High stakes: U.S. nonprofit organizations and the U.S. standing abroad

This research sought to explain the agency of U.S.-based nonprofit nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in the U.S. standing abroad, and explore the NGO role in the U.S. public diplomacy. A multiple-case study method was used to look at five 501(c)(3) organizations that receive predominantly private funding and operate globally. The data gathered from in-person interviews and corporate documentation were compared between cases, and synthesized across cases using the theory-building technique. While U.S. standing affects American NGOs’ practices and discourses, American NGOs’ behavior might have a bearing on the attitudes, perceptions, and opinions of international publics about the United States. Both the NGO-owned state identities and American NGOs’ reputation for autonomy and freedom of expression enhance the U.S. public diplomacy efforts.     

Public diplomacy meets social media: A study of the U.S. Embassy's blogs and micro-blogs

With the evolution of communication technologies, traditional public diplomacy is transforming. This study examines the practice of the U.S. Embassy's public diplomatic communication via social media, namely Chinese mainstream blogging and micro-blogging, sites using Tencent for a case study. This study analyzes the embassy's blog and micro-blog entries and an interview with the embassy's public diplomacy officer. Based on the content analysis and interview, this study discerns the key features of the U.S. Embassy's public diplomatic communication using social media and further suggests that the common values and interests related to the global public as well as experience-sharing and relationship-building might become the focus of new public diplomacy research.     

Networks of international public relations production: The case of Latin American organizations’ connections to U.S. agents

Traditionally, international public relations studies have assumed that a foreign organization, namely a foreign government, is the primary influence on how its home country is portrayed to audiences abroad. This study challenges such assumption of independence by revealing how foreign organizations are connected in ways previous works have not considered. Using Foreign Agents Registration Act data, we reveal the direct and indirect connections that form when foreign organizations hire U.S. agencies to produce their international public relations work. Our network analysis of foreign organizations from Latin American and their U.S. agents documents the network structures that emerge for each country and identifies the types of organizations that are positioned advantageously in the networks. We use these findings to theorize how foreign organizations’ connections and their key positions in networks may influence the production of international public relations efforts for their home country. We at a macro-level, public relations effects depend on the structure of the networks, the overlapping sites where communication content is produced, and who is positioned as key players in the production networks.     

美国与沙特准联盟外交的理论与实证研究

二战结束以来，美国与沙特特殊关系的构建主要依靠准联盟外交，这类外交具有合作载体的非正式性、解决任务的选择性、合作手段的灵活性和战略指向的模糊性等特点。美沙准联盟外交的形成具有国际层面、国家层面和单元内部层面三重原因，双方的安全共同体和利益共同体意识强化了准联盟外交。“9·11”事件后，美国在海湾地区由依靠沙特转向依靠海合会其他成员，其准联盟外交战略呈现多元化趋势；沙特则积极利用欧盟、俄罗斯、中国和印度等来平衡美国的影响力。美沙各自外交战略的调整使美沙准联盟暗藏危机。     

Three Korean perspectives on U.S. internet public diplomacy

This study identifies perspectives of relationships publics have about countries other than their own and examines whether publics engaged through social media-based public diplomacy programs demonstrate different relationship perspectives. Q methodology and survey research were used to investigate these issues. Data come from South Korean adult internet users, including members of Café USA, an online community run by the U.S. Embassy in Seoul. Three relationship perspectives were identified: outcome-based, sincerity-based, and access-based. Compared with other groups, Café USA members put more emphasis on sincerity in their relationships with the United States. The results of this study indicate that individuals’ subjectivity should be considered as far more contextualized and nuanced than has been the case in previous research on national image or country reputation.     

International public relations’ influence on media coverage and public perceptions of foreign countries

The purpose of this study is to examine the influence of international public relations on a target country's news coverage and public perceptions toward other countries. This study proposed a public relations influence model of national image formation and tested its relationships based on 27 countries’ public relations effort targeting the U.S. news coverage and publics. This study found that (1) public relations of other countries in the U.S. had a direct impact on how significantly the U.S. public perceived those countries; (2) the more prominently and favorably foreign countries were covered by the U.S. news media, the more significantly and favorably the U.S. public perceived and felt toward those countries.     

Reinforcing the Divide

Abstract

Accounts of race in the United States have traditionally been steeped in prejudicial notions consistent with the society (Lusane, 2000; U.S. Census Bureau, 2000; Griffin, Caplinger, Lively, Malcom, McDaniel,&Nelsen, 1997). The U.S. Census has been used as an instrument in the continued dichotomous division of American citizens into either one of two groups, Whites and Nonwhites (Ngai, 1999). This essay examines the impact of the U.S. Census on U.S. law, public policy, and distribution of privilege between Whites and Nonwhites. This essay also addresses the influence of census-based racial classification on social work practice and education.     

