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PROJECTS |
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Current research project:
This project is developed in joint cooperation with Dr. Dean Kruckeberg from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, NC, USA. We intend to explore through the analysis of different case studies the role of social media in mobilising public opinion in relation to political matters and in particular in the development of political crises in non-democratic countries. So far we conducted a study on Iran's 2009 presidential elections (a forthcoming book chapter) and a case study on Tunisia's revolution is under preparation.
2010-2012: Communicating Environmental Issues During the 2009 UN Climate Change Conference
This project is developed in joint cooperation with other four researchers of the Knowledge Communication Group at ASB, University of Aarhus. My task in this project is to look at the United Nations (UN) communication practices, specifically at its media relations activities, during the 2009 Climate Change conference. The intent is to analyse UN communication strategies and material produced during the conference to understand UN media agenda and framing as well as its objectives of providing information to various publics about the contemporary problems created by the climate change and about what the UN is doing on this matter. Moreover an analysis of print and online newspapers of some EU countries will be made in order to understand what and how climate change issues were represented and communicated in the environmental discourses of some European journals. As a second step, I intend to look at environmental NGOs and their role in reporting climate change issues and in enhancing public understanding and involvement in those issues.
2010- 2011: The EU Council of Minister and Its Press Service
This investigation is developed in joint cooperation with Dr. Bo Laursen, ASB, University of Aarhus, Denmark. Its aim is to study the role that press officers in the Council Secretariat’s Press Service play when they communicate to the media and press officers' communication practices. Specifically we intend to explore which factors influence the way in which the press officers select and frame public information - mainly targeted at journalists - about political negotiations taking place in the Council.
2009-2011: The 21st Century Italian Public Relations. Exploring the Generic Principles and Specific Applications of Italian PR landscape
This project is developed in joint cooperation with Dr. Giampietro Vecchiato, University of Padova, Italy and with Dr. Sriramesh Krishnamurthy, Massey University, New Zealand. The aim of this study is to analyse the status of Italian public relations practices, in particularly to find out which generic principles are more used in relation to different branches of business/activities and to investigate how ethical questions related to personal influence model are integrated in PR daily work.
2009-2010: Alitalia Crisis: Company's Communication Responses, Media Framing and Blogosphere
This study is developed in joint cooperation with Dr. Stefania Romenti, IULM University, Milan, Italy. This project has two sub-goals: first to explore Alitalia’s crisis response strategies during the last year of crisis and to study how the main national and international newspapers framed Alitalia’s crisis; second, to study how bloggers have framed and discussed Alitalia’s crisis and how they react in the blogosphere in respect to Alitalia’s crisis responses strategies.
2007- 2008: New Media at the Service of the Citizens: Italian Public Administrations and e-Democracy Projects
This study is developed in joint cooperation with Dr. Giorgia Nesti, University of Padua, Italy. Its aim is to analyse how certain Italian public administrations applied policies on e-democracy and e-governance into projects that facilitate citizens’ participation and involvement in local decision-making. Three relevant project are chosen and analysed. These are Iperbole of the municipality of Bologna, Mo-Net/Unox1 of the municipality of Modena and Partecipa.net of the Emilia-Romagna Region.
2004- 2007: Promoting the European Union. Comparative Analysis of EU Communication Strategies in Finland and in Italy
The goal of this project was to analyse communication practices and strategies of the European Commission and its DG for Communication, the Finnish and Italian representations of the European Commission and Finnish and Italian EU offices at regional and local levels. The research was based on a multi-level (European versus national) and comparative (Finnish versus Italian) approach standing on organizational communication and public relations theories but including as well some of the theories of public diplomacy, community relations and marketing communication. The methodologies applied were based on a triangulation of different techniques such as content and document analyses, qualitative analyses of an online survey and of face-to-face interviews and a meta-analysis of existing public opinion reports. The main qualitative empirical study consisted in five parts: the study of five EU documents on information and communication policies developed between 2001 and 2006 and their effects on member states’ implementation; the Finnish and Italian communication strategies through the analysis of EU officers’ activities at the local level; the analyses of different Eurobarometer surveys about citizens’ EU perceptions; the study of EU media relations and the examination of some EU information campaigns as a tool for enhancing organizational image and trust and citizens’ support. The results of this research revealed a similar trend in Finland and in Italy for EU communication strategies. During the period 2001 and 2006 EU communication strategies were not enough tailored to the needs of national publics and they mostly were one-way-symmetrical communications. EU policies on information and communication claimed a decentralisation of tasks and functions which was not completely delivered in terms of local involvement in communication decisions. The effects on improving citizens’ EU perceptions and on positive EU image and trust were pretty low and journalists’ opinions on EU interests in establishing mutual and beneficial media relations scored very poor in both countries.
