Toward a new foreign policy.

Key Recommendations

* Networking has replaced information dominance as the new model of persuasion in the global communication era.

* U.S. public diplomacy needs to switch its strategic focus to start building bridges and forging a network between the United States and international publics.

* Yesterday, the communicator with the most information won. Today, the one with the most extensive and strongest network wins.

Networking has become the new model of persuasion in the global communication era. If the Cold War was about information command and control and the Information Age was about bits and bytes, the global communication era is about networks. Disseminating information is spam, networking is strategic.

Not only does networking capitalize on the capabilities of new communication technologies, but it provides a protective buffer against the cultural distortions that plague messages disseminated over mass media channels. Aggressively pursued, building bridges can traverse cultural and political hurdles to capitalize on the interactivity and connectivity that define the global communication era.

Switching the focus of U.S. public diplomacy means redefining its communication goals. Previously, public diplomacy was equated with "overseas information programs," and its mission was "to engage, inform, and influence" foreign publics. In the global communication era, effective public diplomacy is about building bridges with foreign publics; a mission defined by a network of global links matching U.S. citizens with others in the international community.

Switching strategic focus also means adopting new tactics. To insure dominance, Washington historically focused on maximizing the quantity of information. In those days, the communicator with the most information won. Today, the one with the most extensive network and strongest relations wins.

There are numerous ways to build networks. One is to identify and explore potential links. Effective U.S. public diplomacy must operate less as a communicator and more as a facilitator in an international dialogue. Another tactic is reinforcing existing links; e.g., providing assistance in organizing or facilitating conferences, training symposia, or goodwill ventures. A third approach is to actually create links where none existed before. To achieve this, U.S. public diplomacy may have to become more agile, flexible, and innovative.

Adopting network strategy also calls for new avenues of public diplomacy research. Research has been subservient to creating the message, hence the focus on surveys and opinion polls. Though U.S. officials may have mastered the art of translating polling data into messaging strategies for domestic publics, they have been less than successful with foreign publics. The Shared Values campaign is a case in point. Rather than using research to find the right messages, Washington should attempt to learn how people are connected in order to develop new links. In the future, reliable databases will be more valuable than opinion polls.

A new generation of communication research is developing the tools to measure the quality of relationships. Traditionally, information output has been the primary measure of success. Yet as the U.S. Government Accountability Office noted, impressive numbers in reaching international audiences have not translated into any measurable support for U.S. policies. On the other hand, the perceived quality of political relationships does profoundly impact a nation's credibility, image, and stature. By measuring the quality of America's relationships with key publics rather than the quantity of viewers or listeners, research can more reliably predict public diplomacy effectiveness.

Since the Sept. 11 attacks, Washington has incorporated several relationship-building endeavors such as the Middle East Partnership Initiative and American Corners into its public diplomacy model. Indicating a new direction, the U.S. Public Diplomacy Advisory Commission added "relationship-building strategies" to its 2004 annual report. Similarly, U.S. cultural and educational exchange programs are inherently about relationships. Washington has also used the interactive features of advanced technology to try to stimulate a dialogue with international publics. These are important steps on the road to forging a network of global constituents.

Public diplomacy is of vital significance to U.S. security. As Lee Hamilton noted, it is "an essential element of how we stop people from coming here to kill us." Diplomacy has become even more critical to Washington's ability to pursue its foreign policy objectives globally. Public discontent has spread beyond the Arab and Islamic world to Asia, Africa, and Latin America. The perceptions of foreign publics do matter, and changing those perceptions is possible. In the global communication era, to effectively maneuver the political landscape requires networking as the new paradigm of strategic U.S. public diplomacy.

R.S. Zaharna <[e-mail]> is an associate professor in the School of Communication at American University and an analyst for Foreign Policy In Focus (online at www.fpif.org). She has testified on U.S. public diplomacy before the House Subcommittee on National Security (October 8, 2003, and August 26, 2004) and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee (February 27, 2003). She is currently writing a book on strategic public diplomacy in an era of global communication.