In microcosm, this is why “fund defence spending with an aid cut” is really stupid. What is your strategy to prevail in these conflicts if not through funding something like the World Service in addition to your hard power?
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The government is at its core not serious. Not serious to say we take defence of Europe and ourselves seriously and have our metric be that “are we meeting an input target for defence spending” and nothing else
For many journalists from totalitarian countries working for BBC or VoA or DW was often the only way to sustain themselves, and I also know from my friend there that BBC used to have the least strict ideological overhead (i.e. you could have the most journalistic freedom).
With those systems collapsing you'll only be able to quote servile censored media or worse, influencers, when anything happens in those countries (and what happens there tends to have big international impacts as of recently).
Then we worry about China and Russia having a lone unchallenged voice in countries where we need democratic voices to be heard. It’s not as if WS is that expensive.
There seems to be a bizarre and expanding tendency, on both sides of the Atlantic, that considers soft power to be somehow how passé, or irrelevant, or otherwise superseded by events. I really don’t get it at all, can’t see the logic.
Completely agree. I used the words “something like” quite deliberately, because I can see the case for “World Service no longer can do it, need to spend the money on influencers instead”. But clearly soft power and the information space matter.
Right. A good rule in any field IMO is “look and learn from the people who are beating you”, and the countries we are currently losing to have no doubt about the value of this stuff.
In the US case, it seems as thought they don’t understand its importance or believe in it (or perhaps think it’s “woke”?) In the UK case it seems more that… they are not thinking at all about how to prevail in any conflict apart from the next UK general election?
What distinguishes it from hard power is that it’s not as insistent and indelible. It takes a *really long time to build*, burning it down in this manner is an event rather than a process, and can be impervious to a change of mind.
Considering the reaction when I argue in Brazil that *Brazil* should have an international news service like the BBC World Service unfortunately I can see why people would follow this logic, even if it's bad.
A trusted brand for news like the World Service (I think it is abroad??) must cost a fraction compared to a single fighter jet and pilot plus support? Just on the numbers it makes no sense.
Everywhere I've travelled, all round the globe, people have told me how BBC World Service has always been a beacon of truth and trustworthiness.
It's so depressing to see it undervalued by successive governments.
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"That England, that was wont to conquer others,
Hath made a shameful conquest of itself."
I’d add the UK isn’t actually pursuing hard power because that might cut against domestic political positioning too (tax rises)
The UK is thus far pursuing the rhetoric of hard power which is fiscally free & domestically popular
It's so depressing to see it undervalued by successive governments.