The Foreign Service Journal, May 2014

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | MAY 2014 65 Navigating Two-Way Streets Searching for a Cultural Diplomacy Jessica C.E. Gienow-Hecht and Mark C. Donfried, editors, Berghahn Books, 2013, paperback/$34.95, Kindle Edition/$19.22, 278 pages. Reviewed by Ken Moskowitz In her introduction to this collection of case studies (Volume 6 in an ongoing series of “Explorations in Culture and International History”), Jessica Gienow- Hecht correctly avers that “the more interactive the structure of the cultural diplomacy program is, the more likely it is to be successful.” While that principle has gained new prominence thanks to social media, two-way dialogues have rarely, if ever, been absent from successful public diplomacy. For instance, the principle of mutual understanding was spelled out in the 1946 law establishing the Fulbright Scholar program, which has always aimed to educate the American public as much as overseas audiences. Gienow-Hecht and her co-editor, Mark Donfried, are on less firm ground, how- ever, in declaring that cultural diplomacy must always be delinked from politi- cal messages, with the Cold War as the best-known example. A cultural program entirely devoid of political content might draw big audiences, no doubt—but to what end? If your post’s public diplomacy program centers on organizing concert tours by American musicians even as local extremists are plotting to attack the embassy, why should U.S. taxpayers sup- port it, no matter how well attended those performances are? Similarly, one could enjoy a Confucius Institute seminar on, say, Chinese archi- tecture, but still disapprove strongly of Beijing’s human rights record or foreign policy. In such cases, appeals to mutual understanding have a hollow ring. While the editors deserve credit for assembling so many varied perspectives on cultural diplomacy, the results are uneven. The profile of Nitobe Inazô, a for- mer under-secretary general for Japan at the League of Nations, who spent a year teach- ing in the U.S. and then wrote in English about Meiji Japan, is interesting enough, but adds little to our understanding of the topic. Even more baffling is the chapter about the Bens- berger Memorandum, a 1968 document by a West German Catholic lay group proposing improved relations with com- munist Poland. This example of efforts by non-state actors, which we convention- ally label people-to-people diplomacy, can hardly inform diplomats about best practices given official constraints. More instructively, the repeated failures of Soviet diplomats and corre- spondents to engage Americans during the Cold War cited in the book serve as excellent negative examples of public diplomacy. As one Russian journalist warned at the time, the fear of deviation from prepared texts only “indulges anti- Soviet lore.” Yet while the task of trying to sell Soviet culture and society while on the losing side of history is a fascinating story, we current practitioners of PD should not be smug. At one time or another, all public diplomacy officers are tasked with making a silk purse out of the sow’s ear of bad policy. Proponents of English teaching as a public diplomacy tool could benefit from the chapter recounting the challenges French diplomats confronted in their Syria and Lebanon mandates between the world wars. The prevalence of the French language in so much of the world, includ- ing Russia and West Africa, convinced them it was an “international instrument” that went hand-in-hand with their superior culture and “civilizing mission.” American diplomats should be careful never to give the impression that we feel the same way about the English language or our own culture. While this is a useful and varied collection of case studies, the editors could have benefited from collaboration with a ruthless wordsmith. Readers will struggle with some of the contributions by foreign writers, but even the essays by Americans have not been closely edited. For example, one U.S. ambassador’s information officer is called his “press agent,” while another essay refers to “Soviet impression management.” But my favorite example of gobbledygook discusses two governments that “tried to promote interactive cultural programs and cooperative cultural policymaking to promote mutuality among regional members.” On balance, however, Searching for a Cultural Diplomacy is well worth the time of anyone interested in this important topic. n Ken Moskowitz, a Foreign Service officer with USIA and State since 1986, currently serves in the Office of the Inspector General. His overseas assignments include Budapest, Tokyo (twice), Sofia and Kyiv. BOOKS