The International Communication Association (ICA) holds its annual conference later this week here in Phoenix 24-28 May, and the CSC is sponsoring two events focused on strategic communication.  If you’re interested in strategic communication and in town for ICA, please consider these events.

First, the CSC has put together a back-to-back panel series on strategic communication in the public sector.  The first panel addresses theoretical and ethical issues and the second focuses on case studies (detailed panel descriptions below.)  The panels are scheduled to begin at 9:00am, Monday May 28, in the Sheraton Downtown Phoenix, in Room Maryvale B.

Second, the CSC will host a networking reception 8pm, Sunday May 27 at the Compass Room (located in the Hyatt Regency Hotel, 122 North 2nd Street, Phoenix, AZ) for scholars and practitioners of strategic communication.

We look forward to seeing you at both events.

State- and Supra-State-Sponsored Strategic Communication I:  Theories, Foundations and Ethics (Monday, May 28, 9:00 in Maryvale B)

Strategic communication is deeply intertwined in many of the pressing government policy action problems of the present day.   Consider US Secretary of State Clinton acknowledging to Congress that the US is losing the ‘battle of the narrative’ in Afghanistan or the Japanese government’s struggle to assure its own citizens and the world of the expediency of their crisis response. Consider, too, the challenges the UN has in formulating crisis and post-crisis intervention polices, or the challenges NATO faces in articulating to its constituent citizens and leaders the future direction of the organization.  These examples illustrate that strategic communication should be an intrinsic part of policy development, public diplomacy and crisis response among a number of governmental and supra-governmental agency actions. However, only modest attention has been paid to strategic communication in the public sector.

What are the foundational concepts and theories that inform our understanding of strategic communication in government contexts? What ethical concerns are involved when governments attempt to inform, persuade, or influence their citizens or other populations?  How should these concerns be addressed?  This panel explores definitional issues, theoretical considerations, methodological approaches and ethical concerns to come to a richer understanding of strategic communication in a government context.

State- and Supra-State-Sponsored Strategic Communication II:  Case Studies in Success and Failure (Monday, May 28, 10:30 in Maryvale B)

This panel uses case studies to explore the factors that lead to success or failure in strategic communication from states to their citizens. These cases include the American government’s communication about cancer prevention and control, the “War on Terror,” and concerning the prosecution of polygamy. Two papers have an international perspective, examining “The Singapore Story” as a narrative about the city-state that attempts to support its corporatist system of governance, and a comparative view of Singaporean and Indonesian responses to Islamist terrorist threats. What are the factors that make government-to-population communication successful? How do states use new forms of media to get their messages across? How do populations respond? What causes them to accept or reject the message, or act to support or oppose the campaign?

Other ICA Panels of Interest to Strategic Communication Scholars and Practitioners

Friday, May 25:

Corporate & Strategic Public Relations (12:00 in Alhambra)

New Era of Strategic Communication: Data & Algorithms (3:00 in Valley of the Sun E)

Creating Community, Achieving Mission (3:00 in Paradise Valley)

Saturday, May 26:

CSR Communication in Social Media: Theory, Cases, Research (9:00 in Alhambra)

Safety, Risk & Crisis Communication (10:30 in Alhambra)

Building Community Through Public Sector Orgs (4:45 in Valley Sun B)

Sunday, May 27

State-Press Relationships and Diplomacy (9:00 in Maryvale A)

No related posts.

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The House of Representatives has been working to amend the laws that govern the dissemination of “propaganda” materials in the U.S.  What seemed like a good idea to me and others–one long overdue–is being spun by some observers as a dark effort by the DoD and State Department who want authorization to brainwash Americans.

Last night Buzzfeed posted an article claiming that the changes were being quietly inserted into a defense authorization bill. However, as Matt Armstrong reported, the changes were also part of a stand-alone bill (H.R. 5736) introduced last week.  I confess I am no expert on the arcania of legislative machinery, but the fact that this bill was introduced a week ago and published by the Library of Congress–then later attached to the defense bill–strikes me as more of a procedural move than an effort to sneak something through.

In a further effort to build a sinister narrative, Buzzfeed frets that this is some sort of effort to enable unfettered psychological operations by the military and government on the U.S. population.  Assorted quotes from the article:

The bill’s supporters say the informational material used overseas to influence foreign audiences is too good to not use at home, and that new techniques are needed to help fight Al-Qaeda, a borderless enemy whose own propaganda reaches Americans online.

The new law would give sweeping powers to the State Department and Pentagon to push television, radio, newspaper, and social media onto the U.S. public.

“Senior public affairs” officers within the Department of Defense want to “get rid” of Smith-Mundt and other restrictions because it prevents information activities designed to prop up unpopular policies—like the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

I am not a legal expert, and I suppose changes could have these kinds of consequences if not made carefully.  But I doubt these these are the intended outcomes.

People in the strategic communication and public diplomacy arena (including me) have agreed for some time that changes to Smith-Mundt are needed.  Nobody I know wants changes so they can–MWAHAAHAAHAA!–run propaganda ops on Americans.  It’s more of an effort to recognize the reality of the modern situation.

The law in question was passed after World War II and the intent of the sections under review was originally indeed to prevent State Department communication from influencing the U.S. government.  But since then an interpretation has evolved that the law forbids propaganda destined for foreign audiences from being disseminated domestically, that it applies to the military as well, and that it applies to the most innocuous kind of information.  As Matt points out, “legally, the American public is not supposed to know what Michelle Kwon, for example, does when she is traveling abroad on behalf of the State Department as that is a public diplomacy trip.”

