Western Assumptions in Non-Western Public Diplomacies

Recently, there has been a drive to rebalance public diplomacy scholarship from its predominantly Western origins. However, even as we diversify to non-Western studies, buried assumptions laid in public diplomacy’s foundation may still continue to restrict our view of public diplomacy as a global practice. This Forum essay critically examines two of those assumptions. First, ‘individualism’ — as an ideal of separate, bounded entities — fosters a tight focus on individual actors and action, while often overlooking relational and contextual dynamics. Second, ‘estrangement’ normalises the idea of separation and alienation, a proposition not shared by other traditions that recognise diversity but presupposes inter-connectedness and commonality. From relational and holistic perspectives, mediating diversity is not the same as ‘ mediating estrangement’ . The goal of exposing assumptions is to recognise their limitations and create space for more relational and holistic perspectives to expand our vision from West/non-West to a range of global public diplomacies

Alienation · Diplomacy · Diversity (politics · Environmental ethics · Epistemology · Ideal (ethics · Individualism · International relations · Political economy · Political science · Proposition · Public Diplomacy · Scholarship · Social connectedness · Sociology · Law · Media Studies and Communication · Psychology · Public Relations and Crisis Communication · Social Psychology

• Revisiting public diplomacy in a postpandemic world

  Open Access•R S Zaharna, Zhao Alexandre Huang•Communication and the Public•2022

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