Seminar Series 2014Tuesday 25 March 2014
6:00pm – 7:30pm
Soft Power- Influence and Persuasion
Drinks reception from 8:30pm
13/14 Cornwall Terrace, London, NW1 4QP
Organised by The Daiwa Anglo-Japanese Foundation
“Soft Power” is a concept developed by Joseph Nye of Harvard University in 1990. “Soft Power” is a country’s ability to get what it wants by attracting rather than coercing others. [1] In this seminar, Lord Howell focused on the grey area of national power in the age of digital networks, on the role of civic engagement and soft power as opposed to hard power. He argued that if a nation’s soft power is to be successfully built up and deployed to its advantage, credibility is crucial. The messages of soft power are useless if they are seen as propaganda. Is it ever possible for a state to use soft power and not make it look like propaganda? Joseph Nye recently introduced the concept of ‘smart power’. If soft power is to work alongside military action, what is the right balance between soft and hard? And what is the modern soft power agenda in the age of digital networking? [2]
Professor Yasushi Watanabe examined the potentials and limitations of “soft power,” with a particular focus on Japan’s public diplomacy. At the time when “power transition” and “power diffusion” has become conspicuous both on national and global levels, where should it or can it go? At the time when global competitions for soft power get intensive, how can it avoid falling into a downward spiral of zero-sum game? There are crucial questions at the time when Japan aspires to be a “proactive contributor to peace.” The seminar was chaired by Professor Mike Hardy, Executive Director of the Centre for Trust, Peace and Social Relations.
Summary of the seminar, Soft Power Influence and Persuasion, PDF
[1] Soft Power Superpowers: Cultural and National Assets of Japan and the United States, eds. Yasushi Watanabe and David McConnell (2008)
[2] Old Links & New Ties: Power and Persuasion in an Age of Networks, David Howell (2013)
Presentation by Professor WatanabeView the recording of the seminar here:
About the contributors
The Rt Hon Lord Howell of Guildford
The Rt Hon Lord Howell of Guildford was Minister of State at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office from May 2010 to September 2012, and MP for Guildford from 1966 until 1997. He held a number of Ministerial posts in the previous Conservative government including Secretary of State for Energy between 1979 and 1981 and Secretary of State for Transport from 1981 to 1983. He was Deputy Leader of the Opposition from 2005 to 2010 and Opposition Spokesperson for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs from 2000 to 2010. Lord Howell most recently held the title of Minister of State from 2010 to 2012, where he was responsible for the business of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in the House of Lords. He recently published Old Links & New Ties: Power and Persuasion in an Age of Networks (I.B.Tauris, 2013).
Professor Yasushi Watanabe
Professor Yasushi Watanabe earned a Ph.D. in Social Anthropology from Harvard University in 1997. After post-doctoral research at the Universities of Cambridge and Oxford, he joined Keio University Shonan Fujisawa Campus (SFC) in 1999. His books include Culture and Diplomacy: The Age of Public Diplomacy (2011, in Japanese); and the co-edited volume Soft Power Superpowers: Cultural and National Assets of Japan and the United States (2008). Professor Watanabe was also a Fellow at Downing College, University of Cambridge in 2007 and a Visiting Professor at L’Institut d’Etudes Politiques (SciencesPo) de Paris in 2013. He has served on the Advisory Council on Public Diplomacy of the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Advisory Committee on NHK World and he is currently an editorial member of Gaiko (Diplomacy) magazine.
Prof. Dr. Mike Hardy CMG OBE (Chair)
Prof. Dr. Mike Hardy CMG OBE is Professor of Intercultural Relations; Executive Director, Centre for Trust Peace and Social Relations, Coventry University. Dr. Hardy has served in the UK Government and European Commission. Following overseas postings to cities including Cairo, Jerusalem and Jakarta, he was appointed to lead the British Council’s global program in intercultural dialogue. In 2011, he was invited to the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos-Klosters, Switzerland, and was appointed to act as special adviser to the Azerbaijan Minister of Culture and Tourism in September 2012. Dr. Hardy was awarded the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 2001, and was appointed a Companion of Honor of St. Michael and St George (CMG) in 2010 for his work internationally in intercultural dialogue.