Maintaining a firewall between foreign and domestic audiences was perhaps more feasible when the Internet hadn’t even been conceived.  Today it is impossible.  Any communication by the U.S. government or military anywhere can make it back to the United States in a matter of seconds.  Changes in law are needed to recognize reality and prevent our strategic communication agencies from spending time/resources trying to stop the inevitable.  Not only is this a waste of resources but it inhibits our ability to respond to events in a timely manner when communication plans have to be reviewed by teams of lawyers in an effort to comply with an archaic law (I have been told this is something that happens regularly).

Unintentional domestic dissemination is one thing, but what about more intentional efforts critics are claiming this legislation would enable?  The language in the House bill seems clear enough that it only applies to “materials prepared for dissemination abroad” and does not in any way authorize expenditures for targeted influence of domestic audiences.

Update May 20

Other posts on this topic:

• Jonathan Turley
• Juan Cole

No related posts.

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The release last week of documents captured from Osama bin Laden’s compound in Abbotabad has generated a flurry of interest in the press and blogosphere.  Yet a question has arisen as to whether the release was wise, since the documents are intelligence assets that could give the enemy valuable information regarding what we know about them.  We argue that the release makes sense from a strategic communication perspective, given what al-Qaeda has become.­

The controversy was raised by James Carafano of the Heritage Foundation in an op ed in Friday’s New York Post. Asking “why would the government publish these documents in the first place,” Carafano concluded that it was an act of election-year “preening” by the White House, and said:

The first rule of intelligence is this: Don’t tell the enemy anything if you don’t have to. It would be like FDR releasing the messages captured by ULTRA, the US-British signals-intelligence program that broke the Nazis’ most secret codes.

The analogy to ULTRA is excessive (al-Qaeda leadership already knew we captured their documents whereas the Nazis did not know we had broken their codes), but Carafano’s basic objection is worth taking seriously.  Our position is that whatever intelligence disadvantages accrued from the release are more than offset by strategic communication advantages.

First, everyone agrees that the conflict formerly known as the Global War on Terrorism long ago degraded al-Qaeda’s ability to organize large scale attacks.  As outlined in President Obama’s National Strategy for Counterterrorism, American-led efforts in Afghanistan and Pakistan have destroyed much of al-Qaida’s leadership and “weak­ened the organization substantially.”

For some time now, the concern has been less about al-Qaeda’s operational abilities and more about their force as a social movement. Its brand name has been flexible enough in recent years, much to bin Laden’s discontentment, to accommodate everyone from regional affiliate organizations to organically appearing terrorist cells to anomalous lone wolves.  In many ways, the social movement that al-Qaeda hoped to inspire on 9/11 has transcended the group that created it.

Robert Benford and David Snow have shown that social movements face three key framing tasks. Diagnostic framing means identifying what a movement should consider as the problem it is facing.  Prognostic framing deals with establishing a course of action, and motivational framing establishes reasons members should participate in the recommended actions.

Al-Qaeda has been masterful at diagnostic framing.  The problem, as presented to their audience, is that the West is engaged in a cosmic battle against Islam—a continuation of the Crusades.  Stories of recent wars, al-Nakba (the loss of Palestine to Israel), and treacherous alliances with governments of the Middle East all support this narrative.  Their diagnosis is that a force of champions must step forward to defeat this menace and restore the Ummah to safety and prosperity, and that violent offensive Jihad is the only plausible path to success.  For example, Ayman al-Zawahiri asserted in a 2008 video that “there is no hope of removing the foul regimes in the Muslim countries by anything but force. There is no opportunity for change through peaceful activity.” The motivational frame is to portray al-Qaeda as this champion, an organization that all good Muslims should support, if not join.

Attacking a movement’s framing ideally means undermining its diagnosis, because without it the prognosis and motivation are irrelevant. However, this is impractical in the case of al-Qaeda because public opinion in Muslim continues to support their diagnostic framing.  The alternative, then, is to attack the prognosis and motivation. The same public opinion data show better prospects here, with half to three-quarters of Muslims expressing concern about Islamist extremism.

Release of the Abbotabad documents is good strategic communication precisely because it further undermines the idea that al-Qaeda is a champion of Muslims and that they deserve support. The documents are already challenging, if not entirely rewriting, the bin Laden story. Al-Qaeda’s senior leadership can no longer be viewed as master architects running the show from behind a curtain. Rather, the documents reveal impotent leadership in an al-Qaeda that is internally divided, marginalized and exasperated.

The image is equally bad for their regional affiliates in places like Iraq and Yemen.  Far from the dutiful soldiers they portray themselves to be, the documents show just how far off the reservation they have wandered, pursuing parochial agendas against bin Laden’s wishes and the interests of al-Qaeda’s brand.  They are revealed as loose cannons that can accomplish little except killing the Muslims they are supposed to be saving.

Release of the documents is also justified because turnabout is smart play.  Al-Qaida has long supported the philosophy of rhetorical ninjitsu. Any time they can turn our own words against us, they do.  In the foreword to a book he penned about America’s internal bureaucratic dysfunction al-Qaeda senior leader Abu Jihad al-Masri even used the phrase, “From the words of your own mouth I condemn you” to describe this strategy.

Now the tables are turned.  Thousands of al-Qaeda’s followers in the extremist support forums have already read about these documents, which highlight bin Laden’s strategic irrelevance and managerial impotence. Their reactions are of defensiveness and confusion.  It is hard to dismiss the evidence when it is penned by bin Laden’s own hand.

In short, the Abbotabad documents should have been released because they provide a golden opportunity to injure al-Qaeda the social movement.  The anachronistic argument that they should not have been released ignores the reality that today our adversaries thrive more on perceptions of strength and leadership than real world applications of it.

Update May 11, 2012

Tony Lemieux has posted a blog on this topic.

Related posts:

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Indonesian extremists continue to portray Ambonese Christians as engaged in separatist rebellion against Indonesia, and a crusade against Muslims. This isn’t true, but raises the question: where on earth did they get this idea?

