It is a privilege to contribute to this Farewell Symposium organized at Malta, to mark Professor Dietrich Kappeler’s retirement as President of DiploFoundation. My ten years at Diplo as a part-time faculty member have involved close association with Dietrich. (The association came about as the result of serendipitous actions involving Diplo’s moving force, Dr Jovan Kurbalija, following a chance meeting in Malta in 1999.) I am particularly indebted to him for the decisive support he gave to my writing activities.
During my temporary duty as a Commonwealth adviser in Windhoek in early 2001, I showed to him a modest collection I had then put together of six lectures on bilateral diplomacy which I had written for use at Diplo; he urged me to work on this further, and to develop that collection into a textbook. In diplomatic studies one sometimes encounters a divide between the academic scholars and the practitioners. We need many more like Dietrich who have personally bridged this gulf, through their own experience, conviction, and their ability to work on both sides with fairness and transparency.
Persuasion is indeed at the heart of diplomacy, as anyone exposed to this profession knows through his/her life experience. In this essay, I propose to explore the linkage between persuasion and trust, given that the one is impossible to practice without the other.
Relationship building
The institution of the resident envoy survives, even thrives, in the Internet age of instant communication, universal connectivity, and the near-elimination of geography as a barrier, precisely because durable, credible relations between state representatives working in the field require human contact. Of course, the accredited ambassador has never been the only channel of contact, and today more competing channels exist than ever before. Foreign ministry officials have now begun to deal directly with one another, especially those that belong to active regional institutions; they encounter one another frequently at a succession of functional meetings and develop their own personal links. This is even truer of officials belonging to line ministries, who find it convenient to rely on their own personal friendship networks.
In different kinds of situations, either for problem solving, or when relations are particularly close, backchannel contacts come into play, involving personal emissaries and others. [This is an understudied subject, no doubt because hard information is seldom available. Leaders who enjoy close friendship, say among the G-8 countries, often designate personal contact channels; this is distinct from the designated ‘sherpas’ that prepare for summit encounters. Some other countries use their respective intelligence agencies for such direct contact.] Further up the ladder, the heads of government and state, foreign ministers and others high personalities, similar personal contacts come into play. For instance, at ASEAN one hears of ministers and heads that exchange text messages, via email and SMS, making it very difficult for the foreign ministry to track the communications, much less archive them. I am sure the same is true of the EU, given the frequency of encounters among the leaders of member states.
Amidst this plurality of interchanges, paradoxically, the resident envoy becomes even more central than before. The foreign ministry finds it hard to keep track of all the threads in the dialogue with individual partner states, the more so when the activities of the non-state actors, i.e. businessmen, the industry associations, thinktanks, educational and scientific bodies, and civil society agencies, are woven into the bilateral tapestry. I have long asserted that it is only the resident envoy and his team that has the nearest approximation of the panoramic, realtime perspective that results from this frenetic pace of exchanges. This has changed the equation between the embassy and the foreign ministry, and made it a kind of ‘co-manager’ of the bilateral relationship. [This concept was advanced in my first book Inside Diplomacy (2000), and developed further in The 21st Century Ambassador (2004). For the past 3 or 4 years the MFAs of Austria, Canada, Germany and UK have put into implementation a parallel set of actions that have revalorized the resident envoy, and embedded him and his team more closely into the MFA, even to the point of thinning out their bilateral departments.] It is thus appropriate that we treat the envoy and his/her team as one of the arch-stones of diplomacy. Of course, what is written below of the envoy, applies mutatis mutandis to the foreign ministry official based at home.
Each diplomat in the field, at all ranks, depends on the personal connections s/he establishes with the concerned interlocutors. These in turn hinge on the diplomat’s credibility and winning personality; the deeper the trust that is engendered, the easier it is for the diplomat to be believed. The fact that the nature of work now requires the diplomat to network with a much larger circle of state and non-state actors makes this task more challenging than before. One should add that these dialogue partners are not only located in the country of assignment, but also include those in the home country. In net effect, the diplomat is engaged in multilayered relationships that are both dynamic, and expand over time.
