Is Digital Diplomacy a Competitive Activity?
By Julian Dierkes
This is a question that came up during the #Diplometrics discussion both in my mind, as well as more explicitly during the discussion.
It seems to be on other people’s mind as well:
.@DonLenihan of @Canada2020: Government engages the public on policy in a competitive game of influence w/ winners and losers #futurecanada
— Alfred Hermida (@Hermida) May 19, 2016
Since much of the #Diplometrics and measurement discussion was based on tools that have been developed for and are prevalent in the private sector, it is perhaps not surprising to hear digital diplomacy also cast in competitive terms.
Another realm where some people seem to be thinking of direct diplomacy as a competitive, even aggressive activity is in relations with Russia. Whether that has been in various #twiplomacy efforts around the Ukraine or more recent analyses of “social media information dominance”, this seems to be particularly prevalent in the cyber-skirmishes with Russia.
But does thinking about digital diplomacy as a competitive activity make sense?
Digital vs Public Diplomacy
In writing more about digital diplomacy, it is clear that I’ll have to spend some time thinking about definitions and distinctions of different concepts. As I rev up my monitoring of digital diplomacy discussions online, the one other term that I keep bumping into is “public diplomacy”. That’s not only because the #Diplometrics event was co-organized by the USC Center on Public Diplomacy. But it is a term that has clearly established itself. It seems to encompass “soft power”, as well as various social media, etc. activities. There thus is a clear overlap with my understanding of “digital diplomacy”, though not a perfect overlap. Some “public diplomacy” may not be digital (say, an exhibition showcasing Canada’s art in Japan, for example), while some “digital diplomacy” may not be public.
The purposes of digital diplomacy are the same as analogue diplomacy, however, it’s just that the means are decidedly digital and recognize the benefits of digital technologies in pursuing a kind of diplomacy that may not have been possible in a pre-digital world. Ultimately, however, the point is for Canadian policy regarding international affairs to be implemented.
I think that purpose is not obviously a competitive one. Or, that not treating it as a competitive activity may well lead to better outcomes.
Development as an Example of Non-Competitive Digital Diplomacy
Let’s take development as an example, in part because Global Affairs Canada also includes the former CIDA, i.e. development assistance.
The ultimate goal of Canadian development aid is the reduction of poverty. Obviously, there are entire (sub)disciplines of academic work devoted to the question what development is and how it is brought about. Some of those arguments are in competition with each other, and there are also some arguments about the desirable outcomes of development aid. However, there are also broad agreements on certain types of outcomes.
A number of Global Affairs Twitter accounts have embraced the #ENDchildmarriage hashtag in support of Canadian and broader coalition efforts to affect change that will eliminate the practice of under-18 brides. Given that Global Affairs is part of a coalition supporting this aim, the ultimate outcome is not a Canadian outcome, but rather a global outcome. Sure, if there are real Canadian contributions to be made to this outcome, these should be documented and would likely be acknowledged by other stakeholders, but really, if fewer girls are “married off” underage that is an overall good where competition, even competition for acknowledgment of contributions should play a very minor role. Global Affairs has recently created a site that brings coverage of different Canadian initiatives on this topic together and serves as a great example of such a thematic use of social media.
Digital Diplomacy Supporting Trade Agreements
Let’s take a trade agreement as an outcome of digital diplomacy then. The Trudeau government has committed to signing and ratifying the Trans-Pacific Partnership. Leaving aside the possibility that that commitment may be tactical in that it shows support for trade agreements while the TPP is unlikely to be ratified because of US congress opposition, and let’s assume this commitment is genuine. What are digital diplomacy tools in this context?
Well, Global Affairs might try to reach out to stakeholders in Canada and in other TPP-signatory countries to get a sense of levels of support. Social media invitations to comment on any specifically Canadian role/status in TPP could bring such engagement. To the extent that other signatories might also try to engage stakeholders, I suppose this could be seen as a competitive exercise, yet the ultimate goal is to increase chances of the TPP passing, not to gain a greater “share of voice” on trade issues.
Aspects of Competition in Direct Diplomacy
It seems that the more digital diplomacy is thought of in the context of soft power and nation-branding the more it becomes a competitive activity. When it comes to the engagement of stakeholders, however, competitive dynamics seem only relevant to me in choices about where to concentrate resources, for example. From my perspective, any Canadian digital diplomacy efforts in the U.S. face huge hurdles simply because of the very large number of voices on social media. In engaging a U.S.-stakeholder, a Canadian approach does compete with other voices in a very real way. In countries where online engagement by public actors is still less common, approaches to stakeholders might be that much more likely to succeed. To me, much of Asia is an example of this that is worthy of particular attention by Canadian policy-makers as they strategize about digital diplomacy. That argument is based on perceptions of competition for attention, of course. But it is the attention that is being pursuit in a competitive context, not the goals of diplomacy.
