Soft balancing as a strategy can be attributed to the work of Robert Pape[1] and T. V.
[2] It was criticized by Stephen Brooks, William Wohlforth[3] and Augusto Dall'Agnol.
[4] Soft balancing has been practiced in many developing countries, such as Brazil, India and South Africa.
Soft balancing is not undertaken via military effort, but via a combination of economic, diplomatic and institutional methods.
In other words, soft balancing uses "non-military tools to delay, frustrate and undermine aggressive unilateral U.S. military policies".