The adage that if a lie gets repeated enough times it becomes true is, apparently, applicable in Indonesia’s Ambon region. It was home to a brief separatist insurgency following the Indonesian revolution (1945-49).  Following their defeat in 1950, the separatists (who were Dutch loyalists and both Christian and Muslim) fled the region for asylum in Holland.  There they have carried the torch for an independent Republic of the Southern Moluccas (RMS) ever since.

A strange thing happened with the case of the RMS over time, however: It came to be perceived as a Christian movement that is anti-Islam in nature. Islamist sources in Indonesia repeated this claim Tuesday as the 25 April anniversary of the declaration of the RMS approaches:

History shows that the formation of the RMS is a kind of rebellion among a number of Christian Moluccans opposed to the Jakarta Charter (that would impose Shariah law as state law) as the foundation for the state… This proves that the Moluccan Christian Community has the spirit of separatism, where the church protects these separatist movements.

Nevermind that Islamist extremists aren’t particularly fond of the Indonesian state and its newfound democracy, and that some of them want the state dissolved into a pan-Southeast Asian caliphate that include Malaysia, southern Thailand, Singapore, and southern Philippines.

Scholars – notably Richard Chauvel – have noted that the RMS movement was supported by both Christians and Muslims, especially those who gained by their associations with the Dutch. This included village-level and higher Muslim authorities. They were supported by the Dutch and felt that they would lose the prestige and financial rewards – and be punished by the Indonesians – for this association with the former colonizer.

Because much of the fighting that occurred was between the Ambonese Dutch colonial soldiers (who were predominantly Christian and trusted by the Dutch) and the predominantly Muslim nascent Indonesian military, the perception that it was a war of Christians versus Muslims emerged and spread. This is despite the fact that Indonesia’s first president had Christian Moluccans among some of his most trusted (and rewarded) advisers.

While it is true that most Christians, including Moluccans (such as Johannes Leimena, co-founder of the Christian political party Parkindo and member of both Sukarno’s and Suharto’s cabinets) opposed the Jakarta Charter and lobbied against it, so did many Muslims. Opposing the Jakarta Charter did not make one a separatist, but rather merely one who disagreed with Sharia as the foundation of the state. But among some of today’s Islamist thinkers in in Indonesia, opposing sharia as state law makes one a separatist.

After the debate over the Jakarta Charter, many of the Muslims who supported it, such as Muslim cleric, scholar and prolific writer Haji Abdul Malik Karim Amrullah, essentially conceded their loss and accepted the desire of the majority. The country had more pressing problems to overcome. In the early years of Indonesian independence, Sukarno made repeated overtures to reassure the Moluccan Christians (and Christians elsewhere) that they would be welcome in the Indonesian fold, even while the smoldering remnants of the RMS waged a low-intensity guerrilla war on nearby Ceram Island (the main RMS rebellion was put down within a year or so).

When Suharto came to power, however, things changed. Following a bloody purge of communist and left-leaning Indonesians, Suharto imposed a security state based on fear to create stability. Despite the lack of danger from the extinguished RMS, Suharto treated the Ambon region as a threat, built up a strong military presence there, and continued to cite it (along with West Papua, Aceh, and after its 1975 invasion, East Timor) as a threat to the unity of the Indonesian state. He planned to ease population density on Java and elsewhere and to “water down” Christian communities perceived as supporting separatism. So Suharto ordered forced and voluntary transmigration to Ambon and other regions. This sparked resentment.

In 1998, the East Asian Economic Crisis caused chaos that crippled Indonesia’s economy and led to the abdication of Suharto. Violence between Christians and Muslims broke out in Ambon and nearby regions. Scholarship has shown that political competition and jockeying for power in a newly democratizing Indonesia was a major factor in the violence in Ambon. The violence started between Christian Ambonese and non-Ambonese Muslim immigrants.

But the government – and Islamists – blamed the RMS. Muslim senior military officials were implicated in programs to send arms and armed groups to the region, which swung the advantage clearly to the Muslims fighting the Christians. A nervous peace emerged in the region following the conflict’s cessation.

It was shattered last September and December as Muslims once again battled Christians (see COMOPS blog post here). Again, Islamists blamed the RMS.

In my experience interviewing Christian Ambonese in Java and the Ambon region, they, and the vast majority of Christian Ambonese, remain frustrated but loyal Indonesians. No matter what they do or how vehemently they refute the accusation that they are separatists, they continue to be framed as such by Islamists and by some in the Indonesian government.

This legacy, dating back to the Suharto era, is based on lies and fear. It goes to show, however, that state-sponsored strategic communication – albeit with dubious goals – can come back to haunt. The nominal enemies of the state – in this case, Indonesia’s Islamist extremist community –  use these arguments to support their calls for violent jihad among a predominantly peaceful and loyal Ambonese Christian community.

Despite the tremendous positive changes Indonesia has made since beginning its transition to democracy, it continues to struggle in some regions that have or are currently experiencing conflict. Ambon is one such region. If the Indonesian government actively worked to dispel the myth that separatism was somehow tied to Christianity in the region and more actively promoted the role of patriotic Christian Ambonese (such as Leimena, who was declared a national hero), it would help to deflate the argument that the Indonesian state’s enemies – the Islamist extremists – are making. It could also deescalate some of the tensions that lead to spasms of violence, and eliminate some of the resentment among Christian Ambonese, many of whom are frustrated with being portrayed as a threat to the state. A more peaceful Ambon is in everyone’s interest – except the Islamist extremists.

