INTERVIEW SERIES:The Transformation of Public Relations in the Digital Age
INTERVIEWER: Gökhan Çolak INTERVIEWEE: Dejan Verčič

Reflexive Public Relations and Theoretical Foundations

In the reflexive public relations model you developed with Betteke Van Ruler, how do you define “reflexivity,” and what does it imply for organizational practice?

In our work, reflexivity is not merely an extension of responsiveness, but a qualitatively different mode of relating organizations to their environment. It denotes the capacity of organizations to observe themselves as part of society and to reflect upon the consequences of their actions within broader social contexts.

To fully understand reflexivity, it is useful to introduce the notion of positionality. Our perception of the world is always conditioned by the position from which we observe it, by who we are, where we stand, and what we have experienced.

We do not see the world “as it is,” but as it appears from within a particular standpoint. Reflexivity, in this sense, can be understood as the awareness of positionality. If positionality is the structural condition of perception, reflexivity is the capacity to recognize and interrogate that condition. While this İnsight is often discussed at the level of individuals, it extends equally to organizations. Organizations, too, occupy economic, cultural, and political positions from which they interpret society. Their communication is therefore never neutral, but always situated. Much of public relations theory has remained confined to the behavioral level, focusing on interactions between organizations and their publics. However, legitimacy does not emerge solely within these interactions. It is constituted at the societal level, where different positions encounter one another and where expectations are negotiated. From this perspective, communication acquires a dual role: it is not only a means of influencing others, but also a mechanism through which organizations become observable to themselves. Reflexive public relations introduces a second-order perspective: organizations communicate not only to act, but to understand how their position shapes both their actions and their interpretations of society. In conditions where communication increasingly permeates organizational processes more broadly, reflexivity becomes even more important. Organizations must reflect not only on what they communicate, but on how communication structures their perception, decision-making, and action.

In which fundamental theoretical ways does the reflexive model differ from the Anglo- American, management-oriented approach to public relations?

The Anglo-American tradition has been highly influential in establishing public relations as a management function. It tends to conceptualize communication in terms of effectiveness, control, and the achievement of organizational objectives.

From a reflexive and distinctly European perspective, however, this approach is considered theoretically limited. It reduces public relations primarily to relationship management between organizations and their publics, often treating communication as an instrument for achieving predefined organizational goals. In contrast, European scholarship has long emphasized that public relations cannot be understood solely as a managerial function, but must also be seen as embedded within the public sphere and societal processes.

This difference becomes particularly clear when considering the concept of “the public.” In the Anglo-American tradition, publics are typically treated as stakeholders or target groups. In many European traditions, especially in Germanic and Scandinavian contexts, the concept

refers more broadly to the public sphere (Öffentlichkeit), that is, a space where societal issues, values, and legitimacy are negotiated. Public relations is therefore not only about managing relationships, but about contributing to the formation and quality of public discourse and public opinion.

From a reflexive perspective, one might therefore argue that the Anglo-American approach insufficiently accounts for the positional and societal nature of communication. It assumes, implicitly, that organizations can observe their environment in a relatively neutral way and adjust accordingly. However, if we take positionality seriously, this assumption becomes problematic. Organizations do not observe society from nowhere; they observe it from within specific positions that shape what they can see and how they interpret it. The European perspective introduces an additional layer: communication is not only shaped by organizational position, but also by cultural, linguistic, and societal contexts, which differ significantly across countries. Public relations in Europe is therefore inherently plural, context-dependent, and intertwined with political systems, media structures, and cultural traditions.

Moreover, European research has identified a reflective dimension of public relations as one of its defining characteristics, alongside managerial and operational aspects. This reflective dimension focuses on the public consequences of organizational behavior, emphasizing responsibility, legitimacy, and the organization’s role within society rather than merely its effectiveness in achieving goals . The reflexive model thus introduces a shift from an instrumental to a societal and positional understanding of communication. It asks not only how communication can be made effective, but also how the organization’s position, cultural context, and societal role condition its understanding of what is effective or legitimate.

This entails a broader theoretical move:

• from effectiveness to legitimacy,
• from relationship management to public sphere engagement,
• from organizational control to societal co-orientation,
• and from communication as a tool to communication as part of the ongoing

construction of social reality.

In this sense, the European reflexive approach does not reject management, but situates it within a wider societal framework where public relations is not only accountable to organizational objectives, but also to the dynamics of the public sphere in which those objectives unfold.

Dialogue, Public Sphere, and Digital Communication

In today’s platform-drıven digital environment, shaped by algorithms and data economies, to what extent do you think dialogue and public opinion formation are genuinely dialogıc, and to what extent are they structured or simulated?

