07/27/2009

News / 50 Years Later: The American National Exhibit in Moscow

Contacts between societies improve relations, State’s Burns says


By Carlos Aranaga
Staff Writer

Washington — July 24, 1959, saw the opening of the first American National Exhibit in Moscow, one of 19 such exhibits which would draw more than 20 million Soviet visitors during the next three decades.

Americans remember the videotaped impromptu debate between then-U.S. Vice President Richard Nixon and then-Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev, which took place in a model American kitchen at Sokolniki Park on the opening day. Started as an exchange about kitchen appliances, the debate turned into a face-off about the comparative merits of communism and capitalism.

To mark the Sokolniki Exhibition — a milestone in U.S.-Soviet people-to-people cultural exchange — the George Washington University’s Institute for Public Diplomacy and Global Communication hosted a full-day seminar titled “Face-off to Facebook: From the Nixon-Khrushchev Kitchen Debate to Public Diplomacy in the 21st Century.” Speakers and moderators included award-winning CNN reporter and George Washington University professor Frank Sesno, distinguished journalists Marvin Kalb and William Safire, and Nikita Khrushchev’s son, Sergei N. Khrushchev, a senior fellow at Brown University in Rhode Island.

Addressing the attendees, William J. Burns, under secretary of state for political affairs and former U.S. ambassador to the Russian Federation, described the exhibits as having had a vivid impact on the two societies and having served as a reminder that “relations between countries are not only about ties between governments, but also about connections between societies.”

Ambassador Walter Roberts, a retired U.S. diplomat, recalled how the idea for a showcase of U.S. life was a project undertaken at the behest of President Eisenhower. Eisenhower mobilized the Department of State, the United States Information Agency and the Commerce Department and enlisted U.S. business and corporate support to present a compelling, comprehensive view of America for Russian viewers of the exhibit.

The Washington conference paid tribute to the original America exhibit guides, a number of whom were in attendance, who worked at the exhibits as cultural interpreters. Burns said they “made an enormous difference to the Russians they met across that country’s 11 time zones.” Burns said exhibit guide alumni include current U.S. Ambassador to Russia John Beyrle and top U.S. arms control negotiator Rose Gottemoeller.

In afternoon sessions the conference looked at new media and at opportunities for public diplomacy. Clay Shirky, New York University professor and a frequent lecturer on the online technology network TED, discussed how new media can mobilize publics. He cited the use of mobile phones by Iranian citizens to document abuses and organize demonstrations in the days after the June elections.

Burns recalled the remarks of American journalist Edward R. Murrow, who said, “The really critical link in the international communications chain is the last three feet, which is best bridged by personal contact — one person talking to another.” The new media, according to Shirky, are new methods to bridge that last three feet, and turn passive consumers of information into individual producers of information content.

Burns said that 3 million Russians blog today and that Beyrle, the U.S. ambassador, also has a blog in the Russian language. Burns cited an unofficial, U.S. Embassy-affiliated blog, OpenAmerica.ru, where Russians can hear directly from American diplomats in Russian.

In the iconic and spirited televised “Kitchen Debate” face-off between Nixon and Khrushchev, the Soviet premier suggested to Nixon: “You appear before our people, and we'll appear before yours. This will be much better. People will see with their own eyes.”

To which Nixon countered, “You must not be afraid of ideas.” Khrushchev’s rejoinder: “That's what we're telling you — don't be afraid of ideas. We have nothing to fear. The time has passed when ideas scare us.”

To this, Nixon responded: “Well then, let's have more exchange of them. We all agree on that, right?”

Burns noted how such people-to-people links are now the order of the day: “It was no coincidence that President Obama spent most of his second day at the Moscow summit in meetings outside government, with students and business leaders and civil society activists, with people whose concerns and agendas had more to do with what binds our societies than what rivets the attention of our governments. And it was no coincidence that Secretary [of State] Clinton also spent much of her time in India this past week connecting with people outside government.”

Burns said he remains an optimist on the long-term future of relations between Russians and Americans. He said there is “a good beginning under way toward healthier ties, but with challenges that aren't going to be easy for our governments to manage. But people-to-people programs and exchanges will contribute enormously to better understanding between us.

Go to Face-off to Facebook for further information on the George Washington University conference. A recording of the Nixon-Khrushchev Kitchen Debate may be heard on YouTube.
http://www.america.gov/st/peacesec-english/2009/July/200907241722362ecaganara0.7179071.html?CP.rss=true

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