Toward a tent-driven model of organizations: Stakeholders, permeability, and multiple identities in public relations theory

Abstract

Public relations scholarship frequently studies relations between organizations and publics but rarely considers how the nature of organizations influences this interaction. In this essay, we review conceptions of the organization in several areas of public relations scholarship and find complexity that is unexplained by theory, causing a disconnect between public relations scholarship and practice. Using insights from stakeholder theory, essential contract theory, and intersectionality, we provide a new definition of the organization and 14 propositions about the nature of organizations. This definition is explained with a metaphor of an organization as a tent. The tent is composed of many stakeholders, each with multiple identities, utilizing contracts as poles to push and pull the organization in their preferred direction. An illustrative example is given of how this metaphor operates in a university. We call for a reorientation of public relations theory's relationships to organizations and suggest an important role for public relations and communication in constituting the nature of organizations and ensuring representativeness in decision-making.