SOFT power and hard power are concepts in international and foreign affairs that describe ways in which nations influence one another to achieve certain outcomes.Hard power refers to the visible exertion of force against other nations in ways that include war, territorial invasions or blockades of borders through actual physical intervention.Military force has historically been the arrowhead for hard power. Conversely, soft power is a relatively new idea conceived in the 1980s by Joseph Nye as a means of explaining how force can be exerted through tacit ways that possibly avoid violence and confrontation.Soft power, therefore, can include sanctions, withholding donor funding and other bilateral or multilateral financing.This concept suggests that institutions like the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank use soft power or the power of finance and debt, to influence decisions of (indebted) member states.So instead of militarism, the preference to now apply financial pressure takes precedence and becomes pronounced. Furthermore, soft power alludes […]
All ABOUT SOFT POWER
