Lessons from the Past - USC Center on Public Diplomacy

18 Public Diplomacy
2.1 Listening
While most of <strong>the</strong> elements of PD are presented here in no
particular order, <strong>the</strong> choice of <strong>the</strong> first is deliberate, for it precedes
all successful public diplomacy: Listening. Listening is an actor’s
attempt to manage <strong>the</strong> international environment by collecting
and collating data about publics and <strong>the</strong>ir opinions overseas and
using that data to redirect its policy or its wider public diplomacy
approach accordingly. This has traditionally been an element of each
constituent practice of public diplomacy, with advocacy, cultural
diplomacy, exchange and broadcasting agencies each attending to
<strong>the</strong>ir own audience and opinion research. Information on foreign
public opinion has also been ga<strong>the</strong>red as part of <strong>the</strong> regular function
of conventional diplomacy and intelligence work. In its most basic
form this covers an event whereby an international actor seeks
out a foreign audience and engages <strong>the</strong>m by listening ra<strong>the</strong>r than
by speaking, a phenomenon which is much promised but seldom
performed. It is common to see public diplomacy responding to
shifts in international opinion; cases of listening or structured
opinion monitoring shaping <strong>the</strong> highest levels of policy are harder to
find. The holy grail of public diplomats is to be, in <strong>the</strong> famous words
of USIA director Edward R. Murrow, ‘in on <strong>the</strong> take-offs’ of policy
ra<strong>the</strong>r than just ‘<strong>the</strong> crash landings.’ While systematic assessments
of foreign opinion are modern, <strong>the</strong> state of a neighbour’s morale
has been a feature of intelligence reports as long as <strong>the</strong>re have been
spies. 7 No state has made responding to international opinion central
to its diplomacy or even its public diplomacy, but Switzerland has
made some interesting experiments in <strong>the</strong> field.
2.2 Advocacy
Advocacy in Public Diplomacy may be defined as an actor’s
attempt to manage <strong>the</strong> international environment by undertaking an
international communication activity to actively promote a particular
policy, idea or that actor’s general interests in <strong>the</strong> minds of a foreign