Rebuilding Public Diplomacy: The Case Of Israel

Abstract

Edward R. Murrow, the legendary American broadcaster and one-time lead figure for American public diplomacy as the director of the U.S. Information Agency (USIA), famously captured the distinction by placing advisors at the takeoffs or genesis of policy, with advocates often brought in at the moment of policy failure, the crash landings. For American practitioners it is a tension that has persisted since before Murrow's time at the USIA through the end of the Cold War and up to the present time. This chapter attempts to trace this rather tumultuous history of a continuing duel between advocacy and advisory roles. No single experience captures the estrangement between public diplomacy's advisory and advocacy roles better than the brief but eventful tenure of Charlotte Beers, the George W. Bush administration's first of five Under Secretaries for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs. Keywords:Charlotte Beers; Edward R. Murrow; George W. Bush administration; U.S. information agency (USIA); U.S. public diplomacy