About SVI

In October 2002, the U.S. State Department’s public diplomacy office, under the leadership of former advertising executive Charlotte Beers, launched the Shared Values Initiative (SVI). The goal of SVI was to improve America’s image by convincing the Arab and Muslim world that America wasn’t waging war on Islam. SVI was a complete and integrated communication campaign that included speeches by diplomats and American Muslims to international audiences, "town hall" events in several countries, Internet sites and chat rooms, a 60-page four-color magazine titled Muslim Life in America, a series of newspaper and radio ads and five television commercials.

The Television Commercials

The commercials or "mini-documentaries" as the State Department preferred to call them were the most important element of SVI. All components of the SVI campaign were produced in English and various Middle Eastern languages and dialects such as Arabic, Farsi and Urdu for broadcast over Middle Eastern and Asian television stations.

The five SVI television commercials used a "slice-of-life" format. Each contained a testimonial, which showed happy, prosperous American Muslims in various personal and professional roles. All of the spots featured actual American Muslims actively practicing their religion and commenting positively on the tolerance Americans have for the Muslim faith.

Beers hired advertising agency McCann-Erickson to produce the Shared Values Initiative commercials and buy the media time and space in the targeted countries using $15 million of the $595 million State Department budget. Although criticized as being excessive, $15 million for an international branding campaign is a relatively small amount.

The Broadcast Schedule

The SVI television campaign began airing October 29, 2002, in Indonesia, which is the largest Muslim nation in the world. The ads were then broadcast in what the State Department described as a "sequential rollout" to other Muslim countries.

The State Department initially hoped to get free airtime in the Islamic countries. However, all of the targeted countries, except the former Soviet republics of Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan, refused to run the spots at no charge. At this point, the State Department decided to purchase airtime on international TV stations; however, most countries still refused to broadcast the spots on their state-owned system even U.S.-friendly countries such as Egypt and Jordan.

Al-Jazeera, the pan-Arab television station initially said it would consider it "an honor" to accept the U.S. message but later refused to air the spots.

Only about $5 million of the total $15 million budgeted for the advertising was spent. On PBS's "NewsHour with Jim Lehrer," Beers said the governments probably refused to run the SVI spots because they considered the ads "propaganda."

The spots did air on a number of state-run media systems in Pakistan, Malaysia, Indonesia and Kuwait. Viewers in other countries, such as Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Oman, Qatar, Lebanon and the United Arab Emirates, also saw the commercials via pan-Arab satellite.

The SVI spots ran in Kenya and Tanzania through embassy placement. Other embassy placements were not secured, possibly due in many cases to lack of "ambassador buy-in."

The SVI television campaign was discontinued in early December 2002. But the reasons why are not entirely clear.