View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Texas A&M Repository A DIALOGIC MODEL FOR ANALYZING CRISIS COMMUNICATION: AN ALTERNATIVE APPROACH TO UNDERSTANDING THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY SEX ABUSE CRISIS A Dissertation by SUZANNE ELIZABETH BOYS Submitted to the Office of Graduate Studies of Texas A&M University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY December 2007 Major Subject: Communication A DIALOGIC MODEL FOR ANALYZING CRISIS COMMUNICATION: AN ALTERNATIVE APPROACH TO UNDERSTANDING THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CLERGY SEX ABUSE CRISIS A Dissertation by SUZANNE ELIZABETH BOYS Submitted to the Office of Graduate Studies of Texas A&M University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Approved by: Chair of Committee, Charles Conrad Committee Members, Linda Putnam Joel Iverson M. Carolyn Clark Head of Department, Richard Street December 2007 Major Subject: Communication iii ABSTRACT A Dialogic Model for Analyzing Crisis Communication: An Alternative Approach to Understanding the Roman Catholic Clergy Sex Abuse Crisis. (December 2007) Suzanne Elizabeth Boys, B.S., University of Cincinnati; M.A., University of Cincinnati Chair of Advisory Committee: Dr. Charles Conrad In the winter of 2002, The Boston Globe published an exposé on clergy sexual abuse in the Boston Archdiocese which quickly sparked a global Church crisis. Following the exposé, there was a swell of media attention, a growing public outcry, increasing litigation over alleged abuse and cover-ups, and the emergence of issue-driven grassroots organizations. Despite the vocal involvement of numerous stakeholders in the crisis, the hierarchy’s communicative response to the situation followed relatively traditional crisis management strategies which sought to deny, minimize, remediate, and retain exclusive jurisdiction over the crisis. This strategy contrasts with other stakeholders’ attempts to defer closure, draw out underlying issues, amplify non- dominant voices, contest dominant interpretations, and collaborate on possible solutions. What has emerged is an on-going situation in which an organization’s attempts at strategic communicative crisis management are being contested publicly by key stakeholders. Arguing that existing models for understanding public relations discourse are insufficient for tracing the polyvocality of crisis communication, this study crafts an alternative (i.e., dialogic) model for analyzing crisis communication. This model iv decenters the source organization by tracing the contextual (macro) and interactive (micro) aspects of public relations texts created by three organizations central to the crisis (the United States Council of Catholic Bishops, Voice of the Faithful, and Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests). By viewing crisis communication through the lens of a particular notion of dialogue (i.e., a sustained, symbol-based, contextualized, collaborative-agonistic process of interactive social inquiry which creates meaning and a potential for change), this study traces how organizations use Public Relations (PR) to co-construct an organizational crisis. Discursive reconciliation, the central process of the proposed model, allows the researcher to sift the discourses of stakeholder organizations against one another, using each as a standard for evaluating the others. This allows for an evaluation of how stakeholder organizations manage the potential for communicative interactivity. The proposed model offers an expanded capacity to understand how crises are constructed discursively. It also illuminates the continuing clergy sex abuse crisis. v DEDICATION To all those who have been wounded by clergy and left for lost… To those who have stopped to help… To Murray, who sailed with me through my stormy waters… To the One who called me to this inexplicable journey… L’Chaim. vi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Although writing and research may be lonely work, one does not do them alone. Many people have helped and supported me in the living of this dissertation. Thanks, first, to my committee at Texas A&M: Dr. Charley Conrad, Dr. Linda Putnam, Dr. Joel Iverson, and Dr. Carolyn Conrad. Special thanks to my mentor and advocate, Dr. Gail Fairhurst. Sincere thanks also to those making a difference in the clergy sex abuse crisis. My thanks to those individuals who have paved the way from victim to survivor. Thanks to those who are committed to healing the Body, especially those in VOTF and SNAP. Thanks to individuals like Barbara Blaine, David Clohessy, and Fr. Tom Doyle who doggedly fight for justice. On a personal note, I would like to thank those who helped me navigate this chapter in my life. Deep gratitude to Dr. Tom Thompson and Dr. Ron Lutz, who helped me heal. Thanks to my brother, Mark Boys, and my friend, Susan Duncan, who intervened at key moments. Thanks to those who listened to my story along the way, especially Dr. Carolyn Clark, Adam Saenz’ CommGroup, Jennifer Considine, Jill Grage, Evan Griffin, and Kelly Boys. Thanks to all those who prayed me through, including my family, the New Life prayer groups, the VCC prayer teams, and my VCC small group. Special thanks to everyone who checked on me during the process, especially my parents, Amy Savage, Jon and Charity Boys, Susan Duncan, Gail Fairhurst, and Brian Quick. Lifelong gratitude to my parents for their abiding friendship. Finally, thanks to the One who redeems all things. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ABSTRACT.................................................................................................. iii DEDICATION .............................................................................................. v ACKNOWLEDGMENTS............................................................................. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS.............................................................................. vii LIST OF FIGURES....................................................................................... ix LIST OF TABLES ........................................................................................ x CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION AND CASE............................................ 1 The Case.................................................................... 3 The Perspective......................................................... 13 The Document........................................................... 16 II A REVIEW OF PUBLIC RELATIONS............................... 18 Public Relations as Communicative.......................... 18 Public Relations’ Historic Development................... 19 Grunig’s Model of Two-Way Symmetrical PR ........ 22 Limitations in Public Relations Scholarship............. 26 Public Relations’ Theoretical Framework................. 30 Engaging a Potential Paradigm for PR Theory ......... 38 III CRISES AND CRISIS COMMUNICATION ...................... 40 Conceptualizing Organizational Crises..................... 40 Conceptualizing Crises Further................................. 42 Crisis Communication as Strategy............................ 51 Crisis Communication as Rhetoric............................ 52 IV DIALOGUE.......................................................................... 61 Theorizing Dialogue.................................................. 62 Conceptualizing Dialogue......................................... 66 viii CHAPTER Page The Process of Dialogue........................................... 68 Contextualizing Dialogue.......................................... 79 Specifying Dialogue for This Study.......................... 82 V METHODOLOGY................................................................ 86 Selecting the Stakeholder Organizations................... 87 Selecting the Data...................................................... 93 Orienting to the Data................................................. 95 Construction and Application of Model.................... 100 VI ANALYSIS I: CONTEXT.................................................... 102 Mapping Discursive Presence................................... 103 Mapping Ideological Orientations to Dialogue......... 112 Mapping Communicatively Constructed Contexts... 129 Conclusion................................................................. 136 VII ANALYSIS II: INTERACTIVITY....................................... 140 Tracking Initiative/Response Patterns....................... 142 Tracking (Non)Topicality......................................... 152 Tracking Power......................................................... 166 Conclusion................................................................. 175 VIII CONCLUSION ..................................................................... 179 Researcher as Facilitator........................................... 179 Analysis as Discursive Reconciliation...................... 183 Goal as Tracking Collective Proprioception ............. 186 Tracing Collective Proprioception in Current Case .. 188 Collective Proprioception in the Church................... 199 Limitations and Future Study.................................... 205 Conclusion................................................................. 209 REFERENCES.............................................................................................. 211 VITA ............................................................................................................. 235 ix LIST OF FIGURES FIGURE Page 1 Number of Press Releases/Statements 2002 ........................