By Hans N. Tuch, Guest Contributor
Hans Tuch retired from the U.S. Foreign Service as a Career Minister in 1985. He also taught at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Georgetown University and the University of Missouri-Kansas City in the disciplines of Public Diplomacy and Inter-Cultural Communications.
l. Public diplomacy (by definition of the word "diplomacy") is a Government process to communicate with foreign audiences in an effort to gain understanding and support for our nation's ideas and ideals, our institutions and culture as well as our national goals and policies.
2. The focus of U.S. public diplomacy is in the field--carried out by professional Foreign Service public diplomacy officers at our embassies and consulates (see Mike Canning's "The Overseas Post: The Forgotten Element of our Public Diplomacy"). Our field officers are guided and backstopped by public diplomacy headquarters in Washington which sets policy, advises the White House and coordinates with other government agencies and private organizations. ( Radio and TV broadcasting and Internet operations, while located in Washington, are in effect also field operations geared toward the pertinent populations in foreign countries.)
3. Public diplomacy, in an attempt to affect the attitudes and opinions of foreign publics, involves the entire communications spectrum: contemporary communication technology, as well as such methods of intercultural communication as cultural and educational exchanges, libraries, publications, English teaching and, above all, people, among them professionally qualified foreign service officers specializing in public diplomacy.
4. Information and Cultural programs are inter-related: Long-term cultural and educational programs are designed to create a climate of knowledge and understanding of the United States that is necessary as a basis for foreign peoples to comprehend and accept policies and ideas promulgated through short-term information programs.
5. For U.S. public diplomacy to be effective it must include the very important "learning experience." If we strive to be successful in our efforts to create understanding and support for our society and for our policies, we must first understand the culture, language, history, psychology and motives of the people with whom we wish to communicate.