EVENTS

Date:	Friday, October 3, 2003
Time:	12:00 PM -- 2:00 PM
Location:	Wohlstetter Conference Center, Twelfth Floor, AEI 1150 Seventeenth Street, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20036

October 2003
Transforming U.S. Public Diplomacy in the Arab and Muslim World
AEI-Baker Institute for Public Policy Joint Event

The Advisory Group on Public Diplomacy in the Arab and Muslim World issued Changing Minds, Winning Peace, a report to Congress and to the White House on October 1, 2003. The report is expected to have an important impact on the way the United States communicates with Arab and Muslim nations. At an October 3 AEI event, the chairman of the advisory group, Edward P. Djerejian, and one of its members, James K. Glassman of AEI, presented the findings and answered questions from panelists and the audience. Djerejian is the former U.S. ambassador to both Syria and Israel and assistant secretary of state for near eastern affairs under Presidents George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton. He is also director of the James A. Baker III Institute at Rice University, which cosponsored the event with AEI.

James K. Glassman
AEI

Those of us on the Advisory Group have had a very intense three months. As private citizens and volunteers, we embarked, at the request of Congress and the administration, on a study of what has gone wrong in public diplomacy-which is defined as the promotion of the national interest by informing, engaging and influencing people throughout the world-as distinguished from other such means of influence, such as the use of military power or state-to-state diplomacy.

We were specifically asked, in the legislative language, to "develop new approaches, initiatives, and program models to improve public diplomacy." I think we have done that, and more. One commentator wrote that our report is "a refreshingly blunt assessment . . . offering a series of generally useful, often innovative, and sometimes audacious suggestions." You will have to judge for yourselves.

Since the end of the Cold War, public diplomacy has fallen on hard times. Nevertheless, public diplomacy helped win the Cold War, and it can help win the war on terror-but not in its current state. As our report says in its third paragraph: "A process of unilateral disarmament in the weapons of advocacy over the last decade has contributed to widespread hostility toward Americans and left us vulnerable to lethal threats to our interests and our safety. In this time of peril, public diplomacy is absurdly and dangerously underfunded, and simply restoring it to its Cold War status is not enough."

This is our main message: public diplomacy must be treated, and again I quote from the report, with a "seriousness and commitment that matches the gravity of our approach to national defense and traditional state-to-state diplomacy." Such a commitment and gravity can only be imparted from the top, by the president-which is one of the reasons we call for an office of the special counselor in the White House to set strategic direction, and coordinate and monitor public diplomacy throughout government.

First, from the very start, it was clear that public diplomacy not only lacked resources, it also lacked a coherent management structure. No one was providing the leadership and strategic direction; much was ad hoc. This is not a reflection on the dedicated people who practice public diplomacy. We were impressed with them, but they operate under a threadbare and often chaotic system.

The second point concerns one of my main areas of interest: the media. Government-sponsored international broadcasting was funded last year at $540 million; that compares with $600 million for all State Department public diplomacy programs, including exchanges like Fulbright. Yet, the Board of Broadcasting Governors exists outside the normal structure of public diplomacy. We call in our report for bringing broadcasting under the same coordinated strategic direction as the rest of public diplomacy. We also urge that Radio Sawa adopt the right objectives-as our title says, changing minds, rather than simply building an audience-and we call for an independent review of the proposed Middle East Television Network.

As one commentator wrote about our recommendations, "The report is perhaps most valuable for injecting some much-needed sanity into the Washington debate over radio and television stations targeted at Middle Eastern audiences."

People who like this report ask what they can do. That is simple. Tell Congress to support it and enact the recommendations. Just as important, tell the White House. So far, the White House has said nothing publicly about the report. Speaking as one member of the advisory group, strictly on my own, I hope that silence will end.

