Foreign Relations of the United States, 1917–1972, Volume VIII, Public Diplomacy, 1969–1972

99. Paper Prepared in the United States Information Agency¹

Washington, July 30, 1970

[Omitted here is the table of contents.]

INTRODUCTION

NOTE: The purpose of the Agency Program Memorandum is to furnish guidance for the preparation of the Agency’s budget presentation to the Office of Management and Budget and for the preparation of Area Program Memoranda and Media Planning Papers for fiscal 1971 and 1972. It will be sent to posts to inform the staff in the field of guidelines and priorities the Agency has set for the program as a whole. This is the first year in which an Agency Program Memorandum has been prepared, hence the format is still experimental.

The mission of the Information Agency, briefly stated, is to advance United States foreign policy in two ways: by communicating directly with the people of other nations, and by advising the President and his foreign affairs representatives with regard to the implications of foreign public opinion for U.S. policies.

Of all the agencies of the government, USIA alone is responsible for conducting overseas information and cultural programs. It is the government’s principal instrument of public diplomacy. In this role, it has a continuing responsibility to build respect abroad for the United States, to deepen understanding, on the part of its audiences overseas, of the basic principles that shape America’s approach to foreign affairs, and to seek support for specific policies and actions. From this responsibility, and from the Agency’s role as advisor on foreign public opinion—both in the Executive Branch in Washington and in U.S. Missions abroad—flow the unique contribution USIA is called upon to make in the government’s conduct of foreign relations.

The President’s comprehensive foreign policy message, “A New Strategy for Peace,”² provides USIA with direction for setting goals and operational priorities. The Administration’s emphasis on systematic planning and improved management also imposes upon the Agency the obligation to plan ahead and to review its operations even more carefully than in the past in order to insure the best use of its human and material resources.

The Agency will have to be innovative in the years ahead, and not for budgetary reasons alone. As it reviews its operations in the light of the President’s message, the Agency will bear in mind that the new foreign policy predicates a more discriminating U.S. role in world affairs. The President’s concept of partnership suggests that the U.S. will have to lower its voice. As the U.S. intends to carry “less of the load,” the Agency, too, may do fewer things in some places. This will mean, in many cases, limiting quantities of direct output and developing two-way communications techniques which will convey our information and our views without suggesting that we see ourselves sitting “at the head of the table.” In some countries, an additional factor of increasing government restrictions on foreign information activities will limit the scope and affect the style of USIS operations.

At the same time, even with these constraints, a number of factors indicate a need for increased or intensified USIA action in certain sectors. The foreign policy enunciated by the President implies expansion of efforts to communicate with the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, and the Agency will wish to concentrate greater financial and personnel resources in that area as new opportunities open. The sophistication of audiences and media in Western Europe and Japan—assigned highest foreign policy priority by the President—demands intense effort and more sophisticated communication techniques on the part of USIA, if it is to reach them. In fact audiences and media everywhere are becoming more discriminating, especially as more and more media products from a variety of sources compete for their attention. With television growing in importance in most countries, the Agency will have to make significantly greater use of this medium. The Agency will have to give increased attention, too, to the professionalism of its staff, both in Washington and overseas, which means broadened and intensified training for both American and foreign national personnel. These tasks will have to be accomplished without additional funding and with reduced personnel. For example, there are nearly 20% fewer American USIS employees overseas now than there were three years ago.

All this indicates the need for change in the Agency’s way of managing its affairs and going about its business. In the next few years, it will be essential that the Agency continuously review priorities to insure the best use of resources, progressively adjusting its structure and operations to the needs of public diplomacy in the decade just begun.

GUIDELINES

I. THE AGENCY AS ADVISOR.

Though by its nature less visible and less dependent on major resources, and perhaps inherently less capable of systematic structuring, the Agency’s advisory role is as important as its communication function. In the long run, USIA’s goals will often best be served by its helping to improve the psychological impact of all U.S. Government actions overseas. This it can do in its advisory role, through active participation in decision making in the Executive Branch of the government in Washington and in country teams abroad.

