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In January 2025, the Trump White House unveiled a new Twitter/X account titled “Rapid Response 47.” From the perspective of digital diplomacy, such an account may be of strategic importance. The ubiquity of social media, smartphones, and digital technologies has ushered in an era of instantaneous news dissemination and real-time crisis communication. In this dynamic... Continue Reading →
Diplomacy hinges on credibility. As Ben Mor aptly notes, “being perceived as honest and reliable is a necessary condition for obtaining and holding the attention of target audiences, as well as for effective persuasion.” States that are perceived as duplicitous or deceptive struggle to engage with global publics, let alone persuade them to accept their... Continue Reading →
The rapid development of AI tools has caused a frenzy in foreign ministries (MFAs) as diplomats across the world are trying to identify the risks and benefits brought about by artificial intelligence tools such as ChatGPT, Mistral, Claude, Gemini and DeepSeek. Diplomats’ attempts to grapple with the professional and societal ramifications of AI has taken... Continue Reading →
Throughout the 1980s, noted British historian Eric Hobsbawm delivered a series of lectures examining the academic study of history, and the state of social history, his chosen field. Hobsbawm’s lectures offer much needed insight into the study of digital diplomacy, in general, and the study of AI’s potential impact on diplomacy. For example, Hobsbawm argued... Continue Reading →
Sociologist Manuel Castells famously argued that digital societies relentlessly strive to annihilate time and space. Time is annihilated by the reversal of traditional roles and life experiences. Such is the case with a 30-year-old tech CEO that manages 50-year-old employees or in the view of retirement as a second adolescence, a period of experimentation, of... Continue Reading →
Now is the age of nostalgia. Throughout the world we are witnessing an insatiable longing for the past. In the post-Brexit haze, the UK craves the influence and power of its defunct empire; in Turkey neo-Ottoman sentiments have transformed a President into a Sultan; In America, many still hope to Make America Great Again while... Continue Reading →
In the early days of digital diplomacy research, scholars were enamored by “engagement metrics”. Given that digital diplomacy was closely associated with public diplomacy, and seeing as how public diplomacy mandated that diplomats “engage” with foreign populations, counting likes, Re-Tweets and comments seemed fruitful. By measuring “engagement metrics” one could finally measure the outcome of... Continue Reading →
Note: This post was co-authored by Bar Fishman and Ilan Manor and was originally published on the USC CPD Blog. In recent years, the platform formerly known as Twitter, and now rebranded X, has lost millions of users. This process began following X’s acquisition by tech mogul Elon Musk during 2022. Musk’s contentious policies, which... Continue Reading →
Historian Eric Hobsbawm dedicated much of his academic work to exploring the impact of the past on present-day societies. For Hobsbawm, the past was always present. Yet the function that the past plays in the present could differ greatly. During times of upheaval, the past can serve as a roadmap or template for overcoming adversity.... Continue Reading →
Each week, I publish a list of interesting articles, essays and reports that may be of interest to the digital diplomacy community. This week- Germany blames China for ‘serious’ cyber attack (The Financial Times) OpenAI’s Sam Altman is becoming one of the most powerful people on Earth. We should be very afraid (The Guardian) TikTok... Continue Reading →
Exploring Digital Diplomacy 