Clientelism, Economic Structure, and Public Relations in Southern Europe: An Example of Diversity in the Western World

This article explores the relationship between state power, clientelist relationships, and economic structure in the public relations practice of European Mediterranean countries. It considers the cases of Greece, Italy, Portugal, and Spain, part of a management subdivision – “the Southern European region” – that multinationals have been using for decades. Some common characteristics of the public relations field in these countries can be highlighted, including the prominent role of media relations, the importance of personal relationships, and the gap between state-supported multinationals and remaining companies. The author argues that the field’s normative ideal of the two-way symmetrical model fails in these Western free-market democracies due, in the case of numerous organizations, to an emphasis (and dependence) on building relationships with the government at the expense of other publics, as well as the lack of scale economies. This disparate social and economic structure makes the use of persuasive models more appropriate for their contexts.