Fieldwork in forbidden terrain: The U.S. state and the case of Cuba

This paper introduces the concept of forbidden research terrains and examines one such terrain in detail: post-revolutionary Cuba. After exploring the characteristics of this forbidden research terrain, the paper examines how it was initially created. Through an historical analysis of U.S.-Cuban relations between 1959 and mid-1960, Cuba’s forbidden designation is shown to be the result of U.S. actions prompted by the very broad conception of U.S. interests held by state decision makers. Next, the consequences of Cuba’s forbidden status are investigated and found to include heightened state power in the foreign policy arena. The paper concludes with a brief discussion of other possible forbidden research terrains which are also politically inspired. Some of her past work on the politics of workers’ control in post-revolutionary Cuba has been published inLatin American Perspectives andWorld Development. Currently she is comparing unions in Cuba with those in the GDR.     

Roads to American Empire: U.S. Military Public Works and Capitalist Transitions, 1898–1934.

Between 1898 and 1934, in synchronous and successive U.S. military interventions and occupations in Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Philippines, Haiti, and the Dominican Republic, American soldiers made public works, and especially roads, into a global technology of imperial power. This essay examines infrastructure as a factor in state formation and capitalist transition in these five different imperial spaces as a way to study U.S. empire, and its effects on foreign societies, through a comparative, global, and intra‐imperial approach often precluded by the methodological nationalism of historical and sociological literatures. Despite significant differences between these sites of U.S. war and occupation, both prior to American interventions and during them, U.S. military public works expressed and advanced a common political‐economic logic of state centralization and capital accumulation. Colonial and post‐colonial political institutions and political economies, the strength of central governments, the extent of plantation agriculture and rural proletarianization, world commodity markets, and geography and natural events varied, but determined U.S. imperial infrastructure's outcomes. By the 1930s, the U.S. military had elevated infrastructural improvement to a key repertoire of American imperial power in the world, and one which persisted as the United States turned away from formal colonialism in the era of the Cold War and decolonization.     

Mass and Elite Foreign Policy Opinions

Since the Vietnam War, public preferences on foreign policyissues have played a greater role in the American politicalprocess. Yet comparatively little is known about the mannerin which attitudes on international affairs are formed and howthey are related to other political cognitions. Using data fromtwo large studies of foreign policy opinion conducted by theChicago Council on Foreign Relations in 1974 and 1978, thisresearch examines the question of how mass and elite opiniondiffers in a number of foreign policy domains and looks at whetherthese distinctions have changed across years. In general, thereare patterns of difference in the foreign policy beliefs ofthe elites and the mass public, the most striking being in their"internationalist" view of the U.S. role in world affairs, withsmaller distinctions in the domains of human rights, detente,world problems, Americanism, and international organizations.     

Apps4Africa: A new State Department public diplomacy initiative

In 2010 the U.S. State Department funded an “Apps4Africa” contest to encourage development of socially conscious mobile applications for Africa. The initiative marked a significant departure from traditional public diplomacy efforts to expand diplomatic outreach beyond traditional government-to-government relationships. This case study analyses Apps4Africa to reveal its appropriateness as a model for future efforts and concludes Apps4Africa succeeded primarily because it responded to the changing dynamics of the 21st Century.     

From propaganda to public diplomacy: Assessing China's international practice and its image, 1950–2009

Since World War II, government-sponsored international propaganda and public diplomacy have become more visible and sophisticated in countries around the world. China is no exception. It is not immune to the compulsion and communication imperative to reach and woo the public, both at home and abroad, for its vested interests. From propaganda to public diplomacy, the practices and activities have taken different forms and scopes, mainly including government-owned media outlets aimed at foreign audiences, state-subsidized media organizations as quasi-governmental instruments, overseas advertising and public relations campaigns designed to sway public opinion to win general support for the nation involved or to repair international relations damaged by terrorist attacks and other man-made crises, and recruiting and bribing journalists as clandestine operatives. Whether such practices have been effective in changing hearts and minds among international audiences, however, is open to debate and remains to be further explored. Within the perspective of sociology of knowledge, the main purpose of this study is to look at how China comes to be viewed as an object in international communication research over the past decades that cast the country through the prism of either propaganda or public diplomacy.     

Managing national reputation and international relations in the global era: Public diplomacy revisited

The purpose of this paper is to review and re-examine the concept and practice of public diplomacy in light of the incredible pace of change in global politics and communication, and to discuss implications for future research. It first explains the significance of national reputation and its linkage to public diplomacy. It then surveys and assesses a broad range of literature on public diplomacy, characterized by three basic discourses: public diplomacy as policy-driven rather than relationship-based, the primacy of nation-state governments in the structure and process of public diplomacy, and an emphasis on mass media communication. The paper finally suggests and outlines further research efforts based on the existing literature and the evolving contexts.     

Privileging an activist vs. a corporate view of public relations history in the U.S.

This article elaborates on the argument that the history of U.S. public relations has been distorted by the emphasis on corporate functions of public relations. The dominant corporate-centric view of U.S. public relations history often claim that public relations developed as a response to activists who attempted to interfere with business operations. That myopic, corporate-centric view has perpetuated a negative view of public relations as merely a tool of “big business”. In the past as well as the present, corporations have been learning from and co-opting activists’ innovative public relations techniques. By alternatively grounding U.S. public relations history in the works of activists, we open possibilities for re-imagining the field and legitimizing activists’ works as a positive, central component in public relations theory and research. We end by providing resources educators can utilize to teach a more balanced view of public relations history in the U.S.     

