Ethics smethics

The chapter on ethics doesn't have much else to say other than "ethics are important." But ultimately, we face an ontological crisis; without transcendent moral referents, without even the possibility of agreeing upon a universal ethical structure that applies to everybody everywhere always, ethics, morals, and all related decisions ultimately become existential. Which is to say, personal self-interest constrained only by individual utilitarianism. Bellah said as much in "Habits of the Heart," and Sarte and Camus noted the absence of ethics in much of their work. In other words, the question remains "Why communicate risk?" The answer is ultimately subjective and therefore meaningless.

Risk Communication Legislation

Wes Jamison PUR 6934 Reaction blog #2 Lundgren and McMakin chapter 3

Chapter 3 is both satisfying and frustrating at the same time in that in states the obvious (e.g. government requires risk communication in certain contexts), provides useful, concise examples (e.g. CERCLA/Superfund risk communication requirements), and yet concludes with a nebulous statement regarding environmental scanning (e.g. check with authorities and your company about what is required) that goes without saying for the experienced practitioner.
The authors conclude that government entities have required risk communications, and a further reading of background materials provides context. Many of the federally mandated requirements emerged in response to previous crises, and the example of the Superfund regulations requiring risk communications is a clear example. Furthermore, a reading of the policy literature related to risk (Douglas and Wildavsky’s Risk and Culture, Clarke and McCool’s Staking Out the Terrain) note that many of the liberal political ideals of the 1960’s and 1970’s became enshrined in legislative and regulatory processes. For example, liberalization of interest group and individual access to previously private, privileged information was a response to the Watergate scandal, The Pentagon Papers, and other exposé’s of the abuse of power and knowledge, which led to the Freedom of Information Act and state-level sunshine laws. Clearly these laws were intended to vest various publics with information regarding potential impacts that affected them, and Lundgren and McMakin do an admirable job of noting the practical outcomes of regulatory legislation---that is, organizations that deal with hazard and risk should anticipate and expect regulation compelling them to disclose and unveil risk information via a variety of processes and venues.
More importantly, the readings provide little insight into the background, history, and presuppositions of the legislation---the context, if you will---and give short shrift to the implications of that legislation. For instance, Wildavsky notes in The Rise of Radical Egalitarianism that the philosophical underpinning of enlightenment humanism fueled the regulatory surge of the 1960’s and 1970’s. He notes that liberal legislators in that era naively assumed that all parties would be good faith actors, that reason and rationalism would carry the day, and that our society would continue to reflect presuppositional value agreement, and thus retain the ability to recognize legislation as legitimate. However, he also notes that a concurrent trend undermined governmental authority: embodied in bumper stickers admonishing citizens to “Question Authority,” the era was marked by a distrust of institutions that would be responsible for implementation of reforms. In other words, Wildavsky argues that the progeny of the 60’s and 70’s not only included reformist legislation regarding risk, but the undermining of institutional credibility and legitimacy. The effect was that the very institutions vested with protecting us came to be seen as increasingly illegitimate!
Hunter and Berger support this observation. Hunter first noted in Culture Wars that epistemological, cosmological and ontological consensus were disintegrating in western culture and America in particularly, and Berger noted in The Limits of Social Cohesion that such levels of consensus were no longer possible given the pervasiveness of pluralism. Indeed, much of Beck’s Risk Society reflected this idea that historical antecedents regarding cultural mediators of risk---those institutions in which we vested trust to help us ‘make sense’ of risk and reality---have collapsed or been delegitimized.
This is all by way of saying that risk communication is built upon a series of questionable presuppositions and ideals, and the book scarcely scratches the surface regarding them. Likewise, the authors’ discussion of the regulatory regime regarding risk communication could have used some reference to the literature on the social and political context of the legislation itself. If the assumptions behind the regulations and legislation are false or no longer hold, then processes to manage risk communication that are built upon those assumptions will likewise fail. In other words, the practitioner’s lack of knowledge regarding social context handicaps their ability to practice: with the proliferation of new media and the fragmentation of social structures and institutions, the ideal of an informed public engaged in rationale debate about risk seems naïve and ill-informed. Indeed, as many risk practitioners will testify, providing information regarding risk, although required by law, does little to ameliorate crisis.

The Role of Ethics

A quick summary of L & M, Chapter 5

This chapter discusses how ethics play a role in risk communication. “Questions like how much information to release, to whom should it be released and who makes those decisions are connected with the dissemination of any type of information” (p. 73). The authors discuss the various types of ethical issues that can arise and relevant questions that need to be considered. The types of ethical issues are social, organizational and personal.

Social ethics – This category describes ethical considerations dictated by society such as the sociopolitical environment; who determines what is a risk and to whom it will be communicated; ethnic and social fairness of the risk; consequences of misunderstood messages; and addressing stigma of risk situations.

Organizational ethics – This category of ethical issues relates to how organizations establish their moral codes. Specific instances are: legitimacy of representation; designating the primary audience; releasing information; and compiling with established regulations and guidelines.

Personal ethics – This category encompasses the individual risk communicator’s set of morals and beliefs for instance: using persuasion, the role of the communicator, and deciding between personal and organizational ethics.

This brief overview illustrates the vital role ethics play in risk communication. Without a strong moral compass, organizations and individuals can actually diminish any communication efforts already established or planned. As in previous chapters, the authors stress the importance of audience involvement with forming or evaluating risk communication (others bloggers have also mentioned the role of the audience). The concept of audience analysis seems extremely important in order to understand what they already know, what they need to know, and how best to inform them.

Several of the social ethical issues arise from a lack of appreciation for who the audience is. “The dilemma for those who are communicating risk is how to meet the needs of all audiences” (p. 86). Is the appropriate audience to reach the one at the most risk, the one with the least amount of information, or the one who will make decisions on how to manage the risk? This question must be answered by risk communicators.

The “fairness of risk” issue addresses how certain ethnic groups can be overlooked or ignored in planning risk communication efforts. With the changing demographics in our county, especially the increasing Hispanic population, it is vital organizations begin to pay attention to the growing minority groups. Information for these audience segments needs to be in different languages and consider the cultural factors that will influence messages. The FEMA web site does a good job by prominently displaying the Español link that takes the reader to a page in Spanish.

It seems to me that personal ethics greatly influence the other two categories of risk communication. If individuals choose to behave ethically, this will translate to their organization and beyond to society. What then can be done to provide communicators with the appropriate skills to make ethical decisions? How often should employees be required to review their own, and the organization’s, code of ethics? Obviously, the book cannot go into the amount of detail required to answer these, and many other relevant questions, about the role of ethics in risk communication.

Get me a lawyer! Chapter 3 summary

I am going to go out on a limb here and tell everyone to read Liz Felter’s blog for a brief summary of each law that mandates risk communication. It would be silly for me to post the exact same thing. After all, laws can only be summarized in so many ways.

What is important to emphasize from this chapter, is that as risk communicators we need to understand the laws within the context of the organization we are working for. There are different laws for different areas of potential risk; find yours, grab a lawyer friend, and discuss what it means for your organization.

We need to offer our expertise and take part in discussions about the implementation of these laws too. Many of the laws require some sort of “community relations plan,” opportunity for community feedback, or public meetings. I honestly can not think of a harder part of the job. The researcher in me would want to conduct these interviews (actually I’d prefer focus groups) with some rigidity to ensure I received a variety of opinions. I have never worked in the field, but I would imagine it is easier to get at “the loud minority” group of people who probably are not exactly representative of the population. Who goes to these public meetings any way? I argue that most people do not care until there is a problem or crisis. People that attend these public meetings are probably your higher educated, higher income folks. How do we involve minority groups from the community? I think this problem is why “dangerous” plants/factories are found in poor parts of communities. All of the wealthier people went to the meetings and said “Hey, not in our town. But Shantyville looks like a better place for your risky operations!”

