United States Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy

22 U.S.C. § 1469
in effect
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(a) Establishment(1) There is established an advisory commission to be known as the United States Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy (referred to in this section as the “Commission”). (2) The Commission shall consist of seven members appointed by the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate. The members of the Commission shall represent the public interest and shall be selected from a cross section of educational, communications, cultural, scientific, technical, public service, labor, business, and professional backgrounds. Not more than four members shall be from any one political party. (3) The term of each member shall be 3 years, except that of the original seven appointments, two shall be for a term of 1 year and two shall be for a term of 2 years. (4) Any member appointed to fill a vacancy occurring before the expiration of the term for which a predecessor was appointed shall be appointed for the remainder of such term. Upon the expiration of a member’s term of office, such member may continue to serve until a successor is appointed and qualified. (5) The President shall designate a member to chair the Commission. (b) StaffThe Commission shall have a staff director who shall be appointed by the chairperson of the Commission. Subject to such rules and regulations as may be adopted by the Commission, the chairperson of the Commission may—(1) appoint such additional personnel for the staff of the Commission as the chairperson considers necessary; and (2) procure temporary and intermittent services to the same extent as is authorized by section 3109(b) of title 5, but at rates for individuals not to exceed the daily equivalent of the annual rate of basic pay payable for grade GS–18 of the General Schedule under section 5332 of title 5. (c) Duties and responsibilitiesThe Commission shall appraise United States Government activities intended to understand, inform, and influence foreign publics. The activities described in this subsection shall be referred to in this section as “public diplomacy activities”. (d) Reports(1) Comprehensive annual report(A) In generalNot less frequently than annually, the Commission shall submit a comprehensive report on public diplomacy and international broadcasting activities to Congress, the President, and the Secretary of State. This report shall include—(i) a detailed list of all public diplomacy activities funded by the United States Government; (ii) a description of—(I) the purpose, means, and geographic scope of each activity; (II) when each activity was started; (III) the amount of Federal funding expended on each activity; (IV) any significant outside sources of funding; and (V) the Federal department or agency to which the activity belongs; (iii) the international broadcasting activities under the direction of the Broadcasting Board of Governors; (iv) an assessment of potentially duplicative public diplomacy and international broadcasting activities; and (v) for any activities determined to be ineffective or results not demonstrated under subparagraph (B), recommendations on existing effective or moderately effective public diplomacy activities that could be augmented to carry out the objectives of the ineffective activities. (B) Effectiveness assessmentIn evaluating the public diplomacy and international broadcasting activities described in subparagraph (A), the Commission shall conduct an assessment that considers the public diplomacy target impact, the achieved impact, and the cost of public diplomacy activities and international broadcasting. The assessment shall include, if practicable, an appropriate metric such as “cost-per-audience” or “cost-per-student” for each activity. Upon the completion of the assessment, the Commission shall assign a rating of—(i) “effective” for activities that—(I) set appropriate goals and achieve all or most of the desired results; (II) are well-managed; and (III) are cost efficient; (ii) “moderately effective” for activities that—(I) set appropriate goals and achieve some desired results; (II) are generally well-managed; and (III) need to improve their cost efficiency, including reducing overhead; (iii) “ineffective” for activities that—(I) lack appropriate goals or fail to achieve stated goals or desired results; (II) are not well-managed; or (III) are not cost efficient, such as through insufficient use of available resources to achieve stated goals or desired results, or have excessive overhead; and (iv) “results not demonstrated” for activities that—(I) do not have acceptable performance public diplomacy metrics for measuring results; or (II) are unable or failed to collect data to determine if they are effective. (2) Other reports(A) In generalThe Commission shall submit other reports, including working papers, to Congress, the President, and the Secretary of State at least semi-annually on other activities and policies related to United States public diplomacy. (B) AvailabilityThe Commission shall make the reports submitted pursuant to subparagraph (A) publicly available on the website of the Commission to develop a better understanding of, and support for, public diplomacy activities. (3) Access to informationThe Secretary of State shall ensure that the Commission has access to all appropriate information to carry out its duties and responsibilities under this subsection.

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