Stakeholder vs Public

The terms stakeholder and public are often difficult to distinguish. Depending on what type of literature you reach for, they have different interpretations. Stakeholders have been identified more often in the business literature according to their relationships with organizations. Public on the other hand has more presence in the public relations and other mass media literature.

One of the definitions of a stakeholder given by R.E. Freeman in ‘Strategic Management: A Stakeholder Approach’ says that a stakeholder is “any group or individual who is affected by or can affect the achievement of an organization’s objectives.” He describes it in the wide sense of a stakeholder. In the narrow sense of a stakeholder he means “any identifiable group or individual on which the organization is dependent for its continued survival.” Later this definition has been expanded to include groups who have interests in the corporation, regardless of the corporation’s interest in them. In simple words, stakeholders include everyone who has an interest in the organisation such as employees, customers, shareholders, communities and suppliers.

The term ‘public’ on the other hand has been related to the recipients of messages from organizations. The term ‘public’ can be understood as an audience that has become segmented into more homogeneous subsets that help communicators choose appropriate channels in order to reach them. James Grunig in ‘Excellence in Public Relations and Communication Management’ has differentiated the terms ‘stakeholder’ and ‘public’ in the following way: organizations choose stakeholders by their marketing strategies, recruiting, and investment plans, but the public arise on their own choice and choose the organization.

Even though the definitions and names can be confusing for Public Relations practitioners it is the most important to understand to whom, why and when the message should be communicated. Successful campaigns must also consider how messages will be interpreted by its receivers.