This does not mean that the diplomat spins endlessly like a top, entering into ever widening circles of acquaintances, dealing with multiple partners. The essence of persuasion is to build deep relations with the key players that matter most in a given situation, both in the receiving country and at home. The diplomat adds continually to contacts, but also prioritizes the one’s that matter the most, i.e. those that are decision makers and the real movers.
Cultivation and credibility
At one level, the diplomat, particularly the ambassador, needs to maintain an open door; s/he must be receptive to anyone that wishes to meet the envoy, within reason. This is good public relations and does wonders for the embassy’s image; it also exposes the envoy to a wide stream of information, unfiltered through any intermediary. In a small embassy, this is easy to implement; it even pays the envoy to drop by at the consular services waiting area from time to time, asking those waiting if they have faced delay or any special problem—it reminds the consular staff that they are service providers, judged by the quality of their delivery to their customers, be it foreign visa seekers, or one’s own nationals looking for passport or other services. In the large embassy, the envoy even needs to monitor the telephone manners his personal staff; an African MFA permanent secretary recently told me that when he personally phoned to speak with the resident envoy of an important country, the secretary asked him to give the subject on which he wished to speak with the ambassador! In many big embassies personal staff act as minders for their head of mission, sometimes erecting barriers, functioning beyond their mandate.
Examine the relationship profile of any successful ambassador and you will find that the distinguishing element in his/her performance is the quality of ties that have been established with the principal interlocutors. It is the intensity of cultivation that is the hallmark. Who are the typical objects of such deep cultivation? Typically, they would include:
1. The key person in the MFA territorial department dealing with the envoy’s country; this unit is virtually the home base for the envoy, the one place where he must enjoy high credibility and access.
2. Someone in the office of the head of government; this is vital for rapid transmission of important communications if the bilateral relationship requires that.
3. Similar friendships in the other key ministries that play an active role in the relationship; the ambassador may farm out some of this to others on his team, unlike the first two sets of ties, where s/he must be the one enjoying that access.
4. A wide network of parliamentarians, media personalities, businessmen, industry association heads, academics, science and technology experts, civil society and religious leaders, and others that play an active role in that relationship; this is an open-ended cluster.
5. Leaders of the diaspora, including those that are politically and economically powerful and enjoy good contacts at home, as also the community leaders.
What about the head of government/state, and the ministers? Of course one needs access to these leaders. Local conditions may or may not permit the envoy to establish suchcontacts, not just in terms of business calls, but also by way of crafting real ties of affinity and trust. [ In most Western capitals, other than the envoys of the great powers, ambassadors confront diminishing access to ministers; heads of government are virtually out of bounds. In Germany (1992-95), I found that Foreign Minister Klaus Kinkle had continued the baleful tradition of not receiving envoys even for the customary first call after presenting credentials; after a year, I did manage to meet him, via backchannel contacts. But in practice this hardly mattered as friendships with the state secretaries and the key MFA officials were easy to puruse. (See Rana, Inside Diplomacy, 2000).]
All over the world, it gets harder for the resident envoy to deal directly with the ‘principals’ of the receiving country; this is a result of the multiplication of embassies in virtually all capitals, the increasing work burdens on the leaders, and a diminishing space for real friendships at this level. [See Rana, The 21st Century Ambassador: Plenipotentiary to Chief Executive, (2004), pp.67-9.] In contrast, contact with key officials is seldom a problem for the envoy that learns to ration his/her pursuit of the senior personalities. For the interlocutor to know that the envoy does not abuse access, and seeks personal meetings only when essential, is also an aspect of credibility. [It is increasingly easy to conduct small items of business over the telephone, In Germany (1992-95) I found it possible to communicate a short, specific message even to state secretaries in this manner; they appreciated being spared a request for a personal meeting].
Mechanics of persuasion
How does the envoy’s credibility affect persuasion? The demarche made by an ambassador is an official act, and is universally understood as an expression of the viewpoint of the government that s/he represents. Credibility comes into play in several different ways.
