CULTURAL DIPLOMACY Cultural diplomacy in recent years

CULTURAL DIPLOMACY
Cultural diplomacy in recent years, for example the American efforts at
cultural diplomacy were funded by the CIA as well as the State
Department’s Division of Cultural Relations. Although CIA sponsorship
would be inappropriate and counterproductive today, that history is a
useful reminder of how seriously Washington once took the promotion
of mutual understanding through cultural exchange.
Cultural Diplomacy is quite new in the domain of Ethiopian foreign
policy. Although this term is used increasingly often by political
scientists, communications experts as well as politicians it is still an
area, which is relatively little known. Art and culture are in the forefront
of many countries.
These countries recognize that showing their cultural heritage provides
them with an opportunity of showing who they are, creating a positive
image, thus helping to achieve their political aims. With a debate
currently under way on the subject of public diplomacy it is worth
reflecting on the role that could be played by culture and art in
Ethiopian’s foreign policy.
This is the aim I have to start reflecting on the concept of culture, which
will make it easier to analyze the concept of cultural diplomacy.
What is interesting from the point of view of cultural diplomacy are the
definitions that define the historical aspect of culture. In the strict senseculture is a value in itself (traditional forms such as painting, literature,
music, sculpture, theatre, film); In the wider sense- culture versus natureeverything that is not nature is culture. Culture is the civilization created
by man. In this sense we all create culture.
There have been numerous examples of cultural diplomatic effort
exercised by states, corporations and individuals across the African
continent. In the last fifty years, there have been undergone numerous
political and economic changes. The UNDP commends the region’s
progress in democratization, stating that since the independence
movements of the 1960s, Africa has the highest number of countries
operating under democratic systems. Additionally, before the 2008
economic crisis, there had substantial growth rates, which moved many
countries closer to achieving the Millenium Development Goals set for
2015.
The African continent is not without a significant number of challenges,
but it also is not without numerous positive examples of peace-building
programs and diplomacy, and in particular, cultural diplomacy. Across
the African continent governments are embracing the diversity within
and across their borders and using it as a means to foster dialogue and
various forms of exchanges.
However in the philosophical sense culture is understood by everything
which does not grow of itself from nature but comes about from the
conscious effort of man, being the effect thought and human activity that
constitutes a set of behaviors people have learned, elements of which are
common for members of a certain society and communicated within.
The growth of cultural diplomacy as a means of engaging in
international discourse has become increasingly prevalent in developed
countries in the Western World, but it is by no means restricted to these
states.