TyroCity: International Relations

Communication Theory

International Relations — Sun, 18 Aug 2013 05:41:42 +0000

What is Communication?

Transactional, symbolic process which allows people to establish contact, exchange information, reinforces attitudes and behaviors and change attitudes and behaviors.

The core communication model Source – who, Message – says what, Channel – through what channel and Receiver – to whom [with what effect]

Communication is important in our daily lives, but it is not something that we think about very frequently. We use communication to carry on relationships, work in groups and organizations, and understand and affect the world around us. Because communication is so important to us, it is useful to understand something about it.

Communication is a difficult concept to define. Most people do not think about communication much unless they have a problem with it and sometimes not even then. Though we may think we know what communication is, it is difficult to explain. Even people who study this subject disagree about exactly how to define it. Perhaps it is simplest and most useful to discuss communication by identifying its characteristics and what it is used for.

Characteristics of Communication

Process

One characteristic of communication is that it is a process. If you have a conversation with your friend, you might think that it begins when you start talking with your friend and ends when you say good-by. However, this is not really accurate. Communication is influenced by the state of your relationship before the conversation. If, for some reason, you were angry with your friend before the conversation started, this will have an influence on the conversation. Many different aspects of the past can influence a communication event. Your past experiences in a relationship with a person may tell you whether you can believe what that person says, whether you can trust him/her to keep a secret, what topics you can discuss, how much you need to explain.

The type of relationship before the conversation also has an effect on the way people communicate. A conversation with a stranger is very different from a conversation with a close friend. Two friends have common memories and experiences, and this affects the way they communicate. For example, you can say to your friend, “Remember the time we went ice skating?” and your friend would understand what you meant. Speaking to a stranger, much more explanation would be necessary. In some cases, close friends even invent words or uses for words, which they use as part of their private language.

In addition, your relationship after the conversation may change as a result of that very conversation. For example, if your friend apologizes for having made you angry, and you accept the apology, this will influence your future relationship. If you catch your friend in a lie, if he/she keeps a secret or is especially sympathetic over a death in your family, all of these will influence the future of your relationship. Therefore, communication even as simple as a conversation between two friends is influenced by the past and has an influence on the future, and so communication is a process.

The environment in which the communication takes place also influences the process. If you are in a noisy restaurant, you cannot have a serious, private conversation. At certain occasions, there are certain expressions that you should use. For example, at a wedding, you express congratulations and wish the couple happiness.

Two-way process

Another characteristic of communication is that it is a two-way process. For simplicity, people sometimes talk about a “sender” and a “receiver” in communication. However, a sender receives messages as well as sending them, and a receiver sends messages, too. As the sender speaks, he/she adjusts the message, based on the receiver’s reaction. For example, if you are explaining something and your listener looks confused, you will probably try to explain again in a different way or at least ask, “Do you understand?” If you are trying to convince your listener of something and your listener starts nodding, this will influence what you say, because you will assume that now your listener agrees with you. If your listener does not look convinced, you will continue to try to convince him/her, perhaps by giving another reason. Even a situation like public speaking or a television broadcast is, in some sense, two-way communication. If the public speaker senses that the audience is becoming restless, he/she might speak faster or go on to a new point. Though television and radio do not involve an immediate response from the listener, there are responses through letters from listeners and through ratings. As a result of the two-way nature of communication, both the speaker and the listener are responsible for the success of the communication. The listener must indicate whether he/she understands, and the speaker must adjust the message according to the listener’s reactions.

Symbolic

A third characteristic of communication is that it is symbolic. This means that in communication, we use one thing to stand for or represent another. Words are symbols. The word “nuclear bomb” is not the nuclear bomb itself; it is a symbol which represents the nuclear bomb and its position in world politics. Nonverbal communication can also involve symbols. The symbolic nature of communication is very important. If we could not use symbols, we could not talk about objects or people that were not present. We could not talk about events that took place in the past or that would take place in the future. We could not talk about abstract concepts. Therefore, we use symbols to stand for all of these things.

Purposes of Communication

In a general sense, we use communication to achieve our goals. In order to achieve these goals, we use communication for three main purposes.

Human contact is one purpose of communication. It is important for all human beings to have contact with others. Without communication with other people, we can be very lonely.

Controlling our environment is another purpose of communication. We try to get people to do what we want (within limits) or arrange our situation the way we want it (balancing it with the desires of other people in the situation) by communicating. If you are unhappy with something another person is doing, you might complain to that person about that behavior, and you hope to control your environment that way. If you like something another person is doing, you might say so, which encourages the person to repeat or continue the behavior.