First, the envoy may be acting on his own initiative, or on instructions from home; the interlocutor receiving the demarche has not sure way of knowing, except through the context. For the envoy, the level at which the demarche is made, and its timing are a matter of his discretion; the instructions from home will have typically asked that the demarche be made ‘immediately’ and ‘at the highest level possible’. [ During an interview in an African capital, a US envoy made the wry comment that DC always wants that every demarche be made at the highest level possible; he would lose all credibility if he took that literally, and each time sought meetings with the head of the receiving country.] The timing and delivery method thus becomes a matter for the envoy’s judgment; the ambassador that enjoys high credibility has a wider choice of options in delivering that demarche. For instance, at a typical foreign ministry, he can opt to go to its top civil service head, or a junior minister—though in my experience I have found the former almost always the better choice, unless the issue is uniquely ‘political’. The well-connected envoy may also opt to lodge a parallel demarche at the office of the head of government, if the issue is vital and/or urgent. But when the issue is less vital, it may do just as well to deal with the concerned department or division in the MFA. The envoy may even leave it to the political counselor to deal with the issue at his level in the MFA or another ministry. The other side always appreciates an envoy that does not abuse access.
Second, the receptivity of that demarche is also affected by credibility. On the bulk of international affairs issues, global or bilateral, the recipient of the demarche has very limited personal discretion in accepting or rejecting that demarche. The policy of the host country generally determines his reaction, allowing little leeway. But on to some issues, especially of the bilateral genre, the receiving interlocutor may have a zone of limited discretion. Here the believability of the envoy, and/or his persuasive skill, comes into play. Put another way, an interlocutor may be inclined to tilt in favor of the envoy and take a small risk, if trust exists, based on past experience. S/he may look the individual in the eye, to decide if that person is believable. It is only the resident envoy that can build and sustain that kind of trust, accumulated over a period of time; I call this a ‘benefit of doubt’ doctrine. No amount of technology can replace such personal equations.
Third, credibility is no less vital in the reporting tasks of the envoy, where s/he has to narrate to home authorities an authentic picture of the country of assignment, and its viewpoint. Such feedback to the home authorities is also a form of persuasion. This can be a delicate task, if the envoy brings a perspective that runs counter to the assessment at home, and may consequently not be very welcome; in such situations it is easy to brand one’s envoy as acting as a spokesman for the other side. Rare is the envoy that has not encountered such sniping allegations in situations of political complexity, though usually not to his face. Personal credibility again provides a context against which unwelcome assessments can be judged.
One other dimension of inter-state communication deserves mention. Each government has at its disposal two parallel channels to make a demarche to a foreign state, its own envoy in the other capital, and the foreign envoy in one’s own capital. This is comparable to a ‘double entry bookkeeping’ system, as our good Maltese friend and leading member of the Diplo family, Alex Trigona Scarebis, describes it. By custom and practical convenience, it is the first track that is the primary choice of a foreign ministry; it is almost always better to have one’s envoy deliver a message, or obtain information, or a clarification—that way one deals directly with the principals, and goes through one less foreign actor. Yet, as experience affirms, the foreign envoy serves as a second, auxiliary channel, for confirmation of information or something specific about the partner country where that foreign envoy’s intimate knowledge of his home country is vital. There is one special situation where the foreign envoy is the preferred channel: when one delivers a protest to the foreign country, or any other kind of warning message, governments tend to use the foreign envoy. Furthermore, the more serious the issue, the higher the level at which the message is delivered to this foreign ambassador. [ For instance, in Germany the foreign minister often holds the concurrent rank of deputy chancellor in coalition governments; since the days of Hans-Dietrich Genscher (1972-91), it has become a peculiar tradition for the foreign minister not to meet resident ambassadors, even for the customary post-credentials call. In May 1998, after India’s nuclear tests, the Germans lost no time in summoning my successor in Bonn, Satinder Lambah, to meet the Foreign Minister and receive a rather intemperate message of protest.] Parallel action may be taken at the other end as well, but displeasure is best expressed when the foreign ambassador is summoned, and then told off.
