DISCOURSE ON SUSTAINABILITY IN A PUBLIC INSTITUTION: BETWEEN COMMUNICATIVE RATIONALITY AND INSTRUMENTAL RATIONALITY

Abstract

In this article, we analyze organizational communication discourses in order to understand the rationality by which means journalism in a public institution of higher education. Using Critical Discourse Analysis on journalistic texts published by the institution, regarding sustainability, we seek to enlighten, based on Jürgen Habermas´s Theory of Communicative Action, how the arguments used can be placed, considering the concepts of teleological/instrumental rationality and communicative rationality. Therefore, it is possible to verify if the texts allow a critical reflection on the theme within the social environment, focusing on the search for understanding and problematization of the issue debated within the public sphere. The results fit the need for institutional journalism to compromise more intensely with the precepts of public communication, public interest and public welfare. The strategic orientation aimed at the promotion of the institutional image was predominant in news production.