In foreign policy circles, international development’s role as an instrument of soft power is rarely questioned. It appears in speeches, briefing documents and press coverage as if its inclusion were self-evident.

It’s time to rethink it.

While soft power was intended to describe the persuasive influence of culture and values, it does a poor job capturing the substance of development. The implicit positioning next to hard power makes sound optional, something to deploy once the serious business is done.

But the way we talk about this work is shaping how it’s understood and limits what it can achieve. But anyone who has operated on the frontlines knows: there is nothing soft about this kind of power.

Strategy, Not Sympathy

In Colombia, Palladium's work has shown what national interests align through smart, intentional engagement.

Through programmes like the USAID Sustainable Agriculture Activity and the UK-funded Partnerships for Forests, we helped transform regions once mired in violence and illicit economies into hubs of legal, climate-smart growth. In places like Putumayo and Chocó, Afro-Columbian communities—including former combatants—now earn formal incomes through sustainable açaí cultivation, thanks to purchase guarantees, food safety certification, and support to reach domestic and international buyers.

These initiatives brought together governments, private buyers, community producers, and civil society. They weren’t acts of charity, they were deliberate, strategic partnerships.

Colombia is not the exception. It is proof of what happens when this work is treated as statecraft: focused, aligned, and mutually reinforcing.

The Architecture of Influence

Viewing global cooperation through a strategic lens doesn’t distort its purpose—it reveals its potential. Influence rarely comes from force alone. It comes from building systems that are durable, legitimate and responsive.

The term “soft power” suggests diplomacy with a smile or lifesaving aid as handouts. But this work is often the difference between stability or collapse, partnership or estrangement.

Power is not only what you can enforce. It’s what you can enable, and who chooses to follow your lead.

Toward a Stronger Vocabulary

If the language of soft power undermines the true weight of this field, what should replace it?

We must move beyond binary metaphors. This isn’t the velvet glove to an iron fist. It is a force in its own right—capable of shaping the world in ways that coercion never could.

Call it systemic power: the ability to shift the incentives, relationships and capacities that shape how societies function. Or transformational power: the engine of inclusive, and locally-led, long-term change.

What matters is recognising and articulate this truth: this is how nations shape the future together.

Not Soft. Just Smart.

In a world facing climate shocks, technological disruption, and widening inequality, we need to retire outdated concepts of geopolitical leverage. This work isn’t a sideline to foreign policy—it’s how intentions become outcomes. It remains one of the few tools that can deliver lasting impact without the threat of force.

To lead in this century, global actors must place this kind of engagement at the core of their international strategy. Because in the hardest places, and at the hardest moments, it is often development that holds the line.