[EAI Working Paper] The Story of BTS's Global Appeal: Learning Korean Diplomacy of Attraction from BTS

Editor's Note

The East Asia Institute (EAI) launched the 'BTS Appeal Theory' research team in September 2019. Ahead of the publication of the book "The Story of BTS's Global Appeal," which analyzes the BTS phenomenon from sociological, communication, and international political perspectives, we are publishing the third working paper series, "The World Stage BTS Ascended, A New Horizon for Diplomacy of Attraction."

This study examines the appeal of the BTS phenomenon from an international relations perspective and presents policy implications for South Korea's public diplomacy. After pointing out various problems in existing Korean Wave diplomacy, it emphasizes the power of storytelling, stimulating aspiration and fostering solidarity, disseminating universal messages, connecting with taste communities, forming transnational cultural networks, and regionally differentiated diplomatic strategies for attractive Korean public diplomacy.

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Public Diplomacy and Attraction

The success or failure of diplomacy depends not only on physical resources such as military and economic power but also on the appropriate combination and projection of non-physical resources like values, ideology, culture, knowledge, and diplomatic skills. Especially today, as the importance of public diplomacy targeting the general public of other countries is increasing, the potential for utilizing non-physical resources is growing. South Korea, as a middle power with inferior physical strength compared to its neighboring great powers, faces the challenge of more actively utilizing opportunities for public diplomacy. However, countries that are typically inferior in physical strength often lack the resources and leeway to invest heavily in diplomacy that requires long-term investment and effects, such as public diplomacy, due to the need to address immediate security and economic issues directly linked to survival. This is why middle powers have relatively late entered the field of public diplomacy, unlike great powers like the United States, which have long recognized and invested in public diplomacy. However, precisely because of this, middle powers must accurately assess their available resources and strategically allocate and mobilize them to achieve maximum effect, rather than merely imitating the public diplomacy models of great powers.

South Korea, belatedly paying attention to public diplomacy, declared 2010 the 'First Year of Public Diplomacy' and established public diplomacy as one of the three pillars of Korean diplomacy alongside political and economic diplomacy, actively working to strengthen public diplomacy capabilities. This involves "conducting diplomatic activities to promote diplomatic relations by expanding consensus and securing trust through communication with foreign nationals regarding Korea's history, tradition, culture, arts, values, policies, and vision, thereby enhancing Korea's national image and brand and increasing its influence in the international community."

The core of public diplomacy lies in attraction (魅力). Literally, attraction is the power to captivate and draw in the hearts of others. Prominent international relations scholar Joseph Nye calls this soft power. True public diplomacy can be defined as enhancing national image and fostering a favorable environment by conveying messages to others with one's own appeal and gaining their empathy. If the elements that attract the public of other countries are weak, the effectiveness of public diplomacy will diminish. The South Korean government cites its development model, which has achieved both economic growth and democratization, its image as a peaceful nation with no history of aggression, and its cultural excellence represented by the Korean Wave as representative assets for public diplomacy. Are these values and culture of Korea truly attractive to others? Will disseminating them widely expand international consensus, enhance Korea's national image and brand, and ultimately promote diplomatic relations?

Attraction is highly subjective and emotional. It is a process that appeals not only to the intellect but also to the heart, and its effectiveness varies depending on who the recipient (audience) is. If attraction has a relational character, then one can be said to have truly understood attraction only by knowing what aspects of oneself, what values, and what actions capture the minds and hearts of the recipients, and under what conditions they can effectively attract them. Therefore, the starting point of public diplomacy is to identify what inherent attractions within us resonate with, or can resonate with, the other party.

The language used to represent Korea's cultural appeal is the Korean Wave (Hallyu). If the Korean Wave is defined as the cultural phenomenon of Korean popular culture circulating across borders and generating resonance, then what aspects of the Korean Wave are captivating to others? While the Korean Wave gained significant popularity in Asia centered around dramas in the 2000s, the 2010s have seen its global spread across various genres, primarily driven by K-Pop. This sustained Korean Wave for 20 years has had a profound impact on increasing national recognition of Korea. However, moving beyond this, we must closely examine whether the Korean Wave is changing perceptions beyond national recognition, what kind of brand it is creating, and what aspects or elements of the Korean Wave are effective from a public diplomacy standpoint.

