A Leeds Met academic is joining leading figures in the world of journalism in an examination of the media's reporting of the credit crunch.

Professor Anne Gregory, Director of the Centre for Public Relations Studies at Leeds Met, will join luminaries such as Robert Peston, Martin Lewis and Hugh Pym of the BBC, Francesco Guerrera of the FT, Peter Wilby of the Guardian and Howard Davies of the London School of Economics.

Together, they are contributing towards a special issue of the International Journal of Communication Ethics - Ethical Space, called 'Playing Footsie with the FTSE.'

The issue will consist of a series of papers from eminent academics and journalists from around the world as they reflect on the credit crunch and the crisis in journalism.

Areas for debate include the failure of knowledgeable specialists and well-connected writers to predict the timing and impact of the crisis.

They will also examine the role of social media and blogging in the banking collapse. With a decline in investment in quality journalism, the issue will assess what effect this will have on the kind of investigative work that might have exposed the workings of the financial industry before the crash occurred.

Professor Gregory offers a critique of public relations, and the industry's culpability in accepting lucrative fees in the promotion of the financial industry, without considering the impact of their work.

She then goes on to call for public relations to play a part in defining a new public narrative where the profession assists organisations and society itself as it tries to rebuild a post-credit crunch world where the notion of the common good is central.

Professor Gregory asks for an 'assertive consensus' around the value of 'community' where people are aware of and coalesce around common ends and are prepared to regulate or even sacrifice their own in pursuit of these ends.

Public relations, using the tools of communication in the public sphere has a major role to play in building this consensus.