Abstract
After 9/11, public diplomacy burst on the political radar screen as if it were a new phenomenon when actually it has been part of U.S. foreign policy since the American Revolution. A historical overview of U.S. public diplomacy reveals a peculiar pattern of re-inventing the public diplomacy wheel and recycling old debates. When it remerged on the political scene, not only was U.S. public diplomacy confronting recurring debates from the pre-Cold War and Cold War era, but it also faced a new set of challenges in the post-Cold War era with the shift from traditional diplomacy to public diplomacy to“new public diplomacy.” U.S. public diplomacy appeared to be trying to catch up with the new public diplomacy by incorporating new communication technologies rather than by developing a new communication strategy. What was missing was an understanding of how the underlying communication and political dynamics in the international arena were fundamentally shifting from an Information Age to a global communication era.
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Notes
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© 2010 R. S. Zaharna
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Zaharna, R.S. (2010). Changing Dynamics and Strategic Vision. In: Battles to Bridges. Studies in Diplomacy and International Relations. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230277922_5
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