A third purpose of communication is exchanging information. Most human activities require us either to give information to others or to get information ourselves. Communication allows us to do this.

As you can see from these three functions, communication is crucial to our daily lives.

Aspects of Communication Study

In the study of communication, the subject is sometimes considered according to the number of people involved in the communication event and the type of communication. There is, for example, interpersonal communication, small group communication, public speaking, organizational communication, and communication through the mass media. Communication can also be considered according to its purpose or method. For example, some specialists study persuasion, compliance gaining, deception detection, nonverbal communication, and interviewing.

Communication Theory

Communication theory, mathematically formulated principally by the American scientist Claude E. Shannon to explain aspects and problems of information and communication. While the theory is not specific in all respects, it proves the existence of optimum programming schemes without showing how to find them. For example, it succeeds remarkably in outlining the engineering requirements of communication systems and the limitations of such systems.

Communication theory attempts to explain all forms of verbal and nonverbal communication between two organisms. A complex model follows: Sender (Government or nation) -> Message -> noise (Reaction of third party in IR) -> channel (Diplomatic mission) -> noise (Reaction) -> receiver (Another actors of IR)-> interpretation -> response (As message) and back to the beginning. There are three general approaches to communication theory:

The meaning of a message is determined by the sender.
The meaning of a message is determined by the receiver.
The meaning of a message is determined by both sender and receiver.

Communication Theory in IR

The Communication theory has been developed in IR mainly by Karl W. Deutsch for understanding the national prospect. It has been applied to international politics and international relation by Charles A. McClelland and others.

The Communication Theory reduces the importance of the concept of Power in politics/relation and highlights the importance of the flow of information in governmental decisions.

The Communication Theory attempts to give significance and meaning to the revolution in communications which has extremely changed the nature of human contacts and social relations, to a greater or lesser degree in all parts of the world. This is also being applicable to the world community as well as actors of the international relations; we can understand the situation of world politics by study of the communication strategy and condition. As per this theory the conflicts will arise as a result of breakdown the system of communication established by the state government.

Communication has indeed transformed human relations as well as relations between states to a much greater extent than any other development. The Communication System has undoubtedly increased interdependence of international community agency like the UN much easier.

This system lays stress on the point that if politics is visualize as a system, the control of the system will centered in communication and ability of a state to control is related to its ability to deal with information. As developed by scholar Norbert Wiener and others, the term “Communications” has come to include the concept of “Cybernetics”(steering). Cybernetics is fundamentally a body of theory and technique for the study of probabilities in different but related international relation as well as nation-state and the ways in which message transactions functions to control such relations.

An important concept in cybernetics is that of a mechanism which recognizes incentive, learns, adjust itself automatically upon receiving feedback about its performance, and moves through a determined number of possible circumstances.

Scholar W. Ross Ashby, who is regarded as the pioneer of this system, refers that, when applying the word “Cybernetics” to the international politics, the term is renamed “Political Cybernetics”.

According the scholar Karl Deutsch the system of political Communications offers a model that seems far more manipulable than most actual operations; it often seems to discount irrational, unintentional, or random behaviour, and above all, it does not deal adequately with the nuances of human thought process, the sub-societies of political leadership, and vague quality of many political relations.

International Communication:

The terms ‘international,’ ‘transnational’ and ‘global’ communication not only stand for different definitions of an expanding communication space but also reflect the history of worldwide communication as well as its diversity to maintain the relations between national actors. Global communication gives us an eyewitness view of events in remotest locations, we participate in political discourses of global, regional or even local relevance. These global processes, in which knowledge, values and ethics, natural things, lifestyles are exchanged, is becoming autonomous, a ‘third culture’, a ‘generative frame of unity within which diversity can take place (Featherstone, 1990:2). Such a ‘global world culture’ is shaped by – communication.

However, international communication has its own history. News have already been ‘inter-nationalized’ in the fifteenth century: the wheat traders of Venice, the silver traders of Antwerp, the merchants of Nuremberg and their trading partners shared economic newsletters and created common values and beliefs in the rights of capital (Stephens, 1988:77). The commercialization of mass print media (due to steam engine technology) has led to internationally operating news agencies (Reuters, Associated Press, AFP) in the nineteenth century. World wire and cable systems allowed international communication between France, Germany and Great Britain to their colonies in Africa and Asia. Transnational media organizations such as Intelsat, Eurovision, founded in the middle of the 20th century were the starting point for a new idea of international communication. It was the establishment of internationally operating media systems, such as CNN and MTV by individual companies which have finally inaugurated a new age of global communication by distributing the same program “around the world in thirty minutes” (as a CNN slogan states) – across nations and cultures.

