The ritual creation of political symbols: International exchanges in public diplomacy

Abstract

International exchange programmes have been previously conceptualised based on the ‘opinion leader model’. It expects participants to form positive attitudes towards the host country, and to become influential back home. However, the micro-processes through which this goal can be achieved remain undertheorised. Drawing from Interaction Ritual Theory, this article argues that international exchanges consist of a chain of rituals. They strategically immerse targeted individuals into personal experiences with a shared focus on the host country, transforming the latter into a symbol charged with emotional energy and (strategically devisable) cognitive content. The symbol (now affectively and cognitively laden) is then recurrently invoked to re-circulate through the networks of the participants. A case study of a programme in which the symbol ‘Poland’ became systematically charged with the content of ‘multiculturality’ illustrates this proposition. Practical and theoretical implications (e.g. for the literature on socialisation, norm-diffusion, and face-to-face diplomacy) in international relations are discussed.

Exploring Global Korea Scholarship as a Public Diplomacy Tool

“…Public diplomacy programs aim to change people’s preferences through an affective appeal (Lukes, 2005). The assumption here is that direct exposure, and the totality of the experiences, of international students with the host country and its people, particularly through their bodily presence there, can lead to enmity and liking of the host country (Pacher, 2018; Snow, 2020).…”

Tool selection for public diplomacy flagships: toward an adaptive model

“…We seem to know little about how policy tools are selected in public diplomacy (Gilboa 2008). Existing literature has focused on the content, outcome and mechanism of a specific PD tool, such as international exchange (Pacher 2018) and new media (Sevin and Ingenhoff 2018), but few research have examined the process to select the tools and why such process is followed. This is first because the research is often challenged by subjective factors in decision-making, which is difficult to capture but critical to understand the tool selection process.…”

Rituals of world politics: on (visual) practices disordering things

“…We see ritual in action. Core institutions of international society like diplomacy, international law, colonialism, war and economic governance are replete with rituals (Bentley 2015;Cohen 1978;Faizullaev 2013;Lee 2013;Pacher 2018;Smith 1991;Svensson 2018) -solemn and hyper visible ceremonies consisting of a series of actions performed according to a script and formalised procedure. But apart from such public and grandiose performances, rituals and ritualised activities (Bell [1992] 2009) also pervade a range of more mundane world political practices, including handshakes to confirm alliances or agreements, border crossings, peacekeeping, universal periodical reviews of human rights, treaty-making, processing trauma and reconciliation, and torture (Amoore and Hall 2012;Debrix 2003;Dobson 2019;Charlesworth, Hilary, and Emma Larking 2015;Fierke 2002;Riles 2008).…”