Persuasion is at the heart of the diplomacy process, and in turn depends on credibility and inter-personal communication qualities of the envoy to function in effectively. No less important is the envoy’s ability to work across cultures, but that is a dimension that I hope some other contributor to this collection might wish to pursue.
————
Kishan S Rana
Former Indian ambassador
Professor Emeritus, Foreign Service Institute, New Delhi
Chair, India Committee, Council on Security Cooperation in the Asia Pacific,
Senior Fellow, DiploFoundation, Malta and Geneva
Honorary Fellow, Institute of Chinese Studies, Delhi
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Diplomacy: Theory and Practice, 3rd edn
Diplomatic Persuasion: An Under-Investigated Process
The under-investigation in diplomatic studies of processes of persuasion in explaining diplomatic outcomes needs to be addressed in the interests of better scholarly explanations and diplomatic practice. Although such processes are implicit in nearly all concepts and practice of diplomacy, neither scholars nor practitioners explicitly investigate them. Yet other related fields of study and disciplines examine persuasion and demonstrate its explanatory value.
The Consular Dimension of Diplomacy
Language, signaling and diplomacy
Part of Language and Diplomacy (2001): Ambassador Kishan Rana introduces the dimension of diplomatic signalling. Beginning with a reference to the Bhagwad Gita, one of the sacred texts of the Hindus, Rana outlines the qualities of good diplomatic dialogue: not causing distress to the listener, precision and good use of language, and truthfulness.
Performance Management in Foreign Ministries: Corporate Techniques in the Diplomatic Service
John le Carré: The Biography
I thought to review this book because I had enjoyed the spy novels of John le Carré and, having introduced a chapter on secret intelligence into the latest edition of my textbook and mentioned him in it (p. 155), was keen to see if Adam Sisman had turned up anything new about the novelist’s own short career as an intelligence officer in what was then West Germany.
Born a Foreigner: A Memoir of the American Presence in Asia
This is the eighth volume in the ADST-DACOR Diplomats and Diplomacy Series, and is a very solid addition to it. Cross, who was born of missionary parents in Beijing, spent 32 years in the US Foreign Service, and though his tours abroad included Egypt, Cyprus and London, most were in Asia and it is on these which this memoir concentrates.
Diplomacy, Force & Leadership: Essays In Honor of Alexander L. George
Diplomatenleben
A must-have for German-speaking students of Swiss diplomacy (and diplomacy generally) since the Second World War is Dr. Max Schweizer’s recently published Diplomatenleben.
Quick Diplomatic Response
In the increasingly interdependent world, diplomacy is our only alternative. Wars do not provide solutions for modern problems, whether these are regional crises, environmental challenges, such as climate change, or the risk of global pandemics. Compromise and consensus are not only the most ethical approach, but necessity. This interesting comic presents one day in life of an e-diplomat.
Just a Diplomat
Close students of the new, Conservative Party Mayor of London, the at once engaging and alarming Boris Johnson, will know that he has Turkish cousins. One of these is Sinan Kuneralp, a son of the late Zeki Kuneralp, probably the most distinguished and well liked Turkish diplomat of his generation. Sinan Kuneralp is a scholar-publisher and runs The Isis Press in Istanbul, a house at the forefront of publishing scholarly works and original documents on the Ottoman Empire, chiefly in English and French. The three works noticed here are all its products and reflect the publisher’s own special in...
Diplomacy, Satire and the Victorians
This book, which rests on extensive use of private papers, official documents, press archives and not least Grenville-Murray’s vast output (including novels), is the first biography of this complex man to be written. It begins with the difficulties produced by his illegitimate birth, and then describes his patronage by Lord Palmerston and Charles Dickens, his colourful diplomatic career, and finally his blossoming as a successful writer in France in the 1870s
21st Century Diplomacy: A Practitioner’s Guide
In the 21st century, new kinds of challenges resulting from interdependence among states and globalisation have had a determining impact of the conduct of diplomacy. Diplomacy has become multifaceted, pluri-directional, volatile and intensive, due to the increased complexity in terms of actors, dialogues subjects, modes of communication, and plurality of objectives. This unique text, written by a leading scholar and Foreign Service expert, examines all such factors to provide the definitive guide to diplomacy as it is practiced today. With a multitude of examples from around the world, includi...
