Incorporating competition and comparisons into crisis communication: How competing organizations respond to industry crises

Crisis communication research typically focuses on how a single organization strategically responds to crises based on its own set of situational factors. However, it is common for multiple competing organizations to be involved in responding to the same crisis. By analyzing two industry crisis cases in China, this study provides insights into what we termed competitive crisis communication, which involves not only crisis response timing and strategies but also competition and comparisons among the different organizations involved in the same crisis. The analysis of organizational statements on social media reveals the extent of differences in crisis response strategies adopted by competing organizations. Findings from an analysis of online media coverage and public posts on social media further suggest that stakeholders’ comparisons of different organizations’ crisis responses can influence stakeholders’ emotions and reputational perceptions of the organizations. Finally, the competitive advantages for an organization to respond as the first mover or late mover in industry crisis communication are discussed.     

Sent home: mapping the absent child into migration through polymedia

Migrants and their transnational families document their children and child‐rearing practices on social networking sites (SNS) to enhance their social mobility. In this article, I identify a new group of migrant children, namely those sent home to their parents’ countries of origin for an imagined ‘good childhood‘. I demonstrate that polymedia – SNS and other platforms – sustain these children and create new norms of publicness and visibility in transnational parenting. Exploring how families document child‐raising across international boundaries, I show how the trajectories of parenting relationships remain open ended. I counter the predominant focus on transnational parenting as a kind of abandonment attached to left‐behind children. Instead, I refocus the research on the opportunities polymedia give families to create and sustain intimacies, thus making the trajectories of migrant families and children increasingly dynamic. Polymedia create important shifts in global migration – a transformation that requires changes in the way scholars approach transnational families and long‐distance parenting.     

Rupture Resistance: An Archaeology of Pedophilia Crisis Communication

The national attention brought to high-profile sex crimes such as the Penn State scandal of 2011 and the Catholic Church scandal of 2002 has elevated public awareness of what can be appropriately referred to as pedophilia. Perceived as a public health threat, pedophilia has become a priority news item for its lascivious and predatory characteristics that instill fear within a widespread audience. This article conveys three ideas essential to pedophilia crisis communication. First, a brief introduction of pedophilia is offered as a social construct and catalyst for moral panic within organizations and their communities. Second, a review of modern and postmodern crisis frameworks is offered to examine an organizational approach to pedophilia and its Foucauldian conception as a rupturing, discursive formation. Third, a call for organizations to embrace ruptures in their pedophilia crisis response is advanced to align their activities with the prevailing historical moment rather than within metaphysical traditions.     

Diffusion of traditional and new media tactics in crisis communication

The Internet is emerging as an important tool for organizations to communicate with journalists and publics. This article reports the results of a five point-in-time study of organizational use of the Internet in crisis communication. Through the lens of Rogers’ [Rogers, E. (1962/1995). Diffusion of innovations. New York: Free Press] diffusion of innovations research, the data suggest that about half of the organizations experiencing a national crisis are integrating the Internet into their response. To illustrate this diffusion, the article provides exemplars of innovative Internet response during crisis.     

Getting emotional: An emotion-cognition dual-factor model of crisis communication

The effect of emotional experience on cognitive processes is an under-explored phenomenon in crisis communication research, despite indications of the increasing importance of emotion-based communication in the digital era. Emerging evidence indicates that the emotional experiences of publics play a critical role during organizational crises and determine the degree to which organizations are able to successfully devise communications that help them deal with such crises. Yet no comprehensive, theoretically sound model exists for analyzing how emotions influence the cognitive processing of crisis information. Our study proposes just such a model, capable of describing how cognition and emotion, separately or interactively, influence the publics’ processing of crisis information and consequently their attitudes and behaviors. Our model describes how emotional variables determine whether the publics take a cognition-oriented approach or an emotion-oriented approach to information processing and subsequent formation of interpretations, evaluations, and judgments directed toward organizations. Moreover, our model explains how an emotion-to-cognition assessment of publics’ attitudes is possible and makes a case for how it is critical for predicting and influencing the publics’ behavior during organizational crises. The hope is that this model will aid practitioners and academics in understanding why the publics’ emotions matter during crisis communication as well as how to craft more effective communication strategies as a result. Finally, several avenues for future research are suggested in order to test the validity of our conceptual model in different contexts.     

