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[IP] "Perception management"




Delivered-To: dfarber+@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Sun, 19 Oct 2003 17:16:34 -0400
From: Mohammad Al-Ubaydli <mo@xxxxx>

Dear Dave,
for the IP List, if you wish, I found this article from the journal NATO Review.

<http://www.nato.int/docu/review/2003/issue2/english/art4.html>

I greatly enjoyed reading it because it introduced me to the term "perception management", my new favorite euphemism. I'm guessing it came from the same experts who decided to rename revenge as "reciprocity".

The article includes a rather candid discussion of the US efforts at such management in the Middle East. It includes a mention of new government bodies that have "put in place the most coordinated, best-funded, US strategic perception-management structure since the 1980s. It is focused on the Islamic world and has funding of more than US$750 million for the Middle East alone." I wonder how much of the 87 billion budget for rebuilding Iraq is earmarked for such purposes. I've copied the first part of the article below, but I'm also adding a little background on Radio Sawa, a station that the author of the article is very impressed with.

I first heard the station on a visit to Bahrain in December. The country's population makes for a very small market, and the state media have dominated the FM stations. So it seems that most of the broadcasters have a political connection - including a rather educational station by and for US military personnel.

Radio Sawa is a recent entrant to the region, and I found it by chance when searching for some modern Arabic / English music. After a while though I found it more entertaining to hear the listener polls. They include questions like "Would you work for a female boss" and answers from some uncomfortable sounding men. Sometime around the question "Can there be too much free speech" I understood that the station had American funding. No doubt people who live in the region throughout the year would have spotted this link earlier than I did.

It's a fun station to listen to, but I do think that US taxpayers' money could be spent better. The Middle East's citizens do not need an American radio station subtly introducing debate about American values - we are already having these debates with far less subtlety. Even Saudi Arabians know that they must allow women more rights and introduce democracy.

For the majority of Arabs, the disagreement with America centers on its foreign policy, not its liberal democracy. It is naive and counter-productive to ignore these issues in dialogue with the people of the region. Before the war, British and American government representatives regularly appeared on Al-Jazeera, a channel that prides itself on displaying both sides of every debate. With the build-up of the war, however, these representatives stopped appearing. During the war, Al-Jazeera journalists were killed by American soldiers. And after the war, Al-Jazeera journalists are harassed in Iraq.

Furthermore Arab viewers still watch CNN as well as Al-Jazeera to get more coverage.

By contrast American mainstream media are remarkably one-sided and jingoistic in their coverage. A while back on the IP List you showed the effect of this on Americans, many of whom were completely uninformed about the war, its motives and its outcomes.

So the author of the article is missing the point by a wide margin when he says that "An Arab viewer who finds the reporting on CNN to be contrary to his own news bias can switch to al Jazeera, the Arabic satellite news channel, and see a perspective of the world perhaps more consistent with his own."

Or perhaps the statement is part of perception management....

mohammad

Dr Mohammad Al-Ubaydli
e mo@xxxxx
w www.mo.m

=================================================================
Mind games

Lieutenant-Colonel Steven Collins assesses the Coalition's perception-management operations before, during and after Operation Iraqi Freedom and their implications for NATO.

In the coming months and years, analysts will no doubt examine every aspect of the 27-day period from the attempt to decapitate the Iraqi regime on 20 March to the fall of Tikrit on 15 April to draw as many lessons from it as possible. One area worthy of attention with clear implications for NATO is the way in which the Coalition sought to influence the attitudes and reasoning of foreign audiences and especially those in Iraq in the run-up to, during and after Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Both Operation Iraqi Freedom and NATO?s own experiences in the Balkans have shown the importance of so-called "Perception Management". They have highlighted the necessity of developing the means to exploit this aspect of power, while taking measures to protect against its use by the enemy and other asymmetric political and military capabilities. As NATO re-organises its military structure and takes on missions beyond its traditional areas, such capabilities are becoming increasingly important to Alliance operations.

Perception management includes all actions used to influence the attitudes and objective reasoning of foreign audiences and consists of Public Diplomacy, Psychological Operations (PSYOPS), Public Information, Deception and Covert Action. Of special interest in the case of Operation Iraqi Freedom are public diplomacy, the deliberate attempt to persuade foreign audiences of the content and wisdom of one's policies, intentions and actions, and PSYOPS, the use of activities, predominantly media, to influence and persuade foreign audiences.

Since the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001, the United States has sought to revamp its public-diplomacy capabilities. These had been allowed to atrophy during the 1990s as Washington had not felt the same need to explain its policies globally and build up international good will as it had during the Cold War. Today, the White House Office of Global Communications provides top-level direction for efforts designed to create an overall positive perception of US policy and defence activities. And the US National Security Council Policy Group coordinates the policies and messages developed by the White House between it, the State Department's Office of Public Diplomacy and the Pentagon. Together, these bodies have put in place the most coordinated, best-funded, US strategic perception-management structure since the 1980s. It is focused on the Islamic world and has funding of more than US$750 million for the Middle East alone.

Despite this massive effort, there was little demonstrated success in US public-diplomacy efforts prior to Operation Iraqi Freedom. US Secretary of State Colin Powell?s 78-minute speech to the UN Security Council broadcast live around the world on 5 February failed to convince representatives from the key nations on the Security Council ? France, Germany, and Russia ? that military action needed to be taken immediately against Iraq. By contrast, French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin?s subsequent speech before the United Nations, casting doubt on every aspect of Secretary Powell?s presentation, was greeted with cheers and wild applause. As a result, the United Kingdom and United States made little headway in gaining support among their traditional allies, and a second UN Security Council Resolution authorising military action against Iraq was never put to a vote, as it was obvious it would fail to garner the required support.

Within the Islamic world, US public-diplomacy activities have to date failed to generate much return. Immediate, positive results may be impossible to achieve. Effective public diplomacy takes a sustained effort and a long-term view. For the foreseeable future, as Osama Sibliani, the publisher of Arab American News noted: ?The United States could have the Prophet Muhammad doing public relations and it wouldn?t help.? One instrument with a great deal of promise for the future could be Radio Sawa (Radio Together), a US Congress-funded station covering the Arab world and featuring both Arab and Western pop music, interspersed with news from a US perspective. Within months of its debut in 2002, Radio Sawa's advocates announced that it was one of the most popular radio stations among young Arabs.

During the conduct of the military campaign, the Coalition attempted favourably to shape the world-wide perception of the conflict by a variety of measures, including that of "embedding" reporters with military units scheduled to deploy. Although initially controversial, the decision to embed was, in retrospect, a brilliant move for several reasons. First, reporters who wanted to be embedded were forced to undergo a mandatory mini-boot camp, which gave many their first appreciation of the challenges faced by the average soldier. Second, embedding created an inevitable bond between reporters and the units they covered. And third, embedding made sense because it ensured the safety of the reporters and gave the world its first "real-time coverage" of a battlefield. Because of the fluid nature of Iraqi Freedom, many more reporters would likely have been killed and captured had they been allowed to roam the battlefield freely.

[snip]
<http://www.nato.int/docu/review/2003/issue2/english/art4.html>

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