Adaptation note: This essay is adapted from the author’s Turkish-language CultPost podcast episode, first released on October 1, 2024. It presents insights developed through his Turkish-language book Ulus Markalama: Dünyadan Örneklerle Kuram ve Uygulama (Nation Branding: Theory and Practice), first published in 2017 and released in an updated, open-access second edition in 2021. The text has been translated and edited for international readers while preserving its original argument, examples, and critical perspective.

I have been studying nation branding since 2017, when I published the first edition of my book Nation Branding: Theory and Practice. The book examined the conceptual foundations of the field as well as nation-branding initiatives in 33 countries across several continents. In the same year, I published an article on the “Turkey: Discover the Potential” campaign, analyzing how it constructed and communicated a particular national identity.

Although my later research moved in other directions, I continued to follow nation-branding campaigns. I returned to the field more directly when studying how sustainability was becoming part of national brand identities. That work resulted in a comparative analysis of 31 European countries. Yet before considering sustainable nation branding, it is worth addressing a more basic question: What does it mean to treat a country as a brand—and what can such a strategy realistically achieve?

A Country Is More Than a Product

The concept of the “nation brand” emerged in the late 1990s and became increasingly influential during the 2000s and 2010s. Simon Anholt, one of the field’s pioneers, coined the term in 1996 to describe how the reputations of countries can function in ways comparable to the images of commercial brands.

The comparison begins with familiar principles of branding. When organizations introduce a product, they analyze competitors, identify target audiences, decide how they wish to be positioned, and construct a distinctive identity. Visual elements, slogans, advertising narratives, social-media communication, and, above all, a clear promise help distinguish one brand from another. Nation branding applies aspects of this logic to countries.

This does not mean that a nation can—or should—be reduced to a consumer product. Countries are historically complex political communities, not commodities under the control of a single owner. Nevertheless, they already carry reputations. Foreign audiences associate them with particular cultures, products, political values, landscapes, conflicts, industries, or ways of life. Nation branding is an attempt to understand and coordinate these associations rather than leave them entirely to chance.

Long before the term became common, countries promoted individual destinations, cities, and regions. Cappadocia or Istanbul, for example, might be presented through its own visual identity and promise. The same is true of national products, companies, and cultural exports. The difficulty is that, when every asset communicates independently, the result may be a fragmented or contradictory picture of the country.

Nation branding therefore treats the national brand as an umbrella. Destinations, cities, products, institutions, and cultural forms can retain their particular identities while contributing to a more coherent national image. The objective is not to make everything identical, but to prevent a country’s many points of contact with international audiences from telling entirely incompatible stories.

Beyond Tourism: Soft Power and Public Diplomacy

Tourism is only one purpose of nation branding. Countries also use it to attract investment, support exports, strengthen international visibility, and exercise cultural influence. Here, nation branding intersects with soft power and public diplomacy.

The American political scientist Joseph Nye defined soft power as the capacity to shape outcomes through attraction and persuasion rather than coercion or payment. Military and economic resources are generally associated with hard power; soft power grows from the appeal of a country’s culture, political values, institutions, and policies. The Cold War, for instance, was not only a military and economic contest. It was also an ideological and cultural struggle. Hollywood’s global circulation of the “American Dream” became one source of US influence.

Hard and soft power are not simple opposites, and the use of one does not automatically eliminate the other. Yet military interventions can weaken a country’s attractiveness when international audiences consider them illegitimate. The wars in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan demonstrate how the exercise of hard power may damage credibility and generate resistance. A country cannot build lasting influence through attractive images while ignoring the consequences of its policies.

Türkiye’s television dramas offer a striking example of cultural influence. Turkish series have reached audiences across a vast international geography, making the country one of the world’s leading exporters of television drama. These productions circulate stories, interiors, fashions, landscapes, and social relationships. Viewers who become interested in those stories may also become curious about Türkiye and wish to visit it.

