| Public
Relations and the Law
Dr. Linda Perry
- Law: A system of rules governing a society
- Part of environmental factors affecting the practice of
public relations
- Impact of environmental variables help predict which
strategies and techniques are better suited in that environment.
- Legal System
- Key questions:
- Are there specific legal codes dealing with communication
activities of organizations?
- Does the country have legal codes to regulate the media?
- Constitutional law: interpreted by judiciary
- Statutory law: representatives make law (positive law)
- Common law: (stare decisis) — stand by things decided
— judge-made law in void of statutory law
- British (Civil law in Spain and its former colonies)
- Torts: Plaintiff and defendant
- Administrative law: Rules, policies by executive, to carry
out or in absence of statutory law
- Environmental factors
- Five environmental variables guide PR
- Political ideology
- Gaining support from officials
- Power relationships
- Economic system
- Level of development
- Distribution of resources
- Degree of activism
- Culture
- Media system
- Political Ideology
- With increase in level of democratization
- A parallel increase in the level of sophistication
of public relations.
- Strategic public relations flourishes in pluralistic
societies
- Democratisation has spread public relations.
- PR has impacted process of democratisation and maintaining
particular political systems.
- Political System
- Key variable
- Public relations related to public opinion
- If public opinion not valued
- PR not sophisticated
- One-way, propagandistic
- Closely linked to economic development
- Lack of economic development often leaves a society
mired in illiteracy and povery
- Modern public relations assumes a democratic political structure
in which competing groups seek legitimacy and power
- through public opinion and elections.
- Key Questions:
- Is public opinion valued?
- Do organisations have avenues of influencing public
policy making.
- Economic system
- A pluralistic political philosophy favors greater economic
freedom
- Strategic public relations generally thrives
- Competition among organisations for public attention,
approval and support.
- Many of the 148 members of the World Trade Organization
have begun changing public-sector enterprises to private-sector
investment
- Singapore joined Jan. 1, 1995.
- Degree of activism
- Only pluralistic societies tolerate activism
- Level of economic development also influences level and
nature of activism
- Activist groups try to influence organisations to be socially
responsible
- Pressure groups
- Special interest groups
- Social movements
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- Culture
- Communication influences and is influenced by culture.
- Complex of knowledge, beliefs, art, morals, customs,
and other capabilities and habits acquired by members
of society.
- Media system
- Relationship between media and public relations is critical
- Effective media relations requires understanding the nature
of a country’s media environment.
- Media control
- Who controls
- Whether
that control extends to editorial content
- Media outreach
- Media access
- Media control
- Ownership
- Depends on political system, economic development
- Editorial freedom is directly proportional to the level
of economic development.
- Lack of resources and infrastructure.
- Developed democracies
- Capitalistic entrepreneurs—advertising & subscriptions
- Developing countries
- Ownership in hands of political interests, social
elites
- Maintaining status quo is paramount
- Incentive to influence media content
- Media ownership does not necessarily result in media control
- In developing countries, media strictly monitored and controlled
by political or government forces
- Muzzling of journalists increasingly accomplished by more
subtle, legalistic methods rather than violence or outright
repression.
- Governments' principal methods of control:
- Advertisements
- Controlling supply of means of production: newsprint
- Ownership
- Legal restrictions on content
- Historical means of legal control, British systems:
- Seditious Libel
- Censorship
- Licensing
- Media Environment in Singapore
- Press Freedoms Lag in Singapore: Modernity Means More Than Progressive Banking and Shining Cities,
Martin, Justin D., Columbia Journalism Review, June 28, 2010, http://ww.cjr.org/behind_the_news/press_freedoms_lag_in_singapor.php
-
UN Human Development Index: 23rd (out of 182)
-
GPD per capita (US$50K S$69,104): 7th (in world)
-
Life Expectancy (80.2 years): 13th (in world)
-
Press Freedom: 151st (out of 195)
-
(152nd in 2010 report, Reporters Without Borders)
- Freedom House Survey http://www.freedomhouse.org
- Almost all 192 members of United Nations claim to be a democracy
- No true democracy until 20th century
- Democracy’s Century: A Survey of Global Political
Change in the 20th Century
- Identified seven types of political systems
- 1. Democracies: Multiple parties and individuals
compete in open elections to earn right to rule for a
predetermined period. Opposition parties have a fair chance
of winning.
