The Practice of Public Relations in Lesotho’s Government Ministries: A Case Study.
Although scholars and practitioners increasingly recognise the strategic importance of public relations in the private and public sector, many government ministries have poor public relations, which affects service delivery. This is coupled with limited scholarship on public relations in developing...
| Publicado en: | Communicare Vol. 44; no. 3; pp. 43 - 59 |
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| Autores principales: | , |
| Formato: | Artículo |
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Communicare, Journal for Communication Sciences in South Africa
Dec2025
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| Materias: | |
| Acceso en línea: | Ver este registro en EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=hlh&AN=194532602&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: hlh uiTerm: 194532602 longDbName: Humanities International Complete uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: jinfo: jid: 02590069 U17 jtl: Communicare issn: 02590069 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: Dec2025 vid: 44 iid: 3 pid: 74236 pub: Communicare, Journal for Communication Sciences in South Africa artinfo: ui: 194532602 10.36615/8dn8ew68 ppf: 43 ppct: 16 formats: fmt: @attributes: type: P size: 584KB tig: atl: The Practice of Public Relations in Lesotho’s Government Ministries: A Case Study. aug: au: Phelane, Mathabiso Delport, Mardi affil: Central University of Technology, South Africa. su: Public relations Sub-Saharan Africans Developing countries Professional employees Communication barriers Executive departments Bureaucracy Lesotho Africa sug: subj: Lesotho Africa Public relations Sub-Saharan Africans Developing countries Professional employees Communication barriers Executive departments Bureaucracy keyword: Communication government ministries management public relations ab: Although scholars and practitioners increasingly recognise the strategic importance of public relations in the private and public sector, many government ministries have poor public relations, which affects service delivery. This is coupled with limited scholarship on public relations in developing countries, including sub-Saharan Africa. This article draws on a case study of government ministries in Lesotho to establish how public relations is practised, contested and can be repurposed in the African context. To collect data, questionnaires and semi-structured interviews were employed to solicit views from 20 public relations officers working in 10 government ministries in Lesotho. Data were analysed through an inductive thematic analysis. The findings suggest that public relations professionals face many challenges in executing their duties. These include a lack of communication; a lack of resources; misunderstanding (specifically from management) as to what public relations entails; bureaucracy, political influence and manipulation of information released to the public; information presented in one language only; and the absence of a public relations cadre. Collectively, these challenges suggest limited awareness of the full scope of public relations and a predominance of routine technician tasks over strategic advisory roles. The proposed directives for improvement present an opportunity for public relations practitioners working in government ministries to strategise their work. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: Article src: R language: English refInfo: copyright: @attributes: flag: Y custom: Copyright of Communicare is the property of Communicare, Journal for Communication Sciences in South Africa and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites without the copyright holder's express written permission. Additionally, content may not be used with any artificial intelligence tools or machine learning technologies. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. item: Communicare holder: Communicare, Journal for Communication Sciences in South Africa dt: @attributes: year: 2025 holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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