public diplomacy – Page 26 – IPDGC Smart Power

China, Northern Ireland, Kosovo, the Arab world, and the Vatican: New Books on Public Diplomacy Span the Globe.

April 18, 2012Global Communication, Middle East, public diplomacyLeave a Comment

New books on Public Diplomacy, December 2011 through April 2012

Take Five readers: Let us know if you like this resource, and we’ll make it a quarterly feature.

1) At the 2012 London Book Fair. Professor Zhao Qizheng is launching his two new books in English. They are Cross-Border Dialogue: the Wisdom of Public Diplomacy, published by the New World Press, and How China Communicates: Public Diplomacy in a Global Age, published by the Foreign Language Press (together constituting an English version of his Chinese book entitled Public Diplomacy and Cross-Cultural Communication, published by Remin University Press, 2011). Zhao says, “I’m trying to present a picture of the real situation in China, to reduce misunderstanding and eliminate the foreign reader’s sense of unfamiliarity with the country.”

2) The People’s Peace Process in Northern Ireland, by Colin Irwin (April 2, 2012) — From the book jacket: ‘I recommend this book to all those involved with peace making and peace building, political negotiations and public opinion polls, as well as those with a particular interest in Northern Ireland. … I am persuaded that the unique approach [Irwin] developed of running public opinion polls in co-operation with party negotiators contributed significantly to the successful outcome of our efforts. – Senator George J. Mitchell.

3) Cyberspaces and Global Affairs by Sean S. Costigan and Jake Perry (Jan 1, 2012). Note Part II: Web 2.0 and public diplomacy includes the following articles: – Call for power? Mobile phones as facilitators of political activism; – ICT infrastructure in two Asian giants: a comparative analysis of China and India; – Information (without) revolution? Ethnography and the study of new media-enabled change in the Middle East; – The political history of the internet: a theoretical approach to the implications for US power; – US identity, security, and governance of the internet; – Information and communications technologies and power; – Social media and Iran’s post-election crisis; – Viewpoint: combating censorship should be a foreign policy goal; – Viewpoint: an alternative prospect on cyber anarchy for policy-makers. About the editors: Sean S. Costigan directs MIT CogNet and teaches information technology at The New School, and Jake Perry is an independent scholar.

3) National Relations: Public Diplomacy, National Identity and the Swedish Institute 1945-1970 by Nikolas Glover (Jan 1, 2012). Says the author: “My study focuses on the Swedish Institute for Cultural Exchange with Foreign Countries, 1945–1970. … It postulates that identifying with and promoting a particular national identity in the post-war world has been a question of relating the nation to others … The concept of national relations leads me to engage with historical research on public diplomacy, the history of communication and the history of nationalism.”

4) Diaspora Diplomacy: Philippine Migration and its Soft Power Influences by Joaquin Jay Gonzalez III (Dec 27, 2011). The author talks about “the remarkable and untapped soft power that international migrants possess and how various actors—from governments, NGOs, business, the church, and international organizations—could tap this valuable resource to enhance global cooperation, development, and understanding. With detailed and intimate illustrations from the experiences of the Philippine diaspora in San Francisco, London, Dubai, Dhaka, and Singapore…”

New paperback editions:

5) The New Arab Media: Technology, Image and Perception by Mahjoob Zweiri and Emma C. Murphy (Mar 29, 2012; hardcover published January 2011). ISBS says “topics examined include: the impact of Al-Jazeera * implementation of the internet in the region * the use of the media for diplomacy and propaganda * image culture * the use of the internet by religious diasporas * information and communication technologies and the Arab Public Sphere * the influence of satellite television on Arab public opinion * the explosion of local radio stations in Jordan.” .

6) Kosovo’s Diplomacy: How can Public Diplomacy have an impact on Kosovo’s political and diplomatic position? by Alban Dermaku (Jan 23, 2012; hardcover published January 2011.) Book flap text: “The declaration of independence marked a new era for Kosovo and its relations with the countries that have recognized its independence. Since then Kosovo is striving in its diplomatic efforts to achieve broader international recognition and become a member of the United Nations. … In modern times, public diplomacy is receiving broad recognition as a crucial element for understanding and influencing foreign publics.”

Postgraduate Theses from the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, CA, new on Kindle eBook:

7) Prioritizing Efforts to Improve Foreign Public Opinion of America: Applying a Business Model to Discover and Create Customer Value by Anthony J. Sampson – Kindle eBook (published Apr 12, 2012; thesis written in 2007 for the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, CA). Author’s note: “Given the reality of fiscal and resource constraints, America could not possibly address all of the concerns of the foreign public; rather, America must focus its efforts on the factors that are likely to make the greatest impact. This study identifies negative factors that interfere with favorable foreign pubic opinion and suggests an analytic framework for prioritizing those factors.

