Branding Latin America by unknow

Author:unknow
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Lexington Books
Published: 2018-01-26T00:00:00+00:00

Conclusion

Citizens who support and participate in covert nation-branding campaigns are engaged in a reciprocal power relation, where those governed are often found supporting their governors, indeed encouraging them. This complexity should not be reduced to the metaphor of the “passive carriers of the brand,” since supporters of ICNC are actively transforming their own public image, using the brand in order to improve and advance their aspirations.

The results of this study highlight that, indeed, covert nation branding concentrates on nurturing subjects who see themselves as proactive, visionary creators and innovators who perceive the brand as a materialization and extension of their own ideas. As such, they effortlessly use the brand for their own purposes, which go beyond the future of the nation. The advocates of ICNC are not just ambassadors for Colombia but also for themselves. For them, Colombia’s reputation is an obstacle to success in a world where nationalities are still approached as if they were “labels.” Furthermore, the participants exercise their additional role of “change makers” by creating, inspiring, mentoring, and educating others about Colombia.

The work of the ambassadors, of the “change makers,” is facilitated through the “pedagogical tool” of the ICNC campaign. They describe using this tool to eradicate ignorance about Colombia and to promote and change the image of the South American country; nonetheless, the drive behind their commitment is not simply patriotic—it is one by which they wish to promote and change their own image and therefore give themselves better opportunities in life.

The formative elements of the neoliberal subject, incorporated in covert nation-branding practices, remain constant. Furthermore, an emphasis on self-branding is arising through the application of branding procedures and practices to the “cultivation of the self,” expressed through the campaign’s advocates’ particular and intense attention to self-reputation and self-image. The “cultivation of the self” refers to “the forms in which one is called upon to take oneself as an object of knowledge and a field of action, so as to transform [. . .] oneself” (Foucault 1986, 42). Therefore, when the subjects relate to themselves as brands that need to be constructed, promoted, and positioned, they are submitting their existence to a permanent exercise of exposure, competition, and achievement. Self-branding, in the context of the research presented in this chapter, is an attempt by the subject to ensure his freedom from Colombia’s negative national reputation, which paradoxically involves the enslavement of constant self-discipline. Therefore, self-care also involves caring for one’s own image, valuable in terms of the success it could bring. The art of existence is thus transformed into the art of appearances.

The sophisticated technique of covert nation branding, which seduces human subjects while leaving them to assume different roles, to creatively participate and promote themselves, only endorses one kind of subjectivity: the neoliberal one. The practices of self-branding are underpinned by the same neoliberal rationality and could be approached, unsurprisingly, as a characteristic of the neoliberal subject. Therefore, the challenge that we face, as Foucault (1982) stated, is to promote new forms of subjectivity.

The

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