Publication information The dissertation is published in the series Jyväskylä Studies in Humanities, number 87, 291 p., Jyväskylä 2008, ISSN 1459-4323, ISBN 978-951-39-2893-3. It can be ordered at the University Library’s Publications Unit (click here). For an electronic version (PDF) you can contact me by email
2007: Comparing Professions. How Italian Journalists and Public Relations Practitioners Perceive Their and the Other Profession
This project was developed in joint cooperation with Dr. Toni Muzi Falconi, University of LUMSA, Rome, Italy.The aim of this study was to investigate how journalists and PR practitioners perceive themselves and value the other profession; how they evaluate their professional roles, working methods and relationships and their opinions on Italian news. This study was conducted between March and October 2007 with the support of FERPI (Italian Federation of Public Relations) and FNSI (Italian National Press Federation). It was based both on qualitative data, collected through face-to-face interviews with 6 senior PR practitioners and 6 journalists, and on quantitative data gathered through an online questionnaire. 562 people correctly replied to the questionnaire, of whom 317 were journalists and 245 were PR practitioners. The results of this investigation show some common trends for 3 out of the 10 thematic sections. Similarity in the answers of the two groups is visible in the sections concerning the role of journalists, professional ethics and personal influence, while the answers about the role of PR practitioners, journalists and PRs' working methods, their opinions on their professions, on their working relationships, on Italian news, on the necessity of institutionalizing the PR profession and and on social media are different. In particular this investigation shows how Public relations is still perceived as a vague and ambiguous profession if compared to the well-established profession of the journalist, and whose principal roles and functions are not yet clear for one of its main publics, the journalists. (see publication page)
2007: Report about the Activities of the Italian Centres 'Europe Direct' for the Involvement of Civil Society
This study was supported by the Italian Representation of the European Commission within the framework of EU activities for enhancing and promoting dialogue and debate among citizens and organizations of the civil society upon questions of relevance for the EU. The scope of this investigation was to study which tools and actions the Italian centres 'Europe Direct' developed and implemented between September 2006 and May 2007 for establishing stronger relationships with the organizations of the civil society and for a more active involvement of these organizations in EU debates. This study had two priorities: first, to know the status of the Italian civic activism in relation to the activities developed by the centres 'Europe Direct', and second, to examine how these centres improve their interaction capacity with the organizations of the civil society on the basis of the results obtained. The methods applied were content analysis of documents produced by 38 centres 'Europe Direct' and a qualitative analysis of the phone interviews with the main responsible person of the centres. The phone interviews were made between the second and the third week of May 2007. The method used for the phone interviews was the Single Respondent Organizational Survey (SROS).
2004: The Communication Quality of Kuriiri Project
The aim of this research was to investigate the communication quality of employees working in Keski-Suomen Yhteisöjen Tuki (KYT), the Supporting Association for Third Sector Organisations in Central Finland, which were involved in the national project Kuriiri and in the transnational project 4Work. The aim of this investigation was to analyse the communication quality and management of a public organization that administers international projects. Specifically communication quality was considered as an indicator of functionality and efficiency of Keski-Suomen Yhteisöjen Tuki towards their international partners. The data were gathered through personal interviews with the main officers of KYT, content analyses of briefing and minutes material, field observations and an online questionnaire sent during the summer 2004 to those people who were in 2002-2004 collaborating at the 4Work Transnational Partnership and were analysed through a new re-elaboration of the balanced scorecard for public institutions.
2002- 2003: The Euro 2002 Information Campaign: Analysis and Evaluation of the National Advertising Campaigns
The aim of this research was to analyze and compare the national advertising campaigns developed by the twelve EU countries for the introduction of the euro. The first part of this research focused on the presentation of the information campaign at the European level, which was the general framework for all the other national campaigns. After some considerations about the objectives, the structure and the communication strategies adopted at the European level, this research focused on the national advertising campaigns. The twelve countries, which introduced the new currency, were divided by communication strategy adopted and compared each other by media evaluations and communication effects (message content), and then evaluated mostly on the basis of “recognition”,“recall” and results achieved. |
Copyright
© 2004-2011 by Chiara Valentini
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