No Seat at the Table: The PR Industry's Diversity Failure

By Easha Kapur -

On the 20th of August, a Sanex campaign was banned by the ASA for promoting harmful content. The advert depicted a 'before' image of two black women with 'dry, flaky' skin, followed by an 'after' image of a white woman with ‘fixed’ skin. The ASA ruled the advert 'was likely to reinforce the negative and offensive racial stereotype that black skin was problematic and that white skin was superior'.

Nearly 2 weeks prior, on the 8th of August, Adidas faced backlash over its Oaxaca slip-on shoe, attracting dismayed accusations of cultural appropriation. The shoe heavily resembled the traditional handmade huarache sandals of Villa Hidalgo Yalalag, an Indigenous Mexican Town. However, Adidas failed to acknowledge, credit, or involve Mexican individuals in the shoe's PR campaign or production. The company later removed all promotional materials relating to the shoe on social media, and visited Villa Hidalgo Yalalag to apologise for the upset it caused. 

These two incidents are not isolated, nor are they unrelated. Rather, they illustrate a worrying trend. More and more frequently, corporations are being accused of devising culturally or racially insensitive campaigns. Other notable examples include Heinz’s Halloween-themed ad accused of resembling blackface, Sydney Sweeney’s controversial American Eagle Advert, and Swatch's now-pulled advertisement featuring an Asian Model pulling his eyes outwards. These PR blunders are costly, both reputationally and economically. From accusations of cultural appropriation to eugenics promotion, the PR industry's lack of cultural sensitivity is proving problematic.

The logical question is, of course, why? Why are companies releasing campaigns and adverts that to many would seem immediately racially or culturally insensitive? Evidence typically points to accident rather than intent. After all, it is hardly in companies’ strategic interests to release these controversial campaigns. Contrary to belief there is very much such a thing as bad PR, and Adidas, Heinz, Swatch, and Sanex can vouch. All had to either pull their campaigns, issue apologies, or face regulatory sanctions.

So given that PRs are strategically incentivised to avoid this kind of bad press, the question transforms from why to how? How are these campaigns being released, when the role of PR is to fervently avoid these kinds of scandals? Indeed, when one considers the intensity of vetting processes for corporate advertising, it is hard to understand how no one spotted the cultural insensitivities. Regardless of a PR team's personal stance on so-called "wokeness," their professional aim should be to avoid campaigns that the public will deem harmful.

The statistics provide a possible answer. Perhaps no one identified these campaign insensitivities because those most likely to identify them were never included in the conversations. Whilst 20% of the UK population identify themselves as coming from an ethnically diverse background, only 9-11% of PRs identify themselves as such. It is hardly surprising, then, that campaigns conceived in homogenous boardrooms fail to achieve cultural sensitivity - they lack the diversity of perspective.

But even beyond reputational risk, the lack of diversity in the PR industry may also hinder it from doing its intended job. Given that empathy is a fundamental requisite of good communication, how can a PR industry - which is premised on this very skill - succeed if it lacks the diversity to understand the UK population? Research suggests that PRs who can understand their constituents are better equipped to produce communication that genuinely resonates with said constituents. The sociopolitical contexts of PR therefore emerge as crucial, as they determine whether communication materials connect with or alienate their target audience.

Still, the idea of diversifying the PR profession is not a revolutionary one; concerted endeavours to broaden its demographic extend well before the resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020. So why is change not being precipitated at the pace it should be? 

Dr Lee Edwards suggests the stultified pace of change is a power play. This makes sense; genuine diversification in the PR industry would require an effective redistribution of power. To properly engage with underrepresented groups, established industry leaders would have to cede a degree of the influence and authority they enjoy. She suggests this is a concession they are often unwilling to make, particularly within an industry that insists that success is predicated on individual merit - a worldview that conveniently obscures inherent structural (dis)advantages.

Therefore, in order to stop producing campaigns that alienate the public, that glorify or vilify one skin colour over another, or that entrench stereotypes, perhaps a shift is needed not just in diversity but in the entire way PRs perceive themselves and their industry. If people continue to misconstrued power as a reward for individual merit rather than a product of privilege, those who have it will refuse to relinquish it. Consequently, PR campaigns will continue to falter, perpetually attempting to "give voice to the voiceless" only to reveal, in the most damaging ways, that they never understood them in the fist place.