The relationship between popular attraction and formal diplomacy can be tense. In 2018, amid political disagreements between Türkiye and several Arab governments, the Saudi-owned MBC network halted Turkish dramas across a number of its regional outlets; in Egypt, prominent public figures also urged broadcasters to restrict them. The controversy revealed precisely why cultural circulation matters: television narratives may create familiarity and attraction among foreign publics even when relations between governments deteriorate.

This is also the terrain of public diplomacy. Whereas conventional diplomacy is primarily conducted between official representatives, public diplomacy addresses the citizens of other countries more directly. Nation branding, soft power, and public diplomacy are distinct concepts, but in practice they frequently overlap.

The Test of Experience

Nation branding also deserves critical scrutiny. Because governments often direct or finance these initiatives, branding can become a form of whitewashing: a means of concealing political failures and social inequalities behind an attractive international image. The temptation can be especially strong for developing countries seeking rapid reputational improvement. Instead of confronting their difficulties, they may present themselves as flawless.

Such a strategy is ultimately self-defeating. A brand is not merely a message; it is an experience. If an advertisement’s promise conflicts with what people encounter when they visit, study, work, invest, or conduct business in a country, the inconsistency damages trust. The same principle applies to an ordinary product: if its promotional claim repeatedly fails in use, consumers stop believing it.

This is why a nation brand must be grounded in reality. A country does not become more credible by denying every weakness. On the contrary, a degree of self-criticism can make its communication more authentic. For decades, commercial brands have increasingly attempted to appear human, acknowledge shortcomings, apologize when necessary, and establish less hierarchical relationships with consumers. Governments find this difficult because official communication often retains the cold and formal voice of the state. Yet one purpose of nation branding should be to humanize that voice—not through deception, but through openness and a believable relationship between promise and practice.

Openness, Self-Criticism, and Nordic Positioning

Sweden’s Curators of Sweden initiative, which ran from 2011 to 2018, illustrates this attempt to communicate openness. Created by the Swedish Institute and Visit Sweden, the project handed the official @Sweden Twitter account to a different resident each week. Participants shared aspects of their everyday lives in their own voices rather than reproducing a single official script.

The campaign’s significance lay in the trust it appeared to place in citizens. By allowing individuals to represent the country, Sweden associated its national image with participation, diversity, transparency, and the democratic values of the Nordic social model. The initiative did not eliminate institutional control or controversy, but it offered a more decentralized form of national representation than a conventional tourism advertisement.

Denmark’s official website adopts a similarly self-aware tone. Its welcome message states: “Once we were brutal Vikings. Now we are one of the world’s most peaceful societies.” The contrast turns a potentially negative historical stereotype into an opportunity for irony and self-reflection. It also connects Denmark’s contemporary promise to equality, peace, sustainability, and green transformation. Looking critically at one’s national past is never simple; here, however, historical distance becomes part of the brand’s credibility.

An earlier Estonian positioning strategy used the phrases “A Nordic Country with a Twist” and “The New Scandinavia.” These formulations sought to move Estonia away from associations rooted exclusively in its Soviet past and toward the social, political, and economic standards connected with Northern Europe. The promise was not that Estonia was identical to Sweden, Norway, or Finland, but that it could offer a dynamic and developing variation on a familiar Nordic model. The example shows how a nation brand may reposition a country by redefining the competitive and cultural context in which it wishes to be understood.

Spain: Communicating Inward as Well as Outward

Spain’s tourism emblem, the Sol de Miró, demonstrates that a symbol directed abroad can also carry meaning for domestic audiences. Created by Joan Miró in 1983, the image became the visual identity of Spanish tourism and continues to be used by Turespaña. Its playful visual language is immediately associated with one of the twentieth century’s most internationally recognized artists.