Byzantium and Venice: A study in diplomatic and cultural relations
This book traces the diplomatic, cultural and commercial links between Constantinople and Venice from the foundation of the Venetian republic to the fall of the Byzantine Empire. It aims to show how, especially after the Fourth Crusade in 1204, the Venetians came to dominate first the Genoese and thereafter the whole Byzantine economy. At the same time the author points to those important cultural and, above all, political reasons why the relationship between the two states was always inherently unstable.
Embassies and Foreign Courts
I’ll be with you in a Minute Mr. Ambassador: The Education of a canadian Diplomat in Washington
Diplomacy for the New Century
Positive Diplomacy
Diplomatic Theory from Machiavelli to Kissinger
The Summer Capitals of Europe, 1814-1919
This is an original work, meticulously researched, rich in detail, and written in a clear and – here and there – refreshingly pungent style. Soroka is a Russian scholar but at ease in English.
Lessons from two fields
Reflections on multistakeholder diplomacy
Through analysis of the procedural and institutional arrangements in the functioning of international bodies, Valentin Katrandjiev, seeks to measure the extent to which diplomats accept nonofficial networks and entities as equal partners in the diplomatic negotiation process. Katrandjiev analyses the trend that on the domestic front, societies demand greater public accountability of governments in the process of national foreign policy making. He attempts to do so through the organisational units in MFAs responsible for relationships with domestic stakeholders.
Public diplomacy: Taxonomies and histories
Routledge Handbook of Public Diplomacy
The 21st Century Ambassador: Plenipotentiary to Chief Executive
Ambassador Kishan Rana, a diplomatist for four decades, is now a noted scholar and theorist of international relations and the new diplomacy that has evolved.
The New Diplomacy
Shaun Riordan was a British diplomat for 16 years before resigning in 2000 to take up private consultancy work and journalism in Spain, where he had ended his diplomatic career as political officer in the embassy. He has written a conceptually flawed, often vague, sometimes contradictory, and essentially polemical attack on 'traditional diplomacy'. It is also peppered with New Labour jargon ('stakeholders', 'global governance', 'civil society'), has its fair measure of superficially examined mantras, misquotes Clausewitz, and sports a shop-soiled title - is he not aware that Abba Ebban publish...
Essence of Diplomacy
Christer Jönsson is Professor of Political Science at Lund University in Sweden, where Martin Hall is a Researcher. Their book is described as an exercise in ‘theorizing’ diplomacy, that is, an attempt to provide a general account of its causes and consequences. (The authors are thus severe in denying the title of ‘theory’ to the ‘prescriptive tracts’ which scholar-diplomats have written about their art over hundreds of years, though I notice that they are more indulgent to the use of the term ‘political theory’ as in, for example, ‘liberal political theory’.)
The Contemporary Embassy: Paths to Diplomatic Excellence
Preventive Diplomacy: Stopping Wars Before they Start
Switzerland’s good offices: a changing concept, 1945-2002
Foreign Ministries: Managing Diplomatic Networks and Optimizing Value
This is a collection of papers presented at the 2006 Conference on Foreign Ministries hosted by DiploFoundation in May 2006, in Geneva. The overarching theme is the adaptation and reform that these ministries have undertaken, in the shape of country experiences and the transformation implemented in specific areas such as the application of information technology for outreach to domestic publics, adaptation in consular services and outsourcing options. Some of the challenging issues addressed cover relations between civil servants and politicians, the role of sub-state entities in diplomacy, an...
