Transcript Slide 1

A Cartography of Strategic
Communications
Philip M Taylor
Professor of International
Communications
University of Leeds
The 21st CENTURY GLOBAL ENVIRONMENT
Changing ALLIANCES:
IMPACT OF THE EURO
ECO-ASIA
TERRORISM
Virtual States
Global Warming +/
Ecological disaster +
Creeping Deserts =
Sub-National Groups:
Russian Mafia, FARC,
INFORMATION
WARFARE
UNCERTAIN
FUTURE
ETHNOReligious
PAN-NATIONALISM
WEAPONS OF
MASS DESTRUCTION
‘CLASH OF CIVILIZATIONS’
More GNP =
More Defense Spending
IMPACT OF
TECHNOLOGY
DISEASE
(AIDS PANDEMIC
MALARIA, EBOLA)
POPULATION GROWTH +
RESOURCE SCARCITY =
War over Food, Water, Fish
ASYMMETRIC
WARFARE
GLOBAL ECONOMIC
INTERDEPENDENCE
The 21st century Global
Info-sphere
New regional
players
24/7 rolling news
‘citizen journalists’/
Digital eye-witnesses
The Internet
Blogs, twitter
Web 2.0
Making ‘order’ out of apparent ‘chaos’..
Changing ALLIANCES:
IMPACT OF THE EURO
ECO-ASIA
TERRORISM
Virtual States
New regional
Sub-National Groups:
Russian Mafia,
FARC,
players
24/7
rolling news
INFORMATION
WARFARE
Blogs, twitter
DISEASE
(AIDS PANDEMIC
MALARIA, EBOLA)
Global Warming +/
Ecological disaster +
Creeping Deserts =
‘citizen journalists’/
Digital eye-witnesses
WEAPONS OF
UNCERTAIN
MASS DESTRUCTION
FUTURE
ETHNOReligious
PAN-NATIONALISM
IMPACT OF
TECHNOLOGY
N GROWTH +
RESOURCE SCARCITY =
War over Food, Water, Fish
‘CLASH OF CIVILIZATIONS’
The Internet
ASYMMETRIC
WARFARE
More GNP =
More Defense Spending
GLOBAL ECONOMIC
INTERDEPENDENCE
Web 2.0
…is the job of Strategic Communications
• It is a very NOISY info-sphere
• Lots of competing voices are shouting for
attention
• Those voices are fast, disparate, difficult
to regulate/control, sometimes anarchic
(e.g. viruses, Trojans, worms) sometimes
terroristic
• They have a potential global reach
• They are now interactive (=Web 2.0)
• They challenge the traditional, dominant,
top-down, hegemonic, governmental
‘spokespeople’
Governments have to compete too
• Not with a whisper but with a clear
voice that can and will be heard…
• …because it is credible, reliable,
consistent, honest and truthful
• Silence is not an option; the
resultant info-vaccuum will be filled
with adversary ‘chatter’ (including
misinformation and disinformation)
• Direct to Target Audiences because
democratic free media are
‘unreliable’ as mediators of what is
needed to be said
Communication is….
• From the Latin word ‘communicare’ = to share
• … to the 21st century what gas and oil were to the 20th
• … the fuel that drives political, economic, social, cultural
and military engines
• … networking and to defeat a network, you need a network
• … changing rapidly, especially amongst young people
• … increasingly conducted in virtual environments
Strategic Communication –
the new US definition
• ‘The coordination of Statecraft,
Public Affairs, Public Diplomacy,
[Military] Information Operations and
other activities, reinforced by
political, economic and military
actions, in a synchronized and
coordinated manner.’
(National Security Council definition of Strategic
Communication, February 2005, approved by
Condoleezza Rice before her transition to the State
Department.)
STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS
PUBLIC
DIPLOMACY
Foreign Office/
State Department
(USIA closed 1999)
INFORMATION
OPERATIONS
PUBLIC
AFFAIRS
Military/MoD: IO
has replaced IW in
the lexicon since
mid 1990s
Government:
political/strategic
relationship with
media
PUBLIC DIPLOMACY DEFINTION
‘Public Diplomacy – the open
exchange of ideas and information –
is an inherent characteristic of
democratic societies. Its global
mission is central to … foreign
policy. And it remains indispensable
to … [national] interests, ideals and
leadership role in the world’.
