III.

Diplomatic Machinery

The conduct of relations with other countries has three requirements: (1) an establishment in the home country to formulate policy and instruct personnel sent (2) an establishment abroad from which contacts are made in the foreign country; and (3) personnel to make the system work. Over the centuries these three requisites for diplomacy became increasingly professional and bureaucratic. By the 17th and 18th centuries, domestic foreign affairs establishments were fairly well developed. In the 19th century corps of diplomats increasingly were chosen by competitive examinations. Although ambassadors were often selected on a political basis, they found highly professional staffs waiting for them at their embassies abroad, and they dealt with other skilled staffs when they reported to their home offices.

A.

Departments of Foreign Affairs

Government agencies that deal with foreign affairs are usually called the ministry or department of foreign or external affairs. In the U.S., foreign affairs is handled by the Department of State. Such a department is headed by the foreign secretary (or, in the U.S., by the secretary of state). In democracies, the foreign secretary is always a political appointee who is selected by the nation's leader. Drawing on the expertise within the department and its establishments abroad, the secretary advises the head of state on matters of foreign policy, helps formulate and coordinate policy, and administers the agency over which he or she presides. At times, the foreign secretary is also directly involved in negotiations with other nations. A small number of politically appointed undersecretaries and assistant secretaries aid in running the department.

Departments of foreign affairs usually are divided into geographic and functional divisions. The former consists of bureaus for major geographic areas that are then broken down into smaller divisions and, ultimately, into “country desks.” Desk officers are career diplomats who specialize in various aspects of the country to which they are assigned. Instructions to and reports from embassies abroad are handled first by the country desks. The functional division deals with problems or issues that do not appropriately fall under the domain of any one country: trade, international organization, human rights, intelligence, public information, international law, and passports and visas. Coordination of policy between geographic and functional divisions is a continually perplexing problem.

Departments of foreign affairs also have an administrative section that is in charge of running the agency. This section deals with internal matters such as budget allocations, personnel recruitment and management, training, and logistics.

In an age of interdependence and total diplomacy, foreign affairs departments must coordinate their activities with the foreign activities of other government agencies. Treasury departments, for example, are increasingly involved in negotiations over trade and money. Agricultural departments are concerned with foreign trade and world food problems. Defense establishments are involved in supporting foreign governments abroad and training their armed forces. Intelligence agencies provide heads of state with alternate sources of information about other countries. In some cases, a foreign minister has trouble merely keeping informed of all the activities the nation is engaged in abroad.

B.

Foreign Missions

The embassy abroad, or foreign mission, is headed by an ambassador assisted by a career diplomat who serves as deputy or first secretary. The deputy secretary oversees and coordinates the work of the staff and assumes the responsibilities of the mission as chargé d'affaires whenever the ambassador is away or incapacitated or is between ambassadorial assignments.

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.

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.