Nation branding in the COVID-19 era: South Korea’s pandemic public diplomacy

Seow Ting Lee () and Hun Shik Kim ()
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Seow Ting Lee: University of Colorado at Boulder
Hun Shik Kim: University of Colorado at Boulder

Place Branding and Public Diplomacy, 2021, vol. 17, issue 4, No 8, 382-396

Abstract: Abstract In a global pandemic, public health outcomes are not the only variables at stake. Also at stake are countries’ nation brands and influence, which hinge on how a country responded to the crisis. Based on a case study of a middle power, South Korea, one of the more successful COVID-19 national responses so far, we offer an exploratory conceptual explication of pandemic public diplomacy that is grounded in a normative framework of substance, information, trust, collaboration, and mutual benefit. Sentiment analyses of social media and international news media suggest that the country is perceived as a model on how to cope with the pandemic by international audiences. Unlike other public diplomacy contexts, pandemic public diplomacy challenge conventional assumptions about public diplomacy and nation branding. As nation-states confront a common enemy, how public diplomacy and nation branding play out in COVID-19—arguably the most socially disruptive event in modern history—helps to shed light on the dynamics of mutual interdependence in an interconnected yet competitive world fraught with fear, uncertainty, and information deficiency.

Keywords: Pandemic public diplomacy; Pandemic; COVID-19; Coronavirus; Health; Crisis; Public diplomacy; Soft power; Nation brand; Nation branding; Sentiment analysis; South Korea (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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DOI: 10.1057/s41254-020-00189-w

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