Cultural diplomacy - Demos

Cultural Diplomacy
Leonard outlined the four purposes for public diplomacy in the
twenty-first century:
� increasing familiarity – making people think about your
country and updating their image of it
� increasing appreciation – creating positive perceptions of
your country and getting others to see issues from your
perspective
� engaging people – encouraging people to see your country
as an attractive destination for tourism and study and
encouraging them to buy its products and subscribe to its
values
� influencing people’s behaviour – getting companies to
invest, encouraging public support for your country’s
positions, and convincing politicians to turn to it as an
ally.
In order to achieve these goals, he argued that public diplomacy needs
to operate in three dimensions – and that all three must be covered
for the overall strategy to be effective. First, governments need to deal
with communication on day-to-day issues, which requires them to
align themselves with the news agenda. In particular, they must stop
distinguishing between foreign news stories and domestic ones as if
the audiences were entirely different. Second, they need to use
strategic communication to manage the overall perceptions of their
country. Strategic communication is made problematic by the fact
that different institutions are responsible for managing different
aspects such as politics, trade, tourism, investment and cultural
relations. Third, governments must develop lasting relationships with
key individuals through scholarships, exchanges, training, seminars,
conferences and access to media channels. These relationships are not
built between diplomats and people abroad, but between peers
(politicians, special advisers, business people, cultural leaders and
academics).
Cultural activity has an important contribution to make to public
24 Demos