Co-Sponsored by the VCU Brandcenter
February 26 (Tuesday), 2008 (3:00 - 5:30 pm)
VCU Student Commons Ballrooms

This year's Forum will focus on "Brand America" (see  - http://www.businessfordiplomaticaction.org/ for details on the topic) and will feature Mr. Keith Reinhard (Chairman Emeritus, DDB Worldwide) as the Keynote speaker.  While the theme of the conference is quite broad, the following provides a glimpse of what issues this year's event will cover. 
 
Anti-Americanism is a growing trend that, unless checked, is certain to have wide-ranging and long-term negative effects on U.S. business endeavors, to say nothing of the damage to our reputation as a people, our future economic competitiveness, and the threat to our national security. While it is true that much resentment of our country currently centers on our foreign policy, much does not. Other root causes include the perception that we are arrogant and insensitive as a people, that our culture has become all-pervasive, and that the global business expansion on the part of U.S. companies has been exploitive.
 
“Americans not welcome” says the sign in the window of a restaurant in Seoul.  In Australia, “That is so American” is a common put-down used to refer to something as stupid or evil.  Posters for Smart Car in South Africa extol the product’s virtues:  “German Engineering, Swiss Precision, American nothing.”
 

Across the globe, attitudes toward the United States have never been worse.  A BBC poll, released in January this year, reveals that 26,000 adults in 25 countries say the U.S. influence in the world today is mainly negative.  Countries as diverse as Germany and Indonesia voice the same critical opinion.  The situation is going from bad to worse.  According to a poll conducted by the Pew Center, belief that the United States plays a positive role in world affairs has plummeted across 18 nations over the past two years, and a majority of people in those countries now think we are a bad influence on the world.  In fact, we are ranked just between North Korea and Iran in terms of negative perceptions which means, in the world’s view, we have joined the so-called “axis of evil”.

Even among our supposed friends, favorability ratings for our country are on a precipitous decline.  Polls in Australia show that “down under” many people believe that U.S. foreign policy poses as big a threat to world peace as Islamic fundamentalism does.  And in a poll by a Korean newspaper almost two-thirds of younger South Koreans said that if a war were to break out between the US and North Korea, they would side with their neighbor.   So what is to be done about this? And who should do it?  The VCU 14th Annual International Business Forum will address these questions.