My Last Hurrah

One last blog post with which to end the semester… Am I ready to become a public diplomat? Tory is—and maybe when I finally finish off a PD masters I will be too. This course was educational and eye-opening for a number of reasons, not the least of which was being surrounded by so many knowledgeable individuals willing to share their work and life experiences with this poor, undergraduate student. (Thanks guys!)

These blog posts have been an…interesting way of thinking through the topics brought up in readings and in class. I won’t pretend to love them, but I will write one last post as a personal semester finale, if you will.

This week’s main topic was strategic communication, which, as Tory pointed out, is a term recently out of use by the U.S. Department of Defense. And this just seems to be the week for banning phrases (if you haven’t heard about the Associated Press banning the term “homophobia” in its new style book, check it out here) and redefinitions. But I have my doubts that changing the title of a job is really going to change the job itself. As leaders in the Pentagon finally realized, strategic communication personnel simply duplicate work already being done by public affairs offices, and the added layer of bureaucracy was simply confusing for everyone involved. However, now that the terms are all cleared up, what are those employees going to do? The slow speed of change within government agencies is a topic the class has discusses a few times this semester, with no easy solution on how to fix the speed of change without leaving the government open to fund-draining ideas. But this is one case in which that slow movement could be a big problem. What will the DoD do with these former strategic communications personnel? Is the government going to fire them? Doubtful. It would look pretty bad for the government to start firing employees over job titles and descriptions while the unemployment rate is still so high. Will they continue to do their old jobs? Also doubtful, since their job duties contributed to the overall confusion. They will more than likely not be shuffled around to other departments either. Perhaps the department should have considered this problem before discontinuing the use of the term, and perhaps it did, and we will all have to wait and see what action this slow moving government takes. On the other hand, this could be a prime example of Bryan’s point about military action: the initial action of getting rid of the confusing phrase was a highly valued step. The follow-up and actual implementation of that plan to remove the phrase are more time consuming and less interesting.

There’s a bit of a ramble for you. Have a good break y’all!

~Shaina

Wait. What’s my thing?

I felt inspired by Tory’s last blog post, and I wanted to write one of my own. Although I am not specializing in Public Diplomacy, I find it to be an integral piece of the way in which nations interact with foreign publics. Last week’s guest, retired Ambassador Brian E. Carlson spoke to us about some of the differences in the way that the Department of State and the Department of Defense approach what we are apparently no longer referring to as “Strategic Communication”/Public Diplomacy.

 For me, this lecture was a fascinating look at the way that communications are put out based on mostly bureaucratic differences. I can see that there is a lot of value in the idea that action is valued by the military, and that they do not like to wait to see plans implemented. I am a little like that myself, and if I am not immediately enacting a plan, I often abandon it due to lack of interest- or more often than not, something better comes along.

 The most interesting part of Ambassador Carlson’s talk though was his focus on the fact that we as practitioners need to bring specific skill sets to the field. It might not be enough just to be well versed in the art of public diplomacy- we need something to break us into the field so that we can show our colors. This idea left many of us asking ourselves, “wait, do I have a thing?” over the break. The challenge for us as a class now it to figure out what our specific subsets might be. Although this task is daunting, I think to avoid it will only prove more painful.

 

Just some food for thought. It’s been fun!

The End of Strategic Communication?

So here we are at the end of the semester! After thirteen weeks of Applied PD, are my classmates and I ready to become public diplomats? I sure hope so, that’s why I’m spending $$$ and many sleepless nights to get a masters degree! But I kid (kind of). I think we learned a lot, through readings and lectures of course but also through simulations and off the record conversations with PD practitioners. This last week I am focusing on writing a paper on the public diplomacy and nation branding initiatives of Azerbaijan. Pretty cool stuff! But I did want to write one final blog post.

The theme this week in class was strategic communications. This is supremely ironic because just this week the Department of Defense decided that it would be discontinuing use of this term. You can Click here to learn more about the announcement, but basically DoD says that the mandate of strategic communications personnel was not clear and that often they were duplicating the efforts of public affairs officers. The article also mentions criticism by top brass saying that actions speak louder than words.

