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1 Public Relations Review 36 (2010) Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Public Relations Review Communicating for the good of the state: A post-symmetrical polemic on persuasion in ethical public relations Lance Porter Manship School of Mass Communication, Louisiana State University, Journalism Building, Baton Rouge, LA 70803, United States article info abstract Article history: Received 2 June 2009 Received in revised form 21 August 2009 Accepted 29 August 2009 Keywords: Persuasion Rhetoric Aristotle Burke Symmetrical communications As inarguably one of the most influential theories in public relations scholarship, the symmetrical theory devalues the most common public relations objective, persuasion. This article deconstructs Grunig s work and re-constructs classic rhetoric to provide a postsymmetrical direction for public relations scholarship devoted to influencing behavior. By viewing the practice of persuasion from the perspectives of Aristotle, Plato, Isocrates, Burke, Nietzsche and others, this paper provides ethical and procedural guidelines on how today s public relations scholars can refocus the public relations agenda to focus more on real-world issues Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction By declaring the ethical end game of public relations to be mutually beneficial relationships, Grunig and his colleagues (Grunig & Hunt, 1984; Grunig, 1992) have squarely focused public relations scholarship on an output rather than an ultimate outcome of public relations practice. Grunig s work focuses solely on the process of conflict management, while at the same time vilifying one of the most important end goals of real-world public relations strategy, which is to persuade and ultimately influence behavior. Certainly, managing relationships is part of the process of achieving shared meaning between publics and organizations. However, the symmetrical theory, in merely examining the flow of information in public relations, neglects meaning and ethics, the province of rhetoric. By re-examining ethical persuasion, this paper advocates for a clear role of the rhetorical tradition in adding an ethical perspective to the process of public relations. To establish a post-symmetrical theory of public relations, researchers need to regain a focus on the effects of public relations, which requires a reorientation toward audiences rather than organizations. This article will refocus the rhetorical perspective in public relations to acknowledge persuasion as an ethically acceptable practice and as a legitimate and even critical part of public relations. First, I will trace the development of the symmetrical theory, illustrating how Grunig s arguments parallel the original Platonic arguments against rhetoric. Then I will reexamine the perspectives of Aristotle, Plato, Isocrates, Burke and Nietzsche to critique the current arguments against persuasion. Throughout this article, I will use those same perspectives to provide ethical and procedural guidelines on how today s public relations practitioners serve society by acknowledging the audience. address: lporter@lsu.edu /$ see front matter 2009 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi: /j.pubrev

2 128 L. Porter / Public Relations Review 36 (2010) The dominance of symmetry as a normative ideal While there is a rich tradition of rhetorical scholarship in public relations (Crable & Vibbert, 1983; Heath, 1992, 1993, 2000, 2001, 2006, 2007, 2008; Hoover, 1997; L Etang & Pieczka, 1996) scholars writing in that tradition have often acknowledged symmetrical perspectives as a normative ideal (Leeper, 1996; Marsh, 2001, 2003). Heath (2000), in particular, has called on public relations practitioners to provide a dialogic modern rhetoric by striving to rise above deep pockets incentives and to add value to society by fostering mutually beneficial relationships (p. 70) in line with Grunig and Hunt s (1984) symmetrical communications model. Roper (2005) has identified the hegemony of the symmetrical model and described how Grunig s model has now become the common sense of public relations and is not questioned as often as it should be. While not technically dominant, Grunig s symmetrical model has constructed what Sallot, Lyon, Alzuru and Jones (2003) called arguably the closest thing public relations comes to having a paradigm (p. 51) with the 1984 conception of the symmetrical model as the most cited source and Grunig as the field s most published researcher. In more recent work, Grunig, Grunig and Dozier (2002) have acknowledged somewhat the place of persuasion in public relations by including the mixed motive model in the latest incarnation of the symmetrical theory. While some scholars (Culbertson & Chen, 2001) have incorporated the addition of the mixed motive model, most of the current research in public relations continues to use Grunig and Hunt s previous conceptualization of the symmetrical model of public relations, which condemns persuasion. Nevertheless, some rhetorical scholars have recognized the value in