“Tell the truth, because sooner or later the public will find it out anyway. 

And if the public doesn’t like what you are doing, change your policies 

and bring them into line with what the people want.”^[1]

—Ivy Lee’s advice to John D. Rockefeller, Jr. in 1914

First, a Story…

We’re in ancient Greece. Socrates, a philosopher who counts Plato among his students, stands before an audience in the agora or public square.

Socrates fields a question from Glaucon, Plato’s older brother.

Glaucon presents the philosopher with a scenario: Two rings are given to two people. Each ring has the same power and renders the wearer invisible. The ring allows the wearer to indulge in their appetites and fantasies — and get away with it. The ring wearer would have as pristine a reputation as someone who moderated their behavior.

Glaucon asks Socrates — paraphrasing for brevity and modernity’s sake — “Why would someone be good for the sake of being good? If you could cheat and get ahead without fear of punishment, why wouldn’t you? Isn’t the person who wore the ring and didn’t use its power a total chump?”

Glaucon clearly believes even the most upstanding citizen would behave unjustly if they owned such a ring.

Socrates corrects Glaucon, stating that he is only partially correct. People tend to act for their self-interest. Rational people don’t intentionally make decisions to harm themselves or others. But — and here’s the key — ideas about ethics and morality aren’t lists of laws to prevent people from enjoying life. A code of ethics provides a guide to living a good life.

The Takeaway

The idea of leading and living a good life is especially important in the world of Public Relations. As we saw through the history of Public Relations, there are many examples where practitioners veered away from the truth or public good. As such, ethics should be at the forefront of good Public Relations practices.

Our lives evolve from the results of our decisions. In the world of PR, some of the best-paying clients may ask you to defend or campaign on behalf of a multinational corporation seeking to maximize profit while destroying the planet. Or you could be asked to defend a politician who has done something both illegal and immoral. Choose wisely. Use your skills for good, and you’ll wind up living a happier, more fulfilling life.

You’ll ultimately decide how to spend your time. The hollow sense you have while grinding away for a paycheck is markedly different from the feeling you get advocating for something personally important to you. It barely feels like work. There’s nothing quite like knowing you’re making a difference – for good.

This chapter lends a few philosophical arrows to have in your quiver when the going gets tough.

Ethics, Morals & Laws

The terms “ethics” and “morals” are often used interchangeably, and they can overlap in some cases. However, there are a few important distinctions. A quick point of difference is that “ethics are the rules of conduct provided by an external society, group, or organization,” while “morals are personal, your individual guide to what is right and wrong.”^[2] It gets a little messier from there, if we consider different “levels” of ethics that range from international and societal to professional, organizational, and personal. For our purposes here, we’ll rely on ethics as our catch-all term, because we’re acting in a professional capacity.

Ethics and morals are different from laws. Laws formalize the ethics and morals of a community into  legal codes that incentivize and punish certain behaviors. However, laws cannot always account for the nuances of personal and public behaviors.

“You can be unethical and still be legal,” Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg once messaged his friend. “That’s the way I live my life.”^[3]

To be clear, self-serving philosophies like Zuckerberg’s essentially ignore the notion of ethical principles or a moral compass. The goals are to avoid breaking the law and paying the consequences. It’s a safe bet that Zuckerberg would have taken full advantage of the “Ring of Gyges” in our opening anecdote. However, as Socrates pointed out, having a strong sense of personal and professional ethics may be the more productive path to living a good life.

To sum up a valuable lesson from an ancient Greek philosopher: Do better.

Or, as the Association of National Advertisers put it: “Go beyond what’s legal — do what’s right.”^[4]

A final word on the role of ethics, morals and laws in the field of Public Relations. In the U.S., every person has the right to be represented by counsel, which means that public defenders often may be “forced” to defend a client whose actions they despise. Public Relations is not The Law. You shouldn’t ever feel compelled to work on behalf of any client, and if you are — walk away. You’ll feel better about yourself.

