Cyberspace: Soft Power and Hard Power in Statecraft and Security

This essay delves into the concepts of soft and hard power within the context of cyberspace, exploring how nations leverage these strategies to achieve national security objectives. It defines soft power as the ability to influence through attraction and persuasion, examining its use through public diplomacy, online communication, and cultural exchanges. The essay also addresses hard power, which relies on military strength and coercion, and its application in protecting against cyberattacks through hardware protection and denial-of-service measures. The study highlights the increasing importance of cybersecurity and the strategic use of both soft and hard power in cyber warfare, analyzing their impacts on national security and statecraft, including the manipulation of information and the use of botnets. It explores the interplay between these power dynamics, illustrating how states navigate the complexities of cyberspace to protect their interests.

Running head: CYBERSPACE
Cyberspace
Name of the Student:
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Table of Contents
Introduction..........................................................................................................................2
Soft power in cyber space and its use..................................................................................3
Hard power in cyber space and its use.................................................................................7
Conclusion.........................................................................................................................13
References..........................................................................................................................15

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Introduction
The word cyberspace refers to virtual and also may be defined as an electronic medium
that is used to make a computer network that is global to facilitate and increase online
communication1. Cyberspace is a computer network that is very big which is made of all
computer networks worldwide that employ the protocol of TCP/IP protocol to give a protection
on data exchange services and communication activities.
On the other hand, a cyber attack is exploitation of computer systems, networks, and
enterprises that are technology dependent. The computer codes that are malicious that are used to
alter the real codes of the system are done in cyber attack2. The logic of the data and the codes of
computers are changed which results in dangerous consequences which leads to cyber crime that
includes identity theft and data theft. Another name of cyber attack is Computer Network Attack
(CNA).
The study deals with the process that is followed by the states to deploy soft as well as
hard power across cyber as well as other domains of the statecraft in order to achieve national
security objectives. In addition, the paper covers the definition of soft power in cyberspace and
the time when countries use soft power in defense is explained. On contrary, the definition of
1 Hurley, John, and Lanier Watkins. "Cyberspace: The new Battlefield." In 11th International
Conference on Cyber Warfare and Security: ICCWS2016, p. 180. Academic Conferences and
publishing limited, 2016.
2 Lee, Kwang-Hoon. "The conceptualization of country attractiveness: a review of
research." International Review of Administrative Sciences 82, no. 4 (2016): 815.

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hardware and time period of using hardware for defending a war in cyber warfare to retaliate
cyber attack is discussed in the present study.
Soft power in cyber space and its use
Software is the ability in order to get what is wanted through attraction as well as
persuasion. In other words, soft power is a way to influence the citizens of state to get a position
that is desired via enticement, attraction and allure and also facilitation. For SPP (Soft Power
Projection) the government of a state follows public diplomacy and policies that are used in that
particular state3. The use of test messages, website and emails, especially social networking sites
and blogs that are related to content design to influence and reinforce others for a particular
reason. The true identity of the messages are obscured gives a high leverage-able asset mainly on
the international stage. The soft power capability and mindset that are followed by organizations
are increasing in amount with all having a success rate which indicates that they can mitigate the
risk of cyber attack against well-established, larger and financed opponents. This soft power is a
new course of political study and also the intelligence community that has mitigated the risk of
hard power and gives a benefit and value to the Soft Power Projection. Cyber Security is giving
protection to the network system and data4. The number of attacks increase in the areas of
3 Lindsay, Jon R. "Stuxnet and the limits of cyber warfare." Security Studies 22, no. 3 (2013):
381.
4 Davis, Paul K. "Deterrence, influence, cyber attack, and cyberwar." NYUJ Int'l L. & Pol. 47
(2014): 327.

