Spanning the Boundaries: Support for Media Rights Among Public Relations Practitioners, Journalists, and the Public

Although journalists, public relations practitioners, and the general public have common interests in protecting media rights, public support for those rights is historically weak. The boundary-spanning function of public relations—which relies in part on First Amendment rights—implies that practitioners might bridge the gap between the public's and the media's perspectives. To better understand support for media rights, we surveyed samples from all three groups. The public was least likely to support the 26 media rights addressed in the survey. Public relations practitioners' support fell between that of the public and journalists.