Data Driven Public Diplomacy: Progress Towards Measuring the Impact of Public Diplomacy and International Broadcasting Activities

The full report can be found here. The executive summary can be found here.

This report examines current efforts underway at the State Department and the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) to assess impact through research, analytics and evaluation. It makes suggestions on structures and methodologies needed to make foreign audience research more robust, impact assessment more institutionalized, and feedback loops for strategy and tactics more systematic. The report is based on findings from a six-month study of nearly 100 State Department and BBG research and evaluation documents, in addition to dozens of interviews conducted between February and August 2014 with the staff responsible for them and with users of them.

“Data Driven Public Diplomacy” largely identifies five major areas of needed change:

(1) increased recognition on the part of State Department officials of the importance of research in public diplomacy;
(2) movement away from State Department and BBG’s risk-averse cultures, which can negatively impact how research data and evaluations are conceived, conducted, reported and used;
(3) more consistent strategic approaches in developing and evaluating public diplomacy and international broadcasting activities;
(4) increased training in strategic planning, including research and evaluation; and
(5) more funding and personnel to conduct more meaningful evaluations at both agencies that can correct the course of programs and activities.

The U.S. Advisory Commission was proud to enlist the support of a distinguished group of scholars who completed the appraisals and helped the ACPD make recommendations based on their findings. They include:

Sean Aday, Ph.D. Associate Professor of Media and Public Affairs and International Affairs, The George Washington University

Amelia Arsenault, Ph.D. Assistant Professor of Communication, Georgia State University

Matthew Baum, Ph.D. Marvin Kalb Professor of Global Communications, Harvard University

Kathy Fitzpatrick, J.D. Professor of Journalism and Mass Communication, Florida International University

Craig Hayden, Ph.D. Assistant Professor, American University

Erik Nisbet, Ph.D. Associate Professor, School of Communication, Department of Political Science, The Ohio State University

Shawn Powers, Ph.D. Assistant Professor of Communication, Georgia State University

Jian (Jay) Wang, Ph.D. Associate Professor, Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, University of Southern California

Dr. Nicholas Cull, Professor of Public Diplomacy, University of Southern California, also provided a historical preface to the report that explains the trajectory of measurement and evaluation at the now-defunct U.S. Information Agency.