Italian judge Marco Billi has jailed (pending appeal) six scientists and one public official for six years for manslaughter. They were condemned for downplaying – in their communication – the risks of an earthquake in L’Aquila, Italy, which killed 309 people in 2009. The verdict should send shockwaves through the ranks of public relations professionals, because the precedent it sets could be applied to PR pros just as easily as to our clients and their other advisers. Read on ›

[This is a guest post by Richard D North.] The most important questions about the BBC and Savile saga are often left a little late in the discussion. First, why did anyone of ordinary savviness at the top of a mass entertainment organisation think the old weirdo was worth a post-mortem tribute, granted the strength of the rumours which had been going round for years? Read on ›

[This essay by Professor James Woudhuysen, Joe Kaplinsky and Paul Seaman was first published on spiked-online.] The key to providing for our energy needs is technological development, not sterile rows about energy sources.

Read on ›

You cannot have missed it. A strike at the Marikana platinum mine owned by Lonmin in South Africa led to 34 workers being killed and many more injured in a confrontation with the police. Weeks later the number of people on the illegal strike has increased considerably with only 13 per cent of workers turning up at the mine on Monday. Read on ›

In the late 20th century PR had to manage an increasing number of controversial issues. It became part of the corporate story: the spotlight was turned on its own activities. Firms were invited – rather forcefully – to address their reputations the way they once addressed profits. Read on ›

How does a near-European monopolistic vertical supplier (upstream, downstream and in-between) of an expensive fossil fuel from a semi-democratic country convince politicians from proper democracies that competition and significantly lower prices are bad things? Play an emotive PR trump card, that’s how. Read on ›

The International History of Public Relations Conference 2012 is convening in Bournemouth, England, this week. I’m not going. But I thought I’d use it as a hook to explore the long-forgotten story of a barbaric British company that was eventually pursued to destruction by Sir Edward Grey, a leading Liberal and British Foreign Minister (1905 -1916). I think it marks the birth of modern corporate PR.  Read on ›

The World Business Council for Sustainable Development’s Vision 2050 says the corporate world must play a leadership role in solving mankind’s mounting problems. It outlines a new agenda for business: to work with government and society to transform global markets and competition to achieve a sustainable future. But here is a thought. Is Vision 2050 anything more than a PR survival plan for today’s big companies seeking a long-term and popular license to operate? Read on ›

Barclays Bank has to pay a penalty of £290 million to the Financial Services Authority in the UK, and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and Department of Justice in the US. Its crime? Between 2005 and 2009, it lied to them about the interest rate it was paying to borrow money. The reason? To benefit the bank’s derivatives trading positions by either increasing its profits or minimizing its losses. What can we PR pros say? Read on ›

When comedian Ken Dodd was put in the dock for stashing in excess of three hundred thousand pounds in shoeboxes and suitcases, and placing more untaxed money in twenty offshore accounts, he claimed: “the money was the savings from my taxed income.” Dodd’s hapless losing prosecutor was Brian Leveson QC. So what to make of the Jimmy Carr affair? Read on ›