Jung, Ethics & PR

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Jo Fawkes — Sat, 23 Jul 2011 11:44:28 +0000

This has been my PhD blog/diary and on Monday July 18 I graduated, completing the whole process from registration in 4 years. It was a glorious day – having boycotted my first degree ceremony as a bourgeois irrelevance, I was thrilled my 87 yr old father and my sister came up from London to be part of it. Either I’ve sold out, or recognised the value of rituals – the latter I think. Much of the thesis writing was very lonely, plodding up to the loft day after day, week after week to struggle with ideas and words when you want to be somewhere, anywhere else, so it was great to celebrate the against-the-odds completion. Felt tremendous gratitude for all the support I received and tremendous sense of achievement – as I said to Leeds Met reporter:

http://www.leedsmet.ac.uk/news/index_lecturer_returns_PRPhD_190711.htm

I will continue to blog from www.johannafawkes.com and will start a diary about the Australian adventure, but this chapter has come to an end. Thanks.

July 18, 2011

Article in Propublica about PR and Journalism ethics

Jo Fawkes — Fri, 10 Jun 2011 10:25:50 +0000

The article below reprises familiar discussions about shrinking newsrooms and expanding PR operations, as the comments point out this can cast journalists as unfailing seekers after truth thwarted by the evil empires of PR. But it does seem that the necessary balance has gone so that the challenge to the corporate ‘line’ is no longer mounted, as it takes resources of time and effort that the 24/7 news cycle rarely allows. In this debate, as always, economics trumps ethics.

pr-industry-fills-vacuum-left-by-shrinking-newsrooms

Jung’s centenary – Guardian article

Jo Fawkes — Sun, 05 Jun 2011 11:51:30 +0000

Jung’s was born June 6, 1861 so not surprising his name is back in the news – tho perhaps surprising that there’s not more. Here’s the first part of a recent article in the Guardian, a useful introduction to the man and his work

carl-jung-ego-self

blog connecting inner and outer spheres

Jo Fawkes — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 16:24:01 +0000

agenda-for-a-new-economy-by-david-korten-the-face-before-i-was-born-by-llewellyn-vaughan-lee.htmll

Nice post from Philip Young

Jo Fawkes — Fri, 13 May 2011 15:45:48 +0000

more comments on the Burson-Mastellar mess – including references to my work!Mediations post

BM/facebook ethics & PR mess

Jo Fawkes — Thu, 12 May 2011 23:23:49 +0000

PRSA chair comments on BM/Facebook
scandal

Leading US PR firm Burson Marstellar (BM) has been badmouthing Google on behalf of Facebook and trying to disguise both the relationship and the activities. The PRSA uses this as an opportunity to point out that low membership profile in BM may be a factor in low ethical responsibility. It would be interesting to research this correlation. There are so many factors: membership of professional body PLUS knowledge of code of conduct PLUS willingness to abide by code PLUS cultural/social environment to support such decisions. Suspect the latter is the crunch factor – ethical leadership isn’t written on paper

Are mental patients carrying the shadow of their nurses?

Jo Fawkes — Mon, 21 Mar 2011 15:58:10 +0000

BBC today reports on University of East Anglia research which suggests that mental patients’ reduced life expectancy is attributable to physical attributes like diet, smoking, lack of exercise and high alcohol use – see

Mental health nurses \’set bad example to patients

The research suggests that patients are mirroring nurses’ life styles but apparently with high mortality rates. Can’t help wondering if the patients are somehow paying the price for rejected or denied behaviours in nurses? This would be classic collective shadow dynamics in Jung’s view, or a cultural complex, as Singer and Kimbles (2004) call it.

Will try and get hold of this report and the other recent research into the treatment of the elderly by their ‘carers’. An over-attachment to images of the angelic nurse has a lot to answer for, it seems – for nurses, of course, as well as their patients. And how can they or any other group with such responsibility begin to address the ethical issues raised here, if the reality is invisible?

Reflections on attaining a PhD, including vivas, mock and real

Jo Fawkes — Mon, 31 Jan 2011 01:06:39 +0000

Haven’t posted in a while as felt need to shut up a bit before viva. That was two and half weeks ago and I’m still digesting doctoral status – feels very quietly, deeply satisfying, an almost private pleasure. Too soon to know what difference it will make, if any, in the big wide world. Anyway I’m too exhausted to venture into that world, having been poleaxed into catatonia since viva – not entirely surprising after three and a half years hard hard slog, particularly past eighteen months.