8) The Holy See and the Middle East: The Public Diplomacy of Pope John Paul II by Ronald Patrick Stake – Kindle eBook (published March 31,2012; thesis written in 2006 for the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, CA). Author’s note: “This thesis considers changes in the diplomacy of the Holy See with respect to the Middle East … between 1990 and 2003. Policies … involved (1) establishing full diplomatic relations between the Holy See and the State of Israel; (2) convening the Special Assembly of the Synod of Bishops for Lebanon, ending in the papal visit to Lebanon in May 1997; and (3) opposing the 1991 and 2003 U.S. led wars against Iraq. …{T}he thesis argues that new circumstances occasioned a rethinking of the Holy See’s interests in light of the development of modern Catholic social teaching.”

Fear and Loathing in Development Journalism

April 14, 2012Africa, Global Communication, public diplomacy, Social Media3 Comments

Three items on development journalism in Africa came across my radar screen yesterday, and it was fascinating to read such a diversity of views. It seems that harnessing media in the service of development has been used, at times, as a strategy to repress free speech and democracy, and yet the concept of development journalism is experiencing a revival in the digital age.

What do “Take Five” readers think about these issues? What are the contemporary risks and benefits of promoting development journalism? Shared below are the three views that, taken together, coalesced into this unexpected debate on my desk top. I invite you to continue the discussion here.

“Three Knight Fellows to Launch Continent-Wide Media Projects” (September 2011) announces a dynamic new initiative to be based in Nairobi, Kenya, where three media experts will train African journalists in media management, the environment, and rural development. The project webpage explains that the media training on rural development will be conducted by Knight International Fellow Joseph Warungu, the very distinguished former head of BBC’s African News and Current Affairs department, who will “work with South Africa’s Rhodes University to build a pan-African network of journalists with the skills to cover agriculture, health, small business and other development issues.” This particular fellowship is sponsored by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Well, so far, so good. I’ve spent enough time reading newspapers in developing countries to know that coverage is often dominated by purely political developments, while economic news gets short shrift. Business news taken largely from corporate press releases and launches makes it into the paper, but not the in-depth, grassroots economic reporting that helps readers understand, for example, the local effect of global fluctuations in commodity prices, or how price subsidies can affect rural-urban migration, or how some conflicts are sustained by localized economic opportunities for the few, or how some types of information are as valuable and bankable as a durable good. Therefore, training that helps reporters and editors “follow the money” has to be a good thing, because readers want very much to understand both the development efforts and the wider economic forces that affect their most basic existence.

However, Terje S. Skjerdal’s “Development journalism revived: the case of Ethiopia” (2011) introduces some different ideas. The author explains that “development journalism has attracted considerable hostility over the years. … The practice has been blamed for promoting political agendas instead of people’s interests. The strong dependency on the state, especially in African versions of development journalism, has roused worries from press freedom organizations. … Local journalism paradigms such as Nkrumah’s revolutionary journalism [in Ghana] and Nyerere’s ujamaa Journalism [in Tanzania] were seamlessly interwoven with development-oriented journalism. This was made possible because development journalism in the African meaning of the term, in contrast to the Asian, meant close collaboration between the media and the authorities rather than critical reporting on development efforts. In effect, the state media and the government joined forces against the private media … [and] the critical and investigative role of the media was severely suppressed in the name of the ‘greater good.’”

Yet Skjerdal also explains that, despite this negative history, there has been a revival of interest in development journalism in recent years. He cites as an example the framework of five principles synthesized by Fackson Banda (Communicatio: South African Journal for Communication Theory and Research, Volume 33, Issue 2, 2007) for “development journalism in a new era.” These include seeing the audience as active citizens rather than passive consumers; listening (as journalists) to the public, and not just to official sources; promoting deliberation among people, and between the people and their leaders; and encouraging citizens to conceptualize and express their own development concerns. In sum, the development journalist “must get readers to realize how serious the development problem is, to think about the problem, to open their eyes to possible solutions.”

The rest of Skjerdal’s piece focuses more specifically on the case of Ethiopia, and the results of a survey of Ethiopian journalists on the significance of a new Ethiopian media policy promoting development journalism. Discouragingly, Skjerdal concludes that journalists in that country are finding it difficult to maintain their objective and outspoken stance in the face of a development journalism imperative to promote success stories in order to support national efforts.

But are there other ways to manage development journalism? Ways in which the journalist’s core commitment to objectivity is enhanced rather than diminished by a focus on development?