- 2. Restricted democracies: Single party controls
key constituencies: political institutions, the media,
and the electoral process.
- 3. Monarchies: constitutional, traditional and absolute
- 4. Authoritarian regimes: One party-states or
military dictatorships noted for significant human rights
violations.
- 5. Totalitarian regimes: One party establishes total
control over society, with intrusion into private lives.
- 6. Colonial and imperial dependencies: Mostly first
half of 20th century.
- 7. Protectorates: Request protection from other nations
or the international community.
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- Freedom in the World, 2010
-
2010 was 5th straight year in which global freedom declined
- Country rankings: http://freedomhouse.org/template.cfm?page=546&year=2010
- 1 to 7 where 1=Free —> 7=Not Free
- Free
- 1.0 Australia, United Kingdom, United States
- 1.5 Israel, South Korea, Taiwan
- 2.0 Dominican Republic, South Africa
- 2.5 India, Indonesia, Mexico (PF in 2011 report)
- Partly Free
- 3.0 Sierra Leone, Turkey
- 3.5 Bangladesh, East Timor, Philippines
- 4.0 Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Nepal
- 4.5 Thailand, Pakistan (not free in 2007), Singapore
- public assembly right restricted in 2009; defamation
-
- 5.0 Ethiopia, Fiji
- Not Free
- 5.5 Egypt, Russia, Qatar, Iraq
- 6.0 Afghanistan, Iraq, Vietnam
- 6.5 China, Saudi Arabia, Syria
- 7.0 Burma, Libya, North Korea
- Freedom House: Press Survey, 2010
- Free Press (35%)
- 1. Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden
- 25. United States
- 29. United Kingdom
- 34. Japan
- 37. Australia
- 51. Taiwan
- 69. South Korea
- Partly Free (33%)
- 73. Hong Kong (fell from free, 2009)
- 74. India
- 99. Philippines
- 107. Indonesia
- 111. Fiji
- 125. Thailand
- 131. Egypt
- Not Free (32%)
- 134. Cambodia (fell from partly free, 2009)
- 142. Malaysia
- 152. Singapore (no change)
- 158. Sri Lanka
- 177. Vietnam
- 181. China
- 194. Burma (Myanmar)
- 196. North Korea
- 2010 Press Freedom Index
- Reporters Without Borders
- 1. Finland
- 8. New Zealand (top outside Europe)
- 12. Japan
- 19. UK
- 20. USA
- 34. Hong Kong
- 117. Indonesia
- 137. Singapore
- 141. Malaysia
- 154. Thailand
- 156. Philippines
- 177. North Korea
- 178. Eritrea
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- Legal History Timeline
- 1824: The Singapore Chronicle
- Controlled and regulated
- Content commercial
- 1832: The Gagging Act (East India Company)
- To suppress criticism of company throughout territories,
including Singapore
- Required printing press to have a license
- Prior review and censorship by authorities
- 1835: Liberation of the press
- Indian government abolished censorship
- 1835: Singapore Free Press
- 1845: Straits Times
- All concerned with informing readers, mostly European merchants,
on government policies and trade news.
- Channels to voice European public opinion
- First issue of Straits Times declared
- The Press is ‘the fourth estate’…
- Played the role of watchdog and critic of the administration
- Complained about deficiencies of East India Company
- Demanded improvements
- Played a prominent role in campaign to transfer
the Straits Settlements to direct colonial rule
- 1867: Singapore became a Crown Colony
- 1920: Printing Presses Ordinance
- Regulate printing presses & newspapers
- “public news or comments on public news.”