Entering new territory: A study of internal crisis management and crisis communication in organizations

The aim of this paper is to present and discuss some of the main findings from a large survey of internal crisis management and crisis communication conducted in the spring of 2011 among public and private organizations in Denmark (the ICMCC survey). The survey was conducted among the 367 largest private companies (selected from DK 1000, established by Børsen business magasin) and among 98 public organizations (municipalities). The overall goal was to get a preliminary idea of how these companies or organizations perceive, plan, coordinate and implement internal crisis management and crisis communication activities before, during and after a crisis. The survey questionnaire comprised 36 questions and was sent to respondents who typically are responsible for the crisis-preparedness of their organizations. The results from the survey show that the vast majority of organizations have a crisis or contingency plan, and most of these plans contain an internal dimension relating to the management and communication with the internal stakeholders during a crisis. Thus, the study shows a rather professional and formalized behavior towards crisis management in general, but also when it comes to managing a crisis in relation to the internal organizational stakeholders in specific. In addition, the results clearly indicate a strong relation between organizational size and crisis management; the larger the organization the more likely to have a crisis plan. This particularly pertained to the private organizations. The ICMCC survey forms part of a major collaborative research project, financed by the Danish Council for Independent Research/Social Sciences (2011–2014), entitled Internal Crisis Management and Crisis Communication in Danish Organizations. The purpose of this three-year long project is to shed light upon the role of internal crisis management and crisis communication before, during and after an organizational crisis and/or a societal crisis leading to downsizing or major changes within an organization or an organizational field.     

Prioritizing relationships: The investment model and relationship maintenance strategies in organizational crises

Crisis communication and crisis management are dominated by research in image repair and restoration, but much has to be done to address the lack of research that engages relational perspectives in these fields. Adopting the investment model (Rusbult, 1980) as a theoretical framework and using structural equation modeling, the study develops a crisis relational maintenance model to explain how organizations can (re)build relationships with publics. Survey results show that publics’ commitment and publics’ trust are two significant mediators that influence publics’ relational behaviors post-crisis. The investment model provides a suitable framework to explain publics’ commitment to an organization, with explained variance more than 90 percent, and an organization’s relationship maintenance strategies during and post-crisis significantly affect publics’ trust. Whether an organization’s relationships with the publics can be maintained or repaired depends on whether an organization engages in these relationship maintenance strategies that prioritize publics’ need, which can be reciprocated from publics as publics reorient themselves along with the long-term goals and well-being of the relationships. Results of this study call for further attention on relationship maintenance approaches in crisis communication and management research.     

How publics respond to crisis communication strategies: The interplay of information form and source

Through an experiment with 162 college students this study empirically evaluates an emerging communication model: the social-mediated crisis communication model (SMCC). As part of a series of studies testing the SMCC model, this study focuses on two of the SMCC model's components: the effects of crisis information form (traditional media, social media, and word-of-mouth) and source (third party and organization) on publics’ acceptance of crisis response strategies and publics’ crisis emotions. The findings clearly indicate the importance of strategically matching crisis information form and source when organizations respond to crises. In addition, the selection of crisis information form and source affects publics’ attribution independent and dependent emotions.     

Defining the characteristics of a lingering crisis: Lessons from the National Zoo

This article begins to define the characteristics of a new type of organizational crisis—a “lingering crisis.” A qualitative case study involving the National Zoo indicated that a lingering crisis may involve (1) multiple events occurring over an extended timeframe; (2) intense media scrutiny; (3) escalating involvement of external organizations, including watchdog/regulatory/oversight agencies; (4) incongruent organizational messages and stakeholder perceptions; (5) external/internal charges of organizational deception; (6) insufficient organizational responses to stakeholder concerns; (7) organizational failure to address leadership responsibility for crisis.     

Lost in data translation: A critical review of datasets on refugees

Quantitative data are the backbone of the international refugee regime. Academic researchers and international organizations have been drawing attention to the problems of refugee data that obscure refugee vulnerabilities. Despite these efforts, the limitations of quantitative refugee data, particularly with regard to gendered aspects of refugee vulnerabilities, have often been overlooked. This article aims to address this issue by examining the major limitations of quantitative refugee data. It focuses on the question of “What are the major limitations of quantitative refugee data regarding gendered aspects of refugee vulnerabilities?” By conducting a systematic review of 67 datasets from international organizations, nation-states, and independent data collectors, it argues that there are five fundamental problems with the data: (1) lack of disaggregation, (2) lack of cross-tabulation and inability to harmonize datasets, (3) inconsistent periodization frequency, (4) lack of sex and gender diversity measurement, and (5) survivor bias. This article highlights the importance of critically analysing the data that informs theories and decisions regarding refugee vulnerabilities.     