Into this nuanced landscape of potential benefits and pitfalls comes a paper on “Developing undergraduate journalism curricula: Concerns and issues” presented at a 2009 South African conference by Monica Chibita, senior lecturer in journalism at Makere University in Uganda. I read it with interest, having been privileged to work with Dr. Chibita on a multi-faceted radio journalism training project when I was posted to the U.S. Embassy in Kampala about a decade ago.

First Chibita notes the subjects that Makerere journalism students are traditionally expected to cover – media history, writing, editing, ethics, graphics, analytical thinking and research methods.

Then she asks, “for a journalist looking at practicing in an African context, though, what about understanding community problems and dynamics? What about applying their understanding of the workings of the media to poverty, maternal and infant mortality, HIV/AIDS, energy, environmental degradation, unemployment, governance etc?” And, channelling Banda, “how about making sense of how people diagnose and seek solutions to these problems in their local context and what role the media can play in making this possible?”

And here Chibita introduces a new element, the digital revolution. “It appears that there is a growing need [for such development-related skills.] This is partly because communities now do have some access to a wide range of media. Technologies like the mobile phone, for instance, can be used to bridge the gap between rural people and previously inaccessible ‘mainstream’ media.”

In other words, says Chibita, since digital media brings real potential for mainstream media and government to “listen” to the public, for there to be two-way dialogue among citizens and leaders, and for citizens to be empowered to shape development issues themselves, then it is the obligation of at least some journalists to be professionally prepared to play a role in realizing that potential.

So should we be bullish or bearish on development journalism? Should we embrace the positive vision expressed through the Knight International Fellowships and by Banda and Chibita, or are we persuaded by the more pessimistic view of Skjerdal? In the examples above from Ethiopia, Uganda, and Kenya, do country-specific differences matter, e.g. levels of Internet penetration that are respectively below 2%, about 12%, and above 25%? Are we persuaded by objective criteria such as UNESCO’s ranking of Makerere’s journalism program as among the top 12 in Africa? More broadly, do the risks of defining appropriate topics for journalists always outweigh the potential benefits — or should the development imperative sometimes trump market-based media decisions in the African marketplace of ideas?

Again, Take Five welcomes you to continue this debate.

Editor’s note: On Sunday, Mohamed Keita published an NYTimes Op-Ed entitled “Africa’s Free Press Problem.” Mohamed hits upon similar themes – his post is well worth reading.

Sowing the Seeds of Peace

April 9, 2012in the field, public diplomacyLeave a Comment

Today we feature a guest post from Judith Raine Baroody, Senior Resident Fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the U.S. Dr. Baroody has served in the Foreign Service since 1984, including her most recent post abroad in Paris. In this post, she discusses the roll she played in 1997 as the Public Affairs officer in Nicosia, when she helped to organize one of the first pan-Cyprian festivals since the country’s division in 1974.

Diplomats in blue jeans, we gazed up anxiously at the September skies of Cyprus as we assembled chairs and sound equipment for the festival to bring together Greek- and Turkish Cypriots. It had been a dry year, but now dark clouds were gathering above us, over the grounds of the once-splendid Ledra Palace Hotel in the buffer zone that separated the two sides of the former British colony. There had been clashes between Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots since 1963, when violence broke out in the capital of Nicosia. In 1974, the Greek government’s attempt to seize control led to military intervention by Turkey, which took over the northern third of the island. Since then, Greek Cypriots had not been allowed to cross into the north, nor Turkish Cypriots into the south. In 1996, clashes led to the death of two demonstrators; there was a constant threat of more violence. Now, in 1997, we were looking for ways to make peace in this heavily militarized country.

Children participate in peace festival.
Photo by USAID Cyprus

I was the public affairs officer at the U.S. Embassy in Nicosia, so part of my job was to help the two communities get to know each other, to lay the groundwork for social reintegration once political conflicts were resolved so peace and stability could take root. Working with embassies of other countries, we nurtured a range of activities designed to bridge the two communities. The idea of this festival in the narrow strip of land where the two sides were allowed to gather was to showcase these grassroots projects. Under the U.S. Embassy’s leadership and the auspices of the U.N., the Swiss brought cold cuts, Germans supplied beer, French and Italians offered wine, and we laid on pizza and burgers. We arranged for Cypriot folk music, watercolor painting and traditional dancing. But now angry black rainclouds were rolling in; Turkish Cypriot authorities had blocked off roads and threatened to deny entry to the buffer zone. Maybe no one would come.