Could we think of digital diplomacy thus being a competitive activity in terms of its means of communication, but not its aims?
I am pretty certain that I don’t quite have my definitions and distinctions sorted out in my head and that the question of whether digital diplomacy is a competitive activity will be one that I will want to return to.
How Digital Diplomats and Researchers Conference
In April, I participated in Global Affairs Canada’s #Diplometrics conference asking how the activities that fall under Digital Diplomacy might best be measured.
In addition to fascinating content and lots of learning, I enjoyed looks around the room to see what innovations there are in how we run conferences about things digital, presumably with some difference to “more traditional” events.
Since this conference followed on a conference the week before in an entirely different area (geographically and substantively) where there was no online discussion, no hashtag, and I couldn’t find the other speakers online (!), I was happy to see that the #Diplometrics event involved colleagues who are active online.
Parallel Discussions
I’ve experimented with some tools for hosting discussions at academic events that would allow the audiences to digest and comment on presentations online as a complement to Q&A sessions at the end. So far, these attempts have been mixed, I would say. The #Diplometrics event at least overcame the challenge of other events where there isn’t a critical mass of people engaging online so that twitterwall stall, for example, as too few people are contributing.
The #Diplometrics twitterwall was active enough that new tweets would appear with regularity and that there was a fair number of comments on presentations that went beyond agreement and applause. Those comments in general seem to come in two forms: 1. Actual comments on the substance of presentations, and 2. Links and pointers to other projects, tools and resources. I think both are very useful to include.
I felt significantly less self-conscious staring at my device for a good portion of the time as others did as well, though there was also a number of people (including myself) taking notes with pen-and-paper while using one of multiple devices. Mixed methods! The electronic tool of choice seems to be the keyboard-connected tablet.
.@jdierkes Here you go: Professional digital natives & tools that they are using at #Diplometrics : A pen and paper! pic.twitter.com/7A90BoRjtu
— Philip Mai (@PhMai) April 20, 2016
I am increasingly less concerned about the frequently expressed worry that parallel discussions divide attention. While it does require some concentration and effort to stay focused on a presentation while also commenting on it, in the end, I see this as somewhat akin to (my kids’) bi/trilingual education. Yes, maybe their written expression will not be as perfect as a unilingual student, let’s say 90%, but if they add even only 50% percent fluency in one or more languages that’s still a lot more than 100%. And as a presenters, I am always happy to think that some of the people starting and tapping at devices are engaging more intensely with what I am presenting than someone who is listening passively but with full attention.
Twitterwall and Audiences of Hashtag Users
One challenge I see is between live-tweeting for remote audiences and the parallel in-room discussions I mentioned above.
Looking at my tweets appear on the Twitterwall made me a bit self-conscious that most of what I was tweeting was intelligible only to people in the room and relatively meaningless to others following on-line. This is a general challenge in 140-character-messages, I find, i.e. not to give in too much to the temptation to turn abbreviations and references into a code that becomes unintelligible to the vast majority of accidental or casual listeners.
One solution could be to have two different hashstags for these different purposes, i.e. one that is used, perhaps by a designated team, to live-tweet to remote audiences, and another hashtag that would be used primarily for the in-room discussion. That adds another layer of complexity, however, that we may not be quite ready for (yet).
Other Tools
Video is entering conference activities that I’m involved in. Examples for #Diplometrics were my preview discussion with Mark McLaughlin and Jay Wang on blab, but also the streaming and side-interviews that the #Diplometrics organizers conducted, mostly using Facebook Live. In my mind, such streaming and brief reflective interviews offer terrific opportunities for (at least passive) remote participation in a conference, a single session, or even just one presentation. Nice amplification!
Several presenters relied on prezi rather than PPT, something that I don’t see much at other conferences. I still haven’t seen anyone present directly from a mobile device using the prezi app.
One participant had a gorilla stand for his mobile which looked like it was a good alternative to the keyboard-connected tablet, though not easy to type on.
Of course, some tools one could see at the conference were also decidedly old school-cool:
Tools of digital diplomats… @mjmclean‘s power source appears to be a diesel generator.#Diplometrics pic.twitter.com/sfWuOWV6jJ
— Julian Dierkes (@jdierkes) April 21, 2016
Discussing Israel Digital Diplomacy Conference
In late March, the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs hosted its first Digital Diplomacy conference.
Oxford University PhD student Ilan Manor was very involved in the organization of the conference and participated in it. He was thus an obvious choice as a partner in my very first direct diplomacy blab.
