Social Marketing Social Change Strategies -Myassignmenthelp.Com

Question: Discuss About The Social Marketing Social Change Strategies? Answer: Introduction The role of the cultural values is considerably high in terms of influencing the Public Relations practice in Singapore. It can be presumed that the Singaporean culture is a mixture and the outcome of hybridization of different cultural attributes, which in turn is influential in the manipulation of the Public Relation activities and campaign that is conducted in the same chosen country (Graham Avery, 2013). This report details the various cultural aspects of Singapore and explains how the cultural attributes play a pivoting role in the determination and the planning of the PR campaigns that are held in the selected country. The thesis statement, as per the assignment can be stated, as the cultural aspects of Singapore are influential in the formulation of the Public relations planning in Singapore. The country chosen for this report is Singapore due to its vastness and diversification in the cultural attributes. This essay also elaborates the role of individualism and collectivism in the communication with relation to the Public Relations practice in Singapore. This report further details about the health-related PR campaigns in Singapore. The main purpose of this essay is to help explain the cultural factors that are responsible and influences in the planning of the Public Relations activities. Cultural Background Analysis This above thesis statement can be justified by the fact that Singapore is an intriguing example of a multicultural country that is comprising of Chinese around 76.7%, Malay about 14%, Indian about 7.9% and others being 1.4%. The religions prevailing in Singapore comprises of Buddhist (Chinese), Muslim (Malays), Christian, Hindu, Sikh, Taoist, and Confucianism. It can be further added that Singapore has endeavored to promote its national identity as a land of immigrants since its independence in the year of 1965. As part of this effort, Singapore has four national languages consisting of Mandarin, Malay, Tamil, and English. However, for the business and political purpose, English is the preferred language (Guide, 2018). It can be stated that the Chinese, Malays, Indians and Other have been widely criticized and as the compelling Singaporeans to fit into the ideal characterization of their individual ethnicities, but it has been mostly convinced by the critics that the diversification of the ethnicities is one of the essential elements to unify the society. On facing with globalization and capitalism, the focus has shifted towards the creation of a hybrid ethnic-centric society. The Singaporean identity that preserved traditional cultures has united the Singaporeans in a network of shared culture, so that they are well equipped to appreciate, understand, and accept the other cultures without any conflicts. Based on the same it can be stated that the multiculturalism is thus functioned as the codes for inter-cultural interactions that has been established in the specific social setting. On further addition, it can be conveyed that the consistent and the dominant national narratives advocated by the leaders was that multiculturalism was not a social phenomenon, which is determined by the ethnic majority but a political necessity in the sustenance of Singapores sovereignty. In simple words, the racial harmony was synonymous with and a necessity for global survival. For instance, it can be argued that the governments restraining approach in the democracy, joined with the practical and circumstantial judgments, resulted in multiculturalism to come in practice, which facilitated the evasion of social chaos while enjoying the economic intensification. However, the time when English became the official language and the other languages such as Chinese, Malay and Tamil were made second languages, it helped in the unification of everybody as Singaporeans. This is because it was a neutral language spoken and written universally and by allowing it, the acceptance and appreciati on of other cultures have been triggered. Thus, it can be stated that this played a strong role in the integration of Singaporeans under the standard of multiculturalism and secondary functions in influencing of the economic quality of lives. Influence of the Cultural Communication in Public Relation practice Based on the analysis that has been done on the cultural attribute by the use of secondary research it can be found that the cultural dimension that comes into role is individual and Collectivism, based on the Hofstede Model (Venaik Brewer, 2013). The individualism and collectivism dimension of this model is helpful to analyze the cultural influence within the society. The collectivism refers to an individuals emphasis on independence, self-reliability and self-promotion, whereas collectivism refers to the understanding of the significance of interdependency, in-group loyalty and promotion. It can be argued that the individualism and collectivism perspectives regarding the cultures and communication can have a direct influence on the communication. On a further note it can be added that the communication framework by Gudykunst has identified seven dimensions of communication that can be classified as self-disclosure, Uncertainty, Rules for Communication, face-negotiation, individual ism and collectivism, use of appeals and final being conflict management (Bernays, 2015). However, it can be argued that most of the PR practitioners mostly retort to the cultural values when devising a PR campaign. The PR practitioners take into consideration about the multicultural target audience addressing them (Coombs Holladay, 2013). For example, some of the practitioners carefully sort their words while devising a PR campaign so that it does not exhibits biasness to any of the ethnical group and in the course appears to be culturally offensive, resulting in any kind of conflicts. This needs to be taken care of since Singapore is a multicultural country with diversified ethnicity. The second concern that comes up, whenever the practitioners are devising a PR campaign, they need to take care of four ethnic faces and only one language cannot be taken into consideration while devising the same since, Singapore consists of four segments of ethnicity as previously mentioned. In th is aspect, it can be considered that cultural values and aspects do influence the Public Relations campaigns. In addition, Nolte (2016) argued that culture is an essential way to manage the communication since different individuals perceive every message differently. In this context. Morris Goldsworthy (2015) states that the selection of the easy and understandable language is utmost needed because, one message which is easy for an individual to perceive might not be easy for another individual to receive the same message in the same way as the previous one. On the other hand, it can also be agreed that the message can be understood by an individual of a different ethnicity to understand a message, which