By Edward T. Palazzolo and Dawn Gilpin (With analysis support from Nick Brody, Jesse Herrera, Krista McNaughton, and Jordan Wolff) This is the third post in a series about the one-year anniversary of the State Department’s Dipnote blog. In Part 1 we focused on reviewing DipNote management and processes. In Part 2 we looked at [...]

by Steven R. Corman The GAO has just released a report on the 2009 Congressional and Presidential Transition.  Number five on the hit parade of urgent issues is improving he U.S image abroad (good beat, but it’s kind of hard to dance to). The GAO says that to accomplish this, policy makers must “improve their [...]

by Bud Goodall In today’s “Blogger’s Roundtable” with Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, James K. Glassman, Matt Armstrong from MountainRunner asked a really good question about the relationship of strategic communication to public diplomacy.  Under Secretary Glassman provided a detailed and thoughtful response that distinguished public diplomacy, which is aimed at various [...]

By Edward T. Palazzolo and Dawn Gilpin (with analysis support from Nick Brody, Jesse Herrera, Krista McNaughton, and Jordan Wolff) This post builds on the previously summarized meeting between Steve Corman and Angela Trethewey (COMOPS Faculty) and Heath Kern and Luke Forgerson (DipNote’s Editors). We reviewed roughly one year’s worth of DipNote posts and reader comments [...]

by Steven R. Corman I guess if it’s good enough for Queen Raina, then it’s good enough for State Department Spokesman Sean McCormick.  He will be taking your questions via YouTube video.  All you have to do is go to the State Deparment YouTube Channel and post your question. According to a video statement by [...]

by Steven R. Corman On Thursday the American Academy of Diplomacy released a new report on the dismal state of funding for U.S. diplomacy and public diplomacy efforts, compiled by a Task Force of 14 former senior foreign service officers.  They reckon that the diplomatic capacity of the United States has been “hollowed out” since [...]

by Steven R. Corman and Angela Trethewey One year ago, COMOPS Journal ran an analysis of the State Department’s blog Dipnote, which was then a brand new effort. We complimented them for making the foray into Web 2.0, reviewed the content and users’ reactions, and made recommendations for improving the blog. For reasons that aren’t [...]

by Steven R. Corman There has been some dispute in our little corner of the blogosphere lately about whether strategic communication is a good term for describing the government’s efforts to communicate strategically.  Matt Armstrong commented on this in the course of reviewing the latest plan from the DoD to get their strategic communication house [...]

by Steven R. Corman Matt Armstrong recently posted  an essay on the Smith-Mundt Act that has been getting a lot of attention.  In it he claims that the Act has outlived its usefulness, and I am on record as agreeing with him. Sharon Weinberger over at Danger Room has just finished posting a three part [...]

by Mark Woodward* On May 3, 2008 Cyclone Nargis struck the Irrawaddy delta in Southern Burma with devastating force. Nargis was a killer. The Burma government did not warn people in the region that the storm was coming or how severe it would be, though they clearly knew. According to some reports wind speeds of [...]