I was particularly interested in the section on occupational safety and health act. I took care of a variety of veterinary lab animals for Purdue University and dealt with Material Safety Data Sheets on a daily basis. I did not know there was no formalized standard for these sheets. There should be! If a crisis occurs and someone needs to read that sheet quickly, they should all be the same, so the person knows immediately where to look for the quick information they need. The authors point out one portion of the standard that is missed by many organizations: “the requirement for a ‘written hazard communication program’ that describes what steps will be taken to ensure that workers receive the information about the chemicals in their work environment.” Purdue must have had a communication program as stipulated, because it was part of their training. Every room had a training program which went over chemicals in the room, MSDS’s, and safety procedures. Discussing these hazards and safety protocols with my manager for every room helped me remember them much better than reading a manual.

The take-home message from chapter three is that we need to make our organization’s directors aware of these laws, but also emphasize the need to do more than the law minimally requires. Just getting by is not going to cut it.

Chapter 3: Laws that Mandate Risk Communication

It is imperative that risk communicators demonstrate adequate knowledge or awareness of policies, rules and regulations guiding risk communication effort. Chapter 3 provides an overview of few select legislative instruments and highlights basic requirements relevant to the risk communication process in the US. From an international perspective, it should be noted that the policy and legislative environment differ from country to country, between governments (federal, state or local), and between sectors. Knowledge and compliance to various regulatory requirements is necessary because it could help avoid unnecessary delays in risk communication efforts. As outlined in Chapter 4 on Constraints to Effective Risk Communication, if regulatory requirements are not followed, they can indeed constrain the organization’s communication of risk. It is therefore necessary that the communicator know the internal and external regulatory environment for effective risk communication. Apart from constraining effective communication of risk, failure to comply with regulatory requirements may have adverse results such as protracted litigation process (by the public, individuals or regulating agencies); can weaken the communicator’s potential of justifying and attracting funding; and/or risk the operations’ closure or fines (p. 29). Over and above these, the organization as well as the communicator may suffer trust and credibility erosion.

Most laws and regulations are housed within different sectors and the risk communicator should be aware of the relevant and applicable sectors and provisions within the various instruments which must be followed. Failure to do so may derail the communication process. Most policies, laws and regulations outlines procedures, processes, conditions and standards to be maintained and followed before starting the risk communication effort. There are also protocols in place within certain regulatory agencies to be observed. Some of the laws and regulations applicable to risk communication in the United States are tabulated in Table 3-1 (p. 44). When dealing with risk communication of environmental issues, the communicator should ensure that the relevant provisions of applicable laws such as the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability act are adequately complied to. Other applicable laws and regulations necessary in communicating environmental risks include the Executive Order 12898, 13054, the National Environmental Policy act, Natural Resource Damage Assessment, Resource Conservation and Recovery Act and Risk Management Program rule.

A different set of rules, regulations and procedures exists for health communication, industrial hygiene, hazardous and solid wastes. Risk communicators should always check with the regulatory agencies at federal, state and local government for relevant pieces of legislature. Each country will have a unique set of legislative requirements to which a communicator should be mindful and aware of. The rules and regulations will guide and the communication process to the benefit of the organization. When rules and regulations are followed appropriately, risks of litigations will be minimized. It is there necessary that risk communicators are aware and aligns their communication efforts to the relevant legislative requirements and processes within the organization and government.

Get a lawyer: Chapter 3 discussion

I am going to go out on a limb here and tell everyone to read Liz Felter’s blog for a brief summary of each law that mandates risk communication. It would be silly for me to post the exact same thing. After all, laws can only be summarized in so many ways.

What is important to emphasize from this chapter, is that as risk communicators we need to understand the laws within the context of the organization we are working for. There are different laws for different areas of potential risk; find yours, grab a lawyer friend, and discuss what it means for your organization.

We need to offer our expertise and take part in discussions about the implementation of these laws too. Many of the laws require some sort of “community relations plan,” opportunity for community feedback, or public meetings. I honestly can not think of a harder part of the job. The researcher in me would want to conduct these interviews (actually I’d prefer focus groups) with some rigidity to ensure I received a variety of opinions. I have never worked in the field, but I would imagine it is easier to get at “the loud minority” group of people who probably are not exactly representative of the population. Who goes to these public meetings any way? I argue that most people do not care until there is a problem or crisis. People that attend these public meetings are probably your higher educated, higher income folks. How do we involve minority groups from the community? I think this problem is why “dangerous” plants/factories are found in poor parts of communities. All of the wealthier people went to the meetings and said “Hey, not in our town. But Shantyville looks like a better place for your risky operations!”

I was particularly interested in the section on occupational safety and health act. I took care of a variety of veterinary lab animals for Purdue University and dealt with Material Safety Data Sheets on a daily basis. I did not know there was no formalized standard for these sheets. There should be! If a crisis occurs and someone needs to read that sheet quickly, they should all be the same, so the person knows immediately where to look for the quick information they need. The authors point out one portion of the standard that is missed by many organizations: “the requirement for a ‘written hazard communication program’ that describes what steps will be taken to ensure that workers receive the information about the chemicals in their work environment.” Purdue must have had a communication program as stipulated, because it was part of their training. Every room had a training program which went over chemicals in the room, MSDS’s, and safety procedures. Discussing these hazards and safety protocols with my manager for every room helped me remember them much better than reading a manual.

The take-home message from chapter three is that we need to make our organization’s directors aware of these laws, but also emphasize the need to do more than the law minimally requires. Just getting by is not going to cut it.

Liz Felter

Summary of L & M – chapter 3 Laws that Mandate Risk Communication

It may seem that a good risk communications plan is common sense but many it is conducted because of laws and regulatory requirements.

Certain types of organizations are mandated by law to have a risk communication effort. It is important that when working for an organization that you know what type of regulations may affect it. Along with major federal laws many states have even more stringent laws about risk communication requirements and also are responsible for enforcing the federal mandates.

This chapter lists a few of these major laws;
The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA) or Superfund. These requires specific procedures be implemented to assess the release of hazardous substances at inactive waste sites. This procedure must involve the public when determining acceptable clean-up recommendations. It involves several key communication pieces.
A Community Relations Plan - incorporates information about the site to include demographics, concerns and beliefs about the site and the best methods of communicating these concerns and collecting input from the public about clean-up. The public is interviewed about their views in a location they feel most comfortable. It’s updated yearly throughout the process usually over an 8 year period.
The Administrative Record – support documents and research used to make decisions about the clean-up procedures. It’s housed in a location with easy access for the public.
Information Repository – contains site information, site activities and general Superfund information. Also housed with easy access for the public.
Advertisement of Public Involvement Opportunities – Fact sheets, news releases, and proposed plans to alert the public for involvement opportunities.

Emergency Planning and Right to Know Act – This law requires information about hazardous chemicals in a community and notification and an emergency plan if there were to be a leak be provided to the public. Each year quantities of the chemicals and reports of any spills must also be available to the public and the regulatory agencies monitoring them.

Executive Order 12898, Environmental Justice in Minority Populations – Requires that disproportional human health or environmental risks to minorities or low-income populations be considered. It was recognized that many hazardous waste sites were being located in minority and low income areas. Human and environmental risks must be communicated in a language understood by the people that could be affected and easily available to the public.

Executive Order 13045, Reduce Environmental Health and Safety Risks to Children – This order requires that any risks to children needs to be communicated well to the community at risk.

National Environmental Policy Act – Mandate environmental impact assessments. Three categories included are; Categorical exclusion report says that it will not have an effect, environmental assessment says whether it will or will not have an effect and environmental impact statement says yes it will have a significant effect and impact on the environment. If the environmental impact statement comes back as significant impact on the environment then you have a whole lot of CYA to do.

Natural Resource Damage Assessment – this report basically determines what part of the environment will be impacted such as birds, fish, plants, wildlife, ground water, drinking water, etc.

Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA) - this act was passed to keep employees safe while on the job. It set limits of exposure to potentially hazardous chemicals and other occupational exposures.