Related posts:

1. Extremists Stoking Religious Violence in Indonesia by Chris Lundry Violence between Muslims and Christians broke out...
2. Another Bombing in Indonesia, Another Struggle over Framing by Chris Lundry On Sunday, September 25, a lone suicide...
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The CSC has an article in the current issue of Studies in Conflict and Terrorism on casualty inflation by the Taliban in the Afghanistan conflict.  The abstract follows, and the full text is available here (subscription).

Cooking the Books: Strategic Inflation of Casualty Reports by Extremists in the Afghanistan Conflict

Chris Lundry, Steven R. Corman, R. Bennett Furlow, & Kirk W. Errickson

Islamist extremists in Afghanistan and elsewhere are exaggerating their successes in inflicting casualties on American and other International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) forces. This article quantifies the exaggeration for the month of November 2010, putting the claimed casualty rate at approximately one-half battalion per month. It provides an analysis of how and why this is occurring, and links this extremist strategic communication effort to dominant historical master narratives in the region that may produce sympathy among intended recipients of the messages. The authors argue that these measures undertaken by the extremists can be countered successfully through the use of similar story forms, more timely reporting, use of side-by-side comparisons, and use of similar reporting venues. These steps could challenge the credibility of the Taliban reports, reduce sympathy, and diminish potential recruitment.

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2. Public Diplomacy: Books, Articles, Websites #60 by Bruce Gregory* Morton Abramowitz and Mark Lowenthal, “Restocking the...
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Last month, James Appathurai, NATO’s Deputy Assistant Secretary General for Political Affairs and Security Policy,  agreed to participate in an electronic Q&A sponsored by the Atlantic Community.  He answered 20 questions in four installments, on global partnerships and the Arab spring, partnerships in Asia, questions on Central Asia/Caucasus, and the NATO mission.  The latter includes an item on the NATO narrative that illustrates the large challenge the alliance faces in filling a narrative vacuum that currently exists.

Yours truly was invited to submit a question to Mr. Appathurai. As it happened, my colleagues and I had recently been discussing the issue of NATO’s narrative. So I asked:

It is widely acknowledged that public and political support for the NATO alliance is flagging in many member countries. I and many of my colleagues believe this is because NATO’s narrative has been slowly disintegrating. With the Cold War some twenty years in the past, its original motivating conflict is fading from memory.

What do you see as a sustainable narrative for NATO in the 21st Century? What basic conflict does it exist to deal with, and what desire does that create? What is the projected resolution of that desire? What actors, actions, and events lead from the desire to the resolution?

He answered:

This is the classic and very important question. I don’t mean classic in an old-fashioned sense. We debate this here all the time. I personally don’t have too many questions about it.

What we don’t have is a good slogan. In the early days of the Cold War, one NATO Secretary General defined NATO’s purpose as “keeping the Americans in, the Russians out, and the Germans down.” That was the post-Second World War conception. Since the end of the Cold War, those things aren’t really necessary. The Americans are in. We don’t need the Russians out. Actually, we have them as partners. And the Germans are, of course, strong and vibrant members of this Alliance and of Europe and of the world, without there being anything negative, only positive things about that.

So we never found a good new slogan. And I can assure the new Secretary General has encouraged us to look for one. But to my mind, NATO is about what it is and then about what it does. What it is, is a collection of democracies that is uniquely capable militarily. No other organization can do what NATO can do militarily. You saw it in Libya. You see it in Afghanistan. And that’s a priceless thing because there are times when you need that capability as an international community. We can’t get rid of it.

And it’s also a place where we consult politically. All these 28 countries are here every single day and discussing and debating all sorts of issues. And by the way, with a very wide group of partners now as well. So it is a unique political forum and a very important one.

What do we do? We do three things. We do collective defense. That’s the ultimate mission of NATO, to defend the Allies. Second, crisis management. I mentioned Libya, I mentioned Afghanistan. I can mention Kosovo. I can mention counter piracy missions. And third we do collective security. Building trust and confidence and inter-operability in the broadest political sense as well as technical sense with partners around the globe. So all of that I think is a very important role. But I can’t think of the slogan to define it, and I tried for a long time. I came up with a lot of bad ones, but I never came up with a good one.

I would first like to thank Mr. Appathurai for answering my question, and indeed for participating in entire exercise.  High ranking officials are not required to do things like this, and taking the time that was involved here indicates his commitment to strengthening the alliance’s partnerships and frameworks, and doing so openly and participatively. This is commendable.

That said, I do not find his response especially satisfying.  True, it might be useful if NATO had a slogan. But slogans encapsulate narratives; they do not substitute for them.  I suspect Mr. Appathurai’s difficulty finding one stems from the incoherence of the narrative elements as they exist.  Yes, NATO “defends the Allies” and does collective security, but defends and secures against what?

The second paragraph of my question invokes a narrative arc described by Kenneth Burke.  He said that all narrative is based on a conflict (or other deficiency) that creates desire.  The desire implies a satisfaction (actual or potential). Narrative is a trajectory of participants, actions, and events that leads from the desire to the satisfaction.  This is rhetorically powerful because the narrative is grounded in the desire, and suggests a path to the resolution of the desire.  The need for satisfaction creates an incentive for people to buy into the trajectory–i.e. accept and participate in the narrative.

During the Cold War, NATO had a very strong narrative arc.  The conflict was with the Soviets, as Mr. Appathurai notes, and its behavior in the wake of World War II created a strong desire for protection from the “bear in the woods” (to use the 1984 Reagan campaign’s brilliant storyline).  The bear threatened to eat the North Atlantic countries, so a strong military alliance was the resolution of that desire.  NATO–its participating countries, treaty, mutual defense agreements, joint exercises, funding, etc.–was the trajectory leading from the desire to the resolution.  The story form organizing this narrative was deliverance, in which a threatener menaces a community until a champion comes along to defeat the threatener and restore the community to safety (David and Goliath is a deliverance story).

