Content:

• Future of Communications and Public Relations (PR). (Re)Imagining the Role, Function and Purpose of the Communication Profession

• Les Relations Publiques au carrefour des tensions democratiques de reconnaissance et justice

• The Future of Public Relations as an Organizational Challenge: Topic-Oriented Control, Strategic Integration and Agile Organization in the PR Newsroom

• Desambiguisation du concept d'astroturfing et typologie de tactiques astroturfs

• Running Against the Tide: Educating Future Public Relations and Communications Professionals in the Age of Neoliberalism
 

Every crisis brings opportunities and challenges. In this special edition, the future of communications and PR in and beyond the context of the Covid-19 pandemic is being (re)imagined by scholars addressing the topic from theoretical, practical and educational perspectives. Following Thomas Kuhn's insight that paradigm shifts are often triggered by - epistemological and practical - crises, this special edition invites and encourages the exploration of alternatives to established ways of thinking, the challenging of established mindsets. In doing so, this edition addresses the future of public relations and communications from multiple perspectives: paradigmatic (metamodernism) and theoretical (astroturfing), organizational (newsrooms), competences vs. capabilities and educational (the heritage and challenges of neoliberalism) while also revisiting current premises including PR's role in deliberative democracies. In a time of seemingly growing polarization of perspectives, we need to get beyond dichotomies and toward integration and synthesis.

 

Contributori: Ana Adi, Dalien Rene Benecke, Neeltje M. Du Plessis, Dean Kruckeberg, Brieuc Lits, Jim Macnamara, Rennanlanna Martins Mafra, Irma Meyer, Clarissa Muir, Damian Fernandez Pedemonte, Deidre Porthen, Angela Cristina Salgueiro Marques, Luis Mauro Sa Martino, Rene Seidenglanz, Thomas Stoeckle, Helena Van Wy, Monique Vaughan, Marina Vujnovic.