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Publisher: Northwestern University Press, 2007. - 322 p.
We are living in what one author describes as "highly promotional times." Governments and corporations, nonprofits and special interest groups, all have spin doctors trying to turn the news to their advantage. This increasingly incestuous connection between the practitioners of public relations and journalism has resulted in a troubling shift in power. "Public Relations and the Press" examines how this shift came to be and explores the questions it raises about the role of media in a democratic society and the future of journalism. A democracy works when individuals have access to reliable information upon which to base decisions - information that in our day comes from the mass media. But what if journalists do not have the wherewithal to question their sources and evaluate the information they provide? This, Karla K. Gower explains, is precisely what happens when economic and competitive pressures shift power from the journalist to the source - and the source, not the journalist, controls the flow of information to the public. Gowers describes a situation in which people, "informed" by practitioners of public relations, do not have sufficient information to make valid decisions. At stake is the core credibility of the press itself, and therefore the essential claim of journalism to a privileged role in a democratic social order.
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P U B L I C R E L AT I O N S A N D T H E P R E SS
Medill School of Journalism VISIONS of the AMERICAN PRESS
General Editor David Abrahamson
Other titles in this series Herbert J. Gans Deciding What’s News: A Study of CBS Evening News, NBC Nightly News, Newsweek, and Time Maurine H. Beasley First Ladies and the Press:The Unfinished Partnership of the Media Age Patricia Bradley Women and the Press:The Struggle for Equality David A. Copeland The Idea of a Free Press:The Enlightenment and Its Unruly Legacy Michael Sweeney The Military and the Press: An Uneasy Truce Patrick S.Washburn The African American Newspaper:Voice of Freedom David R. Spencer The Yellow Journalism:The Press and America’s Emergence as World Power Tom Goldstein Journalism and Truth: Strange Bedfellows
P U B L I C R E L AT I O N S A N D THE PRESS T H E T R O U B L E D E M B R AC E
Karla K. Gower
Foreword by Kurt Andersen
MEDILL SCHOOL OF JOURNALISM
Northwestern University Press Evanston, Illinois
Northwestern University Press www.nupress.northwestern.edu Copyright © 2007 by Karla K. Gower Published 2007 by Northwestern University Press. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 ISBN 978-0-8101-2434-9 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Gower, Karla K. Public relations and the press : the troubled embrace / Karla K. Gower ; foreword by Kurt Andersen. p. cm. — (Visions of the American press) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN-13: 978-0-8101-2434-9 (pbk. : alk. paper) ISBN-10: 0-8101-2434-3 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Journalism and public relations—United States. 2. Public relations—United States—History—20th century. 3. Journalism— Objectivity—United States. 4. Mass media—Objectivity—United States. I. Title. II. Series. HD59.6.U6G68 2007 659.20973—dc22 2007007892 The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ansi z39.48-1992.
In loving memory of my parents
CONTENTS
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Foreword by Kurt Andersen ix Preface xv One Introduction 1 Two The Rise of the Professional Source 13 Three Managing Social Change 41 Four Power to the People 67 Five Investigating Power 95
Six Blaming the Messenger 121 Seven Controlling the Message 147 Eight The Pow