This was a compelling narrative that served NATO well for many decades.  Then the bear wandered away, leaving a gap where there was once a clear conflict creating a strong desire for the trajectory leading to the alliance.  As a result, to some observers, NATO looks today like a solution in search of a problem.  Lawrence Kaplan, for example, wonders if NATO is anything more than the military arm of the UN.

The 9/11 attacks against the United States are the basis for NATO’s participation in the Afghanistan conflict, and terrorism seems to be the leading candidate for a new conflict/threat to organize NATO’s narrative.  A page on NATO’s website explaining Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty even bears the header (graphic) “NATO and the Scourge of Terrorism.”  Terrorism also figures prominently in  NATO’s most recent (2010) strategic concept.

However, there are many ways terrorism does not fit into NATO’s existing story.  It would be a stretch to link NATO’s action in Libya to terrorism (while the Libyan government is suspected of involvement in the bombing of Pan Am 103, that happened over 20 years ago).  The intervention in Kosovo was not related to terrorism. Also numerous terrorist incidents in Europe in the 70s and 80s were never met with a NATO response.  There is even disagreement, especially in Europe, about whether terrorism should treated as a matter of war (as opposed to crime).

Stephen Walt notes the incoherence of the current narrative when he says “in recent years NATO has tried to transform itself into some sort  of global expeditionary force.” This incoherence leaves some NATO partners questioning their investment, and disagreeing about what the organization should be, as Klaus Wittman notes in a Danish Institute of International Studies report:

[T]here is no really solid unity on a number of issues: namely whether NATO is a regional or a global organisation, predominantly political or military, how it must balance collective defence and expeditionary orientation, how it must assess certain security challenges and their emphasis in the view of individual allies, the NATO–EU relationship and its political ‘blockage’, the UN mandate issue, the approach to Russia, nuclear weapons policy etc. (p. 37)

Most commentators seem to agree that NATO should be sustained.  But this requires filling the current narrative vacuum.  To do so, NATO must define a clear conflict and corresponding desire that that alliance resolves. Once this is done, it should be scrupulous about maintaining narrative coherence by lending its name only to those actions that are squarely consistent with resolving the desire.

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In previous posts I have advocated amplifying al-Qaeda’s record of killing Muslims, and argued this practice was doing serious damage toAQ’s brand.  Captured documents from bin Laden’s compound indicate that he was worried about the same thing.

Last week David Ignatius of the Washington Post wrote a story based on his “exclusive look” at those documents.  The headline was about bin Laden’s supposed plot to kill President Obama.  But later in the story he describes bin Laden’s hand-wringing over his organization’s image:

Bin Laden’s biggest concern was al-Qaeda’s media image among Muslims. He worried that it was so tarnished that, in a draft letter probably intended for Atiyah, he argued that the organization should find a new name.

The al-Qaeda brand had become a problem, bin Laden explained, because Obama administration officials “have largely stopped using the phrase ‘the war on terror’ in the context of not wanting to provoke Muslims,” and instead promoted a war against al-Qaeda. The organization’s full name was “Qaeda al-Jihad,” bin Laden noted, but in its shorthand version, “this name reduces the feeling of Muslims that we belong to them.” He proposed 10 alternatives “that would not easily be shortened to a word that does not represent us.” His first recommendation was “Taifat al-tawhid wal-jihad,” or Monotheism and Jihad Group.

Bin Laden ruminated about “mistakes” and “miscalculations” by affiliates in Iraq and elsewhere that had killed Muslims, even in mosques. He told Atiyah to warn every emir, or regional leader, to avoid these “unnecessary civilian casualties,” which were hurting the organization.

“Making these mistakes is a great issue,” he stressed, arguing that spilling “Muslim blood” had resulted in “the alienation of most of the nation [of Islam] from the [Mujaheddin].” Local al-Qaeda leaders should “apologize and be held responsible for what happened.”

The moral is that words really do matter when it comes to government strategic communication.  As William Saletan writes in Slate, the Obama administration took a lot of political heat for ratcheting-down the “war on terror” rhetoric, but has been vindicated.  Maintaining the idea that the United States is fighting a religion only reinforces the clash of civilizations narrative, which in turns plays directly into the communication strategy of the Bad Guys.

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Rhetorical Charms: The Promise and Pitfalls of Humor and Ridicule as Strategies to Counter Extremist Narratives

In this article we provide a brief account of the uses of humor, in particular satire and ridicule, to counter extremist narratives and heroes.  We frame the appeals of humor as “rhetorical charms,” or stylistic seductions based on surprising uses of language and/or images designed to provoke laughter, disrupt ordinary arguments, and counter taken-for-granted truths, that contribute to new sources of influence to the globally wired world of terrorism.  We offer two recent examples of how the Internet in particular changed the narrative landscape in ways that offer potent evidence of uses of humor to remake extremist heroes into objects of derision.  We also caution those who would make use of humor as a strategic communication device to take into account the negative side effects and unexpected consequences that can accompany such uses.

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Morton Abramowitz and Mark Lowenthal, “Restocking the Toollkit,” The American Interest, Winter, January/February, 2012, 57-64.  Abramowitz (Century Foundation) and Lowenthal (Intelligence and Security Academy) lament two decades of US overreliance on military force and call for a stronger “array of diverse tools to influence events abroad.”   Critical weaknesses include lack of well informed political intelligence; failure “to mobilize a genuine vision of an active and efficacious diplomacy;” too many closed-off embassies and passive diplomats; government wide public information programs that are “stale, balkanized, and underfunded;” insufficient diplomatic focus on political opposition groups and a broad range of civil society institutions; and an American Foreign Service Association with too little enthusiasm for transformational change.  The authors frame their case for the 2012 political campaigns and the next cycle of foreign affairs reform.

