Foreign Policy

The Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center at Stanford University, in cooperation with the Center for the Pacific Rim and its Kiriyama Chair for Pacific Rim Studies at University of San Francisco, is pleased to present an international conference on "Public Diplomacy, Counterpublics, and the Asia Pacific."

The conference challenges the dominance of U.S.-centric and state-centered conceptions of "public diplomacy" to better understand and practice this resurgent component of world affairs. The complex, shifting contours of our globalizing world demand a broader -- comparative, multi-track, and ethical -- perspective on public diplomacy and its importance today.

A new perspective must take into account public diplomacy initiatives emanating from various places throughout the world. (We begin by "mapping" public diplomacy initiatives originating in the Asia Pacific.)

It must capture the significance of not only state-sponsored programs tightly linked to foreign policy, but also private activities involving a wide range of actors and arenas (i.e., NGOs, international business, media old and new, pop culture) that perhaps more subtly but no less profoundly impact national interests and world affairs.

Ultimately, a new perspective must comprehend that public diplomacy can be more than an instrumental quest for "soft power." A pathway toward robust people-to-people interactions, public diplomacy in its myriad forms can help achieve reconciliation -- the overcoming of historical injustices and other troubling conflicts in our post-9/11 world.

A primary objective of the conference is to discuss and refine papers for a book manuscript (to be considered for publication via a new series of Stanford University Press and the Brookings Institution). The conference/book will cover the following four issue areas: (1) historical and conceptual perspectives; (2) country/region surveys examining significant public diplomacy institutions and initiatives throughout the Asia Pacific; (3) case studies of transnational, multi-track diplomatic efforts driven by civil societies; and (4) case studies of public diplomacy by marginalized groups and in emerging public spheres (e.g. "the blogosphere.")

Conference panels -- at Stanford the morning of April 19 and at USF all day April 20 -- will be in colloquium format for presenters to discuss their research. Limited spaces will be available for observers, and a reservation is required.

The first public talk is on April 18 (5:45-7:00 p.m.) at the University of San Francisco. Shorenstein APARC's Michael Armacost will be speaking on "Japanese Power and Its Public Faces." You can find more details about this event on the USF Center for the Pacific Rim website.

The second public talk is on April 19 (12:15-1:55 p.m.) at Shorenstein APARC. Stephen Linton, Ph.D. (Chairman, Eugene Bell Foundation; Associate, Korea Institute, Harvard University) will give a talk titled "Treating Tuberculosis in North Korea: Toward US-DPRK Reconciliation." Lunch will be served so an RSVP is required. You may reserve a seat by clicking the link to Dr. Linton's lecture.

The conference keynote address is on April (5:45-7:00 p.m.) at the University of San Francisco. Dr. Stephen Linton will deliver a talk titled "Treating Tuberculosis in North Korea: NGO Humanitarian Assistance as Public Diplomacy." The keynote address is free and open to the public. RSVP recommended. Please call the USF Center for the Pacific Rim Events RSVP Line at (415) 422-6828.

More information about this conference and the panel sessions can be found on the website for the USF Center for the Pacific Rim.

This conference is co-sponsored by The Asia Society Northern California; The Japan Society of Northern California; Business for Diplomatic Action; Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University; and the Taiwan Democracy Program in the Center on Democracy Development, and the Rule of Law at Stanford University.

Philippines Conference Room and the Okimoto Conference Room in Encina Hall. Some sessions will be held at the University of San Francisco.

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About the Event:

President George W. Bush has called the decade before September 11 the "years of sabbatical." The popular misconception that America was too distracted to focus on foreign policy obscures the significant debates both inside and outside government to define a new purpose for the world's lone superpower. The end of the Cold War had a profound impact on the Democratic and Republican parties, and a reexamination of the efforts across the political spectrum to articulate a new grand strategy after containment is instructive for understanding how American elites think about issues like democracy promotion, the role of international institutions, and the use of force.

About the Speaker

James Goldgeier is a Public Policy Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, the Whitney H. Shepardson Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, and a Professor of Political Science and International Affairs at George Washington University. In 2005-06, he held the Henry A. Kissinger Chair at the Library of Congress. He taught previously at Cornell University, and he has been a visiting scholar at Brookings and Stanford. In 1995-96, he was a Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs Fellow serving at the State Department and National Security Council Staff. His most recent book, Power and Purpose: U.S. Policy toward Russia after the Cold War, co-authored with Michael McFaul, received the 2004 Georgetown University Lepgold book prize in international relations. He is also the author of Not Whether but When: The U.S. Decision to Enlarge NATO (Brookings, 1999) and Leadership Style and Soviet Foreign Policy (Johns Hopkins, 1994), which received the Edgar Furniss book award in national and international security. He graduated magna cum laude in government from Harvard University and received his M.A. and Ph.D. in political science from U.C. Berkeley. He is currently co-authoring a book for Public Affairs on American foreign policy from 1989 to 2001.

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James Goldgeier Professor of Political Science and International Affairs Speaker George Washington University
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Shibley Telhami holds the Anwar Sadat Chair for Peace and Development at the University of Maryland, and is a non-resident Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution. Previously, he was the Director of the Near Eastern Studies Program at Cornell University and has taught at Ohio State University, the University of Southern California, Princeton University, Columbia University, Swarthmore College, and the University of California at Berkeley. His publications include Power and Leadership in International Bargaining: The Path to the Camp David Accords (Columbia University Press, 1990); International Organizations and Ethnic Conflict, ed. with Milton Esman (Cornell University Press, 1995); and Identity and Foreign Policy in the Middle East , ed. with Michael Barnett (forthcoming, Cornell University Press, 2001); and numerous articles on international politics and Middle Eastern affairs.