The most gratifying aspect of the viva was the fact that three respected experts (Profs Keeble and McKie and Dr Cohen) so deeply engaged with the material, met it at the place where I hoped people would meet it. This sounds obvious but the mock viva was so disappointing, made me realise that even accounting for the ‘worse case’ scenario that framed it, 3 people (including two supervisors) could end up asking reductionist, marginal questions, locked in their own fields of study. At the real thing, the examiners saw beyond their own borders as to how each of the fields under investigation might benefit from cross-fertilisation. They then asked really interesting questions that expanded rather than shrank the debate, like the tension between the critical approach that I’ve adopted in most of my writing to date and the more inclusive, less confrontational attitude suggested by a Jungian attitude. Spot on! Have felt this tug throughout the writing, but end up plumping for the latter (post-critical hermeneutics, I believe) – but emphasising that this is not about homogeneity of the Disney Its A Small World variety, more a recognition that at a deeper level the divisions are not so absolute after all. There was also some discussion about Bernays and propaganda. Lots of agreement about it being well written apart from an overlong intro which needs cutting – other suggestions are up to me to include or not from the discussion: will take on board the need to modify or expand my criticism of the critical approach; expand section on propaganda; increase references to non-corporate PR and to locate the whole debate emphatically in the current crisis. This is very helpful – allows me to re-emphasise central points. The examiners were also great in letting me know from the off that it was a PhD – these minor amendments will only take a few days to make then the MS can be bound and lost in the depths of the library. Also lots of encouragement for the personal afterword in which I describe my own journey in and out of shadows – not a traditional academic thing to do, but one they welcomed as part of a general move to acknowledge the personal aspects of academic writing.

I think I would recommend anyone to think hard about how useful a mock viva might be. On the one hand it made me realise that just turning up with knowledge of the thesis but no prepared defence might be a terrible error; on the other hand I did not need an opening statement or a defence of methodology in the event and did not refer to the pages of prompts I prepared before the final viva (though it did clarify my key arguments). And the somewhat hostile effect of the mock was demoralising, especially the recommendation that I prepare a list of practical recommendations, despite having declared throughout that this was not the objective of this thesis. I suspect however that if the thesis is published (as now seems likely) this will represent a great chunk of potential readers. Luckily there will also be some like the examiners who will make the whole effort worthwhile. There will still be a journey to publication and beyond so I will keep this blog going even though its main task, as a PhD diary, is, astonishingly, accomplished.

one week on..

Jo Fawkes — Wed, 17 Nov 2010 01:43:36 +0000

Thoughts on PhD process from one week’s distance:

I learned how to convert pdf files to word – a challenge in the early hours of submission day (reverse move is easy)
I learned how to extract my large Endnote library to word = really hard work
I finished something that nearly overwhelmed me earlier in the year, when I was already exhausted after only a couple of chapters. While I didn’t go out much, haven’t seen friends or really done anything else in last few weeks/months, I managed to keep enough balance not to get ill. On the other hand, while it has been wonderful being out of my study and in San Francisco this week, I’ve been too tired to go out at night – just beginning to feel rested and looking forward to deeper rest in the next fortnight on Point Reyes peninsula.
The thesis is full of mistakes, misunderstandings, self-taught errors and assumptions. That’s OK. It’s the nature of the beast to be an introductory work, despite being part of a ‘terminal’ qualification. If I get to turn it into a book, there will be much to change, cut, enhance – it is the record of my learning, so my criticisms evidence the fact that I have learned from the process.
I’m looking forward to the practice and actual vivas – means someone else will have read it. V. interested to see what others make of it.

Aberdeen adventure 2

Jo Fawkes — Sun, 24 Oct 2010 11:36:53 +0000

Interesting evening at Robert Gordon University where the CIPR/Grampian PR group held the session on PR ethics. Good turn out with a group of MA PR students and people from different sectors. My bit went OK – hard to know if it was too academic but kept relating it to my own everyday PR experience with very few lit references. But still a sense overall that ethics baffles most people and they don;t spend much time thinking about it – work is too hectic for such indulgence. Students stopped to ask questions at the end and seemed interested.

Most interesting element was contribution of Matt Taylor a senior BP comms guy who seemed thoughtful and interested in the issues raised, as well as raising issues from BP experience. I quoted a BP copywriter who felt betrayed by Gulf of Mexico disaster and he seemed to ‘get’ that conflict between personal and employer values. In PR you are really close to embodying the values of the organisation, so these things matter. Like me, he seemed someone who needs to believe in their work – there are lots like that in PR, though the image of the indifferent agency dominates. If I can get any post doc funding I want to interview people like him to see how self image, image of PR and ethics interlock.

Aberdeen Travelodge was grim – and not cheap - and train back packed but managed to squeeze a quick spin round the Aberdeen Maritime Museum, which was brilliant – fantastic building, full of fascinating information and artefacts, including 3 story model of an oil rig. Brief glimpse into Aberdeen world – that and busy docks visible from museum – a sense of a town that still labours physically, run on ships and machines and cranes, something missing from cities I know now – can just remember the sight of the cranes over London docks from childhood but most cities are just offices and shops now.

Aberdeen Maritime Museum