NPR: State Department Gets New Public Diplomacy Strategy

State Department Gets New Public Diplomacy Strategy

It took 18 months and some prodding from other agencies, but the State Department finally has a new strategy for communications and public diplomacy. The new plan is intended to help State Department diplomats around the world provide a unified message about U.S. policies and programs, something critics say has been lacking.

The new strategy identifies a need for the U.S. to take advantage of every medium to get its message across, including using blogs and other social media. It also says that the U.S. has to get diplomats as much airtime as possible in as many places as possible to talk about American policies and not be reticent about doing it.

Rena Pederson of the State Department told me more than 30 groups that work in diplomatic communication had a hand in creating the plan, which is intended to be a "living document" that will change as needs change. She also said the document was kept short so it would be used regularly in the field.

J. Michael Waller at PoliticalWarfare.org (who provided the original link to the document, which Pederson confirmed is authentic), gives the new plan a "gentleman's C." Waller, the Walter and Leonore Annenberg Professor of International Communication at the Institute of World Politics, notes that in grad school, anything below a B- is a failure, but he adds he might change his grade after rereading the document.

However, Price Floyd, a former State Department media director, quit recently after 17 years because he thinks the department's approach has been misguided. Floyd told On the Media that the department needs to spend less time on public relations and more time on two areas in particular: "good deeds," like the kind seen after the earthquake in Pakistan, and arranging exchanges to bring people to the U.S. and send Americans abroad. (The new plan does stress the need for more exchanges of this kind.)

The Bush administration has often been accused of setting aside diplomacy in favor of a military approach. This new plan could mark a major change in the way the administration views the use of soft power to rebuild America's image, which has deteriorated in many places around the world.

1:44 PM ET | 06-11-2007 | permalink

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