Abstract
The concept of smart power, which Joseph S. Nye defined as a combination of soft and hard power, was embraced by the Obama administration and became an integral part of its foreign policy strategy. With the administration of Donald Trump, we are witnessing a shift away from soft power toward hard power, which indicates a departure from the smart power strategy of his predecessor. This essay raises the issue of the recent decrease of American soft power and concludes that there is a correlation between this decline and the retreat of the U.S. from its global leadership role.
Zusammenfassung
Das Konzept der smart power, das von Joseph S. Nye als eine Kombination aus soft und hard power definiert wurde, war fester Bestandteil der außenpolitischen Strategie Barack Obamas. Mit der Regierung von Donald Trump erleben wir eine Verschiebung weg von soft power hin zu hard power, was einer Abkehr Trumps von der Smart Power-Strategie seines Vorgängers gleichkommt. Dieser Essay untersucht die aktuelle Verminderung der US-amerikanischen soft power und kommt zu dem Schluss, dass es einen Zusammenhang gibt zwischen diesem Rückgang und dem Rückzug der USA von ihrer globalen Führungsrolle.
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Notes
There has been a dispute about who actually was the first to introduce the concept of smart power. Certainly, some credit belongs to Susan Nossel (2004, pp. 131-132), who suggested that American policymakers should turn to liberal internationalism and focus on the “smart use of power to promote U.S. interests through a stable grid of allies, institutions, and norms.” But it was Nye who developed this concept over time as element of an elaborate theory of power in international relations.
Initially, spending of only 51.1 bn. US-$ was planned.
Figures provided by the DoD do not add up exactly, which probably is a rounding effect.
The fact checkers from the Washington Post counted more than 2000 blatant lies or distorted facts in the statements of Donald Trump within less than a year of his time in office (Kessler and Kelly 2018).
This was not a pure hard power approach because it included certain soft power elements such as nation building.
In the Muslim world, Indonesia is a notable exception where the Obama effect had a measurable effect on the favorability rating of the U.S.
In Russia confidence increased from 11% to 53%, and in Israel from 49% to 56% (Wike et al. 2017).
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Havertz, R. Trump’s Departure from Smart Power. Z Außen Sicherheitspolit 12, 93–111 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12399-019-00760-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12399-019-00760-1