Cypriots attending the peace festival.
Photo by USAID Cyprus

An hour before the 4 p.m. start of the fair, Cypriots began to stream in through both checkpoints. They surged in even as the skies opened and a torrent began to pelt the drought-stricken soil. The Cypriots were thrilled to meet each other after three decades of separation. They talked excitedly in their common language of English about “the Cyprus Problem” as well as the more mundane commonalities of their lives as Cypriots. Children handed out carnations to kids from across the line. We pulled our electrical sound systems under the party tents and kept the music going—bouzoukis and drums in joyful clatter—and still they came, dancing, singing, celebrating the chance to mix with strangers from their own land, more than 4,000 in all. The downpour finally gave way to a clear, cool evening, and there was a palpable sense of renewal in the eastern Mediterranean air when the final chords faded. Fourteen years later, Cyprus is still divided. In 2004, the island was admitted into the European Union. In 2008, leaders of the two communities began negotiations under U.N. auspices to reunite the island and opened the cross points. Of all the other countries in which I’ve served in a 27-year Foreign Service career—Syria, Israel, Morocco, Chile, Iraq and now France—none had a single issue whose resolution would change every aspect of its citizens’ lives. Cyprus is known as “paradise with a problem.” For one stormy night in 1997, we were able to forget the problem and rejoice amid the downpour, with renewed hope of a good harvest and, some day, of lasting peace.

A performance at the peace festival in Cyprus
Photo by USAID Cyprus

Going “The Last Three Feet” From 35,200,000 Feet Away

April 5, 2012Global Communication, public diplomacy1 Comment

When former USIA Director, Edward R. Murrow, talked about going “the last three feet” in cross-cultural communication, he meant one person talking to another, through personal contact. But what if that’s not always possible? Travel to remote parts of the world can be difficult—which often makes those last three feet the hardest to reach.

Enter social media.

As a project to complete my Global Communication Master’s degree, I was able to support a direct form of global communication through the State Department’s Virtual Student Foreign Service (VSFS) e-internship. Since October 2011, I helped facilitate face-to-face communication between Americans and young Tajikis by organizing Skype web-chats for the Embassy’s American Corners located throughout Tajikistan. This kind of e-diplomacy micro-tasking expands and enhances our cross-cultural contact, and creates new and diverse channels of communication.

Communicating face-to-face via Skype is nothing new. Many people use web-chats to connect with friends or family abroad every day. In terms of public diplomacy, however, the idea of empowering many young people to connect with people abroad virtually, to learn from each other from thousands of miles away, is a relatively new concept.

The VSFS program began in 2009, as a way for the State Department to diversify its virtual diplomacy. The program selects American students for online internships with U.S. Embassies abroad and allows them to become citizen diplomats and help create web pages, blogs, and Facebook pages to support students abroad in learning about exchange and study abroad programs, as well as fellowships and scholarships. Virtual interns also help with different types of outreach and engagement online or help raise awareness for cultural events or conferences.

Harnessing the energy of the generation that grew up with MySpace and Facebook is the ideal way to facilitate cross-cultural communication for the future—young people are curious about the world around them and are happy to make new friends.

Social media is the engine that allows our generation to go “the last three feet” from 35,200,000 feet away.

This year, the U.S. Embassy in Dushanbe selected four virtual interns (including myself): Ben Lingeman, a Masters student in Syracuse University’s Maxwell School; Courtney Myers, a substitute teacher working on a Master’s in teaching; and Melissa Etehad, a student at UC San Diego majoring in International Studies.

Ben and I were tasked with using our personal and professional contacts to find Americans interested in speaking with Tajiki youth. Courtney and Melissa focused on reaching out to teachers and school principals. The objective for both projects was the same—to facilitate communication and to bridge the gap between Americans and Tajiki youth.

Sadly, not many Americans can name the capital of, say, Turkmenistan, and many others don’t even realize that Central Asia is a fascinating, vibrant, and significant part of the world. Consequently, building people-to-people relationships and expanding avenues of communication with isolated nations in Central Asia is very important.

To further this goal, we were able to organize more than 12 Skype web-chats in over six different locations throughout Tajikistan. These chats produced frank face-to-face discussions and question and answer sessions on anything from hobbies to holidays, to tuition costs and university life. Students from Tajikistan were able to practice their English while interacting with Americans and Americans were able to learn more about Tajikis. The resulting conversations were truly inspiring—two very different cultures were able to come together to talk about what they have in common (it turns out students are stressed out everywhere).

There are roughly 35,200,000 feet between Washington, DC and Dushanbe, Tajikistan—yet when you’re sitting on your couch and interacting and chatting with someone that you see face-to-face in real time, you’d never notice.

