SUSTAINING AND RESTORING THE REPUTATION OF TERRITORIES THROUGH BRAND COMMUNICATION IN THE CONTEXT OF WAR AND THE RISK SOCIETY

Abstract

The article argues that during wartime disruptions and throughout post-war recovery, a territory’s reputation becomes a practical criterion of trust that reduces uncertainty for both external and internal actors and shapes their willingness to provide support and engage in cooperation. The purpose of the article is to conceptualize the mechanisms for sustaining and restoring territorial reputation in a wartime context as a component of resilient marketing within a risk society. The methodological basis comprises a theoretical and conceptual analysis of approaches to risk, reputation, and crisis communication. The proposed toolkit was developed through conceptual modelling of the relationships between institutional actions, communication decisions, and reputational assessments, with a particular emphasis on the digital dimension. The study’s contribution lies in integrating the risk-society framework with instruments of place marketing, strategic narrative, public diplomacy, and risk and crisis communication. It demonstrates that territorial reputation is multidimensional and therefore requires distinct evaluative criteria for different audiences. A further contribution is the adaptation of crisis communication insights to the level of a territory treated as a communicative “organization”. The roles of the population, the diaspora, donors, investors, and international partners are identified as key audiences. An integrated scheme is proposed in which strategic narrative and public diplomacy provide the substantive frame, while a communication-governance procedure ensures its reliability. The scientific novelty of the article consists in a detailed elaboration of the digital dimension of reputational work. Social media create an additional layer of interpretations; consequently, monitoring, verification, and message synchronization become continuous managerial practices. The practical significance of the findings lies in the applicability of the proposed set of mechanisms to the work of central and local public authorities, communication teams, partner networks, and diaspora actors. The article substantiates that sustaining reputation during active warfare requires accurate and regular updates, a clear separation between instructive and adaptive information, coordination under a “single voice” principle, and systematic monitoring. Reputation restoration after the peak of crisis relies on verifiable changes, recalibration of positioning, strengthening local solidarity, and engaging third parties as independent validation. Particular emphasis is placed on the need for a measurement cycle: regular stakeholder surveys combined with analysis of the digital information environment make it possible to detect gaps between official claims and public perceptions and to adjust the communication line on an evidence-based basis.