For the first time, climate change has received full treatment in an important State Department planning document, joining terrorism, democracy, and the global economy among the nation’s top diplomatic priorities. It’s the clearest sign yet that the warming climate has the full attention of the Obama administration.

At the center of global Catholicism, church leaders joined with politicians, scientists and economists to draft a statement declaring not only that climate change is a “scientific reality” but also that there’s a moral and religious responsibility to do something about it.

The United Nations climate change negotiations are headed towards a major deadline this December in Paris to create a new global agreement. The summit presents an ideal place for the US and Latin American and Caribbean leaders to candidly and privately discuss the issue.

But Cyclone Pam is more than just a natural disaster. It is a demonstrable effect of worldwide climate change, which scientists and development experts have long warned will hit Pacific Island states the hardest.

He wouldn’t put it this way, but Secretary of State John Kerry announced this week that the U.S. government will turn the screws on India over the country’s environmental record. In a joint event, the State Department and the Environmental Protection Agency declared that they will install air pollution monitoring devices on more U.S. embassies around the world and release their findings. 

The 2014 CPD Annual Review demonstrates that although public diplomacy is present in every region of the world, it is predominantly in the northern hemisphere. North America is ranked the most active region in public diplomacy, with the United States contributing the most. Asia (Asia Pacific, Southeast Asia and Central Asia combined) comes in second, and Europe is third, with almost the same presence as Asia. As expected, China, Japan, and South Korea take the lead as the major actors in Asia Pacific. India is also very active in PD in South Asia.

As part of the CPD Annual Review process, in January we highlighted some of the year’s key public diplomacy moments in our Top 10 List of the most notable stories from 2014.

Launched in 2013, the CPD Annual Review was developed to serve as a guide to understanding the global landscape of public diplomacy, its ebbs and flows, its triumphs and its shortcomings.