Among the specializations within most public relations firms lies the expertise needed in developing and executing campaigns. Given that the main goal of public relations is to act as the liaison between an organization (whether it be a corporation, government, agency or individual) and a specific public, the range of work that public relations firms are hired for can vastly vary. If the job is to communicate the message of the client to a certain public, all the public relations firm needs to do is provide the strategy to make it successful, right? If these firms are paid to create a campaign that claims that vanilla ice-cream is made entirely of onions, how does the firm manage to make it a strong campaign if it is something that they may not believe in? Where do ethics come into place? When has manipulation gone too far?
In 1990 when the world’s largest public relations firm (at the time), Hill and Knowlton was hired to run the “Citizens for a Free Kuwait” public relations campaign by the Kuwaiti government, they were doing what they should have been doing as a leading international communications consulting firm- communicating a message through a campaign in order to influence the public. However, the ethical standards behind the campaign were later found to be shocking. As an opportunity to gain public opinion to build support for the Persian Gulf War, a young girl by the name of “Nayirah” was used to provide emotional testimony to influence the United States’ public. This young Kuwaiti girl claimed that she had witnessed Iraqi soldiers come into a hospital, armed, into a room where babies were in incubators. Nayirah then mentioned that these soldiers “took the babies out of incubators, and left the babies on the cold floor to die.” This story was repeated over and over within a time span of three months taking place between the testimony and the war. This was definitely an engagement between public relations and the government seeing that even President George Bush and the UN Security Council told the story.
The message had been spread from one audience to another – from the “Citizens for a Free Kuwait,” a Kuwait-financed group that lobbied Congress for military intervention, to an audience who believed this fabrication thanks to repetition, pathos and consistency. Once the evidence found its way to the table, Nayirah was revealed as the daughter of Saud Nasir al-Sabah, Kuwait’s Ambassador to the United States. The girl’s story was merely a ruse given that the girl was coached in what to say and how to deliver her story. The actors behind the curatin included those in Congress who, surprisingly, urged the media not to ask any questions regarding her identity.
Hill and Knowlton executed its job as a public relations team but what they forgot was how to facilitate their job with ethics and honesty. They deceived their targeted audience- usually seen as a form of propaganda. PR firms will always be asked to tailor stories in a certain way for specific audiences, but my question is, how far is too far? Better yet, should public relations have a role within the government? Stay tuned to find out more on October 28th at the APDS Symposium: International Public Relations and the Government. With four panelists targeting public relations from different angles, you won’t be deceived.
http://www.nytimes.com/1992/01/15/opinion/deception-on-capitol-hill.html
http://jcomm.uoregon.edu/~tbivins/J496/readings/PR/ToxicSludge.pdf
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LmfVs3WaE9Y
I love the title you came up with for your article; it really caught my attention and within a few sentences I was hooked! I’ll definitely be checking out your next issues. Best of luck with your Symposium!