On Monday 2 April 2012, the UN will implement Resolution 65/39 which places 'happiness' officially on the global agenda....This is a major triumph for Bhutan's soft power. Forty years ago, the King of this nation established Gross National Happiness (GNH) as an alternative to Gross National Product (GNP)

Ambassador Herbie Hancock believes what the world needs is a little jazz diplomacy. "This is really about the international diplomatic aspect of jazz and how it has throughout a major part of its history been a major force in bringing people of various countries and cultures together."

I am writing today from the world city of London.

In his book, The Al Jazeera Effect, Philip Seib states that “Al Jazeera is a paradigm of new media’s influence,” similar to the way CNN had been the first to influence foreign policy throughout the world. Al Jazeera, Seib writes, goes further by using new media as a tool that ranges from democratization to terrorism, in addition to creating ‘virtual states’.

The world's nations achieved a U.N. goal of cutting in half the proportion of people without access to safe drinking water five years ahead of the 2015 target...The water target was one of the U.N. Millennium Development Goals to reduce global poverty that government leaders, nongovernmental organizations and the United Nations have been working to achieve, with varying success.

Indian foreign policy discourse is hardly Pakistan-centric; its major pre-occupations are the rise of India, its soft-power promotion, UN reforms and India’s role in a reformed UN, relations with the United States etc.

Australia’s international policy portfolio has been left hanging after Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd’s surprise resignation from his post – announced from Mexico in the aftermath of the G20 meeting. Rudd’s resignation, a deliberate retaliation strike against the current Prime Minister Julia Gillard and the ruling Australian Labor Party for the unceremonious leadership coup they pulled off against him some 24 months ago, while fascinating to the political observer, is potentially devastating for Australia’s international image projection.

Seoul has certainly been successful in its soft power efforts globally over the past decade, and has consequentially accrued political capital and financial contracts not only in the Americas but also in Africa, Central Asia and the Middle East.