Codes Of Ethics: A Special Issue Of The Journal Of Mass Media Ethics (journal Of Mass Media Ethics, Vol 17, No. 2, 2002)

E-Book Overview

Revisiting the topic of ethics codes in the media, this special issue begins by tracing the first 50 years of code writing and code enforcement experiences of the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA). The second article shows how the 2000 Member Code of Ethics assumes professional standing for PRSA members, emphasizes public relations' advocacy role, and stresses education rather than enforcement as the key to improving industry standards. Next, this special issue traces the evolution of the Israel Broadcasting Authority's (IBA) code of ethics through five permutations between 1972 and 1998 and analyzes how journalistic codes of ethics in the United States wrestle with the matter of leaks. The Cases and Commentaries section explores the ethical ramifications of a public relations practitioner's decision about presenting a false front group of grassroots image as a part of a public relations campaign. Finally, two book reviews stimulate further thought about entertainment media ethics and ethics in cyberspace.

E-Book Content

Journal of Mass Media Ethics, 17(2), 87–88 Copyright © 2002, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc. Foreword In this issue of the Journal of Mass Media Ethics we revisit the topic of ethics codes in the media. We explored codes thoroughly in 1985–1986, when the journal first appeared. In the intervening years we have published occasional research articles on the subject. Now, given myriad code revisions and debates over enforcement throughout media associations and individual media institutions, this is an optimum time to return to the subject. Four articles and a Cases and Commentaries section inform the debate. Kathy Fitzpatrick of DePaul University has been a thoughtful student of public relations ethics. From her recent experience in helping the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) revise its code she brings an insider’s view into an organization struggling with its credibility and standards. She offers us two articles. The first traces the first 50 years of PRSA’s code writing and code enforcement experiences. Most of the versions of the PRSA code between 1950 and 2000 made pleas for professionalism and offered largely ineffective enforcement provisions. Fitzpatrick’s second article shows how the 2000 Member Code of Ethics assumes professional standing for PRSA members, emphasizes public relations’ advocacy role, and stresses education rather than enforcement as the key to improving industry standards. The multiphase process PRSA has undertaken is instructive, as is the inclusion of that code and all previous PRSA codes in Fitzpatrick’s articles. Our third article, by Yehiel Limor of Tel-Aviv University and Inés Gabel of Israel’s Open University, traces the evolution of the Israel Broadcasting Authority’s (IBA) code of ethics through five permutations between 1972 and 1998. The authors question whether the code is the outcome of a search for ethical and professional guidelines or a means of protecting the IBAfrom external pressures. Since 1972 the code has become more detailed, reflecting ethical, organizational, and political sensitivities. The authors conclude that the result of these changes has been the crystallization and implementation of normative ethical guidelines for Israeli public broadcasting. Taegyu Son of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill then analyzes how journalistic codes of ethics in the United States wrestle with the matter of leaks. After assessing how leaks—particularly from government sources—can compromise journalistic independence, the article discusses strengths and weakness of ethics codes. Four research questions are explored via a systematic analysis of 47 codes. Although leaks are never ex- 88 Foreword plicitly addressed in these codes, the treatment of confidential sources and the need to maintain journalistic independe