Matt Armstrong, www,MountainRunner.us. Guest posts on the future of US international broadcasting, February 2012. Armstrong’s website provides a convenient platform to view a lively debate among current and former US broadcasters on the Broadcasting Board of Governors’ 2013 budget request and Strategic Plan, 2012-2016.  Includes:

Alex Belida, “Reforming U.S. International Broadcasting: A New Mission Statement,” (2/13/2012), “Reforming U.S. International Broadcasting (Part Two): What to do About the BBG?” (2/15/2012), “Reforming U.S. International Broadcasting (Part Three): A New Structure” (2/16/2012), and “Blind Ambition,” (2/16/2012).

Kim Andrew Elliott, “US International Broadcasting: Success Requires Independence and Consolidation,” (2/14/2012)

Alan Heil, “Whisper of America?” (2/14/2012)

David Jackson, “The Future of International Broadcasting,” (2/15/2012)

Caitlin Byrne, Campaigning for a Seat on the United Nations Security Council: A Middle Power Reflection on the Role of Public Diplomacy, CPD Perspectives on Public Diplomacy, Paper 10, 2011, USC Center on Public Diplomacy.  Drawing on her academic research and prior experience as a practitioner in Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Byrne (Bond University) argues that Security Council candidate nations must combine their intense lobbying in the UN with a broader range of efforts focused on reputation, image, and significant engagement and persuasion of international audiences.  Using Australia’s Security Council aspirations as a case study, Byrne looks at how and when middle powers might use public diplomacy strategies to supplement traditional diplomacy and achieve broader soft power outcomes.

Alan L. Heil, Jr., “All Quiet on the Western Front: 2012 Challenges and Opportunities in the Five-Year Strategic Plan for U.S. International Broadcasting,” American Diplomacy, December 2011. Heil (a former VOA deputy director and author of Voice of America) examines challenges facing US and European international broadcasters and the Broadcasting Board of Governors’ 2012-2016 strategic plan.  His assessment provides a detailed summary of recent organizational and functional changes in US broadcasting.  Can the new plan “meet and master the challenges?”  Heil’s answer is “Hopefully, yes.”

Michael Ignatieff, “The Return of Sovereignty,” The New Republic, February 16, 2012, 25-28.  The former leader of Canada’s Liberal Party returns to academe and uses his review of Brad R. Roth, Sovereign Equality and Moral Disagreement, (Oxford University Press, 2011) to argue that “Sovereignty is back.”  Ignatieff’s essay is a thoughtful reflection on the relationship between sovereignty and law, emotional identification of people with the sovereign, appropriate limits to lawful coercion to prevent chaos, and sovereignty’s continued relevance in the deep waters of global commerce.  “Sovereignty has returned,” Ignatieff argues, because citizens need a principle of authority more stable than price signals and government alone.  His essay offers a paradoxical conclusion: if we want justice in our political and diplomatic decisions to intervene in revolutions, and global markets that deliver jobs and take responsibility for their risks, then we need stronger, more capable, and more legitimate sovereign authority.

Charles Kupchin, Rosa Brooks, Rachel Kleinfeld, Tom Perriello, and Bruce Jentleson, “First Principles: America and the World,” Democracy: A Journal of Ideas, No. 23, Winter 2012, 8-45. The contributors to this collection of essays offer principles for a progressive foreign policy.

Charles Kupchin (Georgetown University) in “Grand Strategy: The Four Pillars of the Future” outlines key elements of a strategic alternative to isolationism and neoconservative adventurism.

Rosa Brooks (Georgetown University Law Center) calls for a humbler, more patient approach to democratization in “Democracy Promotion: Done Right, A Progressive Cause.”

Rachel Kleinfeld (Truman National Security Project) argues the US must facilitate connections with and among civil societies in “Global Outreach: Speaking to the Awakening World.”

Tom Perriello (a former member of Congress) in “Humanitarian Intervention: Recognizing When, and Why, It Can Succeed” examines issues and criteria relevant to the legitimate use of force.

Bruce Jentleson (Duke University) discusses foreign policy for a world where the US is “not at the center” in “Accepting Limits: How to Adapt to a Copernican World.”

Rebecca MacKinnon, Consent of the Networked: The Worldwide Struggle for Internet Freedom, (Basic Books, 2012). Drawing on her experiences as CNN’s Beijing and Tokyo bureau chief and work at Harvard’s Berkman Center for the Internet and Society, the co-founder of Global Voicies explores central issues in cyber power and Internet governance.  MacKinnon gives life to her analysis with stories of protest movements, policy debates, and uses and abuses of government and corporate power.  Public diplomacy enthusiasts will find particularly useful her accounts of digital empowerment in the Arab Spring, China’s Internet dilemmas, Wikileaks, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s Internet freedom policy, and the contrasting views of Internet experts Clay Shirky, Evgeny Morozov, and Ethan Zuckerman.

Petar Petrov, Karolina Pomorska, and Sophie Vanhoonacker, Guest Editors, “The Emerging EU Diplomatic System,” Special Issue of The Hague Journal of Diplomacy, Vol. 7, Nos. 1 2012. In this issue of HJD, the editors (Maastricht University) compile articles by scholars and practitioners that examine political, policy, organizational, legal, and contextual issues in the post-Lisbon EU diplomatic system. Includes:

Petar Petrov, Karolina Pomorska, and Sophie Vanhoonacker, “Introduction: The Emerging EU Diplomatic System: Opportunities and Challenges After ‘Lisbon.’”

Daniel C. Thomas and Ben Tonra, “To What Ends EU Foreign Policy? Contending Approaches to the Union’s Diplomatic Objectives and Representation.”

