When Donald Trump repeatedly claims the election is “rigged,” it doesn’t just undermine voter confidence at home. [...] The campaign also acts as a snapshot of American democracy. According to political scientist Joseph Nye, America’s soft power – its ability to persuade foreign leaders and exert influence abroad – partly depends on how the rest of world interprets our political process, values and outcomes.

Iraq has been a difficult place for U.S. public diplomacy for a very long time now, and yet one would think that a war that the U.S. is fighting on behalf of and in collaboration with the Iraqi government and numerous other international partners, a war that is truly an existential one for Iraqi Shia, would produce at least some dividends in terms of Iraqi goodwill toward the United States. 

“Travel Book. Kazakhstan,” a unique art project containing 700 of the most interesting facts about the country, was presented as a joint project Sept. 8 by the Foundation of the First President of Kazakhstan – the Leader of the Nation and Green Penguin Agency. Mass sales of the first book about Kazakhstan published in edutainment format will start this month.

While the days of its worst behavior are long behind it, the United States does have a well-documented history of interfering and sometimes interrupting the workings of democracies elsewhere. It has occupied and intervened militarily in a whole swath of countries in the Caribbean and Latin America and fomented coups against democratically elected populists.

A ballet dancer and choreographer, she is heading a team of 12 artistes on a cultural exchange programme organised by the Indo-Russian Chamber of Commerce and Industries on the occasion of the BRICS summit to be held in Goa between October 15 and 16. 

For more than two decades, Russia has been trying to regain its Soviet-era economic influence in Africa, but such efforts have regularly hit stumbling blocks. Policy experts and Russian authorities attribute this to inadequate knowledge of investment and economic possibilities in the continent.

When discussing soft power, it is important to understand that, just like hard power, it is an attribute of force and as such, maintains a coercive, compulsory nature. Bidirectional influence is a purely methodological, not substantive quality, which creates the illusion that many are involved in the decision-making process, but the sole main beneficiary is still the state that is projecting its power.