Simon Anholt, a member of the U.K. Government’s Public Diplomacy Board...said Korea was showing significant progress in national branding after realizing that branding is not about trying to force people to buy its new self-image, but to show the world it is willing and has changed.

“We think that putting all the events under one theme like the Czech Points in Seoul Festival will show the variety of Czech culture available while offering more than just the things that people know,” said Czech Republic Ambassador Jaroslav Olsa Jr.

South Korea may be one of the fastest growing medical tourism destinations, but for now it lags far behind trailblazers Thailand, Singapore, India, Malaysia and even the Philippines.They all have their own distinctive marketing strategies in an attempt to woo clients, as well as areas of specialization.

Countries in East Asia are increasingly looking to pop culture, as an instrument of "soft power". And the "soft power" competition is alive and well in East Asia, with not just financial returns at stake, but also as a positive influence in the attitudes of target or importing countries.

Today, the USC Center on Public Diplomacy released a Media Monitor Report on "Expo Shanghai 2010 - Flaunting Nations' Beauty through the Practice of Nation Branding".

How did Seoul become Asia's capital of cool? Even here in the Philippines, once an undisputed bastion of American pop and Hollywood movies, South Korean pop music, soap operas and fashion are now all the rage.

The 24-member delegation belongs to the Korean Conference of Religion for Peace. They are heading to Pyongyang on a four-day visit that will include talks and joint prayer meetings with their North Korean counterparts.

"The government does not trust the Foreign Service, does not understand public diplomacy and is only belatedly awakening to the re-emergence of the Asia-Pacific as the centre of the global political economy," said Copeland, now a fellow at both the University of Toronto's Munk School of Global Affairs and the University of Southern California's Center on Public Diplomacy.