Soft Powers - Logan Deacetis

     https://softpower30.com/country/united-states/ 

Soft Powers In the United States

In class, we discussed soft powers and the meaning behind them. Soft power is the country's ability to co-opt instead of coercing. So, I’m going to look at the status of soft power in 2019 compared to 2016, since our soft powers have declined since then. There are many topics that fall under the setting of soft power, and although ranking quite high on the list, there is still much room for improvement for us. Soft power is made up of 3 pillars which are political values, culture, and foreign policy.

First off we will look at the strengths of the soft powers we have now. Overall in the entire world, the United States ranks fifth for soft powers. Looking deeper into the list the United States is ranked number one in the world for digital, culture, and education. This has been this way for many years though. It will likely continue to stay this way since the United States hosts some of the most prestigious universities and hosts more international students than any other country in the world. The United States has schools such as Havard, Bucknell, Princeton, Yale, Colombia, and many more. The United States also leads in digital thanks to some of the largest tech companies like Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, etc. Then we finally can’t forget that America has the most influential pop culture.

Like I said before the United States has had declining soft powers since Donald J. Trump became President. President Trump’s America comes the first attitude didn’t seem to fare too well with other countries. This is because the actions Trump has made the country seem almost unpredictable, and in some country's eyes even untrustworthy. Back in 2016, the ranking of government was sixteen, but now it has dropped down to the twenty-first rank. Despite the government ranking going down, President Trump did a lot to help in other aspects. The enterprise category has gone from ninth-ranked all the way to fifth-ranked. This is because President Trump was a great businessman, and helped the United States economy get back to one of its higher points. 

Overall, despite the drastic changes in the rankings, the United States is in a similar spot in 2016 as compared to 2019. In 2016 the United States had a soft power score of 77.96 putting the United States in 1st in the world. However, in 2019, we were ranked 5th in the world but had a soft power score of 77.40. So looking at the data, I feel like the United States is in a very good and similar position to what it was in in 2016. Despite many people thinking that the United States’ soft power is diminishing, it is in a very good position. The only aspect of soft power we really need to improve is the government. That would include the “Commitment to freedom, human rights, and democracy, and the quality of political institutions.” Soft power is very important to a country because the more soft power the easier it is to interact in foreign affairs.

Comments

  1. Nick DelpFebruary 5, 2022 at 4:59 PM

    What caught my attention in your blog was the United States has dropped in terms of soft power, which is a surprise to me because, a lot of popular culture seems to come from the U.S. I agree that the U.S. is still in a good position with the soft power that they have because despite what the score says, the U.S. dropping by .52, I do not think that our soft power will decline dramatically anytime soon. I feel that the reasoning for the government ranking declining is due to the lack of popularity for Trump among other international leaders. Which obviously plays a role in our soft power especially with how Trump viewed the U.S. in the United Nations deal as well.

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  2. Sam DoudsFebruary 6, 2022 at 7:58 AM

    Logan, I find this whole idea very compelling. Quantifying soft power for purposes of comparison and examination opens a whole number of doors as far as measuring cultural health. But, do you think its possible that because this article was published by an American University that its biases may skew the results. By this I mean that American researchers probably hold American values close to their hearts, could this make their analysis of another countries' values less accurate? This same could be said for their analysis of other countries' approaches to foreign policy. Or, do you think the researchers probably did a good job of controlling for their own preferences?

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