It was idea of a ‘world society’ as a universe of nature and reasoning, a global arena for public debate during the Enlightenment which has inaugurated modernity. Postmodern thinkers replaced ‘reasoning’ by ‘simulation’ and Hegel’s term of ‘World Spirit’ by an idea of ‘instant’ truth, created by the media and conveying the image of a shrinking world. The idea of the ‘world’ seemed to have switched from a supernatural concept into a material reality a new relativity within a global whole and activated, in conjunction with new international political and economical alliances, a debate about the structuralisation of “Globalization.”

It can be argued that the public (and its opinion) is no longer a substantial element of the political system of a society but has turned into a more or less autonomous global public sphere which can be considered not as a space between the ‘public’ and the state but between the state and an extra-societal global community. It is a new global dialectic not in Hegel’s terms between private and public spheres, which gave shape to democracy concepts of the emerging middle classes in Europe in the 19th century, but between the societal and extra societal communication sphere, giving shape to the concept of ‘Being in the World’ of a world citizenship or – in its totality of a ‘global civil society’.

The influence of CNN which has internationally role of a global authority has been widely underestimated. The Internet, as an icon of a globalize media world, with around 200 million people globally ‘being online’ (whatever this means) seems to finally speed up this development.

In such an environment, ‘the international information order’ conventional patterns of international communication (of North/South, developing and developed, central and peripheral nations) are becoming obsolete. International communication theory, modeled in the age of modernization (mainly around push technologies) reveals the imbalance in global media images and description, analyses media imperialism of global accumulate of information, investigates cultural effects of ‘main-streaming’ through internationally transmitted media productions, analyses the varying role played by news media in times of international crisis. Only a few, very recent approaches in cultural studies and sociology, interpret global media flow by a new globalized perspective which interprets arising new communication segments within the global context of inter-relating communication structures and options, highlighting a new effects on a diversified global culture.

The strategy of international communication theory should be to develop a methodology for the understanding of ‘particular’ interpretations, meanings, relevance of the global public sphere, to detect the specifics of this communication space for different world regions – in times of peace and times of crisis.

One example of the global public sphere in a (mass) distribution satellite age of the late eighties, the Internet opens the view for new developments. The western view of a universal global sphere and of the Internet as a globalize medium is therefore a myth. For this reason, a closer analysis of the different world regions in their Internet use (and their idea of a global public sphere) is important. A global analysis of the global diversity of the relevance of the Internet in different media cultures is another example of attempting to understand the specific use of the global public sphere in various world regions. The determination of a specifc profile helps to understand different attitudes and perceptions of this global sphere and the medium of the Internet. I propose to characterize these environments in light of overall media structures in order to determine specific Internet profiles within the overall media setting. Based on this model, five environments can be identified:

Spillover Environment: this environment can be identified by a low level of technical infrastructure. It is located within or on the border of relay satellite footprints of major media environments. The term “spillover” relates to this relay function of major satellite, to ‘footprint’ a center and a spillover zone. Spillover zones are many African regions (spillover from European footprints), Asian and South American territories, also Yukon Territory in Alaska.
State-regulated limited access: countries where governments practice censorship over domestic news media, but minimal control over international (commercial) programming (Star TV case in India).
Post communist transition: Push-mass media (TV) are in these societies undergoing the transition from communism toward democracy. This environment can be characterized by an ill-defined legal situation, a still vivid history of socialist media policy and a commercial market in which international and domestic broadcasters exist alongside various unlicensed local and regional stations (Russia and former USSR states).
Pluralist Environment: Characterization of this environment are basic media regulation. Furthermore, media are regarded as commercial enterprises (USA).
Dualist Environment: This environment can be identified by a parallelism of public service and internationally operating commercial channels, a parallelism of media as cultural and commercial enterprises, where international channels are ‘localized’ by domestic programs (CNN and NTV, MTV and VIVA). Media and telecommunication are state regulated, expensive and therefore Internet development is slow.