In today’s platform-driven digital environment, communicative possibilities have undoubtedly expanded. Social media, networked platforms, and interactive technologies appear to enable continuous dialogue between organizations and publics. However, from a reflexive perspective, this apparent dialogical openness must be critically reconsidered. What presents itself as dialogue is increasingly shaped, and often constrained, by algorithmic infrastructures and data- driven economic models. Platforms do not simply host communication; they actively structure visibility, relevance, and reach. Algorithms prioritize certain voices, topics, and interactions, while marginalizing others. As a result, communication is not merely the outcome of free interaction, but of selection mechanisms embedded in technological and economic systems. In this context, it becomes difficult to speak of dialogue in the classical sense, as developed in normative public relations theory (e.g., symmetrical communication or mutual understanding). Instead, we are confronted with forms of structured, curated, and sometimes simulated dialogue, where interaction is mediated through platform logics such as engagement metrics, personalization, and monetization.

From a European reflexive standpoint, this shift reinforces the importance of understanding communication as situated within the public sphere, rather than as a neutral exchange between actors. Public opinion is no longer formed solely through rational-critical debate, but through a complex interplay between users, organizations, and technological systems that co-produce what becomes visible and discussable. This transformation resonates strongly with the concept of “new publicity”. Here, public relations is no longer limited to mediating between organizations and publics through traditional media, but becomes directly involved in the production of mediated realities within digital environments. Organizations act as publishers, participants, and amplifiers within platform ecosystems, contributing to the shaping of public discourse itself.

Importantly, this does not mean that dialogue disappears altogether. Rather, its nature changes. Dialogue becomes platform-dependent, datafied, and strategically modulated. While interactions may appear reciprocal, they are often asymmetrical in terms of visibility, influence, and control. Organizations, for example, can strategically optimize content for algorithmic amplification, while publics operate within constraints they do not fully control or even perceive. From a reflexive perspective, this raises critical questions of legitimacy and responsibility. If public opinion is increasingly shaped by opaque algorithmic systems and economic incentives, then the conditions under which societal meaning is constructed become less transparent and less accountable. Public relations, in this context, cannot be reduced to managing engagement or visibility; it must also reflect on its role in shaping these communicative environments and their societal consequences. Thus, rather than viewing digital communication as a space of pure dialogue, it is more accurate to conceptualize it as a field of structured visibility and mediated interaction, where dialogue is partially real, partially orchestrated, and always conditioned by the infrastructures in which it takes place.

Culture and Strategic Communication

You challenge the notion of “best practice” ın public relations by emphasizing cultural context. How does culture shape and transform strategic communication processes?

If positionality applies at the individual and organizational level, it must also be extended to the cultural level. Communication is always situated within broader cultural contexts that define what is visible, meaningful, and legitimate. In this sense, culture can be understood as a structured form of positionality.

It provides the horizon within which communication becomes interpretable. Cultural frameworks shape not only what can be said, but also what can be understood, accepted, or contested. They influence communicative styles, norms of interaction, expectations of transparency, and even the very definition of what counts as “public” communication.

From this perspective, communication does not occur between neutral actors, but between actors embedded in different cultural positions. These positions are not fixed, but layered and dynamic. Organizations and individuals simultaneously operate within national cultures, professional cultures, organizational cultures, and increasingly also within global and digital cultures. Communication is therefore always, to some extent, intercultural, even when it appears to take place within a single national context.

This is why the notion of “best practice” is difficult to sustain. What is considered appropriate, effective, or legitimate communication depends on the cultural position from which it is evaluated. Practices such as transparency, dialogue, or stakeholder engagement may be widely endorsed as general principles, but their meaning and implementation vary significantly across contexts. In this sense, the earlier distinction between generic principles and specific applications remains highly relevant: what may be generalizable at the level of abstraction becomes necessarily contextual at the level of practice.

Globalization has further intensified this condition. As organizations operate across multiple cultural environments, they are confronted with differing, and sometimes conflicting, expectations regarding communication. This multiplies positionalities and makes them more visible. At the same time, digital media create shared spaces of interaction that bring these different cultural logics into immediate contact, often without the stabilizing frameworks that traditionally mediated intercultural communication. This development is closely related to what may be described as the communicatization of work. As communication becomes constitutive of organizational processes, shaping coordination, decision-making, and value creation, cultural positionality becomes embedded not only in external communication, but in organizational functioning itself. Organizations do not simply communicate across cultures; they increasingly operate through communication that is itself culturally structured.

