Guangzhou's new Waqqas Mosque is one of many of China's recent forays into Islamic infrastructure -- a market that promises to earn Beijing as much in soft power with the resource-rich Muslim world as it does contract revenues.

For years, Hosni Mubarak and other Arab leaders relied on a straightforward mantra: “It’s me or the Islamists.” American presidents and other Western leaders shuddered at the word “Islamists” and embraced their thuggish allies. What could be worse than Islamists?

U.S. public diplomacy followed that pattern. Over the years, there was some splendid rhetoric from Condoleezza Rice, Barack Obama, and a few others, but the “public” at which public diplomacy was aimed was always carefully limited to exclude the Islamist community.

APDS Blogger: Hend Alhinnawi

In the context of the Arab Spring, India is promoting Islam as an important aspect of Indian history and culture. One way to examine it is to look at the way Indian mass media portrays Islam. This is important for public diplomacy because what India projects to the rest of the world has to accurately reflect what is happening internally to gain credibility.

APDS Blogger: Anna Dawson

Casa Arabe (Albeit Arabi). It is a public Spanish institution created by Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs as it is widely believed the importance of having good relation between Spain and Arab countries. We are working from Madrid to Gortoba. We focus on the tool of foreign affairs public diplomacy as the main means of access to Arab countries.

Throughout history, many nations have relied on historical phenomena, narratives, and myths to define their identities and their relation to the outside reality. When narratives survive the test of time and space, they become meta-narratives which shape the worldview and the conduct of the societies they encompass. In addition to having profound effects on the socio-cultural process, meta-narratives sometimes influence and explicate the international behavior of a nation.

Although most political observers in this region take Ghannouchi at his word, any political party or individual with the label “Islamist” attached is viewed with great suspicion in the West. Part of this stems from the lack of knowledge about Muslims’ faith and culture...