The role of legacy media and social media in international organizational risk and crisis communication

Communication processes flowing through platforms provided by legacy and social media can trigger and amplify the development of crisis situations and how “sticky” they turn out to be for organizations and their stakeholders. Understanding the media environment is essential for effective and ethical organizational risk and crisis communication, domestically and globally. In this chapter, we discuss the state-of-the-art and research insights on the role of legacy media and social media in organizational risk and crisis communication, as well as influences and challenges exerted by and associated with modern digital platforms and emerging technologies. Recommendations based on communication theories, such as mediatization and the social-mediated crisis communication (SMCC) model, and emerging frameworks for understanding the impact of organizational operators of digital platforms and algorithms are provided.