From a reflexive perspective, this requires a heightened awareness of cultural positionality. Organizations must not only adapt their communication to different contexts, but also reflect on how their own cultural position shapes their perception of others. Misunderstandings in communication are often not the result of insufficient information, but of differing interpretive frameworks. Strategic communication, therefore, cannot be understood as the application of universal models or standardized “best practices.” It is better conceived as the ongoing navigation of multiple positional contexts, cultural, social, and institutional, under conditions of complexity and uncertainty. In this sense, strategy and reflexivity converge. Strategy provides orientation for action within specific contexts, while reflexivity enables organizations to recognize the limits of their own cultural perspective. Together, they form the basis of a context-sensitive, culturally aware approach to communication, one that acknowledges that communication is not only about transmitting messages, but about negotiating meaning across different positions within society.

When positioning public relations as a strategic management function, how do you reconcile this with the reflexive, socially responsive dimension of your model?

The relationship between strategy and reflexivity can be most productively understood through the lens of positionality. Strategy always presupposes a position. It is developed from a particular standpoint, shaped by organizational goals, resources, cultural context, and institutional constraints. In this sense, strategy is never neutral; it reflects a situated perspective on what is relevant, desirable, and achievable. Reflexivity, in turn, enables organizations to become aware of that standpoint and its limitations. It introduces a second-order perspective, allowing organizations not only to act strategically, but also to observe how their strategies are shaped by their position and how they are perceived within broader societal contexts. One might therefore say that strategy operates within positionality, while reflexivity makes positionality visible.

This relationship is not a contradiction, but a structural tension. Strategic communication emphasizes purposiveness, coordination, and the achievement of objectives. Reflexivity introduces a critical and normative dimension, focusing on legitimacy, responsibility, and the societal consequences of organizational action. From a European perspective, this tension reflects a broader distinction between instrumental rationality and societal rationality. Public relations cannot be reduced to a tool for achieving organizational success; it must also account for the organization’s embeddedness in the public sphere, where legitimacy is negotiated and contested.

Globalization further intensifies this tension. As organizations operate across multiple cultural and institutional contexts, strategic decisions must be made under conditions of uncertainty and plurality. What is considered a rational strategy in one context may be perceived as inappropriate or illegitimate in another. Reflexivity therefore becomes essential for navigating between different expectations and interpretive frameworks. At the same time, the communicatization of work expands the scope of this relationship. Communication is no longer confined to a specialized function, but increasingly constitutes organizational processes themselves. Strategy is enacted through communication, and reflexivity must therefore extend beyond communication outputs to encompass the communicative structures through which organizations operate. Without reflexivity, strategy risks becoming blind to its own assumptions and to the broader societal implications of its actions. It may achieve short-term effectiveness while undermining long-term legitimacy.

Without strategy, however, reflexivity risks remaining purely observational, capable of critique, but unable to guide action. The challenge, therefore, is not to choose between strategy and reflexivity, but to integrate them. Strategic communication provides direction and coherence, while reflexivity provides orientation and correction. Together, they enable organizations to act purposefully while remaining responsive to the societal environments in which they are embedded. In this sense, public relations can be understood as a practice that operates simultaneously at two levels: it contributes to organizational decision-making, while also facilitating the organization’s ongoing reflection on its role within society.

Globalization and Communication Management

How has globalization transformed public relations theory, partıcularly in terms of managing communication across diverse cultural and social contexts?

Globalization has fundamentally transformed public relations by making communication inherently intercultural, multi-positional, and structurally embedded in complex environments. Organizations no longer operate within a single cultural or societal framework. Instead, they engage with stakeholders embedded in multiple, overlapping cultural systems: national, professional, organizational, and ideological. As I have argued elsewhere, individuals and organizations are always situated within several cultures simultaneously, and communication is therefore always an intercultural practice. This has several implications.

First, culture is not merely a background variable of communication, but both its condition and its outcome. Public relations is shaped by cultural environments, while at the same time contributing to their construction. Communication, in this sense, participates in the ongoing production of social reality.

Second, globalization introduces a persistent tension between universalism and relativism. This tension was already addressed within the Excellence framework in the 1990s, where, together with James E. Grunig and Larissa A. Grunig at the University of Maryland, we worked on the distinction between generic principles and specific applications. The underlying idea was that while certain principles may be generalizable, their realization is always contingent upon local conditions. This line of thinking was further developed in my later work with Krishnamurthy Sriramesh, where we conceptualized public relations as embedded in environmental variables such as political systems, economic development, media structures, activism, and culture . The aim was to enable comparative and cross- national analysis, while maintaining sensitivity to context. These efforts were also reflected in our editorial work, including The Global Public Relations Handbook (2003, 2009, 2020) and Culture and Public Relations (2012), which contributed to consolidating global public relations as a field of study.