We’ll get around to discussing some hefty ethical issues by the end of the chapter, but first things first: Let’s keep you gainfully employed and not in prison.

PR, Strategic Communication & the Law

Practitioners work with words and images. There are laws pertaining to the use of those words and images in different contexts. Perhaps you’ll work at an organization that has an attorney on retainer or even has in-house counsel — and perhaps not. The laws still apply to your actions.

A caveat: Social media is a fast-paced arena, which lends itself to making rapid decisions. There’s no excuse for breaking the law or steering from your personal set of ethics, no matter how rushed you are.

Attribution is giving credit to the original author of content. This is particularly important when it comes to running online contests, as you may find yourself eliciting, sharing, and repurposing content.^[5]

A User-Generated Content Policy is a set of standards regarding the use, sharing, and repurposing of content created by users and fans. The policy should include providing credit for the content, as well as letting people know they’ll receive attribution. It’s vital to convey to all users that their participation and content will be used by the brand.^[6]

Similarly, if you are creating a newsletter, email, or blog post — for example — you might include ideas or direct quotes from another source. When you do, you must provide attribution. Every single time.

The same goes for the images: They are legally protected by copyright laws. Copyright is a form of intellectual property law that protects original works of authorship, and it exists from the moment a work is created.^[7] The Digital Millennium Copyright Act, or DMCA, extended U.S. copyright law to apply to online spaces.

There is such a thing as Fair Use, which is the concept that in certain instances, some copyrighted material can be used without express written permission.

Fair Use includes four basic considerations. First, is the use for commercial or educational purposes? Second, to what extent is the copyrighted work creative in nature? Third, how much, or what amount, of the original material was used? And fourth, how does this use affect the potential value of the work?^[9] The notion of fair use is interpreted and determined on a case-by-case basis.

Images that are in the Public Domain are generally free to use, as the original copyright protection may have expired, as recently happened in the case of Steamboat Willie, an early iteration of Mickey Mouse.

The word “generally” does a lot of heavy lifting in the previous sentence, as it’s worth mentioning that Disney still retains some legal rights as well.^[10] Some authors and illustrators have chosen to make their work publicly available via Creative Commons. Creative Commons works within copyright law, and allows the original author to specify how their work may be reused. In many cases, attribution is all that’s required. Some authors and illustrators choose to place limits on whether their creation may be “remixed” or whether it may only be used for non-commercial purposes. There are billions of CC-licensed works available for use, accessible through basic search engines, including Google, Google Images, and YouTube. Because there are different types of CC licenses, it’s your responsibility to confirm the work is acceptable to use in a specific context.

Another caveat: This is not legal advice. Each of the terms mentioned have been discussed thousands of times in far greater detail than what we’ve done here — and there are complicated cases behind the simple definitions. This is just a brief introduction to key areas if you plan to use information, images or words created by someone else.

Speech, Privacy & the Law

With the very nature of Public Relations being — well, public — it’s worth pointing out that not everything needs to be public. No, we’re not saying you should cover up scandals for clients. Instead, remember that some information is private or proprietary and disclosing it could be illegal.

Common examples of internal communication include emails, memoranda, and newsletters.  This information has limited First Amendment protection, because notions of “newsworthiness” and “public interest” do not apply as they would for media outlets.^[11]

Be careful when creating content for internal newsletters — most legal action related to employee communications stems from sharing stories that disclose personal or private information. Always consider if telling the story or sharing a photo could cause someone embarrassment. Keep in mind: The “getting to know” or “kudos” stories should be submitted by employees to avoid oversharing or embarrassment.^[12]

Defamation is false information that could cause an average, reasonable person to believe that someone’s reputation is damaged. Defamation can occur in both internal and external communication. Language that is negative and harmful, published or communicated to a third party, and is to “some degree” the fault of “the person or organization making the statement in the first place”^[13]  — all fall under the defamation definition.