Resource Conservation and Recovery Act – encourages public involvement in attempting to resolve problems related to solid waste disposal including hazardous waste.

Risk Management Rule/Clean Air Act Amendment of 1990 – facilities must have on file a report of response to different scenarios in the event of an accident at their location.

Privacy Rule – Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996. This act outlines administrative steps policies and procedures to safeguard individuals’ personal private health information in electronic or other form including oral communication.

In closing I think you’ll see how important it is to know what type of organization you work for, what laws affect them and how they prefer to communicate to the public in order to follow the mandates that pertain to the operation.

Risk Communication and Ethics - Chapter 5

I thought i was going to be writing too early.. I am glad to see that i am not the first one to blog.

Chapter 5 is about ethical issues regarding risk and crisis communication. Ethics is hard to define and it is subjective because people have personal morality and ethical rules, which change from person to person. Ethical issues arise in risk and crisis communication when one has to consider concerns about how much information to release, to whom it should be released, and who makes those decisions

Ethics is divided into 3 different types: social, organizational, and personal ethics. Social ethics are the codes of conduct by which the members of the society judge our behavior. These social ethics and approaches change as the society evolves.

As public participation in risk and crisis decision making and communication is gaining popularity, risk communication starts to resemble symmetrical communication, including the ideas and concerns of the public into the decision making process. Since the 1980s, members of the society feel like they need to take part in the decision making process. Public involvement, which means involving the public in all aspects of risk management and communication, is what the general public values. People’s concerns and perceptions must be taken into account when making decisions about risk management and communication.

As the social ethics evolve and public participation becomes the norm, people try to be more involved in all aspects of the risk and crisis communication process. “If the public demands the right to be involved in risk decisions throughout the cycle of assessment, management, and communication, then is it appropriate for organizations to stick to the old ways of making decisions and informing the public afterward?” (p. 76).

Organizations need to consider involving the public when they plan to design and conduct risk and crisis communication. Public input can help an organization to be successful in their communication effort, especially when they include public’s views, concerns and perceptions starting from the risk assessment process. “Those who are communicating risk must determine audience concerns and perceptions of the risk and help decide how to factor these concerns and perceptions into the risk assessment process” (p.77).

A major question the authors ask about risk and crisis communication and the importance of public involvement is: what happens if messages are misunderstood. “Who is to blame when a worker misunderstands a safety procedure and is injured?” Who’s fault is it? That is why you need to do research about how the audience thinks and involve them in the risk and crisis communication decision process.

Another crucial issue regarding organizational ethics is organizational constraints regarding releasing information and organizational structures which may not allow the risk and crisis communicator to act as freely as he/she wishes and may not allow public’s point of view to be involved in the risk assessment and management processes. This might be a problem since it hurts public participation in risk and crisis decision making. “Audiences generally want as much as information as they can as early in the process as possible. However, organizations often release as little as possible as late as possible”

Personal ethics, on the other hand, are the hardest among the three types of ethics to determine and control. What should be the role of the risk and crisis communicator is a major concern in personal ethics. The role of the risk or crisis communicator depends on organizational and personal factors. “If the organization recognizes that those who are communicating risk are a vital part of the risk assessment team, the range of roles available will be wider than in a organization that views risk communication as a necessary evil.

Brief Overview of Ethics with feedback

Ethical Issues of Risk Communication

Issues that dictate the ethical components:

Social Ethics

Social ethics comprise the code of conduct by which society can judge our behavior. (L&M 74)

Sociopolitical Environment’s Influence

Society’s social political environment changes and so does the ethics that govern the field of risk communications.

The Use of the Risk Idiom

Important “gate keeping” issues come into play when identifying what a risk is, or to whom the risk will be communicated to (L&M 76)

Involving the Public

Advantages
Public participation will ensure decision will last concerning risk
Can increase organization’s credibility

Disadvantages
Risk managers may resist because of the fear of loss of control
Requires more time at the beginning of the process.

Fairness of the Risk

Another social ethical issue is whether the risks are spread equitably over all ethnic and social groups. (L&M pg 79)

~Feedback on material~

One of the most important questions posed in this week’s material on ethics, is “What should the role be of the communicator in the risk information process?” (L&M pg 90)

Questions like these seem to encompass the arena of ethics in risk communications. It is important for a risk communicator to understand the nature of the communication as well as the messages that are being relayed from them to their intended audience.

In order to maintain organization or even source credibility it is very important that risk communicators do not try to “sell” (L&M 90) the audience on a risk decision.

It seems that most risk communication is designed by theentity that wishes to expose people to the risk or, occasionally, mandatedby a government agency with intense participation by the regulated industry. Thus the choice to make ethical decisions lies ultimately with the risk communicator.

The true test lies also when organizational ethics conflicts with that of the personal ethics of a risk communicator, creating an interesting dilemma.

Ten Lessons for Managing Uncertainty in Crisis

I was assigned to read chapter two in the Ulmer et al. text about “Managing Crisis Uncertainty.” The chapter defines uncertainty as “the inability to determine the present or predict the future” (Ulmer, 2007, p. 18). Uncertainty in a crisis situation is one of the most difficult things for an organization to deal with properly. The chapter provides ten lessons in order manage the uncertainty that usually accompanies a major crisis. Since all of us are not reading this chapter, I broke down the chapter into the ten lessons to provide you with the “highlights.”
Lesson one is “organization members must accept that a crisis can start quickly and unexpectedly” (p. 18). This seemed somewhat obvious to me, but I guess it is an important thing to remember in practice since the simplest concepts can at times be the easiest to look over when planning.
Lesson two: An average solution is not the best formula for responding to a crisis situation. Responding to a crisis like an organization would respond to an everyday occurrence is not going to make the public feel more comfortable about the current situation.
Lesson three: “Threat is perceptual” (p. 20). It does not matter what the threat actually is, it is what the threat is perceived as that is important. The book gives an example of the Y2K scare as an example of real threat versus perceived threat.
Lesson four: A quick response is important to relieving the uncertainties of the public, whether you have anything new to say or not. This can create stress for the communicator because they “must communicate about events with little, no, or competing information about how the crisis happened, who is affected, and whether the event was managed effectively” (p. 21).
Lesson five: “Organizations should not purposely heighten the ambiguity of a crisis to deceive or distract the public” (p. 25). Communication ambiguity is defined by the chapter as “multiple interpretations of a crisis event” (p. 24). Increasing ambiguity is only ethical when it aids in the eventual understanding of the crisis situation.
Lesson six: “Be prepared to defend your interpretation of the evidence surrounding a crisis” (p. 25).
Lesson seven: Remember that if your organization’s intentions were not honest or honorable prior to the crisis, the chances of recovery are slim to none. In other words, if there was intent to cause a crisis, the truth will come out and the stakeholders will not be very forgiving because, “There is a clear between an organization having an accident and an organization having an accident and an organization knowingly causing or allowing crisis to occur” (p. 26).
Lesson eight: If the organization is not responsible for the crisis, evidence must be gathered to find out who actually is. Simply claiming no fault in the incident will not satisfy anyone.
Lesson nine: Simulating a crisis is the best way to prepare for one as a professional communicator. Let’s face it, getting crisis experience for the first time would not be pleasant in the first place, but without adequate preparation the results could be disastrous. Simulation exercises will make a tough situation a little bit easier to handle.
Lesson ten: A crisis can completely alter the belief systems of the organization. An example that the book gives are the events of 9/11 and how it completely changed our outlook on the world, the way we do business, and the way we view our personal safety.
Overall, I think these lessons are an important checklist for any professional communicator to have on hand even if they initially seem simplistic. Because, when a crisis occurs, it is easy to get frantic and forget the most basic principles.
The question(s) I would like to pose to the class: Do you think these ten lessons are adequate for managing uncertainty? To those of you with more professional experience, I’m sure you have learned more lessons in managing uncertainty than just these ten. What are a few of those lessons?

