Diplomacy

B

1

Organization

A mission is organized into a series of functional sections that observe, report, and deal with issues in their respective areas. Most missions contain sections for political affairs, economic and commercial affairs, information and cultural affairs, consular affairs, and administrative matters. In addition, a mission usually includes a number of attachés from other government departments. Military, air, and naval attachés have traditionally been assigned to foreign missions, but agricultural, commercial, labor, and cultural attachés are becoming increasingly common.

Missions are staffed largely by foreign service officers, with the exception of the attachés who are drawn from their respective agencies back home. The secretaries and clerical staff come from a separate civil service corps. Citizens of the host country may be hired as translators or for nonsensitive jobs.

B

2

Activities

The activities of a diplomatic mission are extremely varied. They range from such serious tasks as negotiating issues of great political significance and reporting and commenting on important events in the foreign country to meeting with foreign students, arranging itineraries of exhibits about life in the home country, and issuing visas.

In addition to their diplomatic and political chores, missions are also in charge of the consular work of the home government. Consular operations are concerned with the economic and commercial relations between nations. Originally, diplomatic and consular chores were kept strictly separate because early theorists felt that national interests should not be “tainted” by private commercial matters. Thus, two separate services—diplomatic and consular—usually existed. Today all major countries have combined these two services, and a single corps of professional civil servants serves in both areas.

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Consular work involves a variety of activities. Consuls issue birth, death, and marriage certificates to citizens residing or traveling in the foreign country. Consular officers also regulate shipping, aid their country's citizens when they travel on business or as tourists, and report on economic and business conditions abroad. Activities are often carried out in consulates located in major trading and commercial cities as well as in the capital city.

C

The Foreign Service

Today, most nations staff their foreign services with career civil servants who are selected on the basis of competitive examinations. Until recent times, however, foreign service personnel were political appointees, often from noble or wealthy families, who could afford the considerable expense that a life of diplomatic activity entailed.

In the 1850s Britain and France instituted competitive examinations for posts in the diplomatic corps, but low salaries restricted the number of persons who could afford to enter the service. In Britain all candidates had to guarantee a personal income of £400 for at least the first two years. The examinations employed by the European powers were extremely difficult, requiring fluency in at least two foreign languages. Since World War II, salaries and allowances have been increased so that persons of all means may enter the diplomatic service.

The spoils system dominated the U.S. Foreign Service until 1924, when the Rogers Act combined the consular and diplomatic services, established difficult competitive examinations for entry into the Foreign Service, and instituted a system of promotion on merit. Each year approximately 25,000 people take the Foreign Service examination; about 250, or 1 percent, pass it and are accepted in the service. About 10,000 persons are in the Foreign Service; some 2000 work in the U.S., and 8000 serve in foreign countries or international organizations.

Although career officers dominate the diplomatic corps, there is usually room for some noncareer personnel. In the United States, for example, highly skilled specialists may be recruited as Foreign Service Reserve officers, although their tenure may be limited to five or ten years.

Many nations appoint distinguished citizens who are not career officers to serve as ambassadors. American administrations have long used ambassadorships in leading countries as political rewards. Usually, however, ambassadors are distinguished men and women from business, law, politics, or academic life. Career officers predominate numerically; in the U.S. about two-thirds of all ambassadors are career diplomats.

IV

Diplomatic Conventions

The modes and conventions of diplomacy are highly stylized and formal. Language always tends toward understatement, and emotion-charged words are taboo. The etiquette and manners of diplomatic meetings are carefully prescribed. The privileges and immunities of diplomats are found in conventions and treaties that have evolved over a long period. Whenever etiquette is breached, a diplomatic “rebuff” occurs. Although this formality and ceremony has an air of make-believe, it serves a practical purpose: It allows diplomats to deal with issues of war and peace in a calm and unemotional manner. In the tense hours of crisis, a cool head, tact, and good humor are necessary.

A

Protocol

Detailed and universally accepted conventions exist concerning most of the formal ways in which countries interact. In the early days of the nation-state system, the departure of an ambassador was a ceremonial event, as was the ambassador's reception by a head of state.

Because ambassadors personally represent the heads of their governments, the relations among ambassadors within a country have always involved issues of prestige. Thus, such details as where an ambassador rode in a procession or which ambassador entered a room first assumed great significance.

Such issues plagued European courts until they were resolved at the Congress of Vienna in 1815 and the Congress of Aix-la-Chapelle in 1818 and, more recently, at the Vienna meetings to draft a Convention on Diplomatic Relations in 1961. As a result of these meetings, diplomats were divided into three classes: (1) ambassadors, legates, and papal nuncios who are always accredited to heads of state; (2) envoys, ministers, and other persons accredited to heads of state; and (3) chargés d'affaires who are accredited to ministers of foreign affairs. Only members of the first class represent their nation's leader. Precedence among representatives in a capital is now based on seniority within its diplomatic corps. The most senior member of that corps is designated the doyen, or dean. The doyen usually represents the entire diplomatic corps at ceremonial functions and in matters of diplomatic privileges and immunities. The most concise digest of the protocol of diplomacy is the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, consisting of 53 short articles completed under UN auspices.