- License required to operate printing press
- 1939: World War II brought stricter press control
- License now for newspaper; annual
- 1945-59: Anti-colonial struggle
- Sentiments not Singapore nationalism but:
- Malayan nationalism
- Chinese nationalism
- Indian nationalism
- Malay nationalism
- Disparate loyalties must be combined into united struggle
against the British
- 1950: Maria Hertogh incident: “jungle girl case”
- 13-year-old Dutch girl, Maria, had been cared for by Malay
Muslim woman during Japanese occupation
- Parents lost track until 1949 when found in Trengganu,
renamed & brought up Muslim
- Custody battle & trial covered in press
- English v. Malay coverage
- Riots: Muslims v. Europeans
- Four days: 18 killed; 173 injured; 72 vehicles
destroyed & 199 damaged
- 1959: Independence from Britain
- People’s Action Party, took over governing
- PAP immediately
- Delineated the role of the press
- Laid down out-of-bounds markers, known as OBMs
- Used the Maria Hertogh incident as justification
- Had to be prevent “subversive or dangerous
elements from manipulating the media to incite trouble
and create social disharmony.”
- Incident “revealed deep racial passions below
the deceptively calm surface, which could easily be
unleashed by emotional reporting and dramatic pictures.”
- May 1959: PAP voted to power, with 43 of 51 seats in the
new legislative assembly
- 1960 Printing Presses Ordinance amended
- Permit required for sale and distribution of newspapers
printed or published in Malaya
- 1963 Merged with Federation of Malaysia
- 1964: The Sedition Act:
- Prohibits publication of any material having a seditious
tendency, such as “promoting feelings of ill-will
and hostility between different races or classes…”
- 1964: Riots during Prophet Mohammed’s birthday procession;
36 killed.
- 1965: Independence
- PAP began to think in terms of a Singaporean culture
- Adopted multiculturalism: “cultural democracy"
- 1971: Black Operations
- Five senior executives of the Nanyang Siang Pau
jailed under Internal Security Act, 2 May 1971
- Initially, four: former general manager, editor-in-chief,
senior editorial writer, public relations office.
- Accused of making “sustained effort to instill
admiration for the communist system” while
highlighting “the more unsavoury aspects of
Singapore life.”
- In fact newspaper had depicted government as oppressors
of Chinese education and language.
- 1972: New Printing Presses Applications and Permits Rules
- Direct response to Black Operations
- Permits renewable annually on the condition media owners
agree to not run “any article which is likely to
cause ill-will or misunderstanding between the government
and people….”
- 1974: Newspaper and Printing Presses Act
- Replaced Printing Presses Ordinance
- All directors of a newspaper company had to be Singapore
citizens
- Two classes of shares
- Management shares
- Voting power 200x on editorial matters
- Shareholders must be approved by government
- Newspaper could not refuse government-approved shareowners
- Ordinary shares
- Government nominees now on boards of directors
- 1977: Government tightened ownership rules
- Newspapers adopted self-restraint as guiding policy.
- 1981: After election coverage, Straits Times agreed
a government nominee would be executive chairman
- Former director of Security & Intelligence appointed
- 1982: Government decreed “arranged marriage”
between two leading Chinese newspapers
- Merged into Singapore News and Publications Ltd.
- 1984: Government decreed another marriage
- SNPL and ST merged into Singapore Press Holdings
- “To develop common ideals for newspapers in different
languages” and to avoid the cost of “wasteful
competition”
- Monopoly complete
- 1986: Growing trend to read foreign publications
- 3,700 available in Singapore; 59,000 circulation
- NPPA amended to restrict “distribution of foreign
publications which have been declared as having engaged
in the domestic policies of Singapore” or “engaging
in campaigns to influence local public opinion.”
