Week 2: Further thought on What we can Learn
In Kim’s entry this week she highlighted the element of “listening”.
As we highlighted last week, and she discussed this week through her discussion
of the case studies, this is truly a critical aspect in ensuring PD is
successful. Through “listening” those managing PD strategy are more likely to
create a locally appropriate and tailored message. As Kim pointed out, this led to a much more
powerful and successfully PD campaign in Pakistan by using Urdu versus
English.
Similarly, I was fascinated by the Bahrain case study.
Although the situation within the country situation was extremely tense, the
term “sectarian” violence was being used, and international media was being
restricted, the US Embassy was able to respond with a media campaign that eventually
integrated social media. By effectively utilizing both English and Arabic, and
responding to the multiple waves of violence, the US Embassy proved how a
responsive PD can be as a foreign policy tool.
I also appreciated Kim’s point about creative alternation
projects. I believe she summarized a lot of the case studies with this concept.
As a development practitioner, these case studies provided creative ideas without
needing significant amount of money. Some
of the easiest to implement – YouTube series, Alumni Outreach,
Facebook/Twitter.
Thanks, Julia! I'd really like to hear more about your perspective that you began to touch on in your last paragraph here... One of the short projects we have also highlights the importance of social media and alternative forums to conduct public diplomacy, and has us analyze those in a way. I'm certainly not a technology expert, and barely use Twitter, YouTube, and even Facebook these days. That said, I still grew up in a generation that definitely uses those sites to an extreme, and we've seen them being used to get news out (ie. Arab Spring), to get people to come to events, or to just spread an idea. It really changes the way diplomacy needs to be conducted, I agree; and Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State discussed this frequently and really pushed for more social media involvement. But I wonder what everyone's thoughts are on these forums, their success, and whether or not our cyber space is becoming too saturated to the point that critical information is being lost. That point was touched on in a few of the case studies and other articles read since, but I think it'd be an interesting conversation.
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