奥巴马的中东政策初见端倪

奥巴马总统入主白宫以来,美国对外政策的第一要务是处理自身当前面临的严重金融危机问题,中东问题处于美国对外战略中相对次要的位置。根据奥巴马的外交理念,新政府将更加强调使用外交手段解决中东问题,并吸引地区和世界各国与美国开展安全合作,建立稳定的中东安全新架构。奥巴马中东政策所要应对的主要任务是：尽早解决伊拉克问题,分阶段从伊拉克撤军,卸下包袱;继续视伊朗为潜在战略威胁,但将奉行具有弹性的接触政策;启动多边外交机制来实现美国的国家安全战略目标;积极推动巴以和谈,消除中东伊斯兰世界的反美情绪;探索与哈马斯等伊斯兰组织的对话与交流渠道;积极争取中俄在中东对美国的支持,鼓励两国发挥负责任大国的作用,帮助美国减轻中东外交压力。     

The op-ed as a strategic tool of public diplomacy: Framing of the 2011 Egyptian revolution

The current study examines how the op-ed section of two prominent international newspapers were used for the articulation of public diplomacy issue stands by international experts who made an attempt to influence both government policy and public opinion abroad.     

Beyond a dyadic approach to public diplomacy: Understanding relationships in multipolar world

This study advocates for a multipolar approach to public diplomacy within a public relations framework. This study applies semantic network analysis to understand Chinese public diplomacy efforts during the 2011 Libya crisis. Two theories, image building and relationship management, informed the analysis. Four important findings emerged from the analysis. First, the evidence suggests that the combination of image building and relationship management provides a comprehensive theoretical framework to understand public diplomacy communication efforts. Second, understanding triads of national relationships reveals nuances that cannot be captured by a dyadic approach to public diplomacy. Third, this study introduces a new method, semantic network analysis, to the research of public diplomacy, and reveals linguistic relationships and shared meaning manifested in the content of People's Daily newspaper coverage of the Libya crisis. Finally, the findings support the pervasiveness of multipolar thinking. Public diplomacy in general, and soft balancing specifically, is about positioning a nation in a wider context and strategically using relationships to accomplish foreign policy goals.     

The fear of public relations in foreign affairs: an examination of the 1963 Fulbright Hearings into foreign agents

Public relations has long been looked at with suspicion given its use of persuasion to influence public opinion. That suspicion turns to fear when public relations is linked to propaganda. The 1963 Senate Foreign Relations Committee's investigation into the Foreign Agents Registration Act provides an opportunity to explore the fear of the public's susceptibility to propaganda and the perceived role of public relations in shaping public opinion. Public relations practitioners working for foreign clients were portrayed in the hearings as mercenaries who worked behind the scenes to influence American foreign policy.     

Shifting Imperial Strategies in Contemporary Latin America: The U.S. Empire and Venezuela under Hugo Chávez

Some scholars have shown how the U.S. has deployed several traditional, imperial strategies to maintain global power, including military interventions, support for proxy governments, economic coercion, and the exercise of hegemony. In many countries, though, these strategies cannot effectively work. Some countries have elected leaders that defy U.S. influence, and, in middle‐income countries, the U.S. cannot use economic coercion. The U.S. also cannot militarily invade all countries that possess anti‐American governments. How, then, does the U.S. aim to confront and control anti‐American governments in the contemporary world? I examine U.S. foreign policy towards Venezuela under Hugo Chávez, who recurrently challenged U.S. global power during his time in office. Through interviews with U.S. state elites, who developed policy towards Venezuela, and through analysis of U.S. diplomatic cables, I show how the U.S. has moved away from traditional, imperial modalities and towards new imperial techniques aimed at frustrating political processes within particular countries, as well as containing their global influence. These techniques include pressuring the federal judiciary, utilizing state agencies to fund and support opposition political parties and NGOs, seeking to terminate particular pieces of legislation, and eliminating eligibility for global leadership positions. These efforts do not immediately aim to displace existing governments, but, in the least, they aim to frustrate the domestic efforts of particular governments, and ultimately cultivate conditions favorable for the political opposition to eventually attain political power.     

Track three diplomacy and human rights in Southeast Asia: the Asia Pacific Coalition for East Timor

Transnational networks of non‐government organizations are increasingly becoming a fixture in international relations, particularly their contribution to traditional notions of diplomacy and its objectives. Less noticed, however, is the involvement of transnational NGO networks in alternative channels for diplomatic exchange, which have been referred to as ‘track three diplomacy’. Described as a form of civil society that transcends borders and nationalities, track three networks and activities involve NGO networks that are movement based, and concerned primarily with raising public consciousness over issues. While their direct influence on formal processes of foreign policy‐making has been limited, they have contributed to expanding both the scope of debate in international relations and the breadth of participation in those debates. Track three networks provide a forum for those communities marginalized by an international system that gives primacy of place to states and their officially‐declared concerns. Their impact is limited, however, by their lack of institutionalization and their reluctance to cooperate with government agencies – an issue that goes towards both their effectiveness and their identity in the long‐term.