State-regulated, limited international communication environment

Within this environment, an important issue is reciprocal communication. In such a restricted context, where access to communication infrastructure is extremely limited and closely monitored, web sites that allow true interactivity and information exchange have been set up outside the region. Because the Internet’s program flow is global, websites dealing with domestic Chinese issues (in Tibet) are located anywhere (mainly in the pluralist environment US). One of these sites, the Digital Freedom Network, publishes the writings of Chinese political prisoners and monitors human rights abuse not only in China but also in Burma and Bangladesh. Another type of reciprocal communication is the use of the Internt by political minorities or opposition groups within a restricted media environment (Singapore, Malaysia).

The meaning of globalization and of global communication is not similar, but different in various world regions. As system theorists assert, growing density and complexity of communication are the sign of a growing ‘world community.’ To understand the new global sphere, its autonomy, independency and ist ‘mediation’ will support the transition into a world community in the 21st century.

Types of diplomacy

International Relations — Sun, 18 Aug 2013 05:41:42 +0000

Democratic Diplomacy:
It is now believed that as power resides in the people and it is exercised by the representatives chosen by and accountable to the people, the work of foreign policy-making and its implementation should be carried on according to the will of the people. Not only that, due importance should be attached to the weight of public opinion. Whatever is done by the President or the Prime Minister or the Foreign Minister or the professional diplomats should be known to the people. Crucial matters should be discussed and deliberated in the legislature and there should be a free press in the country to make them known to the common people. It is based on the assumption that ‘national interest’ is safer in the hands of the public rather than in the hands of some elite group, no matter how well skilled in the art of negotiation the latter might be. If the head of the state or of the government or his representative signs a treaty with any other state or states, it should be subject to ratification by the legislature in order to be valid. Thus, the American Senate was justified in rejecting the Treaty of Versailles signed by President Wilson at Paris in 1919. A wrong step taken by a Foreign Minister (as Sir Samuel Hoare of Britain or Madhavsinh Solanki of India) would invite serious criticism in the Parliament and be the cause of his exit from the government. In Nepalese context we can take the examples of TANAKPUR and PANCHESHWOR Treaty and conflict within the political parties as well as in people. Thus, the making and implementation of the foreign policy should be under the popular check. It is true that this kind of diplomacy invites certain ‘dangers’. The people in general are ignorant and they are not capable of exercising control over the role of professional and skilled diplomats. It is likely that the exposure of each diplomatic effort would put the diplomats in a very awkward situation. It is also possible that the operation of diplomacy on such a manner would suffer from the evils of delay and impulsion. However, these weaknesses may be removed if the people in general are politically develop.

Totalitarian Diplomacy:
It is more or less a duplication of traditional or close diplomacy. In a fascist or in a communist system, the chief-leader of the country is the sole maker of foreign policy and it is implemented according to his will that is supported and sustained by his clique of government. The operation of diplomacy is done according to the principles of a particular ‘ideology’ and any consideration of international peace and security is set aside as may be seen in the. Matters are not taken to the parliament for a free and frank discussion and there is strict censorship over the publication of news. Imperialism and war are glorified and the rulers of such a state frankly condemn peace as the dream of the cowards. Mao of China branded all ‘capitalist’ states of the world as ‘paper tigers’. Surprisingly, the diplomats of a totalitarian state invoke fantastic doctrines of racial superiority, mysticism, materialism and militarism for furtherance of their aims. The diplomats become agents of conquest, double-dealing, and spying, whose business is not to work for peaceful international relations but to provoke disagreement rather than understanding to make the leaders and peoples of other nations weak and blind and divided in the face of the growing totalitarian threaten. The object of Totalitarian Diplomacy “is thoroughly calculated to create and maintain bad relations within the world politics and relation.

Personal or Summit Diplomacy:
The direct participation of the heads of great powers (with their ministers or confidants) to sort out matters or to arrive at crucial decisions makes the case of summit or personal diplomacy. It has become increasingly common since the days of the World War II as war time conferences. Major and fateful decisions affecting the whole course of war and the post-war international order were made during the several personal meetings between Prime Minister Churchill of Britain and President Roosevelt of the United States with which Prime Minister Stalin of the USSR and Chinese Prime Minister was associated afterwards. The making of the Atlantic Charter (1941) is the first instance in this regard. The Tehran Conference of Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin followed by the Yalta meet of 1943 are other important instances. These were followed by the Potsdam Conference of July-August 1945. These meetings prepared the ground for the creation of the United Nations. The Yalta Conference attended by the President of the United States and the Prime Ministers of Britain, France and the USSR solved the tangled problem of peace in Europe. Reference may be made to a number of non-aligned conferences from the Belgrade meet of 1961. The Camp David negotiations of 1959 between American President Eisenhower and the Soviet Prime Minister Khrushchev softened relations between the two superpowers to the point that one could trace a hint of growing cold war between the USSR and Communist China. The Camp David meet of 1978 hosted by the President of the United States and attended by the President of Egypt and the Prime Minister of Israel tackled the issue of peace in the Middle East. In the 1980s such meetings between the Presidents of the US and the USSR cemented the situation of detente signifying steady curtailment of the cold war. Sometimes personal diplomacy is short-circuited by the role of the most trusted agents or assistants of the heads of the states as we may see in Nixon’s reliance on Kissinger and Yahya Khan’s dependence on Bhutto of Pakistan. Frequent movements of such a trusted representative from one place to another with a particular mission make the case of ‘shuttle diplomacy’.

