Soft Power

The New Foreign Policy Frontier

Anne-Marie Slaughter — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 10:39:11 -0500

A rapidly changing world requires news ways of thinking, and new tools for understanding and engaging with societies as well as governments.

The frontier of foreign policy in the 21st century is social, developmental, digital, and global. Along this frontier, different groups of actors in society -- corporations, foundations, NGOs, universities, think tanks, churches, civic groups, political activists, Facebook groups, and others -- are mobilizing to address issues that begin as domestic social problems but that have now gone global. It is the world of the Land Mines Treaty and the International Criminal Court; global criminal and terrorist networks; vast flows of remittances that dwarf development assistance; micro-finance and serial entrepreneurship; the Gates Foundation; the Arab spring; climate change; global pandemics; Twitter; mobile technology to monitor elections, fight corruption, and improve maternal health; a new global women's movement; and the demography of a vast youth bulge in the Middle East, Africa, and parts of Asia.

Traditional foreign policy continues to assume the world of World War II, the Cuban Missile Crisis, and the first and second Gulf Wars -- an international system in which a limited number of states pursue their largely power-based interests in bargaining situations that are often zero-sum and in which the line between international and domestic politics is still discernible and defensible. Diplomats and statesmen compete with each other in games of global chess, which, during crises, often shift into high-stakes poker. It is the world of high strategy, the world that Henry Kissinger writes about and longs for and that so-called "realist" commentators continually invoke.

That traditional world certainly still exists. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's calendar reflects enormous swathes of time spent on states like North Korea, Iran, and Burma; negotiating complicated relationships with states like Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, China and Russia; and adapting to the changing status of rising powers like India, Brazil, South Africa, Indonesia, and Turkey. There's also what George Shultz called "gardening," making sure that U.S. relations with allies, neighbors, and friendly states remain well-tended. But Clinton herself insists that 21st century diplomacy must not only be government to government, but also government to society and society to society, in a process facilitated and legitimated by government. That much broader concept opens the door to a do-it-yourself foreign policy, in which individuals and groups can invent and execute an idea -- for good or ill -- that can affect their own and other countries in ways that once only governments could.

In late June, I spent two days at the Summit Against Violent Extremism (#ACE on Twitter), a conference sponsored by Google Ideas, the Council on Foreign Relations, and the Tribeca Film Festival that brought together more than 80 former gang members, violent religious extremists, violent nationalist extremists, and violent white supremacists from 19 countries across six continents. They came together with 120 academics, NGOs, public sector and private sector partners. The conference grew out of a vision developed by Jared Cohen, the head of Google Ideas, when he served in the U.S. State Department's Office of Policy Planning together with Farah Pandit, who worked on countering violent extremism in the State Department's Bureau of Eurasian Affairs and is the Special Representative to Muslim Communities. But, despite their role, bringing together this range of "formers" is something that Google Ideas and the Council on Foreign Relations can do much more easily than any government could. The range of projects creating networks to help build on effective, early intervention programs already working around the world, such as Singapore's programs to deflect and deprogram Islamic radicals, will also be much easier to develop with a broader range of stakeholders, including some government participation, than they would be through government alone.

Three weeks earlier, I'd spent two days at the Personal Democracy Forum, a bottom-up gathering of digital activists from the U.S. and across the Middle East, including bloggers and organizers at the center of the Arab Spring. Other participants again included government officials, corporate executives, and the civic sector. After listening to many presentations from the founders and participants of organizations like Meetup (the world's largest network of local groups), Civic Commons, Change.org, Purpose, Access, and Movements.org, I concluded that the 1970s slogan of "Think Global, Act Local" could updated to a 21st century activist mantra, "Build Local, Go Global, and Change the World."

Skeptics argue that these kinds of initiatives are doomed to remain perennially peripheral and ineffectual. But, in case anyone hasn't noticed, the traditional tools of fighting, talking, pressuring, and persuading government-to-government really aren't working so well. Thirty years of urging reform produced next to nothing; 6 months of digitally and physically organized social protests and a political earthquake is shaking the broader Middle East. Twenty years of working toward a treaty to govern carbon emissions has barely yielded an informal "accord." Yet measures taken by 40 cities organized by the Bloomberg Foundation and the Clinton Global Initiative will have far more impact.