From the Trenches

April 5, 2012Cultural Diplomacy, Middle East, public diplomacyLeave a Comment

“You are an unofficial representative of the American people.”

These were the words of Richard Gong, the head of the Public Affairs Section at the U.S. Embassy in Jakarta, Indonesia. It was September 1997, and I had just started what I hoped would be an exciting year as a Fulbrighter. I’d been awarded a position as a Senior Scholar at the University of Indonesia, where I would be teaching in the graduate program of the American Studies department. You could also say that this was the start of my career in public diplomacy.

Guest lecturing to graduate political science graduate class at Cairo University — I guest lectured for graduate political science graduate class at Cairo University

During the next twelve months, I watched the fall of a dictator, the complete reorganization of a media system, and the beginnings of democracy in a majority Muslim country. I also learned Indonesian, re-focused my research to the study of journalism in Southeast Asia, and began to do work in public diplomacy that has since taken me all over the world. The lessons I learned in Indonesia have been useful not only in other Southeast Asian countries like Malaysia, Burma, and Timor Leste, but also more recently in on a USG speaker-specialist trip to post-revolutionary Egypt.

My start in public diplomacy may have been somewhat accidental, but I’ve been engaged in it for the past fifteen years. I’ve been a speaker-specialist in ten countries, and although the topics and challenges have varied from post to post, I’ve never forgotten what Richard said.

I like that I’m “unofficial.” As someone who’s spent a lot of time around embassies, I can’t imagine anything more difficult than being a diplomat, and having to guard each and every word I say. I’ve met some great diplomats and some mediocre ones, but the best are those who truly engage with the countries in which they are posted, while never forgetting who it is they work for.

Narrative writing class at Alexandria University — My narrative writing class at Alexandria University

In my work, engagement means taking each country and its media system on its own terms. In Egypt, I spent a lot more time talking about the Indonesian press system than I did about what we have in the United States. There’s a lot that Egypt could learn from Indonesia, another country that emerged from over 30 years of authoritarian rule with a tightly controlled press. As I pointed out repeatedly, the man who in my opinion was Indonesia’s best and most democratic president, Abdurrahman Wahid, was not only a highly regarded Muslim scholar and one-time student at Al-Azhar, he was also the man who abolished the Ministry of Information. As any Indonesian can tell you, democracy, good journalism, and the values of Islam are not incompatible.

I also like that I don’t represent the American government, but rather the American people. In nearly all of the places I’ve been — during Democratic and Republican administrations alike — it’s a cliche to say “we like the American people, we just don’t like your government.” In Egypt, this meant that I was free to point out the weaknesses of both American and Egyptian media coverage of the handful of American NGO workers who were flown out of the country in apparent violation of the principle of an “independent judiciary.” It also meant that I was free to note the hypocrisy of those Egyptian commentators who ascribed all progressive reform to “foreign interference.”

Accidental or not, this is public diplomacy from the trenches, and it’s what I’ll be writing about during my upcoming sabbatical year. As I tell visiting journalist friends who come to the US and meet my classes, they may be the first Indonesian or Malaysian or Bangladeshi whom my American students have ever met. At a time in which “we are all Khaled Said” or “we are all Trayvon Martin,” we are all public diplomats as well. Like it or not, in this interconnected world, each one of us is engaged in public diplomacy.

Cultural Diplomacy in Multiple Dimensions

March 30, 2012Cultural Diplomacy, public diplomacy1 Comment

It’s been “all Public Diplomacy all the time” this week at George Washington University, with many exciting events surrounding the IPDGC’s Hip Hop Diplomacy: Connecting Through Culture conference on Tuesday afternoon, 3/27. (Note: here’s the conference final program; check the IPDGC website soon for the full conference video.)

Tara S at IPDGC conference — Tara Sonenshine

First, we are delighted to see that conference keynote speaker Tara Sonenshine, currently Executive Vice President at the U.S. Institute of Peace, has just been confirmed by the Senate as the new Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs.

Ms. Sonenshine spoke passionately at the IPDGC conference about the importance of addressing challenges to women. She emphasized the power of individuals, and the role of cultural exchange in inspiring individuals to action. She described public diplomacy as a key “inclusionary” strategy that can help put women together with powerful institutions of government and business. Getting women into such loci of power “is a national security issue for us, and for everyone,” Ms. Sonenshine noted.