Well, duh. I think anyone in public diplomacy knows that (see my last post about how “you can’t put lipstick on a pig”). However, I think that strategic communications (or whatever you want to call it) does serve an essential role. It can’t change what the military does, but it can shape the narrative about these actions, and clear up any misperceptions about them. So how is that different from public affairs? Well, I guess I’m used to how the State Department works. In the “R” bureau, there is the Public Affairs branch and the Public Diplomacy branch. Public Affairs generally deals with the domestic audience and with the press, while Public Diplomacy generally deals directly with foreign publics. I’m not 100% certain, but I believe this set-up is meant to help State comply with the Smith-Mundt Act. However, I kind of like it. You won’t necessarily want to put out the same message to both domestic and foreign audiences. I think that DoD needs to adopt a similar organizational structure. They don’t have to call what they do strategic communication, but they do need to be doing the work currently associated with that term.

What do you all think? Is the decision to get rid of the term “strategic communication” good or bad? How do you think DoD should conduct its messaging?

-Tory

P.S. This blog will soon become inactive, but you can continue to hear the latest PD news and my thoughts on it by following me (“les_bagatelles”) on Twitter! /shamelesspromotion

High Art or Low Art, that is the question. But why??!

As I listened to the discussion of art diplomacy in class last week, I found myself getting frustrated at the direction the discussion was taking. What is high art verses low art? Which one is better? Which one is trendier? Which one is less expensive? I might be exaggerating some of those things, but I just wanted to point out something: PD is not a cookie cutter activity. What is the point in debating which kind of art to put on display without first knowing which country we are in- what time of the year it is, and who is it that we are trying to reach?

I am adamant in my belief that if we are going to subscribe to the idea that public diplomacy is a tool that works to influence individuals in foreign nations to be at the very least willing to reconsider their views of the US in a positive way that we have to be willing to start with each initiative as a clean slate. What works for one group in one country will probably not have the same effects in another country, even if the age and demographic of the groups in question are the same.

It isn’t that I don’t see value in these kinds of debates, but I worry that it is a theme that prevails all the way up to the top- spending more time worrying about the content that we want to impose rather than analyzing the audience and trying to find what they might actually like. I feel like this might play into the “no fail” policy at the State Department. People might not be willing to step back and say, “Well that tanked. Next time lets try harder to think about what they might like.”  I worry seriously that the inability to report failure is one of the greatest barriers to PD in the US. If you can’t admit your mistakes, you are doomed to repeat them.

Getting Artsy

This week in class we discussed cultural diplomacy. This blog is meant to serve as an extended response to Shaina’s recent blog post “Why Don’t They Like Us?!” In it, Shaina responds to a question posed in class- “Do other people really care about our [American] art?” I think that it is a provocative question, and it ties in with the theme I have come back to in nearly all of my blog posts. Which is, how do we expand our public diplomacy efforts to reach out to those persons who are not already seeking us out? How do we make them take an interest in us?

In response I’ll give an example of an art program I think works in terms of reaching those people and one that does not. I will start with the one that does not work. My mind went immediately to the Arts in Embassies program. Don’t hate me, program administrators! The program features some good art. But I think it has a very limited audience of country elites. These VIPs get to come to the opening reception and schmooze with embassy personnel. Great, we need to have connections with these people. But when is a normal person going to be able to see that art? Many embassies have high security,which can make a casual drop-by too bothersome, and in repressive states visitors may receive negative attention for their association with the embassy (*cough* China). So I’m thinking this venue is less than ideal. If anyone knows differently please say so in the comments!

The art exhibits that I think really reach a broad range of people are those that have a universal theme. 19th century Southern gothic art may appeal to art snobs, but that’s not a big enough audience. A great example of this is one we have mentioned in class several times, the “Family of Man” exhibit from the 1950s. Millions around the world came to see photographs of ordinary people’s daily lives around the world. Our buddy Paul Rockower created a new version of this exhibit in 2010. You can read about both exhibits here. I suppose it would be hard to recreate the success of the original exhibit- if you want to see an Afghan woman cooking dinner all you need to do is Google it! However, I think this idea of choosing universally relatable subjects still holds true.

What do you all think? What kinds of art and venues are ideal for cultural diplomacy?  Do you agree with my assessments?