Where is the “Diplo” in #Diplometrics
These are some of my impressions from the April 2016 forum on “#Diplometrics – Measuring up: Public diplomacy & advocacy 2.0 for effective results” organized by Global Affairs Canada’s North America Advocacy division and the Univ of Southern California’s Center for Public Diplomacy.
To gain your own impression, check #Diplometrics on Twitter and the storified version. You can also have a look at the blab I had with conference co-organizers, Mark McLaughlin (Global Affairs Canada) and Jaw Wang (USC Center for Public Diplomacy) (YouTube version).
Measurement Using Business Tools
The overwhelming impression I had from the case studies from several countries and international organizations was that measurement is primarily relying on business tools that offer some insights, but that also seem to detract from the most important potential strength that I see in digital diplomacy, i.e. engagement to make better policy, to have a more engaged citizenry, and some success in persuading other countries of given policy challenges.
That sort of engagement does not fit the model of a “campaign”, the terminology that most digidipls who participated in the #Diplometrics conference were using. I had a fairly visceral reaction to that term that forced me to reflect a bit further on what exactly it is that I was objecting to in this terminology.
Engagement is intended to lead to better policy as an outcome and that’s the outcome that would have to be measured, but it is not an outcome that is likely to happen in a linear fashion. Campaigns – by contrast – seem very linear.
To be clear, many of the tools I heard about seemed very appropriate to a broadcast-and-advocacy model of digital diplomacy. Many of these tools were fascinating to hear about and catered to the inner geek of participants, including myself. Some tools were primarily in terms of designing processes (especially the emphasis on planning for digital diplomacy activities ahead of time to be able to define outcomes to measure), while others were more literally measurement tools and a discussion of specific methodologies.
It took 4 mics for @jdierkes to issue his challenge to diplomats 😉 Are we truly measuring diplomacy? #Diplometrics pic.twitter.com/mgHeqGhRrk
— Martha McLean (@mjmclean) April 20, 2016
It was particularly impressive for me to hear how “campaigns” are taking measurement into account in the design of the campaigns already, an approach that is obviously the right way to go in terms of designing activities. Defining desired goals (whether those are specific to the kind of measurements as discussed at the conference) ahead of time is also obviously the strategic and right thing to do. It’s also a very interesting exercise to determine what activities are actually worth pursuing. While I was surprised to see mention of logframes in this context (a tool I’m only recently becoming familiar with through the role I’ve taken at the Canadian International Resources and Development Institute), this is a perfectly sensible approach to take.
Yet, I have to wonder where the diplomacy is in this? Did analogue diplomats work to specific outputs and outcomes pre-defined by logframes? Of course, just because this wasn’t done in the past does not mean that it may not be time to embrace such an approach now. But I do have some doubts about whether that is a direction where added value from social media and digital tools lies as opposed to something that is being pursued because it is the “done thing”.
Symptomatic of this approach is the fact that the two-day conference seemed to pass without the mention of blogs or other forms of shorter or longer policy statements. Instead, the digital diplomacy case studies presented were largely aimed at bringing an understanding of existing policies to specific audiences, or persuading them of the worthwhile nature of specific initiatives, not to gain insights into the goals and implementation of the policy itself.
Strategy to plan ahead for measurement is certainly right. But it’s right for “campaigns” that are looking for countable or re-countable activities by others. Again, that’s not what engagement is focused on.
Bringing Diplomacy Back in
So while it was impressive to hear about the criteria and tools that are being developed to measure, I would hope that the notion of public diplomacy or soft power campaigns doesn’t drown out the promise of engagement that a social media-based or embracing diplomacy holds.
There was an occasional mention of “stories”. While this is a category of measurement that is obviously difficult to standardize, it seems to me to be the most promising direction in terms of thinking about measurement of direct diplomacy. If it is rare – though does happen – that a foreign leader introduces a law with reference to the diplomatic efforts of another country, what are the equivalents of such an impact that can at least be collected if perhaps not measured?
Borrowing from the notion of a campaign, can qualitative goals be established for direct diplomacy for a given time frame? Surely, a diplomat could record impressions of a counterpart’s attitude to a certain profile at one moment in time to compare to a later moment in time, knowing whether or not that counterpart had participated in or been “exposed” to digital diplomacy efforts?
Or, what are the network analysis measures that would speak to the very networked nature of diplomacy? Anatoliy Gruzd‘s (CRC, Ryerson) keynote address pointed forcefully in that direction [and pleasantly catapulted me back into graduate school, pre-social media]. How about recognition of the online power to recruit off-line contacts? Or, a strategic role in bridging structural holes between different communities?
