On November 5, 2009, the International Communication Program of American University’s School of International Service, with the co-sponsorship of the Public Diplomacy Council, hosted a 1-day conference (view conference trailer) on the AU campus exploring a fundamental question: What is the role of “culture” in the work of cultural diplomacy?
Keynote Address
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James Glassman, former U.S. Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, considers the circumstances of cultural diplomacy with respect to the challenges encountered while seeking to achieve his goal of winning what he calls the “war of ideas,” most obviously vis-à-vis the global war on terror, as an exercise in strategic communication. He understands “culture” as the prism “through which we view the world,” like a “pseudo-environment” that inserts itself between us and our environment. If he notes “an effective cultural diplomacy is one that promotes, enhances, and enriches the culture of critical nations,” he also emphasizes some “severe limitations on the work of cultural diplomacy.” And based on his experience in the State Department, he notes that there is not a lot of learning about culture that goes on there. At the same time, Glassman stresses, we cannot “read the minds” of others. For this reason, Glassman concludes, we cannot really understand another’s culture. If we ask, instead: how do others see us? he notes that cultural exchanges are government tools, but the U.S. cannot compete with the global circulation of its own “popular culture.” Therefore, while he exhorts us to “throw off our own solipsism and think of the rest of the world,” this does not mean trying to understand the cultures of others or being overly concerned with how others see us. Rather, he provocatively suggests that the U.S. dedicate its efforts “to improve pride and understanding by foreigners of their own cultures.”
Panel 1
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Richard Kurin, Under Secretary for History, Art and Culture, Smithsonian Institution, begins with the distinction between “cultural diplomacy” and “cultural exchange.” These are not the same activities, he tells us. If during the Cold War cultural diplomacy was, for Kurin, defined as “the pursuit of national self-interest using cultural means” and as promoting the case for “American exceptionalism” – which Kurin describes as the “superiority” model of cultural diplomacy – this is no longer viable in the post-Cold War multi-polar world. In an increasingly diversity-conscious world, people are skeptical of the U.S. popular cultural juggernaut as a potential threat to the integrity of their own cultural identities. Kurin suggests that at present cultural diplomacy should be less about promoting our national self-interest and more about pursuit of “closer inter-relationship” or “mutuality.” This means projecting U.S. diversity as meaningfully connected to the rest of the world. We also need to correct our “failure to take account of local cultures” by hosting, featuring, watching, reading, and listening to the culture of others. Kurin notes that such nuanced two-way exchange of necessity must also go well beyond just the arts, diplomacy, and scholarship as a more “grass roots citizen exchange” determined to build deeper long-lasting less self-interested relationships among people.
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Helle Dale, Senior Fellow for Public Diplomacy at the Heritage Foundation, begins by confirming the fact of universal values and the feasibility of communication between cultures, especially as these advance the goals of democratic governance and respect for individual freedoms. She poses the question: What makes for effective communication with Muslim cultures? To communicate a message with universal application, she notes, “we need to understand how that message will be received by specific other cultures.” She suggests the need for a return to a “field driven approach to strategic communication,” including listening closely to the national narratives of other nations, which she considers critical to the “communication our own national narrative.” This might include, for example, topics typically off our diplomacy radar, such as religious belief. She advocates for a RAND-like “Corporation for Foreign Opinion Analysis,” dedicated to “long-term market research effort aimed at better understanding foreign public opinion.”
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David Firestein, Director of Track II Diplomacy at the EastWest Institute, treats cultural diplomacy as a subset of public diplomacy, defined as the “US government’s efforts to understand, inform, and influence public opinion in support of US foreign policy objectives.” For Firestein, therefore, cultural diplomacy means “using culture as a vehicle for advancing America’s national interest.” This includes: getting people to understand us, getting people to like us, getting other nations to support us in our foreign policies, and finally, getting the world “to look a little bit more like us.” In pursuit of these goals, Firestein suggests, it has been assumed that: “culture” is an expression of American core ideals, these ideals are universal and powerful, and cultural diplomacy is a government undertaking – which is no longer tenable. The context in which we now “tell America’s story” has greatly changed from the Cold War to include the global circulation of popular culture. Given this, Firestein offers the example of his use of contemporary American country music – Honky Tonk diplomacy – as a way to access and open up dialogue on key policy issues in other national contexts.