Professor Telhami has actively been bridging the academic and policy world. He served as advisor to the United States delegation to the United Nations during the Iraq-Kuwait crisis, and was on the staff of Congressman Lee Hamilton. He is the author of a report on Persian Gulf security for the Council on Foreign Relations, and the co-drafter of a Council report on the Arab-Israeli peace process. Professor Telhami is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and a member of the advisory committee of Human Rights Watch/Middle East. He has been a member of the American delegation of the Trilateral American/Israeli/Palestinian Anti-Incitement Committee mandated by the Wye River Agreement between Israel and the Palestinians and has a weekly radio commentary broadcasting widely over the Middle East.

He received his B.A. from the Queens College of the City University of New York (1974), M.A. from the Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley (1978), and Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley (1986).

Professor Telhami will be reporting on his latest poll of Arab public opinion and interpreting the results on key issues.

Daniel and Nancy Okimoto Conference Room

Shibley Telhami Senior Fellow Speaker Brookings Institution
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Over the last fifteen years the world's largest developing countries have initiated market reforms in their electric power sectors from generation to distribution. This book evaluates the experiences of five of those countries - Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa - as they have shifted from state-dominated systems to schemes allowing for a larger private sector role. As well as having the largest power systems in their regions and among the most rapidly rising consumption of electricity in the world, these countries are the locus of massive financial investment and the effects of their power systems are increasingly felt in world fuel markets. In-depth case studies also reveal important variations in reform efforts. This accessible volume explains the origins of these reform efforts and offers a theory as to why - despite diverse backgrounds - reform efforts in all five countries have stalled in similar ways.

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Michael A. McFaul - First, the U.N. is not the world's legislature. Pretending that U.N. resolutions approximate laws is misleading in practice and misguided in principle. In practice, the barrage of resolutions passed every year by the General Assembly has little meaning beyond the U.N. walls. The notion, expressed by U.N. Undersecretary-General for Communications Shashi Tharoor in the latest issue of Foreign Affairs, that Security Council resolutions passed under Chapter VII of the charter are "legally binding on all member states" is also deceptive. A Security Council resolution only becomes binding when a powerful state -- i.e., the U.S. -- makes it so. Nor should U.N. "legislation" be viewed as "international law" under the current rules for membership in the U.N. How can Syria's ambassador to the U.N. claim to represent the will of his people, when his government does not? What kind of legislative body allows one royal family an equal vote to a democratic India representing a billion people?
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In an article written for the current issue of the Washington Quarterly Larry Diamond, Michael A. McFaul and Abbas Milani, suggests that the U.S. government seek a comprehensive agreement with Tehran that would "end the economic embargo, unfreeze all Iranian assets, restore full diplomatic relations, support the initiation of talks on Iran's entry into the WTO, encourage foreign investment, and otherwise move toward a normal relationship with the Iranian government." In exchange, Iran would have to suspend its nuclear weapons program...
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Bombing Iran will exacerbate, not resolve problems, Michael A. McFaul, Larry Diamond and Abbas Milani demonstrate in a new landmark article. "Rather than throw the reactionaries in Tehran a political lifeline in the form of war, the United States should pursue a more subtle approach: contain Iranian agents in the region, but offer to negotiate unconditionally with Iran on all the outstanding issues. Comprehensive negotiations could offer powerful inducements, such as a lifting of the economic embargo and a significant influx of foreign investment and thus create the jobs necessary to persuade Iran to halt nuclear enrichment. If the hard-liners reject the offer, then they would have to contend with an angry Iranian public. Such internal strife would be far preferable to an Islamic Republic united against the attacking forces of the 'Great Satan.'"
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Amr Hamzawy is Senior Associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He is a noted Egyptian political scientist who previously taught at Cairo University and the Free University of Berlin. Hamzawy has a deep knowledge of Middle East politics and specific expertise on the reform process in the region. His research interests include the changing dynamics of political participation in the Arab world, the role of Islamist opposition groups in Arab politics, with special attention both to Egypt and the Gulf countries.

Hamzawy's studies at Cairo University focused on civil society and democratization in the Arab world, Islamism, and the cultural impacts of globalization in Muslim majority societies. He received his Ph.D. from the Free University of Berlin, where he worked as an assistant professor at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies.

Some of his publications include The Saudi Labyrinth: Evaluating the Current Political

Opening, (Carnegie Paper 68, March 2006); Human Rights in the Arab World: Independent Voices, coedited with Anthony Chase, (University of Pennsylvania, 2006); Zeitgenössisches Arabisches Denken: Kontinuität und Wandel, (Verlag des Deutschen Orient-Instituts, 2005); Civil Society in the Middle East, (Verlag Hans Schiler, 2003); Religion, Staat und Politik im Vorderen Orient, coedited with Ferhad Ibrahim, (Lit Verlag, 2003)

Amr Hamzawy holds a Ph.D from Free University of Berlin; M.A. from the Institute of Social Studies, The Hague, M.A. from the University of Amsterdam, and B.Sc. from Cairo University.

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Amr Hamzawy Speaker Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
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