Other Diplomacy
i)Commercial or Economic Diplomacy: Also known by the names of ‘bourgeois’ or ‘civilian’ diplomacy, it resembles the diplomacy of the merchants and the shopkeepers. It is based on the prescription that a compromise settlement between the rivals through negotiations is generally more profitable than their complete destruction. Through negotiations and by agreeing to give mutual concessions some durable understanding may be reached. Here money plays a decisive part as an essential element of national interest. As every state attempts to increase its economic resources through pacific means, it is also known by the name of economic diplomacy. The line of distinction between politics and economics is unclear and since all focus is laid on trade or commerce, non-state agencies or organized business. The agents of such commercial organizations manage to have half-official and half-mercantile status. We may take note of the fact of the entry of foreign capital into poor and backward countries where the multinational corporations are not only producing and selling their finished goods but also undertaking works as construction of roads and bridges, laying of railway lines, installation of power-generating plants etc. The giving of financial assistance by the rich countries to the poor countries has created a new form of colonialism that is nicknamed as ‘dollar imperialism’. This kind of diplomacy may also be seen in the imposition of economic sanctions by a rich and powerful country on a poor and backward country of the world.
ii) Resource Diplomacy: Nature has blessed all countries with certain natural and mineral resources like oil, coal, iron, gold, uranium, etc. If a country is strong and developed, it makes best possible use of its resources. In case it is poor and backward, it becomes the victim of colonial exploitation. But a number of such countries may form an organization and thereby dictate their terms on those who need their resources. The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) is considering one of the best examples for this purpose. The oil is used by the Arab states as an instrument and the term ‘oil diplomacy’ thus comes into popularity. Oil is nicknamed as ‘black gold’ or ‘liquid gold’ and it is true, who captures the oil, captures the power of the world in the present context.

Factors Determining International Relations

International Relations — Sun, 18 Aug 2013 05:41:42 +0000

The Geographic Factor: The location of a State on this planet, its climate and size are such factors which influence its foreign policy in relation to other States. There are numerous authorities who have advocated that the foreign policy of a State is determined by the geography of that state i.e., the geographical position of a State determines its foreign policy. The geographical position of a nation is the principal factor conditioning its foreign policy – the principal reason why it must have a foreign policy at all. As for instance “the geographical factors have been decisive for the course of British history and explain, just as they dictated the main principles of British policy and the pre-occupation of British statement”. (Sir A Chamberlain’s view). If the geographical position of a country is sound, and its climate is healthy, if it is rich in food-stuffs and raw materials, it must follow an independent foreign policy. The geographical position and historical developments are such determining factors of foreign policy of a country that regardless of changes in the form of government, the foreign policy of a country has a natural tendency to return again and again to the same general and fundamental alignment. As for instance, if a state is strategically situated having natural barriers like seas, mountains, terrains, deserts etc., it is not ordinarily vulnerable to foreign invasions. Such strategically situated country follows independent foreign policy in relation to other States.
If a country lacks in all these geographical factors, it has to look to the other States and has to follow the course of the neighboring States in her relation with them. It cannot follow an independent foreign policy, of its own. Thus it is clear that a country which has unfavorable geographical positions cannot be able to keep itself isolated from the events happening in its neighboring countries. The typical example of strategically situated country is that of Great Britain which is surrounded by seas on all sides and the English Channel serves as the most effective barrier to foreign invasion of British Isles due to the fact of which Great Britain remains secure and continues to be a great power. Quite similar is the position of the United States of America. Its geographically isolated position on this globe has brought power and strength to it that it became able to compete Great Britain.

