BACKGROUND
Public diplomacy involves strategies and activities aimed at influencing both the foreign and domestic public, understanding their attitudes towards foreign policy and shaping their views on related issues. These efforts help establish a dialogue across borders that improves understanding of each other, and shapes more positive perceptions of a country’s foreign policy priorities or an organisation’s international relations. For this reason, it is important that those actors responsible for improving the image of their country or organisation have a well-informed understanding of how they are currently perceived. This ensures that new initiatives can be implemented to build on strengths, address any perceived misunderstanding, and improve the overall relationship.
As a contribution to public diplomacy efforts of the 53 Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) Partners, the Asia-Europe Foundation (ASEF) established the Asia-Europe Public Diplomacy Training Initiative in 2013, in partnership with the DiploFoundation (Diplo) of Switzerland. Since then, 5 tutored online courses and 5 face-to-face workshops have been conducted and more than 200 participants have benefited from the training.
OBJECTIVES
Through the Face-to-face Training and the Online Course, participantswill gain insights into the current perceptions of diplomacy efforts in Asia and Europe and how to incorporate public diplomacy skills into their daily work. The specific objectives are to:
- Enable participants to deepen their knowledge of public perceptions of Asia and Europe, bi-regional dynamics, and how these affect their work
- Equip them with public diplomacy tools to increase the visibility of the ASEM Process
- Provide practical skills to formulate, develop and deliver a strategic plan to promote ASEM to foreign and domestic public
- Increase networking opportunity for ASEM diplomats to share their experiences and promote deeper understanding of Asia-Europe relations
ACTIVITIES
1. 6th Face-to-face Training (3-7 December 2018) in partnership with the Federal Ministry for Europe, Integration & Foreign Affairs of Austria (MoFA Austria)
2. 6th Online Course (4 March – 26 April)
TARGET PARTICIPANTS
- Young diplomats in departments dealing with Asia, Europe, or ASEM in the Ministries of Foreign Affairs or equivalent of the ASEM Partners
- Diplomats posted by ASEM Partners to ASEM countries who are dealing with public diplomacy
- Representativesfrom government agencies (culture, tourism, trade and investment, etc.)