challenging the assumptions of the symmetrical model (Brown, 2003; Curtin & Gaither, 2005; Edwards, 2006; Elwood, 1995, 1999; Heath, 2007, 2008; Pfau & Wan, 2006; Weaver, Motion & Reaper, 1996). In proposing a move away from the dominant normative theoretical paradigm of public relations (p. 91) and toward a broader circuit of culture approach, Curtin and Gaither (2005) called on researchers to again examine persuasion. The dominant normative paradigm has removed propaganda and persuasion from the ranks of legitimate public relations practices, but the circuit demonstrates the need to recognize them as part of the repertoire of legitimate practices, albeit while carefully examining the particular circumstances of their functioning within each articulation. (p. 109) 3. Rebutting the original arguments against persuasion To recognize persuasion as a legitimate practice in public relations, we must first examine the history of rhetoric. One can trace the suspicion of all-things-persuasive back to the days of Plato. In Gorgias (380BCE/2008), Plato, speaking through the character of Socrates, uses the analogy of rhetoric as cookery to illustrate how rhetoric, like cookery, is a false art. In comparing rhetoric to gymnastic, legislation, medicine and justice, Socrates/Plato makes the argument that cookery is to medicine as cosmetics are to gymnastic: Cookery is flattery disguised as medicine; and in just the same manner self-adornment personates gymnastic: with its rascally, deceitful, ignoble, and illiberal nature it deceives men by forms and colors, polish and dress, so as to make them, in the effort of assuming an extraneous beauty, neglect the naive sort that comes through gymnastic. (p. 32) In other words, rhetoric is dangerous because it can be used to express a point of view that is not the truth. According to Plato, rhetoric is not concerned with the truth, but merely the appearance of truth. This cookery analogy was a powerful indictment in ancient Greece because cookery brought to mind nothing but negative connotations. Intellectuals of the day considered cookery feminine and thus private. However, as Nietzsche, Ansell-Pearson, and Large (2006) stated before and Foucault and Derrida reiterated later, words are words. Words are not the things they represent. Nietzsche argues that truth is a movable host of metaphors, metonymies, and athromorphisms: in short, a sum of human relations which have been poetically and rhetorically intensified, transferred and embellished, and which, after long usage, seem to a people to be fixed, canonical and binding (p. 117). Therefore, Nietzsche rejects the notion of Platonic philosophical and scientific search for the truth, and instead argues that truth is a rhetorical construction arising from the effective use of metaphors in a social arrangement. Nietzsche (Clark, 1990) said truths are illusions which we have forgotten are illusions (p. 65). 4. Public relations: providing the modern rhetoric Today s pursuit of truth often consists of this same kind of social arrangement formulated by competing interests advocated by public relations practitioners. By advocating a client s position, public relations practitioners participate in this rhetorical construction. Even if one s goal was conflict resolution and a resulting mutually beneficial relationship between an organization and its publics, persuasion is inevitable and necessary. Practitioners must embrace this challenge and use the available means of persuasion to ethically advocate their organization s perspective. Only then can practitioners find shared meaning with today s audiences. Rhetoric provides a framework for ethical public relations. According to Heath, rhetoric is the essence of public relations (1993, p. 142). Elwood (1995) adds that rhetoric constitutes the core components to public relations (p. 12). However,

3 L. Porter / Public Relations Review 36 (2010) I will go even further in this article and say that rhetoric is public relations. Heath said that rhetoric is a dialogue of opinions, counter opinions, meanings, and counter meanings the process by which interests are asserted, negotiated, and constrained (1993, p. 143). Modern public relations practitioners manage relationships and ultimately persuade by maintaining this same public dialogue with numerous stakeholders. Despite these parallels, rhetorical perspectives have often taken a back seat to conflict management in modern public relations literature. Critics often portray public relations in popular culture as a one-way type of persuasion or an attempt by an individual or organization to dominate an issue with a particular point of view. Seeking to elevate the status of the public relations function within corporate management, Grunig and Hunt (1984) (see also Grunig, 1989; Grunig & Grunig, 1989, 1992; Grunig & White, 1992; Grunig et al., 2002) countered charges of public relations being cosmetic or manipulative by developing the two-way model of public relations. In particular, Grunig and Hunt placed two-way symmetrical public relations on the highest ethical plane. Below the two-way