Theory and practice continue to inform each other in a wide range of ways, and this issue illustrates a few of them. It also features an invited theory essay. Such essays, by senior scholars and innovative researchers, will appear occasionally in the journal. The first essay, by Christopher Meyers, provides a critique of recent “strong” global media ethics theorizing and suggests that we would be on firmer ground to pursue an inductive, practice-driven, “weak” program of theory—one that aims not for certainty, but plausibility. Borrowing from the work of Nick Fotion, Meyers argues that considering some key questions, together with a bit more humility, will allow us to find more common ground in our search for universal principles. Next, Amanda Kennedy argues that communication campaigns informed by feminist theories make for more effective public relations. Through analyzing the strategies of a global hand-washing campaign, she identifies manifestations of standpoint theory and an effective application of an ethic of care—both of which ought to better inform “glocal” public relations initiatives. The final two articles both address the issue of corruption in journalism, examining the culturally driven practice of passing envelopes of cash to journalists in different parts of the world. Di Xu provides an in-depth exploration of the common practice of slipping “red envelope” cash to Chinese journalists. Questioning more simplistic explanations, her study argues that the corruptive practice is not sufficiently explained by the cultural notion of guanxi, or “social connection.” Kioko Ireri uses a national survey to document the dynamics of corruptive practices that plague the news media system in Kenya. Noting that his country’s corruption problem is representative of that in other societies, it nonetheless helpfully explores the micro- and macro-level dimensions of corruption in news.
