Managing national reputation and international relations in the global era: Public diplomacy revisited
Section snippets
Between weapons and words: national reputation as “soft power”
National reputation matters in international interactions and transactions. As Jervis (1970, p. 6) wrote, a desired image and reputation can often be “of greater use than a significant increment of military or economic power.” It is hence a form of power and, in Nye, 1990, Nye, 2004 term, “soft power.” Nye extended the argument made by E.H. Carr decades ago, who categorized international power into military, economic, and power over opinion (2004, p. 8). According to Nye (p. x), soft power
Public diplomacy revisited
Diplomatic communication, historically based on “government-to-government” and “diplomat-to-diplomat” interactions, has expanded to include “government-to-people” contacts (e.g., Manheim, 1994, p. 3; Sprout & Sprout, 1962, p. 142). To make sense of this area of inquiry and bring some order to the enterprise, we group the existing literature on public diplomacy into four categories: (1) mass media and public diplomacy, (2) public diplomacy and its intersection with adjacent disciplines, (3)
Research implications
As in the general study of international relations, the field of public diplomacy is inevitably driven by changing events, if not exclusively so (Holsti, 1991, p. 4). Given its currency in contemporary international relations, based on our review, we identify at least three aspects of public diplomacy in need for further exploration. First, managing national reputation is not just about projecting a certain national image but rather negotiating understanding with foreign publics. Such
Conclusions
As Dewey (1938, p. 499) puts it, the most vibrant and useful social research grows “out of actual social needs, tensions, ‘troubles’.” The renewed interest in public diplomacy is clearly attributable to the increasingly diffused centers of interest and power in international politics and the ever more complex communication dynamics. The end of the Cold War did not diminish the role of public diplomacy, but rather made it more significant than ever (Leonard, 2002, p. 48). This review discusses
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