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Soft power is overlooked in the field of international relations, dismissed as lacking relevance or robustness as a theoretical concept. This book expands upon the idea of ‘soft power’ in international relations and investigates how soft power actually functions by looking at three case studies in Japan-China relations.
The prevalent global heritage discourse has been primarily Euro-centric in its origin, premise, and praxis. Diverse cultural, historical, and geographical contexts, such as that of Asia, call for more context-specific approaches to heritage management. This book explores this complexity of managing the cultural heritage in Asia. Case studies include sites of Angkor, Himeji Castle, Kathmandu Valley, Luang Prabang, Lumbini, and Malacca, and the book uses these to explore the religious worldviews, heritage policies, intangible heritage dimensions, traditional preservation practices, cultural tourism, and the notion of cultural landscape that are crucial in understanding the cultural heritage in...
The Rhetoric of Soft Power: Public Diplomacy in Global Contexts provides a comparative assessment of public diplomacy and strategic communication initiatives in order to portray how Joseph Nye's notion of "soft power" has translated into context-specific strategies of international influence. The book examines four cases--Japan, Venezuela, China, and the United States--to illuminate the particular significance of culture, foreign publics, and communication technologies for the foreign policy ambitions of each country. This study explores the notion of soft power as a set of theoretical arguments about power, and as a reflection of how nation-states perceive what is an increasingly necessary ...
This book investigates Nigeria’s soft power capabilities in West Africa, demonstrating the extent to which the power of attraction may serve the country’s foreign policy interests. With the increasing popularity of internationally acclaimed cultural outputs, including afrobeat, Nollywood, and charismatic Pentecostalism, and a foreign policy disposition that is altruistic and sparsely transactional, there is increasing interest in how these soft power attributes influence perceptions of Nigeria in Africa. Drawing on extensive original research in Ghana and Liberia, this book highlights the attractive and unattractive elements of Nigeria’s soft power potential. In so far as it makes the case for Nigeria’s soft power in West Africa, it also discusses the challenges encumbering the effective deployment of the full range of Nigeria’s soft power capabilities in the operationalization of its African policy. This book is a timely contribution to prevailing scholarly discussions about the nature and utility of soft power in Africa. It will be of interest to both Africanists and researchers of international relations, foreign policy, and political science more broadly.
The notion of a ‘politics of religion’ refers to the increasing role that religion plays in the politics of the contemporary world. This book presents comparative country case studies on the politics of religion in South and South Asia, including India, Pakistan and Indonesia. The politics of religion calls into question the relevance of modernist notions of secularism and democracy, with the emphasis instead on going back to indigenous roots in search of authentic ideologies and models of state and nation building. Within the context of the individual countries, chapters focus on the consequences that politics of religion has on inclusive nation-building, democracy and the rights of individuals, minorities and women. The book makes a contribution to both the theoretical and conceptual literature on the politics of religion as well as shed light on the implications and ramifications of the politics of religion on contemporary South Asian and South East Asian countries. It is of interest to students and scholars of South and South East Asian Studies, as well as Comparative Politics.
The Sino-Russian relationship has experienced several permutations in recent decades as both states have undergone radical domestic changes, including the end of Soviet communism and the abandonment of Maoism. This volume brings together scholars to address the current status of Sino-Russian relations in the political, military, energy and trade sectors. In this comprehensive new volume, authors offer a detailed account on the both the historical context and current status of relations between Russia and China and the geo-political realignments in Eurasia. This analysis of the evolving relationship addresses global strategy, energy politics, national security, human security, and Central Asi...
This textbook focuses on how media and communications policy is made and what influences its design. It explores the structures and processes in which policymaking takes place worldwide, the factors that determine its forms, influence its elements, and affect its outcomes. It explores how to analyze policy proposals, evaluate policy, and use policy studies approaches to examine policy and policymaking. Truly international in scope, it lays out the variety of political, social, economic, and institutional influences on policy, the roles of industries and policy advocates in the processes, and issues and factors that complicate effective policymaking and skew policy outcomes. This textbook is a valuable resource for advanced undergraduate and postgraduate students.
"Examines contemporary consumption practices in South Korea, China, India, Japan, and Singapore and both updates and extends popular culture studies of the region. Through an interdisciplinary lens, this collection of essays explores how recent advances and shifts in information technologies and globalization have impacted cultural markets, fashion, the digital generation, mobile culture, femininity, matrimonial advertising, and a film actress' image and performance."--Publisher's description.
This book investigates the neglected question of the impact of a rising Asia on the management of transboundary health problems. The chapters examine the role played by Asia in the governance of a range of global health issues and are tied together by a common focus on Asian countries' use of the sovereignty principle. In addition, the contributors examine the interaction between global, regional and domestic institutions, and present current ideas in Asia on the challenge of governing global health.
Over the last two decades, Singapore has undergone a substantial degree of ‘Asianization’. Apart from participating in the Asian values debate of the 1990s, re-visioning itself as ‘New Asia’ and a global-Asian hub, and establishing Asian identities for the commodities it consumes and produces, Singapore has also repurposed its modernity, cultures, and ethos along similar regionalist precepts. However, even in recent times, Singapore continues to vacillate ambivalently between identifying with and differentiating itself from Asia. Responding to the challenges Singapore faces in coming to terms with its Asian identity, this book examines the complex cultural, social, and political unde...