That “third party” could be the general public or a single person. Defamation is an umbrella term that includes defamatory statements that are spoken, referred to as slander, and defamatory statements that are in writing, known as libel. In the past, libel was considered more severe because the written word persisted longer than speech, but radio and television proved slander could be just as harmful. The internet “further erodes the distinction” between libel and slander, as “words, moving images and sounds can reach millions through the web, where they can remain almost indefinitely.”^[14]

In a defamation suit, the plaintiff — the person bringing the legal action — has to prove: that defamatory communication occurred, would likely harm the plaintiff’s reputation in the community; the communication is about the plaintiff, whether implicitly or explicitly; the communication reached at least one person other than the plaintiff. The plaintiff must also prove the communication is false; and must show evidence of some type of injury to their reputation or person. And finally, the plaintiff must prove that publishing the communication was done with negligence (for most people) or “actual malice” (for public officials and public figures).  Note: “actual malice” means that the person doing the defaming knew the information was false and published it anyway.

There are multiple defenses to a defamation suit, but the two most common for practitioners are truth and opinion. A statement might destroy someone else’s reputation, but if it’s true; it’s not defamatory. The truth really does set you free.  The truth is an absolute defense to any defamation suit.

Second, people and organizations have the right to their opinions. It doesn’t necessarily mean you can first state “in my opinion…” and then legally say anything you want — context matters — but it can insulate people and organizations. If these standards sound vague and open to interpretation, it’s because they are.

The vast majority of defamation suits are brought against reporters and media outlets, and the majority of those suits are won by the defendants.^[16]

But lawsuits require legal representation, which costs money. Even bringing the suit can jeopardize the reputation of each of the parties involved — even those who prevail.

Hopefully defamation is a concept you’re aware of rather than a situation you experience, but awareness is the first step in avoiding that situation entirely.

Free Speech, Publics & “Cancel Culture”

The right to free speech refers only to the government attempting to regulate speech. Organizations can reprimand or fire employees whose actions or online behavior are incompatible with the stated values of the organization. Publics can choose to punish, boycott or “cancel” individuals or companies for certain statements or actions.

The term cancel culture has emerged in recent years, with a negative connotation, to describe the singular or collective act of admonishing, boycotting, or actively protesting a person or entity that has transgressed a norm held by a public.^[17] Like the term “woke,” “cancel culture” is a charged term that rose to prominence in the early 2010s^[18] and originated in left-leaning Black activist circles, only to be later used derisively by right-leaning activists.^[19],^[20]

At its core, cancel culture can be thought of as consequence culture^[21] because it highlights how an audience can be empowered to revolt against a person or company when a cultural or social norm is deemed to have been crossed. The breadth and depth of this revolt depends on a range of factors, and we’ll get to some of that in the Crisis Communication chapter. For now, though, consider these loaded terms as reasons to be mindful of how words and actions can be interpreted — and sometimes misinterpreted — by publics. The potential consequences for individuals and organizations can be dire. Consumers are accustomed to organizations acting responsibly, and will hold them accountable when they fall short.^[22] Individuals and organizations may be endowed with the right to free speech, but active publics determine consequences of that speech.

Cancel culture is based in audience perception and can be a majority of publics or just a select few. For example, in 2023, Bud Light faced backlash by conservative publics after the company partnered with a trans social media influencer. In the following weeks, Bud Light’s parent company, Anheuser-Busch, issued a series of controversial responses that created backlash from more liberal publics.^[23] In the end, revenue at Anheuser-Bush’s U.S. division fell by more than 13.5% by the end of 2023.^[24]

Ethical Frameworks: The Seventh Generation & The Long Now

The “seventh generation” is a belief originating from indigenous cultures.

“We cannot simply think of our survival; each new generation is responsible to ensure the survival of the seventh generation.”^[25] In many cases, the short-term benefits are obvious and tempting, while the long-term consequences are uncertain — and someone else’s problem. A seventh-generation mindset emphasizes the notions of responsibility, stewardship, and accountability.