Tiffany at IPDGC conference — Tiffany Roberts Sahaydak

After her remarks, a terrific panel took the conference floor to talk about their international public diplomacy experience sharing sports, music, and journalism skills with young women (and men) around the world. U.S. Soccer star Tiffany Roberts Sahaydak joined award-winning hip hop and R&B artist Toni Blackman, directors of the youth media training organization GlobalGirl Media (Therese Steiner and Tumi Mosadi), rising Moroccan hip hop star Soultana, and top Zimbabwean women’s basketball coach Belia Zibowa.

Toni B at IPDGC conference — Toni Blackman

Listening to this amazing panel, I recalled last week’s article by Dr. Philip Seib, reflecting on a recent cultural diplomacy conference in the U.K. Seib wrote, “Still needing to be better defined … is the state’s role vis-à-vis the cultural community and the individual artist in the course of these diplomatic ventures.” And in fact our conference was an unusual opportunity to hear vivid descriptions and powerful insights from these artists / experts, right alongside the essential policy overview provided by Ambassador Adam Ereli, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Educational and Cultural Affairs, and a valuable presentation on private sector support for international youth sports outreach from GWU professor Lisa Delpy Neirotti (rounded out by some thoughts of my own on the interrelationship of media and cultural exchange in public diplomacy.)

Adam Ereli at IPDGC conference — Amb. Adam Ereli

Meanwhile, all week IPDGC made the most of the DC presence of two of the conference’s international participants. Tumi Mosadi, who coordinates GlobalGirl Media’s project in Soweto, is today joining a field trip of Washington DC high school students to NBC studios as part of the Prime Movers Media journalism training program sponsored by GWU’s School of Media and Public Affairs (SMPA). Yesterday, Ms. Mosadi had the opportunity to shadow SMPA alum Coleen King at MSNBC’s Chris Matthews news program, and she met with SMPA alum Jayne Orenstein at the Washington Post on Wednesday to talk video-journalism.

Tumi and Therese of GGM at IPDGC conference — Tumi Mosadi and Therese Steiner

Also on Wednesday, Tumi and GlobalGirl Media President Therese Steiner screened a powerful GGM documentary film on the impact of HIV/AIDS on young women in Soweto at GWU’s Department of Global Health (School of Public Health), as well as at State Department’s Office of the Global AIDS Coordinator. IPDGC sends a big thank you to all our GWU colleagues for these collaborations.

Soultana at Marrakesh Lounge in Adams Morgan

And IPDGC provided night life as well: Moroccan hip hopper Soultanaperformed her work – including hit single Sawt Nssa (Voice of Women) – to lively audiences at DC venues Marrakesh Lounge and 19th Bar. (Just as a reminder of the power of international exchanges to connect and build, it was Kendra Salois, former U.S. Fulbright Student in Morocco and current Ph.D. candidate at U. Cal Berkeley, who connected the IPDGC team – not normally famed as music impresarios – with the performance organizers. Our thanks go to Kendra and to Darby Hickey for making the performances possible.)

Is Subversive Diplomacy the Right Path?

March 29, 2012Global Communication, public diplomacyLeave a Comment

After reading Fergus Hanson’s article in Foreign Policy, I have mixed feelings on the State Department’s campaign to use social networking and the Internet as a possible way of “subtly undermining repressive regimes.” While it is great that social networking is being embraced, I am not sure if this is exactly the way to do it. This is especially the case when it is being used in countries that we are supposed to have a partnership with. It seems to me that undermining the regime may be undermining the partnership as well. On the other hand, social media is a very powerful tool and a way to avoid using force by giving empowerment to a country’s citizens. It helps build civil society and give like-minded people the tools they need to work towards government change and promote democracy. It is a very fine line between using social media as empowerment and over-stepping your ground and risking your diplomatic relationship with the country.

Evgeny Morozov believes that Internet freedom will lead to countries imposing more restrictions.

Internet freedom is something that is lauded in our country, but in the regimes that the U.S. is using these new tactics in, this freedom could have very high costs. An empowered citizen, aided by U.S. Government tools, could be caught and prosecuted or even killed. While the United States is using the Internet as democracy promotion, it could turn into what Evgeny Morozov concludes: Internet freedom will lead to countries imposing more and more restrictions and thus making citizens worse off. This is not the goal of the State Department’s efforts and it would be highly unfortunate to see something that is intended to be positive go in the opposite direction.

Projects like the Open Technology Initiative and InTheClear are two very positive initiatives that have some great future possibilities. OTI, by the New America Foundation, allows people to maintain communication when the Internet is under government shut down, and InTheClear allows people to erase data from their phones if necessary. These projects can help those against a repressive regime in times of crisis and seem to be less tied to country partnerships and possibly makes citizens less vulnerable to attack.

