gives PR a glowing testimonial: ‘If I was down to my last dollar, I would spend it on PR.’ The Church of England has a media office, as does the Roman Catholic Church, and other faiths.2 British schools are told that they ‘need to be savvy about PR’.3 Vigilante groups seeking out paedophiles on a housing estate have press officers.4 The media has feasted on PR’s ubiquity and confected up popular sitcoms to laugh it out of respectability – Absolutely Fabulous and Spin City on television and Absolute Power5 on BBC national radio. Even the more obscure edges of the media have nodded towards PR’s existence: there was a ‘king of spin’ in the University of the M25 satire in The Times Higher Education Supplement.6 Indeed, this weekly house journal for academics urges them to ‘work with press officers to ensure their peer-reviewed work is reflected accurately in publicity’.7 It also tells them how being insulted as ‘third rate’ can be turned to institutional advantage.8
