Exploring the Public Relations Landscape in Vietnam: Insights From Industry Experts

Existing global public relations (PR) scholarship categorizes PR practice responses to globalization as either global, local, or glocal, but whether these categories capture the complexity and fluidity of practice in globalizing countries with distinct political and economic environments from Western contexts remains underexamined. Our research provides a comprehensive understanding of PR practice in Vietnam’s business sector by integrating three interconnected dimensions: how practitioners conceptualize and operationalize PR, how environmental factors (infrastructure, culture, and media environment) shape practice, and the current state of PR professionalism and education. From a critical realism perspective, we conducted in-depth interviews with 20 experienced Vietnamese PR professionals and analyzed data through two coding cycles and categorical themeing. Findings demonstrate that Vietnamese PR practice does not fit into global, local, or glocal categories as mutually exclusive; rather, practitioners navigate among these approaches depending on contextual factors such as organizational type, industry sector, corporate culture, and personal ethics, potentially producing hybrid practices. The single-party political system facilitates government relations, creating a landscape in which practitioners strategically leverage state partnerships to enhance organizational effectiveness. Ongoing ethical challenges related to media opacity persist, yet professionals are adapting to digitalization, balancing legacy media relations with emerging media strategies in a complex media environment. However, Vietnamese PR lacks formal associations, standardized education, and ethical codes, hindering the industry’s development. Based on these findings, we propose an integrative framework that synthesizes the three dimensions to offer a lens applicable to other emerging, postcolonial, or transitional economies.