2009 USSC Research Grant Winners, Dr Ben Goldsmith and Dr Yusaku Horiuchi, visited the United States Studies Centre and presented on their research - Global Public Opinion and US Foreign Policy: Trends over time and soft-power consequences.
Their project researches the relationship between global public opinion and U.S. foreign policy and is part of a broader research program that Goldsmith and Horiuchi have been pursuing since 2002.
Since winning the 2009 USSC Research Grant Goldsmith and Horiuchi have been working to produce two papers.
The first of which explores patterns in the large amount of data on international public opinion about U.S. foreign policy. Current research will step back from previous detailed exploration on certain topics (such as support for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq the effects of public diplomacy) and examine some bigger-picture trends and dynamics.
The second paper has the tentative title: "In Search of Soft Power." The aim will be to test whether there is any systematic evidence that "soft power" (Nye 2004) - more specifically, how foreign publics view the U.S. and its foreign policy - really matters for US foreign policy.