Volume 7 (2012)
Issue 1: The Emerging EU Diplomatic System
Special issue edited by Petar Petrov, Karolina Pomorska and Sophie Vanhoonacker
Issue 1 at Brill.comContents
Petar Petrov, Karolina Pomorska and Sophie Vanhoonacker
Daniel C. Thomas and Ben Tonra
Abstract
The strengthened Office of the High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and the new European External Action Service (EEAS) presuppose a set of interests and/or values that the European Union (EU) wishes to pursue on the world stage. But what are those interests and/or values and how does the EU reach agreement on them? Rather than simply ‘cutting and pasting’ from EU treaties and strategy papers, this article identifies seven distinct theoretical models of how the EU and its member states arrive collectively at a definition of their diplomatic objectives. The seven models include intergovernmentalist models of veto threats and log-rolling, normative institutionalist models of cooperative bargaining and entrapment, and constructivist and sociological institutionalist models of elite socialization, Europeanization and collective identity formation. The article identifies the logics of each model and notes their implications for the role of the EU’s new foreign policy institutions.
Jan Wouters and Sanderijn Duquet
Abstract
The European Union has a unique sui generis status on the international plane, which is reflected in its capability to enter into diplomatic relations with third states and international organizations. Over nearly six decades, the European Union (EU) has gradually built its own worldwide bilateral and multilateral diplomatic network, which is made subject — through specific agreements with the host country — to the 1961 Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations. The ‘Union delegations’ are now operating as the diplomatic missions of the EU as a whole, in contrast to the former Commission delegations. This article examines the relationship between the EU and international diplomatic law. How does the EU establish and conduct diplomatic relations? What legal instruments are being used? How do the Vienna Convention and customary diplomatic law come into play? What is the exact legal status of EU ambassadors and diplomatic staff? By critically analysing these issues, this article assesses the specific contribution the EU makes to the further development of international diplomatic law.
Edith Drieskens
Abstract
One of the Lisbon Treaty’s most significant innovations was the creation of the European External Action Service (EEAS), which changed the EU’s functioning not only in Brussels, but also around the world. Zooming in on the multilateral context of the UN in New York, this article examines the new EU delegations and highlights the main challenges that are inherent in their establishment. These delegations could be engrafted upon a wide network of European Commission delegations, yet the literature gives little indication of success in integrating the functions and actors. Adding to the literature and building upon interviews with policy officials in both Brussels and New York, this article indicates an additional external challenge in implementing Lisbon’s provisions, with the context of the UN General Assembly raising more fundamental questions on status and membership — questions that have also shaped the role of the EU delegation to the UN during its first year of operation.
Kolja Raube
Abstract
Despite considerable academic attention on the European External Action Service (EEAS), only a few studies have touched upon its relationship with the European Parliament. This article looks into the relationship between the EEAS, its High Representative and the European Parliament. It pays particular attention to the question of whether — during the making of the EEAS — the European Parliament was able to expand its parliamentary oversight in external relations along the lines of legislative, supervisory and budgetary powers.
Federica Bicchi
Abstract
This article analyses the role of the European External Action Service (EEAS) in EU foreign policy communications. Having cumulated a number of pre-existing functions, the EEAS is situated at the centre of the existing communication systems used in the European Union in relation to matters of foreign policy. Moreover, the EEAS is contributing to the expansion of the existing practice of foreign policy communications in three ways. First, it has affected the direction of communication flows in the most well-established (but now declining) communication system — the COREU/CORTESY network — as a growing proportion of messages now originate in Brussels. Second, the EEAS is developing an autonomous EU capacity for information gathering, as EU delegations regularly draft political reports. Third, the EEAS has contributed to the expansion of information sharing in consular affairs, which is an area of mixed and contested competences. The EEAS is thus a key actor in EU foreign policy communications, although practices are forever shifting and its role is still under construction.
