The Foreign Service Journal, November 2011

12 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / N O V E M B E R 2 0 1 1 Other notable leaders on the list in- clude Lara Setrakian, a correspondent for Bloomberg Television/ABC News; Saul Garlick, CEO of ThinkImpact; Dr. Franziska Bratner, Member of the European Parliament; Howard W. Buffett, executive director of The Howard G. Buffett Foundation; and Rye Barcott, author of It Happened on the Way to War. Young Professionals in Foreign Pol- icy is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organi- zation committed to fostering the next generation of foreign policy leaders by providing young professionals with the knowledge, skills, exposure and rela- tionships to tackle critical global chal- lenges over the course of their careers. The Diplomatic Courier bills itself as a global affairs magazine that con- nects the current diplomatic and for- eign policy leadership to the next generation of leaders. It publishes quarterly in print and weekly online. — Laura Pettinelli, Editorial Intern W(h)ither Public Diplomacy at State? The July 8 departure of Judith McHale from the position of under secretary of State for public diplomacy and public affairs, after more than two years in the position, prompted sur- prisingly little commentary. Nor has any successor yet been named; Assis- tant Secretary for Educational and Cultural Affairs Ann Stock is serving in an acting capacity. Other than a press release by the United States Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy ( www.state. gov/pdcommission ) an d a brief post- ing (“R Is for Resignation”) on the Diplopundit blog ( http://diplopun dit.blogspot.com ), the main analysis of McHale’s tenure came from Philip Seib, director of the University of Southern California’s Center on Pub- lic Diplomacy ( http://uscpublicdiplo macy.org ). Writing in the Huffington Post ( www.huffingtonpost.com ), Seib asserts that “McHale’s most valuable contribution may have been to struc- turally reinforce public diplomacy within the State Department. By over- seeing the addition of deputy assistant secretaries responsible for public diplomacy throughout State, she took a big step toward increasing the central- ity of public diplomacy in American foreign policy.” But he cautions that much work remains to be done to in- stitutionalize the changes McHale oversaw and build on recent progress, particularly in terms of reaching out to the Middle East following the Arab Spring. On the larger question of public diplomacy as a profession, a 2009 essay by retired FSOs Patricia Kushlis and Patricia Sharpe, editors of the Whirled View blog ( http://whirledview.type pad.com/whirledview ), con tinues to resonate strongly two years later. In “Public Diplomacy Today and Tomorrow,” Kushlis and Sharpe set out to “define some of the special charac- teristics and powers of public diplo- macy; examine some of the missteps that have brought American public diplomacy into disrepute and made it ineffectual; look at some demonstrably successful best practices that may form the basis of a rehabilitated public diplomacy capacity; and suggest orga- nizational reforms that would integrate public diplomacy insights into the for- eign policy process in ways that would enormously enhance U.S. interactions with the world.” The essay has five sections: Public Diplomacy — What It Is, Why It’s Needed and How It Could Work Well for America Again; Public Diplomacy — A Profession within a Profession; Deconstructing the Interactive Shib- boleth; The Field — Where Foreign Policy Succeeds or Fails; and Public Diplomacy Tomorrow — How to Make It Work, If We Want It to Work. Let us hope that McHale’s succes- sor will read it before assuming his or her duties. — Steven Alan Honley, Editor Welcome, ROSS! The Republic of South Sudan ( www.goss.org ) ac hieved its inde- C Y B E R N O T E S T he street protesters and the street protest organizers just amaze me for their sheer courage. I don’t think Americans can really get a grasp on how danger- ous this is, to go out on these streets with this army and these thugs. … I have asked for permission to visit five cities in the past week and every re- quest has been rejected. So when I go out, and I ignore it, I always get this very stern warning that there will be consequences. [But] at a certain point you just say, I do the best planning me and my security teams can do, and then you go out there and you do it. … I think the technology of modern communication has overruled the govern- ment’s capacity to just kill. It doesn’t work. And the protesters, unlike in 1982, are fully aware that the international community is watching them.” — U.S. Ambassador to Syria Robert Ford, excerpted from a Sept. 22 interview with The Daily Caller (http://dailycaller.com).