Examining the expertise,experience, and expedience of crisis consultants in Singapore

By most accounts, crisis preparedness in organizations globally has been appalling (0035 and 0250). The situation is no different in Singapore (Wu & Dai, 2001). With crisis expertise often lacking from within organizations, many resort to engaging public relations (PR) agencies to help. This study, which is inspired by Frandsen and Johansen's (2008) study in Denmark, aims to evaluate the contributions of consultants from PR agencies. Adapting indicators to assess professionalism proposed by Lages and Simkin (2003) and Sallot, Cameron and Lariscy (1997) and integrating them with variables from the contingency theory (Pang, Jin, & Cameron, 2010), this study seeks to examine: (1) the level of expertise of consultants in offering crisis management consultancy; (2) the level of experience of consultants offering crisis management consultancy; and (3) the value and expedience of the consultancy services offered. Findings showed that agencies in Singapore hired consultants based on skills such as writing, speaking and ability to manage the media. For some, lack of direct experience was compensated by in-house training. International agencies appeared to have an advantage over the local agencies by virtue of their access to expertise and knowledge from their international network. However, as the majority of agencies had only managed few crises, it was difficult to assess the value these consultants added. Studies examining consultants in PR agencies are rare. It is hoped this study would trigger research around the world.     

Thinking aloud/allowed: pursuing the public interest in radio debate

This article examines the controversy that erupted in 2006 when the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) was accused of banning certain commentators. The ‘blacklisting’ saga surfaced differences in ideas and practices of publicness among the contenders in the controversy and revealed that notions of the public, public accountability and the public interest were contested. The research describes independent newsroom practices conducted in terms of journalistic ethics and professional ideologies, and shows that journalists assume a powerful role in defining publics and calling them into being, as well as in orchestrating their participation in public deliberation. This is a professional responsibility that is recognised and defended. However, the practices associated with that responsibility and the power to orchestrate the debate in particular ways are not critically engaged within the profession. Just as the debate illuminates the concept of publicness imported into journalistic practice, it also illuminates concepts imported into SABC institutional practice which are rooted in a long lineage of national democratic struggle. In the controversy, the two concepts chafed against each other, propounded in each case by protagonists embedded in their respective lineages. The controversy was thus more than simply a struggle for political control; it was a contest about the meaning of democratic citizenship itself, rooted in differing but intersecting political‐intellectual logics.     

THE INTELLECTUAL IN QUESTION

Although contemporary scholars in various disciplines readily appropriate many of his ideas, Antonio Gramsci's theory of intellectuals remains curiously unappreciated. From the standpoint of the oft-lamented crisis of the contemporary intellectual, however, it represents a resource that is both indispensable and difficult to retrieve. In this article the historical and sociological nuances of Gramsci's theory, as well as the powerful, yet unheeded lessons of his own life as an intellectual will be examined. In particular, Gramsci's analysis of the social affiliation and political agency of the intellectual provides the framework necessary to explain the rise and ongoing crisis of the academic intellectual as a historically unprecedented figure. This point will be illustrated by examining the case of influential academic intellectuals such as Michael Walzer and Michel Foucault. The article concludes with some reflections on the merits of Gramsci's distinctive way of being an intellectual.     

Grassroots Environmental Organizations in the United States: A Gramscian Analysis*

The theoretical approach utilized in this study is based on the pieces of information scattered throughout Antonio Gramsci's work and the extrapolation made out of his notion of hegemony. From a Gramscian perspective, social movements are creative reactions to contracting hegemony. To the extent that it provides room for the existence of collective actions, hegemony is expansive; yet, because it is not total, the condition for the existence of counter‐hegemonies that call to question its “essentials” also exists. The case of grassroots environmental justice organizations in the United States (GEJOs) that deal with first‐order quality of life issues falls within the province of the latter dynamics. GEJOs deal with an issue limited in scope, viz., environmental crisis; however, their movement participants have contested the multiple dimensions of existing hegemony. These organizations, as total counter‐hegemonies, have challenged the political, economic, intellectual, and cultural orders of the American society. The interest in distributive justice, participatory democracy, public‐oriented scientific endeavor, and a well‐ordered cultural realm based on a universal good sense are the fundamental elements of an alternative hegemony manifest or latent in the discursive formations and practices of GEJOs. The study is based on document analysis and interpretation of the literature on GEJOs in the United States.     

