1948/59 Rosa Parks and the Montgomery Bus Boycott
John Harrington, Editor of PRWeek UK
Judge's comment
"The moment that kick-started the US civil rights movement and became a blueprint for modern protest movements in the country and far beyond.
The campaign was about far more than PR, but at its heart were many ingredients that make a success comms campaign. It began with a simple gesture - Rosa Parks refusing to give up her bus seat for a white person - that symbolised the unjust nature of the segregation laws in a way that resonated widely. The protest itself, where black people refused to ride the bus for 381 days, generated massive coverage and positioned the protestors as peaceful and righteous in contrast to their attackers. Of course, Martin Luther King was the perfect orator to communicate why change was needed."
Public relations Work
Objectives: To end racial segregation on public transportation in Montgomery, Alabama.
Target Audience: African American residents of Montgomery whilst governmental bodies and the wider American public constituted a secondary audience.
Key messages: Racial segregation is unjust. African Americans deserve equal rights when using public transportation.
Strategies and Tactics: Contrary to popular belief, Rosa Parks’ protest and the campaign that followed were not entirely without prior planning. The local chapter of The National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NAACP), which Parks was the secretary of, had already planned a campaign following Claudette Colvin’s refusal to give up her seat to a white passenger. This included a potential boycott of the Montgomery buses and efforts to obtain the support of the Church. This plan was, however, axed following the President of the local NAACP chapter’s discovery that Colvin, a single 15-year-old, was pregnant which meant that obtaining the support of conservative churchgoers would be difficult.
Whilst Parks’ decision to not give up her seat was not planned; she was aware of its political implications. The president of the local NAACP chapter visited Parks following her arrest and convinced her to allow him to use this event to spark the protest movement he had previously been planning. The central idea was that en-masse non-violent forms of protest, the main of which was the Montgomery Bus Boycott, would create enough financial pressure on decision-makers to obtain better treatment for African American communities. The local NAACP chapter also presented Rosa Parks as a tired Christian woman wanting to rest rather than the life-long civil rights activist she was. They rightly believed this would facilitate obtaining sympathy from non-Black communities.
Tools and Channels: Convincing the entirety of Montgomery’s African American population to take part in a boycott was not an easy task due to the community’s reliance on the public transport network. NCAAP campaigners overcame this by convincing Black business owners and taxi drivers to provide alternative services to make the boycott possible and recruiting a strong communicator in Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. to enlist the Black community. This was mainly done through large speeches and other public events. Activists also distributed flyers and leaflets.
Implementation: Around 20,000 passengers boycotted Montgomery’s buses for 381 days.
Results: The campaign was a success. In 1956, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Alabama’s segregation laws as being in violation of the U.S. constitution.
Sources:
Montgomery advertiser
Time
History.com
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