THE U.S. AGENCY FOR INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT, USAID, is estimated to have saved almost 92 million lives over the past two decades through its various programs and interventions, according to a study published in the medical journal Lancet. It has done so by significantly reducing deaths from HIV/AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis, and other infectious diseases, as well as making improvements in maternal and child health. More specifically, the study, which analyzed data from 2001 to 2021, found that USAID funding was associated with:
- a 15% reduction in all-cause mortality;
- a 32% reduction in mortality among children under five;
- a 65% reduction in HIV/AIDS-related deaths;
- a 51% reduction in malaria-related deaths;
- and a 50% reduction in deaths from neglected tropical diseases.
Of those whose lives were saved, 30.4 million were children under the age of five, according to the study.
For years, one of the driving forces behind USAID was its critical role in America’s “soft power”—whereby a country may raise its global standing through attraction rather than aggression. The man who coined that powerful concept was a former dean and faculty member of the Kennedy School, Joseph S. Nye Jr.
Nye, who held the role of Harvard University Distinguished Service Professor, emeritus, at the time of his death this May, had been a leading figure in international relations since the 1970s with his work on international institutions.
The role of public diplomacy and cultural exchange in international relations
A nation’s power has traditionally been framed in military and economic terms—the ability a country has to coerce or threaten others. While at HKS, Nye realized that something was missing in this framework: the role of attraction in helping a state achieve its aims.
“Soft power” refers to the idea that a country can use elements such as its culture (for example, movies and music) and political values to attract other countries rather than coerce them through military force. In his 1990 book, “Bound to Lead: The Changing Nature of American Power,” Nye explored the roles of soft power, hard power, and smart power (a mix of hard and soft power strategies). It was one of many scholarly works that placed him in the ranks of the world’s most influential political thinkers. As Nye wrote in “Bound to Lead,” “if you can get others to want what you want, you can economize on sticks and carrots.” He developed the concept in more detail in 2004 in his book “Soft Power: The Means to Success in World Politics.”
Nye’s analysis was built in part on his experience in senior roles in the U.S. government during breaks from his academic career at Harvard Kennedy School, which included nearly a decade as dean. He stayed actively engaged in debates about the nature and use of power until his death.
In the decades since Nye fleshed out the concept of soft power, the United States has used it to achieve foreign policy goals. For decades, the U.S. State Department and other government agencies used cultural tools to help persuade other countries and their citizens to embrace American values. For example, USAID supported not only food aid and development projects but also programs that promoted democracy, human rights, and cultural exchange. The agency increased its spending dramatically from $13.4 billion in 1990, when Nye coined this phrase, to near $25 billion in recent years—and its impact grew correspondingly until it was curtailed by the Trump administration.
“Wise American policy would maintain, rather than disrupt, patterns of interdependence that strengthen American power, both the hard power derived from trade relationships and the soft power of attraction.”
Other countries have used soft power as well—and more may be leaning toward it as the United States relies on it less. For example, South Korea’s hugely popular K-pop music and films have helped build a global following and awareness of South Korea’s growth. Analysis has suggested that this “Korean Wave” influence initiative has generated $8 billion to $10 billion for Korea through tourism and commerce. China, too, uses its cultural heritage as a foreign policy tool, creating hundreds of Confucius Institutes around the world. The global adoption of China’s DeepSeek AI could also be considered a form of “soft power,” as the scholars Owen Daniels and Hanna Dohmen have argued recently in Foreign Affairs.
Soft power may be more important than ever as a tool in the foreign policy toolkit, and Nye’s work helps us understand the world to this day. Currently, as Nye and others have suggested, the soft power of the United States is weakening. In a posthumously published article in Foreign Affairs, published this year, Nye and his frequent coauthor Robert Keohane argue that President Trump’s policies in his second administration may have eroded it. “Over the past 80 years,” they write, “the United States has accumulated soft power, based on attraction rather than coercion or the imposition of costs. Wise American policy would maintain, rather than disrupt, patterns of interdependence that strengthen American power, both the hard power derived from trade relationships and the soft power of attraction. The continuation of Trump’s current foreign policy would weaken the United States and accelerate the erosion of the international order that since World War II has served so many countries well—most of all, the United States.”
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The Power of Radio
VOICE OF AMERICA (VOA) was established as an American broadcaster during World War II and over the decades has played a role in cultural diplomacy, supporting U.S. soft power through its programming for audiences abroad. (As of this writing, its fate under the Trump administration is unclear.) HKS alumni and affiliates have worked for VOA. Former VOA director David Ensor was a Joan Shorenstein Fellow at the Kennedy School’s Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy in 2015. In a paper he published as a fellow, Ensor wrote, “VOA is an effort to harness and direct the nation’s soft power by exporting truthful, balanced journalism. This is a model of state broadcasting with a long history, credited with contributing to the peaceful demise of the Soviet Union.”
Alum Navbahor Imamova MC/MPA 2017, a journalist from Uzbekistan, has also worked for VOA as an anchor, a reporter, and an editor. In an HKS profile during her time at the School as a Mason Fellow, Imamova said, “I want to continue to alter the media landscape in Central Asia and, in doing so, change the political landscape of a region badly in need of fundamental reforms in every sector.”
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Banner image: Villagers collect rations parachuted from a plane onto a drop zone in South Sudan. Photo by Tony Karumba/AFP; faculty portrait by Martha Stewart