When Sir Martin Sorrell declared on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that “there is no such thing as PR anymore”, the reaction across the industry was swift and predictable. Commentators rushed to defend the discipline. LinkedIn filled with rebuttals. 

Sorrell’s claim was blunt. Public relations, he argued, has “morphed into social media”, into internet media and content created at scale. Flood the system with content and visibility follows. He believes PR is no longer a distinct or defensible category.

This viewpoint exposes something deeper than a semantic row. When claims of PR’s irrelevance keep returning, it is worth asking why.

A profession uneasy with its own origins

Part of PR’s difficulty in defending itself lies in its history. Edward Bernays, often described as the father of public relations, was explicit about the discipline’s early purpose. His work professionalised persuasion at scale, borrowing heavily from propaganda techniques refined during wartime. He believed public opinion could be shaped, guided and managed by those who understood mass psychology.

Modern PR has spent decades trying to distance itself from that legacy, emphasising ethics, transparency and dialogue. Yet the tension has never fully disappeared. The suspicion that PR manipulates rather than informs remains stubbornly resilient.

In today’s environment, where misinformation spreads faster than fact and AI can generate influence at industrial scale, that unresolved history matters. When Sorrell talks about saturating ecosystems with content, he is reviving a Bernays-era logic, but without the ethical scaffolding PR has spent decades trying to build. 

A profession that struggles to explain itself

Even now, after years in the industry, my parents still aren’t entirely sure what I do. That confusion is not unique to family conversations. It mirrors a wider failure of definition.

PR professionals understand their value instinctively. They navigate ambiguity, manage risk, interpret sentiment and broker trust between organisations and the societies they operate in. Yet too often, the industry explains itself in tactical terms. Coverage. Reach. Content. Outputs.

When PR reduces itself to what it produces, it invites others to judge it by scale rather than judgement.

This gap between impact and understanding is not new. In a recent Stories and Strategies conversation, nonprofit communications leader Marc Whitt captured it simply: “Great work does not speak for itself, and impact does not equal awareness.”

From counsel to content

The shift towards content has not helped. As media fragmented and owned channels expanded, PR embraced content creation enthusiastically. That adaptation was necessary. But in doing so, the discipline often allowed “storytelling” to become shorthand for its entire contribution.

Storytelling is not trivial. But stripped of context, ethics and intent, it becomes indistinguishable from marketing copy or platform-native noise. This is where Sorrell’s critique bites. If PR is just content, then scale will always win.

The rebuttal PR needs to hear

During the same BBC Radio 4 debate, Sarah Waddington, chief executive of the PRCA, offered a more grounded counterpoint. Storytelling, she argued, is not a new job role borrowed from elsewhere. It has always sat at the heart of PR. The difference is that brands and institutions now face fragmented media, misinformation risks and the growing influence of AI systems.

Waddington’s rebuttal matters because it reframes the issue. PR is not defined by the channels it uses, but by the judgement it applies. It is about helping organisations understand how they are perceived, where trust is fragile and what responsible communication looks like under pressure.

In that environment, PR’s role is not to flood channels, but to help organisations understand what they should say, how they should say it, and why it matters. It is about brokering understanding between groups, engaging communities responsibly and building trust in volatile conditions.

That distinction matters. It separates PR from content production and reasserts its strategic purpose.

Measurement and the credibility gap

As Gini Dietrich, creator of the PESO Model, has argued, the “PR is dead” debate persists not because PR has stopped working, but because it is too often confused with publicity. When success is measured through outputs, impressions and clip reports, credibility is flattened into visibility, and PR’s strategic value is lost.

PR’s struggle with measurement has compounded its identity problem. For years, the industry has wrestled with how to demonstrate value beyond outputs. The Barcelona Principles were designed to address precisely this challenge, shifting focus from volume to outcomes, from activity to impact. The latest iteration reinforces that communication should be evaluated against organisational objectives, societal impact and stakeholder trust.

Yet adoption has been uneven. Where measurement remains weak, PR is easily reduced to a cost centre or a content function. If outcomes are unclear, others will define relevance on their terms.

Physician, heal thyself

As Terryanne Chebet has argued, “Public Relations’ primary goal is permission generation. It’s about credibility, context, and cultural capital.” When PR is reduced to a delivery mechanism for campaigns, its strategic function is lost and its value becomes easier to dismiss.

PR has advised countless organisations on reputation, narrative and legitimacy. It understands how trust is built and eroded. Yet it has allowed its own role to be mischaracterised, diluted and, at times, apologised for.

This is not about defending PR out of nostalgia. It is about recognising what the discipline does uniquely well. Interpreting complex environments. Anticipating risk. Balancing competing stakeholder expectations. Making sense of uncertainty. No algorithm does that responsibly at scale. No content factory replaces judgement.

The industry has modernised its tools faster than it has modernised its self-description. It has allowed louder disciplines to frame its relevance, rather than insisting on its own strategic contribution. 

What PR leaders must reclaim

If PR wants to stop being declared dead, it must stop waiting to be validated by others.

That means reclaiming language. Being clear that PR is not a channel or a content type, but a strategic function rooted in trust and legitimacy.

It means insisting on measurement that reflects outcomes, not just activity, and using frameworks like the Barcelona Principles consistently rather than ceremonially.

And it means resisting the temptation to chase scale at the expense of meaning. Flooding the system may generate visibility. It does not generate trust.

PR is not dead. But it does have a PR problem. And until the industry addresses it with the same rigour it applies to clients, declarations of its demise will continue to feel uncomfortably persuasive.

Curzon PR is a London-based PR firm working with clients globally. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact our Business Development Team info@curzonpr.com