Ambassador Edward P. Djerejian
Rice University

There is no question in our minds that public diplomacy-the battle for ideas-is just as important an instrument of policy today, especially after September 11, as military and political diplomacy and actions. In the daily discourse of the Arab and Muslim world, the United States is simply not sufficiently or in any significant way present. Our operating premise was that in the aftermath of the Cold War and the terrorist attacks of September 11, the United States is engaged in a major struggle expanding its own tolerance and marginalizing the extremists. It is a long-term struggle, and the solutions that the Advisory Group advocates match the challenge. We call for a dramatic transformation of public diplomacy.

All the polling shows that there is such a strong and highly favorable attitude to U.S. values and what they stand for in the Muslim world. On the other hand, there is opposition and highly unfavorable ratings for U.S. politics. This report puts into place a requirement for a new strategic direction for public diplomacy informed by a seriousness and commitment that matches the gravity of our approach to national defense and traditional state-to-state diplomacy. The commitment must come from the President of the United States; it has to come from the top down.

We strongly suggest reinvigorating, revitalizing, and reactivating the National Security Council Policy Coordinating Committee for Public Diplomacy, to be co-chaired by the undersecretary of state for public diplomacy and public affairs and by a very high level NSC officer. The State Department's Office of Public Diplomacy needs to be reinforced with policy, research, and command over financial resources. We are asking for a new office with a small group of officers with language expertise to monitor the Middle East press and translate the commentary into talking points and to write op-eds.

U.S. funding for public diplomacy outreach programs is $25 million-a depressingly small amount-for the entire Arab and Muslim world. To say financial resources are inadequate for this task is a gross understatement. We are asking for a reallocation of resources and an increase in funding. It is shocking that the United States of America, the preeminent power, with the global responsibilities it has in the Arab and Muslim world, only has five people who can fluently defend, explain, and inform American values and policies on Arabic television. We propose a massive change in culture in the training of American foreign service officers in the key languages of this region either by recruiting people with fluency or training others early in their careers and providing a reward system for officers to maintain fluency.

This is a national security interest. We hope the report will be a wake-up call. Public diplomacy is a generational struggle, and the United States needs to give it strategic direction from the top and provide the necessary human and financial resources.

Penn Kemble
Freedom House

It is regretful that the return of public diplomacy to the agenda has to come during an election year; there is likely to be a certain amount of political tension over the issues being addressed, but there is a potential to win over the internationalists from both conservatives and liberals to an effort at reconstructing our public diplomacy capabilities.

We have to engage the Islamic world in a far deeper, more encompassing way then we have before. The report outlines quite an array of programs and activities that will advance such an engagement. We have to show respect for the peoples of these cultures. We have to convince them that we wish them well, that our experience can be helpful, and some of the things embodied in their cultures can enrich our lives. There is a process of creative destruction in the conduct of public diplomacy. There may be circumstances when some of the most important things that we have to do will increase tensions with the Islamic world.

We have to challenge misconceptions that are widespread in the Islamic world. There is clearly a powerful delusion in the cultures of many of these communities that Israel and the United States are to blame for the economies or other aspects of those societies. We have to hold out the promise of democracy. We have to nourish democratic communities in these societies.

Joshua Muravchik
AEI

Our public diplomacy efforts in the war of ideas were an essential part of our victory in the Cold War. Since the Cold War, we have systematically dismantled our public diplomacy capability through relentless budget cuts. The cuts in our foreign policy have not just been in our public diplomacy function, but in other related areas, such as a 10 percent cut in the number of our consulates abroad including posts in Egypt, Turkey, Indonesia, and Nigeria. It is also startling how few American books have been translated into Arabic in the last few centuries.

If we are going to reach the masses in those countries, it is going to be through the opinion leaders who are on the Internet. At a time when world public opinion is running strongly against the United States, we should try to shore up support among our natural allies in Europe rather than concentrating efforts solely on the Middle East. What we want to accomplish in public diplomacy is so hard to measure.  

AEI research assistant Sharon Utz prepared this summary.