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This article contributes to foreign policy analysis by applying role theory to the study of soft power, evaluating the relationship between a state's chosen international role(s) and susceptibility to non-coercive influence. I argue that in countries where said role involves committed engagement with varied power poles, elites derive benefits from their various partners and thus abide soft power bases such as the Russian Diplomatic Academy (RDA) without violating the principle of autonomy maximization. I utilize a mixed methods approach, using logistic regression as part of a qualitative case study of Kazakhstan. Drawing on an original dataset of Kazakhstani ambassadors since 1992, I find that foreign policy role better explains the continued presence of RDA-trained diplomats within the Kazakhstani ambassadorial corps than traditional security arguments. This outcome demonstrates the promise of examining soft power through the lens of role theory, with an emphasis on the agency of potential targets of influence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Does foreign aid improve the image of donors in recipient countries? Studies have found weak overall effects, but also positive correlations that are highly conditional on donor and recipient factors, like program characteristics and regime type. Our statistical and case study analysis of US foreign aid leads to a more skeptical perspective. We assess the impact of foreign aid on public opinion of the United States in twenty recipient countries during the Obama and Trump presidencies, using Pew Research Center survey data. A multi-level longitudinal analysis of individual and country-level variables finds that correlations between aid disbursements and foreign public opinion disappear when controlling for attitudes about the US president. These results are corroborated in crucial case studies of Kenya and Turkey. The findings are important for governments that use aid to influence foreign opinion and for scholarship that considers aid to be a source of soft power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Chinese government's rigorous efforts to enhance its soft power have confronted a major challenge during the COVID-19 pandemic. This study aimed to look at how the Chinese soft power changed throughout the pandemic using English news articles that covered China. The research took a data science approach to investigate the contents of articles using machine-learning-based sentiment analysis and Dirichlet-Multinomial Regression (DMR) analysis. The results show a gradual downturn in overall sentiment and that the topics related to political issues made the most significant impact. Nevertheless, the major increase in referencing Chinese social media implied that the sources of Chinese soft power have been diversified throughout the pandemic. In addition, this research has aimed to engage in major debates around soft power theory. Providing a multi-disciplinary approach for analyzing soft power, this research has tackled the difficulties in the quantitative conceptualization of soft power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scholars of international relations have long recognized the importance of soft power in great powers' hegemonic designs. In contrast, we know little of middle powers' employment of noncoercive strategies of attraction and, in particular, how soft power operates in the context of middle-power antagonism. We suggest that, first, soft power enhances coalition-building strategies for middle powers. Contrary to expectations that states join forces against a shared threat, the use of soft power via development aid produces an "Us" versus "Them" distinction in target states that unites them in the absence of a common enemy. Second, middle states' soft-power strategies are likely to support coalition maintenance so long as it does not challenge target states' national interests. Utilizing extensive archival and interview-based data, we examine how soft power featured in Egyptian–Israeli competition across sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) from 1957 to 1974. We demonstrate how soft power operates beyond the context of great power agenda setting, therefore providing novel evidence for the importance of soft power in the interplay between interstate antagonism and noncoercion in world politics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Do states' partnerships with foreign elites influence international public opinion? During Russia's annexation of Crimea, the Kremlin strengthened its ties with far-left and far-right European parties—leading some European elites to express more explicit pro-Russian positions. This paper analyzes how these elite-level ties influence ordinary individuals' foreign policy attitudes, offering insight into the conditions under which soft power "trickles down." By leveraging public opinion data before and after the conflict in Crimea (2012–2017), and employing an estimation strategy that follows the same logic as a standard differences-in-differences strategy, I demonstrate that Russia's linkages with anti-establishment parties led to greater confidence in Vladimir Putin over time, but had limited impact on favorability toward Russia, the United States, and NATO. These findings have important implications for autocratic public diplomacy, our conceptualization of soft power, and Russian foreign policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

By trading upon the principles of South-South cooperation, Brazil is widely viewed as having gained a positive image worldwide. Brazil's South-South development cooperation was one of the foreign policy instruments it used to raise this profile. However, studies of the generation of soft power are still lacking in the international relations literature, and where empirical research exists it focuses more on the results of soft power strategies than on how soft power is created. Therefore, this article explores how Brazil's soft power strategy is conceptualized in Brazil's development cooperation discourse and how it is operationalized through South-South development activities. This research uses a triangulation method combining the analysis of official documents, academic studies and interviews to conclude that the Brazilian government under President Lula (2003-2011) influenced the organization of its cooperation agency and guided it towards sectors and targets that contribute to the creation of positive outcomes. This article contributes to the debate on the state's behavior in soft power, that is, the 'behavior' of the Brazilian government in the design of its cooperation agency's activities, thus also contributing to knowledge about the relationship between an agent's behavior and the outcomes of a country's policy of 'soft empowerment'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study presents the first systematic analysis of the public opinion dimension of soft power competition in the contemporary Middle East. Building on the scholarship on perceptions of foreign states and Arab public opinion, it proposes a series of hypotheses about sectarian identity, religious worldviews, and anti-Americanism as determinants of attitudes toward Turkey, Iran, and Saudi Arabia in the context of regional rivalry. It then presents multivariate probit estimations utilizing Pew Global Attitudes Survey to test these hypotheses. The findings suggest that religious identity and worldviews directly affect favorability ratings of these three powers in the Arab Middle East. While Sunnis favor Saudi Arabia and Turkey over Iran, religious individuals demanding Islamic law favor the Islamic Republic. Furthermore, anti-Americanism translates into lower support for Saudi Arabia and Turkey, but greater support for Iran. Democratic attitudes have no influence over perceptions of these three powers indicating the limits of democracy promotion as a foreign policy tool. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores the relationship between ethnic, sectarian, and religious identities and soft power in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region in the immediate aftermath of the Arab Uprisings. Utilizing original public opinion surveys conducted in Egypt and Iraq in 2012, we find that identity-based allegiances play a major role in groups' choices regarding which countries' increasing involvement in the region are seen favorably and which countries are seen as an ideal model for the region. Sunnis are likely to view Turkey and Saudi Arabia positively in both regards, whereas Shiites are more supportive of Iran. But our results also suggest that crosscutting cleavages should not be overlooked: Sunni Kurds are less likely to hold positive attitudes toward Turkey and Saudi Arabia. Our findings also show that Copts, a religious minority in Egypt, hold positive attitudes toward the United States and negative ones toward Saudi Arabia and Iran. These findings contribute to both the theoretical literature on soft power and the debates on international competition for influence in the MENA region by emphasizing the role of ethnic and religious identities in shaping attitudes toward international actors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Constructivism in the International Relations literature mainly focuses on the constitutive interaction between international norms and state actions. Few studies explore when ideas at the domestic level matter in foreign policy change. I propose a constructivist account for policy change that emphasizes not only ideas but also material interests as exogenous factors constituted within domestic structures. My empirical analysis in the case of the Turkish International Cooperation and Development Agency reveals important evidence demonstrating the influence of (i) shared normative values, mostly constituted by the foreign policy elite's intersubjective understanding of Turkey's historical roots and cultural ties in the region and (ii) material interests, favored through the 'trading state' and framed by the convergence of principled and causal beliefs on policy change. Ideas matter in foreign policymaking when a set of contingent conditions is satisfied: (i) A small group of recognized foreign policy elite has shared normative beliefs and (ii) an enabling political environment exists, particularly a majority government facilitating foreign policy appointments to key positions so that a window of opportunity is provided for policy entrepreneurship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]