(US Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy, 1991
Report).
SOFT POWER
‘Soft power …is the ability to get desired outcomes
because others want what you want. It is the ability
to achieve goals through attraction rather than
coercion. It works by convincing others to follow or
getting them to agree to norms and institutions
that produce the desired behaviour.
Soft power can rest on the appeal of one's ideas or
culture … and … depends largely on the
persuasiveness of the free information that an
actor seeks to transmit. If a state can [do this] it
may not need to expend as many costly traditional
economic or military resources.’ (Keohane & Nye)
STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS
PUBLIC
DIPLOMACY
CULTURAL
DIPLOMACY
INTERNATIONAL
BROADCASTING
INFORMATION
OPERATIONS
PUBLIC
AFFAIRS
PUBLIC DIPLOMACY
‘Soft Power’
CULTURAL
DIPLOMACY
Long-term;
Elites are main
target audience
• Reciprocal (two-way)
• Mutual
• Development of mutual
trust and understanding
• Talking AND Listening
• ‘To know us is to love us’
INTERNATIONAL
BROADCASTING
Short-term;
Mass Communication
(radio, TV, internet)
• One-way (point-to-multipoint)
• Counter-propaganda with
‘news’ and ‘facts’
• Needs to be fast (but not
‘real-time’) and CREDIBLE
• ‘Truth is the best propaganda’
PUBLIC DIPLOMACY
‘Soft Power’
•
•
•
•
•
•
CULTURAL
DIPLOMACY
INTERNATIONAL
BROADCASTING
Long-term;
Education
Short-term;
News & Views
British Council
Alliance Française
Dante Alighieri Society
Goethe Institute
Carnegie Foundation
Confucius Institute
•
•
•
•
•
•
BBC World Service
Radio France International
RAI International
Deutsche Welle
Voice of America
China Radio International
STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS
PUBLIC
DIPLOMACY
INFORMATION
OPERATIONS
PUBLIC
AFFAIRS
Information Operations
definition - UK JWP 3-80
• ‘Co-ordinated actions undertaken to
influence an adversary or potential
adversary in support of political and
military objectives by undermining his
will, cohesion and decision making
ability, through affecting his
information, information based
processes and systems while
protecting one’s own decision-makers
and decision-making processes’
STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS
PUBLIC
DIPLOMACY
INFORMATION
OPERATIONS
Computer Network
Operations
Human
Factors
INFORMATION ASSURANCE
OPERATIONAL SECURITY
ELECTRONIC WARFARE
DECEPTION
PSYCHOLOGICAL
OPERATIONS (PSYOPS)
CIVIL-MILITARY COOPERATION (CIMIC)
MEDIA
SIGINT
HUMINT
PUBLIC
AFFAIRS
US DoD JP 3-13 2006
• The integrated employment of
electronic warfare (EW), computer
network operations (CNO),
psychological operations (PSYOP),
military deception (MILDEC), and
operations security (OPSEC), in
concert with specified supporting
and related capabilities, to
influence, disrupt, corrupt, or usurp
adversarial human and automated
decision making while protecting our
own.
INFORMATION OPERATIONS
‘Soft information support to hard power’
COMPUTER NETWORK
OPERATIONS
‘SIGINT’
HUMAN FACTORS
‘HUMINT’
• COMPUTER NETWORK
ATTACK
• COMPUTER NETWORK
DEFENCE
• ELECTRONIC WARFARE
• OPSEC
• CIMIC
• DECEPTION
• PSYOPS
--------------------------• PUBLIC AFFAIRS
NATO Definition of Psychological
Operations (PSYOPS):
‘Planned psychological activities using
methods of communications and other
means directed to approved audiences
in order to influence perceptions,
attitudes and behaviour, affecting the
achievement of political and military
objectives’
HUMAN FACTORS
The Influence (People) Piece in IO
PSYOPS
• White
• Grey
• Black
Leaflets, TV, Radio,
Posters, websites,
Loudspeakers etc
- Talks directly to TA
- Relationship to CIMIC
PUBLIC AFFAIRS
• Press
• Radio & TV
• Internet
Press briefings &
Conferences, releases,
Off-the record?
