Through the looking glass: A decade of Red Cross crisis response and situational crisis communication theory

Abstract Crisis communication has emerged as a hot topic in public relations literature. However, little attention has been paid to nonprofit organizations (NPOs), one of the largest sectors of public relations practice. In particular, few studies have examined that the crisis response strategy NPOs can employ to repair their reputations. For the Red Cross and other NPOs, when faced with a crisis, communicating with their publics is critical to restore a positive reputation and, ultimately, to the continued success of the organization once the crisis has passed. The study was based on the work done by Coombs [Coombs, W. T. (2007). Protecting organization reputations during a crisis: The development and application of situational crisis communication theory. Corporate Reputation Review,10, 163–176] to develop and refine what he has called the situational crisis communication theory (SCCT). The theory posits that certain public relations’ crisis situations are better resolved if organizations adopt specific crisis response strategies. The study presented in this paper examined the crisis response strategies of the American Red Cross through the lens of the SCCT.