The origins, use and development of hot line diplomacy
A Dictionary of Diplomacy, Second Edition
Twentieth Century Diplomacy: A case study of British practice, 1963-1976
Book review by Geoff Berridge What is so original about the book is that the author has asked himself: What are the major forms of diplomatic contact? And followed this with the question: How and to what effect were they each employed by one state over a period sufficiently short to make detailed research possible […]
The Queen’s Ambassador to the Sultan: Memoirs of Sir Henry A. Layard’s Constantinople Embassy, 1877-1880
Once more students of Ottoman diplomatic history are in debt to the scholar-publisher, Sinan Kuneralp, for Sir Henry Layard was one of the most remarkable and controversial of British ambassadors to Turkey in the nineteenth century and served there during the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-8 – and yet the volumes of his memoirs dealing with this period have hitherto languished unpublished in the British Library, in part perhaps because of their size. (Layard admits himself to having been ‘somewhat minute, perhaps a great deal too much so’, p. 692.)They are here published almost in their entir...
Managing the Cold War: A view from the front line
Michael Alexander, a Russian-speaking senior British diplomat who died in 2002, was a major behind-the-scenes figure in what he calls the ‘management’ of the cold war to a peaceful conclusion.
The Visa Dimension of Diplomacy
British Heads of Mission at Constantinople, 1583-1922
A Dictionary of Diplomacy
Like all professions, diplomacy has spawned its own specialized terminology, and it is this lexicon which provides A Dictionary of Diplomacy's thematic spine. However, the dictionary also includes entries on legal terms, political events, international organizations and major figures who have occupied the diplomatic scene or have written influentially about it over the last half millennium. All students of diplomacy and related subjects and especially junior members of the many diplomatic services of the world will find this book indispensable.
Diplomat’s Dictionary
Getting to the Table: The Process of International Prenegotiation
Texts in diplomacy
Part of Language and Diplomacy (2001): Professor Dietrich Kappeler provides an overview of the various types of formal written documents used in diplomacy, pointing out where the practices surrounding these documents have changed in recent years. He also discusses multi-language treaties, including the difficulties of translation and interpretation.
Ever the Diplomat
Diplomacy: Theory and Practice, Fifth Edition
In 2005, I reviewed the third edition of Diplomacy: Theory and Practice by G.R. Berridge as essential reading for Robinson Crusoe, had he been a student of diplomacy. We all know that eventually Crusoe ended his assignment on the foreign island and returned to his native country where he found himself a wealthy man for whom bibliography no longer had a role to play … unlike the rest of us, who have continued to practise diplomacy and read books about it.
Mediation in International Relations
The Limits of Neorealism
The Limits of Neorealism
The Practice of Diplomacy: Its evolution, theory and administration
First published in 1995, the long-awaited second edition of this valuable textbook on the history of diplomacy has at last appeared. The first chapter has been expanded to include non-European traditions, and a wholly new chapter has been added to take account of developments over the last 15 years. It is for the main part a work of relaxed authority, clearly written, and – unusually for an introductory work – full of intriguing detail which it would be difficult if not impossible to find in other secondary sources.
Persuasion in sociology of diplomacy
Dr Milan Jazbec, a practitioner and researcher in diplomacy, positions a discussion on persuasion in the sociology of diplomacy. Social context determines both diplomacy and persuasion. Dr Jazbec makes a distinction between pressure and persuasion. In a rather counter-intuitive view to dominant discourse, he argues that genuine persuasion cannot be public. As soon as it becomes public, it immediately becomes pressure.
The Oxford Handbook of Modern Diplomacy
Inside Diplomacy
This is a book on diplomacy in general and the Indian Foreign Service (IFS) in particular. It is also a gem, and a large gem. It breathes life, wisdom, and good humour, and is full of rich detail. I found it thoroughly absorbing. Students of diplomacy at all stages of their careers will find it immensely useful, while those in a position to influence the future shape of the IFS will discover a whole raft of constructive suggestions for reform fearlessly advanced.
The Art of Diplomacy: The American Experience
The Professional Diplomat
The Foreign Office
Diplomatic Security under a Comparative Lens – Or Not?
“Diplomatic security” is the term now usually preferred to “diplomatic protection” for the steps taken by states to safeguard the fabric of their diplomatic and consular missions, the lives of their diplomatic and consular officers, and the integrity of their communications; it has the advantage of avoiding confusion with the controversial legal doctrine of diplomatic protection.
