Beyond organization-centred public relations: Collective action through a civic crowdfunding campaign

Public relations scholars have called for a shift from organization-centred approaches and practices to community, - or collective-based ones. With the Internet, the latter have become more frequent although under-researched or not well understood. This article addresses those gaps by researching a community-based campaign in New Zealand and by underpinning the research with collective action theory. Methodologically, it combines netnography, thematic analysis, and interviews with major players, to analyze a civic crowdfunding campaign. It provides an account of how two amateur activists not only initiated and managed this campaign, but also raised US$1.5 million (NZ$2.27) within three weeks to buy a private beach and gift it back to the New Zealand public. The article seeks to add to both PR scholarship and practice. It adds to the former by analysing the campaign and identifying success factors for civic crowdfunding campaigns more generally; and to the latter by accounting for a different kind of activist and community-based PR that goes beyond organization-centred approaches to offer gratifying community-centered work that improves the reputation of PR for contributing to the common good.