Effective governments need to consciously manage their ability to wield influence, which builds their soft power and improves their standing in the world. And any soft-power strategy needs to be linked to how a country uses its economic and military power, to build a coherent international policy based on all three kinds of power that some have termed intelligent power.

This is what the UAE is doing by the creation of a Soft Power Council at a ministerial level that reports to the cabinet, with the responsibility of supporting the country’s national agenda and building the UAE’s position as a global example of leadership and excellence, while strengthening the communication framework with the peoples of the world and promoting human rapprochement.

The UAE has an exceptional record of commitment to the international bodies that run the global community such as the United Nations, the World Trade Organisation, and many international treaties. It also has a substantial record of giving aid and humanitarian support to a wide variety of troubled spots around the world, and it has offered leadership in the struggle to find renewable and sustainable energy sources.

These are only a few examples of how the UAE has developed its soft power in conjunction with its economic power, and occasionally with its military power like in Yemen today.

An important example of the UAE’s soft power is the way that it took the lead as an Arab and Muslim nation to define the intellectual battle against the terrorists of Daesh (the self-proclaimed Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant). His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, was the first to articulate the vital importance for Muslim nations to focus on enlightened thinking, open-mindedness, tolerance and acceptance of others, and governments’ responsibilities for creating stable institutions that focus on their people and end the black holes that foster despair and extremism.

The new Soft Power Council will be able to coordinate activity across all the branches of government that contribute to the UAE’s international standing. It will also ensure that all of them follow the same strategy, which will greatly amplify the UAE’s ability to define and use its soft power in a responsible manner for the good of the country and the whole of humanity, while remaining keenly aware that the horrors of anarchy and civil war have made such work all the more important in the Arab world.