Toward a caring government: Advancing ethical government public relations (2021)

This study explores the potential contribution of care ethics to government-public relationship (GPR) management. Drawing on the ethics of care and relationship management theory, this study examined government communicators’ conceptualizations of care and care-based relationship cultivation strategies by interviewing 32 public relations practitioners working at county government agencies in the United States. The study advances public relations scholarship by proposing a Care-Based Relationship Cultivation Model and suggests measures for seven care-based relationship cultivation strategies highlighting care ethics.