Understanding Australian multiculturalism in public relations practice through a social justice lens

Abstract

While the Australian PR discipline and industry has acknowledged the demographic realities of multiculturalism, it has yet to critically interrogate multiculturalism as an ideological concept, contested discourse and politicised practice. This paper addresses this gap by investigating how public relations (PR) practitioners and culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) stakeholders in the Victorian government and multicultural sectors understand multiculturalism. It situates PR practice, and PR practitioners, within broader theoretical perspectives on Australian multiculturalism. In doing so, this paper contributes to knowledge in two ways: firstly, by identifying the significant deficits in existing Australian PR scholarship on multiculturalism; and secondly, by building bridges to new approaches and engaging with contemporary research and theories of multiculturalism. To this end, this paper opens up and extends the PR discipline’s ability to better engage with, and contribute to, ongoing contemporary debates on Australian multiculturalism.