Assaying experience of soft power: CALD community narratives in New South Wales in COVID-19 pandemic times

Focus groups were conducted in Greater Western Sydney (New South Wales, both CALD magnets) with social workers and migrant community organization members, to find out what attracted culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) migrants to Australia, how they experienced Australian life (particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic), and what Australian and overseas media attracted them. Authors conducted narrative analysis, using codes from the experiential theory of attraction-based influence, to uncover CALD participants’ experience of attraction. Expected attractions (with positive valence) were identified as were new attractions associated with Australia’s international ‘civic’ role and migrants’ civic opportunities in multicultural Australia. Authors discerned negative valence to a lesser degree.