What's your world view?
World views are a set of almost unshakeable assumptions individuals have about the world. How do they impact on public relations? And how can we strive to shake off others' sceptical worldviews about the practice? Dr Jon White reports.
There are many ways of thinking about and defining public relations. So much so, there can even be little agreement about what the practice is, what it involves – and where it fits into wider society.
Some years ago, as part of the much-quoted Excellence study, which still forms a basis for much teaching and thinking about public relations, University of Maryland professor James Grunig and I looked at the effect of worldviews on public relations practice.
Recent international developments – such as when Ukrainian President Zelensky described the current situation in his country as not a war of armies, but a war of worldviews – have put the consequences of worldviews back into public debate. So it’s worth revisiting what they involve and how they can inform thinking about public relations.
A worldview is a set of images and assumptions about the world. As individuals, we develop our views of the world growing up in a particular society and culture, through education and experience, and use worldviews as a way of making sense of new information that comes to us.