Simon Duke
Abstract
Following a difficult birth, the European External Action Service (EEAS) is now a much scrutinized reality. Much of the analysis has concentrated on its quasi-institutional nature, its relations with the principal external action actors in the European Union and beyond, as well as the question of its legal capacity. Relatively little attention, however, has been paid to the important training dimensions, which are critical to the smooth development of the Service, especially considering the disparate backgrounds of EEAS constituents. This article argues that there is no ‘one-size-fits-all’ solution to the training dilemma. Differentiation rather than standardization, within the constraints of a programme (rather than a full-blown European Diplomatic Academy), will be the salient features of the first years of training in the EEAS. It is also argued that training can be a key strategic tool for the Service’s development and, more generally, the external relations of the EU itself.
David Spence
Abstract
The proposal to create the European External Action Service (EEAS) seemed to be an acceptance by the European Union’s political elites that, in the post-Westphalian world, more attention needed to be given to collective European diplomacy rather than individual national diplomacy. Yet there was no guarantee that existing officials, whether from EU institutions or from the EU member states, would easily accept the related diplomatic norms and values. Melding different epistemic communities into one effective new diplomatic community is not a foregone conclusion. Europe’s new diplomatic service ‘an sich’ is not a diplomatic service ‘für sich’. While creating a team with a spirit of unity was the formal goal, ambiguities in the Lisbon Treaty’s articles on the EEAS have facilitated a major reassertion of bureaucratic politics, which are destined to keep Westphalian diplomacy alive and to produce even more turf battles and complexity. The mind-sets of the component parts of the EEAS are so diverse that, without serious discussion of these issues and concentrated training, creating a new European diplomacy will be difficult.
Publication date: 1 January 2012
Issue 2
Issue 2 at Brill.comContents
Baldur Thorhallsson
Abstract
This article argues that there are two broad categories of qualitative factors that determine the ability of small states to influence the United Nations Security Council (UNSC). The first is the internal competence of small states in areas such as knowledge, initiative, and diplomatic, coalition and leadership skills. The second is the image of the state in the international system with specific regard to its perceived neutrality or reputation as a norm entrepreneur in particular policy fields. These qualitative features need to be combined with quantitative variables — such as population, territorial size, gross domestic product (GDP) and military capacity — that are normally used in International Relations (IR) in order to understand small states’ ability to become active participants in the UNSC.
Karina Pultz
Abstract
Dialogue has become the grand new imperative of world politics in recent decades, particularly since 9/11 and the ‘war on terror’. It is also at the forefront of the agenda within the public diplomacy debate. This article points out that current attempts to capture public diplomacy through ‘soft power’ are of limited value for understanding dialogue as a central component in this field. The article claims that the notion of soft power should be supplemented with that of discursive power, which allows us to enquire into dialogue as a form of interaction that is able to transform identities. A case study on Danish-Middle Eastern dialogue activities illustrates that dialogue can be effective public diplomacy.
Cristina Archetti
Abstract
Based on a range of interviews with foreign diplomats in London, this article explains the considerable variation in the way that communication technologies both affect diplomatic practices and are appropriated by diplomats to pursue the respective countries’ information-gathering and public outreach objectives. The study shows that London, as an information environment, is experienced differently by each of the diplomats and embassy actors. The analysis elaborates a model of the ‘communication behaviour’ of foreign diplomats, based on an evolutionary analogy: foreign diplomats in the context of the British capital, within their respective embassy organizations, can each be compared to the members of a species that is attempting to survive in a natural environment. The nuances highlighted by the explanatory model challenge the largely homogeneous and generalized nature of current debates about media and diplomacy, as well as public diplomacy.
Vicky Reynaert
Abstract
In the past, the effectiveness of the European Union’s (EU’s) foreign policy suffered from a lack of consistency as well as horizontal and institutional coherence. In order to enhance the consistency and coherence of the EU’s foreign policy, the Heads of States and Governments reformed the position of High Representative and created a European External Action Service (EEAS) under the Treaty of Lisbon. This article deals with negotiations on the decision regarding the organization and functioning of the EEAS by examining the preferences of the actors involved, the negotiation process and the eventual outcome. Will the institutional set-up of the EEAS and the new position of the High Representative enable the EU to play a more consistent and coherent role in the world? The article concludes that the EU’s foreign policy is now characterized by an even more complex institutional framework, resulting in the expectation that the EU will have even more difficulties in conducting an effective foreign policy.
