Slavery, abolition and PR

It is the 200th anniversary of the abolition, by Parliament, of the trafficking of slaves. The complete abolition took a little longer in the British Empire - 1834.

Naturally, there is a lot of media coverage about slavery and its impact. And one interesting article I came across on the BBC website focuses on the role of the Quakers in the abolitionist movement.

What is extraordinary, from a communications perspective, is how they pioneered PR and marketing techniques to achieve their aims.

The Quakers used a variety of methods to great effect that by all accounts were quite radical and original at the time:

• Mass petitions
• Lobbying of MPs
• Posters and pamphlets
• Case studies - one a diagram of the cramming of slaves on the ship The Brooke illustrated effectively the conditions slaves had to endure and, by all accounts, changed minds
• Logos (as pictured above) and tag lines
• The use of their meeting houses as a network to spread the word through talks and organise themselves
  

And they were passionate about their cause!