- Time magazine after article, “Silencing
the Dissenters”
- Asian Wall Street Journal and two other publications
- 1988: Expelled foreign correspondents covering election
- 2002: Ownership rules amended
- Broadened definition of foreign source of funding
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- Singapore Constitution, Part IV
- Freedom of speech, assembly and association14. —(1)
Subject to clauses (2) and (3) —(a) every citizen
of Singapore has the right to freedom of speech and expression;(b)
all citizens of Singapore have the right to assemble peaceably
and without arms; and(c) all citizens of Singapore have the
right to form associations
- (2) Parliament may by law impose —(a) on the
rights conferred by clause (1) (a), [speech] such restrictions
as it considers necessary or expedient in the interest
of the security of Singapore or any part thereof,
friendly relations with other countries, public order or morality
and restrictions designed to protect the privileges of
Parliament or to provide against contempt of court,
defamation or incitement to any offence; ...
- Restrictions in Singapore
- Penalties
- Expression that would have a “tendency”
to cause unrest and social disorder
- Licensing
- Guidelines and standards for content
- Broadcast, print, newspapers, ISP, ICP.
- Time, content and language
- Censorship
- Censorship in Singapore
- Government has defined role the media are to play in society
- Contributing to national development
- Informing, educating and entertaining
- Channel for public opinion and feedback
- Censorship
- A means to protect national and social interests
- Protecting the young
- Disallowing content harmful to public order and national
interests
- Safeguarding moral values, acknowledging community
values
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- Sedition Act
- Seditious tendency—Tendency to:
- Bring the government or the courts into hatred or contempt,
- Raise discontent and disaffection among the citizens
of Singapore, or
- Create hostility between different races and classes
of people in Singapore.
- § 4 prohibits making, preparing or conspiring
to do any act that has a seditious tendency.
- § 9 prohibits publishing seditious newspapers
- § 10 empowers the courts to stop circulation
of seditious publications
- Official Secrets Act
- Prohibits disclosure or dissemination of official documents
or information
- § 5 prohibits communication of any information
that has the nature of official secrets.
- Information does not have to be classified as “secret”
to be covered by the act.
- Internal Security Act
- Prohibits publications that compromise national interests,
public order and security, and those that have a subversive
tendency.
- Can be held (jailed) without trial or charges.
- NPPA
- Newspapers and Printing Presses Act
- Regulates newspapers and magazines
- Publishers must have permit to print any “regularly
printed” publication.
- Extends to private organisation newsletters
- At complete discretion of minister of NPPA.
- May direct that a newspaper be printed in a particular
language.
- Internet regulation
- Broadcasting Act regulates Internet access and services
- MDA Class License Scheme
- Internet content providers (ICP) and
Internet service providers (ISP) are deemed automatically
licensed
- Must observe and comply with Class License Conditions
and the Internet Code of Practice
- Code outlines what is offensive or harmful to Singapore’s
racial and religious harmony.
- ICPs must register with the MDA
- Especially political or religious bodies
that publish online newsletters or forums on
political or religious issues in Singapore.
- Must ensure content complies with the Code
- Nothing immoral or illegal broadcast
- Prohibited material: anything that is contrary
to national security, public order and morals, racial
and religious harmony, anything that runs contrary
to national laws
- Pornography, obscenity, extreme violence or cruelty,
incites racial or religious disharmony.
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- Law of Confidence
- If someone has promised to keep a secret, he/she should
be held to that promise
- Not contract law. Instead, based on
- a duty to be of “good faith” and
- “the moral principles of loyalty and fair
dealing.”
- Law endorsing an ethical principle.
- Evolved into laws to protect trade secrets and industrial
processes
- Today extended to personal information and used to
prevent disclosure by the media
- Plaintiff’s three elements
- 1. Information has quality of confidence
- Not public information or knowledge
- Reasonable person realises confidential nature
- Ideas (can’t be copyrighted), such as
scripts, stories
- Unauthorised photographs (place)
- 2. Circumstances importing confidence obligation
- Marriage: Disallows disclosure of information exchanged
between spouses while married (even after divorce)
- Some intimate relationships (courts determine)
- Employment — contract or duty of
fidelity
- Woodward v. Hutchins: Defendant was
press agent for Tom Jones &
others. He published articles about his former
employers. Suit dismissed: “in the public
interest” that the truth be told to set
the record straight.
