Public Diplomacy: Enabling National Security Strategy

Public diplomacy seeks to promote the national interests of the United States through understanding, informing and influencing foreign audiences in accord with the 2006 National Security Strategy NSS. Public diplomacy helps shape global perceptions of U.S. policies and objectives and is a key enabler of our foreign policy. An ongoing debate on American public diplomacy convincingly argues that current efforts are ineffective and in need of significant overhaul. This paper examines the effectiveness of public diplomacy and the implications of its success or failure on the 2006 NSS. The examination includes discussion of public diplomacy as an enabler of foreign policy consideration of public diplomacy as a strategy of engagement assessment of the effectiveness of Americas public diplomacy strategy and finally, discussion of the implications of ineffective public diplomacy for success in achieving our 2006 National Security Strategy objectives.