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Every breath you take / Every move you make / Every step you take / The world is watching you.
This play on the hit song by English rock band The Police seems fitting for Moo Deng, the cute baby hippo who has become one of Thailand’s most famous figures in recent weeks while garnering international fame and popularity. Arguably, to the extent of overshadowing our new Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra.
Our beloved Moo Deng has added to Thailand’s lustre even though she’s less than three months old, whereas Ms Paetongtarn is 38 and has been a political celebrity for years as the daughter of former premier Thaksin.
The pygmy hippo already commands a huge following and gets invitations, local and abroad, one after another. She has even been seen in the arms of the Mona Lisa at the Louvre in Paris.
One day, she appeared on the turf at Northwest Stadium, home of the NFL team, the Washington Commanders, in the United States. Another, she was spotted at the Allianz Arena in Munich, Germany, watching FC Bayern rout Dinamo Zagreb in the opener of the Uefa Champions League.
“Moo Deng also watched Bayern Munich yesterday,” the club wrote in a post on its X account last week.
In fact, it could be said Moo Deng is using her phenomenal popularity to teach Ms Paetongtarn some lessons about soft power.
The prime minister is very keen to promote Thailand’s soft power. That was reflected in the government’s policy statement read out in a joint parliamentary sitting the other day.
Ms Paetongtarn mentioned that word 13 times in her 83-page statement. “The government will promote the elevation of Thai wisdom as a creative culture to advance the nation’s soft power,” she declared.
Her enthusiasm began last year when she was preparing to serve as a government leader while then-PM Srettha Thavisin was at Government House, as she was in charge of this policy.
Soft power has proved its worthiness and success in countries like the United States, South Korea and Japan through music, films, TV series, tourism and food. Thailand is a latecomer but this country always thinks big.
And as a new soft power player, the government wants to stun the world and Joseph Nye, the US scholar who coined this term, by boldly trying to equip every corner of the country with it. Ms Paetongtarn has named it the “One Family, One Soft Power” scheme.
She didn’t go deep into detail on that grand idea, only saying in parliament that a centre would be set up in every locality to promote creative design and culture to achieve this goal. There is no exact data on how many families there are in Thailand. But if the number of households is used as a rough parameter, it’s almost 23 million, according to a survey by the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission. That means the country will have 23 million projects, or other things related to soft power, under her tenure. That is a gigantic challenge no other world leader dare dream of.
While Ms Paetongtarn and her cabinet members boast of soft culture, Moo Deng leads by example. She continues to make people love, admire, and talk about her, and even travel from afar to meet her in person at her birthplace. This perfectly fits what the prime minister is striving for. Soft power can make money and promote tourism, among other planned achievements.
And those guiding Moo Deng know all too well that successful soft power requires plenty of eye-catching content, not press conferences. Moreover, it must be executed quietly and humbly, as South Korea and Japan have shown.
Exporting soft power to other countries is not easy and policymakers should bear in mind the issue is highly sensitive, at least in the case of Thailand as neighbouring countries may fear cultural domination.
Laos once limited the number of “foreign” songs played each night at all entertainment venues to preserve its culture and prevent those from Thailand from intruding. The old Thai embassy in Phnom Penh was burnt down by Cambodians in 2003 because of fake news that a Thai actress had said the highly respected Angkor Wat in Siem Reap belonged to Thailand. Some of our neighbours even claim Muay Thai is not truly or exclusively Thai. They maintain it’s also played in their countries and should just be called kickboxing.
These examples show how everything about soft power must be handled with care.
Ms Paetongtarn recently appointed a group of gurus to help her navigate policies. It may not be a bad idea to appoint Moo Deng as an adviser to instruct her cabinet on how to make soft power work, with no need to mention “soft power” at all.
After all, that little cutie at Khao Kheow Open Zoo is Thailand’s real soft power guru.
Saritdet Marukatat is a Bangkok Post columnist.