Jan Wouters and Sanderijn Duquet, “The EU and International Diplomatic Law: New Horizons?”

Edith Drieskens, “What’s in a Name? Challenges to the Creation of EU Delegations.”

Kolja Raube, “The European External Action Service and the European Parliament.”

Federica Bicchi, “The European External Action Service: A Pivotal Actor in EU Foreign Policy Communications?”

Simon Duke, “Diplomatic Training and the Challenges Facing the EEAS.”

David Spence, “The Early Days of the European External Action Service: A Practitioner’s View.”

“Public Diplomacy in the Age of Social Media,” New America Foundation, Washington, DC, February 16, 2012.  In this 90-minute YouTube video, Alexander Howard (Government 2.0) moderates a panel of mid-career US Department of State officers on social media trends and practices.  Panelists:  Suzanne Hall (Senior Advisor, Innovation in the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs), Nick Namba (Acting Deputy Coordinator for Content Development and Partnerships, Bureau of International Information Programs), and Ed Dunn (Acting Director, Digital Communications Center, Bureau of Public Affairs).

Olivier Roy, “Breakthroughs in Faith,” World Policy Journal, Winter 2011/ 2012, 8-13.  Roy (European University Institute, Florence, and author of Holy Ignorance) challenges dominant “clash or dialogue of civilizations” theories of the “return of the sacred” in diplomacy and global politics. Both “clash” and “dialogue” analysts err, Roy argues, in framing religion as transmitted identity rather than chosen faith.  Rather, the fundamentalist impulse in many religions is driven by rising secularization, not by resistance to modernization.  This gap between faith and identity has strategic consequences in the context of the Arab Spring, the role of Al Qaida, and rise of new religious movements as international actors disassociated from a given culture.

Barry Sanders, American Avatar: The United States in the Global Imagination, (Potomac Books, 2011).  Sanders (UCLA) looks at historical origins and recent manifestations of a broad array of complex and contradictory images of the United States.  His self-referential assessment (“The United States bears the world’s hopes and dreams as no other nation in history.”) examines a variety of psychological and cultural explanations for these images and the “slender connection between America and views about America.”  Sanders emphasizes Western perspectives and frames his interpretation of American exceptionalism as the “expectations and longings among foreigners in their expectations of the ‘American Dream.’”  He urges caution in using opinion polls, which are volatile and superficial, in analyzing attitudes and instead focuses on more deeply rooted predispositions and stored images.  His concluding chapter offers five positive images that matter in foreign policy and in “messages” that “can be sent by the practice of public diplomacy.”

Paul Sharp and Geoffrey Wiseman, eds., American Diplomacy, (Brill, Martinus Nijhoff, 2012).  Sharp (University of Minnesota, Duluth) and Wiseman (University of Southern California) compile essays by scholars and practitioners that “examine questions arising from the Obama administration’s efforts to revive American diplomacy and its response to the ways in which diplomacy itself is being transformed.”  Originally published as a special issue of The Hague Journal of Diplomacy (Vol. 6, No. 3-4, 2011), the book includes a new conclusion and index.  For an annotation of the content, visit “Public Diplomacy: Books, Articles, Websites #59.”

Jonathan Spalter, “Open-Source Diplomacy,” Democracy: A Journal of Ideas, No. 23, Winter 2012, 59-70.  Spalter (Chairman, Mobile Future) uses Eric Raymond’s essay, “The Cathedral and the Bazaar,” to frame an approach to US diplomacy that embraces open source technologies.  Spalter, a former USIA and National Security Council official in the Clinton administration, calls for “a more adaptive, technologically engaged, and diversely skilled professional foreign policy corps.”

Tara Sonenshine, “Engaging a World in Transition,” US Institute of Peace, January 23, 2012.  The nominee for US Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs discusses her views on public diplomacy, foreign and domestic challenges to US foreign policy, funding for diplomacy and development, leveraging the power of technology, and the need for increased “understanding of American values.”

Janice Gross Stein, ed. Digital Diplomacy in the Digital Age: Essays in Honour of Ambassador Allan Gotlieb, (Signal, 2011).   Essays by scholars, diplomats, and journalists look at diplomacy’s future and pay tribute to one of Canada’s leading diplomats.  Stein (University of Toronto) organizes their contributions in four sections:  “Diplomacy with the United States in the Age of Wikileaks,” “The Professional Diplomat on Facebook,” “Diplomacy in the Age of Twitter,” and “Where is Headquarters?”  Allan Gotlieb’s career and book, ‘I’ll Be With You in a Minute, Mr. Ambassador’ (see “Gem from the Past” below), are pioneering contributions to the study and practice of diplomacy.

“Sun Tzu and the Art of Soft Power,” The Economist, December 17, 2011, 71-74.  Drawing on the views of scholars and Chinese political leaders,The Economist looks at strengths and limitations in China’s increasing use of Sun Tzu as a tool in its soft power strategy.  

US Department of Defense, Sustaining Global Leadership: Priorities for 21st Century Defense,  January 2012.   With cover letters from President Barack Obama and Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, this 8-page “defense strategy” seeks to frame US national security interests, advance the Defense Department’s efforts to “rebalance and reform,” support deficit reduction through less defense spending, and profile the primary missions of US armed forces.  Although President Obama’s letter makes passing reference to strengthening all the tools of American power, “including diplomacy and development, intelligence, and homeland security,” the report makes no reference to strategic communication and information operations capabilities.

US Government Accountability Office, Broadcasting Board of Governors Should Provide Additional Information to Congress Regarding Broadcasting to Cuba, GAO-12-243R, December 13, 2011.  GAO finds that a strategic plan for US broadcasting to Cuba — submitted by the BBG in response to a Congressional directive in August 2011 –  lacked key information necessary for Congress to exercise it oversight responsibilities.  GAO recommends that the BBG provide an analysis of estimated costs and cost savings of sharing resources between the Office of Cuba Broadcasting and the Voice of America’s Latin American Division.  Report Summary.

