Client

Palgrave Macmillan UK

Editor

Problem and main goal

To contribute with the historical development of Public Relations in Colombia to map the country´s contribution to the discipline. This book chapter was included in the ‘Latin American and Caribbean Perspectives on the Development of Public Relations: Other Voices’ is the fourth volume in this series of six books on national histories of public relations (PR). The nations that comprise the seven chapters range from Mexico at the northernmost, to Argentina at the southernmost and eastward to The Caribbean nations. In all, the histories of PR in 15 countries are examined.

Methodogy

• Focus conversation method
• Semi-structured interviews
• Literature review of historical papers
• Approach of asynchronous recollections, testimonies and personal archives

Insights

• PR’s development in Colombia has factors that should be recognized: One is the vision of professional men and women who learned the discipline and its workings from other
• countries with more experience in the matter, and who returned home to bring awareness of PR to Colombia in the 1960s and 1970s.
• The early development of the discipline was shaped by North American education, practice and theorization, a link which remains strong. Nonetheless there is a continuous development of the Latin American School of Thought on PR offering a more social focused approach than the more pragmatic US model.
• Professional associations were important in legitimizing PR as a professional activity, especially from the mid-1960s to 1990 by supporting its development, especially in higher education.
• The positioning and representation of PR as a professional activity of high value was crucial in making it part of Colombian organizations’ core communication activities.
• The expansion of university education since the 1990s has also contributed to the growth of the discipline and its perception among decision-makers and influential people.
• Currently the exercise of PR in Colombia is recognized as a profession full of challenges in terms of relations with the world, research possibilities and continuity of a scholarly
• production, thanks to the role played by pioneers, early practitioners, professional bodies and educators.