Economic Factors: The economic factors hold a key-plate in affecting the relation of a State with the rest of the world. The chief elements of economic factors which determine the position of a country in relation to other states are (i) its self-sufficiency and (ii) its capacity to provide food, clothing and shelters to its population. Since nature has unevenly distributed its wealth all over the world, no country can claim that it is wholly economically self-sufficient and thus a great power.
A State may be purely agrarian or agricultural being rich in its raw materials and food-stuffs only but lack in mineral resources as coal, iron etc. and hence such States cannot be industrially advanced. Again a State may be rich in mineral resources which can establish huge centers of production and hence they may be industrially advanced states. Again there is the third category of States which may be styled as the balanced States capable of producing enough food for their population and establishing industries out of the resources available within their territories, such as Great Britain, the U.S.A. and the Soviet Union. But they also cannot pretend to be self-sufficient because they have to depend upon other States for import of raw-materials without which their industries cannot run successfully. Thus the so-called balanced States becoming able to exert influence on other States and become big powers in course of time. Whether it is the case of Great Britain, or of the United States or of the Soviet Union or of China, the story is the same. Just as the huge supplies of raw materials and natural resources are essential for a country for becoming a big power, a large population is also essential for bringing about greater industrial and agricultural output as well as for raising a powerful army and navy. The great development in China is an illustration on this point which has become one of the Five Big Powers of the world and very recently has taken its seat in the 15 members-Security Council of the United Nations. By population alone cannot make a country strong if it goes on increasing day by day without a corresponding increase in production. The case of India is a leading one on this point.

If a country does not control the increase in its population corresponding to the increase in its production it must look for some other territories to accommodate its increased expansionist policy. Japan invaded Manchuria with this motive; China occupied Tibet for similar ambition, Germany clashed with the Allied Powers with the same motive.

Demographic factor: The demographic factor – (a) the size of the population and (b) ethnic circumstances, also affect the international affairs to a great deal. A nation becomes great and powerful if it has both a growing large population and efficient industrial production. The Soviet Union and the U.S.A. are treated to be big powers only because they have large population and a market industrial development. In contrast to the above two countries, our country though having a large population has not become great power only because it has not been industrially so advanced as to satisfy its needs. Thus the size of the population and equally the huge and efficient industrial production determine the existence to which a nation can claim have an independent foreign policy of its own. Thus the size of population contributes to the weakness of the country. Greater the size more weak economic position is of a country.
Another demographic factor is the ethnic circumstances of a nation. Those countries having a single race or nationality have no internal problems to solve. Such countries are quite free to pursue an independent foreign policy but the countries which have various races or nationalities are bound to face numerous internal problems. The recent split of Pakistan into Pakistan proper and Bangladesh is due to the fact that Pakistan is composed of several racial groups. Though we find that India is composed of several racial groups but the constitution of this country has solved the internal problems of India and there is no likelihood of this country being split up into different entities. The case of India serves an example in that despite diversities there is unity.

Strategic factors: The military strategy of a country is another important factor to determine the foreign policy because is closely connected with the national security of the country. If a country has effective protective natural barriers, it seldom worries about its security, as for instance British Isles and Japan. These countries are surrounded by oceans on all sides and they enjoy the position of islands. Thus the natural barriers of these countries have afforded protection from foreign aggression. Since they are surrounded by oceans on all sides, they have become able to have strong navy to safeguard their frontiers from foreign attacks. This is the main reason that they are considered as great naval powers. Besides seas and ocean, mountains, rivers, snow, deserts, swamps and forests play significant roles in safeguarding the territories of countries.
The Soviet Union and Switzerland are among the few countries which have the most secured frontiers. Both of these countries play important roles in their international affairs as they are strengthened by the most effective protective natural barriers. Distance is another factor influencing the foreign affairs of country. Countries which are isolated from the disturbed areas of the world due to distance, remain actually unaffected by the U.S.A. on the globe serves an example in this respect which remained unaffected by the disturbances taking at some distant places. Thus the distance of a country from the centers of trouble spots is an important factors governing the strategic problems of that country.

Additional Factors:

The historical-psychological, sociological factors: If a country has its bold history, and its people are ready to sacrifice their blood for their motherland, its moral shall always be high. The future of a country cannot be assessed well if we do not study its to day’s affairs in light of the yesterday’s history. No country can pursue an independent foreign policy if the morale of its people is not high and their national character is not strong enough. Such elements are necessary for adopting an independent policy by any country or nation.

