Sunday, October 17, 2010

Beefing Up Sri Lanka's Image

Not satisfied with traditional diplomacy methods, Sri Lanka is reportedly pumping up its image with the aid of PR Firms.

Sri Lanka's Sunday Times reports that the government is paying UK firm Bell Pottinger about 30,000USD per month to promote Sri Lanka in the United States and about 20,000USD to another firm in India. Sri Lankan papers question whether the money is well spent and whether it's necessary to outsource such a domestic service. But there's little information about the ends, means and impacts of the effort.

And (without attempting to malign the efforts of Don Draper and his colleagues) how effective can a PR campaign be when a nation's domestic turmoil is attracting negative attention from the United Nations and the United States--one of the countries targeted by this campaign?

So, pop stars and PR aren't exactly working out. Maybe it really is time to give peace a chance?

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