Foreign Publics
This new face of diplomacy comes with both great benefits and also poten-tial threats. On the plus side, the value of word of mouth has a long history both in that it provides good marketing and reputation building without tangible cost and that others find it more believable than if the organization had promoted itself. However, on the negative side, sociological diplomacy is much harder to control. It is based more on individual actions and respons-es than systematic or planned communication campaigns. A country cannot control how individual citizens act in all situations, or prevent all foreigners from encountering racism or prejudice. Should a country or its individuals do something that others find offensive or wrong, these individuals only have to access their social networks to start gathering support from individuals and groups domestically and abroad. Despite a variety of countries attempting to control digital information flow both into as well as out of their country, the resourcefulness of citizens, revolutionaries, and activists has prevailed repeat-edly connecting these individuals with the information they were seeking and providing an audience for their voice so that they could mobilize support, awareness, and activism. These actions have often resulted in severe damage to a country’s soft power or complete social revolution.
Because of both the potential opportunities as well as the risks in this ap-proach to diplomacy, it is important to apap-proach the relationship with within border foreign publics in a symmetrical way and to attempt to achieve balance of interests among related parties (Grunig, 2009). Symmetrical communica-tion has been shown to be more effective than an asymmetrical approach in relationship building, particularly long-term relationship building between organizations and publics (Grunig & Huang, 2000; Hon & Grunig, 1999).
Kim and Ni (2011) have highlighted the need for diplomacy to not only be one sided in seeking soft power to secure one’s own nation’s interests, but also to be “soft empowering” to those countries who may be less culturally powerful or attractive to other nations. There is a need to open the dialogue and to learn from and understand each other in order to build successful and
enduring soft power; otherwise a nation runs the risk of being revealed as only seeking its own interests through cultural and social interactions. If this happens, the nation will in turn lose some of its soft power, as manipulation and exploitation are not viewed as factors that increase one’s attractiveness to others but may only further increase active information behaviors against the country among foreign publics.
Here again the role of the individual and grassroots movements is critical in developing effective and enduring soft power. As previously mentioned, their messages have the benefit of being seen as unbiased and authentic. As a result of recent developments in communication technology and social networking, within border foreign publics can spread their legitimized voice quickly and efficiently at a very low or no cost to the country. Thus making these publics a country’s greatest ally or enemy in the realm of diplomacy.
By extension of this idea, Kim and Ni (2011) highlight that a country might even reap benefits or losses from its own citizens interacting as diasporas or visitors within other countries. As a result it may be advantageous to cultivate cultural awareness and respect for diversity among one’s citizens in order for them to act as assets to a nation’s soft power both at home and abroad.
Furthermore, if governments embrace a role of facilitating instead of at-tempting to censor or limit the exchange of cultural products and information among social members internally and externally, they may encourage more creativity among cultural producers who can enact the role of positive diplo-mats on behalf of the nation (Kim & Ni, 2011). Lastly, governmental policy efforts to foster and secure open and egalitarian grassroots interactions will be critical to maximize positive communicative actions and temper negative communicative activism. The efforts of social institutions to create inclusive culture, tolerance for foreign values, and mutual respect for within border, foreign publics will also be important in encouraging positive communica-tive actions among these strategically positioned publics. Despite the shift to a more person-to-person approach, as dictated by sociological globalism, the role of the government in diplomacy has not been completely revoked.
However, it has been drastically altered and it is important that governments acknowledge this and adjust their approaches and policies to help mobilize the resources already available through their citizens and social organizations.
In today’s globalizing society some of the strongest potential advocates and adversaries of a nation and its diplomacy are no longer in the state offices and municipal buildings, but in the grocery store, the bar, and on Facebook.
These groups and individuals have the potential to be the most believable and affordable allies in building a nation’s soft power, but the relationship a na-tion cultivates with its within border foreign public is critical in determining
whether or not this potential is realized. This chapter has provided a discus-sion of major factors that influence that relationship as well as predictors of communicative action, the types of activism likely to be enacted, and import-ant considerations in developing these relationships. As we move forward in this age of globalization and digital technology it is likely that our networks and connections will only become more advanced and interconnected. Na-tions would do well to recognize the importance and value of relaNa-tionships with those key publics inside their borders and work to develop them to the best of their ability, not only to benefit relations within their borders but also to in turn bolster relationships with constituents abroad.
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