Richard Virden, “Diplomacy and Public Diplomacy in One Country: Poland During the Cold War,” AmericanDiplomacy.org, December 21, 2011.  Retired diplomat Dick Virden provides insights into US public diplomacy in Poland during and after the Cold War.  His narrative looks at contrasting social and political environments in Poland during the 1980s and 1990s and implications for US public diplomacy tools and methods.

Vivek Wadhwa, “The First Brain Drain in the United States,” Georgetown Journal of International Affairs, Winter/Spring 2012, 89-96.  Using data gathered by a research team at Duke, Harvard, and UC Berkeley, Wadhwa argues that very few international students plan to stay in the US after completing their degrees due to flawed US immigration policies and better opportunities in their home countries.  “The world’s best and brightest now view the United States as a decreasingly attractive place to live and work.”

Jian Wang and Shaojing Sun, Experiencing Nation Brands: A Comparative Analysis of Eight National Pavilions at Expo Shanghai 2010, CPD Perspectives on Public Diplomacy, Paper 2, 2012, USC Center on Public Diplomacy. Jay Wang (University of Southern California) and Shaojing Sun (Fudan University) explore how Chinese visitors “experienced the branded space of national pavilions” at the Shanghai Expo and how this “brand experience” might have shaped or re-shaped their perceptions of the sponsor countries.  Drawing on surveys of visitors to the pavilions of Brazil, India, Israel, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, the United Arab Emirates, and the United States, the authors provide a wide ranging discussion of nation-branding as a concept, its use as an instrument of public diplomacy, China’s role as sponsor and target of public diplomacy, and the institutional value of World Expos.  Their  comparative study finds value in the “brand experience” framework, assesses the impact of the national pavilions, offers insights to Expo practitioners, and identifies areas for future research.

Wilton Park, “Putting the Power in Soft Power,” Conference Report, WP1117, October 12-14, 2011. In this online report, conference rapporteur Jayne Luscombe summarizes key points and views expressed by practitioners, scholars, and policymakers attending a three-day conference on soft power.  Wilton Park is associated with the UK’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office.

Jillian York, “The Arab Digital Vanguard: How a Decade of Blogging Contributed to a Year of Revolution,” Georgetown Journal of International Affairs, Winter/Spring 2012, 33-42.  The Electronic Frontier Foundation’s Jillian York looks at the evolution of the Arab blogosphere, the unique impact of its common language in creating “a transnational community of sorts,” and the variety of digital tools used for citizen activism.  Her optimistic account shows that what seemed sudden “was in fact the culmination of nearly a decade of efforts.”

Blogs of Interest

Robert Albro, “Models as Mirrors or Cultural Diplomacy?” Public Policy Anthropologist, February 15, 2012.  Albro (American University) offers comments on findings from a cultural diplomacy survey of scholars, policymakers, practitioners, and cultural producers who attended conferences on cultural diplomacy at AU.  Posted also on the USC Center for Public Diplomacy’s CPD Blog.

Daryl Copeland, “Canadian Public Diplomacy, Then and Now,” The Mark, January 3, 2012, and “A Future for Public Diplomacy” The Mark  January 12, 2012.  Copeland (Ottawa University and the author of Guerrilla Diplomacy) writes that Canada “once a pioneer in public diplomacy” now faces an “uphill battle” and is “trailing most of its diplomatic competition.”

Helle Dale, “Fill the Public Diplomacy Leadership Vacuum,” WebMemo, February 3, 2012 and “Quieting the Voice of America,” February 23, 2012. Dale (The Heritage Foundation) questions leadership, organizational, and budget deficiencies in the Department of State and US international broadcasting.

Gem From the Past

Allan Gottlieb, ‘I’ll be with You In Just a Minute, Mr. Ambassador,’ The Education of a Canadian Diplomat in Washington, (University of Toronto Press, 1991).  When Canada’s Allan Gottlieb arrived in Washington in 1981 to begin a seven-year tour as Ambassador to the United States, he anticipated most of his time would be spent in diplomatic formalities and meetings in the Department of State.  He quickly discovered that diplomacy’s radical transformation required the talents of an effective lobbyist and, in the words of former US Secretary of State James Baker, an ambassador who is “an insider” and who “knows how to work the system.”  Gottlieb’s book was and is a pioneering contribution to “the new diplomacy.”  This new diplomacy, he wrote, “is, to a large extent, public diplomacy and requires different skills, techniques, and attitudes than those found in traditional diplomacy, as it is practiced in most countries, including Canada.”
____________________________________

*Bruce Gregory is an Adjunct Professor at George Washington University and Georgetown University, and publishes this list periodically via mailing list.  We reprint it here as a service to our readers.  Bruce can be reached by email via bgregory at gwu dot edu

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I pass on, for your viewing enjoyment, a segment from the PBS Newshour about a perky, Chinese speaking, twenty-something Voice of America employee named Jessica Beinecke.  She is becoming something of a sensation in China by teaching American slang to people there via internet video.  Her program, called OMG! Meiyu, uses social media not only to distribute her shows, but to get viewers involved in selection of the slang to be covered in upcoming segments.  It’s a great example of how technology changes not only what we think of as public diplomacy, but innovative ways in which it can be delivered.

UPDATE February 12

Some of my colleagues asked why I used “boogers” in the title of the blog, when the video says nothing about this.  The actual PBS Newshour segment (which I wrongly assumed the video below displayed) had a clip from an OMG! Meiyu about “stuff that comes out of your face” (see it here) including boogers.  Sorry for the confusion.

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