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Psychopower of Cultural Diplomacy in the Information ‘Psychopower’ of Cultural Diplomacy in the Information Age Natalia Grincheva April 2013 Figueroa Press Los Angeles ‘PSYCHOPOWER’ OF CULTURAL DIPLOMACY IN THE INFORMATION AGE Natalia Grincheva Published by FIGUEROA PRESS 840 Childs Way, 3rd Floor Los Angeles, CA 90089 Phone: (213) 743-4800 Fax: (213) 743-4804 www.figueroapress.com Figueroa Press is a division of the USC Bookstore Copyright © 2013 all rights reserved Notice of Rights All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmit- ted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior written permission from the author, care of Figueroa Press. Notice of Liability The information in this book is distributed on an “As is” basis, without warranty. While every precaution has been taken in the preparation of this book, neither the author nor Figueroa nor the USC Bookstore shall have any liability to any person or entity with respect to any loss or damage caused or alleged to be caused directly or indirectly by any text contained in this book. Figueroa Press and the USC Bookstore are trademarks of the University of Southern California ISBN 13: 978-0-18-215589-7 ISBN 10: 0-18-215589-7 For general inquiries or to request additional copies of this paper please contact: USC Center on Public Diplomacy at the Annenberg School University of Southern California 3502 Watt Way, G4 Los Angeles, CA 90089-0281 Tel: (213) 821-2078; Fax: (213) 821-0774 [email protected] www.uscpublicdiplomacy.org CPD Perspectives on Public Diplomacy CPD Perspectives is a periodic publication by the USC Center on Public Diplomacy, and highlights scholarship intended to stimulate critical thinking about the study and practice of public diplomacy. Designed for both the practitioner and the scholar, this series will illustrate the breadth of public diplomacy—its role as an essential component of foreign policy and the intellectual challenges it presents to those seeking to understand this increasingly significant factor in international relations. CPD Perspectives on Public Diplomacy is available electronically in PDF form on the Center’s web site (www.uscpublicdiplomacy.org) and in hard copy by request. About the USC Center on Public Diplomacy at the Annenberg School The USC Center on Public Diplomacy seeks to advance and enrich the study and practice of public diplomacy through its research and publication programs, professional training and public events. The USC Center on Public Diplomacy (CPD) was established in 2003 as a partnership between the Annenberg School for Communication and the School of International Relations at the University of Southern California. It is a joint research, analysis and professional training organization dedicated to furthering the study and practice of global public diplomacy. Since its inception, the Center has become a productive and recognized leader in the public diplomacy research and scholarship community. CPD has benefited from unique international support within academic, corporate, governmental, and public policy circles. It has become the definitive go-to destination for practitioners and international leaders in public diplomacy, while pursuing an innovative research agenda. For more information about the Center, visit www.uscpublicdiplomacy.org ‘PSYCHOPOWER’ OF CULTURAL DIPLOMACY IN THE INFORMATION AGE 5 Abstract This paper focuses on the phenomenon of digital diplomacy, critically analyzed from the perspective of philosophical psychoanalysis. The study aims to elaborate the theoretical underpinnings of digital diplomacy through employing the conceptual framework of collective individuation and psychotechnologies developed by French critical philosopher Bernard Stiegler. Stiegler’s philosophical conception of contemporary politics under the condition of globalized cultural and economic capitalism is employed in this work to explain the dramatic changes in diplomatic relations taking place on the international arena at the beginning of the new century. Keywords: digital diplomacy, psychotechnologies, transindividuation, psychopower, ‘soft’ power ‘PSYCHOPOWER’ OF CULTURAL DIPLOMACY IN THE INFORMATION AGE 7 Introduction Cultural diplomacy has recently received a renewed interest around the world from governments, cultural practitioners, and academics as a means to understand, inform, engage, and influence domestic and international audiences. Diplomacy has traditionally served to manage relations among states and other parties by advising and shaping foreign policy, which eventually coordinates and secures specific states’ interests in the international arena. With the advance of new media communication tools, diplomacy in the information society has gone significant transformations. Digital diplomacy, also known as public diplomacy 2.0 or e-diplomacy, incorporates the inclusive nature of traditional public or cultural diplomacy and refers to the cross-cultural practices through digital and networked technologies, including the Internet, mobile devices, and social media channels.1 Though in the last decade digital diplomacy has been the focus of close attention from political leaders and cultural practitioners, there is still a lack of academic engagement with this subject in a more critical and theoretical context. However, it is imperative to better understand how these technologies that externalize cultural memory, national heritage, and identity—as well as human values— work within a larger political context in global communications. This paper aims to elaborate the theoretical underpinnings of digital diplomacy through employing the conceptual framework of collective individuation and psychotechnologies developed by French critical philosopher Bernard Stiegler. This paper consists of three parts that employ Stiegler’s critical theory to discuss different dimensions of digital diplomacy as a practical field in an academic context. The first part,Phenomenology of Collective Memory, introduces some important points of Stiegler’s theory and provides key definitions and explanations of the main concepts that are heavily utilized in this study to elaborate on the critical understanding of the social, economic, and political processes of digital diplomacy. The second part, Psychopower, 8 ‘PSYCHOPOWER’ OF CULTURAL DIPLOMACY IN THE INFORMATION AGE further advances the theoretical legacy of Stiegler and discusses it in a broader context of global international relations. Finally, the last part of the paper, Participative Digital Democracy, presents the major social and technological concerns of Stiegler’s philosophical project in relation to the processes taking place within diplomatic activities carried out in the digital environment. This study does not aim to provide a complete comprehensive framework of digital diplomacy as a new field of theoretical research; rather, it tries to deepen the understanding of the political and economic mechanisms in the international communication and diplomatic activities that are increasingly more complicated and challenged with the advance of digital technologies in the global capitalism system. Phenomenology of Collective Memory: Transindividuation Processes in the Information Society In his series Techniques and Time, Stiegler claims that human agency is always in need of technical extension and support to sustain oneself and realize individual and collective goals. As such, “technical prosthesis” has always been critical for humans, making possible its ever becoming.2 Most importantly, the cultural phenomenon of human memory influencing the construction of future development becomes possible only with the advent of techniques and tools. These tools serve as external virtual drives of human experiences and knowledge memory that shape the future.3 Stiegler’s conceptualization of memory exteriorization is crucial for the present study because it helps to analyze audio- visual and digital technologies and their major influence on human consciousness. These technologies, according to Stiegler, have a strong potential to impact human cognitive processes by constituting consciousness outside of real life experiences. Technical audio- visual and digital objects and tools build future experiences in contemporary society, out of which the principles for memory selectively emerge to preserve the primary moments in an ongoing real-time montage of the present. Digital, electronic dimensions of modern exteriorization technology, as Stiegler emphasizes, results ‘PSYCHOPOWER’ OF CULTURAL DIPLOMACY IN THE INFORMATION AGE 9 in erosion of national collective memory being programmed under the contradictory economic and cultural globalization forces in a political struggle for manipulating human consciousness. According to Stiegler, different communication techniques employed by audio-visual and digital industries are the key drivers of the global technical system exacerbation, disorienting individuals and leading to an increasing loss of collective and self- understanding, resulting in a state of “ill-being.”4 To better explain these processes, the following section provides some background for Stiegler’s critical philosophy through defining such important notions as individuation and collective individuation or transindividuaton (used in this paper interchangeably). The notion of individuation is constructed on the premise that an “individual” is never given in advance, but produced or comes into being in the course of multiple ongoing processes. Individuation occurs as a complex
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