Examining the applied media ethics question of professional persuasion, this special double issue resulted from a colloquium and conference on allowable ethical limits of deception in professional persuasion. Participants were invited to reason their way toward a threshold that would define acceptable deception for a professional persuader in pursuit of favorable market and public opinion conditions for a client. As a whole, this issue covers a broad range of views and expressions of opinion that often come close to defining the threshold between morally acceptable and morally outrageous persuasion.

Volume 16, Numbers 2 & 3, 2001
Contents: Foreword. C.W. Marsh, Public Relations Ethics: Contrasting Models From the Rhetorics of Plato, Aristotle, and Isocrates. L. Wilkins, C. Christians, Philosophy Meets the Social Sciences: The Nature of Humanity in the Public Arena. J. Black, Semantics and Ethics of Propaganda. S.B. Cunningham, Responding to Propaganda: An Ethical Enterprise. S. Baker, D.L. Martinson, The TARES Test: Five Principles for Ethical Persuasion. T. Cooper, T. Kelleher, Better Mousetrap? Of Emerson, Ethics, and Postmillennium Persuasion. K. Fitzpatrick, C. Gauthier, Toward a Professional Responsibility Theory of Public Relations Ethics. R.I. Wakefield, C.F. Barney, Communication in the Unfettered Marketplace: Ethical Interrelationships of Business, Government, and Stakeholders. CASES AND COMMENTARIES:Was Microsoft's Ad Unacceptably Deceptive. BOOK REVIEWS: D.K. Shurtleff, God Is Not Dead, Nor Doth He Sleep. M.M. Monahan, Unplug the Simplicity Drug. P.M. Lester, Ted Koppel: We Hardly Want to Know Ye.