In the end, the direction of the initiative is positive because it takes into account the realities that activists are moving online and that the Internet is a cost-effective mechanism for giving access to those who lack it, but it still raises questions about the legality of it all, the potential for diplomatic consequences, and the true impact it is going to have on citizens and their repressive regimes.

An Attempt to Prevent War: “Israel Loves Iran”

March 28, 2012Global Communication, public diplomacyLeave a Comment

As social media becomes increasingly apparent in the lives of citizens throughout the world, its place in domestic and international political, social, cultural and economic affairs is also expected to become more prominent. There has already been much debate about the role social media played during the Arab Spring, and as various world events unfold in the years to come, social media’s capacity to incite change will undoubtedly continue to be a part of the analysis.

One such event that may act as a future case study is that of “Israel Loves Iran,” a campaign started by Israelis who believe that the “Israeli Iranian conflict has no real ground,” and is based on “nothing.” The group’s Facebook page, which was created less than two weeks ago on March 19, 2012, already has over 46,000 likes on Facebook.

The initiative, “Iranians, We Love You,” has surfaced at a time when the discourse around the two countries is centered on Iran’s nuclear progress and whether a preemptive strike by Israel against Iran is imminent. With Iran’s nuclear program looming and negotiations between various government officials taking place, these citizens have decided to take a visible, public stance opposing violent action and showcasing the need for soft diplomacy. Through this endeavor, Israel Loves Iran is shifting the focus from the respective governments to the Israeli people—the people who love Iran.

The group’s website is largely forum-based; it seeks stories from individuals that convey favorable feelings about Iran and asks for testimonies and stories about “the real Iran.” Although negative comments sometimes flare up, the discussions are primarily positive in tone. This outlet allows people of different nationalities to convene in a centralized location and find the beauty within each culture. The site also has pages entitled “Iran loves Israel,” “America loves Iran and Israel,” “Germany loves Iran,” and “Jews of the World love Iran,” which each feature testimonies and links to articles, videos, music, religious verses and stories about the mutual love shared by each of these groups.

Dispersed throughout the pages, one can find comments expressing the appreciation for the site’s creation:

“We love Israel too. No war!”
“This is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.”
“Give peace a chance; all we need is love…”

The Israel Loves Iran campaign is a public display of anti-war outcry. The cause behind this movement has the ability to gain vast momentum from the public, but–even with a strong backing–would it have ability to change the course of government action? Does it have the potential to change public perception?

The group’s members certainly hope so. As Ronny Edry, one of the individuals responsible for the “Iranians, We Love You” initiative told PBS Frontline reporter Neri Zilber, “We don’t want war. No matter what the governments are saying, on both sides, we are against it, since we are the ones fighting it…I think it is important that we raise our voices.” Through social media, Israel Loves Iran is trying to avert war and promote a lasting peace between the two nations.

The Public Diplomacy Challenge in Pakistan

March 26, 2012Middle East, public diplomacyLeave a Comment

Tomorrow, President Obama meets Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani of Pakistan on the margins of the Nuclear Security Summit in Seoul. A central topic is likely to be the status of relations between Pakistan and the United States, which have been severely strained in the aftermath of a military operation gone bad along the Afghan-Pakistan border in November. During the operation, due to what military investigators described as mistakes at higher echelons on both sides, U.S. and Pakistani forces exchanged fire. Twenty-four Pakistani soldiers were killed, inflaming public opinion in Pakistan, suspending military cooperation and putting its fragile civilian government on the defensive.

The other casualty in the episode was U.S. public diplomacy in Pakistan. Not so long ago, the United States and Pakistan were speaking of a long-term strategic partnership. But after a string of events over the past 15 months, the relationship is in intensive care. Even before the November border incident, two-thirds of Pakistanis viewed the United States as an enemy, not a partner. A pillar of the Obama administration’s regional strategy starting in 2009 was transforming the relationship with Pakistan’s civilian government – and the Pakistani people. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the late Special Representative Ambassador Richard Holbrooke, together with U.S. Ambassadors Anne Patterson and Cameron Munter, began a broad and candid conversation with different segments of the Pakistani population that chipped away at years of pent-up frustration and misperception. An aggressive U.S. response to destructive flooding in Pakistan in 2010 helped as well.

But these public diplomacy gains were easily swept aside last year. First, an intelligence operative with diplomatic status killed two Pakistanis on motorbikes (he claimed in self-defense) that led to a protracted standoff over treaty obligations under the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations. Pakistan released him after negotiating compensation for the victims’ families but the public diplomacy damage was severe. Three months later, there was the raid that killed Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad, a justifiable action from the standpoint of U.S. security, but nonetheless perceived in Pakistan as a violation of sovereignty. And there is Pakistani public frustration with on going drone operations, which the government in Islamabad is more familiar with than it lets on publicly.

