According to an interview with American scholar Joseph Nye in the British magazine Monocle, nations can adopt more “soft power” measures, which can be used as a type of subtle cultural (and ultimately political) pressure to obtain goals without violence or military-driven exertions.

The US has engaged in public diplomacy urging Israel to keep that threat off the table while a new round of sanctions takes hold. Mr. Panetta argued last Friday in Washington that such an attack now would deal a blow to the global economy, endanger US troops in the Middle East...

The value of breaking your government’s monopoly on foreign policy cannot be discounted. For instance, veterans of the United States can connect veterans of Russia’s armed forces much better than a bureaucrat from the State Department can engage...

"We can see how we can enhance military-to-military cooperation, interoperality and public diplomacy so that we can better explain Nato and what it does and we at Nato can better understand the region," he told Gulf News.

Since earlier this year, when works by American artists were installed in the new U.S. Embassy compound in Beijing, there is an ever-lengthening waiting list to join the weekly tours. The visitors gaze at the vast ceramic wall installation by artist Betty Woodman...

One group taking a hard look at how to solve the problem is the British-based charity WaterAid. When the organization analyzed why water points failed in Tanzania, it found something interesting: the most sustainable were those maintained by private contractors.

The competition, supported by Korea’s Ministry of Culture, Korean Culture and Information Service and the Presidential Council on Nation Branding, is expected to be held annually with the increasing popularity of Korean pop music and culture throughout the world.

Voice of America rolled out a series of new programs at a briefing here this morning, highlighting “OMG!”, a new youth-oriented program aimed at China, where, according to its host, it is sometimes called “OMG: Oh My Lady Gaga.”