Journalism and public diplomacy professor Philip Seib was recently appointed the new director of USC's Center on Public Diplomacy. On his first day as director, Seib shared his plans for the Center, what sparked his interest in the field, and his former dream career.
This interview is the first of a series of Q-and-A's with USC Annenberg faculty.
As the new director of the Center on Public Diplomacy, what are your plans?
PS: We want to continue the work that’s been done by professor Geoff Wiseman and his predecessors, and also raise the Center’s profile a bit in terms of holding conferences, starting the publications program and making ourselves available to others who are interested in public diplomacy by offering training programs.
What does your typical day at the Center look like?
PS: Today is my first day on this job so it’s kind of hard to say. One of the things about our Center on Public Diplomacy is that it’s both part of the Annenberg School and the School of International Relations. Even beyond that, within USC there are lots of people in many fields who are interested in what we’re doing, so I want to try to broaden our constituency. That means lots of meetings and lots of phone conversations. The trick is to not to get so caught up in the intensity of the day-to-day schedule that you lose the sense of the big picture. Fortunately, I have some very good people who are working with me at the Center, and I think if we manage things correctly we’ll be able to do that.
It seems like you are always traveling overseas. How do you handle the jet lag?
PS: [Laughs.] I’ve mastered the art of sleeping on airplanes so I’ve been able to avoid jet lag for the most part.
How did you originally develop an interest in public diplomacy?
PS: I’ve worked in the area of news media and the foreign policy process for 15 years at least. It’s a blend of communication and international relations — fields in which I’m very interested. It was kind of a natural evolution of the work I’ve been doing. My degrees are in political science and law, so in some ways I’ve long been looking for a way to blend my work as a journalism professor with those fields. This comes pretty close.
Growing up, what was your dream job?
PS: Playing center field for the New York Yankees. [Laughs.] When I was growing up I don’t think I was really intent on becoming a university professor. My interest in this area came about in more recent years.
Ultimately, what's your goal as director of the Center?
PS: I want to advance public diplomacy to be a more prominent part of foreign policy for the United States and for other countries. That’s so important. We need to get more people thinking about public diplomacy and recognizing that there is a viable alternative to harsher methods of implementing foreign policy. I hope that the people who implement foreign policy will evolve over time, will have fewer conflicts and more reliance on methods such as public diplomacy.
