Production by U.S. embassies of the State Department’s long-running series of annual “Background Notes” covering every country in the world had long been considered a useful service for the American public. Now, however, they appear to have morphed into yet another taxpayer-subsidized campaign commercial for the Obama Administration. The old …
In a recent speech to the American Security Project, Tara Sonenshine, Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy, laid out her vision for her tenure in office. “I always begin with, well, what is this nation about?” she said. Most people hesitate to go there, presumably for fear of offending this …
Yesterday, the State Department issued its 2011 International Religious Freedom Report, which represents the culmination of an annual review the State Department must undertake pursuant to the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 (IRFA). However, other than exhorting countries that are egregious violators of religious liberties (as defined in IRFA) …
Americans deserve transparency about what their government is doing, as long as that transparency doesn’t threaten national security. Transparency should also be the guiding principle of the State Department’s public diplomacy and U.S. international broadcasting. But since 1948, the U.S. Information and Educational Exchange Act, also know as the Smith–Mundt …
There is some confusion in Foggy Bottom as to how the United States ought to define Boko Haram, an Islamic militant group based in northern Nigeria. Last week, Assistant Secretary of State Johnnie Carson testified in front of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, calling Boko Haram a “terrorist organization.” Yet …
In his report to the permanent council of the Organization of American States (OAS), Secretary General Miguel Insulza made the correct call. After traveling to Paraguay with a group of experts and meeting with all involved parties, Insulza urged OAS member states on July 10 not to suspend or expel …
Even by U.S. government standards (not a high one these days), the State Department’s budget process is a mess. In almost every budget cycle, billions and billions of hard-earned taxpayer dollars get allocated to the State Department in the last minute without proper congressional debate or substantive hearings. As a …
On May 17, Robin J. Lerner, deputy assistant secretary for private sector exchange at the State Department, made a valiant attempt to correct the troubling disparity in the public diplomacy competition between the Chinese and American governments, a competition in which the Chinese are clearly pulling ahead. The issue in …
Controversy has swirled around the Smith–Mundt Modernization Act since it passed mark-up as an amendment to the House version of the National Defense Authorization Act last Friday. Smith–Mundt has prohibited U.S. citizens from accessing the public diplomacy products of the U.S. government, whether in print or on the airwaves, since 1948. Critics on the left …
The House Armed Services Committee clearly acted in the U.S. interest when it voted to modernize the Smith–Mundt Act last week, as an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act. Since 1948, Smith–Mundt has prohibited agencies of the U.S. government from informing the U.S. public in print or on the …
