CPD Perspectives: Spectacle in Copenhagen: Public Diplomacy on Parade

In the most recent paper from the CPD Perspectives series, Donna Marie Oglesby examines the role the public plays in global climate change politics, using the 2009 climate change negotiations in Copenhagen as a primary example.

Oglesby tests the values-based theories of public diplomacy using the 2009 UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen as a case study. Its failure to conclude with a significant outcome, she argues, is due in large part to the fact that the debate around climate change focused on the global public sphere without taking into account that policy decisions are made in the capitals of nation states. Oglesby recommends that such public diplomacy should be grounded within state-centered politics.

CPD Perspectives is a periodic publication from the USC Center on Public Diplomacy, and highlights scholarship intended to stimulate critical thinking about the study and practice of public diplomacy.