The editors invite proposals for for a special issue of the Global Media Journal-American Edition to be published Fall 2012 on the theme "Use of Social Media in Public Diplomacy: Getting Connected and Getting the Message Out."

Abbas, perhaps remembering these history lessons, apparently came to the conclusion that the status quo needed to be shaken up. To his credit he did not chose a violent option for this action. Abbas’s goal of going to the UN was to peacefully shake things up.

The award’s sponsors are professors and academics who say they are independent of the government. While the government has enthusiastically embraced the need for more robust cultural links to enhance China’s “soft power,” it wants that charm campaign to stay under the firm direction of the ruling Communist Party.

Turkey now has a chance to promote democracy in the Middle East, build ties with its neighboring peoples, and rise to leadership in the region, all at the same time.Turkey’s time to become a Middle East power seems to have arrived. Challenges remain...including the future of Turkish-Israeli ties and Iran’s hostile attitude to Ankara’s rising influence in the region.

The tough times have seen Irish business rediscover Germany as an important trade partner. It is a given here to have access to and interest in Irish culture, thus cultural diplomacy can have a great reach. Ireland’s cultural chief...sees a need to give Germans a sense of Ireland’s contemporary cultural landscape, particularly as the debate over the future of Europe draws us closer together.

In the case of a decades-long conflict between India and Pakistan, citizen diplomacy has the potential to counter a negative way of thinking about each other through people to people interaction. The Indian and Pakistani governments can help create a better environment for future official relations by supporting the unofficial citizen diplomacy already occurring.

U.S. government funded international broadcasters reached an estimated 187 million people every week in 2011...The BBG’s Performance and Accountability Report follows on the heels of BBG’s latest strategic plan which sets an over-arching objective of making BBG the world’s leading international news agency working to foster freedom and democracy with the goal of reaching 216 million people weekly by 2016.

A star-studded...cultural forum that brings the likes of organic-food advocate Alice Waters, filmmaker Joel Coen and cellist Yo Yo Ma to Beijing this week...is a response to the sclerotic environment surrounding China policy in Washington D.C...a “class trip” that would create “some fund of common experience [between the two sides] where you’re not always arguing.”