In the US, where rules on the disclosure are stricter, technology groups report far higher spending on lobbying. Google, for example, spent $8.85m in the first half of 2014 alone in the US – nearly four times what it said it spent lobbying the EU for the whole of 2013. Google declined to comment on this article. But its efforts in Europe are part of its “soft power” approach towards influencing policy makers.

When Chinese President Xi Jinping arrives in Ahmedabad on Wednesday, by his side will be his glamorous folk singer celebrity wife, Peng Liyuan.  For the Xis, this will be a first visit to India together. For an Indian audience, this will be a first experience of a new - and, some would say, softer - side to China's diplomacy.

U.S. Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs Richard Stengel says that in the face of strong foreign propaganda machines such as Russia and the Islamic State, the U.S. needs to harden its "soft power" with its own participation in the global conversation.

fter all the talk of a "pivot to Asia," America’s return to the Middle East is welcome, but wars do not create peace. Killing Bin Laden did not destroy terrorism, and killing ISIS fighters will not bring stability. American leadership and soft power in the Middle East should be invested in three areas...

Wrapping up an account of the Narendra Modi government’s foreign policy activism in its first hundred days in office, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj claimed last week that Indian diplomacy had moved into high gear with its “fast-track diplomacy”. The foreign ministry’s public diplomacy division has published a colorful booklet filled with photographic evidence of the government’s impressive global engagement in the past three months. 

Coordinating Political, Legal and Security Affairs Minister Djoko Suyanto has said that the government is employing soft power to protect Indonesians from the influence of Islamic State (IS), also known as ISIL, militants.

The British government is spending £1.5 million ($2.44 million) to have all of Shakespeare’s works translated into Mandarin by the Royal Shakespeare company. UK culture secretary Sajid Javid said he hopes the move will build “stronger links with China.”

Ebola is thousands of miles away from Kenya's pristine Indian Ocean beaches, but the deadly disease appears to be discouraging tourism there and elsewhere in this vast continent.