The President’s “new strategy” entails a new level of sensitivity to the perceived interests of other nations; the Agency’s policy and research mechanisms must be further refined to enable the Director to provide the President with accurate information and analysis of foreign opinion for his policy decisions. Public Affairs Officers abroad must regard themselves as part of these policy and research mechanisms as well as users of the information and analysis in advising their Ambassadors.

ACTION:

1. The Agency will continue to give high priority to attitude research, to provide background for performing the advisory function, as an aid to policy judgments, and as a tool for use in planning or evaluating USIA programs. (IOR)

2. The Agency will seek to develop a systematic and continuing method for tapping the knowledge and judgment of USIS field officers, as a valuable source of information regarding attitudes and psychological factors. This method will include thorough debriefings of returning officers in the Agency and reports from the field on selective, critical issues when required for specific purposes. (IOR)

3. The Agency will initiate a series of advisory papers on the policy implications of foreign attitudes, as an experiment in systematizing its advisory function in Washington. (IOP/IOR/Areas)

II. THE AGENCY AS COMMUNICATOR.

A. A Priority for Content: the New Strategy for Peace.

In his comprehensive message, “U.S. Foreign Policy for the 1970’s: A New Strategy For Peace,”³ the President sets forth a foreign policy based on three elements: Partnership with friends, strength, and the willingness to negotiate differences with adversaries. It is the Agency’s task to relate American positions and actions over the coming years to this concept in order to help key audiences abroad see specific decisions as parts of a whole.

Much of this will find its expression in themes devised country by country and area by area. Some themes, however—especially those designed to show the United States as a strong, creative, and forward looking nation and thus a worthy and desirable partner—have broader relevance and will receive the priority attention of Agency media.

1. Foreign Policy.

The Agency’s principal message is that the U.S. wishes to contribute to the achievement of a stable peace which will permit the nations of the world, acting in a climate of mutual respect, to develop their own potential, to choose their own form of government, and to work together to solve shared problems.

a. The United States, acting in a spirit of partnership, will, where this is consistent with its own national interest, participate in the defense and development of allies and friends on the basis of mutual consultation and responsibility.

b. Where its interests conflict with the interests of other nations, the United States will actively seek areas of accommodation and will maintain a willingness to negotiate.

c. “Where it makes a real difference and is considered in our interest,” the United States is ready to cooperate with other nations and with international organizations to assist those countries which undertake programs of modernization based on the principle of self-help.

d. The United States recognizes that unchecked pollution of the air, land and sea constitutes a world-wide threat to human life, and is willing to take a leading role, in cooperation with other countries and with international organizations, in developing means to reverse the trend toward degradation of the environment. Since all efforts may be meaningless if the population of the planet continues to increase at present rates, the U.S. will participate in international programs aimed at halting the population explosion.

2. The U.S. as a Society.

The approaching bicentennial celebration offers the Agency a unique opportunity to project the United States of the present against the backdrop of its history—to discuss the experience and the democratic values that have emerged from the nation’s first two hundred years, and to convey the dynamism and diversity of the American society which must meet the tests of the 1970s.

a. Rapid economic and technological development has brought the nation unprecedented prosperity but has also created new environmental and social problems. Americans are going through a period fraught with tensions but rich in promise as they seek solutions that will assure equal opportunity and improve the quality of life for all citizens.

b. The diversified structure of American mass education, always a subject of controversy and experiment, has been a vital factor in the country’s growth. Americans are now engaged in fresh debate and testing to make education responsive to the needs of today and tomorrow.

c. The variety of expression in the arts, the innovation and experimentation, reflect the diversity and vigor of contemporary America.

d. Americans have put scientific research and technology to work to satisfy human needs, and much knowledge and experience gained, as in the space program, is available to all nations.

