The attractiveness of the English language, the influence of media and the high level of wealth and economic innovations are markers of identity and the power of English-speaking countries. To what extent is their soft power a key to major influence?
ICultural power and influence
1 Educational influence
Since the beginning of the 20th century, the USA has appeared as the messiah of the world, using its hard power to achieve its goal. However, American “messianism” has been balanced by its soft power.
KEY WORDS
Soft power is the influence through culture, diplomacy, and attraction rather than force. Today, we talk about smart power, a mix of hard and soft powers that underlines the necessity of military actions as well as cultural alliances.
Only American and British universities are ranked in the world’s top 10 best universities. Therefore, they attract many foreign students (42% for Oxford).
The British Council is present in more than 100 countries promoting a better knowledge of the UK and the English language.
2 Cultural leadership
BBC and US television networks such as CNN are broadcast worldwide. They provide 24-hour news coverage as well as documentaries. The streaming platform Netflix (1997) offers a film and series library and produces its own series.
The cinema industry in English-speaking countries is very prolific. The US film industry plays a crucial role in the American soft power as well as the economy. Other film industries play a major role around the world, namely Bollywood from India and Nollywood, which refers to Nigerian film industry.
The English-speaking press is one of the largest mass media in the world with The Times of India or USA Today, for example. Finally, the Big Tech or GAFAM (Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon and Microsoft) are the five most dominant American technology companies.
IIEconomic power and financial influence
1 The first economic superpower
The USA is the world’s first economy. It is symbolised by its stock markets: Wall Street with the Dow Jones and Nasdaq. In the UK, the City (London’s financial district) is home of one of the main stock exchanges in the world.
The American superpower is also exemplified by its multinational compagnies (MNC), such as Cisco, FedEx, Walmart but also with NATU (Netflix, Airbnb, Tesla and Uber). Other major industries are the food industry with Mars and McDonalds as well as the pharmaceutical companies (Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer) and the car industry with Ford and Chevrolet.
Free trade agreements (FTA) are necessary for countries to see their economy thrive. It is the case with USMCA, but also CETA (EU-Canada) that excludes the USA.
In 2022, a Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) was launched between the Indo Pacific countries (ASEAN, South Korea, Japan, India, Australia and New Zealand). It has become the biggest economic agreement in the world with 3.5 billion of humans.
2 The leadership of the dollar
The world currency is undoubtedly the American Dollar ($). It is predominantly the currency in which goods are quoted and traded. It is used by international institutions like IMF.
Info
The US dollar has one vertical bar ($) as its symbol, and not two. When it is written with two bars, it refers to the idea of money, but not the currency.
Currencies of many nations are pegged to the dollar. Some countries, like Ecuador and El Salvador, have adopted the US dollar as their official currency.