A Combination of Hard and Soft Power

States practice foreign policy to defend and promote their interests in the world. States tend to define their national interests primarily in terms of security and prosperity, but these interests are also frequently taken to include key national values and traditions. In Europe the constitutional order includes democracy, the rule of law, and respect for human rights. These values are central to Europe’s identity and to European foreign policy but are increasingly being challenged around the world. China and Russia assertively promote a fundamentally different model, and their views find a ready audience among authoritarian rulers everywhere.

Across the globe, freedom of expression and other fundamental rights are under attack. Meanwhile, populists and nationalists are working hard to weaken the European constitutional order from the inside. Anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, and other forms of intolerance are on the rise. At home as well as abroad, Europe is embroiled in a contest of values and ideas.

How can liberal democracies respond? What combination of hard and soft power do they need to preserve the rights and liberties that are fundamental to Europe’s cultural identity?

Across the globe, freedom of expression and other fundamental rights are under attack. 

A country’s soft power, Harvard Professor Joseph Nye has written, rests primarily on three resources: its culture (where others find this attractive), its political values (when it lives up to them at home and abroad), and its foreign policies (when they are seen as legitimate). Soft power, the power of attraction, has long been part of European diplomacy.

Third Pillar of Foreign Policy

In Germany, cultural relations and education policy form the third pillar of foreign policy, along with political and economic relations. France counts ‘a vibrant culture’ among the factors that contribute to its security, prosperity, and influence. The United Kingdom, in the opinion of (then) Foreign Secretary William Hague, is “a modern-day cultural superpower”.

The European Union, too, is engaged in cultural diplomacy. In 2017 EU ministers said that culture is ‘an essential part of the EU’s international relations.’ But the EU is a newcomer to the field and its policy is still in its infancy, both conceptually and in terms of implementation.

The attacks on Europe’s core values of liberty, democracy, and the rule of law are dangerous; they leave no room for complacency. But the rise of illiberalism should not be cause for despondency either. Europe does not lack the means to respond; what it lacks is a sense of direction. Too often, as the composer Chilly Gonzales put it, it looks like ‘a movie with no plot’. Faced with threats to its cultural identity, Europe needs to mount a cultural response.

If Europe is to defend its values effectively abroad, then Europeans will have to stand up for them at home, with courage and conviction.

There is no doubt that cultural diplomacy can be a key component of this response, provided it is rethought and redesigned. Cultural diplomacy needs a paradigm shift, both at national and at European level. The traditional model, with its dominant emphasis on displaying national cultural ‘achievements’, is no longer fit for purpose. It must be replaced by a model that not only combines national perspectives with a common, European approach, but which also has cultural freedom among its prime objectives.

If Europeans are to respond effectively to the erosion of liberty around the world, they will have to employ all the means at their disposal. For the EU this means that cultural diplomacy must be reconfigured as an integral dimension of European foreign policy instead of being treated as an incidental adjunct, as is the case today. The EU needs to move beyond the confines of its current policy framework, recognising both the limits and the potential of a more ambitious approach.

Cultural diplomacy needs a paradigm shift, both at national and at European level. 

Soft power, as defined by Nye, is the ability to affect others to obtain preferred outcomes by the co-optive means of framing the agenda, persuasion, and positive attraction. Cultural diplomacy is regarded as a subset of public diplomacy, which is understood by practitioners as activities undertaken to understand, inform and engage individuals and organisations in other countries in order to shape their perceptions in ways that will promote a country and its policy goals internationally.

Culture includes a people’s way of life (customs, values, ideals), arts and heritage, and popular culture (the products of a commercial entertainment industry).

A changing World Order

What is the liberal international order? One leading analyst, John Ikenberry, defines it as an ‘open and rule-based international order’ that is ‘enshrined in institutions such as the United Nations and norms such as multilateralism’. At its heart were collective security, open markets, and democracy. This order is changing rapidly and may even be fracturing.

Change is affecting it at three levels:

1. power is shifting from western states to rising powers
2. liberal-democratic values are being challenged in many parts of the world, and
3. the US appears to be losing interest in upholding the liberal international order.

The post-1945 dominance of western powers is under pressure from various quarters. Daalder and Lindsay, who wrote The Empty Throne, distinguish between three categories of challengers:

First, revisionist powers, such as China and Russia, who want to reshape global rules to their own advantage; Second, emerging powers, such as Brazil and India, who embrace the perks of great-power status but shun the responsibilities that come with it; and third, rejectionist powers, such as Iran and North Korea, that defy rules set by others.

The UK now regards Russia as a bigger threat to its national security than Islamic State and Al Qaeda.

China, too, has used military force in defiance of international law. It has rapidly built up its military presence on islands in the South China Sea. When its territorial claims were rejected by the Permanent Court of Arbitration, China dismissed the ruling as ‘a piece of paper’ that is destined to come to naught. It has embarked on an ambitious programme to project its power in the world through loans (Belt and Road), investment in strategic industries, diplomacy, and military means. In Asia, China spends more on defence than India, Japan, South Korea, Australia, Pakistan, Vietnam, and the Philippines together.

Moscow has supported destabilising activities of political leaders in Bosnia and Herzegovina, encouraged anti-EU sentiment in Europe, interfered in American and French elections, and engaged in cyber-attacks and attempted attacks.