B. A Preferred Stance: Influence with Low Visibility

The Agency and USIS posts will maintain an operational stance sensitive and appropriate to the situation in each country, responsive to the concept of partnership and to the tone of the President’s foreign policy statement. “Partnership” can be projected, and a “low profile” maintained, by

1. keeping post activity, output and visibility to a level appropriate to the goals of U.S. foreign policy in the country;

2. selectively extending the concept of binationalism beyond BNCs to other kinds of post operations which lend themselves to co-sponsorship arrangements and host country participation;

3. developing and expanding communications techniques in which target audiences or their representatives play an active role (e.g. seminars, letters to the editor in Dialogue, etc.);

4. developing multinational activities within or outside of regional organizations on issues and problems of shared concern;

5. encouraging private U.S. business and American organizations to engage in activities which support Agency objectives.

ACTION:

a. The Agency and USIS Posts will identify those regional organizations, both official and private, which have the actual or potential capability for taking the initiative in information and cultural programs promoting common goals. Where possible, the Agency will assist these organizations to realize their potential and phase out USIA activities which would duplicate theirs. (IOP/Areas)

b. The Agency will be alert to third country information activities with two goals in mind: (1) to identify opportunities for cooperation with friendly efforts, and (2) where U.S. interests dictate, to point out the distortions of hostile propaganda, keeping in mind the aim of lowering cold war tensions. (Areas/IOR/IOP)

C. Operational Priorities

1. Allocation of funds, personnel and facilities will be adjusted to reflect new U.S. foreign policy priorities and Agency capabilities.

ACTION:

a. Management processes and techniques will be improved.

(i) The Agency will appoint a high level task force to develop—with outside consultants, as necessary—a Resource Allocation System, building on the positive aspects of the present PPBS, and taking account of knowledge gained through the contract effort of A.D. Little, Inc.⁴ On approval of the Executive Committee, the task force will proceed to test the new system at a pilot post or posts. (I/IOP/IOR/IOA)

(ii) The Agency will continue its effort to develop a Management Information System, geared to the requirements of the Resource Allocation System, including the PAO Resource Management System. (IOR/IOA/IOP)

(iii) In order to increase the PAO’s involvement in decisions affecting his country program, the PAO Resource Management System will be expanded to additional media resources, and at the same time simplified to the extent possible. This will be done with careful attention to control of the necessary paper flow and bookkeeping requirements for small posts. (IOA/IOP)

(iv) USIA and CU planning processes will be integrated, so that all cultural and information programs carried out by USIA in a given country will be described and analyzed in a single document. (IOP)

b. The level of Media operations will reflect both the special capabilities of each medium for projecting particular kinds of messages to particular audiences, and PAO and Area judgments as to the proper mix and balance of products and programs required for communicating with their targets. (Media/Areas)

c. Agency-wide standards for resource allocation by country will be developed. (IOP/IOA/Areas)

(i) Criteria will be set for maintaining or establishing small posts.

(ii) Criteria will be set for and applied to information and binational centers, with the purpose of assuring the representative quality of those installations the Agency continues to operate or support.

(iii) Techniques will be developed for keeping a USIS presence in some places where a USIS post may not be justified. The possibilities of joint USIS/State staffing in certain circumstances will be explored.

(iv) Criteria applicable across Area lines for the staffing and funding of country programs will be developed, articulated and progressively applied.

d. Career development and training programs will be expanded to increase the professionalism of the Agency’s staff, including its foreign service, domestic service, and overseas local employees. (IPT)

(i) A new career development division will concentrate on career counseling and planning for all categories of Agency staff.

(ii) The course in international communications, which is now being evaluated as a pilot project, will be regularized.

(iii) All available avenues to keep the staff abreast of significant trends and developments of contemporary America will be pursued.

(iv) The Agency will inaugurate a series of media workshops in Washington and overseas.