From a longer-term perspective, my earlier work in the 1990s already approached public relations from a global standpoint, emphasizing that communication cannot be confined to national boundaries. What has changed since then is the intensity and structural relevance of these dynamics. As we later argue in Communication Excellence (Tench, Verčič, Zerfass, Moreno & Verhoeven, 2017), globalization is not only an external condition, but one of the defining characteristics of contemporary organizations. Excellent organizations are, by necessity, globalised, mediatised, and reflective, that is, they must continuously engage with diverse environments, operate within saturated media systems, and reflect upon their own role in society. This perspective situates globalization within a broader transformation of society, what has been described as hypermodernity, characterized by complexity, acceleration, and permanent change. Communication becomes central in such environments, not merely as a managerial tool, but as a way of making sense of uncertainty and navigating competing expectations. This development reinforces the importance of positionality. Communication is always shaped by the position from which it is produced, and globalization multiplies these positions. Strategic communication, therefore, can be understood as the ongoing effort to navigate between different cultural logics, institutional environments, and stakeholder expectations under conditions of uncertainty.

New Publicity and Digital Transformation

In your concept of “New Publicity,” how does digitalization redefine the circulation of information and visibility in contemporary media environments?

“New publicity” describes a structural transformation in the ways visibility is produced, distributed, and sustained in contemporary media environments. Traditionally, public relations operated within a relatively stable media system in which journalism functioned as a central gatekeeper. Organizations depended on access to media institutions in order to gain visibility and legitimacy within the public sphere. Digitalization has fundamentally altered this arrangement. Organizations are no longer merely sources of information for journalists; they increasingly act as media producers in their own right. They create, curate, and distribute content across multiple platforms, often addressing publics directly without the mediation of traditional news organizations.

I often describe this shift as a movement from mediated visibility to self-produced visibility. Visibility is no longer granted primarily through journalistic selection, but is actively constructed by organizations themselves. Communication becomes continuous rather than episodic, and strategically curated rather than externally filtered. However, this does not mean that mediation disappears. Rather, its nature changes. Instead of editorial gatekeeping, we see the emergence of algorithmic and platform-based mediation, where visibility is shaped by data-driven selection mechanisms, engagement metrics, and platform logics. In this sense, mediation becomes less centralized, but not less powerful, only less transparent. This transformation leads to a fragmentation and redistribution of visibility. Multiple actors, organizations, influencers, media outlets, and users, compete and interact within the same communicative spaces. The boundaries between journalism, public relations, marketing, and personal communication become increasingly blurred.

From a reflexive perspective, this raises important questions about the relationship between communication and the public sphere. If organizations increasingly produce their own visibility, they also participate more directly in shaping public discourse. Public relations is no longer simply about representing organizations within existing publics; it becomes part of the process through which publics themselves are constituted. This development is closely linked to broader transformations such as globalization and the communicatization of work. As communication becomes central to organizational processes, and as organizations operate across multiple contexts, the production of visibility becomes both more strategic and more complex. Visibility is no longer a by- product of communication; it becomes one of its primary objectives and conditions.

Wıthin the framework of “New Publicity,” do you think public relations is shifting from meaning production toward attention management?

There is clearly a growing emphasis on attention, driven by the dynamics of digital media environments characterized by information abundance and competition for visibility. In such contexts, communication must first capture attention in order to have any effect at all. However, I would not interpret this development as a replacement of meaning by attention. Rather, attention and meaning have become more tightly interconnected. One might say that attention has become the gateway to meaning.

In environments of attention scarcity, communication is increasingly shaped by the need to become visible. This leads to formats, styles, and strategies designed to attract and sustain attention, often privileging speed, emotional resonance, and visual appeal. At the same time, meaning remains essential for legitimacy, trust, and long-term relationships. Without meaning, attention remains superficial and short-lived. What we are witnessing, therefore, is not a shift from meaning to attention, but a reconfiguration of their relationship. Meaning is increasingly produced under conditions where attention must first be secured, and this inevitably influences how meaning is constructed, communicated, and interpreted.