Joining in on DirectDiplomacy Project
I am very pleased to be joining in on the DirectDiplomacy project and to try to build on the excellent work and established voice that was created by Ben Rowswell and his various collaborators in the first three years of the project.
As digital diplomacy is evolving there continues to be a need for scholars to understand what impact this evolution is having on international relations, but also to offer their experiences and analyses of existing efforts and initiatives under consideration. That is what I continue to hope to offer through posts to this site and activities of the project.
One of the particular contributions that the DirectDiplomacy project has made is that it offers a focus on Canadian participation in the evolution of digital diplomacy. That is an important feature to continue and is one of the reasons that I’ve wanted to join in on the project.
As I’ve been drawn into research on digital diplomacy from my focus of Canada’s bilateral relationship with Japan and Mongolia, I’ve been looking for an outlet for analyses and commentary that is of particular relevance to Canada while also speaking to a broader discussion. Rather than set up a site that would divert attention, I am very excited about joining an existing effort.
Some Ideas
While I am mostly pleased to join an existing effort, I also have some few ideas of additional activities for the DirectDiplomacy project.
Video
Video and visual representations are becoming a common feature to social media activities. Yet, as researchers, we’re only slowly adjusting to the apparent reality that large parts of the public prefer information to be delivered in video formats. That implies that we focus our research attention more on video, but also that we communicate via video ourselves. While video platforms that are integrated with social media are still emerging, I will be experimenting with blabs focused on digital diplomacy. See my recent preview of the April 2016 #Diplometrics conference with Mark McLaughlin and Jay Wang as an example.
This is an example of where I look at the use of social media as both, a practitioner (of communication about academic research) as well as a researcher/analyst.
Differentiation of Digital Diplomacy
As digital diplomacy has established itself as an element in many countries’ policies and efforts, activities are taking more and more forms and shape. That represents a challenge to researchers and practitioners alike in keeping up with innovations, patterns, and opportunities. One common response to that challenge is functional differentiation and specialization. Within the broader field of direct diplomacy that utilizes social media and other information and communication technologies, that means a distinction between broadcast of information and engagement, for example. This distinction could be paralleled by a distinction between public diplomacy and direct diplomacy in my mind.
For me personally, engagement and direct diplomacy are the much more interesting aspects of the broader field of digital diplomacy as they seem to represent more significant departures from analog diplomacy.
As I work myself more into the direct diplomacy subject matter, I suspect that some of the necessary differentiation will happen in my writing as well, perhaps through some posts that aim to clarify some distinctions, but also through the “categories” scheme for this blog.
Measurement
Clearly, evidence showing the impact of direct diplomacy efforts is somewhat of a holy grail, i.e. a goal that drives the field of practitioners and analysts alike, but that most likely will never be reached. This is another aspect that is shared between digital diplomacy and efforts of knowledge translation and dissemination by academics. While metrics of the impact of academic work were imperfect in an analog world (citation counts, journal impact factors, etc.), quantitative measures are even less convincing in a digital age. For diplomats, requests for measurement of impact are somewhat new in a digital era as such requests were not required to motivate/fund analog diplomacy efforts in the same way.
While measurements might remain elusive, striving for ways to capture some aspects of impact certainly is an important task for researchers and practitioners.
Better Policy Based on Stakeholder Engagement
The greatest promise of direct diplomacy remains – in my mind – that engagement of foreign policy stakeholders abroad and at home will make for better policy. That, however, remains a – very convincing – thesis and will not be tested until we find better platforms, communication tools, and mechanisms for engagement. Challenges that are often highlighted in discussions about engagement are limited resources (it appears to be less resource-consuming to speak to many than to listen to even a few stakeholders), “trolls”, and the need for secrecy and discretion.
One of the aspects of stakeholder engagement in policy making that I’m looking to develop further is governments and policy-makers “thinking out loud” more and more publicly. Rather than request input on a near-finalized policy, why not ask for views on different options that are under consideration? Obviously, this would only be feasible for diplomatic initiatives that do not include private/secret negotiations or even mild confrontations. But in those cases, it strikes me that an open process would be more likely to strengthen the results than consultation on a nearly-finalized policy.
Format
I will likely select a new theme for the blog simply to refresh the visual impression. I am looking at themes that maximize opportunities and visibility for comments.
I also find myself challenged by the high standard of bilingualism set by the project so far. While bilingualism is a huge Canadian asset, my French is passive (i.e. I don’t write, certainly not correctly, in French), it is not widespread in BC and thus is a challenge in recruiting graduate student collaborators who might post in French or translate to French. Something to continue to consider.
I do very much plan to continue to involve graduate students in the project. In my case, that will be primarily students in UBC’s Master of Public Policy and Global Affairs and in my course on “Communicating Policy” most directly.
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