Immigration and inclusion in South Wales

This research explores the impact of new migration on receiving communities, in particular on community, integration and cohesion. Based on research carried out in Cardiff and Merthyr Tydfil, it explores the perspectives of both new and settled residents. Key points For new migrants, economic integration seemed a necessary precursor for inclusion and cohesion; those who were able to work were viewed more favourably by settled populations. But economic integration was no guarantee. Discrimination and negative media portrayals were cited as particular barriers by new migrants, while in some apparently integrated and cohesive settled contexts, particular vulnerable groups (e.g. older people and women) remained excluded. These amounts are after income tax, and do not include housing or childcare costs. There was no evidence that community tensions are an inevitable consequence of new immigration. White immigration, whether middle-class professional, student or migrant worker, appeared to be invisible to local populations in Cardiff. Educated migrants with good English, whatever their ethnic or national background or migrant status, and whether living in deprived or affluent areas, integrated more easily than others. Age-based and generational tensions of different kinds existed across all the groups and geographical areas studied. Among young people, some expressed hostility toward migrants; others shared education, sport and social outings together. Older people in all groups expressed anxieties about the behaviours of young people. Poverty and deprivation had a direct and negative impact on inclusion and cohesion in the case study areas. People who were poor or living in deprived areas, from both migrant and settled communities, felt they were treated poorly by those in positions of power and described similar discrimination and attitudes among service providers. Visibly different migrant interviewees related this to issues of race, but the research suggests that it is also class-based. Social class differences were a complex but important factor in shaping people's experiences of inclusion and cohesion and in shaping community responses to new migration

Towards the professionalisation of public relations in Malaysia: Perception management and strategy development

The aim of this study is to explore how the status and standards of public relations as a profession are perceived by the three main groups involved in public relations: academics, practitioners, and business leaders. It is concluded that public relations can be a 'true' profession if all parties involved are united and committed to developing standardised, universal forms of public relations practise

Shoot first and ask questions later: media coverage of the 2003 Iraq war

Based on extensive original research, Shoot First and Ask Questions Later provides a comprehensive analysis of media coverage of the war in Iraq in 2003. The authors look closely at the main actors involved through a broad range of interviews with journalists (both embedded and non-embedded), news editors, news heads, and with key planners at the Pentagon and the UK Ministry of Defence. This book also investigates how the war was represented on television, employing both a systematic content analysis of the broadcast news coverage of the war and a series of case studies that unravel key moments of good and bad reporting during the war. Finally, it examines how people responded to and interpreted the information they received from the media, drawing upon both large-scale surveys and focus groups. What emerges, for all its blemishes, is a picture of a sophisticated, military public-relations campaign - one that had less to do with censorship than with promoting certain kinds of coverage. At the heart of this was the embedded journalists program, which has clearly changed the way war is reported. In future, the authors argue, journalists need to understand their role in this public relations effort, and to ask questions not only when access is denied, but also when it is granted