(v) The Agency will provide a variety of media and other functional training (in English teaching, BNC operation, library science, radio, etc.) tailored to the needs of individual field officers to prepare them in specialized fields new to them with which they will have to deal in their next assignment.

e. The Voice of America will adjust its programming and facilities to increase regional effectiveness. (IBS/Areas)

(i) English broadcasts to South Asia and the Far East will be treated as vernacular broadcasts addressed to specific audiences.

(ii) As additional transmitters can be made available, priority will be given to increasing vernacular language broadcasts to Eastern Europe.

(iii) The Voice of America will actively seek opportunities to expand medium wave coverage in areas where it is important.

2. The Agency will adjust the allocation of its resources to reflect priorities among Areas. (IOP/IOA)

ACTION:

a. The Agency will provide all the resources it can to establish and expand communication with significant audiences in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. (IAS/IAE/Media)

(i) Special International Exhibits funds will, as a rule, be reserved for exhibits in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, and used in ways that will increase the impact of each exhibit—e.g., by enabling the employment of a greater number of American guides and by the publication of souvenir pamphlets. (IAS/ICS)

(ii) The Agency will seek opportunities for greater cooperation in television with countries of the area and, if possible, for arranging program exchanges. (IAS/IMV)

(iii) The Agency will maintain its interest and participation in RIAS as the most effective means of communicating with audiences in East Germany. (IAE)

b. Far from taking for granted a favorable psychological climate in Japan and key countries of Western Europe, the Agency will respond to the high priority the President has assigned to U.S. relations with these countries. (IAF/IAE/IOP/IOA)

c. While the Agency still has a major commitment to programs in Southeast Asia flowing from the overall U.S. engagement there, it will disengage as rapidly as feasible from information support to governments there. (IAF)

d. The Agency will attempt to restore the level of useful communication with Arab target audiences, primarily through radio. (IAN/Media)

3. The Agency will seek, both in Washington and in the field, opportunities and techniques for exploiting television in communicating with target audiences.

ACTION:

a. The Agency will continue to work, on the highest level, to develop closer operational relationships with American networks both in order to avoid duplicating their activities and to obtain freer access to the use of their documentary programs where these would otherwise not be seen. (I/IMV)

b. In countries where there is a satellite television capability, posts will maintain close contact with local television broadcasters to assure, within the limits of the policy set forth in CA–1493, July 29, 1970,⁵ that television programs important for the accomplishment of Agency objectives are given maximum exposure on foreign television. (Areas/IMV)

c. The Agency will acquire the technical capability to produce television programs in color and will go into color production as effective placement in the field necessitates this move. (IMV)

d. The Agency will continue to cultivate its working relationship with Eurovision and the Asian Broadcasting Union and will explore the possibility that similar networks may develop in other Areas, especially Latin America. (IMV/IAE/IAL)

4. Agency media will seek fresh approaches and techniques in order to convey to priority audiences around the world—many of which are increasingly sophisticated—an impression of U.S. creativity, innovative spirit, and technical skill.

ACTION:

a. Where posts and media must choose between high quality targeted products and programs on the one hand and quantity output on the other, the decision will go in favor of quality. (Areas/Media)

b. The Program Coordination Staff of IOP will function as the central “theme” office for the development of coordinated programs focusing the efforts of various media at a given time on themes of priority interest in more than one Area. The programs will be offered to field posts for their adaptation to the needs of their country programs. (IOP/Areas/Media)

c. To assure both the representative quality of USIA overseas installations and their appropriateness to program needs in the local context, a central Overseas Space Planning and Services Staff will be established in IOA to supervise their interior and exterior design, maintenance, furnishing and refurbishing. (IOA/Areas)

d. To assure that the most modern techniques and devices are explored for their possible utility to the Agency, the Media will on a continuing basis acquire and test new products in Washington and, where appropriate, in field situations. (Media)

e. To reach key audiences such as media leaders and university and intellectual circles, particularly in more advanced countries, the Agency will continue to develop and employ techniques more sophisticated and less direct than the traditional information handouts. (Areas/Media/IOP)

(i) Seminars and conferences, already a vital part of posts’ programs, will be a preferred means of engaging members of these audiences in an exchange of views with American peers on issues of common concern.