The organizational and administrative factor: This factor constitutes the form of the government within a political society and the attitude of the people towards it. Many of majority of foreign issues can be decided by the sound governmental organization, efficient public administration of a country. A government which has strong support from its people lasts long and becomes efficient with lapse of time and becomes also able to deal with the foreign affairs peacefully. Thus, general support of the government and the efficient administration are very important factors for the formulation of sound foreign policy.

The Military factor: Last but not the least significant factors is the military factor which determines the foreign relations of a country. This factor is considered from various aspects, e.g., size of the armed forces, quality and morale of army men, quantity and variety of weapons and equipments which determine the foreign relations also.

Propaganda and Diplomacy

International Relations — Sun, 18 Aug 2013 05:41:42 +0000

The usefulness of the instrument of propaganda is now recognized by all the states of the world. But it assumed a significance of its own in the age of cold war. The foreign policy maker paid due attention to the role of propaganda and the diplomats had to perform and execute their job by sailing on winds of propaganda. A study related on propaganda and diplomacy has shown recent year’s development that diplomacy is spread through by propaganda which is contained in communications sent form one government to the other in notes, request, protests, publication, demands for apologies, declarations, official speeches and the like. Sometime, official declaration made for propaganda purposes have their own impact upon the diplomatic bargaining. Whether such declarations should be treated as sincere commitments or not, is verified by the events that occur afterwards. In most of the cases it is found that such declarations are just meant for creating propaganda.

In the time of fascism, propaganda is considering one of the essential parts of the official ideology. The fascist’s official agencies create mass hysteria by means of propaganda to enthuse people so as to deify the authority of the supreme leader. New slogans and symbols like Mussolini’s fasces and Hitler’s Swastik are used to inspire the people to take part in a life of do or die for ht cause. Badges and fancy uniforms are distributed among the soldiers and other paramilitary forces to inculcate a feeling of importance and status.

In this age of democratic diplomacy, propaganda has become very important for the obvious reason that more and more people are becoming participants in the process of diplomacy. Besides, the advanced means of communications are creating a host of serious problems for the diplomats. The days are gone when the foreign affairs were considered to be a matter of specialized study and their conduct was left to the experts. A common man was entirely ignorant of the process of politics in the national or international affairs. Now the elements of propaganda have entered into the world of diplomacy and diplomacy is sometimes dominate by the propaganda.

Wartime Propaganda

Massive modern propaganda techniques began with World War I (1914-1918). From the beginning of the war, both German and British propagandists worked hard to win sympathy and support in the United States. A Ministry of Information was set up, as it had been during the First World War, which employed film directors, actors and entertainers throughout the war. When war broke out in September 1939, the British Government was very aware of the importance of propaganda. That is to say, providing information about the way the war was going trying to make sure that people obeyed the regulations and restrictions that were imposed by the government and keeping up people’s morale. The approach of World War II in 1939 brought many changes of using media too. To counter the propaganda being broadcast by Germany and Italy, the British government asked the BBC to offer services in Arabic and Spanish, and agreed to pay the additional costs required.

German propagandists appealed to the many Americans of German descent and to those of Irish descent who were traditionally hostile to Great Britain. Soon, however, Germany was virtually cut off from direct access to the United States. Thereafter British propaganda had little competition in the United States, and it was conducted more skillfully than that of the Germans. Once engaged in the war, the United States organized the Committee on Public Information, an official propaganda agency, to mobilize American public opinion. This committee proved highly successful, particularly in the sale of Liberty Bonds. The exploitation by the Allies of President Woodrow Wilson’s Fourteen Points, which seemed to promise a just peace for both the victors and the defeated, contributed greatly toward crystallizing opposition within the Central Powers to continuation of the war.

After World War I propaganda achieved great importance as an instrument of national policy in the totalitarian state. Germany, Italy, Japan, and the Soviet Union deliberately molded public opinion through government propaganda agencies. In Germany, Adolf Hitler established the extremely powerful ministry of propaganda headed by Paul Joseph Goebbels. Completely dominating all public statement in Germany, this agency activates the so-called war of nerves. Before each new aggressive move by Germany; for example, against Czechoslovakia in 1938, the German press and radio publicized alleged evidence of persecution of German minorities in the victim country. Incidents were manufactured and exploited to justify German intervention, and the German war machine was depicted as invincible. The technique proved effective in dividing populations, weakening the power of the victim to resist, and causing its allies to hesitate. As the European crisis intensified, German agents in France spread propaganda of defeatism. Through books, pamphlets, and venal newspapers and in the legislature and the army, they encouraged dissatisfaction with the government, distrust of allies, and fear of German military power. These divisive efforts hastened the collapse of French resistance when the German army finally struck in May 1940.

