Badminton Diplomacy continued...

Correction to my posting on Badminton Diplomacy. The tournament is this week, starting on Friday. The team had actually been informed previous to the denial of their visas that they (the visas) were ready to be picked up in Dubai.

Also to add to this story, a quote from the Washington Post article this morning:

This is a very unfortunate situation," State Department spokesman Robert A. Wood said Wednesday.

"You know, as the secretary and others have said, when the Iranians unclench that fist, there will be a hand waiting to greet them," Wood added. "We are very interested in trying to improve relations between the American people and the Iranian people, and this is not a good step forward in terms of trying to promote people-to-people exchanges."

One Step Forward, 2.0 Steps Back

This is not as timely as some recent posts, but I still owe an entry from the first week...

While rumors circulate about his replacement, acting and outgoing Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs James Glassman has been ruminating about lessons learned and his legacy at PD. However, it strikes me that two of those take-away messages are strangely at odds with each other. 

On one hand, Glassman (in a solid application of 'listening') notes that the U.S. polls least favorably in the Middle East and non-Arab Muslim nations, just as he marks these areas of the world as central to Global Strategic Engagement and 'winning the battle of ideas.'

...achieving specific foreign policy and national security ends is possible even if the United States is not popular...We need to recognize that there is a complex, multi-sided battle going on in Muslim societies for power. This is a battle in which we cannot be a bystander if we wanted to.

On the other hand, a cornerstone of Glassman's tenure at PD has been an emphasis on Public Diplomacy 2.0:

This new approach takes advantage of new social networking technologies like Facebook and YouTube and Second Life. In fact, a few days ago, I became the first U.S. high official to participate in a Second Life event when I participated in a discussion with bloggers from Egypt and others around the world.

While PD 2.0 makes for good media sound-bites at home and generates a progressive, proactive image for the outdated division of the State Department Glassman inherited from his predecessors, it does little to address the United States' number one target audience in GSE/the 'battle of ideas.'

In fact, it is likely not even reaching them. I spent over a year researching online public media and interviewing bloggers in one of the most moderate Arab countries, Jordan. The fact remains that, as much as new media and Web 2.0 are doing for free speech, balanced journalism, and even civil society, they remain a drop in the bucket when you consider the region's established (and populist) media machinery. Only about 20% of the population in the Middle East has regular Internet access, and it is much more expensive relative to the cost of living than in Europe or the U.S. The demographic that does use the Internet in the Arab world is likely to be affluent and, on balance, more secular.

That is not to say there aren't Internet users of all stripes in the Middle East (the Muslim Brotherhood in Egpyt sports a robust blogroll), or that PD's Digital Outreach Team clarifying U.S. policies on Arabic and Farsi blogs isn't a step in the right direction. But the 'complex battle' Glassman references, between voices of moderation and extremism, is not playing out only or even mostly online. The public square in the Arab world is not found in Second Life nor on YouTube (actually, it's Ikbis for Arabs) nor on the comment boards of Baheyya's blog in Egypt; it is the actual, public square. It is the news stand next to the Mosque ablution fountain. It is the coffee house where political debates flare over the late-night hum of al Jazeera's punditry programs or its latest rebroadcast message from bin Laden.

If the U.S. wants a voice in this public square, or to promote local moderate voices, it needs to operate through the people's media. Accept more invitations for official spoke-persons at al Jazeera tapings (I can tell you Gonzalez's Arab-speaking replacement is less than stellar, but that the channel's translations for English speakers are fair and accurate). Place editorials in the still-dominant local print media (After all, Qaddafi gets page space in ours). Cash-in the doomed al Hurra's mutli-million dollar budget for more language training for press attaches and cultural affairs specialists in Embassy posts throughout the region.

PD 2.0 isn't a bad idea for the Arab world and Muslim nations, it's just 10 years too early--and 10 years can be an eternity for the United States' regional image and 'the complex battle' raging within Middle East society.

Words Matter

I thought this question, raised by Anderson Cooper in an interview with Obama (http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0902/04/acd.02.html), was particularly interesting since we discussed the exact same issue in class last night, and I think Obama reiterates the very same conclusion that our class came to - words matter.

Cooper: I've noticed you don't use the term "war on terror," I think I read an article that you've only used it once since the inauguration. Is that conscious? Is there something about that term you find objectionable or not useful?

Obama: Well, you know, I think it is very important for us to recognize that we have a battle or a war against some terrorist organizations. But that those organizations aren't representative of a broader Arab community, Muslim community.