symmetrical model on this ethical plane, Grunig and Hunt placed the two-way asymmetrical model and still lower the one-way model of public relations. In two-way symmetrical models of public relations, the public relations practitioner acts as an impartial mediator between two parties. The practitioner relays equal communication between an organization and its publics to the mutual benefit of both parties. In two-way asymmetrical communication, the practitioner works as an advocate for his or her own organization while still maintaining a dialogue with the organization s publics. In one-way communication, the practitioner either works as a press agent or as a public information officer, merely transmitting or releasing information. Grunig s two-way models of public relations closely parallel the idea of rhetoric as dialogic (Heath, 1993; Kent & Taylor, 2002). However, Grunig and Hunt s still-widely-cited original conception (1984) downplayed persuasion, If persuasion occurs, the public should be just as likely to persuade the organization s management to change attitudes or behavior as the organization is likely to change the public s behavior (p. 23). More recently, Grunig and his colleagues have softened their stance on persuasion. Grunig (1997) revised the excellence theory to acknowledge that the four models coexist and overlap. Responding to criticism of the symmetrical model as unrealistic and the condemnation of persuasion in particular (see Ihlen, 2002; Skerlap, 2001), Grunig et al. (2002) shifted their pure two-way symmetrical focus slightly to Murphy s (1991) mixed motive model, whereby practitioners pursue win-win situations to persuade their own organizations as well as their external publics. However, Grunig et al. (2002) maintained that persuasion involved communication without concern for publics: Many scholars have reacted negatively to our suggestion that the symmetrical model is normatively superior to the others because they believe that one or more of the other models represent acceptable public relations practice or because they believe that public relations always is asymmetrical. Most of them have been trained in the humanistic tradition of rhetoric, or in the applied social science of marketing communication. These theorists see no problem with a public relations practitioner who represents only the interests of his or her employer or client without concern for the interests of publics. (p. 311) However, advocacy or persuasion from the rhetorical tradition involves ultimate concern for publics as dialogue cannot occur without them. No ethical applied social scientist or rhetorician would suggest ignoring your audience or scientifically manipulating them. Aristotle (353BCE/1996) actually addressed this issue, Neither rhetoric or dialectic is the scientific study of any one separate subject; both are faculties for providing arguments. (p. 115) Public relations practitioners define their respective organizations through dialogue. Public relations practitioners, through this constant dialogue, must concern themselves with the interests of the organization s publics to facilitate effective dialogue. By maintaining this effective dialogue with an organization s publics, the public relations function serves as the social conscience of that organization (Heath, 1993). However, developing a social conscience does not mean accommodating the concerns of all stakeholders. On the contrary, ethical organizations use public relations to attempt to persuade their stakeholders that the organizations position is for the good of the state. While Grunig and other researchers working in the symmetrical perspective certainly had the highest ethical intentions in attempting to establish symmetry as a normative model for public relations, the systems-based symmetrical model lacks any true ethics. According to Heath (2004, 2008), the symmetrical model focuses solely on the process of public relations. Grunig relied on systems theory to examine the direction and flow not the ethics of communication. When Grunig criticizes persuasion, therefore, he is criticizing the process of persuasion. Heath (2008) pointed out that rhetoric provides a true ethical perspective for public relations: Systems theory is aethical. For instance, if some cataclysmic event, such as a massive asteroid or huge volcanic eruption, caused the end of some massive lineage of animal species, so be it. The fact that meat-eating predators kill and consume small bunnies and deer fawns, so be it. That s the nature of the system. Enter rhetoric and its companion, ethics: Rhetorical theory invests the human character and judgment explicitly into the meaning of communication. (p. 208) Even so, Heath (2007) has still attempted in recent writings to reconcile advocacy with the symmetrical tradition: The sort of advocacy that would be comfortable with symmetry presumes that participants engage in dialogue in which they can learn by recognizing the merits of others statements as well as understanding where and how challenges may refine ideas at play in the public sphere. This paradigm assumes that ideas grow in quality through dialogue as a win-win outcome. As such, advocacy is a virtuous management and communication strategy and philosophy. (p. 43)

