An Analysis Of The Diplomatic Phenomenon Of America 's First Lady

As the spouse of president, American first lady can not behave without politicalimplication interpreted by the public and media, particularly in diplomatic occasions.There exist two kinds of perspectives about first lady diplomacy: one is that first ladyis an important part of American public diplomacy with increasing significance; theother is more of the radical feminism that first lady is constrained by her identity asthe spouse of president, which means that she can only perform the traditional role ofwife and mother, playing a trivial role in “soft issues”.This paper is based on previous studies of first ladies. By literature retrival and casestudy it conducted research on the nature and role of first lady diplomacy in areassuch as International Relations, women status, American publich diplomacy.As the most influential female in one of the greatest countries in the world,American first ladies can play a even more noticable role in introducing femaleperspectives to international communities and improving women status than femaleleaders. The frequency of first lady appearance can to some extent reflect thePresident’s value on US public diplomacy. Although there are different types of firstlady diplomacy, it mainly serves two purposes: supporting US public diplomacy andimproving woman’s international status. First lady’s diplomatic performance isaffected by external environment and her inner capability. The formal includes thefirst lady institution, constitional setting, president’s perspective and the historicalcauses; while the latter consists of her own personality, charactoristics, ambition andso on. With the rising quality and awareness of US common public, first lady’seducation and capability are facing with increasingly harder requirement, and firstlady has more potential to play a more concrete role in US diplomacy, thusencouraging first ladies of other countries to join them in contributing to the peaceand cooperation of the world.