Three Cheers for “Diplomatic Frivolity”: Canadian Public Diplomacy Embraces the Digital World

Abstract

This chapter analyses how public diplomacy has evolved in the face of contemporary diplomatic practice, including the advent of the Internet and the power of Web 2.0 (social media) diplomacy to amplify communication and assert a more open foreign policy. The first section examines public diplomacy as a field of study. The second section analyses whether public diplomacy is a peripheral “third pillar” of Canada’s foreign policy. The third section provides cases of Canada’s digital diplomacy directed at Austria, China, and Iran to revive debates about how public diplomacy can create a more democratic and open Canadian foreign policy. The chapter concludes by offering some lessons on what digital diplomacy portends for the future of Canada’s public diplomacy and a more democratic foreign policy.