What public relations can and cannot do …

Those able to listen this weekend to NPR’s On the Media program were treated to an interview with Fraser Seitel, author of The Practice of Public Relations (now in its 10th edition, no less), Republican and supporter of George Bush, who nevertheless tagged the administration’s public relations efforts as dismal, likely the “worst ever” of any presidential administration in recent history.

It was refreshing to hear a respected professional like Seitel say straight out that the Bush administration’s increasingly negative public image is not the result of inept performance by his public relations staff and advisors, but rather the direct result of the administration’s disastrous policies, which all the spin and messaging in the world can do little to overcome: “I am afraid there’s not much this administration can do,” says Seitel. “It pretty much is what it is.”

Contrast this to the ennervating blame game that often occurs with individuals or organizations who think the function of PR is to help them spin (or even lie!) their way out of situations in which they have landed, often due to their own bad strategic and policy decisions. Take, for example, reaction in the UK to the findings issued last week of the Walker Report, calling for more transparency in Britain’s private equity and venture capital association. More transparency? No, said one prestigious commentator … private equity has simply ‘failed at the PR game.’ As though it were a game that if played well enough could avoid one’s having to be ethical and transparent and all that …

That certainly was the attitude of another president, Richard Nixon, who a couple of years into his administration fired off a memo to his chief of staff complaining about how bad his public image was and blaming it on his spokespeople. In another “On the Media” interview segment this weekend, scholar and journalist James Reston, Jr. author of The Conviction of Richard Nixon, analyzes the recently unearthed memo and points to it as an example of Nixon’s career hallmark trait of blaming others for whatever ill befell him, personally and professionally. Unable to foresee the unravelling of his presidency and sullying of his public image because of his own shortcomings and policy decisions, Nixon took the easy way out and blamed it … on poor PR!

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