Partial readings for January 23

I'm pasting this in anyway, but all the work I did in creating special spacing, margins, varying fonts sizes for section headings, and artsy fartsy bullet points, didn't hold once I imported the file into this field. It all kind of runs together. Just a warning.

LESSONS ON MANAGING CRISIS UNCERTAINTY
Chapter 2 in Effective Crisis Communication (moving from crisis to opportunity)
Ulmer, Sellnow and Seeger (2007).

Uncertainty – the inability to determine the present or predict the future
Organizational crisis – a specific, unexpected, and nonroutine event or series of events that
create(s) high levels of uncertainty and threaten or are perceived to threaten an
organization’s high priority goals

3 characteristics of crisis
Surprise
Threat
Short response time

Crisis communication demands
Manage uncertainty
provide consistent voice
identify cause of crisis
contact all affected
determine current and future risks
Respond to crisis
reduce uncertainty
coordinate activities
disseminate information
Resolve crisis
compensate victims
renew organization’s reputation
grieve and memorialize events (if appropriate)
Learn from crisis
enhance safety and prevention
review industry standards
enhance community dialogue

Crisis response
Not good (generally): routine procedures (i.e., firings, minimizing scope of event,
shifting blame)
Better: recognize and address uncertainty and novelty of crisis

Threat and uncertainty
Perceived threat contributes to levels of uncertainty during organizational crises
Managing uncertainty involves developing consensus among stakeholder concerning
potential threat

Stakeholders
Any group that has an interest, right, claim or ownership in an organization
Primary—those whose actions can be harmful or beneficial to an organization: employees,
investors, customers, suppliers, government, community
Secondary—those who can affect or be affected by the actions of the organization: media,
activist groups, competitors
Organization must communicate to stakeholders once crisis is defined

Short response time complicates uncertainty
Factors
Lack of basic crisis preparation
Novelty and magnitude of event affects information flow—slow to accumulate, assemble,

disseminate information

Crisis communicators should be prepared to answer:
What happened?
Who is responsible?
Why did it happen?
Who is affected?
What should we do?
Who can we trust?
What should we say?
How should we say it?
(I think these last two must be internal. I can’t imagine the public asking
these of an organization; authors a bit vague here)
There may not be answers for all questions, but messages should be consistent

Communication ambiguity
During and in the aftermath of a crisis, conflicting arguments in determining responsibility, courses of action, who is affected, and issues of compensation, coupled with regulatory and safety decisions made with regard to the crisis can create multiple interpretations of an event, termed by the authors as communication ambiguity
The authors’ statements on ambiguity (pg. 24):
Ambiguity is ethical when it contributes to the complete understanding of an issue by posing alternative views that are based on complete and unbiased data that aim to inform
Ambiguity is unethical if it poses alternative interpretations using biased or incomplete information that aims to deceive
(I would argue that ambiguity is a neutral construct. It’s a condition devoid of value. Adding to ambiguity by amplifying uncertainty is a course of action—that’s unethical. Ambiguity in and of itself is a benign condition.)

Ambiguity can arise from 3 areas after an organizational crisis:
Evidence – Whose scientific evidence should the public believe?
Intent – Did the organization knowingly commit the crisis?
Responsibility – Did the crisis originate within or outside the organization?
Crisis communicators should be ready and willing to defend their interpretation of a crisis,

and practice good, honest, ethical conduct before and after a crisis develops. They should

make sure they build a case for why the organization is not responsible for the crisis—if

indeed it is not

Organizational structures can deteriorate or collapse following a crisis
Crises “thrust people into unfamiliar roles, leave some roles unfilled, make the task more ambiguous, discredit the role system, and make all of these changes in a context in which small events can combine into something monstrous,” pg. 28
Organizations should implement training to prepare for uncertainty, threats, and communication demands
If crisis is extreme or severe, both organizational and personal belief and sense-making structures can collapse, leading to dramatic shifts in how organizations manage both unfolding and future crises

Chapter summary
Communicating in the midst or in the wake of a crisis is unlike communicating at other times. During crisis situations, tremendous constraints may inhibit an organization’s efforts to communicate effectively, yet the organization’s stakeholders need critical information in order to make informed decisions. Constraints may include lack of information about the severity of the problem, difficulty in identifying those affected by the crisis, and unavailability of accurate and appropriate information. Crucial decisions must be made under stressful conditions, while image and credibility is at risk.

Lessons on uncertainty and crisis communications
Organization members must expect the unexpected
Organizations should not respond to crises with routine solutions
Threat is perceptual
Crisis communicators must communicate early and often following a crisis regardless of the availability of critical information
Organizations should not purposely heighten the ambiguity of a crisis to deceive or distract the public
Crisis communicators should be prepared to defend their interpretation of the evidence surrounding a crisis
Without good intentions prior to a crisis, recovery is difficult or impossible
If the organization is not responsible for a crisis, communicators must build a case for who is responsible and why
Organizations must prepare for uncertainty through simulations and training
Crises challenge the way organizations assess and conduct their business

Mic Brookshire

reaction to chapter 4 & 6

For a public relations practitioner, effective risk and crisis communication skills are now more of a fundamental ability rather than a special field of practice. Along with the popularity of new media that arm individuals with powerful communication tools; blogs, cell phones, wireless Internet, and so forth, the speed of "trouble" travels far and fast compared to the past. Furthermore, because of these advanced technology, what started as a simple dew drop may result as a hurricane if they are not handled professionally. People have better access to information, and the skeletons cannot stay in the closet forever anymore. In this extent, it is important to know the initial actions you need to take during a risk situation. This is where the tips from our textbook come handy.

While it seems pretty obvious, L&M illustrate the importance of "“knowing the audienc." Basically, risk management starts from audience analysis because that is where communication initiates. The book goes as far to state that by properly analyzing the audience, "you will be in a position to know how to apply any of the other principles" (p.100). Additional factors indicate the need to diversify methods in order to meet segmented audiences, simple and explicit messages to utilize understandings, honest and compassionate communication methods to reconcile the audience, and consistent messages sent out to build credibility (p.100~p. 103). The text also identifies certain factors that "constrain care, consensus, and crisis communication" (p.47). Because a communication process is a two-way road, it is essential to consider both roadblocks of the practitioner and the audience. Both sides need to be confirmed in order to resolve a risk situation.

In April 2006, a chemical compound which is commonly known as benzene was found in a popular vitamin drink in Korea. The Korea Food & Drug Administration tested 5 different vitamin drinks on the market and found out that all of them had benzene in it. About half of the products had sufficiently more than the limited amount of the chemical compound within beverages. Of course this was reported to the media, and naturally people were outraged. Immediate crisis communication took place. Manufacturers of the products recalled all drinks on the shelves. They wrote a letter of apology to the public and promised a higher level of concern towards the product’s health issues. However, this was not enough to resolve people’s outrage. Sales dropped dramatically and the whole vitamin drinks market practically wiped out of business at that time. During the same period of time, other bottled drinks such as orange juice and energy drinks also dropped in sales simply because they contained contents in the same containers. The initial reaction to this incident would be pretty similar among public relations practitioners; they should have seen it coming. If a risk is directly related to people's health, it is bound to cause a dramatic effect. However, if you take a closer look to the situation and analyze what went through the mind of the manufacturers, the crisis situation faces a whole new level.

Benzene is prohibited from table use since it causes cancer and dramatically affects the hematosis systems. However, it is almost inevitable for beverages to contain this component during the process chain. There is a certain amount of benzene needed to threaten our health, and the portion is so minimal in the vitamin drinks, the manufacturers decided that it was better not to mention it on the face. This was considered a smart choice among the “decision makers” since there is no point on alarming the public when nothing really is the matter. A more important factor was that this was a "vitamin C drink." Not only did these drinks meet the well-being trends of Korea, it really did do good things for your body. Compared to the advanced economical and technological status of the country, the awareness and education level regarding vitamin C effects and the importance to take supplements is among the lowest of OECD membership countries. The vitamin C drinks were highly welcomed by nutritionists, since it contained 500mg of vitamin. This is more than the required daily intake which means one drink a day will take care of the worries of the shortage of vitamin C consumption among Koreans. In other words, the risk was in presence along the whole process, and they knew about it. The manufacturers decided to carry this risk along the road since the drinks were making so much money and also because it gave more than it had of risk. Clearly, the judgment was wrong since as mentioned above, the vitamin C drink market practically died and people are resistant to take pills because it seems to be "too much of a medicine." It appears that the current situation rather seems to be a crisis.