As an Atlantic correspondent and as curator/host of the new feature, Notes from the Foreign Policy Frontier, I will be working out some of the broader concepts we need for thinking about effective policymaking on this new frontier. As Internet guru Clay Shirky puts it, talking about "non-state actors" is like calling an automobile a horseless carriage. The term just underlines our need for a framework that moves beyond states and addresses both governments and societies. Here complexity theory and network theory offer more answers than game theory; neuroscience, psychology, and sociology often provide better insights and solutions than political science and economics. Also vital are the voices of a much wider range of people than standard foreign policy commentary allows: citizens of developing countries, women and girls, minorities, youth, indigenous peoples, corporations, civic groups, state, local, and municipal governments, and so on.

Equally important, I'll be looking at the world through a very different lens -- highlighting features of the foreign policy landscape that simply disappear if we examine only a world of opaque unitary states negotiating, pressuring, fighting, and ignoring each other -- Arnold Wolfers' classic image of the international system as a bunch of billiard balls banging against each other. Those readers who follow me on Twitter will know that I am actively curating foreign policy news, analyses, and commentary from as wide a spectrum of global sources as possible, and always welcome inputs and responses. I will often link to what I find on Twitter and elsewhere here, as well as posting thoughts, impressions, and longer reflections and commentary. Join me! And let me know, in the comments or on Twitter, what you are thinking and doing on the foreign policy frontier.

Anne-Marie Slaughter, a member of the Atlantic Council, is Dean of the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs and the Bert G. Kerstetter '66 University Professor of Politics and International Affairs at Princeton University. Photo credit Reuters.

The New Foreign Policy Frontier

Jorge Benitez — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 10:36:20 -0500

From Anne-Marie Slaughter, the New Atlanticist: The frontier of foreign policy in the 21st century is social, developmental, digital, and global. Along this frontier, different groups of actors in society -- corporations, foundations, NGOs, universities, think tanks, churches, civic groups, political activists, Facebook groups, and others -- are mobilizing to address issues that begin as domestic social problems but that have now gone global. It is the world of the Land Mines Treaty and the International Criminal Court; global criminal and terrorist networks; vast flows of remittances that dwarf development assistance; micro-finance and serial entrepreneurship; the Gates Foundation; the Arab spring; climate change; global pandemics; Twitter; mobile technology to monitor elections, fight corruption, and improve maternal health; a new global women's movement; and the demography of a vast youth bulge in the Middle East, Africa, and parts of Asia. . . .

French diplomats: "France is losing the battle of soft power"

Jorge Benitez — Thu, 23 Jun 2011 15:54:14 -0500

From Catherine Bremer, Reuters: A group of French diplomats complained on Thursday that budget cuts were hampering the country's ability to conduct foreign policy and eroding its diplomatic influence in the world.

The diplomats, some retired and others still working, criticised President Nicolas Sarkozy's foreign affairs policy in an anonymous article in the daily Le Monde under their moniker "the Marly Group", named after a grandiose Paris cafe in the grounds of the Louvre museum where they meet. . . .

Describing Sarkozy's diplomatic showmanship as "seductive theatre" that masked a diplomatic network that was like "a castle of sand", the diplomats wrote: "Year after year, this network gets eroded and is becoming an empty shell."

"Because of our lack of financial weight, we have less and less influence in debates and decisions in African countries that are key for us," they said, calling the foreign ministry's operational budget of around 3 billion euros insufficient. . . .

"France is losing the battle of soft power, which affects things on the ground and for the long term," the diplomats wrote. (photo: Reuters)

Solidarity: On the Front Line of Freedom's Defense

Jorge Benitez — Sat, 11 Jun 2011 11:49:09 -0500

From Julian Lindley-French, the New Atlanticist: Freedom will only flower if North Americans and Europeans together tend the lighthouse of hope so many millions want to believe in. We must therefore face together the world as it is, for it is far too soon to believe the world is as we would like it.

That means a strong West. But 'strength' must include in its inventory legitimate armed forces credible and able to act in the world of today and tomorrow, not the past. 'Soft' power is all well and good but all the lessons of the past and the present suggest that without the firm foundation of hard power Utopia will eventually fall.

Frankly, too often the 'strategies' I read to justify the squalid nature of Europe's retreat reveal the lie that is Europe's contibution to defending freedom. Indeed, in the visionless world of Europe today we only recognize only as much threat as we can afford. It is thus a short step back to Munich and Neville Chamberlain's grovel that he was unwilling to defend the freedom of a small country far away about which he know nothing. The rest is barbarous history.

