“Move aside, sanctions and treaties. There’s a new diplomatic tool on the block – pop culture. Instead of traditional foreign policy tools, South Korean diplomacy efforts have increasingly focused on other venues: K-pop, K-dramas, and K-beauty. Indeed, the prior South Korean prime minister, Moon Jae-In, invited K-pop performers to conferences with the United Nations, the United States, the United Arab Emirates, France, and China. The usage of pop culture as a means of diplomacy is not a new occurrence, but the massive popularity growth of South Korean culture is a never-before-seen phenomena – one that will spearhead the nation’s foreign policy.”

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