Public relations literacy: Developing critical consumers of public relations

Abstract

This article introduces the concept of public relations literacy and proposes that public relations literacy should be promoted to empower consumers of public relations’ actions and messages and to increase the accountability of practitioners. The goals of this article are to describe the concept of public relations literacy as a subset of media literacy, discuss its value to society, and propose areas of critical thinking that could enhance the conceptualization and practice of public relations literacy.