There is one small country over which freedom is not only being defended, but supported. Sadly, only eight NATO nations are doing it, with the rest shuffling their collective feet in the shameless defiance of solidarity. If Freedom and solidarity go hand in hand. Sadly, there is a sub-text in Secretary Gates speech which I see here at this impressive conference. Too many Europeans either take feedom for granted or simply do not believe in preparing for its defence.

The consequence? A very real danger now exists that in the face of coming challenges European democracies will simply lack the means to defend freedom, even if they want to. 1939 all over again.

Professor Julian Lindley-French, a member of the Atlantic Council Strategic Advisor’s Group, is Special Professor of Strategic Studies, University of Leiden, Netherlands and Associate Fellow of the Royal Institute of International Affairs, London. This essay first appeared on his personal blog, Lindley-French's Blog Blast.

Soft Power is Dead, Long Live Soft Power

Derek Reveron — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 15:24:19 -0500

Just three weeks ago, the International Olympics Committee signaled that a new era in international affairs had finally begun. By eliminating Chicago a personal appeal by President Obama, the IOC subtly told the United States that its unipolar moment was over. Instead, future international affairs will be dominated by different regional power centers-the European Union, China, India, and Brazil. Just as much as the 2008 Olympics in Beijing was China’s coming out party, the 2016 games in Rio would be Brazil’s. Analysts and commentators interpreted this as another nail in the coffin of U.S. soft power. Many of the arguments are based on Paul Kennedy’s argument in the Rise and Fall of Great Powers and accept the inevitability of American decline.

Instead of imperial incompetence, pessimistic interpretations of U.S. power may be wrong.

Just a week ago, the Nobel Committee selected President Obama as its 2009 Peace Prize winner. More than a consolation prize after Olympic Committee defeat, the prize underscored that American soft power is not dead.

The dismayed focused on how premature the award may be. But the award is about the attractiveness or soft power of American leadership, rather than the recognition of specific accomplishments. President Obama, himself, seemed to interpret it this way during his early morning press conference:

I am both surprised and deeply humbled by the decision of the Nobel Committee. Let me be clear: I do not view it as a recognition of my own accomplishments, but rather as an affirmation of American leadership on behalf of aspirations held by people in all nations.

To be honest, I do not feel that I deserve to be in the company of so many of the transformative figures who've been honored by this prize -- men and women who've inspired me and inspired the entire world through their courageous pursuit of peace.

But I also know that this prize reflects the kind of world that those men and women, and all Americans, want to build -- a world that gives life to the promise of our founding documents. And I know that throughout history, the Nobel Peace Prize has not just been used to honor specific achievement; it's also been used as a means to give momentum to a set of causes. And that is why I will accept this award as a call to action -- a call for all nations to confront the common challenges of the 21st century.

The contradictory decisions suggest views of the United States are mixed, yet the U.S. president is viewed as a global leader. This is evident beyond Africa, where Obama’s image is ubiquitous, but also throughout the developing world where his message of hope inspires younger generations.

It is not that the United States is a declining empire; rather, the terms empire or hegemon do not adequately describe the United States. While the current international system speaks with an American accent, the United States and Americans are also vulnerable to the same international system that causes concern around the world. Thus, it is American leadership that is still demanded.

Writing in reaction to the cottage industry of seeing the United States in decline, Alan Dowd noted that, “America has a magnetic pull on peoples of every race, religion and region.” This is evident in emigration patterns, international students in American colleges, and the desirability of American companies as joint venture partners. While the world will learn more about Brazil and experience Rio in 2016, it cannot ignore the United States. The Nobel Committee reminded us of that.

When it comes to dealing with climate change, confronting economic challenges, supporting peace processes, preventing nuclear proliferation, President Obama has his work cut out for him. These are complicated issues that governments have been wrestling with for decades. Fortunately, he has renewed the United States’ global appeal, which is required to confront transnational challenge. The changed nature of security today requires global cooperation and soft power is a necessary tool.

Derek Reveron, an Atlantic Council contributing editor, is a professor of national security affairs at the U.S. Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island. These views are his own. AP Photo: "Visitors look at a sand sculpture of U.S. President Barak Obama with a Nobel Prize medal, created by sand artist Sudarshan Pattnaik on the Golden Sea beach in Puri, India, Saturday, Oct. 10, 2009."