7. Ethical Codes

As Grunig and Hunt indicate, true professions have strong professional organizations with codes of ethics and the ability to prohibit those who violate the code from practicing the profession. Public relations has several professional organizations, and most have codes of ethics, however, no one central organization can control access to the practice. Therefore, enforcement of these codes is difficult and the effects of sanctions that can be imposed are questionable.

The IABC Code The International Association of Business Communicators (IABC) provides its members and other communication professionals with guidelines of professional behavior and standards of ethical practice. The code basically states that the professional should be committed to ethical behavior:

IABC recognizes the need for professional integrity within any organization, including the association. Members should acknowledge that their action reflect on members, their organizations and their profession.

Sanctions It is recognized that while the code may apply to coommunication professionals generally, sanctions would apply only to I A BC members.

For a first violation, unless criminal activity is involved, the sanctions would be informative and educational. They would share concern over the situation, rendering opinions with the intent to help guide the member toward more professional performance.

A second violation for the same or related offense would bring a warning, again with the intent of information and education.

A third or subsequent violation could involve a further warning, or if the situation were flagrant without serious commitment of improvement, an alternative sanction of suspension for up to one year could be given. Any decision of suspension or reinstatement must be reviewed and approved by the IABC Executive Committee and the executive board director responsible.

1. To the history of the PRSA Code

The code of the Public Relations Society of America is the most detailed and comprehensive in the field. When PRSA was f'ounded in 1948, one of its first actions was to develop a code of ethics so members would have some common behavioral guidelines and managers would have a clear understanding of their standards. This code became the tool used to distinguish professionals in public relations from shady promoters and publicists who have been quick to appropriate the term public relations to describe their activities.

The PRSA Code was adopted in 1954 and revised in 1959, 1963, 1977, 1983, and 1988.

Because the PRSA Code seeks to establish specific standards for the practice, it must be changed periodically to address new problems. In 1963, revisions were designed to toughen the standards for financial public relations after an investigatiuon by the Securities and Exchange Commission resulted in a public revelation of the corrupt actions of some practitioners. In 1977, under the threat of antitrust litigation by the Federal Trade Commission, certain provisions of the code barring contingency fees and banning one member’s clients were changed. This revision of the code also removed sexist concepts and language from the documents.

In 1983, Articles 1 and 5 of the code were revised to cover potential as well as past and present clients. This was the result of a grievance board hearing about a practitioner’s disclosure of a potential client’s plans to a competitor.

As the result of a scandal involving the newly elected prsident of the society who was charged with insider trading and violations of a client’s confidence, the code was revised again in 1986. This revision gives the ethics board more freedom to communicate its actions and those of members who resign before their cases can be considered. The need for this change was made apparent when a front-page story in the September 26, 1986, issue of the Wall 5treet Journal revealed to many PRSA members for the first time the resignation under fire of their president.

Enforcing the PRSA Code

Complaints against PRSA members can be filed with the National Grievance Board or with a judicial panel in one of PRSA's nine national districts. If evidence of violations is found, charges are filed with one of the district judicial panels and a hearing is held.

The board of directors reviews the district panel's findings and makes the final decision to censure, suspend, or expel a member. However, it would be illegal for the society to attempt to punish a member through publicity or to condemn nonmembers for unethical practice.

The articles of the PRSA Code most often cited according to a 1987 study funded by the Foundation f'or Public Relations Research and Education are (in order of frequency).

Article I A member shall deal fairly with clients or employers, past, present and potential, with fellow practitioners and the general public.

Article 3 A member shall adhere to truth and accuracy and to generally accepted standards of good taste.

Article 2 A member shall conduct his or her professional lif'e in accord with the public interest.

Article 7 A member shall not intentionally communicate false or misleading information, and is obliged to use care to avoid communication of false or misleading information.

Article 6 A member shall not engage in any practice that tends to corrupt the integrity of the channels of communication or the processes of government.

By 1987, the society had reprimanded three members, censured three, suspended two, and expelled two. Six others, including a newly elected nationa1 president, resigned their memberships before action could be taken. In seventeen other cases, the charges were dropped because of insufficient evidence or other circumstances that made it impossible to pursue the inquiry.

Because professional organizations do not have the force of 1aw behind their codes of practice, enforcement is a difficult problem. The investigation of charges independent of those who make them is an expensive process most organizations cannot afford. Moreover, the legal and ethical responsibility to avoid damage to someone’s reputation and livelihood without cause requires that any group proceed cautiously in the enforcement of a code of practice. The American Society of Newspaper Editors encountered so many legal problems and other difficulties in its attempts to censure members that it suspended further enforcement attempts soon after its code of ethics was adopted in 1923.

As we said earlier, codes, policies, and even laws are not the answer to achieving ethical practice in public relations. 0nly the individual professional can ensure his or her ethical behavior. In an article titled "Hope springs eternal for good use of PR," W. M. Shaller put it quite simply: "Customers and prospects long ago recognized ethics as an aspect of individual character, not collective industry. PR professionals would do well to emulate customer and prospect wisdom; good ethics is just good business." Those who exemplify the best of any profession develop a personal philosophy that allows them to deal with individual cases as they occur.

Chester Burger, president of a New York-based management consulting firm, revealed his own philosophy in a Public Relations JournaI article concerning ethics in public relations. The statements below are a capsule of what he learned during a newspaper reporting and public relations career spanning more than four decades:

Lesson 1 Communicators must trust the common sense of their audience. More often than not, the public will justify our trust by seeing accurately the issues and the contenders and the motivations, Communicators should not use clever headlines, gimmicks, distortions, or lies to communicate eftectively. Don’t underestimate the public's perceptiveness.

Lesson 2 People generally will know or care very little about the issues that concern you. You've got to inform, to clarify, to simplify issues in a truthful manner, and in ways that will relate to the self-interest of your audience.

Lesson 3 Don’t compromise your own ethical standards for anyone.

Don't take the easy way out. Don't say what you don't really believe, and don' t do for the sake of expediency what you think is wrong. It ain't worth it. Ask yourself how your action would look if it were reported tomorrow on the front page of your local newspaper. Who would absolve you from the responsibility if you said you wrote it or said it because your boss told you to?

Lesson 4 Choices for communicators between right and wrong are rarely black or white, yes or no. Questions of ethics involve degrees, nuances, and differing viewpoints. Too many times in my life I have been wrong to feel sure that I know the right answer. A bit of uncertainty and humility sometimes is appropriate in considering ethical questions.