4 130 L. Porter / Public Relations Review 36 (2010) Classical ideas of public relations for the good of the state Rather than attempt to reconcile persuasion with the symmetrical model, I will instead turn to Aristotle and Isocrates for ethical guidelines in persuading publics. If an organization is to have a social conscience as conceptualized by Aristotle, the organization must participate in the affairs of state. In Rhetoric (353BCE/1996), Aristotle stated that a good life requires a well-ordered state, which requires deliberation or rhetoric. In the text of Rhetoric, he defines rhetoric as the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion (p. 5). Consequently, modern public relations scholars have condemned Aristotle. Attempting to show the two-way symmetrical model as the historically correct foundation for public relations ethics, Marsh (2001) compared and contrasted the works of Plato, Aristotle and Isocrates. Marsh also eschewed persuasion, instead seeking win win relationships and incorporating the willingness of an organization to change to nurture an important relationship (p. 80). Working under the assumptions that the two-way symmetrical model is an existing, normative model for public relations (p. 354), Marsh (2003) later held up Isocrates as morally superior and symmetrical because Isocrates sought unification and consent. In contrast, he declared Aristotle a supporter of the asymmetrical, adversarial, selective truth discourse (p. 87) and argued that Plato s intolerance of dissent (p. 86) was dangerously asymmetrical (p. 87). However, Aristotle s means of persuasion are not too different from the goals of modern public relations (or Isocrates, for that matter) in understanding human character, goodness and emotions through research and/or dialogue. In fact, when Aristotle (353BCE/1996) conceptualizes rhetoric as fundamentally a communal art, he could easily be describing the common methods of modern public relations in advocating particular points of view: It is absurd to hold that a man ought to be ashamed of being unable to defend himself with his limbs, but not of being unable to defend himself with speech and reason, when the use of rational speech is more distinctive of a human being than the use of his limbs. (p. 5) Marsh instead points to Isocrates as more symmetrical in that Isocrates discusses the actual behavior of speakers rather than just their speech. For example, according to Marsh (2003), Aristotle discusses ethos only as it resides in the character projected by the speaker during the speech. In Isocratean rhetoric, however, Marsh maintained that ethos is inseparable from the entire life of the speaker (p. 358). I interpret both Aristotle and Isocrates quite differently than Marsh and find that these two philosophers actually judge the ethics of speakers in quite similar ways. Both men believed that one must participate in rhetoric to be a good citizen. Consider Aristotle s opinion (353BCE/1996) on how speakers should be evaluated on their character rather than what they project, What a man wants to be is better than what a man wants to seem, for in aiming at that he is aiming more at reality. (p. 21) In fact, Aristotle (350BCE/2004) believed that through argument, speakers character would be revealed, The power of speech is intended to set forth the expedient and the inexpedient, and therefore, likewise the just and the unjust. (p. 7) Similarly, Isocrates believed that a person was literally the embodiment of their public statements. Private behavior was not judged in Greek and Roman society. If you argued about good things in public, you were virtuous. Isocrates (353BCE/2000) encouraged his students to speak on honorable and good things, and imitate the great ones: The power to speak well and think right will reward the man who approaches the art of discourse with love of wisdom and love of honor. (p. 255) Isocrates philosophy has more to do with ethical persuasion and advocacy with honor. 6. Acknowledging the audience Much of Grunig s and his colleagues criticism of advocacy and persuasion as an ethical practice stems from fears that speakers will attempt to dominate audiences with one-sided arguments or through scientific manipulation. L Etang (2006) warned against using the rhetorical perspective to focus solely on the speaker because of the lack of acknowledgement of power differentials between speaker and audience and of the role of the media in amplifying the conversation (p. 370). Ironically, the symmetrical perspective fails to acknowledge the audience in focusing on the flow of information rather than the process of persuasion (Edwards, 2006). In contrast, a close examination of Aristotelian rhetoric reveals a true focus on the audience. In fact, Aristotle specifically calls for focusing on character, audience and content (353BCE/1996). Using an Aristotelian perspective and taking cues from previous work by Miller (1989), Edwards (2006) made the case for using the audience as partners in the public relations dialogue who help shape rhetorical discourse (p. 857). She points out that the two-way model neglects publics and ultimately dialogue by focusing too much on organizations. By employing theory that embraces all the participants in the communication process, researchers and practitioners can better understand the complexities of these relationships. Practitioners may more fully appreciate the implications of their communication strategies and tactics and thus be better able to meet the needs of participating audiences. And audiences who better understand their roles may be able to more meaningfully engage in the dialogue. (p. 857) In an answer to criticisms of his two-way symmetrical model, Grunig (2000) called on the professional and academic community to move beyond pure advocacy and recognize collaboration as the core value of public relations,

5 L. Porter / Public Relations Review 36 (2010) Public relations must rise above pure advocacy to value a symmetrical form of public relations in which collaboration becomes the major public relations idea and skill that we offer organizations to help them rise above the wrangle in the marketplace. (p. 45) However, this strategy is not always possible or even desirable. Can practitioners accommodate every active public of an organization? Would cattle ranchers rise above advocacy to collaborate with members of the Sierra Club that wanted to abolish their livelihood (Cameron, 1997)? Would organizations alter their strategies to accommodate morally reprehensible groups? Nevertheless, many groups use acceptable and ethical public relations strategies to attempt to influence each other and their common publics. When an organization takes a stand, that organization is still in a dialogue with opponents in that the debate is structured by the opponent s position. According to Burke (1951), the ensuing debate results in a higher level of truth: A rhetorician, I take it, is like one voice in a dialogue. Put several such voices together, with each voicing its own special assertion, let them act upon one another in cooperative competition, and you get a dialectic that, properly developed, can lead to views transcending the limitations of each. (p. 203) In fact, Burke (1966) provided explicit instruction on how to ethically direct persuasion and determine the very vocabularies used in debate. By using terministic screens, practitioners can even attempt to determine normative behavior. The terms humans use to define their observations affect the nature of our observations (p. 46). As those terms differ, our observations differ. Burke refers to those defining terms as terministic screens. These screens direct attention in keeping with (their) nature (p. 46). Shared meaning is then created through an open contest in society, in what Burke referred to as the marketplace of ideas. Public relations practitioners inevitably use terministic screens to structure the debate on issues important to the organizations they are representing. According to Heath (1993), public relations practitioners as well as activist organizations are ethically using terministic screens to challenge publics and organizations alike: Changes that affect businesses and non-profits result from calls, voiced in interpretive vocabularies, to constrain their prerogatives by displacing old meanings with new ones. Idioms of environmentalism, feminism, racism, ageism, consumerism, and globalism have altered the salience and meaning of values such as fairness, equality, aesthetics, safety, and security. (p. 142) However, before audiences are subject to terministic screens, they must first identify with the speaker. According to Burke (1951), the key term for the old rhetoric was persuasion...the key term for the new rhetoric is identification (p. 63). Speakers, Burke said, use God/Devil terms to develop terministic screens. God/Devil terms are inarguable descriptions of what is good and what is bad. Identification looks to replace formal argument with these associative clusters. Scholars, too, use terministic screens to persuade. Perhaps one of the closest examples in public relations scholarship of using terministic screens is Grunig s and his colleagues categorizing of symmetrical vs. asymmetrical public relations models. Despite Grunig et al. s acknowledgement of the normative strategy of symmetrical persuasion (2002), scholars working from Grunig s perspective continue to place persuasion in the asymmetrical model question area in their analysis. A close examination of the latest questions used to categorize public relations practice in the Grunig mixed motive models reveals a bias. Persuade a public that your organization is right on an issue is included in the pejorative asymmetrical battery of questions along with the Devil terms Manipulate publics scientifically, Use attitude theory in a campaign, and Get publics to behave as our organization wants (p. 337). In contrast, the symmetrical battery of questions includes the God terms Negotiate with an activist group, Determine