There are increasing indications that public relations is slowly returning to the public administration curriculum. This was a common topic in early public administration literature, but by the second half of the 20th century it had largely disappeared from widely used textbooks. Now, with the increased power of the news media and other rapidly growing and changing alternative communications venues that define this information age, public relations is again relevant for future public managers. This article summarizes research results about these trends, based on a survey of the literature. It presents the historical and contemporary normative case for including public relations in the MPA curriculum, and synthesizes these results to provide suggestions for pedagogic approaches.
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