Get Smart: Combining Hard and Soft Power

Author(s): Joseph S. Nye, Jr.

Source: Foreign Affairs, Vol. 88, No. 4 (July/August 2009), pp. 160-163
Published by: Council on Foreign Relations
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 Response

Get Smart

Combining Hard and SoftPower

JosephS.Nye, Jr.

on carrots and sticks. But can it

In her confirmation hearings, U.S. Secre rarely
taryof StateHillary Clinton said,"America totallyreplace either.Thus theneed for
cannot solve themost pressingproblems smart strategiesthat combine the tools
on our own, and the world cannot solve of both hard and softpower.
them without America_We must use In an otherwise estimablenew book,
what has been called 'smartpower/the full Power Rules: How Common Sense Can
range of tools at our disposal." Since then, RescueAmericanForeignPolicy,Leslie Gelb
editorialpages and blogs have been fullof argues that "soft power now seems tomean
references to "smart power." But what does almost everything,, because both economic
itmean? and military resources can influence other
"Smart power" is a term I developed states. (Gelbs recent article in these pages,
in 2003 to counter the misperception that "Necessity, Choice, and Common Sense"
soft power alone can produce effective [May/June2009], isdrawnfromthebook.)
foreignpolicy.Power is ones ability to But Gelb confuses the actions of a state
affectthebehavior of others to getwhat seeking
to achieve desired outcomes with
one wants. There are three basic ways to the resources used to produce those out
do this: coercion, payment, and attraction. comes. and economic resources
Military
Hard power is theuse of coercionand pay can sometimes be used to attract as well
ment. Soft power is the abilityto obtain as coerce?witness the positive effect of the

preferred
outcomes
through attraction. If U.S. military s reliefeffortsin Indonesia
a state can set the or on Indone
agenda for others following the 2004 tsunami
it can save a lot sians' attitudes toward the United States.
shape their preferences,

Joseph S. Nye, Jr., is University Distinguished Service Professor at

toLead.
Harvard University and the author of The Powers

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 Get Smart
This means thatmany differenttypesof to affect his
country's nuclear weapons
resources can contribute to soft power, program. And U.S. soft power got no
not that the term "soft
power"
can mean where indrawingtheTaliban government
any typeof behavior. away fromalQaeda in the 1990s; it took
In his book, Gelb defines power too hard military power in 2001 to end that
as or groups alliance. But broader such as pro
narrowly, "getting people goals,
to do something theydont want to do." moting democracy,protectinghuman
He ignoresa long literatureon the other rights,and developing civil society,are
facetsof power that are used to persuade not best handled with guns.
others to do what is in fact in theirown
interests.As U.S. President Dwight CONTEXTUAL INTELLIGENCE

Eisenhower put it, leadership is about In 2007, formerU.S. Deputy Secretary

gettingpeople to do something "notonly of StateRichardArmitage and I co-chaired
because you tellthemtodo so and enforce a bipartisan commission at theCenter
your ordersbut because they instinctively for Strategic and International Studies
want to do it for
you." Sometimes that thathelped popularize theconceptof smart
is possible, and sometimes not, but it is power. It concluded that thePentagon
an of power. is the best-trained and best-resourced
certainly important aspect
Even if softpower is rarelysufficient,it arm of the government but that there are
can help create an enabling or disabling limits towhat hard power can achieve
context for on itsown and that turningto thePen
policy.
The major elementsof a country'ssoft tagon because it can get thingsdone
power include itsculture(when it ispleas will lead to an overmilitarized foreign
ingto others), itsvalues (when theyare policy.Gelb criticizes us inPower Rules
attractiveand consistentlypracticed), for "a mechanical combining rather than
and itspolicies (when theyare seen as a genuine blending of the two ideas,"
inclusive and legitimate).Over the past but we never proposed a mechanical
decade, public opinion polls have shown formula for smart power. Figuring out
a serious decline in theUnited States' how to combine the resourcesof both
in Europe,Latin America, hard and soft power into smart-power
popularity
and, most dramatically, theMuslim strategies requires what
I call "contextual
world. Poll respondents have generally intelligence" inmy book The Powers to
cited theUnited States' policies, more Lead. In foreign
policy, contextual in
than its culture or values, to explain this telligence is the intuitivediagnostic skill
decline. Since it is easier for a country to thathelps policymakersalign tacticswith
than its culture, U.S. to create smart
change its policies objectives strategies. Of
President Barack Obama should focus presidents,
recent U.S. Ronald Reagan
on choosingpolicies thatcan help recover andGeorge H. W. Bush had impressive
some of theUnited States' softpower. contextual intelligence; theyounger
Of course, soft power is not the solu Bush did not.
tion to all problems.The fact that the Academics and pundits have often
North Korean dictatorKim Jong II likes been mistaken about theUnited States'
towatch Hollywood movies is unlikely power. Just two decades ago, the conven