PR and Strategic Communication scholars have advocated a similar philosophical stance, in what’s been referred to as “The Long Now.” The argument is essentially that PR is characterized by thinking in the present, emphasizing quarterly profits, and engaging in damage control. Instead, identifying and emphasizing long-term goals and building enduring relationships is central to The Long Now, which encourages practitioners to think “hundreds of quarters ahead, not just one or two.” The idea is that good decisions take time and require expertise. The Long Now envisions a “’good corporate citizen’ that thinks in terms of satisfying networks of stakeholders — some of whom have nothing to offer the organization today — will make better, more ethical, civic choices and ‘foster responsibility.’”^[26]

Ethics & Moral Philosophy: Aristotle, Kant, Mill & Rawls

Most of this textbook prepares you for being a successful professional, rather than living the philosophical “good life.” However, the two actually go hand-in-hand. And even though we just got through a list of “stuff you should avoid doing,” ethics isn’t simply another list of bad behaviors to avoid — it’s the study of how we should live our lives. Ethics “are not just something we have. They’re something we do.”^[27] They are values in action.^[28] There are books and courses devoted to each of the philosophers mentioned here, so we’ll take some intellectual shortcuts in the interest of distilling a single concept from each philosopher.

Aristotle (384-322 B.C.) is considered “perhaps the greatest philosopher who ever lived,” and argued that moral virtue was a state of character and a way of being.^[29] For our purposes here, we’ll focus on his idea of the Golden Mean. The basic premise is that the correct course of action almost always lies between two extremes. If it helps, think of it as the Goldilocks principle of “not too hot, not too cold, but just right.”

The Golden Mean refers to certain virtues, and people who have an excess or deficiency of that virtue becomes a vice. For example, the Golden Mean could be ambition, and an excess of ambition may result in someone climbing the corporate ladder by any means necessary. Meanwhile, a lack of ambition may result in someone not getting off the couch. The right answer and correct action usually lies between two extremes. Keep in mind the right thing doesn’t lie in the exact middle, but along a spectrum between two extremes. Aristotle held a high standard for getting it right, noting that it is “possible to fail in many ways … while to succeed is possible only in one way.”^[30]

Our next two philosophers, Immanuel Kant and John Stuart Mill, represent two ways of thinking that are fundamentally at odds: deontology and utilitarianism. Deontology argues that the morality of an action is determined by the nature of the action itself, not by the potential effects it may have. Utilitarianism holds that actions are justified by whether they would provide the greatest good for the greatest number of people.

Kant (1724-1804) contributed a concept that we’ll refer to as universalizing the action.^[31] To determine whether or not a particular action is moral, you must ask: (1) Would the world function if everyone did this? (2) Even if the world would work, would I want to live in that world? (3) Are you using a human being as a means to an end?^[32] If you answer “no” to any of those three questions, the action is unethical. It’s a tough standard to meet, which is why it retains value.

Mill (1806-1873) was a student of Jeremy Bentham, and developed Bentham’s idea of utilitarianism in what was termed the “Greatest-Happiness Principle.” The basic idea is that “actions are right in proportion that they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness,”^[33] with happiness and unhappiness characterized by the presence or absence of pain and pleasure. A cynical view of the philosophy is that it constitutes “moral arithmetic,”^[34] where “the ends justify the means.” While Bentham essentially sought out actions that produced the greatest quantity of happiness, Mill examined the quantity and quality of happiness and pain produced by an action. Mill also distinguished between “higher” pleasures of the heart and mind and “lower” sensory pleasures, arguing that “higher pleasures” were qualitatively superior, since people who have experienced both prefer higher pleasures.

