One of the obvious divisions within international actors (but particularly countries) conducting public diplomacy is between those that employ staff from the local community and those that ‘import’ staff from their home country. Each approach presents particular opportunities and challenges worth considering.
For those that use local staff, one advantage is the ability to communicate with the audience through members of the target community. This is an advantage, because if encourages a networked approach to communication and helps alleviate the extensive problems which can occur when projecting across cultural barriers, as discussed by RS Zaharna. Local employees present a version of your voice, but one that may be received in a different way to your own due to their peer position in the local community; particularly in situations when a national representative might be seen as an ‘outsider’. This ‘local’ advantage may be accentuated by the likely greater understanding of local cultural norms. Those adopting a messaging approach will still need to be refined and tested for an audience but the use of staff from within that audience can provide the message with an advantage over one projected merely by outsiders.
Engagement over specific issues, similar to some NGO methodologies, requires the ability to engage a with the community rather than the presentation of a national image. As such, the national / local decision is one based as much on the best engagement with the audience rather than the best representation of home. This perspective is reinforced by Nick Cull who recently highlighted one of the lessons from past public diplomacy experience, “(s)ometimes the most credible voice in public diplomacy is not one’s own”.
Conversely, the ‘experience’ may be an important part, particularly of national public diplomacy. This is particularly the case for organisations which seek to ‘represent’ their country overseas, particularly through cultural centres, providing an image of that country similar to the original Amerika Haus offering a “window to America“. This often leads organisations to emphasise national rather than local staff, as a visitor will be meeting an inhabitant of the country being represented, rather than a member of the local community. These questions of representation, even an emphasis on soft power, rather than issue based engagement tend to influence the decision.
To be fair the above is hardly a revelation, but there are a couple of issues which tend to receive less attention. First, cost; can a local individual be paid less? If so, how much of a saving can be made in switching from national to local staff? Second, in times of crisis, ‘national’ staff tends to be withdrawn, but what happens to local staff?
1) During lean times many organisations will be tempted to make the calculation to see if they can lower staff cost by using ‘local’ staff. Interestingly the switch from national to local staff, resulting in cutting costs, will demonstrate to the local community that despite emphasis on equality or reciprocity the value of two people doing the same job is different based on nationality. Some organisations may not consider this a problem, others may find this causes difficulty when trying to engage with that same local community. This tension may come into sharp focus if there’s a mixture of local and national staff doing similar jobs. The relationship with staff may be considered largely an HR or legal issue, but it contains considerable risk for the relationship with the local community.
2) The first issue has the potential to be an ongoing tension that it can be tempting to ignore until unless it causes a serious problem within the work-place. This overlooks the wider implications of this problem. Similarly the second problem can also be easily overlooked. This is because the second consideration only exists at times of crisis; particularly when an organisation is forced to stop working, or reduce representation in a country or area. Faced with this situation many organisations withdraw their ‘national’ staff, however, the ‘local’ staff are not always given the same option.
AJS White’s personal history of the British Council highlights one of these examples. The Suez Crisis, “ended for the time being the Council’s work in Egypt and the Council’s London appointed staff had to evacuate Syria and for a brief period Jordan”. White also notes “the local staff in Jordan carried on the work”. In the case of Jordan the local staff were able to continue, and in fact in Egypt sequestrators were appointed. This happened because the tension did not extend to targeting those working for foreign organisations; when that targettting does happen local staff become trapped in an ambiguous space between their employer and the local authorities (whether that authority originates from legal position or force of arms).
This problem was perhaps best demonstrated through the situation of native translators working in Iraq. Claims were made in 2007 that Iraqi translators and been ‘Abandoned’ because, according to the Times Online, “the Government ignored personal appeals from senior army officers in Basra to relax asylum regulations and make special arrangements for Iraqis whose loyal services have put their lives at risk.”
The story highlighted the personal experience of these local staff; “One interpreter, who has worked with the Army since 2004 … was told by Downing Street that he would receive no special favours and to read a government website.”
A year later stories surfaced of the conditions in which translators who had managed to claim asylum had been housed. These stories highlighted the specific difficulties of working with translators in Iraq, but in a wider sense the local staff are often considered harder to protect than national staff. Â This presents the clear pressure for public diplomacy organisations to consider what is likely to happen to the local staff should they be forced to withdraw (and many do).
However, there are some questions that are rarely discussed and experience is not often shared; If a showdown is likely, are local staff given a choice to leave or resign first? Local staff are often employed in the more junior grades, the least likely to be told in advance and even less likely to be consulted on strategy. Would those that do resign be reinstated after if the tension passes should they wish? Or is the desire to protect their family to be counted against them? Conversely, does letting large numbers of staff resign give away the plans to defy the authorities in the host country?
The answers to these questions, and the way the organisation acts toward the ‘local’ staff will be not only influence the relationship with the employees but will also demonstrate to the local community the ‘true’ opinion the PD organisation has about members of the local community.
If an organisation goes for a showdown and during the resulting fallout leaves any of the local staff to suffer the consequences (when national staff go home) the community are likely to make judgements about that decision. They may even decide that the organisation sees their community as disposable; only to be engaged with when it suits their ends. To this end, the question is both, what are the responsibilities of an organisation to local staff and what if the organisation cannot live up to the expectations of the local community?
While a national PR organisation naturally focuses on national goals, this sort of judgement is likely not only to make recruitment of staff in future difficult, but is likely to impact negatively on any attempt to re-engage with the community. With numerous areas of geopolitical tension currently create the potential for a forced withdrawal; these issues are likely to surface for a number of PD organisations around the world. Many will, very likely, cover their legal duty of care, but will they all mitigate the risks, both PD and personal, relating to their local staff?