Has public opinion any relevance today? Does public opinion influence public diplomacy?
Edmund Gullion says that public diplomacy is “the cultivation by governments of public opinion in other countries”; many writers like Joseph Nye and Anholt argue that public opinion matters. Its relevance came especially during the cold war and after where we saw the spread of democracy, followed by globalisation which brought a proliferation of international actors and technology, which allowed people to make their concerns heard in an easier way. Through these facts one can argue that public opinion holds power, furthermore one can also say that public opinion is key in resolving certain political issues and has great relevance in public policy being a hot topic on many political agendas. As example of this straight after the end of the cold war the USA started by reducing the budget of its public diplomacy department, thinking there was no need to invest so much in its image abroad, but after the September 11 attacks in 2001 decided to invest again (even don not as successfully as previously) since as a country ‘they couldn’t understand why were they hated’, over the years and especially after the Iraq invasion in 2003, we could see the USA various attempts to change public opinion abroad by the creation of radios, magazines and so on.
However as Noam Chomsky rightful points public opinion has no influence in policy making, through out our western democratic societities we see the division of what the people want and the policies engaged by our democratic governments which don’t take our will into consideration. Were we asked about what we think should be done in Iraq or Afghanistan? No, but opinion polls are available that tell the government what we think, in other areas such as education even when protesting about cut and fees increasing we are still not heard.
We who live in democratic societies far long than many other countries, found ourselves with the same problems that many people in authoritarian regimes. We may not be killed for protesting, but our protests are not taken into consideration anyway. Today Egyptian people opinion holds more power (in their state) than ours, who pride ourselves of our liberal freedoms. We have ‘free’ election, we choose who will represent us (from the candidates given to us), but we have no say in public policy making, and neither during political campaigns public policy issues are not discussed in an open way, making it hard to know the position of such parties in real issues and what the implications are. In real politics public opinion does not count, unless people are in the streets Demanding change and ready to sacrifice themselves for this change as we are seeing in Egypt or as we saw in the revolution wars.
Public opinion has increasingly been very important as to how, where and when a country does something. History has shown that in instances when public opinion is not taken into account the people who do run the nation do not stay for long into power. This has happened with George W . Bush for example when he attacked Iraq where he did not ask his nation whether that was the best thing to do. In recent developments in Tunisia, Egypt, Bahrain and Libya clearly show that public opinion must be taken into account always otherwise the whole nation will be against you and will bring down whoever runs the country.
ReplyDeleteI am sorry to disagree with you but if public opinion was taken into account George Bush, Kadaffi, Dos Santos in Angola and so many would have resigned or stepped down and not waited to lose in elections or being removed 'by force'. With regards to Tunisia, Egypt and so on these people have suffered for many years, therefore they shouldn’t have endured that and there are many around the globe dissatisfied, complaining but still their wills it’s not taken into consideration, also it wasn’t public opinion that removed these dictators ( or whatever you want to call them) from power, but the power of actions and not words... actions as in revolution, people willing to die ...blood as brought them changes not words and manifestations.
ReplyDeleteTake any democratic country in Europe and try to count how many strikes and manifestation happen over change, yet our words mean nothing, because in democratic countries we wait for elections when we have the power to have a government sacked (at least in paper), yet we do nothing apart from protesting, and at the end we go to our houses , the next day we pay our taxes and go to work like nothing happened. But if we demanded change through actions like they did in Egypt you could be sure that our politicians would think twice since they wouldn’t the country to come down as you said.
I agree with you to a certain extent regarding public diplomacy's role in policy making. However, in the recent demonstrations and revolutions in the countries of North Africa and the Middle East, the people are demanding change (as you say) to have what we already have! That is democracy. Although I agree that democratic governments do not always listen to public opinion when making foreign policy decisions, I do believe that it is the best form of government that we have come up with so far. And also, democracy is not just about being able to influence policy making, it is about all the freedoms that come with it (lifestyle, speech, etc.) - and that is something worth fighting for. Compared to the oppressed populations in some parts of the world - do the people in e.g. the countries of Western Europe really need to "demand change" in the way it is being demanded in the authoritarian regimes? No, as we have freedom of speech and we can get rid of politicians - which may not be worth much, as you say - but it is still worth something as it shows that public opinion DOES matter at times. The example of the US after Iraq in 2003 and their damaged image illustrates this, which forced the US to rethink and reinvest in its public diplomacy.
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