Daniel Hernández Joseph
Abstract
No other foreign service has as strong a consular concentration, or is as centered in a single other country, as the Mexican Foreign Service and its consular network in the United States. Mexico has 73 embassies and 67 consulates throughout the world — with 50 of these consulates in the United States. Clearly, consular work and particularly the consular tasks that are performed in the United States take up a large part of the resources, attention and priority of Mexican foreign policy.
Camelia Tigau
Book reviewed:
- Peter van Ham, Social Power in International Politics, The New International Relations Series. London: Routledge, 2010.
Michele Acuto
Book reviewed:
- Mark Amen, Noah J. Toly, Patricia L. McCarney and Klaus Segbers (eds.), Cities and Global Governance: New Sites for International Relations. London: Ashgate, 2011.
Elena Atanassova-Cornelis
Book reviewed:
- Iokibe Makoto (ed.) and Robert D. Eldridge (translation and annotation), The Diplomatic History of Postwar Japan. London: Routledge, 2011.
Publication date: 1 January 2012
Issue 3
Issue 3 at Brill.comContents
Bjørnar Sverdrup-Thygeson
Abstract
In the diplomatic canon, where the field has been demarcated by a central distinction drawn between suzerain and parity-based state relations, Imperial China has squarely been designated to the former category, and thereby as inherently alien to the diplomatic tradition. However, this image of a monolithic 2000-year-long rigid, hierarchical system betrays a too shallow assessment of Chinese history, and fails to acknowledge a noteworthy strain of parity-based relations running through Imperial Chinese foreign policy. This strain was at its most pronounced during the four centuries of the Song Dynasty, where China’s relations with a set of important neighbouring states were handled on egalitarian terms that were far more reminiscent of a full-fledged diplomatic multi-state system than what is popularly acknowledged. Based on a case study of the diplomatic relations of the Song Dynasty, this article argues that Imperial Chinese foreign policy on a set of occasions showed itself to adhere to principles immanent to classical diplomacy, and that these eras thus should naturally, and beneficially, belong to the historical canon of diplomacy.
Jean Heilbronn and Christian Lequesne
Abstract
This article highlights the specificity of the recruitment of senior diplomats (Advisers) in France since 1970. The idiosyncratic character of the French situation resides in the lack of a single examination. The diversity of ways by which a senior diplomat can enter the French Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs (FMFEA) leads to the coexistence within the ministry of two main groups — the ENA diplomats (that is, from the National School of Administration, the Ecole Nationale d’Administration) and the so-called ‘Orient’ diplomats — each defending specific interests and roles within the French Quai d’Orsay. The kind of entrance exam that you take still determines careers in the French MFA. The pillarization of the career has nevertheless decreased since the 1990s, because the necessity to cope with common external challenges (such as budgetary cuts) has reinforced a shared identity among French senior diplomats.
Liudmila Mikalayeva
Abstract
This article applies genre analysis to the state reports of fourteen countries in two first cycles of monitoring of the Council of Europe’s Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities. Focusing on the packaging of information and modality (level of the word), sentence length and quoted speech (level of the sentence), and thematic filling (level of the text), the article checks for the effect of experience in reporting. While novice reporters in general display more ‘conservative’ stylistic choices than experienced reporters, convergence takes place with time, as reports become more formal in the second cycle. At the level of structure of the text, the high rate of non-compliance of experienced reporters with the structural–thematic prescriptions is contrasted with the very good compliance of novice reporters. This finding, which is puzzling if genre competence is confused with perfect formal compliance with genre norm, may be explained by the difference in the meaning of monitoring for different states.
James Pamment
Abstract
This article examines the relationship between theories of the ‘new’ public diplomacy and recent attempts by foreign ministries in the United Kingdom, United States and Sweden to develop public diplomacy strategies for the early twenty-first century. It provides a summary of policy debates in each nation alongside analysis of the evaluation methods that have been designed to support them. The article argues that expressions of a new public diplomacy are best explained within the constraints of different institutional and national cultures. Innovations in public diplomacy have typically taken place within the context of domestic demands for public accountability and value for money, pressures for empirical data to inform policy-making, and the increased centralization of public diplomacy activities. Evaluation plays an important role in improving actors’ capacities for newer forms of public diplomacy, but often by measuring the public diplomacy institution and its objectives, rather than whether the needs of foreign publics are met. This suggests that any paradigm shift from old to new public diplomacy has in practice centred on domestic and organizational concerns rather than the achievement of normative goals such as increased dialogue with foreign citizens.
