Main Page | Month Archive | Email Updates | RSS Feed

The Public Diplomacy Blog is intended to stimulate dialog among scholars, researchers, practitioners and professionals from around the world in the public diplomacy sphere. The opinions represented here are the authors' own and do not necessarily reflect the views of the USC Center on Public Diplomacy at the Annenberg School.

THE USA-WORLD TRUST IS AN IDEA WHOSE TIME HAS COME
JAN 6, 2009 - 1:00PM PDT
Posted by Mitchell Polman
All posts by this author

The Brookings Institution's report on its proposed USA-World Trust has unleashed a predictable torrent of criticism from the public diplomacy community. To be sure, not all of the commentary has been negative, but much of it has been. The critics are rehashing many of the same tired arguments that have been used to kill any ideas to deal with today's public diplomacy realities.

Predictably much of the discussion has centered on how the trust is or is not like the old US Information Agency (USIA). Many seem to be asking why if we are going to create the Trust then... FULL TEXT
 
Read Comments (0) | Add Your Own

FINE TUNING BROADCAST PUBLIC DIPLOMACY
JAN 6, 2009 - 9:04AM PDT
Posted by Kim Andrew Elliott
All posts by this author

I am happy to see that Alvin Snyder is contributing again to the CPD Blog. I have always learned from his experience and have found his views to be interesting and provocative. His return commentary, about a revival of Worldnet, accordingly provoked me to add some thoughts about the possibilities for a public diplomacy television service.

When it was created in 1985, Worldnet billed itself as the “first global satellite television network.” Despite its head start, Worldnet was soon eclipsed by CNN International and BBC World, which were much more successful in getting access to cable systems around the world.... FULL TEXT
 
Read Comments (0) | Add Your Own

REINVENTING BROADCAST PUBLIC DIPLOMACY
DEC 16, 2008 - 7:52PM PDT
Posted by Alvin Snyder
All posts by this author

It's unfortunate that President Ronald Reagan's global interactive TV Network, Worldnet, no longer exists as it did two decades ago when he stood at Berlin's Brandenburg Gate and dared Soviet leader Gorbachev to "tear down this wall".

Our former Worldnet TV service at the U.S. Information Agency would have been a perfect fit for President Obama, who plans to speak to Muslim audiences in the first 100 days of his administration from a venue somewhere in the Middle East.

With Worldnet's former global, regional, and local reach abroad, including its interactive TV locations at many U.S. cultural centers linked to... FULL TEXT
 
Read Comments (2) | Add Your Own

AMERICAN PD: MISSION STILL NOT ACCOMPLISHED
DEC 15, 2008 - 12:10PM PDT
Posted by Rob Asghar
All posts by this author

If we consider public diplomacy in the narrower sense, as one government's efforts to speak to the public of another nation, President Bush's visit to Iraq this weekend would be a, well, "fitting" symbol of the state of American PD. He narrowly ducked rage that was aimed at him by a new manner of shoe bomber, one equipped with both ninja skill and ferocity.

So as the leader of the world's sole superpower attempted one simple soft-power victory lap amidst the hard-power effort that defines his tenure, the lasting image is even more ironic than that from his "Mission Accomplished"... FULL TEXT
 
Read Comments (0) | Add Your Own

INDIA REFRAMES THE WAR ON TERROR
DEC 15, 2008 - 11:33AM PDT
Posted by Adam Clayton Powell III
All posts by this author

MUMBAI -- Following the attacks here two weeks ago, much of the coverage on local media looks familiar: red banner stripes and logos with such phrases as "26/11 Fight against Terrorism". But it is not quite the same as US networks' "War on Terror".

There are "Indians of the Year", mini-package profiles of the soldiers and others who died during the fighting that occurred the week before last just down the street from my hotel, and live coverage of vigils and demonstrations. Also, the attack on Mumbai has been framed as attack on modernity. So far, again, it looks quite... FULL TEXT
 
Read Comments (1) | Add Your Own

Previous posts  1 2 3 >  Last »