Listened to both the podcast and your discussion with Dr. Rangappa's class and always enjoy the points made and brought up. I thought the last questioner in the class was close to a point discussed often in the past which is one difficulty we have in our international info programs is expressing a common understanding of what we, as Americans, believe. This used to be a no-brainer but now everything is up for debate (so it seems) which is partially a problem of the many-on-many debates online using unfiltered strawmen, ad hominim attacks, etc and also, as you persistently point out a problem of leadership.
Another podcast worth listening to was one on the 60's public diplomacy efforts as part of the Apollo program that brought the US space program to the world and highlighted its importance to all of mankind and not just to Americans. https://information-professionals.org/episode/cognitive-crucible-episode-130/
It's hard to imagine us gathering around something like that now though we could cite many instances of American leadership in areas that benefit everyone. Again, we can trace this back to not just having failing to plan and resource PD efforts but who would champion it?
I disagree that we need to have a common understanding of what we believe. In fact, the differences has been and can remain part of our strength. I've heard this "challenge" since I first learned about and entered the PD realm nearly 18 years ago. The idea we need to know who we "are" before we can articulate a vision of what we want tomorrow to look like and thus what our foreign policy should be and how we should organize and execute toward that vision is non-sensical, and yet the idea persists. We have gotten wrapped around the axle seeking specifics, losing track of the baseline ideas. The Apollo example is a fitting example: at about the same time, people like Louis Armstrong were part of the PD effort, for good reason but the if we take the "common understanding," as some did at the time, he was a bad fit (some sought to confiscate his passport). He was a great fit. (No relation, by the way.) This one line of discussion can and should spawn a longer discussion that I won't launch in a comment.
I think we agree...? Concur that we've lost sight of the 'important characteristics' and get lost in the disagreements over implementation and details. I think we do have a set of principles in our founding documents which have always been aspirational and set the baseline for what keeps the country together and which we represent to the world. Also agree this is a longer discussion.
Oh and yes the definition discussion. I keep coming back to the sign above an old Pentagon boss's desk: "The level of emotion on any particular issue is inversely proportional to the issue's importance." He would often point to that when he felt I was getting too immersed in the discussion definitions.
Listened to both the podcast and your discussion with Dr. Rangappa's class and always enjoy the points made and brought up. I thought the last questioner in the class was close to a point discussed often in the past which is one difficulty we have in our international info programs is expressing a common understanding of what we, as Americans, believe. This used to be a no-brainer but now everything is up for debate (so it seems) which is partially a problem of the many-on-many debates online using unfiltered strawmen, ad hominim attacks, etc and also, as you persistently point out a problem of leadership.
Another podcast worth listening to was one on the 60's public diplomacy efforts as part of the Apollo program that brought the US space program to the world and highlighted its importance to all of mankind and not just to Americans. https://information-professionals.org/episode/cognitive-crucible-episode-130/
It's hard to imagine us gathering around something like that now though we could cite many instances of American leadership in areas that benefit everyone. Again, we can trace this back to not just having failing to plan and resource PD efforts but who would champion it?
I disagree that we need to have a common understanding of what we believe. In fact, the differences has been and can remain part of our strength. I've heard this "challenge" since I first learned about and entered the PD realm nearly 18 years ago. The idea we need to know who we "are" before we can articulate a vision of what we want tomorrow to look like and thus what our foreign policy should be and how we should organize and execute toward that vision is non-sensical, and yet the idea persists. We have gotten wrapped around the axle seeking specifics, losing track of the baseline ideas. The Apollo example is a fitting example: at about the same time, people like Louis Armstrong were part of the PD effort, for good reason but the if we take the "common understanding," as some did at the time, he was a bad fit (some sought to confiscate his passport). He was a great fit. (No relation, by the way.) This one line of discussion can and should spawn a longer discussion that I won't launch in a comment.
I think we agree...? Concur that we've lost sight of the 'important characteristics' and get lost in the disagreements over implementation and details. I think we do have a set of principles in our founding documents which have always been aspirational and set the baseline for what keeps the country together and which we represent to the world. Also agree this is a longer discussion.
Oh and yes the definition discussion. I keep coming back to the sign above an old Pentagon boss's desk: "The level of emotion on any particular issue is inversely proportional to the issue's importance." He would often point to that when he felt I was getting too immersed in the discussion definitions.