Jazz, Rock 'n' Roll, and DiplomacyCan American culture make Muslims love us?
Posted Friday, Nov. 9, 2007, at 12:50 PM ET
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StumbleUponIn the Soviet Union, the West's sonic appeal came more in the form of jazz—which was promoted by the U.S. government, especially in Willis Conover's jazz broadcasts on Voice of America and in the officially sponsored tours of such jazz musicians as Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington, not just in Russia but also in the Middle East. When I was a Moscow correspondent in the early-to-mid-'90s, many Russians told me that their first endearing—and enduring—impressions of America came from Conover's jazz programs. The music's appeal lay in its boisterousness, its improvised virtuosity, which stood in such contrast to the party's stale culture.
And let's not forget the countries of Western Europe, whose postwar youth were attracted to America not just by the Marshall Plan but also by the liberating energy of our movies, especially the films noirs and gangster melodramas that our own critics at the time found so vulgar.
So, again, here's the question: What does America have going for it now? What could we send out to the world that might have the same impact on, say, Arabs and Muslims today that rock, jazz, and B-movies had on Russians and Europeans during the Cold War?
It may be, as Hughes (and both women who preceded her in the job) concluded, that there are no answers. The roar of Abu Ghraib, water-boarding, and military occupation—or even the quieter but still teeth-gnashing encounters with rude officials at U.S. embassies and airports—drowns out, or infects, our most engaging art forms and most strenuous attempts at public diplomacy. Even in its heyday, the U.S. Information Agency could do little to counter the clear "message" transmitted by the war in Vietnam. In that sense, policies do trump culture.
But let's say the next president begins to readjust American policy. It's not clear that anything in our culture might help restore our image.
First, the case of Cold War Europe might hold few lessons on how to mold the hearts and minds of current-day Arabs and Muslims.
Many people under Communist rule hated their governments. Since the world was divided into two blocs (the American-led West and the Soviet-led East), those who hated the East were predisposed to like the West. But today, in a world of dispersed power, people have many models from which to choose; Saudis or Egyptians who despise their autocratic regimes are more likely to find solace in Islamic fundamentalism than in any Western beacon.
During the Cold War, information was also divided in two: the Communist organs on the one hand, the BBC World Service and Voice of America on the other. The choice was stark and clear. One appeal of jazz and rock, especially in times of intense crackdown, was their forbidden status. Now, with satellite dishes and the Internet, everything is accessible. The challenge of sending out a message isn't that the foes are jamming the signal; it's that the channels are cluttered with so many other messages.
Once more, then: What is to be done? What should—what can—the next president do to improve America's image in the world?
There are some obvious measures. Train immigration and customs officials to lighten up; there are ways to stay on alert while making ordinary tourists feel welcome. Send speakers on foreign tours, even if they're (within reason) critical of U.S. policies. Translate more classic American books and documents, and make them available at foreign libraries. (Another way of putting these last two ideas: Bring back the U.S. Information Agency—an independent bureau, separate from the State Department, that promotes American values and culture, not an administration's policies.)
But what else? If you were president, or chairman of this revived USIA, how would you promote our values and culture? Quite apart from changing foreign and military policy (that's the subject of another column), how would you make America more appealing or at least less hated?
Send your ideas to . I'll read them and report back on what you said.
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Remarks from the Fray:
Is Kaplan looking for a substitute for a more rational foreign policy? Surely that can't work. The US has an idealistic foreign policy in theory and rhetoric, whereas its approach in practice is haphazard, disjointed and usually driven by short-term real-politik. Making rhetoric and actions match would be much better, even if that means that the US admits to only pursuing self-interest.
US culture had an outsized influence when US technological advantage meant that most widely available cultural products (recorded music, movies) were American. With mass culture products mature (and their effects known to those in power), and the technology to produce them widely available, local products now compete more or less effectively with American ones. Since most US cultural products reinforce negative stereotypes of the US, it's not even clear that better access to US cultural products would help. When was the last time you saw a movie, or listened to a song that made you proud to live in the US, and that could not have been about another country?
The US shares cultural values with the rest of the world. Things like the power of the individual, the importance of religion in public life, dedication to science and education, free enterprise, secularism and the fight for equality are (in varying degrees) worldwide recognized values. But everyone has a different idea of their relative importance, and many of these values stand in opposition. The US doesn't have a clear message to broadcast. in the first place. Moreover, almost every country has historical advocates for all of these values, some much older, some much more eloquent, than the US's.
--endorendil
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Communism is/was a bastard child of the Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution. It promised to produce the same things liberal capitalism promised -- a world of prosperous, free and equal people -- only better. We could attack it, and did, by showing that it didn't deliver the goods as well. Jazz, rock and roll, and the individual hedonism that went with them were something that people raised in a communist society could recognize as part of a better material existence.
Islam isn't vulnerable to the same attack because, unlike Communism, it isn't purely materialistic. Like all serious revealed religion, it has the great fudge factor of Heaven and Hell to make up for its worldly failures and to keep the faithful in line. As long as conformity to the will of God is the most important thing, mere prosperity and material well being aren't enough, and individual liberty is positively pernicious.
--jack_cerf
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It is beyond ignorant to believe that foreigners see the US and its role, impact, aims and program in a distorted fashion. Rather, it is folks here who have a distorted view. Merely attempting to uber-distort our image with mere fluffery is a fool's errand.
Why does jazz and rock resonate among the oppressed? Because it has soul. Soul is the very antithesis of what our globalized, corporate one world is all about. Soul is what is left in people when everything else-- their wealth, their security, their family and community relationships, their spiritual expression-- is stripped from them, or distorted and repressed. It's that part of humanity which shines through when the material things are gone.
Well, what are you going to do to show the world that we still have soul? Nothing. You can't manufacture it. You can't create it with propaganda or b.s. aid programs or ambassadors. You can only show soul by suffering deprivation with grace and good humor; by sacrificing personal interests and gains for the greater good of all; by respecting human rights, human values, and human life.
Now how do you do that while enforcing a world wide empire of a thousand foreign bases, with a military behemoth sucking up more resources than it would take to clothe every naked person and fill every hungry belly?
You can't. So give it up. Give it up and wait patiently until the evil we send out in the world comes back in full force on our own heads. Then we can atone, we can burn off the self satisfaction, the self interest and the selfishness and return to being the people we once were and are no longer-- people with a surplus of soul.
And when that happens, the world will see it, and the world will respond.
--doodahman
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Let's not "engage" the Muslim world at all. Let's leave them alone as much as humanly possible. No wars, no bombing, no saber rattling; no "peace processes," no attempts to win them over with our "culture," no summits, no humanitarian assistance, no any kind of assistance, no nothing. Let's get off of their oil as much and as quickly as possible. Let's have as little relationship with the Muslim world as possible. Let's just leave them alone.
As long as the Muslim world remains so backwards, self-pitying, primitive and dysfunctional everything we do will backfire. You can't even try to help or "win over" such a sick, hate-filled, self-hating person without being held in contempt and dragged down.
The idea that Muslims will fall in love with our "culture," as in the products of our culture, is pretty lame. They may, eventually, be inspired by the roots of our culture, the personal freedoms and elevation of the individual our values celebrate, and that may ultimately loosen them up a bit. And hopefully, some day, they will find a way to embrace these ideas and turn their own society into a different, non-American kind of humane, democratic Muslim society.
But even that can't happen by design, by the US trying to make it so. Anything we do, good or bad, will be considered meddling.
--EarlyBird
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(11/12)