how publics react to the organization Use theories of conflict resolution in dealing with publics, and Help management to understand the opinion of particular publics (p. 337). The very term asymmetrical implies an innate imbalance in the persuasion process. To illustrate how these God and Devil terms are still perpetuating themselves as terministic screens in the public relations literature, we will examine a more recent article that uses the symmetrical models. Yun (2006), in his study of U.S. diplomats in Washington, DC, found by examining correlations between Grunig s conception of ethical communication and Grunig s conception of symmetrical and asymmetrical communication that symmetrical communication was inherently more ethical than its asymmetrical counterpart (p. 307). However, Yun s questions posed to measure asymmetrical communication include Devil terms such as not volunteering unfavorable information, make journalists favorable to our government, disagreement between our government and journalists results in a zero-sum game, and attempting to get favorable publicity into the media and to keep unfavorable publicity out (p. 302). In contrast, Yun s measures for symmetrical communication include such God items as helping to resolve misunderstanding, develop mutual understanding, making unconditional commitment to quality relationships with journalists (p. 302). His items measuring ethical communication include God terms such as always getting involved in a dialogue with journalists, disclosing our purpose, humanitarian, developmental, human rights, and environmental issues that concern the well-being of people on the globe being official pillars of our foreign policy, and finally being concerned about the well-being of people on the globe (p. 302). None of the items used as God terms by Grunig and his collaborators or Yun would conflict with principals of ethical persuasion. However, Marsh s work (2001) continues to view persuasion as a Devil term, Public relations need not be adversarial. It need not adopt an ethics of asymmetrical advocacy. (p. 95) Furthermore, Marsh felt compelled to defend Isocrates use of persuasion as a sign of the times he lived in, describing the very term of persuasion in grim terms:

6 132 L. Porter / Public Relations Review 36 (2010) If it still seems that Isocratean morality (and consequently this article) strays too far from the grim realities of persuasion in a volatile, adversarial environment, we must remember that during Isocrates life Athens constantly battled external enemies and that, internally, bitter litigation was virtually a way of life. (p. 95) 7. Persuasion, identification and presence in public relations Today s communication environment is certainly more complex, contentious and litigious than the time of Isocrates, with exponentially larger, more diverse and empowered audiences taking advantage of myriad forms of media. Digitization has fragmented, mobilized and socially networked most forms of mass media, empowering a privileged portion of today s audiences to fully control their media choices. Many publics can now consume media when they want, how they want, and even where they want. At the same time, digitization enables authors to create revolutionary immersive and interactive media environments that require new levels of technical skill from both authors and audiences. Twitter, Facebook and other social media allow organizations to talk directly to their publics and active publics to speak to each other more than ever before. Therefore, now more than ever, the scholarship of public relations needs to revise its terministic screens to examine the entire public relations process, which includes persuasion as one of the most common objectives of real practice. Conflict resolution, managing relationships and symmetrical communication are all legitimate and desirable outputs of ethical public relations efforts. However, the ultimate outcome of public relations efforts will always remain influencing attitudes and ultimately, behavior. Public relations professionals are paid to advocate ideas and to influence behavior. Elwood (1995) placed communication as prior to all fields of inquiry, and always persuasive, forcing us consciously or subconsciously to interpret, evaluate, and to act. Communication is the vehicle for human action (p. ix). 8. The increase of dialogue in public relations scholarship While some public relations scholars have chosen to de-emphasize persuasion, persuasive rhetoric through public relations serves an important purpose in society today. As the number of media sources increases, individual arguments are becoming increasingly hard to hear in today s multitude of powerful voices. Consequently, scholars have charged public relations professionals with crafting the modern rhetoric or the rhetoric of organizations. Perhaps by taking a less defensive stance about advocacy, public relations and rhetoric can remove the stigma from their names. Aristotle believed that rhetoric, ethics and politics were not easily separated. 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