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Posted on 11/11/2001 10:27:33 AM PST by a_Turk

In the 1980's, when Pakistan was considered a cold war battleground, American cultural centers were a focus of intellectual and social life in Islamabad, Karachi, Lahore, Hyderabad and Peshawar. Each offered well-stocked libraries, discussion groups led by visiting Americans and a stream of cultural programs. In Lahore, the country's most sophisticated city, singers from the Metropolitan Opera created a sensation, and there were long lines for a show of posters of American paintings.

But after Soviet troops withdrew from neighboring Afghanistan in 1989, the United States began losing interest in Pakistan. Following a series of budget cuts in Washington, five American cultural centers there were either closed or greatly reduced in scope. The ideals, history and cultural vibrancy of the United States were taken off display for millions of Pakistanis. Now, thousands of young people live at fundamentalist academies where they learn nothing but how to chant the Koran and hate the infidel.

Pakistan is only one of many countries where the United States cut its public diplomacy programs in the early and mid-1990's. In Turkey, another Muslim country on whose friendship the United States counts heavily, the American consulate and cultural center in Izmir were shut, and American libraries in Ankara and Istanbul gave away most of their books and closed their doors to the public.

Across the Arab world, where anti-Western propaganda is a radio staple, Voice of America broadcasts are barely audible and reach less than 2 percent of the population in the 22 countries to which they are beamed. Security concerns contributed to the decline of exchange and information programs in a few countries, among them Egypt and Lebanon, but the key factor was Washington's loss of interest.

It would be naïve to suggest that the United States just has a public- relations problem. Much anti-Americanism springs from grievances over issues of foreign and economic policy. Nonetheless, the United States has a story to tell, one that includes episodes of idealism, noble sacrifice and the nurturing of values integral to human freedom.

But as the world population rose during the 1990's, especially in turbulent Muslim countries, America lost interest in telling that story.

During the cold war, much of Washington, from members of Congress to covert C.I.A. operatives, agreed on the need to promote American values abroad. But after the collapse of Soviet power, some Americans came to believe that serious ideological conflict had vanished from the world, and with it any need to address ordinary people in foreign countries.

The current federal budget, which allots $370 billion for the military, gives $22 billion for all nonmilitary spending abroad, including foreign aid grants, radio projects like Voice of America, and the budgets of the State Department and United States Information Agency.

Funding for foreign exchange programs, measured in constant dollars, fell by nearly one-third from 1993 to 2000, from $298 million to $211 million. This year it rose slightly, to $232 million.

NOW, policy makers in Washington have begun listening again to advocates of cultural exchange and public diplomacy. Those advocates believe, in the words of Allan Goodman, president of the agency that administers Fulbright scholarships, that "the only way we're going to reduce hatred for America is by giving people some perception of our society, some opportunity to see who we really are."

Diplomats and other specialists have also been discussing ways the United States could gradually regain intellectual influence in places like Pakistan. Suggestions range from translating American books and magazines to designating a diplomat at every American embassy to work full-time with the local education ministry to assure that teachers and textbooks present a fair view of the United States.

But many specialists say that the best chance for long-term impact lies with programs that are in place but poorly funded. Exchanges that link American students and mayors and entrepreneurs with counterparts abroad, for example, operate on budgets equivalent to those of 1968, when the world had 40 percent fewer people and dozens fewer nations. The State Department's visitors program is bringing fewer than 5,000 people to the United States this year. The Fulbright program, established in 1946 "to increase mutual understanding between the people of the United States and other countries," has 4,500 slots. This year there are 56 available for exchanges with Egypt, 29 for Nigeria and 26 for Pakistan.

SOME of the most promising State Department exchange programs, like one aimed at high school students, are open only to citizens of formerly Communist countries. There is growing support for the idea of creating similar ones for Muslim countries. Michael McCarry, a former diplomat who now heads an alliance of exchange programs, is urging the State Department to spend $50 to $75 million on a new "exchange initiative for the Islamic world."

"These programs are essential to preventing future wars, particularly wars where the adversaries are not states but individuals who might participate in terror networks," said David L. Phillips, a former United Nations adviser who is now deputy director of the Center for Preventive Action, a conflict resolution group in New York. "Public diplomacy targets civil society and creates an environment where mutual understanding is possible. If there is a wall between you and your adversaries and there's no way to understand them, you're going to demonize them. Then it's easier to act aggressively."

"The alternative is a process that requires constant contact at all levels so people understand where we're coming from," he said. "It is very effective in reaching out not only to elites but to people who matter, people who if left alone might even become antagonists. Contact gives a basis for cooperation, and contact in sports, culture, among businessmen or anyone else breaks down negative stereotypes and ultimately works its way into the political domain."

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