is allowed under the dimension of uncertainty. However, it can be considered safe to use the four most used languages in the propagation of the campaign when addressing to the citizens of Singapore. Based on secondary research, it has been found that most of the PR practitioners find it difficult to work and address the diversified target audience since the cultural values are highly influential in the impact of the practice (Bochner, 2013). Furthermore, Davis (2013) adds that the practitioners working in the government and public-funded institutions have expressed the significance of making sure that the cultural values are sensitively addressed in all the proposed communication to avert any kind of collateral damage. This is because of the fact that multiculturalism is currently an official guideline, which all civil staffs are anticip ated to carry out. In case the same is not abided by, the backfire would be comprised of the peoples discontentment due inequality and biasness regarding any certain ethnic group. However, this is regardless of whether of the majority or minority in the ethnic groups in Singapore. Hence, all racial representations that is included in the translation of languages should take precedence even over the success and effectiveness of the intended message to persuade the target audience (Levy Sidel, 2013). For the PR professionals, the rationale for the cultural values playing a significant role was a little different, as it had more to do with everyday communication in carrying out every task effectively. For the same, the differences in the cultural values can disrupt and hamper their communication workings, ultimately leading to misinterpretation and misunderstanding among the diverse ethnic groups trying to work in collaboration and harmony (Gordon, 2013). PR activities not only involve the passing of the information or indirectly influencing sales, but these activities also involve the gathering of feedbacks to facilitate the improvement of the services in the future. Based on the self-disclosure dimensions, some of the PR companies encourage the audience to share their feedbacks, to effectively note down and observe their experiences, share any concern, which is a transparency to manipulate the audience with better service in the future. In a multicultural setting like Singapore, it is obvious that the cultural aspects would be influential in the PR practice where English remains to be the common tool of propagation in the communication. This can be assumed by the operations of the cultural attributes in Singapore that permeates through all levels and structure of life, including business and commerce. In addition, the Singaporean leaders have also constantly cultivated a sense of nationhood and mainly focused on the necessity for the unification of the diverse ethnicities for their nations prospect and potentiality. With relevance to the Public Relation activities in Singapore regarding the health issues such as diabetes, it can be stated as one kind of health and social marketing campaign. In accordance to the same and the concerns related to the topic, it can be stated that the PR campaign is a social marketing that applies the marketing principles and techniques to create, communicate and deliver a valuable message in order to influence the target audience behavior, which would, in turn, benefit them as well as the society (Schiavo, 2013). In the PR campaign, the PM in the national rally has imparted speech on various issues. However, the main health issue that has been discussed is related to diabetes. Singapore has been addressed to be the fourth diabetes-affected country in the world. Thus, this kind of social PR campaign is somewhat related by the fact that the fast moving lifestyle and the culture of the country enforce the society to adapt to the same lifestyle, which can have an adverse effect on the health of the citizen (graphics.straitstimes.com, 2018). This PR campaign has been conducted to spread awareness of the deadly disease and not only discuss its causes and effects but also impart awareness about the initiatives that the government would be taking to help cure and eradicate this disease (Hong, 2013). Singapore is a diversified cultural country and here the cultural factors mainly influence the PR campaigns. The food customs and lifestyles vary differently in the different cultures and based on the sam e this campaign addresses all the people in the rally (Lefebvre, 2013). During the speech, PM Lee has broken down the segregation of diversity in explaining their vulnerability to this disease. With this, it can be stated and perceived that cultures have an even role in this social awareness PR campaign and to explain the social and health benefits, PM Lee has used the good influence of breaking down the cultures to facilitate and help understand the gravity of the situation. The good use of incentives such as gifts, by the Health Promotion Board, has been used to motivate the audience for being self- health conscious since this is one of the customary ways to show respect to the people of Singapore as well as respecting their effort of adapting to a healthy lifestyle. Citing of live examples to adopt a healthy lifestyle has been put to use during the meeting in the rally since people of Singapore and genuine and tend to listen more to live example rather than focusing on fictitious facts and point of view. It can be considered as one of the aspects and adopted the persona of the people, falling under their respective cultures. As previously states, the information and pieces of advice that has been imparted to put a strict restriction in the diet and lifestyle of the people since, these are interrelated and varies from culture to culture (Adams, 2013). Conclusion With the help of this essay, it can be concluded that the cultures do have an immense impact on the planning and the execution of the PR campaign. It can be stated that PR campaigns are usually the activities that are done without hindering any of the ethnical diversity within the country and usually done for the benefit along with the awareness of the target audience. Conducting of PR campaign by being biased is thus of no use if it fails to address and reach all of the target audience. It can be considered that PR activities are one of the challenging tasks for the PR practitioners since they have to take many factors into consideration since this society is itself influenced by the cultures and in this manner, it invisibly influences the PR activities. The social marketing PR campaign that been discussed in the essay also adds to this fact by the justification that PM Lee has used the cultural attributes and influences to address the health concern and discussion. The detailed ela boration of the diversity within the country indicates the fact Singapore is a multicultural country that is severely affected by the disease and needs to be addressed in such a technique that it does not hurt or hinders the sentiments of any of the cultures. 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