The Role of K-Pop in International Relations
Part I: The charm of music in catching the world’s attention
South Korea has a secret weapon in strengthening its relationships with other countries while promoting its culture at the same time. This secret weapon is called K-Pop Diplomacy. In 2017, President Moon visited Indonesia for a bilateral meeting. During the visit, the Indonesian first daughter also had her wedding. So, President Moon gave a signed copy of EXO’s album with a special video from Minho of SHINee congratulating the newlyweds. In 2018, Seohyun of Girls’ Generation flew to North Korea for a performance. Joining her were Red Velvet who also performed their hits. According to reports, North Korean leader Kim Jung Un adjusted his schedule in order to meet the girl group ahead of their performance. In 2019, Korean ambassador Han Dong Man gave a BTS album to Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte stating that Korean culture has spread much in the country; and with BTS as one of the most popular acts, the album signifies an intensified impact of the relationship of the two countries. With K-Pop artists participating in political affairs and K-Pop products being globally exported, the prominence of K-Pop continues to grow. Hence, this article explores K-Pop on the diplomatic stage.
Diplomacy is an important practice in international relations as it helps countries build and foster relationships with each other. More importantly, in terms of skills, diplomacy is the art of conducting negotiations for gains in a sensitive and tactful manner to avoid conflict. There are three important strategies in diplomacy: connection, which is building bridges with each other through a shared common interest or experience; consistency, which is a strength of cultural diplomacy in establishing connections despite possible tensions; the final strategy is innovation, which is the means to evolve as trends and power relations continuously change (Goff 2013).
Interestingly, there are studies about how music has been instrumental in pursuing a country’s interests. Subjects of study include the German Kultur and Jazz Diplomacy. There are three concepts to help us understand more about how music (and entertainment in general) acts as a diplomat (Quessard 2020). The first concept is soft power, developed by Joseph Nye, which is to understand one’s capability to influence the behaviour and interests of others rather than using tangible means (e.g. military, economic). Nye (2008) names that culture, political values, and foreign policies are significant resources for soft power. The second concept is nation branding, which is a country’s effort to promote its “brand” in order to increase tourism, investments, and international cooperation (Gienow-Hecht 2018). The final concept is public diplomacy where soft power can be channelled to the audience. In other words, it is also a country’s way of communicating with its audience to be able to promote its national interest and foreign policies (Lee 2011, Huijgh 2016).
Sound diplomacy, nevertheless, is still considered to be understudied (Neumann 2016) especially with the increasing popularity of K-Pop. Therefore, as this article recognizes the significance of K-Pop, it aims to include K-Pop in sound diplomacy by using and combining the ideas of Quessard and Goff. The study will be divided into three parts. The first part will discuss about how soft power connects with the audience. This section will be generally about the power of music. The second part will tackle on how Hallyu (Korean Wave) has been consistently used as a nation brand. The final part will explore the broader public diplomacy and how it has constantly kept up with new developments in pop culture, technology, and politics.
PART I: The Soft Power // Connection
As previously mentioned, culture is a great resource for soft power. This is where cultural diplomacy stems from as it shares stories about a country. These stories are simplified in order for the foreign audience to easily grasp their meaning (Goff 2013, Kessler 2020). As an example, Hollywood productions of movies, shows, and music have contributed in propagating American values and also in increasing America’s exports (Goff 2013; Quessard 2020). With this, popular culture has been considered as the “greatest untapped resource for cultural diplomacy” (Schneider in Goff 2013 p 424). To give a historical background of music as soft power, this article proceeds with narrating the story of the German Kultur (culture) and jazz.
In Germany, music contributed significantly in building their national identity and German Kultur. During the Napoleonic occupation, the German people feared political and military defeat. However, Beethoven’s symphonies were one of those that soothed them. In the late 19th century, there was a contest among European countries in influencing American culture. France campaigned for their arts. Britain promoted their literature and social ties with America. Germany endorsed their music. The non-verbal musical export from Germany was widely accepted by the Americans. Germany’s music, furthermore, had great influence in the development of symphony orchestras in Chicago, Boston, Philadelphia, and New York and even to jazz music (Gienow-Hecht 2009).
During the Cold War, jazz was used as a political and cultural instrument to promote American culture especially in countries where communism is strong (Dunkel 2014). In fact, jazz was the “Trojan horse of American entertainment” with Former President Eisenhower dubbing it as “America’s greatest diplomat”. American Jazz had positive reception in Eastern Europe particularly from the Czechs and Slovaks (Von Eschen in Quessard 2020 p 284). On the contrary, American Jazz was not popular in most Asian countries that had anti-America and anti-capitalism sentiments. This is where German Jazz comes in as another anti-communist Cold War diplomat. West Germany also promoted their culture through Jazz Diplomacy with their tour in Asia, “Asientournee”. Thailand, for instance, was a challenging country for America to control despite being its ally. Fortunately, King Bhumibol Adulyadej was a fan of jazz. With this information, America sent their own representative; however, the King had requested for German Jazz musicians knowing that they were on their Asia tour. In the end, the band performed a composition by the King and a jazz rendition of a famous Siamese dance called “Nau Djay Ramwong”. They called their version “Now Jazz Ramwong” (Dunkel 2014). For America and West Germany, jazz was a great instrument to promote their values and culture; and to distinguish themselves from the communist countries. Currently, America is a superpower in shaping global popular culture. Nevertheless, this does not stop other countries from also exporting their own popular culture. And South Korea has successfully improved its reputation through K-Pop.
