When soft power success and ‘attractiveness’ cannot be sustained: Zimbabwe and South Africa as case studies of the limits of soft power

Soft power and public diplomacy are about the building of attractiveness. And the building of national attractiveness has become a growth industry, with many governments now even employing nation brand consultants to tell them how to make themselves more attractive to investors, journalists or tourists (see Jansen 2008; Volcic and Andrejevic 2011). Effectively these nation branding consultants are in the business of building soft power, functioning as outsourced public diplomacy. Their work has much to tell us about what underpins the building, maintenance and loss of attractiveness.