2020

Canel, María-José; Luoma-aho, Vilma; Barandiarán, Xabier

Public sector communication is about managing relationships. This chapter explores how communication can help public sector organizations by building intangible assets that are valuable for society. It takes the term public sector communication to refer to “goal‐oriented communication inside public organizations and between public organizations and their stakeholders that enables public sector functions within their specific cultural and/or political settings, with the purpose of building and maintaining the public good and trust between citizens and authorities”. The chapter first describes the specificities of the public sector in terms of intangible assets, and discusses the extent to which intangible assets can be conceptualized and deployed in the public sector. It then introduces the public value perspective. With the help of a case observation, the chapter addresses how combining the public value perspective with the concept of public sector intangible assets can enhance public sector communication.