For some industry insiders, the trio personify a growing partnership between Beijing’s aspirations to export what it calls “soft power” – a sugarcoated version of China and its myriad social problems – to the West and Hollywood producers, who are bending over backwards to get a piece of the world’s fastest growing film market.

“If you are going to tell people the truth, you better make them laugh; otherwise, they’ll kill you.”
-George Bernard Shaw

I used to think that humor was one thing that didn’t translate in cross-cultural communication. In my travels, I had watched numerous attempts at jokes fail miserably as they got lost in translation or cultural nuances. Things often ended awkwardly amid the seemingly untranslatable nature of humor.

Mr. Xi’s journey to America’s heartland underscores the importance of the public dimension of U.S-China diplomacy. Since China’s “soft power” efforts have largely been bi-coastal, Mr. Xi’s trip to the fly-over country is particularly noteworthy. Let’s hope that Mr. Xi’s Iowa visit will help broaden and enrich the Chinese imagination of America.

Muscatine, Iowa, is to play host to a special guest on Wednesday, when China’s Vice President Xi Jinping, the nation’s presumed next leader, returns to the small town he first visited as part of a sister-state program more than two decades ago. Mr. Xi’s journey to America’s heartland underscores the importance of the public dimension of U.S-China diplomacy.

At a time when the rest of the world marvels at — or perhaps dreads — China’s rise, Beijing perceives a serious weakness in its own armour: the lack of soft power. For all its economic woes, the West still possesses ample soft power as evidenced by its cultural domination.

Cuddly pandas are China's ambassadors of soft power and other countries use money or culture to enhance bilateral ties, but Singapore prefers to say it with flowers -- orchids, to be exact. The tropical city-state cultivates special orchid varieties and names them after a motley mix of foreign leaders and celebrities as part of its diplomatic repertoire.

As a way to promote travel, Japan will invite influential bloggers and Twitter users from across the globe to visit areas affected by the earthquake, tsunami and ensuing nuclear crisis, which occurred last March.Targeting these areas will aim to restore Japan’s dwindling tourism, which dropped by 50 percent in the first three months following the natural disasters.

...the U.S. Constitution is now copied less frequently by countries writing new constitutions than in the immediate aftermath of World War II...The implicit fear, made manifest by a posse of commentators, is that our constitutional “soft power” is in decline -- much as our hard power is perceived to be faltering.