There are four factors in understanding the convergence of music and diplomacy (Williamson 2014). In this section, these factors are applied in analysing K-Pop Diplomacy through BTS’ music. BTS is used as a case study since the 2018 Hallyu White Paper has named the group as a catalyst for boosting the popularity of K-Pop around the globe. They have also been called a “cultural event” (Kim 2018 p 77) as they continue to showcase Korean culture through their music and performances. Moreover, BTS have made great impacts on South Korea’s economy through their concerts and products (exports); and increasing their fans’ interest in the country therefore studying Hangeul or pursuing Korean studies or visiting for tourism purposes.
The first factor is listening. It is considered as an important activity as it is “both a goal and a process” especially in understanding emotions, contexts, and in anticipating reactions and expectations from the audience (Williamson 2014 p 255). As briefly discussed in a previous article, what made BTS appealing to their fans is music with meaning. They share stories about bullying, depression, struggles of youth, pursuit of happiness, and forsaking society’s ideals and temptation, which the fans can relate to. BTS stands for Bangtan Sonyeondan which translates to Bulletproof Boy Scouts in English. When they debuted, they explained that they chose their group name because it represents an image of not succumbing to social norms. Moreover, as BTS, they would protect the dreams and hopes of the youth from societal standards and oppression. Many listeners around the world can understand and relate to BTS’ music.
The second factor is the audience. Their context and interaction with the performers influence how they receive the messages of the performer. Hence the importance of listening in order for messages not to be taken out of context (Williamson 2014). BTS sing songs with socially conscious messages such as not giving in to societal pressures and loving one’s self. They also include their stories of struggles, fears, and anxieties. These messages– resonating with the listeners–have made their fanbase grow larger. Their messages have also brought them to a collaboration with UNICEF with their #ENDViolence campaign. You can find more about this topic in this article.
The third factor is the contextual embodiment. There are universal values and objectives, but there are also social and historical experiences that are unique to every individual, group, and country. Making music is a contextual activity that is according to certain events (Williamson 2014). BTS sing about issues that are common among the youth. Through these songs, they spread love, hope, and inspiration around the world. Still, they did not adapt to the Western standards of music in order to attract listeners (Kim 2018, Song 2020). They have chosen to promote their own lived experiences by incorporating Korean traditional culture into their musical arrangements. Two of the most talked about performances are BTS’ 2018 Melon Music Awards performance for their song “Idol” and the music video for Daechwita by Agust D, Suga’s alter ego.
The final factor is collaboration wherein different participants place efforts in building relationships to achieve common goals. In diplomacy, citizens of different countries come together to do a common project (Williamson 2014). As BTS inspire their fans to be good (and with the Love Myself campaign with UNICEF), their fans around the world have collaborated for projects to spread kindness and do good deeds in the name of BTS. In a way, this also raises South Korea’s reputation in international cooperation.
“Thus, even though music and emotions may be universal, they do receive much of their meaning and their clout through actual circumstances. The connotations as well as the moods by which feelings are raised are culturally conditioned and highly dependent on the listener’s as well as the performer’s disposition. The ways in which musicians realize and audience understand musical meanings are linked to the beliefs and attitudes of their respective cultures. Such attitudes are subject to cultural change. Or, to put it differently, what matters about music is not only what is played but what people hear and think while giving or attending a performance.” (Gienow-Hecht 2009 p223)
Soft power, through the promotion of pop culture, makes entertainment an essential component for diplomacy (Burns and Kanji in Quessard 2020). In this manner, culture is used to promote communications and exchanges between and among countries (Kessler 2020). Speaking of exchange, now we discuss diplomatic gifts. Diplomatic gifts used to be luxury artifacts “whose principal use is rhetorical and social, goods are simply incarnation signs, the necessity to which they respond is fundamentally political” (Appadurai in Neumann 2016 p 116). Therefore, these diplomatic gifts are highly representative of a country’s history and culture. As innovation is a strategy of diplomacy, South Korea has also caught up with modernity. K-Pop albums have been given as diplomatic gifts, and K-Pop artists continue to be included in political activities. For instance, EXO, who have a big fanbase in China, joined President Moon in his first official state visit to the country. Another evidence was when BTS’ album was given by a Korean Ambassador to the Philippine President during a meeting to discuss the establishment of a Korea Town in the capital. The album as a gift symbolises how popular K-Pop has gotten in the country therefore strengthening South Korea’s influence.
It is important to remember that pop culture is still a commercial business. As it is produced by the private sector, pop culture can help boost a country’s soft power when a government assigns a small budget for cultural diplomacy. However, due to its nature, the companies also have the creativity freedom to make goods that may not be favorable to the government (Goff 2013). In this case, we proceed to the next article where we will talk more about the role Hallyu, as South Korea’s nation brand.
See you next on the next article!
special thanks to Wallea Eaglehawk for giving support and encouragement, and for editing
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