The Knowledge Disadvantage

I recently came across an interesting impetus for U.S. public diplomacy, and specifically for exchange programs with China. On the U.S. Department of State’s website, under the 100,000 Strong Initiative, one section discusses the need for more study abroad opportunities. It acknowledges the severe disproportion between the number of Chinese students who study abroad in the United States and the number of U.S. students who study abroad in China. This means, in the most basic sense, that more Chinese people know about the United States than people in the U.S. know about China. It’s an imbalance in knowledge, and one that could “undermine the strategic trust between the two countries.” To put it simply, the U.S. is at a knowledge disadvantage on the global playing field and it isn’t happy about it.

The graph below illustrates the vast difference in numbers of students studying abroad in the opposite country.

This implies at least two problems for public diplomacy practitioners: One, that very few of them have firsthand knowledge of or experience in a country that is extremely important to the U.S. in terms of economics, environmental issues, nuclear non-proliferation and more. And two, that young people do not seem to be interested in going to China or even learning Mandarin—in fact, according to the U.S. Department of state, 600 times more Chinese people study English than Americans study Mandarin. If young people do not participate in exchange programs, the U.S.’s ability to correct its knowledge disadvantage with China will be limited.

But there is an upside! For those public diplomacy practitioners struggling to convince the government and private donors that yes, this program or that initiative is important, and yes, it really does require funding, perhaps this information will help. Because what political leader wants to be told that someday soon the U.S. could be facing another world power that knows all the little details of culture, society, economics, and politics in the U.S., while we know next to nothing about them?

~Shaina

Why Don’t They Like Us?!

During a discussion in class last week, a student asked an interesting question about art diplomacy that I feel should be addressed. The question was “Do other people really care about our art?”

On the surface, this question has a basic yes or no answer. Either yes, “other people” (read: people in other countries) really do care about our (U.S.) art, in which case—great! Awesome! Enjoy some more of our art and learn from it our positive qualities/cultural heritage/mindset/ideals. Or no, other people do not care about our art. How sad. Art is meant to be shared, and they don’t want to share with us…*sob*.

Just kidding. But I digress. If we give the question a yes or no answer, we’re done. They like us or they don’t, and if they’re not interested in experiencing our art, then art diplomacy is dead. Right? Wrong. Let’s look at the question a different way. Perhaps, in terms of public diplomacy, “yes, they care about our art” really means that they are open to U.S. culture. They are interested in learning more about us, and as long as we can provide that information on their terms, they are willing to listen. We have presented them with something that they find intriguing, and we can feel confident that presenting more art in a similar vein will continue to interest them. In this case, “no, they don’t care about our art” is not a stopping point for public diplomacy. It simply means that we are approaching the problem the wrong way. What “they don’t care about our art” means is that we have been presenting ourselves badly. We are not appealing to the people we want to reach, either because we are showing them something they are not interested in—in which case we should change the subject—or because we are not approaching them on their level. We have not yet piqued their interest. Perhaps this specific public diplomacy program has failed, but the initiative as a whole has not. Art diplomacy is a huge field, and with time and research, a perfect fit can be found for every situation.

~Shaina

We Are Not a Brand. Or Are We?

I was intrigued by Tory’s perception of nation branding as an unrealistic practice, because it portrays a large group of people as having a single identity. In some ways I agree: while we generally hope that a majority of people in a given country feel somewhat connected and similar, at least in terms of patriotism, to say that all people in a country can be defined by the same “brand” is almost ludicrous. But is nation branding really the same as branding for a consumer product?

Well, yes. That’s the short answer. Both nation branding and product branding attempt to achieve the same goal; that is, to encourage the “consumer” to behave more favorably towards the “product”. In the case of nation branding, the consumer—a person from a different country—is being manipulated to think and behave more favorably towards the product, i.e. the country being branded.

But do we really want to market our country like we would peanut butter or cooking spray? That question is more difficult to answer. In terms of public diplomacy, yes. Nation branding is a useful way of affection a target group’s perceptions of, and hopefully actions towards, the United States. In terms of our own perceptions of our government, however, I think the average U.S. citizen would be less in favor of the idea. As evidenced in recent political advertisements, election campaigns, and of course the election itself, the US has shown that it is not in favor of portraying the country as a business. Arguments to elect a businessman to run the country as a successful corporation seem to have largely failed. I do not believe that bringing up the argument of US-as-business or US-as-product would go over well in the current political atmosphere.

