Soft Power: Global Dominance with a Smile?

Power: the ultimate end goal of all individuals, nations, and the whole, wide, world. With its great desirability, the thought of “Power” seems to flourish most recently in modern politics, as, “With power comes everything”. However, with the growing demand for power, not just on national grounds but also on the international stage, comes the increasingly grim and ruthless fight for a seat. The extreme lengths of social hardship dragged out in search of global dominance are traumatizing, but it's the focus of Hard Power as the “Most effective—only — the option” that has turned ambitious desire into war and crisis. In reality, under the hard outer shell most nations have adapted, where influence by force is ideal, there lies a framework which, when rightly implemented, leads to significantly fewer drawbacks, and substantially more success. Soft power, though emergent, has not come even close to realizing its full and utter potential, and its implementation, as we will understand, could result finally in the overtaking of today's world.

First of all, what exactly entails soft power? We can refer back to the idea of power—the ability to affect others to get one's preferred outcomes—which divides its obtainance into two methods. Hard power, the implementation of military or economic force to coerce others to change viewpoints to benefit oneself, comes to be one of most concentration. With heavy military budgets, economic competition, and uncountable social and environmental sacrifices along for the ride, it is historically coined a more traditional method of power. Soft Power, on the other hand, then refers to the act of co-opting rather than coercing; persuading others into believing what they want is what one wants. Essentially, it is the creation and the promotion of a full nation-wide narrative (consisting of its social statuses, cultures, and lifestyles) which sets to convince other nations that one's nation is desirable, attractive, and a global power to not fight, but respect. This art of political attraction stems from American political scientist Joseph Nye, who pioneered the theory of soft power as a driving force, and the missing wheel to many countries' failed dominance. 

In this, Nye proposes three pillars of soft power: that of political values, culture and forgein policy. To build a globally valued nation, all three aspects should be at least in development, and not only that, but they must be visible and in alignment with global desires. With this, we can subdivide even deeper the areas of focus. For instance, gaining economic power through soft power tactics is to, instead of pressuring and forcing relations with one’s economic standings, encourage outside countries to idealize one's economic standings by themselves; letting other countries be naturally drawn to one’s economic success in the first place. . Political power can also be positively re-enacted through soft power. By showcasing a democratic, “fair”, unintimidating narrative, seats at international tables (G7, Unions, NATO) are more likely to find way, introducing nations to the power of civilized proposition, security and suggestions as opposed to forceful political implementations. Finally, social and cultural power, which, though looked upon less as a final goal, is very impactful in the grand power-obtaining scheme. Through soft power, promoting cultural attractiveness means demonstrating the “way of life” as desirable and unique. As to attract attention in this aspect, nations tend to expand on certain cultural niches, as well as promoting active social qualities, in order to paint the picture of a “to strive for '' community. For example, as the United States expands across the realms of political and economic growth, many overseas nations therefore saw its capitalistic and democratic way of life as promptly desirable (making the connection to its success). Counting the international market of Hollowood among everything else America is known for, these all play roles in the rise of America on the global stage, high on the podium of ‘praise’. 

Speaking of cultural power, the rise in media has reaped significant opportunities to engage with international consumer markets, and really stamping a brand for one's country. Showcasing a country's “splendors” in the media, especially in the 21st century, has brought about almost as much cultural influence in popular culture and daily life today than any technique has produced in the past. Regarding success in cultural promotion, the soft power developed recently by east asian countries such South Korea, pose a great example. Unlike America, who proved itself as the “ultimate dream” with economic and social resilience,  these East Asian countries (and China will be touched on shortly) have interestingly gained more global attention through their pop-culture and cultural appeals. For instance, the Korean wave or “Hallyu”, coined to describe the overwhelming overtaking market of Korean media in the shape of Kpop, Kdramas, Korean food, Korean fashion, Korean skincare, and the overall Korean lifestyle, has set South Korea up for international market domination. With a kpop fandom of about 200 million by December 2022 compared to the 52 million population of South Korea itself, we see Korea make their mark in daily western radio stations, streaming platforms, fashion magazines (HoYeon Jung being the first non-american to have a solo vogue cover) and even in the UN. And this wave of international interest in Korea’s cyber identity is growing still, as BTS take on the Grammys, as Parasite wins the oscars. Subsequently, not only is there more praise from international citizens regarding (the portrayal of) Korean culture, but also accompanying political power increases, as the Korean economy thrives off a pure tertiary economy, without the gift of abundant natural resources. Another aspect demonstrated, as well, in the USA, is the amount of forgein exchange students enrolling in South Korea. Entrepreneurship is one of the most  valuable assets of a nation; seeing the impressive 200 thousand international students studying in Korea each year proves that its soft power has done a great job in convincing the world it is a great country to live in. 

After understanding the benefits and the successes soft power offers, I bet most other big shot nations have dabbled in similar appeals. And you would be right; however, there is a danger in potential abuse and over-promotion of soft power. If we push an appeal too far, it will eventually fall; nations like China and Russia have been observed falling down the rabbithole, and analyzing their downfalls can help us understand the consequences of too much ambition. Diving into China on the one hand, after climbing its way up the economic ladder from essentially net zero, late 1990’s China had many of the necessary means to continue conquering in hard power. However, with the realization of lacking what many economics pointed out as friendliness and alliance appeal, China soft power initiatives came to the drawing board.  