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Nancy Snow, Associate Professor of Public Diplomacy, Syracuse University, asks: As a diplomatic tool, how does culture have a transformational effect on international affairs and among publics? She goes on to itemize a series of goals for the U.S. in achieving this transformational effect, including: 1. creation of a new Cultural Diplomacy Corps to “overcome perception and perspective myopias,” 2. rededication to person-to-person cultural exchanges of citizen ambassadors as opportunities of mediation, translation and synthesis, 3. expansion of the presence of cultural diplomats on college campuses and as part of a global education mission, 4. transformation into a “super engagement power” fostering “leadership in international dialogue, global partnership and negotiation” as global citizens. Considering the way forward, Snow adds that it is not too late to do these things and that, quoting from Edward R. Murrow, “truth is the best propaganda” and recognition of our shared “human dignity” our essential bond to cultivate.
Panel 2
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Frank Hodsoll, former Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, begins, noting, “Cultural diplomacy – or I would urge cultural engagement – is more about mutual understanding and respect of distinctiveness than it is about highlighting distinctiveness.” He explains we should be seeking to find common ground through cultural distinctiveness, as it nevertheless reflects universal human aspirations. This begins by listening and engaging with others sympathetically in ways promoting “mutual endeavor.” Hodsoll ascribes the importance of culture today in foreign affairs to: its close relationship to identity politics, an increase in global cultural commerce, the perceived threats of globalization, the influence of new regional media, and the rise of the internet. He suggests, therefore, that increasingly global power will be defined by “connections,” which depend upon communication, technology, and better mutual cultural understanding. Building these connections, Hodsoll advocates cultural engagement that brings “the art and culture of others to the U.S. and to celebrate them.”
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John Brown, Adjunct Professor of Liberal Studies, Georgetown University, takes the opportunity to reflect upon his experience as a U.S. Department of State Cultural Affairs officer in Russia, from 1998 to 2001, as a case study in cultural diplomacy. He asks four key questions: Why is culture important to Russians? How do Russians view American culture? What was my work as Cultural Affairs officer? What is the value of cultural diplomacy as seen by somebody who practiced it? In answer to these, he first notes that for Russians “culture” is considered part of their collective “identity,” as opposed to Americans, who define themselves “in terms of ideas.” Second, “Russian culture” receives state support in ways not found in the U.S. Third, Russians view culture – as “high culture” – to be “one of their main contributions to the civilization of mankind.” From the point of view of Russians, American popular culture is increasingly viewed as: vulgar, imperialist, and non-reciprocal. Brown emphasizes the need for better State Department support for cultural programming. Of his time in Russia, he notes, “in contrast to other major powers, we were not doing anything in the field of culture.”
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Kathleen Brion, President of the Public Diplomacy Alumni Association, notes, “I view cultural diplomacy from a practitioner’s perch.” And as she notes, just as diplomacy is a state function, “For me, cultural diplomacy is a government enterprise.” It is also, she stresses, “a process” and not a product. As a process, it is intended to: build trust in the U.S. as a partner, to give the U.S. government a means to open up and to shape alternative kinds of dialogues and to effect constructive changes in relationships over time. Citing examples from Macedonia, Japan and Bahrain, Brion suggests there is no definitive approach to a “democratic” cultural diplomacy. Instead, she asserts, narratives about the U.S. and Americans are built “from a complex of factors that define who we are, and how and why OUR version of democracy has evolved that way it has.” Democracy building, in this sense, is often not an explicit goal in the best kinds of cultural diplomacy work she cites here, and is secondary to building opportunities for successful partnered dialogues.
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Lawrence Wohlers, Senior Advisor for International Activities, Smithsonian Institution, explicitly focuses on arts diplomacy and its role in democracy promotion. For Wohlers, arts diplomacy in the State Department is distinct from the facilitation of cultural exchanges. He also notes that democracy promotion became a much more focused U.S. policy goal only upon the end of the Cold War, in Eastern Europe, the ex-Soviet Union and Africa. At the same time the funding for arts diplomacy suffered a precipitous decline. Wohlers asks: Since arts diplomacy was so crucial for the promotion of democracy during the Cold War, what happened? Wohlers notes the problem of not having anything to talk about with counterparts, once the focus solely becomes the nuts and bolts of democracy promotion. By reducing arts programming, he notes, we also reduced the context and platform for discussions needed to build relationships. It is in short a mistake to view arts diplomacy as a means to the end of democracy promotion. Instead it offers a beginning to a conversation. This is because arts diplomacy offers a way “to get foreign audiences to see Americans as normal people” like themselves.
Closing Remarks
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Robert Albro, Professor of International Communication, American University (View text PDF)