When it comes to public diplomacy, this is as difficult as it gets. But does this matter? Well, when it comes to reducing the ongoing threat of violent extremism, there is no country in the world more important than Pakistan. Pakistan’s links to the Taliban, the Mumbai attack and domestic plots involving David Headley, Faisal Shahzad and Najibullah Zazi are well chronicled. This is not to indict the entire country – Pakistan has suffered far more casualties from terrorism than the United States. It is to say that the U.S. cannot defeat, dismantle and deter al Qaeda and its affiliates, the reason we are militarily engaged in the region, without building a stable long-term relationship with Pakistan’s government and its people.

This will be a lengthy and difficult process, which can be the starting point for tomorrow’s meeting between the President and Prime Minister. They should begin the recovery by first acknowledging the pervasive mistrust that handicaps the relationship and undeniably contributed to the tragedy in November. Notwithstanding political tensions on both sides, they need to reaffirm that, once Pakistan completes its review, high-level delegations from both countries will reconvene to reach new understandings on cooperation and support. Ultimately, if the United States seeks a partnership with Pakistan, and vice versa, both countries need to be more forthcoming.

Corporate Policy, Social Media and Collective Action

March 23, 2012public diplomacyLeave a Comment

Will Youmans, a PhD student at Michigan, and SuperTweeter Jillian York (@jilliancyour), of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, have a new piece in Journal of Communication titled “Social Media and the Activist Toolkit: User Agreements, Corporate Interests, and the Information Infrastructure of Modern Social Movements.” The article looks at four case studies from the Arab world — Facebook’s response to the “We are all Khaled Said” group, YouTube’s handling of gruesome videos from Syria, anti-atheist internet campaigns in Morocco, and the online activities of the pro-regime Syrian Electronic Army — to show the complex relationship between corporations, regimes, and protest movements.

From the abstract:

The uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt, and elsewhere have been credited in part to the creative use of social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter. Yet the information policies of the firms behind social media can inhibit activists and empower authoritarian regimes. Analysis illustrate how prohibitions on anonymity, community policing practices, campaigns from regime loyalists, and counterinsurgency tactics work against democracy advocates. These problems arise from the design and governance challenges facing large-scale, revenue-seeking social media enterprises.

Youmans, who has conducted several studies of Arab media (especially Al Jazeera), and York, one of the most prominent and insightful writers/researchers on issues of online privacy, are particularly well-positioned to write on this topic. The paper makes some interesting insights into how tech corporations’ fundamental desire to increase revenues and users can make for strange bedfellows with authoritarian regimes interested in squashing protest movements that utilize, and sometimes depend on, social media.

One of the important points they make is that “social media provide the tools for organized dissent yet can also constrain collective action.” This happens, they argue, because the code itself “sets the range of usability,” and company policies and user agreements both enable and constrain users. For instance, Facebook eventually took down the Khaled Said page because it violated their ban on pseudonymous users. Yet in authoritarian regimes protesters often risk their lives by going public.

YouTube is an interesting example of how a social media company is trying to confront some of these issues. YouTube bans graphic and “disgusting” videos, which has created problems when citizens have posted gruesome footage of regime violence during the Arab Awakening (and in Iran before that). Yet these videos are also often the only way, or the most effective way, of documenting these abuses for the wider world and fellow citizens in the given countries.

YouTube responded to this conundrum by allowing the videos — usually — under a corporate policy allowing footage that is “educational, documentary, or scientific” in nature. And they have been responsive to community policing of the videos posted to their site. But sometimes videos still get pulled, and even if they are ultimately allowed back online, it may be too late for them to be effective.

At the end of the day, however, social media companies are still businesses, and must make deals with these regimes to gain access to new markets. China is perhaps the best and most discussed example because of its huge population and repressive internet policies. Companies such as Google and Yahoo! have been willing to compromise on their ideals by censoring delicate topics, and sacrifice user privacy and even security, to appease government officials.

Regimes and their supporters take various approaches to social media-driven protest, ranging from shutting down the internet entirely to engaging in internet-based attacks and counter-propaganda campaigns. Recently, for instance, pro-Chinese government hackers have deluged Twitter conversations with the hashtags #Tibet and #Freetibet with spambots.

As the authors conclude:

Although social media firms made some exceptions for reformers during the Arab Spring, their policies and the architecture of their products will increasingly complicate collective action efforts. Nonetheless, pressures by users have and will continue to force adjustments in design and policy.