Language and Media Barriers in Public Diplomacy Engagements of Ethiopia

Abstract

International language and media are crucial for strategic communications that aim at influencing foreign audiences' attitude. Despite a recent resurgence of political, public, academic, and media interest in foreign policy issues, there has been no study investigating the impact of communication barriers on Ethiopia's public diplomacy objectives. This study sought to answer several questions: What changes and continuities in language use have occurred in modern Ethiopian diplomacy? How have the language practices of mainstream mass media affected public diplomacy? And how have language and media shortcomings hindered public diplomacy efforts amid recent foreign policy challenges? To explore these questions, the study employed the concepts of "soft power" and constructivist public diplomacy, utilizing qualitative research methods and an exploratory design due to the lack of prior research on this topic. Data were collected through literature reviews, document analysis, and media assessments, and analyzed both chronologically and thematically. The findings revealed that diplomatic practice in Ethiopia was multilingual during the imperial period but shifted to a unilingual approach during the Derg and EPRDF regimes. Additionally, the dominance of local languages in Ethiopian mass media, coupled with the absence of international media outlets, hampered strategic communications. This resulted in the localization of public diplomacy messages that were intended for an international audience. The study also highlighted the limitations of public diplomacy in addressing recent foreign policy challenges, which were exacerbated by the digital media divide, a fragmented domestic political and media landscape, lack of a unified national narrative on key national interests, and a reactive, crisis management-focused approach at the national level, which lacked a proactively articulated public diplomacy strategy.