PROFESSIONAL CODES OF ETHICS

In June, 2020, a fringe religious group placed a full page advertisement in the Nashville TN daily newspaper claiming that on July 18, “Islam is going to detonate a nuclear device” in the city.  The ad was a breach of professional ethics  and an attack on religion. It should have been immediately rejected by the advertising staff at the newspaper. (Details below)

All professionals have specific ethical codes based on long  tradition. Probably the best known is the Hippocratic Oath in which a physician vows “to abstain from doing harm”  (often  phrased as “first, do no harm.”)

Similarly, communications professionals have strong codes of ethics to help guide their work.  These are based on moral principles such as honesty, doing no harm, helping people, acting in a fair way, upholding the truth,  and honoring commitments.

JOURNALISM AND PUBLIC AFFAIRS REPORTING 

The Society of Professional Journalists code of ethics is the most widely used by journalists.  In outline, the SPJ code says that the media should:

  • Seek the truth
  • Act independently
  • Be accountable and transparent. Respond to critics honestly and respectfully.  Make corrections when warranted. Admit mistakes.
  • Minimize harm and have compassion for those who may be affected adversely by news coverage;

The items above are what we call “prescriptive” (should do) items.  There are also “proscriptive” (no, don’t do this) items on the list below.  These include:

  • Don’t lie,  plagiarize or misrepresent your work.
  • Don’t be afraid of criticism.
  • Don’t accept gifts, free trips or preferential treatment.
  • Don’t use undercover methods of gathering information unless traditional open methods will not yield information vital to the public.

Journalists have a variety of ethical codes,  but the SPJ code is the most universally accepted.  Most news organizations have their own codes of ethics, and many academic and international organizations also have ethics codes. A short list would include:   

Most countries have ethical codes for journalists. Here are a few:

Examples of professional ethics issues in journalism  

  •  The Norfolk Virginian Pilot employed an editorial staff  writer in the 2017-2021 period who also worked as a speech writer for Dominion,  the region’s largest electrical utility.  The conflict of interest  was known by the newspaper’s publishers.  The writer penned editorials that mocked environmentalists for opposing big gas pipelines and for preferring renewable energy.  The newspaper’s conflict  raised questions  about its ability to serve the public interest. The state chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists called it a “conflict of interest and a breach of journalistic ethics.” The statement added:   “According to the SPJ Code of Ethics, journalists should avoid conflicts of interest, real or perceived. Such conflicts undermine the trust and confidence that readers have not only in journalists but also in the news organizations they work for.”   This was a highly unusual instance of a direct and obvious conflict of interest; most such conflicts occur indirectly, through gifts or favors, or the employment of relatives, all of which are also
  • In 2021, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch uncovered a mistake in a Missouri state department of education website,  where over 100,000 social security numbers and other types of personal information were embedded in easily accessible source code. The newspaper informed  state officials and delayed publication until the vulnerable pages could be taken down. (This was definitely the ethical thing to do.)  Although every web page has source code that is visible to web browsers, Missouri Governor Mike Parson said journalists were hackers and called for criminal prosecution. However, the fact that the newspaper alerted  authorities to a problem before it was publicized shows its adherence to the SPJ Code’s admonition to “minimize harm.”  Clearly, the Post-Dispatch behaved ethically, unlike the governor of the state.
    See also this NPR article.
  • Beirut barracks: One of the least known and most significant instances of delaying publication to minimize harm involved the October 23, 1983, bombing of the US Marine Corps barracks in Beirut, Lebanon. Two months before the attack, John Donvan of ABC News realized that the building was vulnerable and talked with the commander on site. Donvan agreed not to air the story until the security had been upgraded, but the process took several weeks, due to Pentagon red tape, and in the meantime, terrorists attacked the barracks, killing 241 marines.  ABC News was well-guided by ethical considerations in this case, despite the unfortunate outcome.

ADVERTISING ETHICS  

Advertising professionals are also ethically bound to tell the truth, substantiate claims, follow the law and loyally represent clients in the IAE and AAF ethical codes.

Advertising and public relations ethics codes include:

 From the AAF Code:   

  • Advertising, public relations, marketing communications, news, and editorial all share a common objective of truth and high ethical standards in serving the public.
  • Advertising, public relations, and all marketing communications professionals have an obligation to exercise the highest personal ethics in the creation and dissemination of commercial information to consumers.
  • Advertisers should clearly distinguish advertising, public relations and corporate communications from news and editorial content and entertainment, both online and offline.
  • Advertisers should clearly disclose all material conditions, such as payment or receipt of a free product, affecting endorsements in social and traditional channels, as well as the identity of endorsers, all in the interest of full disclosure and transparency.
  • Advertisers should treat consumers fairly based on the nature of the audience to whom the ads are directed and the nature of the product or service advertised.
  • Advertisers should never compromise consumers’ personal privacy in marketing communications, and their choices as to whether to participate in providing their information should be transparent and easily made.
  • Advertisers should follow federal, state and local advertising laws, and cooperate with industry self-regulatory programs for the resolution of advertising practices.
  • Advertisers and their agencies, and online and offline media, should discuss privately potential ethical concerns, and members of the team creating ads should be given permission to express internally their ethical concerns.
  • Trust between advertising and public relations business partners, including clients, and their agencies, media venders, and third party suppliers, should be built upon transparency and full disclosure of business ownership and arrangements, agency remuneration and rebates, and media incentives.