To joke or not to joke: A diplomatic dilemma in the age of internet
Part of Language and Diplomacy (2001): The first paper, presented by Prof. Peter Serracino-Inglott as the keynote address at the 2001 conference, examines the serious issue of diplomatic communication in a playful manner, through one of the most paradigmatic and creative examples of language use: joking.
Yes, (Saudi) Minister! A Life in Administration
After a brilliant ministerial career in Riyadh, Algosaibi fell from grace at the Ministry of Health in 1984. This was the start of his diplomatic life, which commenced in Bahrain and continued in London. This is a shrewd and lively book.
The idea of diplomatic culture and its sources
To what extent does an independent diplomatic culture exist which permits diplomats to exert their own influence on the conduct of international relations? Insofar as such a culture exists, what does it look like, is it a good thing and, if it is, how is it to be sustained? This paper explores what we generally mean when we talk about culture and how we see culture operating in contemporary international relations. It sketches the basic elements of a diplomatic culture and discusses different accounts of its origins.
Diplomatic Classics: Selected texts from Commynes to Vattel
The Cinderella Service: British Consuls since 1825
A weak diplomatic hybrid: U.S. Special Mission Benghazi, 2011-12
In the widespread coverage of the brutal murder of US Ambassador to Libya Christopher Stevens and others in the US mission in Benghazi on 11 September 2012, there has been much confusion over the character of the post. It has been repeatedly described in the media as the American ‘consulate’ but the official position, recently stated emphatically by the Report of the Accountability Review Board for Benghazi (ARB) convened by secretary of state Hillary Clinton, is that ‘the U.S. Special Mission in Benghazi was never a consulate and never formally notified [in any character] to the Libyan ...
Innovation in Diplomatic Practice
Multi-Track Diplomacy: A systems approach to peace
The Beijing-Washington Back-Channel and Henry Kissinger’s Secret Trip to China
Curing the Sick Man: Sir Henry Bulwer and the Ottoman Empire, 1858-1865
This is the first book of a very promising young historian. Laurence Guymer, who is head of the Department of History at Winchester College and a research associate in the School of History at the University of East Anglia, has produced a biography of Sir Henry Bulwer that successfully challenges the conventional account of this colourful mid-Victorian figure. It also raises the question of how ‘diplomatic success’ is judged.
What Diplomats Do: The Life and Work of Diplomats
Sir Brian Barder’s book What Diplomats Do offers comprehensive insight into the life and work of diplomats. It deserves to be read by practitioners and aspiring practitioners of diplomacy, by students and teachers of diplomacy, and by anyone interested in what diplomats actually do. It crosses genres as easily as it addresses and holds the attention of a broad audience.
FDR’s Ambassadors and the Diplomacy of Crisis: From the rise of Hitler to the end of World War II
What effect did personality and circumstance have on US foreign policy during World War II? This incisive account of US envoys residing in the major belligerent countries – Japan, Germany, Italy, China, France, Great Britain, USSR – highlights the fascinating role played by such diplomats as Joseph Grew, William Dodd, William Bullitt, Joseph Kennedy and W. Averell Harriman. Between Hitler's 1933 ascent to power and the 1945 bombing of Nagasaki, US ambassadors sculpted formal policy – occasionally deliberately, other times inadvertently – giving shape and meaning not always intended by ...
Last Man Standing: Memoirs of a political survivor
Jack Straw was the ablest and wisest of Tony Blair’s foreign secretaries and served in this capacity from 2001 until he was ungratefully dumped without warning by his leader in 2006. Afterwards he hit the headlines by courageously publishing his dislike of the full veil worn my some Muslim women, on the grounds that this was such a visible statement of separation and difference that it complicated community relations and was, in any case, a cultural preference rather than a religious obligation. (Straw was then and still is the Labour MP for a Bradford constituency with a large Muslim popula...
Cursed is the Peacemaker: The American Diplomat [Philip Habib] Versus the Israeli General, Beirut 1982
Bertie of Thame: Edwardian Ambassador
Lucky George: Memoirs of an Anti-Politician
This is a belated and less than comprehensive note on this book, which I stumbled upon in a second-hand bookshop while on holiday. It is one of the most lively, shrewd, and brilliantly written diplomatic and political memoirs that I have ever come across.