(ii) For selected media representatives, travel to the United States (programmed by the Foreign Correspondents Centers)—or, when useful, to third countries—will enable these key people to see for themselves and report their findings to their audiences at home.

f. Agency media will design programs and material attuned to important youth audiences overseas. Whether or not a direct appeal to youth is made in a given program, the increasing proportion and role of youth suggests the young should constitute a sizable proportion of the USIS primary target group in many countries. The formats of publications, the voices of radio announcers, and the content, viewpoints and personalities selected for USIS programs and materials should take this into account and seek to attract these student and youth audiences. (Media/IOP)

g. Agency Media will seek to increase opportunities for staff travel as a means of enhancing the professionalism of personnel, providing needed familiarity with the U.S. scene or other countries, and enlivening and deepening output. (Media)

5. The Agency will pursue, both in Washington and overseas, opportunities and means for cooperating with private American business and organizations in carrying out USIA’s mission, and will seek to exploit available products of commercial media suitable for program use.

ACTION:

a. The acquisition function of the Motion Picture and Television Service will be strengthened in order to provide posts a wider choice of films produced commercially but of clear value and appropriateness to country programs. (IMV)

b. Posts will, with the help of their Ambassadors, establish close contact with representatives of major American businesses both in order to counsel them on public relations matters of concern to the U.S. national interest and (except in cases where this may be counter-productive) to involve them in the moral and financial support of Binational Centers and of other USIS programs. They will call on the Agency where home office authorization or encouragement is needed, and the Agency will take action on a high level, as appropriate. (Areas/IOP)

c. The Agency will study the legal and practical feasibility of having corporate sponsors cover part or all of the costs of specific regional or world-wide satellite telecasts. (IGC/IOA/IMV)

6. The Agency will systematically undertake to refine its techniques of identifying and selecting target audiences within countries.

ACTION:

a. The Agency will give priority to the analysis of influence structures and the definition of target groups in 20 to 25 countries of highest priority. Where feasible, experiments like the Philippines “agents of change” study⁶ and other pilot projects will be undertaken, with the aim of developing a research base for the refinement of the target concept in Agency planning and practice. (IOR)

b. With regard to those countries of high priority where projects similar to the Philippines study cannot be undertaken, the Agency will give priority to analysis of existing relevant information about influence structures in their societies, including the role of public opinion in the formation of public policies of their governments. (IOR)

c. The Agency will develop means to enable posts of lower priority to benefit from the methods of social science research in identifying target groups and individuals. (IOR)

d. The Agency will analyze those direct activities (exclusive of VOA and the servicing of foreign mass media) which are conceived for very large or mass audiences to ascertain whether their departure from the Agency’s philosophy of selective targeting is justified. (Areas/IOR/IOP)

7. The Agency will mount a coordinated effort in support of the American Revolution Bicentennial Celebration.

ACTION:

a. Within the limits of available resources, the Agency will develop special products, programs and activities that will help project in other countries the meaning of the Bicentennial celebration. (Media/Areas/IOP)

1. Source: National Archives, RG 306, Director’s Subject Files, 1968–1972, Entry A1–42, Box 15, Policy and Plans (IOP)—General 1970. Limited Official Use. Drafted on July 29 by members of the IOP/P staff. White sent a copy of the Agency Program Memorandum to all heads of elements under a July 30 covering memorandum, indicating that the memorandum, “on which you commented in a previous draft,” had been “approved in substance by the Executive Committee.” Bunce initialed the covering memorandum for White. On July 6, White had circulated to the Executive Committee a draft version of the Program Memorandum, noting that she had shared an earlier draft (presumably the one referenced in the July 30 covering memorandum) with the heads of all elements and had incorporated their “comments and suggestions.” (Ibid.)
2. See footnote 2, Document 78.
3. Ibid.
4. See footnote 4, Document 38.
5. Not found.
6. Not found.