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financial, military networks and government has increased cyber terrorism and made it a priority
of national security.
It is important for a state to use soft power in order to defense or offense measures for
retaliating cyber attacks. Countries use soft power to promote the ethnic war and conflict
strategically. The relations between such policies of national security and soft power have
remained unknown5. For warfare of soft power, the framework has been determined for
empirical analysis. The wars of soft power are fought in the minds and hearts of humans. The
impacts of soft power are related to national security that has intangible components and is also
most pivotal. The soft power depends on institutions, instruments of economic assistance,
cultural exchanges, ideas of propagation, democracy promotion and diplomacy and also
influence on them. Other societies are also encouraged by the United States. The soft power
technology is a low-cost, risk and returns and is used for all time. The hard power is used
whenever needed. The force used in hard power creates a problem for the state. The informal
policies of foreign for power acquisition are not given any restrictions to realm the legitimacy.
The political criminal nexus as social structure by which the state is able to transform the
organized crime those are transitional to an instrument of foreign policy. For instance, in the
Autonomous Republic of China, the minds and hearts of Crimean citizens were changed to
increase the component of soft power security of Ukraine6. Psychological warfare uses the soft
5 Duncan, Bob, Andreas Happe, and Alfred Bratterud. "Cloud Cyber Security: Finding an
Effective Approach with Unikernels." SECURITY IN COMPUTING AND
COMMUNICATIONS (2017): 31.
6 Deibert, Ronald J. "Bounding cyber power: Escalation and restraint in global
cyberspace." Organized Chaos: Reimagining the Internet (2014).

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power as a weapon for the power of attraction. It gives citizens to do and believe the things they
are doing. It changes the view of the citizens to see each other and the whole world. States uses
the power of soft power to have a profit in the territorial power which manipulates perceptions of
a human. The soft power even helps to promote the ethnic war and conflict strategically. The
relations between such policies of national security and soft power have remained unknown. For
warfare of soft power, the framework has been determined for empirical analysis. The wars of
soft power are fought in the minds and hearts of humans. The impacts of soft power are related
to national security that has intangible components and is also most pivotal. The informal
policies of foreign for power acquisition are not given any restrictions to realm the legitimacy.
The political criminal nexus as a social structure by which the state is able to transform the
organized crime those are transitional to an instrument of foreign policy. For instance, in the
Autonomous Republic of China, the minds and hearts of Crimean citizens were changed to
increase the component of soft power security of Ukraine. The hard powers against cyber attack
are the attack that includes inserting malware to steal the data within the cyberspace, denial of
services
The countries face cyber attacks; soft power is used to mitigate the risk that has arrived in
the country. The alternative to soft power is the hard power. The agencies of United States and
also the NGOs which have encouraged the groups of pro-democracy are in many of states such
as Iraq, China, and Egypt. They do not have a coercing aim, toppling is much less and also the
government. The purpose that comes second is to replace the regime is not coercive. The
opponent regime and the United States are also determined to change the regime. If no incentive
is given to the regime for changing its behavior, no coercive leverage is initiated by the United

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States. The physical resources that are created by soft power, several servers are set up and
software are designed which helps the activists of human rights to propagate the messages and
also creates the firewall of information to block the messages. Soft power initiates information
campaigns which help to change the preferences of hackers that are initially made and also
recruit the members that are related to terrorist organization7. The software standards are
implemented by soft power when the country is under cyber attack. The economic principles can
promote development as well as innovation, which causes for dominant position on the operating
systems as well as search engines market. The search engine usually attracts user for superior
performance. The Google search engine is followed by Yahoo and Bing. In this aspect, Google
search algorithms return outcomes to the particular users through indexing over trillion internet
addresses. There are more than 1000 million times a day, Google decides the thing what is vital
and what is not. For an example, China has realized this when it held dispute with the
organization. The country wanted to censor Google search results in the Chinese territory as well
as launched attacks against the infrastructure of Google. Soft power represents the behavioral
way to get the result. It is contrasted with the hard power8. There is historically predominant
realist measures of national and state power by quantitative metrics like population size and
concrete military as well as the gross domestic product of the state. However, having the
resources can not generate the desired results. On contrary, soft power has more influence and
can rest on the hard power of threats and payments. Soft power is persuasion and the ability for
7 Gartzke, Erik, and Jon R. Lindsay. "Weaving tangled webs: offense, defense, and deception in
cyberspace." Security Studies 24, no. 2 (2015): 321.
8 Inkster, Nigel. "Measuring Military Cyber Power." Survival 59, no. 4 (2017): 31.