British Envoys to Germany 1816-1866
Diplomatic Education
Diplomatic Education’ was published as Chapter 11 in: An Anthology Celebrating the Twentieth Anniversary of the Higher Colleges of Technology, ed. Tayeb A Kamali, (HCT Press, UAE, 2007).
Persuasion, trust, and personal credibility
Ambassador Kishan Rana indicates the cultivation of relations and the credibility of diplomats as the basis for persuasion in diplomacy. He provides an initial taxonomy of the type of relations that diplomats should cultivate. When it comes to credibility, Ambassador Rana presents the main ways of developing and maintaining credibility in diplomatic relations. The more credible the diplomat, the more likely it is that their persuasion with local interlocutors will be successful.
Diplomacy for a Crowded World
A Selection of New diplomatic memoirs
I have just written a review article on these six books of British diplomatic memoirs for the English Historical Journal, so here I shall just provide some notes on those that I believe to be most valuable to students of diplomacy.
Twitter for Diplomats
Twitter for Diplomats is not a manual, or a list of what to do or not to do. It is rather a collection of information, anecdotes, and experiences. It recounts a few episodes involving foreign ministers and ambassadors, as well as their ways of interacting with the tool and exploring its great potential. It wants to inspire ambassadors and diplomats to open and nurture their accounts – and it wants to inspire all of us to use Twitter to also listen and open our minds.
Applying the pedagogy of positiveness to diplomatic communication
Part of Language and Diplomacy (2001): Dr Francisco Gomes de Matos applies what he calls the "Pedagogy of Positiveness" to diplomatic communication. He proposes a checklist of tips for diplomats to make their communication more positive, emphasising respect and understanding of the other side, and keeping in mind the ultimate goal of avoiding conflict.
The Diplomats, 1919-1939
Diplomacy: Theory and Practice, 2nd edn
British Diplomacy and the Descent into Chaos: The career of Jack Garnett, 1902-19
I am in favour of biographies of relatively obscure individuals like Jack Garnett because there are plenty of them on the famous; moreover, studies of this kind often turn up interesting details (including how the famous were seen from the foothills) and stimulate thought on bigger questions. John Fisher’s well written and thoroughly researched study of this early twentieth century British diplomat, into which contextual detail is expertly woven, is no exception.
The Practice of Diplomacy, 2nd ed
Diplomacy and domestic politics: The logic of two-level games
The Turkish Embassy Letters
Language and Diplomacy: Preface
Part of Language and Diplomacy (2001): In the preface below, Jovan Kurbalija and Hannah Slavik introduce the chapters in the book, and extract the general themes covered by the various authors.
All Fall Down: America’s fateful encounter with Iran
All Fall Down is the definitive chronicle of Americas experience with the Iranian revolution and the hostage crisis of 1978-81. Drawing on internal government documents, it recounts the controversies, decisions and uncertainties that made this a unique chapter in modern American history. From his personal experiences, the author draws revealing portraits of the people who engaged in this test of wills with an Islamic revolutionary regime.
The inertia of Diplomacy
Diplomacy is used to manage the goals of foreign policy focusing on communication. New trends affect the institution of diplomacy in different ways. Diplomacy has received an additional tool in the form of the Internet. In various cases of interdependence and dependence interference in a country’s affairs is accepted. Multilateral cooperation has created parliamentary diplomacy and a new type of diplomat, the international civil servant. States and their diplomats are in demand to curb the excesses of globalization. The fight against terrorism also brought additional work for diplomac...
Inside Diplomacy
This is a book on diplomacy in general and the Indian Foreign Service (IFS) in particular. It is also a gem, and a large gem. It breathes life, wisdom, and good humour, and is full of rich detail. I found it thoroughly absorbing. Students of diplomacy at all stages of their careers will find it immensely useful, while those in a position to influence the future shape of the IFS will discover a whole raft of constructive suggestions for reform fearlessly advanced.
International Regimes
Reforming Diplomacy: Clear Choices, New Emphases
