Culture

• "Culture" is a term that broadly describes the common beliefs and activities that a particular group of people share. Culture can be expressed through the art that a particular people create or the way in which those people organize leadership. It also is expressed in the norms governing behavior in common circumstances, such what two people do when they meet.
  
  

Artistic Exchanges

• One strategy for cultural engagement is for two governments or agencies to arrange exchanges of artistic endeavors that showcase each other's culture. They may invite symphony orchestras or acting companies from each country to travel to the other to perform the concerts or shows that they typically perform for their own citizens. This gives the citizens of the two countries the opportunity to experience a side of each other's culture that they might not generally be exposed to by mainstream news organizations.
  
  

Displays of Leader Engagement

• Cultural engagement seeks to overcome the sense of "us and them" that the people of two nations with very different cultures can feel toward one another. One strategy to overcome this sense of antagonism is for the leaders of two different countries to make high-profile displays of interest and understanding of each other's cultures. For example, in 2009, American President Barack Obama gave a major speech in Cairo to the people of Egypt and cited a number of passages from the Koran. This strategy both demonstrates an interest in the other culture and engages the people of the culture that the leader addresses. Furthermore, this draws the attention of the news media from the leader's own culture and the subsequent stories then help to educate the leader's own citizens about culture of the people the leader addressed.
  
  

Engineer Open Engagement Platforms

• Cultural engagement does not have to come from events that the government directly organizes. The citizens of a culture are often its most eloquent spokespeople. By providing tools to circumvent Internet censorship by oppressive regimes, a government can facilitate open dialogue between its citizens and the citizens of cultures that would otherwise be denied access by their government. In this way, the citizens of two cultures can express themselves directly to each other. This dialogue allows citizens to bypass both the image an oppressive government wants the outside world to believe about its own citizens and the images about the outside world an oppressive government wants its own citizens to believe.