FOREIGN AFFAIRS ?
2009
July/August [161]

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 ey
Ny Jr.
JosephS.
tionalwisdom was that theUnited States necessitate cooperation among govern
was in decline, from so-called ments and international institutions.
suffering
imperial
overstretch. International rela Even at the top level (where theUnited
tions theoryat the time sufferedfrom a States representsnearly half theworlds
materialist bias that truncated conceptions total defense the U.S.
expenditures),
of power and ignored the full range of militarymay be supreme in the global
factorsthatcan influencebehavior through commons of air, sea, and space, but it
attraction.This iswhat I triedto recover ismuch less able to control nationalist
in 1990with the idea of softpower. populations
in
occupied
areas.
A decade later,with theCold War Contextual intelligence is needed to
rivalry over,
the new conventional wisdom produce an integrated strategythat
was that theworld was characterized by combines hard and softpower.Many
unipolarity
and U.S. hegemony. Some officialinstruments of softpower?public
neoconservative drew the con diplomacy, broadcasting, exchange pro
pundits
clusion that theUnited Stateswas so grams, development assistance, disaster
that it could decide what was relief, military-to-military contacts?are
powerful
rightand otherswould have no choice but scattered
across the U.S. government.
to follow.This new unilateralismheavily There is no overarchingpolicy that
influenced theGeorge W. Bush admin even tries to integratethemwith hard
istrationeven before the shock of 9/11 power into a comprehensive national

produced theBush doctrineof preventive securitystrategy. The United States

war and coercive democratization.
spends about 500 times asmuch on the
Contextual intelligence
must startwith
military as itdoes on broadcasting and
an understandingof not just the strengths exchange programs. Is this the right
but also the limitsofU.S. power.The proportion?And how should theU.S.
United States is the only superpower, government relate to the generators of
but preponderance does not constitute soft power in civil society?including

empire or hegemony.The United States everythingfromHollywood to theBill

can influence, but not control, other parts andMelinda Gates Foundation?
of theworld.World politics today is like
a three-dimensional chess game. At the SUCCESS IN THE INFORMATION AGE

top level, military power among states Despite its numerous errors, theUnited
isunipolar; but at themiddle level, of States' Cold War strategy involved a smart
interstate economic relations, the world combination of hard and softpower.The
ismultipolar and has been so formore U.S.military deterred Soviet aggression,
than a decade. At the bottom level, of while American ideas undercut commu
transnational relations (involving such nism behind the IronCurtain.When the
issues as climate change, illegal drugs, BerlinWall finallycollapsed, itwas de
pandemics, and terrorism),power is stroyednot by an artillerybarragebut by
chaotically distributed and diffuses to hammers and bulldozerswielded by those
nonstate actors. who had lost faith in communism.

Military power is a small part of any In today's information age, success

response to these new threats; these is the resultnotmerely ofwhose army

[162] FOREIGN AFFAIRS Volume88No.4

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 Get Smart
wins but also ofwhose storywins. The
currentstruggleagainst Islamist terrorism
ismuch less a clash of civilizations than
an ideological strugglewithin Islam.The
United States cannotwin unless the
Muslim mainstream wins. There is very
little likelihood thatpeople likeOsama
bin Laden can everbe won overwith
softpower: hard power is needed to deal
with such cases. But there is enormous

diversityof opinion in theMuslim world.

Many Muslims disagreewith American
values aswell asAmerican policies, but
thatdoes notmean that theyagreewith
bin Laden. The United States and its
allies cannot defeat Islamist terrorism
ifthe number of people the extremists
are recruitingis largerthan the number
of extremistskilled or deterred. Soft
power is needed to reduce the extremists'
numbers andwin the hearts andminds
of the mainstream.
The United States can become a smart
power by once again investinginglobal
public goods?providing things that
people and governmentsin all quartersof
theworld want but cannot attainon their
own. economic
Achieving development,
securingpublichealth,copingwith climate
an open, stable
change, and maintaining
international economic system all require
leadership from theUnited States. By
complementing itsmilitary and economic
in its
might with greater investments
softpower, theUnited States can rebuild
the framework itneeds to tackle tough
global challenges.That would be true
smart
power.?

FOREIGN AFFAIRS ? 2000

July/August [163]

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