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moving people through argument9. The production of soft power can be affected in positive
methods through the host of nonstate actors within as well as outside of the states. The actors
affect general people as well as governing elites in different states and create or enable an
environment for the government policies.
Hard power in cyberspace and its use
The hard power is a way which defines the ability of political body and nation which uses
the military strength and the incentives and also other behaviors are also influenced. The
approach of hard power in cyberspace is not transferable in this era. The behavior of hard power
depends on payment and coercion. The hard powers that a state can deploy are giving protection
against the denial of services and also protection hardware so that the intruder cannot insert any
type of malware in the cyberspace to steal the data. Hard Power Projection (HPP) is mainly used
in the military which deals with the application of assets of the military which includes troops,
naval vessels, aircrafts, and tanks. Hard power is produced inside then cyberspace. The hard
powers against cyber attack are the attack that includes inserting malware to steal the data within
the cyberspace, denial of services10. The hard powers that a state can deploy are giving protection
against the denial of services and also protection hardware so that the intruder cannot insert any
type of malware in the cyberspace to steal the data. The states may have a denial of service
attack by the use of botnets for many corrupted devices of Cyber Power and internet system. A
9 Rid, Thomas. Cyberwar will not take place. Oxford University Press, USA, 2013.
10 Zhang, Li. "A Chinese perspective on cyberwar." International Review of the Red Cross 94,
no. 886 (2012): 806.

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botnet is organized by infiltrating virus in computers that do not have protection. Botnets can be
rented from other devices with a huge amount of money. Botnets are used for extortion. The
other cases that are involved in hard power are that involvement of hactivists. The other forms
that are involved in hard power are adding malicious code to systems or to steal property that is
intellectual11. Governments may use these as a path to increase the economic resources. The
strategies that are involved in cyberspace are that it mainly focuses on the legitimacy,
relationship; building and also operating are more effective. Cyber Security is giving protection
to the network system and data. The number of attacks increases in the areas of financial,
military networks and government has increased cyber terrorism and made it a priority of
national security. There are four aspects of the operation that comes under giving protection to
national security. The four aspects are as follows: sustaining and constructing cyberspace;
freedom of action that lies in cyberspace is denied; Freedom of action is ensured within the
cyberspace, and effects are created within cyberspace in all domains. Cyberspace is a computer
network that is very big which is made of all computer networks worldwide that employ the
protocol of TCP/IP protocol to give a protection on data exchange services and communication
activities12. A cyber attack is exploitation of computer systems, networks, and enterprises that are
technology dependent. The computer codes that are malicious that are used to alter the real codes
11 Ridout, Tim. "Building a Comprehensive Strategy of Cyber Defense, Deterrence, and
Resilience." Fletcher F. World Aff. 40 (2016): 63.
12 Tor, Uri. "‘Cumulative Deterrence’as a New Paradigm for Cyber Deterrence." Journal of
Strategic Studies 40, no. 1-2 (2017): 110.

