For the People, By the People, About the People

The Public’s Increased Engagement in Foreign Policy Over the Last Decade

Noor Yassein, Print Editor-in-Chief

January 18, 2022

If you scroll through the news or social media, you’ll find countless opinions and analyses on our government’s handling of COVID-19, domestic policy, and international affairs. Even through an event as wide-reaching and extreme as a global pandemic, major headlines and popular issues continue to focus on international relations. It seems that everyone has an opinion, and it’s hard to believe that it wasn’t always this way. But is this really the case? And if not, what changed? Through investigation of these questions, I found that over the last decade, there has been an increase in public engagement within foreign affairs, due to an influx of available information, as well as the technology to disseminate it.

In my research, I began by looking specifically at the United States, given its recent election, as well as its dominance in the media. According to a Pew Research survey, at the beginning of the decade, only about 8% of voters found that foreign policy was something they considered when making their decision around who to vote for. That same year, in 2010, the top six priorities were found to be, predictably, the economy, jobs, terrorism, social security, education, and medicare. Looking at these statistics, I considered the possibility that perhaps the amount of public engagement in foreign policy fluctuates depending on whether there was a crisis at home. This theory was further supported in the research done by Pew, showing that consideration of foreign policy at this time was the lowest it had been since before 9/11. This makes sense, since the effects of the economic crash of 2008 were still prevalent in people’s everyday lives at the time this research was conducted.

Following this same line of thinking, given everything that’s happened in the world over the last couple of years - specifically, events that have had a direct impact on people’s lives - concern around foreign policy should currently be at an all-time low, right? Even if it seems to be everywhere, maybe the majority of people aren’t as involved as I’d previously thought?

Wrong. Well, sort of. To my surprise, I found that foreign policy seemed to be a consideration, if not exactly top of mind. As expected, the top six issues considered in the United States in 2021 consisted of the economy, COVID-19, unemployment, terrorism, fixing the political system, and affordable healthcare. This all makes sense, given the number of issues at home that Americans have needed to consider over the last few years. After all, we are heading into the third year of a pandemic which, while certainly global, seems to have exposed issues within individual countries that previously were not visible, or simply were not as significant. Not to mention, COVID-19 has had an obvious impact on the way everyone conducts their day-to-day lives. However, this time, there were some specific international issues that made the cut on this list, albeit not the top six - climate change, for one, or global trade. In addition, a significant number of Americans reported being of the opinion that a somewhat active stance in foreign affairs is beneficial to the country’s future, and even more reported believing that even if compromises will become necessary, the interests of allies should be considered when making decisions. 

Deciding to widen my scope, I looked into the trends on a more global scale. An article from the European Council on Foreign Relations found that the public today has become more knowledgeable and opinionated on foreign policy. Not only this, but it also found that they expect their governments to take these opinions into account when making decisions about issues beyond their national borders. Given both this information and that of American foreign policy, it does seem that awareness and interest in foreign affairs has risen over the last decade.

There are a few reasons why I think this might be, but it boils down to one main cause: the amount of information easily accessible to the public has skyrocketed, as has both the availability and the capability of the technology required to support this phenomenon. Rather than, for example, researching a topic by heading to the library to flip through books that may or may not have the information you need, or reading your local newspaper to find out the happenings of the White House, you can now simply type your question into Google, and have hundreds of relevant sources appear right at your fingertips. And chances are people will find out about an event or new policy faster if a political leader posts something on Instagram, rather than waiting for it to be published in the news. Now that isn’t to say the news is irrelevant - this is certainly not the case. But it plays a different role in the world now than it did at the beginning of the decade - while it is still there to inform (and help the public gain all the facts, rather than just those presented by the leader in question), it is also there to supplement and provide analysis regarding the knowledge already gained through other internet sources. 

More and more of our lives and former ‘traditional’ media is increasingly informed by social media, a platform which does not recognize national borders. Headlines appear about trends found on Tiktok. A video shot in Turkey might go viral in Canada. A photo shot in Switzerland might become popular in New Zealand. Social media provides a platform for people everywhere to interact, and as a result of this universality, allows citizens of different countries to become more aware of issues in other places than they might have been previously.

Thus, this brings us back to my original point: the last decade has seen a significant increase in public engagement on issues of foreign policy, thanks to an influx of both available information, and the technology required to disseminate it. This phenomenon of increased information has both good and bad consequences - some of the bad including the sheer volume of information out there, and the fact that not all of it is necessarily correct. However, overall, I think it’s a positive trend. Foreign policy is meant to reflect the views, interests, and desires of a government in its relations with other nations. In democratic countries, the government is meant to represent the people, and thus, an increased involvement and knowledge from said body can only be a good thing, in my opinion. However, such a shift must be met with caution, especially on the part of the public. As I stated earlier, not everything that is said on the internet is necessarily accurate. We must be careful to not let the loudest voices conquer on the basis that they are the loudest, and instead try to sort out for ourselves what - and who - we believe. As a society, technological and informational developments over the last decade have given us significant power and capability. Going forward, it is up to us how we choose to use it: will we use our powers for good? Or is our strength going to wind up being our downfall?