The New Handbook of Communication and Corporate Reputation

The authoritative communication-centered reference on corporate reputation, fully reimagined

Reputation is no longer an organizational asset to protect but a distributed evaluative phenomenon constituted through communication across stakeholders, platforms, and algorithms. Now in its Second Edition, The New Handbook of Communication and Corporate Reputation assembles 46 chapters from international scholars spanning public relations, organizational communication, journalism, media law, rhetoric, and digital platform studies to map this transformation.

This handbook introduces new conceptual architecture including the claims-perceptions-reality diagnostic, the concept of relationates as a replacement for the overstretched stakeholder category, and a map of recurring problem spaces where reputational tensions surface. Coverage addresses artificial intelligence and algorithmic mediation, misinformation and disinformation, character assassination, moral-outrage crises, polarization, corporate social advocacy, and narrative warfare.

The book also covers:

• Diagnostic frameworks for context collapse, DEI authenticity challenges, and the epistemic limits of contemporary reputation measurement approaches
• Contributions from Manfred Scwaiger, W. Timothy Coombs, yvind Ihlen, Juan-Carlos Molleda, Vilma Luoma-aho, Michelle Schumate, and other leading scholars
• Analysis of stakeholder activism and how public discourse shapes organizational identity construction and legitimacy under contested conditions
• An editorial stance favoring diagnostic clarity over prescriptive formulas, aligning the volume with current theoretical scholarship rather than practitioner manuals
• Perspectives from contributors across North America, Europe, and Asia addressing reputation dynamics in varied institutional and media environments

Designed for scholars, doctoral and graduate students, and senior practitioners in communication, public relations, management, and marketing, this handbook provides the field's most thorough communication-centered treatment of corporate reputation under conditions of complexity, contestation, and accelerating technological change.