From a reflexive perspective, this raises important questions about the societal consequences of communication. If attention becomes a primary organizing principle, there is a risk that communication prioritizes what is visible over what is relevant, and what is engaging over what is meaningful. This has implications not only for organizations, but for the quality of public discourse. At the same time, the communicatization of work further reinforces this development. As communication becomes central to organizational processes, attention management becomes embedded not only in external communication, but also in internal coordination, decision-making, and knowledge production. Organizations must continuously manage not only what they communicate, but also how attention is distributed within and around them.

From a strategic perspective, this means that public relations must operate within an attention economy. From a reflexive perspective, it must also question the consequences of this condition. The challenge is therefore not simply to manage attention effectively, but to ensure that attention is connected to meaningful, responsible, and legitimate communication. In this sense, attention does not replace meaning. It transforms the conditions under which meaning is produced and negotiated within contemporary public communication.

Future of Public Relations: Theory and Transformation

When considered together, how do reflexive public relations, strategic communication, and “New Publicity” shape the future trajectory of the discipline?

Taken together, these concepts point toward a more comprehensive and differentiated understanding of public relations as a discipline that operates at the intersection of organizational strategy, societal expectations, and evolving media environments. Strategic communication emphasizes purposeful, goal-oriented action. It provides organizations with the capacity to coordinate communication in line with objectives, allocate resources, and act effectively under conditions of competition and constraint. Reflexive public relations introduces a broader societal and normative dimension, shifting attention from effectiveness alone to questions of legitimacy, responsibility, and the organization’s role within society. “New publicity,” in turn, highlights the transformation of the media environment, where visibility is no longer mediated in stable ways, but is continuously produced, distributed, and contested within digital and platform-based systems. What becomes visible through this combination is that public relations can no longer be understood as a single function or even as a clearly bounded field. Rather, it emerges as a multi-level practice that operates simultaneously within organizations as part of decision- making and coordination, within society as part of legitimacy construction and public discourse, and within media systems as part of the production and circulation of visibility. These dimensions are increasingly interdependent, and their boundaries become more difficult to distinguish.

This interdependence is particularly evident in the context of the communicatization of work. As communication becomes constitutive of organizational processes, it is no longer confined to a specialized function. Strategy is enacted through communication, reflexivity is enabled through communication, and visibility is produced through communication.

Communication thus becomes not only a tool of organization, but a condition of its existence. From this perspective, the future of public relations lies not simply in refining techniques or improving tools, but in integrating these perspectives into a coherent framework capable of addressing complexity. Organizations must navigate multiple and often conflicting positionalities, cultural, institutional, and societal, while operating in environments characterized by uncertainty, fragmentation, and rapid change.

In this sense, public relations increasingly becomes a practice of navigating complexity of positioning organizations within society, while simultaneously reflecting on how those positions are constructed, communicated, and perceived. One might therefore argue that the future of the discipline lies in recognizing that organizations do not simply use communication, they exist through it.

In the context of artificial intelligence, data analytics, and digital platforms, do you foresee public relations becoming more strategic, or evolving toward a more reflexive and public- oriented model?

Developments in artificial intelligence and data analytics will undoubtedly enhance the strategic capacities of public relations, enabling more precise forms of planning, targeting, and evaluation. However, these developments should not be understood in isolation. They are part of a broader transformation that could be described as the communicatization of work. Increasingly, work across organizations is constituted through communication: coordination, decision-making, knowledge sharing, and even value creation are mediated through communicative processes. In this sense, communication is no longer simply a function within organizations; it becomes a defining feature of how organizations operate. Strategic communication, therefore, expands beyond its traditional boundaries and becomes intertwined with management itself. This development has two important consequences.

First, it reinforces the strategic dimension of communication. If organizational processes are increasingly communicative, then the ability to design, manage, and guide communication becomes central to organizational success.

Second, it simultaneously intensifies the need for reflexivity. As communication permeates all aspects of organizational life, the consequences of communication, intended and unintended, become more far-reaching. Organizations must therefore become more aware not only of what they communicate, but of how communication structures their actions and their relationships with society.

This is further amplified by the conditions of what is sometimes described as a post-literate or post-truth environment, in which traditional authorities, scientific, institutional, or expert, are increasingly questioned . Under such conditions, communication does not simply transmit knowledge; it becomes central to the construction, contestation, and validation of knowledge itself. For this reason, it seems unlikely that public relations will evolve in a purely strategic or purely reflexive direction. Rather, both dimensions will develop in parallel. The increasing centrality of communication in organizational life strengthens the need for strategic coordination, while at the same time making reflexivity indispensable.

One might therefore argue that the communicatization of work marks a further step in the evolution of public relations, from managing communication, to understanding its consequences, to recognizing communication as a constitutive dimension of organizational existence.