I was very inspired reading after Hilary Rodham Clintons Leading Through Civilian Power Subtitle: Redefining American Diplomacy and Development. Clinton talked about the “smart power” approach, which is needed to help solve global problems and for the US to find a balance between hard and soft power.
Clinton states, “We must not only rebuild—but also rethink, reform, and recalibrate.” This notion I believe is vital! I think the US, as well as other nations, have very big problems with change. Just like people, governments get in the habits of certain ways to do things and have tribulations to co-evolve with the developments of the time. The world is changing, relationships are changing, problems are changing…. So the US must change their means of diplomacy and development. We do see the US doing this, but not at a fast enough pace.
This is not to say that the US cannot still use traditional forms of diplomacy which Clinton notes will remain critical to advance the US agenda; but like Clinton affirms, “it is not enough.” I agree that people must work together, and engagement must go beyond just governments; we must also leverage power by creating connections. Everything that Clinton is saying I agree with, so is she following through? Are these changes being made?
One of her points that hit very close to home was the notion that “although the world’s problems are vast, the United States’ resources are not.” The US must take advantage of creating partnerships. However, this seems to be very hard for the US. For example, with the current partnership of nations involved in helping rebel forces in Libya, the US continues to be bombarded that they are not doing enough, that they have the power to take the lead, so why are they not taking it?
I agree with you that Hillary Clinton's article was encouraging. I think her emphasis on cooperation between government agencies and recognizing the potential and resources of our government workers was much needed. I also like how Clinton did a great job on making the connection between why development and public diplomacy often go hand in hand. I think often Americans are disgruntled that our tax dollars are going to say, build a school for children in, say, the Sudan, without realizing that the stabilization of the country can correlate with our domestic security. I also think her suggestion for the Civilian Response Corps provides a team of experts that may perhaps be more quickly to mobilize, and can create an American presence in conflict zones or disaster areas more quickly than other government workers. As you ask, are these changes being made? I think its important to remember that bureaucracies tend to move at a turtle pace, or else they wouldn't be bureaucracies. So these changes will take time, as the state department is regaining funding and resources it has lost. However I am hopeful that Clinton will instill the importance of cooperation and building relationships so that this will be, as R. Zaharna puts it, a successful change in grand strategy.
ReplyDeleteIn Zaharna's article, she notes that there is confusion between tactics, strategy and grand strategy of public diplomacy. However she distinguishes the three principles by saying that tactics are understood by the individual activities we engage in, strategy are the ways we achieve our objectives and the grand strategy is how an actor (i.e. state) views the world and how it wants to relate to it. Under the bush administration (as well as many of his predecessors) we talked (and to some extent still are) about “winning a war of ideas.” By conceiving our public diplomacy strategy as a “war of ideas,” this puts or external relations on an “us vs. them” platform. This type of rhetoric serves as a disservice to the U.S. public diplomacy objectives and places us in a negative light in the eyes of many foreigners who think we are fighting a war with them. While Secretary of State Hilary Clinton, along with President Obama, has tried to switch gears and change this type of rhetoric by focusing on partnerships and collaboration, there is still a long road ahead for U.S. public diplomacy.
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