Both China and Russia actively seek to change the international discourse about human rights, including in the UN Human Rights Committee. To promote their statecentric agenda both Moscow and Beijing have significantly upgraded their cultural diplomacy and informational activities in other countries.

America's Change of Direction

The third major development is America’s change of direction. Its largely unsuccessful interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq have dented America’s readiness to deploy force as an instrument of statecraft. America’s willingness to act as guardian of the international trading regime has also waned, even among Democrats: as Presidential candidate, Hillary Clinton withdrew her support for the Trans-Pacific Partnership. But prior to Donald Trump’s election, leading Democrats and Republicans remained by and large committed to America’s post-1945 role as leader of the ‘free world’. 

Trump broke with this tradition. As President, Trump has described NATO as “obsolete” (a remark he retracted), and the EU as a “foe” (a remark that still stands). He has praised dictators and scorned allies, including Canada, Germany and the UK. Trump imposed tariffs on steel and aluminium from Canada and Europe, ostensibly for reasons of security, which have now been reversed by the Biden administration. He ended America’s participation in the 2015 Paris Agreement to mitigate climate change but the new American government is committing itself again.

President Trump abrogated the 2015 nuclear agreement with Iran (President Biden is willing to continue negotiations) and has recently announced to withdraw from the INF nuclear arms control agreement with Russia. Washington has cut off funding to the United Nations Reliefand Works Agency (UNRWA) which provides humanitarian aid to Palestinians. The US has left UNESCO. It has stopped cooperating with UN Special Rapporteurs whose global mandate includes possible human rights infringements in the USA.

With Russia stirring up trouble, China rising, and America possibly unreliable as a guarantor of the liberal world order, how should Europeans respond?

For 70 years, principles and values helped hold the Atlantic Alliance, the World Trade Organisation, and other pillars of the international order together. This era, it seems, is now closing. With Russia stirring up trouble, China rising, and America possibly unreliable as a guarantor of the liberal world order, how should Europeans respond?

Two world wars and decolonisation put an end to Europe’s position as the geopolitical centre of the world. With the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet-Union, Europe also lost its place at the centre of US foreign policy.

This process is set to continue. As other global and regional power centres emerge, Europe’s relative position will inevitably erode. For a start, Europe’s share of the world population will decline. In 2015 the EU counted 509 million inhabitants, some 6.9 percent of the world’s total. China (1.4 billion) and India (1.4 billion) together accounted for 35 percent of the global population. As other parts of the world grow, China’s share is projected to fall from 18.9 percent to 12.0 percent in 2050, while India’s share is expected to fall from 17.7 percent to 16.1 percent.

Shrinking Europe

The subsequent Euro-crisis fuelled deep misgivings and distrust between Northern and Southern Europeans. In 2015 tensions between Western and Central Europeans, and within many Western countries, were aggravated by Angela Merkel’s unilateral decision to open Germany’s borders to asylum seekers and other migrants. The British decision, in 2016, to leave the European Union dealt another blow.

Contrary to expectations, European public opinion did not react to the difficulties, divisions, and uncertainties of recent times by turning against the European Union.

British analysts in particular have long argued that the EU is, or has become, too diverse, or too meddlesome, to hold together. It is bound to disintegrate sooner or later and suffer the fate of previous common European ventures.

But there is another side to this coin. Europe is stronger than it might at first sight appear. Contrary to expectations, European public opinion did not react to the difficulties, divisions, and uncertainties of recent times by turning against the European Union. On the contrary, it appears that Brexit and the election of Donald Trump have galvanised public support for the European Union.

In 2018 favourability ratings of the EU reached their highest level in 35 years. Close to three-quarters of respondents in the Euro area are in favour of the Euro (74 percent), while 20 percent are against. Perhaps equally remarkably, overall trust in the European Union remains higher than trust in national governments and national parliaments.

Global Regulatory Power

Nor has the EU been paralysed. No country has left the Euro; in fact, six new countries joined since the outbreak of the financial crisis. The EU has redoubled its efforts to strengthen the global trading system, striking deals with Canada and Japan. The trade agreement with Japan is the largest in the EU’s history and covers nearly a third of the world’s GDP. For the first time the EU’s draft multiannual financial framework includes a significant budget for European defence cooperation.

Such statistics should be read with a degree of caution: favourability ratings do not readily translate into political influence. Still, the EU’s broadly positive image does constitute an asset in an era of increasing global political competition. It remains for the EU – EU governments as well as EU institutions – to recognise the value of this asset, and to build on it.

For all its evident flaws the European Union remains a beacon of hope to countless people, within Europe itself and elsewhere in the world. Hopes and expectations can be particularly strong in regions where people’s liberties are ignored and their rights denied. It often takes writers and artists, working outside official channels, to register such hopes– the hope that Europe will live up to its values of freedom and justice, and that Europeans will not abandon them to their fate.

For all its evident flaws the European Union remains a beacon of hope to countless people.

The international order is in flux. Europe may no longer be its geopolitical zenith, but neither is it the nadir. The European Union is not an international power in the traditional, Westphalian sense, nor is it likely to become one, occasional rhetoric about a ‘European army’ notwithstanding. But the EU is more resilient, and more relevant, than its doomsayers allow for.