~Shaina

Can a tiger change its stripes?

Every time I hear the words, “Nation Branding,” I have to admit, I stop and think about it for a minute. The IC student in me wants to shout out that a nation is not a brand, it is a living, breathing entity filled with  people and cultures (for what country today has only one culture-even Japan, most often mentioned as a homogenous culture has its minority groups- they still count!). On the other hand, nations do represent something specific in today’s globalized economy. Nation branding, today often mentioned in the same context as PD, seems to be a growing trend among nations of the day, as they strive to develop and advertise their “brand.” Gyorgy Szondi puts forth several conceptual similarities and differences between nation branding and PD. He focuses first on the fact that while PD seems to have emerged largely from the US during the cold war, that nation branding was at first a distinctly British undertaking. Szondi goes further, saying that nation branding really focuses on the image of a nation, saying that it is a way for nations to shape and mold the image that the rest of the world has, presumably in a positive way, and also to attract people to either visit the nation, or to feel comfortable doing business with it.

I suppose the largest differentiation for me to accept is that a nation branding campaign associates the image of the nation of the whole- it incorporates its cities and citizens into the brand, whereas PD often seems very government heavy. Other than that, I honestly don’t see a lot of distinction between nation branding and PD- mostly because I don’t accept the fact that a large, powerful nation can change its “brand” anymore than a tiger can change its stripes. The idea of something doesn’t reside in the object itself, but in the minds of those who behold it- therefore one can only change the image by doing something drastic- often through action.

I am not saying that nation branding is not a worthy undertaking, but I do think it is foolish of large nations who already have very powerful “brands” to invest large sums of money in campaigns that do very little. Posters, new slogans, and bumper stickers are not going to do much to persuade anyone that the image they have of the US is out of line with its brand. I find the whole conversation to be a little trendy, and perhaps it would benefit our brand if we simply chose to sit this one out. After all, not needing to up one’s brand can at times be a statement in and of itself.

Can a Nation be a Brand?

Well this week in class I think we were all (Professor Hayden included) a bit distracted by it being Election Day, but we did manage to fit in a bit of discussion about “nation branding.” I have conflicted feelings about this concept. On one hand, it repulses me. How can you think of a nation as a brand? It implies a level of nationwide conformity that I don’t think exists anywhere on earth. Related to this, I think it can reinforce stereotypes. Check out Australia’s tourism campaign from a few years ago (banned in the UK!). All that’s missing is a Crocodile Dundee cameo!

On the other hand, some nation branding campaigns attempt to break stereotypes. We mentioned in class South Africa’s campaign, which focuses on sustainability and a growing hi-tech industry. It works somewhat- after seeing a South African embassy representative present the campaign last year, I went out and bought a bunch of sustainably-grown wines from South Africa. But while I may appreciate South Africa’s viticulture, it is not going to make me forget the country’s history of apartheid and continuing problems with inequality and corruption.

In that way, I guess nation branding shows some similarities with public diplomacy. In both cases, as the saying goes, “You can’t put lipstick on a pig.” You can bring in the best marketing experts to put together a real slick campaign to try to make your country look good, but if your country is pursuing unpopular policies it’s not going to do much. Former Undersecretary of Public Diplomacy Charlotte Beers found this out the hard way. Her Madison Avenue expertise could not save the U.S.’ international reputation during the beginning of the War on Terror.

So should nations pursue branding campaigns? It depends. Countries that already have a clearly defined “brand” (think U.S. France, China) may find it tough going to if they try to suddenly switch gears and show a new side of themselves. On the other hand, there are some countries out there that may profit greatly from a branding campaign. These are smaller countries that do not receive much international attention. One reading this week mentions the success of the UAE Pavilion at the Shanghai World Expo. One of its pavilion’s designers said the project design was easy, since they were working with a “blank slate.” When there are few preconceived notions about a country, it makes it easier to define oneself.

What do you all think? Can nation branding change the way a country is viewed? Why or why not?

-Tory