 Examples of professional ethics issues in advertising  

  • Nashville Tennessean — In June, 2020, a  fringe group placed a full page advertisement in the Nashville TN daily newspaper claiming that on July 18, “Islam is going to detonate a nuclear device” in the city.   Once the publisher and other managers of the newspaper were informed of the ad, it was immediately withdrawn, apologies were made and an investigation was started. “Clearly there was a breakdown in the normal processes, which call for careful scrutiny of our advertising content,” said vice-president and editor  Michael Anastasi. The ad was a breach of professional ethics in terms of its false claim (which was essentially a bomb threat) and its attack on Islam in the supposed name of Christianity. It should have been immediately rejected by the advertising staff at the newspaper.

 PUBLIC RELATIONS   

One of the cornerstones of public relations theory — the James Grunig two-way symmetrical flow theory of communication — comes out of a concern for ethics.    In the Grunig model, the role of a public relations professional is not only to represent the company to the public but ALSO the public to the CEOs and board of directors of a company. As the Arthur W. Page center notes:

The two-way symmetrical model of public relations is considered the most sophisticated and ethical practice of public relations. This model focuses on dialogue that creates and sustains mutually beneficial relationships between an organization and its key stakeholders.

 Examples of professional ethics issues in  public relations   

  1. Imagine that you are consulting with Victoria’s Secret, a lingerie company with hundreds of stores and billions of dollars in sales. A   New York Times Feb. 2, 2020  news article exposed the company’s serious issues: “The Angels at Victoria’s Secret suffered a culture of misogyny.”  The article notes that Victoria’s Secret has been sued and involved in harassment and abuse of models by male CEOs.

If the consultant’s response is simply to recommend a new slogan and a new branding campaign, the consultant has missed the point of the Grunig two-way symmetrical flow model.   The ethical response would be to include models and customers in the group of publics and to suggest real changes in the company’s structure and behavior. Changes would begin with a full independent  investigation of  the charges, restructuring the management and supporting appropriate charges against the old CEOs who abused the models.   (This is eventually what occurred —  The old CEOs were sacked and a class action lawsuit alleging that models suffered a  “culture of sexual harassment and misogyny” was settled for $90 million on May 16, 2022).

2.  Imagine you are consulting an international health organization about Nestle Corp. and its ongoing issues with irresponsible marketing of baby formula. (See this article on Professionalism and ethics for details). For decades, despite the establishment of international codes regulating infant formula marketing practices and the mounting death toll, Nestle refused to change.  How would you suggest changing the company?

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY / WEB DESIGN

Content ethics not that different from journalism, although the fact/ opinion separation is often not as strong. This media may involve photography, journalism and advertising.

Special problems involve issues like setting cookies, collecting and selling data, nuisance issues like interstitial advertising, and questions about copyright.

IT and Web codes include:

Other media ethics links:

Practical advice 

For the news media, ethics is not always cut and dried.What is legal is sometimes not what is ethical, and visa versa. Here are a few situations where media professionals need to be aware of potential harm.

