The significance of strategic communications: implications for the free and open indo-pacific initiative

Abstract

Strategic communications, meaning the coherent use of words, actions and other communicative means to achieve a policy goal, play a particularly important role in international affairs today for reasons that are related to the elevated role that values play in international security. Values are by their nature intrinsically linked to the formation of national interests and furthermore to the formation of the international order. As today’s international confrontations arise from different interpretations by major powers of what constitutes a ‘rules-based international order,’ the role of values-based persuasion has been greatly elevated. In the light of this altered political landscape, strategic communications now need to occupy a central place in strategy to shape the international rules-based order, which is based on the capacity to convey both interests and values. Indeed, a doctrinal review of strategic communications suggests that they have a constitutive function, in addition to defensive and resilience-building functions to protect against counter-narratives and malign influences. Strategic communications play a role in structuring the perceptions and behaviour of target audiences, putting them among the tools that states have to shape the international security environment.