Over time, the concept and definition of public diplomacy has evolved, as demonstrated by the following statements from various practitioners: The most important roles public diplomacy will have to play for the United States in the current international environment will be less grand-strategic and more operational than during the Cold War. Support of national policy in military contingencies is one such role, and probably the most important. – Carnes Lord (former deputy director of USIA), professor of statecraft and civilization, October 1998 Public diplomacy – effectively communicating with publics around the globe – to understand, value and even emulate America's vision and ideas; historically one of America's most effective weapons of outreach, persuasion and policy. – Jill A. Schuker (former senior director for public affairs at the National Security Council), July 2004The United States Information Agency (USIA), which was the main government agency in charge of public diplomacy until it merged with the Department of State in 1999, described it as "seek[ing] to promote the national interest and the
national security of the United States through understanding, informing, and influencing foreign publics and broadening dialogue between American citizens and institutions and their counterparts abroad." A country may be acting deliberately or inadvertently, and through both official and private individuals and institutions. Effective public diplomacy starts from the premise that dialogue, rather than a sales pitch, is often central to achieving the goals of foreign policy: public diplomacy must be seen as a two-way street. Furthermore, public diplomacy activities often present many differing views as represented by private American individuals and organizations in addition to official U.S. government views. Traditional diplomacy actively engages one government with another government. In traditional diplomacy, U.S. Embassy officials represent the U.S. government in a host country primarily by maintaining relations and conducting official business with the officials of the host government whereas public diplomacy primarily engages many diverse non-government elements of a society. It involves not only shaping the message(s) that a country wishes to present abroad, but also analyzing and understanding the ways that the message is interpreted by diverse societies and developing the tools of listening and conversation as well as the tools of persuasion.In the online communication environment, public narratives often hold greater significance than the actions of state actors in promoting the country. One of the most successful initiatives which embodies the principles of effective public diplomacy is the creation by international treaty in the 1950s of the
European Coal and Steel Community which later became the
European Union. Its original purpose after
World War II was to tie the economies of Europe together so much that war would be impossible. Supporters of European integration see it as having achieved both this goal and the extra benefit of catalysing greater international understanding as European countries did more business together and the ties among member states' citizens increased. Opponents of European integration are leery of a loss of national
sovereignty and greater centralization of power. Public diplomacy has been an essential element of American foreign policy for decades. It was an important tool in influencing public opinion during the
Cold War with the former
Soviet Union. Since the attacks of September 11, 2001, the term has come back into vogue as the United States government works to improve their reputation abroad, particularly in the Middle East and among those in the Islamic world. Numerous panels, including those sponsored by the
Council on Foreign Relations, have evaluated American efforts in public diplomacy since
9/11 and have written reports recommending that the United States take various actions to improve the effectiveness of their public diplomacy. The
United States Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy was established in the late 1940s to evaluate American public diplomacy effort. The commission is a seven-member bipartisan board whose members are nominated by the President and confirmed by the
United States Senate. William Hybl is the current chair, and other members include former Ambassadors
Lyndon Olson and
Penne Percy Korth Peacock, as well as
Jay Snyder,
John E. Osborn and Lezlee Westine. This traditional concept is expanded on with the idea of adopting what is called "population-centric foreign affairs" within which foreign populations assume a central component of foreign policy. Since people, not just states, are of global importance in a world where technology and migration increasingly face everyone, an entire new door of policy is opened.
People's Republic of China Soon after the 1949 founding of the
People's Republic of China, the
Chinese Communist Party institutionalized its view of public diplomacy as "people's diplomacy" (
renmin waijiao). People's diplomacy was expressed through the slogan, "influence the policy through the people." During the
Mao era, the government emphasized distributing foreign language works such as
China Pictorial,
China Reconstructs, and
Peking Review. Sister city initiatives are an increasingly widespread mechanism for Chinese public diplomacy. From the early 2000s until 2024, the number of China's sister city relationships doubled.
International communication centers Republic of China During the 1970s, the
Kuomintang during the tenure of
Executive Yuan Premier
Chiang Ching-kuo organized a people's diplomacy campaign in the United States in an effort to mobilize American political sentiment in opposition to the PRC through mass demonstrations and petitions. Among these efforts, the KMT worked with the
John Birch Society to launch a petition writing campaign through which Americans were urged to write their local government officials and ask them to "Cut the Red China connection." ==Methods==