Is partial disclosure classed as misleading?

“If you are faced with the prospect of publicising something that you know to be untrue, there is little doubt that in the court of public opinion there is no justification for this kind of unethical behaviour. On the other hand, there may be ethical justification for partial disclosure so long as it does not mislead the public or harm anyone.” (Parsons: 2008: p.18)

This is the real debate. The meat on the bones. The juicy stuff.

Three parts of that quote from a CIPR endorsed book stand out for me:

“may be”

“partial disclosure”

“does not mislead”

Each of these are such tenuous, yet significant variables which could be interpreted in a whole variety on their own. Once you bring the three variables into one judgement you are presented with a complex matrix of possible outcomes.

The most critical of the questions that helps to determine the boundaries of the other variables is that of ‘what does it mean to mislead?’

mislead
verb (past and past participle misled /-ˈlɛd/)
[with object]

cause (someone) to have a wrong idea or impression:
the government misled the public about the road’s environmental impact
(Oxford University Press: 2011)

If you reveal only 70% of the truth you are not lying to the public per se but you will leave the audience with a different impression than if you had revealed 100% of the truth, however that impression is not ‘wrong’ as it will accurately correlate with the truth they know.

Nobody will ever know everything about something in my opinion, there will always be new knowledge or truth to be discovered and if we were to look at this dilemma from a philosophical perspective then it could be argued that what is truth to one person may not be truth to another, and what is regarded as the truth may be challenged and change over time.

Therefore if to be honest is not to mislead, could there indeed be room for partial disclosure of the truth within the boundaries of the ethical practice of public relations as suggested by Parsons in the opening of this post?

I say yes. It is matter of individual judgement and conscience within that matrix of variables.

What do you think?

• Oxford University Press. (2012). Definition for mislead: Oxford Dictionaries Online (World English). [Online] Available from: http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/mislead?q=mislead [Accessed: 12^th December 2011]
• Parsons, P. (2008) Ethics in Public Relations: A Guide to Best Practice. 2^nd Ed. London: Kogan Page.