Peter Vale
Abstract
This article reviews a trilogy of memoirs written by diplomats who served South Africa’s apartheid government. It explores the ‘communication’ versus ‘representative’ function of diplomacy and sets this in the context of a pariah state, as apartheid South Africa once was. It suggests that all diplomats who served under apartheid were complicit in that system. The article also looks towards the role that the idea of the international setting played in the formation of a southern African state system. This is viewed again the backdrop of Britain’s fading empire. This explains how South African diplomacy was cast in the imperial mode. The porousness of southern Africa’s borders is used to explain how diplomacy was used to reproduce states.
Books reviewed:
- Pieter Wolvaardt, Tom Wheeler and Werner Scholtz, From Verwoerd to Mandela: South African Diplomats Remember. Volume 1: The Wild Honey of Africa. Pretoria: Crink, 2010.
- Pieter Wolvaardt, Tom Wheeler and Werner Scholtz, From Verwoerd to Mandela: South African Diplomats Remember. Volume 2: The Noose Tightens. Pretoria: Crink, 2010.
- Pieter Wolvaardt, Tom Wheeler and Werner Scholtz, From Verwoerd to Mandela: South African Diplomats Remember. Volume 3: Total Onslaught to Normalization. Pretoria: Crink, 2010.
Juergen Kleiner
Book reviewed:
- Jan Melissen and Ana Mar Fernández (eds.), Consular Affairs and Diplomacy. Leiden: Martinus Nijhoff, 2011.
Tatiana Zonova
Book reviewed:
- P. Sharp, Diplomatic Theory of International Relations. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009.
Michel Kostecki
Book reviewed:
- Kishan S. Rana and Bipul Chatterjee (eds.), Economic Diplomacy: India's Experience. Jaipur: Cuts International, 2011.
Publication date: 1 January 2012
Issue 4: The Domestic Dimension of Public Diplomacy
Special issue edited by Ellen Huijgh
Issue 4 at Brill.comContents
Ellen Huijgh
Steven Curtis and Caroline Jaine
Abstract
Not every foreign ministry communicates with its home audience. For some it is unconstitutional; for many it serves no purpose. But for multicultural and particularly former colonial powers, communicating with the home audience has the potential to be a vital tool for engagement, especially as the boundaries between domestic and international are blurred by international travel, migration and global connectivity. This article examines ‘public diplomacy at home’ in the United Kingdom, both as a general policy of the last Labour government and more specifically in the context of initiatives to tackle Islamist terrorism. In terms of the latter, it explores the strengths and limitations of both faith-based approaches to outreach to Muslim communities and a country-based approach to outreach, using Pakistan as a case study.
Ellen Huijgh and Caitlin Byrne
Abstract
Public diplomacy’s scholarship and practice are evolving and seeking to adapt to the expanding interests, expectations, connectivity and mobility of the publics that have come to define the field in an organic fashion. The characteristic distinction between international and domestic publics as the key to defining the practice of public diplomacy is increasingly challenged by public audiences that are no longer constrained by such traditional delineations. The attention on the involvement of domestic publics in public diplomacy, or its domestic dimension, has to be understood within this context. This article aims to cast further light on public diplomacy’s domestic dimension, with Canada and Australia — two countries that have much in common — as the launch pads for discussion. The article’s first section investigates the approach and development of public diplomacy’s domestic dimension in both countries and draws out the similarities and differences. The second section identifies the opportunities, challenges and tendencies in its practice as well as the conceptual implications. The article finds that while differences in approach remain, Canada and Australia have more in common than not when it comes to involving domestic audiences in international policy, especially in recent years. Their practice of public diplomacy’s domestic dimension appears to be resilient and adaptive in nature, although it has been subject to fluctuations resulting from changes in the political climate, leadership styles and governmental preferences, and resource availability. Additionally, reconceptualizing public diplomacy with a domestic dimension and constructivist underpinnings opens the window on norms that are taken for granted in diplomacy and offers the potential for a more inclusive view and practice — a better fit for its time.
