I recently came across an old blog post by the wonderful blogger Marco Recorder who asked his readers to offer definitions of the term digital diplomacy. While I have been researching digital diplomacy for more than two years, I too often find myself confronted by the dilemma of how to best define this novel form... Continue Reading →
Why Digital Diplomacy Should be Follower Centric
It's fair to say that the marketing and sales worlds are customer centric. Companies that produce products to be sold to the general public are well attuned to their customers' needs. The process of launching a new product is also customer centric as companies aim to evaluate whether such products will meet the expectations, needs... Continue Reading →
In Digital Diplomacy, A Narrowing Digital Divide-Part 1
By and large; the digital divide refers to inequality in access to, or ability to use, information and communication technologies. Such a divide may exist between populations and geographic areas in a given country or between countries. The global digital divide often refers to the fact that the internet has not spread evenly throughout the... Continue Reading →
How Kenya’s MFA Leads By Example
2014 Summaries Over the past few weeks, many bloggers, journalists and research institutes investigating digital diplomacy have published their summaries of 2014. One such summary that attracted much attention dealt with India's digital diplomacy achievements over the past year. While some have focused on the social media activity of India's new Prime Minister and twitter celebrity Narendra... Continue Reading →
Exploring the E.U.’s Twiplomacy
From a diplomatic perspective, the European Union (EU) is a baffling entity. On the one hand, it represents a political union of 28 member states. As such, it has governing bodies, legislative bodies and a foreign service that promotes the E.U.'s interests around the world. On the other hand, each member state in the E.U.... Continue Reading →
Great Expectations- what followers of diplomatic institutions expect to find online
Last week I had the opportunity to address a group of ambassadors to the UN Headquarters in Geneva. The topic of discussion was the current practice and potential of digital diplomacy at the embassy level. Following my presentation, the ambassadors asked me what are followers of digital diplomacy channels looking for? Why have they decided... Continue Reading →
When the E.U. realized the potential of digital diplomacy
Like most nations and international organizations, the European Union has eagerly adopted social media over the past two years. And like most foreign ministries, the E.U.'s digital diplomacy apparatus amounts to a social media empire consisting of countless twitter channels and Facebook profiles. On twitter, one can choose to follow the E.U.'s Foreign Policy Service,... Continue Reading →
Exclusive interview with Gal Rudich, Head of new media section at the Israeli foreign ministry’s Digital Diplomacy Unit
Two weeks ago I had the opportunity to further my study of Israel's Digital Diplomacy by interviewing Gal Rudich, Head of New Media Section at the Israeli Foreign Ministry. Gal spoke to me about the Israeli digital diplomacy model, how the ministry coordinates digital diplomacy messages at the ministry and embassy level, how the ministry... Continue Reading →
The medium is NOT the message in Digital Diplomacy
I recently became interested in learning which language rules supreme in the world of twiplomacy. While English has long since replaced French as the Lingua franca in the physical world, I was not so sure it had done so in the digital one. I therefore compiled a sample of 84 countries analyzing the languages they... Continue Reading →
Exclusive interview with the director of Israel’s Digital Diplomacy Unit
Israel has one of the most active Digital Diplomacy units in the world. In a recent survey I conducted of 86 countries spanning the globe, Israel's MFA (Ministry of Foreign Affairs) was found to be the tenth most active MFA on twitter. It was also the fifth most popular MFA in the sample. Yoram... Continue Reading →