  • Don’t publicly identify crime victims:  The names of witnesses to a crime, or victims of  a crime, will probably be found in public documents  and it may be perfectly legal to disclose them before a trial. But this could be highly unethical, since it exposes the witness to intimidation (or worse) and the victims to additional suffering.  Even when a public trial is held, journalists usually withhold the names & identities of witnesses, juvenile offenders and sexual assault victims — even though they are matters of public record and perfectly legal to publish (As noted in our Section 3.6 on Privacy law  and also in cases like Smith v Daily Mail, Cox v Cohn, and Howard v Des Moines Register).
    • Note: Given these ethical restrictions, it’s interesting to see how the press worked to confirm a very controversial July, 2022 case of a ten year old sexual assault victim who needed an abortion. Many people, including the attorney  general of Ohio, thought the story was a hoax. Reporters for Ohio and Indiana newspapers scoured the criminal databases to find the perpetrator and confirmed the connection to the victim.  (Washington Post, July 27, 2022).   Note that the victim herself was never publicly identified.
  • Respect the principle of innocence until guilt is proven:  Police and prosecutors often hope to bias potential jurors with pre-trial releases of damaging information. The problem is that this information may not be accepted by the court. For example, a coerced confession would not be admissible. Yet sometimes police will tell reporters that they “have a confession” in the hope that this will make the prosecutor’s job easier.
    In short, don’t attempt to try the case in the media; let the courts do their jobs, and wait for pre-trial information to be processed by the courts.
  • Names withheld pending notification of relatives: The press sever be the first to inform relatives of the death of their loved ones.   This is a difficult task for professionals in criminal justice and / or the clergy.  The reason for this ethical rule is that within the first  hours of learning that a close relative has died, many people seriously consider suicide.  The police usually ensure that people are informed by officers,  in person, who stay until there is someone –  another relative, a member of the clergy or at least a neighbor – who will stay with the bereaved during the first hours or days.    People in the press are not trained for this job, and risk causing serious harm by notifying relatives.
  • It’s even worse when the news media publishes information about deaths before the closest relatives have been informed. This is one of the ways that the news media loses community trust.
    • Sports writer Roland Lazenby was working with the Roanoke Times in the 1980s when an airplane crashed  on a nearby mountain. He helped police carry the  stretchers down the mountain and in the process learned the names of the accident victims.  He filed an “advance” story with the names and with strong  instructions to run the story in two days. However, an eager editor put the information into the newspaper that came out the next day. Understandably, relatives were shocked, police were angry, and ethical codes to minimize harm were broken. Reporters may need to withhold information from their own editors under these circumstances.
  • Avoid deception — In the past, journalists have gone  undercover to get a story that might otherwise not be accessible.  Famed journalist Nelly Bly went undercover in a New York asylum in 1888, for example. But this is a risky and potentially unethical approach that may lead to trespass charges, for example, in a 1992  ABC News undercover report from a grocery chain,  or  a voicemail hacking scandal at a Gannett newspaper.  There are also pseud0- journalists such as right wing political activist James O’Keefe, who use the idea of undercover journalism for purely political ends, for example, trying to expose wrongdoing by  the League of Conservation Voters.    According to the Society of Professional Journalists code of ethics, reporters should “Avoid undercover or other surreptitious methods of gathering information unless traditional, open methods will not yield information vital to the public.”
  • Be careful with classified military and government information:  It may be illegal to publish certain “classified” (secret) information about a government agency, and yet there are cases where journalists go ahead and publish because they are following their ethical duty to serve as watchdogs on government. This was the point in the US v New York Times case over the Pentagon Papers history of Vietnam in 1971.  Publication can also lead to problems for the journalist, including jail time.
    On the other hand, classified military or intelligence information about the location and strength of troops, about weapons capabilities, about the identities of intelligence agents, about sources and methods of intelligence gathering are among items that are  unethical and possibly illegal to publish / broadcast.
    These are deep waters and care is needed.  Journalists have a “special obligation to serve as watchdogs over public affairs and government,” according to the SPJ code. “Seek to ensure that the public’s business is conducted in the open, and that public records are open to inspection.”  But journalists also have an obligation to avoid endangering military and intelligence personnel.
  • Ads and body image: Some kinds of advertising may be perfectly legal and yet push social boundaries and images into ethically unacceptable directions.  The tendency to emphasize extremely thin and unhealthy body shapes for women is often considered unethical. Jean Kilbourne’s work with the  “Killing Us Softly” documentary series has helped to bring this issue to light.
  • Ads and truthfulness:  It may be illegal or contrary to FTC or FCC regulations to fabricate information in advertising,  yet social critics like Adbusters and Yes Men fabricate advertising for reasons they believe are highly ethical, such as poking fun at tobacco advertising or the lack of corporate accountability on environmental issues. In the end, what makes a parody ad acceptable is that the parody is revealed before damage is done.
  •  Some companies engage in unethical business practices, and attempt to cover that up through public relations and advertising.   For instance, tobacco, fossil fuels and indoor tanning industries have all attempted to minimize concerns about public health and environmental aspects of their businesses with highly deceptive advertising.  This is a difficult area of corporate speech that we will consider in the section on Advertising.

These are just a few examples of the kinds of ethical complexities people in the media face.  So it’s important to understand ethical principles and professional ethical codes that might help deal with these issues.

One last word 

Don’t be complicit. Think independently.   If an organization provides a template for a limited range of  ethical responses or a narrow list of public(s) that should be considered, you may have to question the a priori assumptions and the fairness of the ethical evaluations process.

As in the Victoria’s Secret case (above), ethical considerations should always rise above simple issues concerning company reputation. They should include concerns for possible harm to employees and the public, and also possible unethical or criminal behavior by corporate CEOs.

Your ethical responsibility always extends beyond the boundaries that may have been set by your organization.