Theoretical Underpinnings for PR (part 2)
by:
Charles Lamson
Persuaders and Their Appeals
We have all practiced persuading others to do our bidding since we discovered as babies that crying brought us a bottle. As adults we persuade people to come with us to see a film they do not want to see or to take us to pick up our car at the shop or to come for us when the car breaks down. Although these may be considered deeds of friendship, they are actually negotiations. We used something in the bargaining process, stated or unstated
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Personal Persuaders Organizations and authorities, family members and what sociologists call "significant others" - people you care about - exercise leverage over you. Organizations that you belong to ask for money regularly and you usually give. They ask you to obey certain codes of conduct and to be present for certain events, and you usually comply. You may belong to the organization for social, religious or political reasons or for economic reasons (as with the organization that employs you). In the workplace, certain people are in positions of authority - those who have special responsibilities. When you work for someone or when you are a conscientious member of an organization you generally comply with the requests of those in authority. You also do generally what close friends and members of your family ask you to do. Recognition of authorities in families is long-lived when it grows into respect or when someone has the leverage of purchase (that is inheritance). Often personal persuaders can get you to do things contrary to your own desires, best interests or values. Their persuasive control is potent (This is PR: The Realities of Public Relations 9th Edition by Doug Newsom, Judy VanSlyke Turk and Dean Kruckeberg, pg 123).
Interpersonal Persuaders Less potent and influential are the interpersonal persuaders. These are found in the mass media in the forms of editorials and advertisements. They are found in the content of various types of entertainment and among persons who perform. They are found as well in educational and governmental institutions and in the commercial institutions that we depend on for goods and services. In some countries all of these may be operated or controlled by government. These interpersonal institutions may persuade you through your fear of the punishments that they have available for noncompliance or because of the interpersonal persuasiveness of their representatives. An individual teacher in a school or an individual sales clerk in a favorite store moves the relationship beyond the impersonal and into the personal
(Newsom, VanSlyke Turk and Kruckeberg, pg.123)
Some of these interpersonal persuaders qualify as opinion-makers because they influence significant numbers of people. Some are opinion-makers because of their public status (as in the case of celebrities and other newsmakers), and others because they manage the news. Some of the most visible opinion-makers are both public figures and news managers (Newsom, VanSlyke Turk and Kruckeberg, pg.123)
Opinion-Makers and News Managers A news manager may be someone who creates an event that becomes news when it is made to happen usually on a carefully detailed and prearranged schedule. The event may be Mickey Mouse's visit to a children's hospital or the terrorist attacks on a major city building or system somewhere. It may continue over an extended period of time as did the 1979-1981 hostage crisis at the American University in Tehran, Iran. A news manager may also be someone who focuses media attention on an event that might otherwise be overlooked. In addition, a news manager may attempt to control information as President Clinton tried to do in the Kenneth Starr Grand Jury. This is not new. As media critic William L. Rivers noted, "Nothing is quite so absurd as thinking of news control by government as a modern phenomenon... Information policy has been at the very center of governing the United States from the beginning (Newsom, VanSlyke Turk and Kruckeberg, pg.123).
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