It's not Facebook, but ... Images from NATO's new marketing campaign in Washington, DC.

By Joshua S. Fouts

Posters like the above appeared throughout the DC Metro system today featuring NATO troops working with Afghanis with titles highlighting themes like “Working for Peace,” “Defending Freedom,” and “Securing Afghanistan’s Future.”

NATO has launched the marketing campaign, ostensibly, to celebrate their 60th Anniversary Summit this April 3-4, but also to recast its image in the eyes of the US public.

NATO poster "Securing Afghanistan's Future"

I caught up via email with James Snyder at NATO headquarters in Brussels. Snyder is NATO’s Information Officer for Denmark, Norway and the United States. “This [Public Diplomacy] campaign … is the first time we have ever done something like direct marketing — which is standard operating procedure for corporations, governments and NGOs and IOs alike.”

Snyder explained that NATO wasn’t planning on including any kind of new media outreach program just yet, “We’ve talked a lot about new technologies and engagements,” he said, but since NATO has no real collective presence on either Facebook or LinkedIn, we shouldn’t expect to see them reaching out communities in anything other than the physical world.

NATO's "Working for Peace" poster

After a year immersed in Muslim-focused communities in the virtual world of Second Life, we believe it is critical that organizations with the size, scope and importance of NATO consider a comprehensive outreach effort targeting not only the mainstream policy types in Washington, DC but also a new generation of social leaders who are cultivating growing and influential communities far off the beaten path of the DC Metro. These communities have the power to augment and influence opinion in a highly focused way.

Walking the streets of London this week, we noted again and again how geopolitics play into cultural identity. When one is in Europe, one feels much more connected with the world than one does in the US. Part of this is geography: The US is effectively an island divided from the Europe and Asia by two oceans. Part of it is cultural: The news media in the US reports as though the US population lived on a planet all its own. But this is not the same in virtual worlds. Access to cultures, languages and communities is instant and transformative. NATO is often at the frontlines of cultural engagement — especially in their peacekeeping movements. The communities NATO troops encounter, though in the physical world, often have members who have connections to some digital identity and community. As the world transitions into a new global culture and economy, this will only increase. To do their job effectively, they must engage both the physical and the digital. We commend NATO for taking this first step toward outreach in the US and hope that they will move swiftly to expand their efforts to the vibrant digital communities around the world.