ABSTRACT

The media are a public particularly important for international public relations practitioners. To be successful in media relations on an international stage, George (2003) points out that relationships with the media should be developed before they are needed. It would be a mistake, however – and one commonly made – to assume that media throughout the world operate on much the same common principles. Because public relations efforts often rely heavily on mass media, planning those efforts based on misperceptions about how media function could do worse than simply render your plan ineffective – it could result in severe damage to reputation and credibility. Media structures develop in a country as the result of several forces, primarily the social, economic and political environments within which media operate. Consequently, it is difficult to isolate media from those environmental factors, so understanding those dynamics will be useful, and our discussion will blend those elements. A term sometimes used to describe the study of communication and mass media systems is metacommunication.