Abstract
Soft power has become a catchall phrase that suffers from analytical ambiguity. Extant literature on soft power often conflates it with other kinds of power. In this paper, I suggest examining soft power from the power recipient’s perspective, emphasizing the latter’s agency. I introduce three ideal motivational bases of power recipients’ compliance with power wielders’ desires: fear, appetite, and spirit. Fear-based and appetite-based compliance are in line with coercion or inducement respectively in Joseph Nye’s soft power formulation. As such, soft power arguments require ruling out fear-based or appetite-based compliance. Soft power is rare in world politics, and it often builds on material preponderance of the main custodians of the standard of civilization, that is the central actors in the (regional) international society in question, leading to soft power’s correlation with hard power.
BibTeX citation
@article{ayhan_soft_2023,
title = {Soft Power is Rare in World Politics: Ruling Out Fear or Appetite-based Compliance},
volume = {19},
issn = {1751-8059},
doi = {10.1057/s41254-023-00304-7},
pages = {476--486},
number = {4},
journaltitle = {Place Branding and Public Diplomacy},
author = {Ayhan, Kadir Jun},
date = {2023},
note = {Type: Journal Article},
}