America also needs to pay attention to its 'soft power'

Twenty-five years ago I wrote an opinion piece for the International Herald Tribune in Paris about America's image abroad.

I was living in London and within the span of a week, two British tourists had been murdered in the U.S. - a carjacking in Florida and a robbery gone bad in New Orleans - and the London tabloids were filled with screaming headlines about America's mean streets and violent culture.

Having lived abroad many years, I was all too aware of the image that many held in their minds about our country. When an Indian friend was being transferred to America to work for a large technology firm, his second question to me about America was, "Should I buy a gun?"

I was taken aback and explained that he would be living in a quiet, upscale suburb with virtually no crime and that with two young children in the house, a gun was too often a tragedy waiting to happen.

This week there will be more screaming headlines abroad about America's violent culture. America does not have a monopoly on violence, but among the richer, industrialized nations it is unique when it comes to mass shootings. A 2017 study showed that while the U.S. holds five percent of the world's population, 31 percent of mass shootings occur here.

As I wrote long ago, this is not just about a loss of tourism dollars because some might choose not to come to the U.S. out of fear that they, too, might be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

In 1990, the scholar and diplomat Joseph Nye wrote a book in which he coined the phrase "soft power" and differentiated it from the "hard power" of military force or the coercion that comes with the imposition of sanctions or the withholding of aid.

Soft power is based on the powers of attraction and appeal. In the case of geopolitics, countries associate themselves with another country because of the appeal of that country's culture or economic vibrancy or the strength of the ideals that are at the core of its politics. When President Reagan referred to America as a "shinning city on a hill," that is what he was talking about.

The Pew Charitable Trust's Research Center has surveyed countries around the world for decades about attitudes toward the United States, and in the last two years, there has been a significant drop in America's favorability score, particularly among our closest allies and closest neighbors. Incidents that we have seen in recent days play a part, but so does the rhetoric emanating from Washington. One's image, like personal relationships, requires attention and tending.

We sometimes forget that other countries have domestic politics, too. When America takes certain actions that attract criticism in one country, that country's political leaders will be more reluctant to be seen working closely with the U.S. Take for example, the situation in the Strait of Hormuz. Why would our European allies refuse to be part of an American-led coalition to safeguard shipping and, instead, opt to set up their own maritime shield?

America's inability to deal with the deadly violence plaguing our society is seen abroad as both a political and a moral failing. And, when policies change day to day on a whim or a tweet, other countries cannot trust what we say. This has wide and troubling implications whether one is talking about economic or security issues.

America is called the most powerful country in the world for good reason, but an important component of that power is the power of our ideals and our continuing quest to form a more perfect union. When progress toward those ideals recedes, we lose those things that make America so special and, potentially, a positive force in the world.

Keith Peterson, of Lake Barrington, served 29 years as a press and cultural officer for the United States Information Agency and Department of State. He was chief editorial writer of the Daily Herald 1984-86.