PUBLIC AFFAIRS RELATIONS WITH GOVERNMENT The PRACTICE

preview Government activities at all levels have tremendous daily impact [negative or positive] on every kind of organization Public affairs units help organizations anticipate and respond to issues affecting their activities and environment It helps them lobby, build campaigns and shape public policy

What is public affairs Public affairs is the aspect of public relations that deals with the political environment of organizations It is sometimes called government relations It helps organizations anticipate or respond to issues affecting their activities It specializes in building public policy relationships between organizations and in public policy arena

Arena of public affairs PA for not-for-profit organizations such as schools, libraries, foundations to influence regulations in their favour PA in business because government plays the roles of stimulant, referee, rule maker, engineer, pursuer of social goals, defenders, provider, customer, controller etc

Public affair tasks Information acquisition through fact finding mechanisms Information processing through evaluations of options Information dissemination Fight fire with fire on the governmental relations front through sensitive ‘leaks’ to the media about government activities when boxed into a corner

Understanding the political system Electoral activities – involves the elections of candidates favorable to an organization’s interests; plans are developed to help raise fund and canvas votes for the candidates such as the political action committee [PAC] Legislative activities – working to gain or create support for favorable legislation and build opposition against unfavorable activities. Lobbying is the major avenue used here. The understanding continue in next slides

Understanding the political system Regulatory activities – fostering an understanding of the day-to-day workings of the organization and the regulators. The regulators are more difficult to influence because they are not elected Politicking from the grass roots – this is done through grassroots lobbying and issue [advocacy] advertising where the organization canvas support from voters to help them elect people who will support their cause More understanding the political system ahead

Understanding the political system State and local public affairs – staying on top of issues, knowing the right PAC to contribute towards, cultivating the right media contacts should not only be done at the federal levels, but at the state and local levels Internal political communication – involves PR practitioner who monitors government affairs and using in-house publications and other media to provide political instructions, increase employee awareness of political issues and encourage employee political involvement

Government public affairs Government owes the citizens an understanding of issues and what roles they were to play in governance. This necessitated setting up of public information officers in the US and Information officers in Nigeria They help inform, educate and direct the citizens on government policies and services that are available and how the citizens can access them They gauge public opinion and perform all the roles of the PR practitioners; most times they become too protective of the government of the day - NTA

Technology and government public relations It enhances the two-way communication system Web pages of government agencies could be created with adequate information to benefit the citizens Websites can achieve the objectives of communicating with the publics and researchers; distributing large volume of information; publicizing and analyzing new policy; soliciting public comments

task Make copies of Case Studies in Page 318-319 for students to provide answers