Kathy R. Fitzpatrick
Abstract
This article addresses the issue of how strategic publics should be defined in public diplomacy. The article first reviews widely accepted theories of stakeholders and publics in business and public relations that help to explain the role and value of publics to organizations and provide alternatives for the conceptualization of strategic publics. It applies these concepts to public diplomacy in an effort to demonstrate their potential usefulness in identifying and prioritizing strategic publics at home and abroad. The article then suggests that although stakeholder theory and situational theory are useful tools for conceptualizing strategic publics in public diplomacy, these theories must be expanded to capture fully the complex nature of the contemporary diplomatic environment. An expanded framework that is based on networks of influence is suggested as an alternative for defining public diplomacy publics in a networked world.
Teresa La Porte
Abstract
The concept of public diplomacy has traditionally been understood in state-centric terms and has been closely related to a state’s foreign policy. Despite conceptual evolution towards more dialogue and networking with different players, some authors continue to envisage public diplomacy as a state pursuit. The impact of globalization on politics, however, has provoked the emergence of an array of non-state organizations that have progressively increased their influence, power, legitimacy and credibility in the global arena. They may act complementary to or independent from states, and sometimes even challenge the role of the state. This article proposes an alternative approach to the concept of public diplomacy that can include non-state actors’ independent actions. The article explores three main conditions for non-state organizations that could contribute to broadening the conceptual framework of public diplomacy: emphasis on the object of the action; legitimacy to develop public diplomacy initiatives based on effectiveness; and a progressive disappearance of borders between the domestic and international dimensions (as so-called ‘intermestic’ actors attempt to do). These preconditions are examined in the following two scenarios: defending citizens’ interests before international institutions; and explaining and implementing international institutions’ policies locally.
Yiwei Wang
Abstract
Chinese public diplomacy — considered to be the continuation of its internal affairs — is booming unlike anywhere else in the world. Yet its rise is being hampered by several domestic constraints that are identity-related, institutional, societal and cultural in nature. This contribution aims to shed light on the domestic dilemmas that could hamper the rise of Chinese public diplomacy. It first explains what Chinese public diplomacy entails and the initiatives that have been undertaken by the Chinese government in this field. It then focuses on the different kinds of domestic pressures that are challenging the rise of Chinese public diplomacy, and briefly touches upon the case study of Chinese public diplomacy towards Europe, while suggesting paths to overcome these challenges. The author suggests that in order for Chinese public diplomacy to reach its full potential, China needs to overcome its domestic constraints, and to this end, the Chinese government needs to stimulate the collaboration of Chinese domestic non-state actors with international civil society around shared values.
Shay Attias
Abstract
The new Israeli public diplomacy approach seeks to empower Israeli citizens to utilize their position both as information consumers and producers in order to participate in grass-roots public diplomacy efforts. So-called ‘peer-to-peer diplomacy’ reflects the shift from ‘old public diplomacy’, where the nation-state has since 1960 been the sole actor in international relations, to today’s reality where average citizens play an increasingly important role. The notion of ‘peer-to-peer’ (P2P) describes the latest development in diplomatic practice, wherein civilians — by virtue of social media — are not only consumers of government information, but also information producers, with the potential to bypass existing official government bodies. Today’s public diplomacy is about more than governments employing ‘soft and smart power’. It is increasingly about dealing and collaborating with a public that can obtain and produce the information themselves.
Mladen Andrlić, Iva Tarle and Suzana Simichen Sopta
Abstract
In a globalized world, with dynamic flows of information and communication, public diplomacy also supports internal understanding of international values and relations. The sharing of international standards, democratic changes and market reforms in Central, Eastern and South-East Europe has become more effective by communicating with the domestic public. This has also been experienced in Croatia, which has long been considered as one of the more advanced transition countries. Croatia’s strategic goal of becoming a functional market democracy has always been in line with NATO and EU values, although the costs and benefits of accession were, and still are, to be discussed both abroad and with the domestic public. Creating pluralistic, well-structured and institutionalized platforms for permanent public dialogue is a multifaceted activity that allows all segments of society to practise democracy. The lessons learned in Croatia confirm that a government — if and when it develops a domestic dialogue — not only gains public support for its foreign policy goals at home and abroad, but also becomes better articulated internationally.
1 January 2012