Risk and crisis no longer stare at you in the face; they hit you from every angle, and they hit you fast and hard. My ultimate take after reading chapter 4 and six all comes down to one big question. Is there really a guideline? I assume that practitioners who have had some educational background in public relations would have the least knowledge to deal with risks and crisis, but we see crisis almost on our daily basis. How is this happening?

My Take on Chapters 4 & 6

My initial reaction to this week’s readings is one of surprising satisfaction. I say that because, as usual, I was truly not expecting to actually enjoy the chapters. Instead, I was prepared to plow though the assigned material. I think that I enjoyed reading the chapters because the authors’ style is somewhat simple coupled with the fact that I find the topic to be interesting. Okay, enough praising of the book. When describing organizational constraints, the authors listed inadequate resources as being one of the potential roadblocks. They included the following statement within that section:
Many organizations that would never refuse a scientist software to calculate dose quite easily turn down a requisition for desktop publishing equipment that would make it easier and less expensive to create and revise risk messages which are far more readable for the intended audience (p.48)
At the risk of showing how little knowledge I have about available software in general, I wonder, what sort of software would actually help a practitioner to create and revise risk messages? Are they talking about something as simple as Microsoft Word being unavailable? Isn’t the skill in the mind of the professional communicator what can create messages rather than any piece of software?
In the section discussing hostility and outrage as constraints from the audience, the example of people resisting change by saying that generations before them had drank from the same water featured the following suggestion: “A possible way to overcome this type of attitude is to show not only the dangers of continuing risky behavior but the benefits of changing behavior to something less risky” (p. 62). I thought that another important and perhaps successful message would be to show when/how the change took place (perhaps with visuals) because such illustration might explain why the situation has changed.
The section addressing panic and denial included the statement that “[p]anic and denial are beyond the skills of most risk communicators to manage.” Yet, this led me to think that those people in panic or denial can still influence others. So, messages that clearly illustrate the situation and particularly disprove claims from those in denial are essential to a crisis communicator’s efforts.
In the section addressing constraints for both the communicator and the audience, the segment on stability of the knowledge base gave examples of scenarios in which “experts on a particular risk often disagree on the magnitude or effects of the risk” (p.68). So, if the experts that you bring forth are challenged by their colleagues or if the study that you quote is considered to be too general or too specific, what do you do? I’d really like to know the answer to that question. In the past year, I’ve seen this scenario play out quite often with the global warming issue. Whereas I am an environmentalist and believe in all of the current movement’s efforts to lower carbon dioxide emissions, I’ve had some pretty heated discussions with others who argue that reputable scientists have discredited the global warming threat.
In chapter 6, several of the suggestions were sensible, so there was really not much to comment on except for what seemed like the authors’ comments. For instance, after reading three pages into the chapter, I realized that many U.S government agencies were listed as examples of what not to do. The section on explaining reductions in magnitude included the following statement:
While research in this area is quite complicated, one suggestion is to illustrate this concept graphically. The presidential/Congressional Commission on Risk Assessment and Risk Management (1997) recommends bar charts to show the radical differences between scales (p. 109).
The above-mentioned statement, although not unclear had the following interpretation from me: “We don’t really know what to do or what to tell you to do. But hey, here’s what these people who often do things wrong tell you to do.”

blahog blahog blahog

Lundgren and McMakin bring up a point in Chapter 4 (pg. 63) that seems to be contagious in this country—apathy. “Audiences in care communication (and to a lesser degree some crisis communication efforts) are often apathetic.”
I’m not a PR major, so maybe I’m underinformed—or just plain wrong—but I’m highly skeptical of the general public’s ability to intelligently follow any issue of social consequence, and more skeptical of its collective capacity to make reasonable decisions even when presented with immutable facts. We are not a science or health literate society—most of us don’t care unless it’s dropped on our doorstep.
I understand that in risk and crisis communication efforts, any organization must offer to involve the public, and theoretically, it’s the proper position to take. So Lundgren and McMakin do so (at least in these readings), which I think is idealistic.
I’m sure there are many cases where an informed target audience successfully interacts with a public-minded organization, but I think these are exceptions. Maybe I’ll change my mind over the course of the semester.

Which type of approach to risk communication is the current federal administration using in its current effort to secure support for it policy in Iraq? (Lundgren & McMakin, Chapter 2). Is this administration listening? To anyone? By all indications, it is not using any of the 12 approaches to communicating risk Lundgren and McMakin have advanced, so that proves the point I made above. The authors are idealistic thinking the public can understand and make intelligent decisions on issues of policy. And obviously, the current administration thinks so. And maybe it’s just using the old press agentry/publicity model of public relations: source-receiver one-way communication based on incomplete, distorted, or only partially true information. Lundgren and McMakin ask (Chapter 2, pg. 13) “Are all [12] approaches equally valid?” Apparently, none are. And the administration is loathe to make risk comparisons to Vietnam, although many journalists are.

Lundgren and McMakin deal with uncertainty in Chapter 6 (pg. 104). If you are in charge of the communication and know the risks and therefore can anticipate answers to the questions, you’re in good shape. But from a journalistic standpoint, you may have to collect and present scientific information. Sources may conflict and you may have difficulty in determining what the “truth” is. One strategy is to present an array of viewpoints. But that could lead to confusion. Are there PR strategies to counteract a situation like this?

When people assess personal risk, it is theorized they will use not only the information you give them (as the representative of an organization), but other information as well. Mass media plays a role, but people are more likely to use interpersonal channels of communication—friends, colleagues, others in their community. As a risk communicator, knowing your audience is certainly a benefit, but may not necessarily make your communication efforts successful.

Mic Brookshire

reaction to readings

The readings were very practical and rooted in good common sense concepts. After reading them it appears that sometimes organizations are their own worst enemy.
Internally they don’t always understand the need for good risk communications which in turns can lead to lack of funding to support this effort. The lack of education at the management level of why risk communications is important can also lead to failure of this effort. As a full time employee of the University of Florida I couldn’t help but seem examples of these concepts in my daily work. The Threat Rigid Response (TRR) seems to be a quite popular reaction within the Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (IFAS). Most reactions stem from a lack of knowledge and understanding of the concept. The three characteristics that need to exist to avoid TRR are a mechanism for upward flow of information, the theory that communication is everyone’s business as opposed to being the job of public relations dept. and having numerous ways for the community to get information about the organizations activities. All three of these concepts are almost non-existent. Imagine how difficult the risk communicator’s job would be in this situation. When it comes to potential role dichotomy we prefer to only have to play the part of the educator, explain, inform and impart knowledge. Many times our audience wants us to be a facilitator and point to solutions, a partner that jointly solves problems and the manager that tells them what to do to help prevent or mitigate the risk. Those roles are not always comfortable for folks in academia.

The bureaucracy of an academic institution lends itself to many layers of an approval process. It is almost impossible to get a response back in a timely manner that wouldn’t somehow spark a reaction of suspicion on the audience’s part. This all fits with the corporate protection requirements but shouldn’t these policies be reviewed form time to time? In academia it appears that there are many gatekeepers in place just to insure the protection layer stands strong.

IFAS is very large and communications internally are not as strong as they need to be. The concept of conflicting organizational requirements comes into play at this point. From one office to the next you may find that each of them has a different way to handle communicating information. Planning for risk communication is not on the top of their list of things to do. Then again insufficient information to establish a plan may exist, therefore, hindering the ability to create a plan.

