Let's play connect the dots. After the US midterm elections, President Obama will visit India, Indonesia, South Korea, and Japan. Trace a line between the nations, noting how it loops down through the Indian Ocean and back up through the South China Sea and East China Sea, forming a semicircle around China.

In recent years, Indian corporate largesse has also benefited, among others, Yale, Cornell and the University of Pennsylvania. But these gifts also illustrate a broader phenomenon: India's growing soft power.

Turkey is at a crossroads: Its economy is booming, and the Turkish economic miracle is the direct result of the current government’s willingness to foster domestic entrepreneurship and do whatever is necessary to integrate the country into the twenty-first century’s global economy.

Recently China has been ramping up its efforts at soft power. Last July Xinhua announced that it would launch a 24 hour English language channel and in 2009 China Central Television (CCTV) launched an Arabic channel. Even the private sector is getting into the act and Blue Ocean Network, China's first privately-owned English language TV network targeted at overseas audiences was launched in 2009.

Taiwan has been trying to raise its international profile with the goal of becoming a full member of the world community even though its relations with mainland China have improved over the past year, the British Broadcasting Corporation has reported.

Branding China as a free rider on the international order not only affects China's relations with the West, but also has strongly negative effects on China's international image.
Fighting this argument is a huge public diplomacy problem for China.

As an ancient civilization that has lasted five thousand years, the Chinese civilization has learned a profound lesson by witnessing the ups and downs of other cultures. The lesson is that a culture can be better sustained through openness and become stronger by including diversified external influences.

Due to the pressure either by NATO or the EU, as well as, the efforts by the countries involved, the Iranian influence has rather decreased, but it remains in the form of a "soft power" structure, closely related to the state apparatus of Teheran.