By Inga Kaškelyte

Activities of corporate donors get little exposure in the Czech media, largely due to the press's refusal to name companies in relation to their charitable activities. Moreover, editors risk being penalized for violating this unwritten rule. For large multinationals with philanthropy programs entering the market, this state of affairs can be a nasty surprise.

Only a few years ago, corporate philanthropy evoked confusion and puzzlement among the general public. The concept, which had a long-standing tradition in the West, remained unknown in post-communist Europe. Fortunately, since then the situation has improved. Large multinationals as well as indigenous companies began to realize that it was good to reinvest part of their profit into the community via public-benefit projects. The recently announced Top Corporate Philanthropists List 2006 is a testament to this. The overall number of companies donating to charity has increased since last year, with more than 900 million Kč ($43 million) invested into charity projects.

Unfortunately, the Czech media still choose to largely ignore these efforts. We frequently read of doctors who finally managed to collect enough funds to buy expensive medical equipment or see children on TV playing with new computers in children's homes. All of these "miracles" happen in spite of the well-known fact that the health, social and cultural spheres suffer from a severe lack of finances. The reality is that many of these positive developments came about because of corporate donors, and yet the wider public fails to hear about this due to the TV and printed press "embargo" put in place on these funders.

Myths and contradictions

Two of the most frequent arguments used by the media to justify this behavior center on a couple of misconceived but still widely held myths. The first of these is the much feared "hidden advertisement." In the eyes of many editors and editors-in-chief, corporate donors, through their charitable activities (some of whom give several million crowns annually), are trying to gain access to coverage through the "backdoor" in an effort to overcome legal restrictions and traditional advertising channels.

When the Vodafone Foundation and the Czech Streetwork Association announced in October at a joint press conference the launch of a joint awareness campaign in support of low-threshold clubs for children and young people, the majority of media representatives present at the event openly refused to mention the name of the foundation in relation to the campaign, in spite of the fact that it was fully funded and co-organized by the foundation in question.

An editor from Czech Television advised us to get the name of the foundation changed, because in his words "with Vodafone in the title, you have no chance with Czech Television." Even more a matter for concern, a reporter from Czech Radio explained that any mention of a corporate donor in her report would get her penalized by her editor. Similarly, our efforts to convince the reporter from the Czech News Agency to make a reference to one of the organizers of the event as being "a mobile phone operator" met with failure. The comment was erased by the reporter's editor, and it remains unknown whether the reporter himself was penalized for his insolence.

Only the most puritanical observer would consider a reference by a newspaper to a specific company that donated a certain amount of money for a charitable purpose to be a hidden advertisement. Indeed, legislation makes the clear distinction between such cases and those where a journalist mentions a corporate subject in exchange for a bribe.

Following this logic, we have to ask a question: What is the greater advertisement? Devoting half a page of print in the business supplement of a national daily to the brand change of a mobile operator, or mentioning the same firm's support for low-threshold clubs for young people?

The bald fact is that, in the course of its re-branding as Vodafone, Oskar in one year experienced an unprecedented level of exposure. The issue that so excited local editors was the prospect of the arrival of the largest global mobile operator to the Czech market and the possible impact such a move would have on consumers here. That one of these effects would be the establishment of the Vodafone Foundation and the investment of some 10 million Kč into the charitable sector was, for the most part, completely ignored by Czech media, and it remains the case to this day.

The second myth is that such coverage provides "no added value information."

In the view of many in the press, companies should devote themselves to charity in return for the quiet satisfaction of doing a good turn without expecting any sort of publicity. As such references to firms don't provide any added value to readers or viewers, the argument goes, why bother giving these companies additional exposure "free of charge"?

From my own experience in the United Kingdom, philanthropy is perceived as a natural byproduct of most firms' commercial activities. The charitable activity of a car company is given the same sort of attention as the launch of its new model. Unlike in the United Kingdom, the Czech media report predominantly on the commercial products of companies. If a newspaper is to remain a balanced source of information to its readers, why is it that the information about the ethical behavior of the companies is regarded as being of lesser value than that of its market activities?

Is corporate philanthropy just another manifestation of a refined greediness of the business sector?

I don't think so.

Companies are made up of people who have an innate human need to help others. Companies are also accountable to their shareholders, employees and customers for how they handle funds at their discretion. The top management of a joint-stock company simply cannot afford to invest several million crowns into charity with no expectation of this being reflected in the wider reputation of the company. To think otherwise is utterly naive, not to mention ultimately counterproductive.

Sponsoring versus philanthropy

Many Czech companies with whom we meet perceive philanthropy as support of sporting activities. Indeed, one third of Czech companies do not give a single heller to public-benefit projects, choosing instead to invest these funds into the sponsoring of sports. If a company attaches its name to that of a national sports league, its publicity is secured. Should it decide to give the same amount to abandoned children, nobody will hear about it.

Supporting corporate philanthropy is not a primary task of the media. However, this does not mean that it should ignore corporate philanthropy as it does currently. Such an approach not only deprives the wider public of important information on a lesser-known side of the business community, but, just as significantly, it diminishes the motivation for businesses to donate to the charitable sector.