John Rawls (1921-2002) contributed what’s been referred to as the veil of ignorance. The idea is to adopt an objective mindset that considers the viewpoints of all publics and stakeholders. It’s a three-step process. First, remove all personal interests. Second, identify the relevant publics and stakeholders; and third, approach the situation from the perspective of every stakeholder. The mental exercise allows the practitioner to “walk a mile in another person’s shoes,” to arrive at a solution that minimizes the harm to any individual or group. The weighty concept underlying the idea is that in a different world, the people making the decision could be the ones impacted by the decision — and the moral choice is to act with that in mind. Recent studies have demonstrated that a veil of ignorance decision-making model promotes actions that are more impartial and beneficial to society.^[35]

Each philosophy looks at the world in a slightly different way, and you may find greater value in one approach relative to another — that’s perfectly fine. The point is that by evaluating situations through a philosophical lens, you can often arrive at a better solution, and do so in a thoughtful, methodical fashion.

Experts Talk Back:

Dr. Charles Marsh, Oscar Stauffer Professor of Journalism and Mass Communication, Emeritus, University of Kansas.

Dr. Marsh is the author of Public Relations, Cooperation and Justice: From Evolutionary Biology to Ethics, and co-author of the textbook Strategic Writing: Multimedia Writing for Public Relations, Advertising and More.

Full disclosure: The author was a student in Dr. Marsh’s graduate course in Ethics. Marsh was also a committee member for his comprehensive exam and dissertation.

I am embarrassed and ashamed to be late to the party on ethics of care. It’s a big field, and so to say “here’s what it is” becomes pretty reductive. But one thing it does — kind of across the board — is to say all our approaches to ethical problem-solving tend to involve justice: “What’s the just thing to do?”

Rawls does. Aristotle: one of his top virtues. And surely justice is a Kantian categorical imperative—it must be. The practitioners of ethics of care say, ‘What if we move beyond that, or beside it?’ And say, ‘What if justice is not our highest motivation? What if caring about things and caring for things is even higher?’

And it’s taken me a while to say. ‘Okay, that’s wrong, but let’s do it anyway.’ And then thinking — there’s the old classic John Stuart Mill utilitarianism of “the greatest good for the greatest number,” so if you saw two burning buildings and 12 people were in one, and just one person in the other building — but that was our child in the burning building, we’d go save our child.

And again, I’m being simplistic and reductive, but there’s a kind of ethics of care.

And I think it’s a very human and realistic thing to say that if we’re really, really going to dig brutally into what values we have, very often justice and fairness are not going to be our highest values. And so that, to me, is a lot of what ethics of care is about. And it does so many things for approaching how we want to address ethical dilemmas. Because, one, it moves us beyond the patriarchal dead white guys — and those guys are so valuable and so brilliant. But one after another, with the exception of agape, leaves something that needs to be addressed, and I’m ashamed for not addressing it earlier.

Yes. And like so many practitioners, I found myself in that predicament.

And this is going to sound probably glib, but I truly, truly believe this. And this is something I did not have when it happened to me: I think it is so important to have your own set of personal values.

I know that’s a feel-good statement, but I’m just talking about pure self-interest, and pure self-defense, to have a set of values that you have deeply thought about. So, when you’re in the situation you’re describing, and it’s intensely stressful, and you’re not thinking straight, and you’re probably not sleeping enough, and you’re distracted and stressed — to be able to go back and say, “Okay, wait a minute, when the world was normal — if it ever is — but when the world was a lot quieter, here’s what I said I stood for.’

And I even think to not only have your set of values but to have them ranked. And I don’t know if that will help or not because things change. But to be able to say, “When the world was normal, here’s what I said I believed in, and now I’m so confused, I’m just going to have to hope that I was thinking straight in those days.’ And here’s what I’m going to do.

One bit of advice would be to have their own statement of values. Literally, what values — and this would be true of any profession — but to help with that situation you described. Because it’s going to happen. What are your values?

I think anybody else entering the profession — although AI may change this — but, you have to be a very good researcher and writer.

