New CPD Perspectives Released, “The Hard Truth About Soft Power”

CPD Advisory Board Member Markos Kounalakis and former Hungarian Ambassador to the United States Andras Simonyi have authored the fifth paper in the CPD Perspectives series for 2011.

In this paper, Kounalakis and Simonyi outline the difficulty soft power has experienced in gaining an upper hand over the preference to use hard power. Soft power is a concept that has been in play for centuries but only recently has it been seen to carry enough gravity to be used in the form of effective public diplomacy campaigns. The authors also include a spectral framework for when soft power can be used and how soft power has played out in certain situations regarding foreign policy. A framework for soft power is seen as crucial to understanding when it can be used by governments for decision-making and policy analysis. In this piece, the authors attempt to explain these complexities and argue for a change in both perception and practice of the modern-day expression of soft power in unexpected and, at times, unorthodox ways.

Read the thought-provoking piece in its entirety here.

CPD Perspectives is a periodic publication from the USC Center on Public Diplomacy, and highlights scholarship intended to stimulate critical thinking about the study and practice of public diplomacy.