The political significance of this choice becomes clearer in historical context. Miró was Catalan. Under Francisco Franco’s dictatorship, which lasted from the end of the Spanish Civil War until Franco’s death in 1975, the central state suppressed regional languages and identities, including those of Catalonia, the Basque Country, and Galicia. Spain’s subsequent transition to democracy restored regional autonomy, although disputes over its extent have never disappeared.

I therefore read the adoption of Miró’s work as more than the use of a famous artist’s cultural prestige. It can also be understood as a pluralist gesture: Catalan culture is presented not as something external to Spain, but as part of the country’s national and international identity. Whether or not this interpretation captures every institutional intention behind the logo, it illustrates a broader point. Nation branding does not communicate only with foreigners. It also proposes a story about belonging to the country’s own citizens.

Distinctive Promises in Asia

“Malaysia, Truly Asia” is among the most established destination-brand slogans in the world. It draws on Malaysia’s multicultural population and presents the country as a place where visitors can encounter multiple Asian cultures within a single destination. As Tourism Malaysia continues to emphasize, the phrase is more than a decorative tagline: it is a concise promise of diversity. Its strength lies in giving international audiences a clear reason to choose Malaysia rather than offering a generic invitation to visit.

Japan and South Korea demonstrate how popular culture can become a strategic source of national visibility. Japan’s Cool Japan strategy draws on the international attraction of areas such as design, fashion, cuisine, manga, anime, and other creative industries. South Korea’s Korean Wave, or Hallyu, has brought music, television, cinema, beauty, food, and fashion to global audiences. In both cases, cultural products operate not only as exports but also as forms of public diplomacy and soft power.

China presents a different reputational challenge. In many markets, Chinese manufacturing was long burdened by associations with low prices and low quality. In recent years, however, China has invested heavily in renewable energy and affordable technologies, creating new grounds for national-brand value. During Donald Trump’s first presidency, the United States’ announced withdrawal from the Paris Agreement created a symbolic opening for China to claim greater climate leadership. Industrial investment subsequently reinforced this possibility: China became a leading supplier of clean-energy technologies and, according to the International Energy Agency, accounted for one-third of worldwide clean-energy investment in 2023.

This does not mean that China’s reputation has been completely transformed or that its environmental contradictions have disappeared. It shows, rather, how policy, technology, and production can generate new associations. A nation brand cannot be changed by a slogan alone; it changes when audiences encounter sustained evidence of new capabilities.

The Infrastructure of Cultural Influence

Countries communicate their cultures through institutions as well as campaigns. China’s Confucius Institutes, Germany’s Goethe-Institut, Spain’s Instituto Cervantes, and Türkiye’s Yunus Emre Institutes teach languages, organize cultural activities, and establish long-term contact with foreign publics. Their work demonstrates that soft power is built through continuing relationships, not only through short advertising bursts.

International media perform a related function. TRT World from Türkiye, Al Jazeera from Qatar, and RT—formerly known as Russia Today—offer interpretations of world events associated with particular national or regional perspectives. Such organizations are important instruments of international communication, although their ability to create influence ultimately depends on the credibility audiences grant them.

From Image to Sustainable Practice

Nation branding is therefore a broad and complex field. It requires the coordination of economics, tourism, culture, politics, international relations, advertising, media, and public participation. It involves communication with foreign audiences, but it also shapes how a nation imagines itself. It may create cultural attraction and economic opportunity, yet it can just as easily become superficial propaganda if the story it tells is detached from lived reality.

The most durable nation brands are not built by inventing perfection. They emerge when a country identifies a distinctive promise, communicates it coherently, and supports it through credible institutions, policies, and experiences. Authenticity does not require the absence of problems; it requires an honest relationship between what a country claims and what it does.

Sustainability has become increasingly central to this relationship. Countries now present environmental responsibility, social equality, and green transformation as elements of their national identities. But the same test applies: sustainability cannot remain a fashionable slogan. To strengthen a nation’s reputation, it must be visible in policy and everyday practice. The future of nation branding will therefore depend less on the perfection of national images than on whether nations can earn the promises they make.