"Soft power" is a hot topic in Washington, D.C. these days. The question: Has Donald Trump 's gutting of foreign aid meant a diminishment of soft power. Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) accused the ...

One of the more striking features of the Trump administration’s approach to foreign policy—not the chosen ends, but its preferred means—is its absolute confidence in America’s hard power and its ...

Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. Rachel Wells is a writer who covers leadership, AI, and upskilling. Some call them soft skills. Others call them power skills. But ...

Earlier this month the United Kingdom government launched an inquiry into the country’s soft power – that is, its tools of attraction and cultural influence. Soft power is an elusive form of influence ...

Power is the ability to get others to do what you want. That can be accomplished by coercion (“sticks”), payment (“carrots”) or attraction (“honey”). The first two methods are forms of hard power; ...

Since the start of his second term, U.S. President Donald Trump has been dismantling the traditional channels of American soft power. The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) is no longer ...

Clockwise from top left: Moo Deng; LISA; Thais celebrate after the government approves same-sex marriage; a still from The White Lotus. Clockwise from top left: Moo Deng; LISA; Thais celebrate after ...

With the news dominated by dramatic examples of countries using coercion, intimidation, and payoffs to advance their interests, the power of attraction would seem to be irrelevant in international ...

In a world marked by wars in Ukraine and Gaza, is the age of soft power over? Thirty years ago, with the end of the Soviet Union, increasing integration in Europe, and America’s “Unipolar Moment,” the ...