Emergence in Power; Reproduction of Soft Power in Foreign Policy of the US with Emphasis on Hollywood Cinema in Post-Pandemic Era

Document Type : Original Article from Result of Thesis

Authors

1 Department of Political Science, Birjand University, Faculty of Literature and Humanities

2 Faculty member of the Department of Political Science, Faculty of Literature and Humanities, Birjand University, Birjand, Iran

3 Faculty member of the Department of Political Science, Birjand University, Faculty of Literature and Humanities

Abstract

Conceptualizing soft power in behavioral patterns of foreign policy of the US is an efficient tool for implementing the foreign policy of this country. Soft power is essentially an abstract concept which includes a variety of tools in dissemination approaches. The US is one of the countries which makes use of the most various soft power tools to implement behavioral patterns of its foreign policy. In this context, Hollywood cinema as a cultural industry, has significantly helped the governing system of the US to achieve international interests. Accordingly, Hollywood cinema in post-crisis (coronavirus epidemic) will apply an emerging pattern of the soft power in the post-pandemic era by emphasizing on selectivist activism while narrating. The question posed in this study is that what will the selectivist pattern be like in emergence of soft power in foreign policy of the US considering the Hollywood association in the post-pandemic era? The purpose of the current study is comprehending the pattern of reviving soft power of the US in post-pandemic era through emphasizing on Hollywood cinema. The general conclusion of the paper indicates that Hollywood cinema as a media tool in disseminating the soft power of the US, will apply an emerging pattern of soft power in the post-Corona era on the basis of selectivist activism while narrating. This paper will try to answer the main question through a descriptive-analytical method.

Highlights

Introduction

Soft power is a concept that can be interpreted simultaneously in limited and concentrated or extensive and detailed contexts, and plays a decisive part in governments’ influence in the international system. Countries are Janus-like in exercising their power in the international system within their foreign policy interactions. Power has two faces; a negative face based on hard power, and a positive face based on soft parameters such as culture, identity, value, and media normativity, which targets promoting their hegemonic influence and can be regarded as a non-materialistic approach to the power. United States is a country that has always reflected soft modes of power in their foreign policy to magnify their influence. This country utilizes soft power tools – including media like cinema – to promote their global influence in the international system in order to secure their political interests and affect the international identity. This media attraction project somehow helps the US appear as a global leader in the realm of global cultural identity. The US has proven to be able to reflect and realize their political-ideological goals in global crises within the framework of their media patterns by emphasizing tools such as cinema and connecting them to the politics. This is what the US do in the post-pandemic era to regain their declined soft power, and be recognized as a progressive leader.

Research Method

This is an interpretive-analytical research and the collected data is extracted from library findings and up-to-date internet sources. In order to diversify the research literature, a variety of English data and Hollywood movies are used to analyze and answer the main question.

Findings

Contrary to the popular belief that regards the soft power merely a means of promoting influence of the Unites States’ values and political culture, the present article argues that the new reading of soft power in the slacktivistic narration context is the United States’ emerging reaction in the international system aiming to transform the ideological narration. Indeed, the United States seeks to use Hollywood products to marginalize the common discourses of the international system and introduce the American discourse as a global hegemonic reference. Accordingly, majority of these works employ parameters like worldview and exceptionality of the American culture and identity in order to reproduce an identity that is different to the common cultural structure of the world, aiming to promote their global influence and conquer the global markets. The United States, being aware of the devastative effects of corona pandemic and decline of their influence on the international system, have planned the power transformation for all conditions of the global system in such a way that they can use their soft power in post-pandemic period to progress their goals and promote the effective role of culture and media as empowering and discourse-making contexts. Accordingly, the present article provides a slacktivistic concept of soft power in the US foreign policy in order to investigate changes of the United States’ approach to the international system, especially in the post-pandemic period, and refer to the 2021 cinematic products, aiming to present a new concept of the soft power; the power that intends to reproduce and hegemonize itself. The strategy adopted by Hollywood and the US foreign policy in post-pandemic era appears in form of a communication triangle consisting of polarity, security, and leadership, which enables the United States to reclaim their role as a progressive leader by promoting security and power in the international system. Somehow, establishment the relationship between artistic/cultural languages to the media helps them promote their political hegemony and represent a kind of link between the virtual civil society and social togetherness led by them.

Results and Conclusion

Media play an effective role in legislation and management of the foreign policy. They reflect and reproduce the foreign policy information internationally through different channels. Involvement of powerful media in foreign policy can promote a country’s power and discourse in addition to marginalizing the competitors and obstacle their interactions, which is also known as slacktivistic policy. According to the research hypothesis, the United States will promote the principles of their foreign policy and reproduce their soft power in pandemic and post-pandemic eras relying on Hollywood products. For example, the United States intends to promote the relationship between Hollywood and diplomacy using Hollywood’s 2021 products that have/will bit the international box office. The ultimate goal is to enhance the United States’ cultural-identity interaction capacity in line with their political interests. In other words, Hollywood’s cultural-political mechanism and its relationship with the foreign policy will tend to politics-culture based software orientation to develop a new phenomenon in the soft power context. Many of Hollywood movies in 2021 the bilateral understanding of human and society is objectivized and subjectivized constructively in order to revive the United States’ soft power. The narrative logic of these movies suggest that the social world data contain phrases where people of different societies can structure their relationship with the others. Such a dialectic-based relationship between the existing affair and the future affair (reproduction of power) is indicative of the United States’ attempt to reclaim their soft power and promote an imbalanced order; i.e. this country can establish a relationship between the virtual civil society and global togetherness by means of media and promote their role as a global leader and represent a uniform cultural-identity pattern.

Keywords

Main Subjects

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International Studies Journal (ISJ)
Volume 18, Issue 3 - Serial Number 71
January 2021
Pages 227-248

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