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of the system are done in cyber attack13. The logic of the data and the codes of computers are
changed which results in dangerous consequences which lead to cybercrime that includes
identity theft and data theft.
The countries use hard power to decrease the impact of a cyber attack that includes
inserting malware to steal the data within the cyberspace, denial of services. The hard powers
that a state can deploy are giving protection against the denial of services and also protection
hardware so that the intruder cannot insert any type of malware in the cyberspace to steal the
data. The other forms that are involved in hard power are adding malicious code to systems or to
steal property that is intellectual. Governments may use these as a path to increase the economic
resources. The strategies that are involved in cyberspace are that it mainly focuses on the
legitimacy, relationship; building and also operating are more effective. Cyber Security is giving
protection to the network system and data14. The number of attacks increasing in the areas of
financial, military networks and government has increased cyber terrorism and made it a priority
of national security15. The hard power is tedious to use. The hard power is a way which defines
13 Clark, David, Thomas Berson, and Herbert S. Lin. "At the Nexus of Cybersecurity and Public
Policy." Computer Science and Telecommunications Board, National Research Council,
Washington DC: The National Academies Press (2014).
14 Davis, Paul K. "Deterrence, influence, cyber attack, and cyberwar." NYUJ Int'l L. & Pol. 47
(2014): 327.
15 Belk, Robert, and Matthew Noyes. On the Use of Offensive Cyber Capabilities: A Policy
Analysis on Offensive US Cyber Policy. JOHN F KENNEDY SCHOOL OF GOVERNMENT
CAMBRIDGE MA, 2012.

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the ability of political body and nation which uses the military strength and the incentives and
also other behaviors are also influenced. The approach of hard power in cyberspace is not
transferable in this era. The behavior of hard power depends on payment and coercion. There are
four parts of the operation that goes by offering assurance to national security. The four
viewpoints are as per the following: 1. maintaining and building the internet; the 2. opportunity
of activity that lies on the internet is denied; 3. The flexibility of activity is guaranteed inside the
internet, and 4. impacts are made on the internet in all spaces. The capacity to reshape the
inclinations is the capacity that lies in the delicate power. The contemporary practices that
depend on group approach rely upon making arrangement benevolent and furthermore draw in
the group to accomplish the goals that are shared16. The power that originates from fascination
has been unmistakably comprehended by the government officials. Popularity based approaches
and military utilize delicate power as staple17. The inclination is that is related to resources that
are immaterial has a capacity to build up inclination, for example, culture, organizations,
political esteems and identity to expand the ethical expert and true blue18. On the off chance that
16 Carlin, John P. "Detect, Disrupt, Deter: A Whole-of-Government Approach to National
Security Cyber Threats." Harv. Nat'l Sec. J. 7 (2015): 391.
17 Lindsay, Jon R. "Tipping the scales: the attribution problem and the feasibility of deterrence
against cyberattack." Journal of Cybersecurity 1, no. 1 (2015): 66.
18 Chen, Jim, and Alan Dinerman. "On Cyber Dominance in Modern Warfare." In European
Conference on Cyber Warfare and Security, p. 52. Academic Conferences International Limited,
2016.

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the esteem is known to the government that the resident of the state needs to take after, at that
point, it will be taken a toll productive. Hard power is produced inside then cyberspace.
Operations are included in external forces. Hard power policy is a demonstrated in some states in
regard to war and handle the crisis in that state.
The physical military means that are needed to force the regime of the enemy for
changing the ways or to change the regimes is the work of hard power. The control over the
adversary is produced by hard power success19. The class of hard power is becoming less usable
in the United States mainly in the congested regions and the critical regions. Direct adversaries
are aimed for the hard power. The threat of the soft power is on the environmental condition. The
hard powers against cyber attack are the attack that includes inserting malware to steal the data
within the cyberspace, denial of services20. The hard powers that a state can deploy are giving
protection against the denial of services and also protection hardware so that the intruder cannot
insert any type of malware in the cyberspace to steal the data. Hard power is highly vulnerable to
cost, risk and are violent. The thing that is to be judged for the countries like the United States is
the count that soft power prevents the aggression by those antagonistic countries. The P2C is
risky and violent. Hard powers are used in countries to gain more and aggressive and offer fast
service. Hard power is the strong potential that has dividends that are healthy at moderate risk.
19 Cavaiola, Lawrence J., David C. Gompert, and Martin Libicki. "Cyber House Rules: On War,
Retaliation and Escalation." Survival 57, no. 1 (2015): 99.
20 Gompert, David C., and Hans Binnendijk. The Power to Coerce: Countering Adversaries
Without Going to War. Rand Corporation, 2016.