Philip Young has a thought-provoking piece - mediations: Ethics study: as clear as your conscience - on his recent research into PR and ethics.
I don't believe that PR is any more or less ethical than most professions, although I do believe that we do have a role as the ethical guardian. For this reason it is essential that PR practitioners have a firm grasp and understanding of what we mean by ethics, and this is where I think many fall down.
The comparison with journalists is interesting. I think there is a big difference between journalists (the majority of whom I see as ethical) and the media that they work for. Some of the media has very low ethical standards - even flagships like Radio 4's Today programme have become partisan and sloppy, as evidenced by the disgraceful conduct of the Today team responsible for the 'Gilligan affair'.
At one time I like to believe that the media did have higher standards but they are sinking rapidly. The main reason is probably financial pressures leading to understaffing.
British Spin comments about how even national newspaper journalists don't do their job anymore. Instead of carefully researching a political story they are happy to go on handouts from PRs and get a quick comment from the other party. The same is true in other areas of PR.