And then, I’m biased, but I think studies from every discipline you can name show — and I’m back to indirect reciprocity now — that if you approach this profession as relationship development, not as advocacy…The number one value of the Public Relations Society of America is advocacy. And I think that’s regrettable, because it still ties our profession too much to that Edward Bernays, legal counsel model.

… The idea I would try to put in their head, selfishly because I saw this work in my profession, and all the research suggests this is correct, is to see public relations as relationship development. And relationships with whom? With people who have the resources that your organization or your client needs. And so, to see your business as building honorable, honest, win-win relationships, because those are the enduring ones. Seeing your profession doing that can be ethically satisfying and financially satisfying.

Corporate Social Responsibility: Doing Well by Doing Good

As you might recall from earlier in the chapter, there are different layers of ethics that overlap: personal (our own moral compass), organizational (reflected in an organization’s mission/values/vision statement^[38]), professional (articulated in codes of ethics), societal (including communal values, behavioral norms and networked framing), and international (global values and behavioral norms). These layers overlap, and there may be tension between them at times.

With respect to organizational ethics, over the past few decades, there has been an increased expectation that organizations behave in a socially responsible manner. Corporate Social Responsibility is the “sum of the voluntary actions taken by a company to address the economic, social and environmental impacts of its business operations and the concerns of its principal stakeholders.”^[39]

Patagonia is an example of a company that prioritizes transparency, which is built on a foundation of trust and prioritizes accountability and open communication.^[40] As its founder Yvon Chouinard put it, “You don’t have to worry about telling people about all the bad stuff you’re doing as long as you say, ‘We’re working on these things.’ But if you try to be dishonest — try to hide it — it’s gonna come back and bite you…”^[41] To that end, Patagonia has prominently featured its own environmental footprint on its website for more than a decade.

Its transparency is radical at times. In one instance, the company publicly reported that its own auditing showed “some red flags” that “startled us” regarding the use of migrant labor in their supply chain, which Patagonia characterized as “a form of indentured servitude that could also qualify, less politely, as modern-day slavery.”^[42] The company announced what a series of steps it took to resolve the problem, as well as a detailed timeline. By acknowledging and owning its shortcomings rather than downplaying them, Patagonia serves as an exemplar of corporate transparency.

The idea of “Doing Well by Doing Good” is that an organization can prosper financially by being a good corporate citizen. This approach emphasizes building genuine relationships in the community and industry, and engaging in transparent dialogue.

It’s not just a warm and fuzzy idea, either: It works. It’s been demonstrated that “CSR is not altruistic do-gooding, but rather a way for both companies and society to prosper,” and is “especially true when CSR is conceived of as a long-range plan of action.”^[43]  In other words, when we consider The Long Now.

One example is when the SXSW festival was canceled during the pandemic, and an artist thanked a brand:

“I just wanna give a shout out to YETI who paid all the artists that were scheduled to play their SXSW party this year. They didn’t have to do that and they didn’t advertise it once it was done. Solid.”^[44]

Within the first 24 hours, there were several hundred retweets and thousands of likes, with the first response being, “My opinion of the YETI brand just went up a few clicks.”^[45] Doing well by doing good.

Summary: Putting it All Together

We just covered a pretty decent amount of ground.

At a basic level, it behooves a practitioner to obey the law, and it is each PR professional’s responsibility to be aware of those potential issues. Ignorance is no excuse.

Ethics is not a list of things to prevent people from enjoying life. Consider ethics as a guidebook to living a good life.

Understanding and embracing moral philosophies can get you through some difficult situations. They can also help you arrive at a better decision: Apply that philosophy or code of ethics by using the Potter Box, and — with some effort — you can rest assured knowing that you considered multiple viewpoints and alternatives.

The Long Now, and Doing Well by Doing Good are more than just the PR version of “Live, Laugh, Love.” They are the bedrock of a sound, long-term strategic approach that builds genuine relationships and benefits the organization over time.