This expanded definition of cultural diplomacy uses exchanges of cultural goods and services, cooperation and networking among museums, cultural foundations and ministries, artists and curators from different countries and continents, to promote better and closer relations and extend their overall societal and political influence. But in recent years, an expanded and more self-reflexive definition has prevailed which conceives it as a policy area in its own right, which promotes quality of life, the arts, joint capacity building, economic growth and social cohesion by engaging citizens and civil society actors, across borders, both as producers and consumers of cultural activities.
Cultural diplomacy in this perspective would be limited to the processes that occur when formal diplomats, operating at the service and in the name of their governments, use cultural resources to help advance national interests. A more traditional definition of cultural diplomacy sees it as a soft power tool through which states and/or international organizations pursue foreign policy objectives.
Cultural diplomacy has become an ambivalent concept with blurred boundaries.