- Fiduciary Relationships — lawyer-client,
doctor-patient, religious adviser-disciple (positions
of trust)
- Third party to confidential information
- 3. Unauthorised use of such information to the detriment
(damage) of the person who confidentially communicated
the information.
- Defences
- Consent granted by owner
- Media get person to sign a consent form
- Must be from right person
- Cannot extend beyond specific purpose agreed
to.
- Information already in the public domain
- Courts consider degree of accessibility, circulation
extent
- Internet has a profound effect
- Disclosure in the public interest
- Public right to know must outweigh private interest
- Exposing iniquitous conduct
- Crimes, misconduct, e.g., malpractice and corruption
- But to appropriate authority (not necessarily the
press)
- Law of Confidence, Remedies
- Injunction
- Interlocutory (provisional) on urgent basis to
restrain publication before court proceedings.
- Permanent
- Damages
- Monetary loss
- Difficult except in trade secrets, then market
value
- Account of profits
- Delivery up (of documents or articles)
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- Other law topics
- Financial disclosure (corporations)
- Anything that can materially affect the price of stock
- Intellectual property
- Based on principle that protecting creative works will
encourage more creative works.
- Right to the fruits of their labour.
- Copyright
- Trademark
- Patents
- Copyright
- Right of people to prevent others from copying their work
- The right attaches when the work is created.
- Automatic under common law.
- No need to register in U.S. or in Singapore.
- In Singapore, Copyright Act of 1987
- 2005 amendment for U.S.-Singapore Free Trade
Agreement
- In U.S., a constitutional right enabled by federal
law that define parameters.
- Copyright Act, Singapore
- Protects
- Original works
- Literary, dramatic, artistic, musical
- Subject-matter other than works
- Entrepreneurial works (films, magazines, etc.)
- No copyright of ideas, facts
- Copyright: original works
- Creator must have used some degree of intellectual effort,
skill and labour in the physical expression.
- Must be reduced to material form.
- Literary works
- Single word (Exxon) may not be copyrightable
- Copyright: bundle of rights
- Reproduction--most significant
- Publication
- Performance
- Communication to the public--newest
- Broadcast, cablecasting, Internet transmission
- Adaptation
- Copyright
- Duration before public domain
- Original works
- Entrepreneurial works
- Sound and films, 70 years
- Television, radio and cable programmes, 50 years
- Print, 25 years
- International protection
- Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic
Works
- Multinational system of reciprocal rights
- Singapore acceded in 1998
- 149 countries
- Moral rights
- Copyright: Ownership
- Original works:
- Generally the creator, but there are exceptions:
- Journalists employees
- Other employees, contracts for services, work for
hire
- Commissioned artwork
- May be transferred, assigned or licensed to another
- Entrepreneurial
- Organisation involved in commercialising work.
- Copyright: Infringement
- Plaintiff (civil) must demonstrate
- Sufficient degree of objective similarity
- Causal connection that indicates conscious or subconscious
copying
- Piracy (civil and criminal)
- Music and DVD’s.
- Defence was to make music available legally
- Defences (legal)
- Fair dealing (fair use):
- Research
- Criticism or review
- Reporting current events
- Public interest (right to know)
- Education
- Multiple copying of insubstantial portions (5%)
- Limited copying of whole work for educational purposes
- Copyright infringement: Remedies
- Injunction
- Damages or account of profits
- Statutory damages
- Delivery up
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- Defamation in Singapore
-
Defamation is both a criminal offence and a civil action
- Criminal law generally deals with acts that have an impact on society as a whole.
- Civil law is primarily concerned with disputes between private parties.
- Defamation Law
- Singapore Defamation Act (derives from common law)
- Libel (“permanent” form)
- Slander (spoken, nonpermanent)
- But used interchangably in statute
- Plaintiff must show special damages
- Words must be defamatory
- False, malicious or personal imputation
- Identification
- Publication
- When are words defamatory?