I think we have to -- you know, words matter in this situation because one of the ways we're going to win this struggle is through the battle of hearts and minds.

Cooper: So that's not a term you're going to be using much in the future?

Obama: You know, what I want to do is make sure that I'm constantly talking about al Qaeda and other affiliated organizations because we, I believe, can win over moderate Muslims to recognize that that kind of destruction and nihilism ultimately leads to a dead end, and that we should be working together to make sure that everybody has got a better life.

Badminton Diplomacy?

In class last night, we talked about Culls article and the facets of PD. A story in the news this week highlights cultural/exchange diplomacy in an interesting way.

The United States women's Badminton Team was denied visas to enter Iran for an International tournament coming up in March. According to their foreign minister, the visa process was just too "time consuming" thus the team would not receive them in time. See FP Passport for their blog on it, which brings up a sexist angle as well.

The relationship between Iran and the US is increasingly in the spotlight as the world waits to see how our new president will act. According to an NY Times article yesterday,
"While Mr. Obama is expected to soften the Bush administration’s line against talking to Iran, the aides said, he may also seek to toughen sanctions."

While Badminton tournaments may not be on the top of Mr. Obama's list of grievances against Iran, this particular snub of our public diplomacy does show an unwillingness to engage with the US.
If even the most benign form of PD, allowing our teams to compete in their country, is rejected then it seems difficult to forsee how or where the US and Iran will ever diffuse tensions.

comprehensive perspectives on Korean Wave (podcast0

A podcast about the reasons of the wide popularity of Korean Wave in China and Japan and also the backlash.

http://www.npr.org/templates/player/mediaPlayer.html?action=1&t=1&islist=false&id=5300970&m=5300996

Arabs in American Entertainment Media

I just wanted to post this before I forgot. As we were discussing the portrayal of various peoples in our entertainment media, I was reminded of an article I read for another class earlier this year. The article was from the book Reel Bad Arabs: How Hollywood Vilifies a People (more info here) by Jack G. Shaheen. The portion of the book that I read pointed out the lyrics to Arabian Nights from the Disney movie, Aladdin as well as the Arab character in the film Father of the Bride II. I've found the lyrics for Arabian Nights, here, for those of you that are interested.
We discussed in class today how we sort of form our opinions based on the things we have been exposed to. Shaheen's work goes along with this idea and addresses the fact that Arabs are rarely represented in American entertainment media, and when they are it is mostly in a negative light.
Just a short discussion point.

Arab Media on Arab Media

While defining public diplomacy an academic discipline may be a daunting task, media analysis is not uncommon in the U.S. or abroad. President Obama's recent appearance on Al-Arabiya has sparked discussion across all media outlets on the strategic importance of his choice and exposes a renewed interest in the study of Arab media from not only Americans, but Middle Easterners as well. Abu Dhabi's The National recently published this article on a lecture given by Middle Eastern media analyst Dr. Adel Iskander, also a visiting researcher at Georgetown. Without naming "public diplomacy" or "propaganda," the article discusses the recent shift in Arab media from a local to a global focus. Iskander explains that with Al-Jazeera's creation in 2006, Arab journalists "are becoming far more interested to communicate their own stories to the West." If the desire to explaining one's home culture is a part of formal public diplomacy, is this statement an acknowledgment that Middle Eastern public diplomacy, much like American public diplomacy, is taking on a new design? When we consider part of public diplomacy the credibility of a news outlet, sharing one's personal story must be balanced with keeping a sense of objectivity.

The most interesting statement in the article though comes after the admission that the objectivity of Arab media is always in question. Iskander noted that few stories are published about Qatar, the home base of Al-Jazeera's headquarters. He then discussed the value of the Arab blogosphere. Iskander's assessment explains well why blogs have become such a popular source of information. "Blogging ambiguity is where its strength lies because its everything but objective. It’s the ultimate equaliser."

The New American Foundation posted a lecture on their website given by James Glassman back in December about Public Diplomacy 2.0. In their summary of the talk, the website highlights Glassman's conclusions that due to the success of New Media, such as blogs, "the United States [holds] a comparative advantage over radicalized ideologies that require insulation from criticism." While Glassman's analysis that radical ideologies suffer when exposed to criticism may stand strong, is it only the U.S. that holds the comparative advantage in fighting radicalism with New Media? The objectivity of much of the government-owned Arab media may be questioned, but Iskander's praise for Arab blogging would suggest otherwise. Ideological propaganda may face greater challenges from Public Diplomacy initiatives supported by New Media, but the United States should not be considered the sole combatant of all things radical, nor the sole provider of all things objective.