Attraction does not exist on its own and is not derived from objective experience. Attraction is the result of intersubjective social interaction and is created through communication and exchange. If reality is socially constructed through continuous communication, then an 'attractive' reality is perhaps the result of actors interpreting the world in a specific way, communicating about their interpretations of certain facts, and ultimately converging on a single reality, or truth. Therefore, merely persuading others in the process of (re)constructing an attractive 'reality' called the Korean Wave, reflecting one's own interests, is not a very effective method for South Korea. According to Lyotard, persuasion occurs through debate, and debate proceeds through reasoning based on empirical evidence. However, since reality is in fact constructed, debaters often fail to agree on the evidence itself or on what constitutes evidence, thus making the process of reasoning impossible. Instead of reasoning, actors attempt to construct and reconstruct the reality of the issue to suit their own interests, and this tendency is even stronger when the actor is a state.

In the process of (re)constructing a 'charming' reality through the Korean Wave that reflects its own national interests, South Korea often makes the mistake of disregarding or ignoring the views of others (foreign audiences) and emphasizing or imposing its own opinions. In fact, considering that it was neighboring countries that first captured and named the phenomenon of the Korean Wave, the production of attraction should be a process of eliciting empathy through communication and exchange between oneself and others. Nevertheless, the so-called existing Korean Wave diplomacy has not moved beyond a one-way direction. In reality, the focus of public diplomacy has not moved beyond the government taking the lead in promoting and exporting the main actors of the Korean Wave and their cultural content overseas. However, what is more important is to understand and adopt the process by which the Korean Wave gains attraction from around the world, and its attractive factors (genes) and methods of utilization.

In this regard, BTS's appeal serves as a wake-up call for existing Korean Wave diplomacy or public diplomacy. This is not because of achievements like BTS's Billboard album and Hot 100 No. 1 rankings, but because of the different level of appeal production and distribution methods they have demonstrated. The appeal of the content produced by BTS lies in storytelling. Rather than telling common stories of youth, they convey extremely personal stories, such as their growth and success, with honesty and authenticity, eliciting empathy from the audience and prompting reflection on real-world problems. Second, BTS's storytelling is characterized by conveying universal and contemporary messages. While the main environment of the lives BTS members experience is Korea, the issues they address and raise their voices about are predominantly global issues, resonating particularly with the youth generation across borders. Third, BTS exhibits a uniqueness in conveying universal messages in their own way. While the themes they address are universal, their method of message delivery is a strategy that ignites the enthusiasm of specific taste communities, announces their presence, and achieves greater success based on that. As a result, BTS has created an enormous transnational cultural network by connecting fans worldwide, known as ARMY (hereinafter referred to as ARMY), with a sense of belonging and solidarity. Fourth, the entire process of content production, dissemination, and reception by BTS is a two-way communication of participation, communication, and exchange, with the boundaries between producers (BTS) and consumers (ARMY) blurred. Unlike the existing Korean Wave, which featured 'manufactured' idol groups controlled in a top-down manner with a supreme producer at the apex, BTS maintains a horizontal relationship with ARMY and has a system of continuous communication and collaboration via social media. Through the case of BTS, what the South Korean government should do is not simply promote BTS's appeal. It should seek a new BTS-style public diplomacy by referencing their appeal strategies, such as storytelling of authenticity and universality, global network expansion strategies, and horizontal participation.

■ Author: Son Yeol_Director of EAI, Professor at the Graduate School of International Studies, Yonsei University. Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Chicago. He has served as Director of the Graduate School of International Studies and Head of Underwood International College at Yonsei University, Director of the Institute for Sustainable Development, and Director of the Institute for International Studies. He was a specially invited visiting professor at the University of Tokyo and a visiting scholar at the University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill) and the University of California (Berkeley). He served as President of the Korean Political Science Association (2019) and President of the Association for Modern Japanese Studies (2012). He was a senior fellow at Fulbright, MacArthur, Japan Foundation, and Waseda University’s Advanced Research Center for the Humanities. He has served as a consultant for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Korea National Diplomatic Academy, the Northeast Asian History Foundation, and the Korea Foundation, and as a specialist member of the Committee for Northeast Asian Affairs. His research areas include Japanese foreign policy, international political economy, East Asian international politics, and public diplomacy. His recent publications include Japan and Asia's Contested Order (2019, with T. J. Pempel), Understanding Public Diplomacy in East Asia (2016, with Jan Melissen), “South Korea under US-China Rivalry: the Dynamics of the Economic-Security Nexus in the Trade Policymaking,” (The Pacific Review 2019(32):6), and "Middle Power Diplomacy of South Korea" (2017, co-edited).

■ Managed and Edited by: Jeon Ju-hyun, EAI Research Fellow

Inquiries: 02 2277 1683 (ext. 204) jhjun@eai.or.kr

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