Prince Harry's Book Publicity 'Worst I've Ever Seen' for Reputation—Expert

Prince Harry's book and interviews have left him vulnerable to allegations of hypocrisy, a PR expert told Newsweek.

Spare became the fastest selling non-fiction book in history after shifting 1.4 million copies by the end of its first day, but the publicity campaign has been a "disaster" for his reputation, Edward Coram James said.

The chief executive of PR agency Go Up told Newsweek: "If the brief was just to sell books and get high viewership numbers then they've smashed it. They've done a terrific job. If the brief had a reputational component then that element of it has been a disaster."

"I think in terms of actual reputation management, if there is a reputational component, then it's the worst I've ever seen. If you're going to lay charges at the feet of others you've got to make sure you're not doing the same thing yourself."

Harry said both in the book and in a series of high profile interviews that his family were briefing against him in the media and offered that as a justification for describing deeply personal moments in his memoir.

Among the private details in the book, Harry describes Princess Charlotte crying over her "baggy" flower girl dress at age three and a conversation with Prince William and King Charles III after Prince Philip's funeral.

Beyond the book itself, Harry accused Queen Camilla in interviews of leaking in order to rehabilitate her own reputation having been framed in the media as the "villain."

The duke has argued that Kensington Palace should have publicly denied a story accusing Meghan of making Kate Middleton cry at a bridesmaid's dress fitting.

However, he also told ITV that he and Meghan Markle didn't accuse the royals of racism, but unconscious bias during their Oprah Winfrey interview. Almost two years after the interview aired, he suggested the interpretation that it was a racism allegation was the media's not his and Meghan's.

'Double Standard'

James said: "You could say right, this person's really rude to me. Then six months later you're caught being really rude to someone else, that's hypocritical. The way the Sussexes have been hypocritical has been much more direct than that because their actual response itself has been a double standard. It's not that they've been caught leaking elsewhere. They say we hate leaks, by leaking.

"Something that really stood out in the ITV interview is there was this whole color of the baby's skin row where Harry clarifies that he's not actually accusing the royal family of racism he's accusing them of unconscious bias.

"He says that the royal family are guilty of not clarifying statements. He used, as the example, the Meghan flower girl dress row, the bridesmaids dresses. He says Meghan didn't make Catherine cry and he said the royal family should have released statements to clarify things immediately.

"Yet in the Oprah interview he says something that the press believe is him saying the royal family is racist. And yet it takes him a year and nine months to clarify that the royal family isn't racist and the press just misconstrued what he said.

"He says he's fiercely private and protective over the privacy of his children and yet in his book he give deeply personal information about the children of the Cambridges. The optics are really clear. He looks like he is applying one rule for himself and a completely different rule to someone else."

James also suggested Harry might also be at risk of appearing hypocritical in relation to the British media, even though a large portion of his argument, including about the death of Princess Diana, was "absolutely fair enough."

He said Harry's experiences with the tabloids were in many cases deserving of sympathy and any one of his major scandals could be sufficient to drive a normal person to a nervous breakdown.

However, the prince also launches some deeply personal attacks on individual journalists including a tabloid editor, whose name he says is "a perfect anagram for Rehabber Kooks"—an apparent reference to former News of the World editor Rebekah Brooks.

Spare reads: "Loathsome toad, I gathered. Everyone who knew her was in full agreement that she was an infected pustule on the a*** of humanity, plus a s*** excuse for a journalist."

The characterisation comes after Meghan's debut Spotify podcast Archetypes looked at the negative labels that hold women back.

James said: "All his experiences with the media can culminate to become incredibly traumatic for him and I think on that element his deep mistrust of the press is understandable because of what they've put him through.

"On the other hand, if you are going to call out other people for malpractices you have to make sure that you are not committing exactly the same mistakes.

"And so he can't go around being incredibly vile about individual members of the press. You can talk about 'the press' without bringing any individual person into disrepute but to go and make very personal, very aggressive attacks on individual people is very, very difficult, especially from someone like Harry who has the profile where that stuff sticks.

"He is now doing the one thing that he has said he is not about, which he laments and hates."

Jack Royston is Newsweek's chief royal correspondent based in London. You can find him on Twitter at @jack_royston and read his stories on Newsweek's The Royals Facebook page.

Do you have a question about King Charles III, William and Kate, Meghan and Harry, or their family that you would like our experienced royal correspondents to answer? Email royals@newsweek.com. We'd love to hear from you.