How the next president can fix ‘Brand America’

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I’ve just published the 19th edition of my annual survey, the Anholt Nation Brands Index® (NBI), which since 2005 has been measuring the ‘brand images’ of countries.

Each year we interview around 40,000 people in 20 nations to track their perceptions of 50 other countries.

A number of governments subscribe to the NBI and use it to help understand how their country, its population and its products, culture, tourism, policies and investment potential are viewed across the globe.

This isn’t vanity. Just like the brand images of products, the brands of nations are immensely powerful drivers of growth and profit: as I wrote back in 1998, leaders today need to be brand managers as much as they are policymakers.

It’s been seven years since the United States last appeared in the NBI’s top slot as world’s most admired nation: yet from the launch of the NBI in 2005 right through until 2016, America’s No. 1 position felt like a permanent feature of the index.

Since last year, Japan has been the world’s most admired country, and the United States hovers between seventh and 10th place.

Anholt’s recently-released top “Nation Brands” list.

Each year, Simon Anholt’s Nation Brands Index interviews around 40,000 people in 20 nations to track their perceptions of 50 other countries. JONATHAN BLOOM

So how does a country gain or lose a good “brand image”, and how seriously should the 47th President take the question of America’s diminished international appeal?

Analysis of the nearly 1 billion data points collected by the NBI since 2005 (which includes points about how each country is governed, how beautiful its landscape is, how attractive its products are, its culture, its economy, or even whether respondents would like to have a friend from there) demonstrate that the biggest single reason people like or admire other countries is because they feel glad those countries exist.

People don’t necessarily swoon because a nation is rich, powerful, successful or beautiful, but because it is perceived to contribute to the world beyond its own borders, to humanity and the planet.

Traditionally, it’s been the Nordic countries that seem to do this best: People associate these nations with tackling pollution and climate change, poverty, inequality and conflict.

A woman walking in Sweden, one of the Nordic nations, which regularly top the nation branding list. weyo – stock.adobe.com

More recently, countries like South Korea, Chile, the United Arab Emirates, Japan and Saudi Arabia have seen their scores rise most rapidly from year to year – and for very much the same reasons (even though the UAE and Saudi Arabia are major fossil-fuel producers).

There are five main drivers of a positive national image:

The perception that a country has strength in terms of its population size, its territory, its economic or military power (what Professor Joseph Nye famously dubbed ‘hard power’, or the ability of a country to impose its will on others)

The perception that a country is in some way relevant to the person perceiving it

The perception that the country develops or uses advanced technology

The perception that a country is beautiful

The perception that a country is a positive force in the world, and contributes to peace and prosperity outside as well as inside its own borders.

Of these five drivers, the fifth is by a wide margin the most powerful: and this should come as no surprise. After all, the success, beauty, prosperity or strength of other countries mostly benefit the citizens of that country and may even be a disadvantage to others.

In the post-World War II era, the US’ global image rose after its ambitious Marshall Plan helped rebuild shattered nations. Getty Images

Despite its status as a major fossil-fuel producer, the United Arab Emirates (home to Dubai, above) is rising on the nation brand list. hit1912 – stock.adobe.com

The US should take a leading role in rebuilding Ukraine once the fighting has ended in order to boost its nation-brand satus. EPA

What people most want from other countries is that in looking after their own population and their own territory, they do not do so at the expense of others.

And the US has a long history of such achievements.

Following the end of World War II, for instance, the US-backed Marshall Plan delivered positive results to its donors, recipients, the entire European neighborhood, and arguably much of the world beyond.

This has almost nothing to do with the party-political ideology of multilateralism versus isolationism: it’s simple self-interest.

Whether Kamala Harris or Donald Trump wins the election this week, there is a real opportunity to improve the profile the US in the world. Michael Brochstein/ZUMA Press Wire / SplashNews.com

Lots of people like the idea of strong, domestically-focused governments for their own country, but few want governments like that in other countries because it makes them more likely to become rivals rather than trading partners, donors, friends and allies.

As the US heads for the ballot box, the next administration, whatever its political leanings, needs to rediscover the art of balancing domestic and international interests: a challenge which, historically, America has often excelled at, and when necessary, still does.

The US defense of Ukraine (and no doubt a Marshall-like reconstruction plan when the time comes) shows that doing good and doing well, for countries as much as companies, are often very much the same. This is the message America should wake up to on Nov. 6.

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