Talks to TA via Media
(reliability?)
IO HUMAN FACTORS &
THE ‘WAR’ ON TERROR
WHITE = AN
HONEST SOURCE
GREY =
IDENTIFIES
NO SOURCE
PSYOPS
• White
• Grey
• Black
BLACK – PRETENDS
TO BE A DIFFERENT
SOURCE
‘ATTRIBUTABLE’ &
‘NON-ATTRIBUTAL’
PUBLIC AFFAIRS
• Press
• Radio & TV
• Internet
TRUTHFUL,
ATTRIBUTABLE
AND ‘OFF THE
RECORD’
STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS
PUBLIC
DIPLOMACY
CULTURAL
DIPLOMACY
INTERNATIONAL
BROADCASTING
INFORMATION
OPERATIONS
HUMAN
FACTORS
PSYOPS
CIMIC
MEDIA
CNO
INFO ASSURANCE
OPSEC/EW
DECEPTION
PUBLIC
AFFAIRS
US INTERNATIONAL BROADCASTING ‘FAMILY’
VOICE OF AMERICA
Broadcasting Board of Governors
RADIO FREE EUROPE
RADIO FREE ASIA (1996)
Targets China, North Korea,
Burma, Vietnam etc
RADIO & TV MARTI
Cuba
RADIO SAWA & AL HURRA TV
‘Together’ & ‘The Free One’
Middle East
RADIO FARDA (2002)
‘Tomorrow’
Iran
CUBA NEWS
The Miami Herald
By Nancy San Martin, Fri Jun. 24, 2005.
And you thought the Cold War
had ended !!!
Martí a priority, state official says
The U.S. military aircraft broadcasting
TV and Radio Martí's signals to Cuba
will not be diverted to Iraq, at least
until a replacement plane is bought
and equipped, a senior State Department
official said Thursday.
Commando Solo
''The president has made the decision that we would do what we could to break
through the information blockade imposed by the Castro regime,'' the official
said after El Nuevo Herald and The Herald reported concerns raised by Miami
Republican Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen that the Pentagon's C-130 Commando Solo
plane could be sent to the Middle East.
''As far as we know . . . until the permanent platform is available, the C-130 is
flying,'' said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of
sensitivity surrounding the issue.
If you are at the receiving end of these broadcasts, it looks like
PSYCHOLOGICAL WARFARE
STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS
PUBLIC
DIPLOMACY
CULTURAL
DIPLOMACY
INTERNATIONAL
BROADCASTING
INFORMATION
OPERATIONS
HUMAN
FACTORS
PSYOPS
CIMIC
MEDIA
CNO
INFO ASSURANCE
OPSEC/EW
DECEPTION
PUBLIC
AFFAIRS
National Media Image vs
National Official Image
Cultural Diplomacy or
‘Cultural Imperialism’?
• Free media products give negative impressions of a
society (news media interested in ‘bad news’;
Hollywood interested in sex, drugs and rock ‘n roll’)
• Governmental CD & SC tries to correct this with
‘good news’ and cultural achievements
• If you are on the receiving end, CD CAN look like
Cultural Imperialism, Coca-colonialism,
McDomination of another form of psychological war
of ideas and values
• It therefore HAS to be TWO-WAY: mutual and
reciprocal
STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS
PUBLIC
DIPLOMACY
INFORMATION
OPERATIONS
PUBLIC
AFFAIRS
DOMESTIC
FOREIGN
Public Affairs – US Definition
“Those public information and community
relations activities directed toward the
domestic general public by various
elements of the USG, as well as those
activities directed to foreign publics,
including the media, by official U.S.
spokesmen abroad.”
STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS
PUBLIC
DIPLOMACY
CULTURAL
DIPLOMACY
INTERNATIONAL
BROADCASTING
INFORMATION
OPERATIONS
HUMAN
FACTORS
PSYOPS
CIMIC
MEDIA
CNO
INFO ASSURANCE
OPSEC/EW
DECEPTION
PUBLIC
AFFAIRS
DOMESTIC
FOREIGN
Office of Strategic
Influence (OSI)
Office of Special
Plans (OSP)
IMPACT = UNDERMINED CREDIBILITY OF ALL THE OTHER PILLARS
Are these pillars appropriate?
STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS
IS THIS REALLY ME?
PD
IO
PA
Legacy of the Cold War
• They become bureaucratic
stovepipes, slow and reactive
• They cause ‘turf wars’
• They were designed to win an
ideological battle against
communism as a political system
• They were built before the age of the
internet and Al Qaida as an ‘idea’
Is there a better solution?
• A Dedicated Department/Ministry of
Strategic Communication?
• Answerable to President/Prime
Minister’s Office – it is STRATEGIC
• Close liaison with all other
ministries
• A long-term Grand (Information)
Strategy is required
Influencing Attitudes
DEPARTMENT OF STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS
Old & New
Media
International Broadcasting
Public Diplomacy
Public Affairs
Influence Operations
Why is this necessary?
• To bring order to the chaos generated by
terrorism and AQ in internet-age
asymmetric information warfare
• Terrorists know that their activities are
10% violence and 90% propaganda
• The western (US) response to 9/11 has
been 90% violence (war) and 10% strategic
communication
• NATO countries still tend to regard
‘information’ as a support weapon or tool
• For AQ, it is THE CENTRAL weapon and
tool
Obama vs. Osama?
• Iraq, Afghanistan and the ‘war’ on terror
have made ‘winning’ the information war
harder and longer
• ‘Terror’ cannot be defeated with tanks,
planes, armies, missiles and ships – in fact
it makes it worse (e.g. Palestine)
• Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib and a whole host
of SC ‘own-goals’ have undermined the
credibility of the west as a ‘force for good
in the world’ (global polls reflect massive
anti-Americanism, anti-western sentiment)
Western information
‘own goals’
• The label of ‘war’ empowers terrorists with
the status of ‘warriors’
• ‘Crusade’, ‘Infinite Justice’ and numerous
other semantic and cultural insensitivities
(Danish Cartoons, Saudi female drivers,
Sudanese Teddy Bear names, Afghan
soccer balls)
• In themselves, not serious but in the longterm – and fixed on the internet – they
provide adversaries with ‘proof’ of a clash
of civilisations
AQ’s SC advantages
• Doesn’t need to ‘play by the same
rules’ (e.g. lies, Katrina) and exploits
openness of democratic systems
• Has a vision of what victory looks
like (Caliphate) but draws on the
past (final battle of a 1000 year
crusade against the infidel)
• AQ’s kinetic acts are designed to
win political information effects, not
winning militarily
Conclusions
• Intelligence Services and police are
the most effective tools to defeat
terrorists WHO ARE CRIMINALS
• To fight an idea, you need to wage
an INFORMATION WAR at the
tactical, operational and STRATEGIC
(i.e. POLITICAL) levels
• Restoration of western credibility is
possible – but you need a Grand
Strategy
Where to wage ‘information
war’ in the real world?
TARGETED
INFORMATION
LOCATION
ISLAMIC & NONISLAMIC WORLD
MIDDLE EAST
IRAQ
AFGHANISTAN
STRATEGIC
(GLOBAL)
OPERATIONAL
(REGIONAL)
TACTICAL
(THEATRE OF
OPERATIONS)
STRATEGIC
COMMUNICATIONS
PUBLIC
DIPLOMACY
INFORMATION
OPERATIONS/
PSYCHOLOGICAL
OPERATIONS
Where to wage ‘information
war’ in the virtual world?
All tactical
information
has strategic
potential &
vice versa
Anonymity/
disguise of
Users &
Locations
Users aged 13-35:
The key target
audience for
terrorist recruiters
Websites
Second life
Facebook/BEBO
Blogs
Chat-rooms
Email
podcasts
Servers
YouTube
On-line games
Internet-linked Wii
Internet cell phones
Info-bombers,
Hackers, bloggers
Broadband
revolution increases
speed of downloads/
uploads
‘To fight a network
You need a network’