Qatar’s soft power

Qatar
• Qatar is a country in Western
Asia. It occupies the Qatar
Peninsula on the northeastern
coast of the Arabian Peninsula in
the Middle East; it shares its sole
land border with Saudi Arabia to
Qatar airways
the south, with the rest of its
territory surrounded by the World-class museum
Persian Gulf.
• As a comparatively small state in
the gulf, Qatar established an
"open-door" foreign policy where
it maintains ties to all parties and
regional players in the region.
 What were the steps to Qatar's soft power?

• Al Jazeera Media Network

• Mediation

• World Cup 2022

Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani-Former Emir of Qatar

• Al-Jazeera was formed at a time where Arab societies had lost hope in local Arabic news
coverage, and seeked for free press and honest news coverage in Western news channels
such as the BBC, and so Al-Jazeera was incredibly revolutionary in creating a news outlet
that was somewhat free in its reporting, and definitely far more free in comparison to old
Arabic news channels.
 Mediation
• Doha played host to talks between the US and
US–Taliban deal, 29 February 2020
the Taliban and Qatar has a crucial role in the
evacuations from Afghanistan last year.Qatar
has proven in the past to be an effective
mediator between the United States and
groups that Washington is unwilling to meet
with directly. As a first step, Qatar allowed
the Taliban to open an office in Doha in 2013.
It is considered to be the first office of the
Taliban outside Afghanistan after the US
intervention.In the following years, Doha
supported and facilitated peace talks between
the US and the Taliban.
World Cup 2022
• In addition to the situation
of migrant workers,
international organisations
have denounced the
constant abuses suffered by
women and members of the
LGBTI+ community, as
well as Qatar's financial
support for extremist
groups. Thus, while many
recognise that Doha has
done a great job of soft
power, other analysts point
out that the numerous
criticisms are preventing the
Al-Thani regime from
achieving its goals.