As the drive has accelerated it has helped give Ankara something it rarely had before: soft power, the allure of a country widely seen to be a success.

The US government’s failure to accord American Muslims the same respect, rights and privileges due to American citizens is nothing short of an ethical failure...the American insistence on profiling the Muslim minority at home is causing the US to lose its moral high ground, and with it, the soft power it once exerted.

If a state possesses sufficient “soft power,” it has acquired the ability to frame and shame events and actors in international relations...The French role in last year’s intervention in Libya was a perfect example.

The successes chalked up by Lung transformed Taipei into a world-class city of culture, explaining why she is tipped to repeat this feat on a national scale and take Taiwan’s soft power to the next level.

The growing realization in India, at least outside the government, is that engagement shouldn’t be merely state or personality driven. India’s government should take note of this, and ease visa restrictions on citizens from neighboring countries. It’s time to showcase India’s soft power, rather than relying on the External Affairs Ministry.

Yes, India’s soft image, its perceived internal disarray, its inability to guard its borders, its inclination to shun hard decisions, its readiness to make concessions out of a pronounced sense of vulnerability, historical pressures on it by Western powers and the conflict with China...

Furthermore, despite making impressive efforts to cultivate its soft power, Joseph Nye concludes that China “has had a limited return on its investment.” Perhaps most importantly, while the past decade has undermined global opinion of U.S. power and policy, China has been unable to develop strong alliances.

As the second largest economy in the world, China has been working to improve its cultural soft power. Last week, a consortium of Chinese companies agreed to set up a joint venture with the US-based DreamWorks Animation, with agendas to make a sequel of blockbuster movie Kung Fu Panda 3 later this year.