Feminism and public relations

This chapter explores feminism and public relations. By feminism, I refer to a social movement that seeks to end discrimination on the basis of gender. Like public relations, this movement emerged out of capitalism (Felski, 1989 ) and modernity (Daymon & Demetrious, 2014 ; Felski, 1995 ) and lacks a single and stable definition or meaning. Critical perspectives in feminist public relations scholarship are rare. I therefore explore the relationship between women and public relations in the histories, theories and practices of the field from a critical perspective in order to develop new understandings of the gendering of public relations. I argue feminism remains undertheorised in public relations, despite a body of feminist scholarship stretching back to the 1980s.