When it comes to seeing the public as an equal partner that is where IFAS shines.
They have advisory committees established at each of their county offices and research centers around the state. They meet with them often and seek input on issues relating to the needs of the community as well as research needs of local industries. They understand that buy-in from stakeholders is very important to their existence and funding. They are improving at understanding how cultural diversity plays a role in different value systems.

Because IFAS interacts with the public on a daily basis they are clearly aware of many of the constraints fro the audience. Hostility and outrage are a regular part of production agriculture. IFAS many times is called upon to present research on behalf of the producer when dealing with the regulatory arena. We are a science based institution therefore we can experience panic and denial and apathy all in the same day. Science may say a risk is greater than what is perceived by a farmer that has been growing crops for 30 years, apathy is apparent in many instances. We get a double whammy when we are seen as a government agency and a science institution. Many folks find that reason enough to mistrust us.

Principles of risk communication need improvement in IFAS. A pretest can only happen if you have a plan and build enough time into responding in order to do a pretest. Improvements are evident in knowing their audience e and speaking in simpler language.
Listening to concerns of the audience are also improving. It all comes down to continuing to educated key administrators on the campus level as well as in research offices and county offices about the importance to risk and crisis communication.

Risk Communication - reaction post 1

This week’s chapters made me realize the multi-dimensional nature of risk communication and the different aspects that might influence it. I already knew that risk and crisis communication were complex issues, but both chapters made me aware of the “little details” of risk communication.

Chapter 4 contained information about organizational constraints affecting risk communication. I am interested in reputation management and this chapter was especially interesting because it made me aware of how all the problems that might arise when communication about risks are also crucial for the protection of an organization’s reputation.

The chapter listed all the different organizational constraints a communicator might face. Some of these constraints are: management apathy or hostility, difficult review and approval procedures, corporate protection requirements, and conflicting organizational requirements. These organizational constraints not only concern risk communication, but they also affect the overall reputation of the organization.

If an organization has trouble communicating, than trust, credibility and transparency issues will arise, thus influencing the organization’s reputation negatively. Effective risk communication is important for a strong reputation, especially during times of risk and crisis. Just ignoring a situation, not responding effectively, or corporate arrogance instead of open and honest communication in times of risk or crisis might damage the credibility of an organization, creating long-term damage on the organization’s reputation.

There was also another point I found interesting in chapter 4. I thought that two constraints: potential roles dichotomy and the unwillingness to see the public as an equal partner were closely related and they made me aware of the importance of the emotional aspect of risk communication.

A dichotomy of roles is created when “the audience expects a different role from the one the organization is willing to play” (Lundgren and McMakin, 2004, 52). And when audiences come across a role dichotomy they feel anger, hostility and confusion about the message.

The example in the book (pg. 52) mentions a situation where a mother calls a risk communicator (local agency communicating about air quality issues) and when she is not satisfied with the response she is getting, she finally asks: “You sound like a mother, would you let your child back into the house?” (52). The response suggested in the book is a calm, rational response without involving emotions: “Providing advice as a mother could even have resulted in legal action later”(52). I think that even though the respondent doesn’t have to respond like they are friends, I think that the response should involve some emotion.

It might be hard to define your role as a communicator is the person you are trying to talk to is acting very emotionally. So a potential role dichotomy might be unavoidable.

The examples provided in chapter 4 all contain very rational responses, which might not always be possible. Acting calm and rational might be the absolutely right thing to do, but it might not be the best response at all times.

I think that risk and crisis communicators, especially when health and safety issues are involved, need to also consider the emotions of the people they are communicating with. You have to realize that people who are trying to gain some more information are in risk and they might not always be rational, and a cold face or tone might make them even more hostile. The authors agree with this point and they state “risk communication, however, cannot be effective unless it considers the emotions, beliefs and political leanings of the audience”. Identifying with your audience and trying to understand their emotions might be a key to effective risk communication.

Reaction Blog #1

Effective communication is becoming an essential component of all aspects of organizations in this era. It is therefore imperative that communicators are aware of the constraints that may cloud the quest for effective communication and the principles guiding communication. The constraints and principles as articulated by Lundergren and McMakin (2004) in Chapter 4 and Chapter 6 bring about three underlying prerequisite for effective communication of any form. These are; 1) knowledge of the internal environment within which the communicator finds him/herself, 2) knowledge of the external environment within which the communication will be made and 3) planning. I consider these three to be critical success factors in a communication of risk and the main take home message from the text readings. All communication attempts fail or succeed on the basis of these three factors, briefly discussed below.

Knowledge of the internal environment: Each organization or institution exists within a broader policy and legal framework as well as policies internal to the organization. Communicators should therefore know their institution’s mandate, character, requirements, protocols, systems, resources (human, financial) limitations, concerns and issues, roles and responsibilities because these will show as to whether the institutional or organizational environment is conducive and enabling enough to facilitate successful communication to the external audience. The commitment and support of the internal environment (organization leadership and systems) is very important. Knowing and dealing with the internal environment is like ‘testing the waters’ – the systems in place and protocols should be able to guide one as the level of commitment and support to be expected from the entire organization. As Lundergren and McMakin (2004) noted, it is necessary to “first reach the internal audience before reaching out to an external audience” (p. 49).

Any attempts of communication without support from organizational leadership may lead to hostility and conflicts. When the communicator is aware that the internal environment is either hostile or indifferent to communication attempts, an appropriate strategy of lobbying, educating can be adopted in advance. The strategy can endeavor to instill a spirit of shared expectation, common knowledge/understanding and a participatory culture within the organization (Lundergren & McMakin, 2004, p. 50). When the communicator has the support of the internal audience, all other challenges presented by the external audience can easily be dealt with. Knowledge of the internal environment also helps to define one’s communication limits as outlined in Lundergren and McMakin (2004) under principles of process (p. 96). Commitment, support and buy-in by internal audience can smoothen and lighten what otherwise could be difficult. However, this may still remain a challenge when an organization keeps on shifting goal-post more often than not.

Knowledge of external environment: This entails mainly the target audience of communication attempt and the environment within which the audience exist. The key lesson that keeps cropping up in the two chapters revolves around the need to know your audience. To avoid most constraints that may come from the target audience, it is therefore necessary to undertake audience analysis. Audience analysis, when done appropriately should be able to answer a lot of questions needed prior to the communication event such as, “how does the audience view the organization I represent?”, “what are their concerns, fears and priorities?”, “What are their beliefs, customs, traditions, attitudes?” and questions regarding literacy levels, language and diversity. Most communication attempts have failed because they overlooked their audience beliefs and traditions. In Botswana, HIV/AIDS intervention strategies failed because they were introduced without due regard to the behavioural practices and value systems, beliefs and localized social relations of the communities themselves (Ntseane & Preece, n.d.) Synthesis of the Batswana belief system regarding HIV/AIDS was given by Tlou (1996) as follows;

'A pilot study of the older women's existing knowledge and beliefs about AIDS,and of their sexual practices and experience in caring for people with HIV/AIDS was carried out. It found that the older women believed that AIDS is not a new disease but an epidemic of boswagadi, the Tswana term for `a state of widowhood whereby…….the surviving spouse has to undergo ritual cleansing and observe several taboos, the principal being sexual abstinence for one year'. After the year, a traditional doctor can perform the purification rituals and declare that the widow(er) may live as a single person. It is believed that failure to observe these rituals can result in disease and ultimately the death of the widow(er) or any person with whom they have sex. The term boswagadi is also applied to disease resulting from failure to observe the prescribed rituals. (http://journals.cambridge.org/download.php?file=%2FASO%2FASO17_04%2FS0144686X9700653Xa.pdf&code=4f59ed2af2421b6b91f4e05f6aebbcf2)'.

It was after the insights from studies such as these that intervention strategies were focused to dispelling the myths and superstitious beliefs surrounding the disease. This is a typical example whereby communicators did not know their audience. It could have helped if communicators could have initially used mental models approach to determine how the Batswana perceived the risk of HIV/AIDS disease and designed appropriate messages targeted to addressing the gaps and inconsistencies.

