The Trump administration cares little for soft power. The abrupt shuttering of the Voice of America and other US-funded media outlets including Radio Free Asia attest to this. An executive order, issued last Friday, directed the US Agency for Global Media to reduce its operations to the minimum required by law. A subsequent White House press release listed a series of complaints accusing the Voice of America of publishing “radical propaganda”.
The impact of the cuts in Asia will be twofold: the media environment in many countries will suffer because Voice of America and Radio Free Asia made valuable contributions where free press was limited.
But the cuts will also damage the US ability to shape public opinion in Asia in its favour.
Compared with other information flows in the region which we measure – news agencies, newspapers and TV – radio skews more favourably to the United States than any other medium.
The Lowy Institute’s Asia Power Index provides unique insight into how successful the Voice of America has been. Across 27 countries, the Asia Power Index uses Google Trends Analysis to track the relative reach of comparable foreign media outlets.
The number one ranked radio broadcaster in the 2024 Asia Power Index? The Voice of America, by a considerable margin, accounting for more than half of all online interest in the largest foreign radio broadcasters we compared. In the latest edition of the Asia Power Index, the Voice of America was the most sought-after radio broadcaster in Bangladesh, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea, Laos, Mongolia, Myanmar, Pakistan, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam, in many cases, by a considerable margin.
It’s also worth pointing out that compared with other information flows in the region which we measure – news agencies, newspapers and TV – radio skews more favourably to the United States than any other medium.
The next most popular radio broadcaster ranked by the Asia Power Index? Russia’s Sputnik, which had grown to 22 per cent of online search interest in radio broadcasters in Asia, up from just 7.7 per cent in 2021.
The results of the next Asia Power Index may look very different.