Leading by Example, Lighting the World: Open Government, Transparency, and Soft Power in Obama’s National Security Policy

ABSTRACT Throughout his presidency, Barack Obama promoted open government and transparency at home and abroad as instruments of American soft power. President Obama sought to improve the American people’s confidence in democracy by making the executive branch of the national government more open and transparent. Through the power of its example, Obama further sought to encourage other countries to do the same and want what America wants: the strengthening of liberal democracy globally, greater openness and transparency in international relations generally, and reinvigorated American leadership of the liberal international order. This paper relies on Obama’s own words, White House documents, and government reports to demonstrate why and how his administration sought to assert America’s global leadership through the power of America’s example. It identifies Obama’s open government and transparency agenda as a critical tool of the administration’s national security strategy to address growing disillusionment with liberal democratic governance in America and elsewhere and to counter the rising challenge to the liberal order by rival, authoritarian states – China and Russia especially.