Empathy as a main ingredient of impactful crisis communication: The perspectives of crisis communication practitioners

Sixteen in-depth interviews with Belgian crisis communication practitioners were conducted to get their perspectives on the role of empathy in crisis communication. While demonstrating empathy toward crisis-affected stakeholders is considered an essential best practice, the role of empathy in responding to crises has only received limited attention in research. The aims of this study were to examine how practitioners interpret the concept of empathy in crisis communication; to what extent they value the expression of empathy in crisis responses and for what reasons; and what exactly constitutes an empathetic crisis response according to them. In addition, instances in which stakeholders may in turn experience empathy for organizations in crisis were examined. As such, the aspiration behind this study was to provide insights that can initiate further theorization and research on the role of empathy in the context of organizational crisis communication.     

Interactionism,Social Organization,and Social Processes: Looking Back and Moving Ahead

With its roots in American pragmatism, symbolic interactionism has created a distinctive perspective and produced numerous important contributions and now offers significant prospects for the future. In this article, I review my intellectual journey with this perspective over forty years. This journey was initiated within the American society, sociology, and symbolic interaction of circa 1960. I note many of the contributions made by interactionists since that time, with particular focus on those who have contributed to the study of social organization and social process. I offer an agenda for the future based on currently underdeveloped areas that have potential. These are inequality orders, institutional analysis, collective action across space and time, and the integration of temporal and spatial orders. The article concludes with calls for further efforts at cross‐perspective dialogues, more attention to feminist scholars, and an elaborated critical pragmatism.     

How publics react to situational and renewing organizational responses across crises: Examining SCCT and DOR in social-mediated crises

The prevalence of social media among networked publics calls for more research regarding how organizations can conduct effective crisis communication on social networking sites. Based on the situational crisis communication theory (SCCT) and the discourse of renewal (DOR) theory, this study examined how social media publics’ sentiments were affected by situational and renewing organizational responses in various clusters of crises. Twitter data of six crises representing three crisis clusters varying in the responsibility attribution (i.e., ambiguous, accidental, and preventable) were collected. We conducted a content analysis on organizations’ official tweets during crises (N = 59) and sentiment analysis on publics’ replies on Twitter (N = 4,340). The results showed that publics’ positive sentiments toward organizations were affected by organizational crisis responses that included instructing information, sympathy, systemic organizational learning, and effective organizational rhetoric. We recommend that crisis managers express sympathy toward publics as well as organizational learning that prevents a crisis from happening again.     

Uncertain citizenship and public deliberation in post‐apartheid South Africa

The post‐repressive‐regime South African government has actively convened a public sphere bristling with institutions and policies designed to facilitate public deliberation. However, certain apartheid legacies and contemporary political compromises facilitate the reach of power into the convened public sphere, leading to the corralling of public deliberation and the attempted silencing of critical voices. By the end of the Mbeki presidency, a cacophony of public dissent erupted, some of it insisting on the importance of open public critique and some of it seeking to limit and shape dissent itself. The article discusses ongoing contests over the meaning of publicness, locating the roots of these different ideas of publicness in different political and intellectual traditions, each with different understandings of the deliberative citizen. It suggests that participation in public debate is increasingly confined to the exertion of a narrowly defined notion of national democratic citizenship. Arguing that the formation of counterpublic spheres in South Africa is inhibited, the article considers the role of what it terms ‘capillaries’ of public deliberation, in which various kinds of radical critiques of cultural values, norms, identities and the fragmentation of historical consciousness take place.     

How organizations framed the 2009 H1N1 pandemic via social and traditional media: Implications for U.S. health communicators

Through a quantitative content analysis, this study reveals how 13 organizations differently framed the 2009 H1N1 flu pandemic crisis via their traditional (n = 211) and social media (n = 534) responses. When framing the crisis as a disaster, a health crisis, or a general health issue organizations relied more on traditional than social media. However, they tended to use social media as much as traditional media when framing the pandemic as a general crisis. In addition, organizations relied more on traditional media to address emotions than on social media. Together, the study's findings provide applied and theoretical insights for scholars and crisis managers.