“Reform, development and opening up”; the Beijing 2008 Olympics though China’s eyes was not just another sporting event, but their first chance to showcase its political position and cultural attractiveness to the world. Within the decade years building up to the said critical event, it was said by the leading General him that China must be “Depicted.. as democratic, open, civilized, friendly and harmonious”. With the 6.8 billion dollars spent on the Olympics—100 million blown on the opening ceremony alone—, not including the brand new airport, new roads, and basically newly developed city accounting for tens of billions more in costs, the then passionate government prioritized soft power “completely beyond measures”. However, looking back at their efforts, it is hard to admit the decline China has long since seen with every controversy, and as military reform, propaganda and CCP violations almost embraced their soft power failure. 

The downfall of China's unsustainable soft power initiatives; how was it to be? Centralized, the issue is, under three areas: the hard power mindset, propaganda, and a lack of capitalistic individuality, all three stem  from the government's eagerness to satisfy its throne. Touching upon the mindset, we are describing the itch of distress the government carried as attempts in soft power pursuits were thrown on stage. That is, that Chinese politicians themselves saw soft power as a strong knife to be used; but as a strong knife in their array of missiles. The struggle to let go of the need to engage in risky economic and political battles which contradicted the promotion of the Chinese Narrative ultimately suppressed China’s ability to engage in a soft power revolution. This can be seen in two ways. Directly prioritizing economic values, such as fishing waters against the Philippines, as something worth fighting for not only shows hostility and not soft power, but it also shows that China will choose their own gains over international relations anyday. (Keep in mind that, although some understand the scope of China’s position and attempts, that the global audience does not get much context). In this, directly highlighting the means to which a nation is willing to sacrifice their whole reputation for gain, does not demonstrate a desirable nation. This principle also ties to China's heavily pushed (and debatably ineffective) charm offensive. Through the creation of soft power resources such as media, temples and cultural identity measures, the controlling, funding and profiting of the government is what makes these initiatives unsuccessful. The clear ‘power’ intention of, for instance, “Helping developing countries with economic aid”, is easily stripped to expose the true meanings of self propensity, and extreme corruption impacts on other parties. With these two trends, it seems as if nations like China cannot help but lean back to the forcefulness and coercion demonstrated through toxic and undemocratic hard power, which comes at losses as true intentions and negative perspectives of values are built internationally. 

This segues into the next issue of propaganda, and the increasing obsession of the CCP to promote this unrealistic, and not even ideal, nation narrative both inside and outside China. This is related to the failure of China’s soft power initiative, because to put it simply, government made propaganda cannot compete with individually-nurtured cultural environments. Going hand in hand with the third issue of missing capitalistic individuality, the problem is that the government does not understand two things: that international audiences can not only see through government-induced propaganda that overstressed culture and neglects civil society, but also can realize the inconsistencies between the luxurious, freedom-filled China in the narrative compared to the hard-hitting reality. The classism, housing crisis, aging population, extreme pollution, but physically aside, the lack of freedom of speech and now freedom to leave their homes is so drastically different from the propaganda-filled soft power movements by the government, that it just becomes completely negligible and illegitimate. 

And where does individuality play in? As mentioned in a paper analyzing Joseph Nye’s finds of soft power; “The party has not bought into Mr Nye’s view that soft power springs largely from individuals, the private sector, and civil society. So the government has taken to promoting ancient cultural icons whom it thinks might have global appeal.” As explained, the next step China could be taking is to open up the nation to more civil and citizen insight, thoughts, innovations and ideas. As the government controls the people so much as to ban hundreds of terms from being searched, with nearly no access to western media, no ability to voice protests and suggestions, and therefore no role of the people in soft power, we understand why the governments ‘Guessing game’ of appeals is a failure. 

At this state, the desperation of China to earn soft power back then has now led to a full blown power crisis, where not only does China care too much about tying their actions back to proving their global superiority (trading lives to prove a point), but they now also have less incentive for to be good to the people at all. All coming down to global unfavorability, China now has more than 50% of American citizens deeming its nation as unfavorable. China must recognize that their citizens are not pons in the promotion of their political goals, that “The best propaganda is not propaganda” (Nye), but rather that, by collaborating and working to promote what truly reflects citizen desires, can naturally  cultivate the soft power needed for true global resilience.

After that debunking, we can understand that soft power is a weapon that can, yes, be utilized to maximum, sustainable utility; but also, it can be abused to maximum crackdown. To have the power of obtaining the outcomes you want, we learned it can be done through coercion and threats, bribes and treacheries, and even these aspects disguised as such. Or, we can engage in smart power; the perfect balance between hard and soft, attraction and ‘action’. These successful countries at the end of the day have the ability to shape cultural, political and forgein preferences to deem as desirable. These countries engage actively in both the economic and political prosperity for their own sake, as well as letting individuals shape these countries on their own. It also recognizes that power is not a zero sum game; in collaboration, different nations can still be mutually attractive in each other's eyes. This way, damaging conflict is actually reduced, and respect is risen. There is no need for glorification, for jealousy, but with more open policies, and more opportunities for growth, I believe one day all countries could develop their soft power flower.