Planning: The third important consideration for communicators is planning. With information on the internal and external audience and their environment, the communicator should plan accordingly based on the knowledge available. Planning is captured in Chapter 6 under the principles of process (Lundergren & McMakin, 2004, p. 95). A plan should be able to consider timing of events based on the internal and external environment activities, plans and major events. Chapter 4 notes that constraints emanating from unforeseen delays, protracted approval procedures can derail the communicators’ plans. I take it that these can be minimized by planning that is based on knowledge of the internal and external environment within which communication will be undertaken. For example, if one has done his homework thoroughly knowing the protocols to be satisfied within an institution, planning will be instructed by the protocols in place and the strategies the communicator will put in place within the plan to deal with the situation. Knowing both the internal and external audience helps to time activities, determine the methods and strategies to be employed in each (i.e., inform planning and strategies to be employed). Most plans do not fail because of the constraints outlined in Chapter 4 but are due to poor and uninformed planning. To develop ‘plans and schedules that are both realistic and flexible’ (Lundergren & McMakin, 2004, p. 56) for effective communication of risk, it is necessary to know the organizational requirements, demands, protocols and the target audience activities and plans. Failing to plan has been equated to planning to fail.

For effective communication of risk, the three points noted above are critical and most of the things the communicator will do revolves around these. When adequately done, they will help avoid numerous constraints outlined in Chapter 4 and accommodate the three principles of risk communication presented in Chapter 6. I consider these as pre-requisites to effective communication, without which communication endeavor is bound to fail.

For further consideration:
I agree that the communicator should be prepared to tackle or address peripheral issues or concerns of the audience. But how then does one address a concern that is totally beyond the communicator’s organizational mandate or the political decision making regarding the issue is uncertain? A case in point is found in the following newspaper link article http://www.gov.bw/cgi-bin/news.cgi?d=20040224&i=Islanders_brave_raging_Okavango (BOPA 2004). The real concern of the community here was that government previously made attempts to relocate them because they were living in a small island prone to floods, secondly because the settlement was not formal, i.e., it was illegal and thirdly because they could not be provided with social amenities because the settlement was not gazetted. They therefore thought that if they evacuated the islands due to impending floods, government may take advantage of the situation to deny them coming back to the island. None of the communicators could ascertain as to whether that may happen or not, because it takes a political decision and process. How then do we as communicators deal with an issue where we do not have answers and uncertainty looms?

Reaction blog #1

Lundgren and McMakin (2004) divided “risk communication along with functional lines, distinguishing between care communication, consensus communication, and crisis communication” (p. 4). They also mentioned, “Crisis communication is risk communication in the face of extreme, sudden danger-an accident at an industrial plant, the impending break in an earthen dam, the outbreak of a deadly disease” (p. 6). On the other hand, according to Dr. Robinson’s lecture, she defined risk communication as “the exchange of information among interested parties about the nature, magnitude, significance, or control of a risk” (Covello, 1992), and crisis communication as “grounded in the effort to manage public perceptions of an event so that harm is reduced for both the organization and stakeholders” (Seeger, Sellnow, & Ulner, 2003). After I’ve been majoring in public relations, the terms, crisis communication and risk communication, became to be familiar to me. However, I haven’t thought of the difference between two terms before. In my understanding, the crisis communication is the management function in public relations perspective, considering the relationship between public and organization significantly, and related to managerial role of public relations. Risk communication is the technical and practical function to make the public aware the risk before and after the risk as one-way, and related to the technician role of public relations.
As the organizational constraints for the communicator in risk communication, Lundgren and McMakin (2004) indicated the inadequate resources, management apathy or hostility, potential roles dichotomy, difficult review and approval procedures, corporate protection requirements, conflicting organizational requirements, and insufficient information to adequately plan and set schedules. Among those organizational constraints, I regard the management apathy or hostility would be the most fatal for the effective risk communication because the lack of support from the management would not give the possibility of the effective risk communication at all. The other constraints would bring about the difficulty of effective risk communication. This is in the same context with the argument that public relations should be in the dominant coalition for the effective communication. I also believe whether the public relations is in the part of dominant coalition or not affects the role of public relations significantly different. If the public relations for the risk communication is in the part of dominant coalition, the role of communication would be increased to the various programs such as the programs involved with the community and corporate responsibility as an active role. However, if the risk communication suffers from the lack of support from the dominant coalition, the risk communication would have the limitation and only play rather the passive role than proactive role.
In Lundgren and McMakin’s (2004), the table of the reasons the audience can be hostile in p. 60 shows easily how the various factors such as catastrophic potential, level of familiarity, level of understanding, and voluntariness affect the hostility more and less. One of the factors that I’d like to discuss is the amount of media attention. The table shows that the highly popularized media attention makes the audience more hostile and seldom mentioned media attention makes the audience less hostile. I do not agree with this analysis. I think highly popularized media attention depends on the size and the seriousness of the risk. If the highly popularized media attention makes the audience more hostile than the seldom mentioned media attention, the media relations during the risk would not be needed. When there is the serious risk, the heavy media coverage helps the audience understand the risk accurately, estimate the situation fully, and prepare the possible risks in the future.
In Lundgren and McMakin’s (2004) principles of risk communication, I understood that to know the audience and the risk situation is the most fundamental principle of risk communication. In order to know the audience and the risk situation fully, the thorough research and planning in advance are essential. Academic research would be helpful for the practitioners in doing research and planning the program. However, I do not think that many practitioners in real world have chances to read academic journals for their practice. As a doctoral student and the researcher, this is my strong hope that the academic research is widely valued by the practitioners in real world and helpful for their effective practice.

School Shootings

I was an undergrad at the University of Minnesota in 2005 when a high school student in Red Lake, Minnesota, killed several people in his high school, including himself.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,151085,00.html
The news coverage was continuous. No one knew why this student was prompted to do such a thing or why his behavior was overlooked by teachers. The school was on a Native American Reservation and the shooting shocked all of the residents on the reservation along with the residents of the state of Minnesota. Everyone thought that Minnesota was a place where school shootings did not occur. Colorado was where students shot other students and that is hundreds of miles away from Minnesota.

The authorities were not very well prepared for the crisis. Because no one imagined that school shootings would happen in Minnesota, let alone in Red Lake, they did not have a crisis plan. Information was scarce at the beginning. In fact, news stations and journalists were not allowed on the reservation, so the early coverage of the shooting on television showed the fences around the school and the reservation.

The initial idea was to let the authorities on the reservation handle the shooting. They did not want to involve people from the outside, like the police, but they eventually decided to in order to complete a full investigation. I think the fact that everyone in Minnesota wanted answers was the reason the reservation authorities allowed the police to get involved.

After the first few days of the shooting, the crisis was handled very well. The authorities knew how to handle the crisis well by “managing uncertainty,” “responding to the crisis,” “resolving the crisis” and “learning from the crisis (Ulmer, Sellnow and Seeger, p. 13).”

The consistent voice was provided by one spokesperson who kept the media updated on what was happening with the investigation. Over time, more and more was discovered about the motive of the crime and how the authorities were preparing to respond to a similar crisis in the future.

All in all, I would say the Red Lake shooting is a good example of how to handle crisis, such as school shootings. The odds of another shooting happening in Red Lake is slim, but school shootings may occur in other cities in Minnesota. Authorities in those areas can learn from the Red Lake shooting so they can update their crisis manuals. School shootings do not happen very often, but it is good for schools to be prepared for them. They need to know who they will contact and when and they also need to know what they will do with the students. By following addressing all of the crisis communication demands and by learning from similar crises, authorities can be prepared for many crises.

