The Evolution of Diplomacy

The concise Oxford English Dictionary gives 8 definitions of evolution, of which 3 I would like to draw your attention to:
1. gradual development, esp. from a simple to a more complex form.
3. the appearance or presentation of events etc. in due succession.
6. an opening out (Thompson [ed.],1996: 468).

The word evolution for me completely encapsulates the nature of diplomacy, in the sense that it did indeed start as a simple form of political negotiation and has since evolved into something much more complex and a lot harder to define.

In such a cosmopolitan, globalizing world, we can look back now with retrospect and say that it was inevitable that the nature of diplomacy would change. As for the most significant change? I offer not a single event or moment in time but rather a chain of events that started after World War I.

White considers traditional or 'old' diplomacy as dating from the end of WWI and I am happy to accept this. Traditional diplomacy was very protectionist in nature, it was a bilateral proccess (involving 2 parties) and was very closed and secretive. This bilateral approach meant that it was much easier to keep diplomatic negotiations secret as there were no other parties to interfere or leak information either to the public (who at this time were not nearly as politically active as today's society) or to other political agents. Also at this time there were no international institutions or multi-national coorporations with any political influence who would perhaps oppose or attempt to influence diplomatic disscussion. In spite of all the secrecy, White does acknowledge that it was within the traditional diplomacy framework that diplomacy did start being regulated; there were procedural rules in place to protect diplomats as political negotiation could be extremely difficult at times. Traditional diplomacy did work in the time that it was developed, however after the First World War the global sytem began to change and evolve and new actors and issues would start to emerge on to the global political stage (White, 2005:390).

After WWI, globalization ushered in the dawn of the communications age across most of the world. Morgethau in his book Politics Among Nations actually blames the development of communications for the decline of dimplomacy:

'diplomacy owes its rise in part to the absense of speedy communications in a period when the governments of the new territorial states maintained continuous political relations with each other' (Morgenthau, 1985:569).

I disagree that the advances in communcations technology count for a decline in diplomacy, rather it pushed the nature of diplomacy to change and adapt. Rather than diplomats having to take a ship to a foreign land to discuss territory they can make an appointment over the phone and fly out the same afternoon. Communication also encompasses the internet and media, something which has forced diplomacy to stop being secretive and bilateral into something which can be nothing but open and multilateral. In our post WWI world, we have new actors such as NGO's, inter-governmental organizations as well as MNC's and TNC's that all now play some role as a political agent. We as a society are much more politically active and politically informed (its hard to turn on the tv without hearing a politcal quip from Stephen Fry and I can't seem to watch anything but Mock the Week* past 9pm on Dave - I'm not complaining!). It must also be pointed out that with all these changes since the end of World War I that the interests of states are changing and the need for diplomacy now extends to issues such as environment and humanitarian aid rather than just centering around a states acquisition of land or foreing policy.

Diplomacy no longer has the same meaning it had 200 years ago and this for me is a positive, diplomacy needed to develop in order to be effective in the world we live in now. I acknowledge that there are perhaps times when certain diplomatic negotiations would be more successful if they were kept secret, however this just is not plausible for today's international political system. Perhaps I can give you the single, most significant change in the nature of diplomacy - the answer has to be the end of WWI. The end of WWI sparked the chain of events which led to the evolution of the 'new' diplomacy that we have today.


* I would recommend Mock the Week to anyone who likes a more humerous look at the weeks current events but be warned that the language can be quite coarse!!