- Courts will consider
- The impression the alleged defamation leaves with the ordinary, reasonable person
- Affect on plaitiff's reputation
- Changes in societal attitudes
- The context and circumstances of the expression
- Headlines, tone of article, nature of publication, textual emphasis given statements
- What can be defamatory?
-
Newspaper, magazine, book content
- Cartoons, caricatures
- Signs, statues, effigies
- Chalk marks, graffiti
- Films, videos, sound recordings
- Broadcast
- Email and Internet postings
- Innuendo (facts implying wrongdoing)
- Et cetera
- Defamation: Defences
- Burden of proof on defendant
- Justification or truth (intention not relevant)
- Fair comment
- Qualified privilege
- Absolute and statutory privilege
- Innocent publication
- Innocent dissemination
- Consent
- Truth
- ALL must be true, not just parts
- Precise truth of each defamatory statement.
- Includes reasonable meanings or innuendoes.
- Belief that it was true is not enough.
- Justification
- If part that cannot be proved true does not injure the
plaintiff in any significant way
- Fair comment
- Opinion, especially on issues of public interest.
- Individual right, shared by media
- Most frequently raised by journalists
- Must be objective, in spirit of fair discussion
- Must concern a matter of public interest
- Must be based on fact, but not statements of fact (court
decides)
- Qualified privilege
- Statements between people with a common interest in the
topic discussed.
- Statements made in the course of discharging a social,
legal or moral duty or responsibility.
- No media privilege at common law.
- Statutory privilege for certain reports
- Reports of certain proceedings that are fair and accurate.
- Public interest outweighs private interest
- Key: must be fair and accurate
- Examples
- Judicial proceedings and documents in open court
- Reports, copies and extracts of public records
maintained under statutory order
- Proceeding of and papers authorised by Parliament
- Can be negated by malice (ill will)
- Absolute privilege at common law
- Words spoken in association with the administration and
running of the government, such as criminal proceedings.
- Parliamentary privilege
- Unless extremely defamatory out of malice (abuse
of privilege)
- Innocent publication
- Defendant tries to show he didn’t mean it, didn’t
know, or used due care.
- Innocent dissemination
- Retailers, distributors
- No knowledge of defamatory content
- Consent
- Obtain written or on-camera releases
- Defamation: Remedies
- Damages
- Actual and expected financial loss
- Social disadvantage
- Emotional distress and grief
- Injunction
- Considerations
- Aggravating factors
- Social standing of the parties
- Scope of publication
- Manner and timing of publication
- Defamation: Mitigating factors
- Factors reducing damages
- Apology
- With acknowledgement of falsity
- Delay by plaintiff (sleeping on rights)
- Reputation of plaintiff
- Scope of publication
- Simple Contracts
- Agreement by two or more parties (including PR agencies or
counselors)
- Formation of contract
- Offer--can follow invitation to offer, may be electronic
- Acceptance--mirror image of offer, may be electronic
- Effectively communicated while offer valid (not silence)
- Consideration (something of value, for promise)
- Intent to create legal contract
- Capacity
Sources
Chay-Németh, Constance, “Becoming Professionals: A Portrait of Public Relations in Singapore,” in The Global Public Relations Handbook: Theory, Research and Practice, Lawrence Erlbaum and Associates, Mahwah, NJ (2003).
Krishnamurthy, Sriramesh, & Dejan Vercic, “A Theoretical Framework for Global Public Relations Research and Practice,” in The Global Public Relations Handbook: Theory, Research and Practice, Lawrence Erlbaum and Associates, Mahwah, NJ (2003).
Liang Shiqu, Nation Building and Press Freedom: A Legal History of the Press in Singapore, Faculty of Law, National University of Singapore (2003-2004).
Tan, Kevin YL, The Singapore Legal System, Singapore University Press, National University of Singapore (1989).
Teo, Yi-Ling, Media Law in Singapore, 2nd ed., Sweet & Maxwell Asia (2005).
Zakirhusain, Mustansir, Initial Trust in Consumer-to-Consumer E-commerce: A Singapore Study, Honours Thesis, National University of Singapore (2005-2006).
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