By Alan Heil Who would have thought two years ago that this East African country of 128 million residents would be the scene of a deadly civil war in 2021? Ethiopian President Abiy Ahmed was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2019. His country had ended a decades-long war with its neighbor to the north…
1. THE STRUGGLE TO REFORM PUBLIC DIPLOMACY STAFFING: As any PD officer knows, the effort to inform and influence foreign publics relies heavily on support from approximately 2,600 loyal PD Locally Employed Staff (LES) who do PD work in 189 U.S. missions around the world. Any attempt to reform their functions, structures, and position descriptions is…
Can the North African country of Libya offer hope for reforms elsewhere? On March 16, a new national unity civilian government took power in Tripoli. In the words of a recent Washington Post editorial: “After a decade of chaos, the oil rich nation has taken a significant step toward a new political order.” Libya’s recent…
1. “POTUS” VISITS FOGGY BOTTOM: A visit to the State Department by the President of the United States (POTUS) is always a major event. (President Trump only visited the building once in four years — for Secretary Pompeo’s 2018 swearing-in ceremony — and once famously joked that Pompeo was head of the “Deep State Department”.) So…
The ingenuity of hopeful humanity, from a 27-year-old environmental activist in India to President-elect Joseph Biden in United States. Both have faith that a bright day for weary, afflicted humans the world over must follow a grim winter for mounting victims of the greatest pandemic tragedy (COV-19) this century. According to Washington Post reporter Taniya…
In two years’ time, shortly after graduating from the Harvard Kennedy School, we will join the U.S. Department of State Foreign Service to begin serving as American diplomats. At that time, we will be presented with the same question that all diplomats must answer: where do we wish to serve? Our answer to that question…
Surveying the world scene as a new year and new decade dawns, many would agree, on the basis of events this past year that there aren’t many rays of hope on the horizon. 2019: —As Middle East Institute President Paul Salem describes the year past: “In the Middle East and North Africa, there were five…
Boxing great Muhammad Ali traveled to Africa in early 1980. President Carter asked him to persuade African leaders to boycott the 1980 Olympics in Moscow because the Soviet Union had invaded Afghanistan. Ambassador Lannon Walker was abruptly pulled from negotiations in Angola to accompany The Champ as his diplomatic advisor. This was more than sports…
Why were the hopes for development of new African states so disappointed after they attained independence? Former Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Herman J. Cohen took a long view. His conclusions may help Public Diplomacy officers now assigned to Africa think through how best to support the development enterprise. State and USAID officers…
The First Monday Forum on July 2018: Nelson Mandela Centennial, featured a panel of speakers: Dr. Bob Wekesa from the department of journalism and mass studies at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa; Ron Nixon, the Homeland Security correspondent for The New York Times and author of, Selling Apartheid: South Africa’s Global Propaganda…