Cultural Diplomacy
This year's Oscar for the best foreign film went to Iran, a country which is grappling with a tense international environment because of its nuclear program. One debate, always important to Iranians, is about the contribution of such movies to the Iranian image.
The cultural institutions of most countries are autonomous, unconnected with any local educational facility. But China’s Confucius Institutes are different, leading to criticism from some teachers, education authorities and parts of the media.
...Dickinson State College in North Dakota became the most recent university to turn down a Confucius Institute — a cultural outpost of the Chinese government that already has 350 branches on campuses around the world, from Paris Diderot University to Penn State University, and from Argentina to Zimbabwe.
Cultural and humanitarian diplomacy is multifaceted including cultural policy, information and advocacy. There is a reason for naming the traditional diplomacy as the “hard power”, while the cultural or public diplomacy is called as the “soft power”.
The U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs announced today that TechWomen – an international exchange that uses technology as a means to empower women and girls worldwide – is now accepting applications from American women in the technology sector...
There's so much political irony to go around in this story. First, there's a construction company wholly owned by the Chinese government -- which generally has an attitude toward mosque construction in the People's Republic that ranges from somewhat uneasy to downright hostile...