American Public Diplomacy and Islam

American Public Diplomacy and Islam Charlotte Beers,Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Rosetta Stone outlet Public Affairs Testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Washington, DC February 27, 2003 Thank you, Mr.Chairman, and distinguished members of the committee. Ithink you're going to find my remarks a bit of an echo,but I hope to draw upon some very recent experiences thathelp put context in the discussion that we've been havingabout public diplomacy and the Muslim world. Before youis a report on CD-ROM, and if you're not CD-ROM- friendly,there's a printed report as well of our activities in thelast year. You also have examples of booklets, and youhave a copy of the new communication plan for the Department's Visa program. September 11th gave us ahighly accelerated learning curve. I must tell you that,without the supplemental and the ability to redirect 2002funds, we could never have initiated these programs toMuslim audiences with whom, in the past, we've had almostno discourse.Our job is to both inform and engage. ButI must tell you, "inform" is really the first job. I'd say60 or 70 percent of the effort of our 800 people who are in the State Department in the U.S. is to explain andadvocate our policies. Around the world, then, we linkinto our embassy staffs, some 16,000, including publicdiplomacy officers. We reach them through web, throughe-mail, through cable, and our own American Embassytelevision channel. They can take our products andactivate them locally in ways that we in Washingtoncannot. In the last year, we entered totally newchannels of radio and television in the Middle East, SouthAsia, and East Asia. Our officials were on those channelsin record numbers as we discussed foreign policy issues andtheir context. We also had a number of op-ed piecesplaced, arranged personal interviews, and conducted agreat number of roundtables. Our Web-site languages andproducts now include Arabic, Farsi, Urdu, and Pashtu. Wealso have extremely able partners in this business ofgetting the word out through the Broadcasting Board ofGovernors [providing oversight and support for Voice ofAmerica, Radio Sawa (Arabic), Radio/TV Marti (Cuba), Worldnet TV, Radio Free Europe, Radio Free Asia]. Butwe've learned the power of a digital-video conference. WhenKen Pollack, the writer who had produced "The ThreateningStorm," a very reasoned and interesting discussion of prosand cons of confronting Iraq, we asked him to interrupthis book tour and put him into nine countries in Rosetta Stone Japanese Europewhere we needed that message, as Senator Biden points out.And it had a powerful effect. He's going back again intomany other countries. I think this year we've gainedgreater skills in public affairs. We no longer wait forpeople to produce our stories. We went into Afghanistan anddid an 18-minute documentary on the reconstruction ofAfghanistan. And my proudest moment was when that ran onPakistan TV on the 6:00 news. So one of the importantlessons of this year is that the television channels, which are more crowded every year, as well as the radiochannels, will be very thirsty for programming. Andthere's an art form to getting them to use programmingthat we can produce and make available. The products weproduce these days are very different from a few years ago.It requires good detective work. We have to find thestory, one that's not the story being written in theheadlines. Many of the headline stories sometime make youwonder if you've in a time warp, because they don't coverany of the things that our people know so well - which cansometimes explain the mystery about the gap between us andthe rest of the world. In addition to good detectivework, we have to have artful writers and photographers.And that's why those samples in front of you are animportant element. Our Office of International InformationPrograms (IIP) can produce a four-color booklet,translated in many languages, for example, "Iraq: From Fear to Freedom." It talks about the horror of Hussein's regime,but also our deep desire for a democratic and unifiedIraq. Believe me, there are places in the world wherethis viewpoint has never been seen or heard. So it'simportant to assume that you're often dealing with a greatdeal of lack of information. Our most recent program,"Iraqi Voices for Freedom," is a great prototype of howthe Policy Coordinating Committee, co-chaired by myself andthe National Security Council, works. IIP people didinterviews of the exiles, Department of Defense did someother kinds of interviews. The Near East bureau vetted thesubjects, so when we launched this program, we could offerthe press not only the booklet but also video interviewsthat the media can pick up and use as on their television channels. And many of the individuals themselves have agreedto do digital video conferences or interviews. It'sthis kind of total communication effort - going back in myadvertising day - that is the way to get the word out, incontext. We've just formed an Arabic-speaking team thatis headed to London next week. London is a gateway formany of the Arab and Muslim television and newspaper people. And we need to establish a constant presence andengagement there, including Rosetta Stone Portuguese training, teaching, andinterviewing. If my first point is the need to inform,my second relates engagement.