Wes Jamison PUR 6934 Reaction blog #1 Lundgren and McMakin chapters 4 & 6

The readings were practical and applied, if somewhat pedestrian. The authors identify various risk venues and scenarios, and provide a compilation of the literature, and in so doing present a “cookbook” of pragmatism for the practitioner. Whether in the form of constraints such as inadequate resources, management "push back," role confusion, procedural hurdles, or other internal or external constraints, chapter 4 is valuable in stating the obvious: any practitioner can empathize with the authors’ discussion of constraining variables related to risk communication, and the value of chapter 4 lies in its articulation of what might otherwise be mere intuitive, anecdotal, and esoteric knowledge limited to professional expertise but rarely stated. Similarly, chapter 6 takes the obvious aspects of practitioner experience and articulates their components, and the authors lay out their gambit: risk communication entails knowing your audience and knowing your situation. Nonetheless, risk and its communication is more complex and confounding than the authors make it appear, and several practical and theoretical issues emerge from the readings.
Interestingly, the authors note on pp. 56-57 that personnel constraints are real and potentially serious, but the three emotional constraints they list involve limits on rational choice rather than other social psychological affects. Obviously the authors implicitly support rational choice and social exchange theory, but nevertheless they overlook a potentially devastating consequence of risk communication: what are the negative psychological consequences on the communicators who must constantly deal with real and perceived risks, such as increased personal anxiety, cynicism, and trivialization of real risk? If individuals underestimate risks that are familiar, what is the impact of constant risk communications exposure upon communicators’ perceptions of risks? Social Psychologist Sherry Latinga has noted that proximity to potentially anxiety-ridden and risky situations can cause risk invisibility.
Likewise, one of the constraints includes uncooperative management, thus membership in, or influence upon, the dominant coalition is critical for effective management of risks and communication thereof. Yet, the authors provide little insight as to techniques for ingratiation of risk communicators into the dominant coalition, and alternative communication strategies for the "excluded" risk communicator is lacking. Similarly, the authors note that management may be reticent to provide information. This is no surprise, since information is a source of power in organizational settings, and organizational sociologists tell us that stewardship of information and “information frugality” is often seen as a critical component of management power. And the authors posit that practitioner inability or unwillingness to see differing value systems is a constraint---this argument has profound implications. Peter Berger posits in “The Homeless Mind” that individuals who are constantly bombarded with alternative value systems can experience “cognitive homelessness” and subsequent anomie if they cannot exclude those value systems from their frame of reference. In other words, all value systems are not equal, and the very act of recognition and understanding undermines the heuristics, schemas, and cognitive shortcuts that provide meaning and grounding.
While the authors do an admirable job of listing constraints, they fail to discuss them in any depth. For instance, on pp. 67 they discuss stigmatization and efforts to reduce it without discussing the very real and beneficial social functions of stigmatization in various contexts or the self-conscious efforts of competing political actors and rhetors to use social stigmas for political gain. Their discussion, albeit limited to practical discussions for pragmatic practitioners, could have used a discussion of the broader context and implications of their recommendations.
Chapter 6 was similar in that it provided useful “how-to” guidelines and a ready reference standard, without providing deeper context or implications. Most interesting is their presentation of Covello’s matrix of risk response as well as the importance of social trust in institutions. Covello provides a very useful matrix for testing various research frames, and the variables proved accurate and predictive in a research project I did in Europe. The work done in Europe on trust indicates that one effect of post-modernism and post-structuralism, e.g. the disintegration of traditional social structures and communities of meaning and their reintegration into reified communities of “people like me”, has profound implications for risk communication. Indeed, counter-intuitively, the Eurobarometer biannual survey of EU public opinion indicates that increased scientific knowledge of abstract risks actually increases opposition to the risk, and it also indicates that trust has declined precipitously in institutions that have traditionally been vested with dissemination of risk information, e.g. government agencies, universities. It also found that people increasingly withdraw from public discussions of risk in favor of seeking explanations in their individuated communities of meaning. This is by way of saying that traditional risk communication models face increasing difficulty in the EU.
Finally, the authors posit a very parsimonious and compact definition of risk communication: know your audience and know your situation. But, given the advent of new media and their impact on communications and the ability of publics to align and realign in a limitless array of ideologies, perceptions, and opinions, what exactly constitutes a “public” these days? Was the individual blogger who precipitated a crisis for the Krypto-lock manufacturer a “public?” If so, how can any practitioner know the almost limitless and shifting publics within her domain? Who is a “stakeholder”, given the new media and the fragmentation of communication channels, and how can a company possibly engage in effective environmental scanning when its environment is typified by perpetual and complex mutation? These are questions that the authors neglect to discuss, and although the text may be effective as a manual, a “recipe book” of best management practices, if the devil is in the details, or rather the contingencies, then chapters 4 and 6 lack the needed depth and context.

Better prepared next time?

In an article in the Toronto Sun, “Risk of another SARS-like outbreak: report,” it reports that there is potential risk in Ontario, similar to the outbreak in Canada in 2003. http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/2007/01/10/3277539-sun.html However, unlike 2003, the government is preparing for the risk of a potential outbreak. According to “Justice Archie Campbell's report, entitled Spring of Fear [sic], notes that many of the recommendations he made in two interim reports have yet to be implemented. Campbell says the province is better prepared today than it was in 2003, but much remains to be done” (Artuso, 2007).
Because of the unlikely crisis in 2003, the Canadian government was not prepared adequately. But this time there is no excuse for not being prepared now, as Campbell commented, “SARS taught us lessons that can help us redeem our failures," he says in his report. "If we do not learn the lessons to be taken from SARS, however, if we do not make present governments fix the problems that remain, we will pay a terrible price in the face of future outbreaks of virulent disease" (Artuso, 2007).
What was a crisis in 2003, has prompted the Canadian government to be prepared for the risk of another outbreak, and have better communication plans in order. According to the article, “Campbell's report does not blame any person, group or government but points to systemic failures in communication, infection control and worker safety that left the province ill-prepared for the outbreak” (Artuso, 2007). One of the major communication breakdowns was that health care workers were not adequately informed about how to protect themselves from contracting the disease, thus spreading it among doctors and nurse and their families.
Obviously, a crisis communication plan, and proper risk communication is essential for any government, especially when it comes to health issues and matters of public safety. This fits into Ulmer et al.’s definition of crisis, “An organizational crisis is specific, unexpected, and nonroutine event or series of events that create high levels of uncertainy and threaten or are perceived to threaten an organization’s high-priority goals” (2007, p. 7).
Now that the Canadian government is aware of the risk of a SARS II outbreak, they must construct a risk communication plan, because that was one of their self-assessed failures in 2003. According Lundgrin and McMakin, “Risk management usually begins with a risk assessment. Just how dangerous is the risk? […] Risk assessment is a scientific process that characterizes the risk and assesses the probability of occurrence and outcome” (p. 6-7). Those in charge of the assessment will ask certain questions to get at the heart of how dangerous the risk, its probability, and who or what will be effected by it. After the assessment is completed, the results will determine what will be done to prevent a crisis.
Once the risk has been identified, Ulmer et al suggests being mindful to the changing dynamics of the specific situation and risk that has been identified. They say, “Mindfulness requires us to constantly adapt our perceptual skills to account for the ever-changing world around us. […] To do so, we must be willing to see new categories of problems and solutions, rather than forcing the evidence we observe to fit into existing categories we have been taught” (2007, p. 157). Thinking outside of the box is critical to preventing crisis. Even though in the case of the Canadian SARS outbreak, it would have been hard to see the outbreak coming, now there is no excuse for anyone not to see a disease spread from halfway across the globe. It has happened before, and a good risk identification plan considers past cases of crises, and also think about what may be unlikely, but possible. In Canada, a SARS outbreak of that size was unlikely, but it always was possible.
Since I am not an expert on health communication, and some of my classmates seem to have a large body of knowledge in this area, what do you believe should be done to develop an effective risk communication plan in Ontario? What kinds of lessons can be learned from SARS to help prevent SARS II? What does this mean for other parts of the world? How should their health departments and governments react to the possibility of this crisis? Is anyone aware of similar efforts for prevention in the United States? I have heard quite a bit about Bird Flu in the last couple of years, but not as much about SARS since all of the problems in 2003.