The use of soft power in international relations. A case study: the Holy See (ICRP-Budapest, 2020)

This paper aims to study the Vatican City-State and the Holy See. It focuses on “soft power,” a concept coined and introduced in the 1990s by Harvard scholar Joseph Nye, and on the tools, mechanisms, or instruments that the Holy See uses to influence various issues in International Relations, whether bilateral or multilateral. For this study, there are used Vatican's websites with a range of official documents, newspapers as: La Stampa, Corriere della Sera, L'Osservatore Romano, America, Monday Vatican, Inside the Vatican, Catholic World Report, Diplomat Magazine, books and also a set of paper- studies by scholars who have researched on this subject, such as: T. Byrnes, J. Troy, J. Haynes, L. Cushley, F. Rooney, B. Cox, D. Philiphot, etc. The conclusions show that the Holy See, being an actor of transnational character exerts soft power not only through the Pope as the head of this institution, but also through Secretary of State, Papal Nuncios, Pontifical Council for Culture, Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue and many Catholic organizations of humanitarian, social and peacemaking character such as: Caritas, Diaconia, Jesuit Refugee, Saint Egidio Community, etc.