In harnessing the benefits of global tourism, the international community will take “critical” steps forward in advancing the United Nations’ sustainable development goals and post-2015 development agenda, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said today.

Thai 'soft power' is highly visible in Indonesia through every-day encounters such as consumer products, entertainment, fashions, food and fruits, to name but a few.  Somehow, Thai authorities who are promoting the country's smart power have no idea of utilising this popular and neutral medium. Na

India's prime minister is proposing a new addition to the lengthy list of annual U.N. observances: World Yoga Day. In his speech to the U.N. General Assembly, Prime Minister Narendra Modi extolled the therapeutic powers of yoga and said it could help tackle global problems.

China’s soft-diplomacy push hit a speed bump this week when the University of Chicago decided to pull the plug on renewing a controversial Beijing-funded Confucius Institute.The decision may prompt other universities to rethink their relationships with Confucius institutes – attractive because they offer free Chinese-language classes and cultural programs to cash-strapped colleges in the United States, albeit with limitations on what they can teach.

If there was something threatening about the incursion of Western cultural and political influence ten years ago, the China of today seems a bit more confident about its standing in the world. Not that this newfound swagger has supplanted the paranoic tendencies inherent to authoritarian rule...

The philanthropic sector has welcomed the Federal Government’s move to join forces with those of the United States, United Kingdom and Sweden to launch a $200 million Global Innovation Fund. Minister for Foreign Affairs Julie Bishop said that Australia would contribute $30 million over four years towards the fund that would see the Government take a more creative approach to the planning and delivery of development programs. 

That K-dramas have bolstered South Korea's cultural capital is quite established. In May 2013, Park was invited to Los Angeles to participate in the Leaders' Meeting for Creative Economy. The meeting brought together South Korean government and entrepreneurs to discuss Korea's economic growth on the world stage. Park was there to discuss how DramaFever and similar initiatives were helping to bolster South Korea's global influence.

Indonesia, home to the world’s largest population of Muslims, had some words of advice for the United States for defeating the extremist group Islamic State and other like-minded jihadists.