Ranch dressing is quietly doing America’s diplomacy for it

The World Cup has shown how American influence is often built: spontaneously, beyond negotiating rooms, through unfiltered encounters with our institutions and people. Ranch dressing may be a punchline, but it also stands for something serious. It is quintessentially American, easily accessible, and doesn’t need a global marketing campaign. People simply try it and find themselves asking why they can’t get this condiment back home. The same is true for much of what visitors have seen during the World Cup, from small kindnesses by strangers to familiar songs in unfamiliar places. These are soft?power assets hiding in plain sight. Yet…