The propaganda aspects of World War II were similar to those of World War I, except that the war was greater in scope. In the 1930s the United States and Germany engaged in a propaganda war leading up to World War II. Radio played a major role, and propaganda activities overseas were more intense. Both Germany and the United Kingdom again sought to persuade American opinion. German propagandists played on anti-British sentiment, represented the war as a struggle against communism, and pictured Germany as the unbeatable champion of a new order in world affairs. German agents also gave their support to movements in the United States that supported isolationism. German propaganda efforts again proved ineffective, especially after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor; the evidence of German aggression was too clear, and American sympathies were increasingly on the side of the United Kingdom. After the United States entered the war, the Axis powers sought to weaken the morale of the Allied armed forces and civilian populations by radio propaganda. The British traitor (conspirator) William Joyce broadcast from Germany under the sardonic name “Lord Haw Haw”; the American poet Ezra Pound broadcast for the Fascist cause from Italy; U.S. forces in the South Pacific became familiar with the voice of Iva Ikuko Toguri D’Aquino, a native Californian of Japanese descent, who broadcast from Japan as “Tokyo Rose.”

Allied propaganda efforts were aimed at separating the peoples of the Axis nations from their governments, which were solely blamed for the war. Radio broadcasts and leaflets dropped from the air carried Allied propaganda to the enemy. The official U.S. propaganda agencies during World War II were the Office of War Information (OWI), charged with disseminating information at home and abroad, and the Office of Strategic Service (OSS), charged with conducting psychological warfare against the enemy. At Supreme Headquarters in the European theater of operations, the OWI and OSS were coordinated with military activities by the Psychological Warfare Division.

Cold –War Propaganda

In the period of the Cold War, a marked conflict of interests between the United States and the Soviet Union following World War II, propaganda continued to be a significant instrument of national policy. Both Democratic and Communist blocs of states attempted by sustained campaigns to win to their side the great masses of uncommitted peoples to achieve their objectives without resorting to armed conflict. Every aspect of national life and policy was exploited for purposes of propaganda. The Cold War was also marked by the use of defectors, trials, and confessions for propaganda purposes.

In this propaganda war the Communist nations seemed initially to have a distinct advantage. Because their governments controlled all media, they could largely seal off their peoples from Western propaganda. At the same time, the highly centralized governments could plan elaborate propaganda campaigns and mobilize resources to carry out their plans. They could also count on aid from Communist parties and sympathizers in other countries. Democratic states, on the other hand, could neither prevent their peoples from being exposed to Communist propaganda nor mobilize all their resources to counter it. This apparent advantage for Communist governments eroded during the 1980s, as communications technology advanced. Inability to control the spread of information was a major factor in the breakdown of many Communist regimes in Eastern Europe at the end of the decade.

The United States Information Agency (USIA), established in 1953 to conduct propaganda and cultural activities abroad, operates the Voice of America, a radio network that carries news and information about the United States in more than 40 languages to all parts of the world. In 1978 USIA functions were taken over by the International Communication Agency; its name was changed back to the U.S. Information Agency in 1982. In 1967 it was revealed that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) had for many years covertly supported numerous American and foreign labor, student, and political organizations, such as Radio Free Europe, the efforts of which benefited U.S. foreign policies.

The Soviet Responses to Truman Doctrine and Marshall Plan:

International Relations — Sun, 18 Aug 2013 05:41:42 +0000

In response to the Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan, which the Soviets saw as a concerted effort to encircle them, Stalin organized the Informational Bureau of Communist Parties (Cominform) in September 1947.

This was an effort to unify communist parties around the world and to put up a united front against capitalist aggression.

In January 1949, the Soviets organized the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (Comecon), a Russian version of the Marshall Plan designed to aid Eastern Europe in postwar reconstruction.

It was also used to bind together the economies of the Soviet bloc, all under Moscow’s strict supervision.

Current activities and positions

International Relations — Sun, 18 Aug 2013 05:41:42 +0000

Criticism of US policy

In recent years the US has become a target of the organization. The US invasion of Iraq and the War on Terrorism, its attempts tostifle Iran and North Korea’s nuclear plans, and its other actions have been denounced as human rights violations and attempts to run roughshod over the sovereignty of smaller nations. The movement’s leaders have also criticized the American control over the United Nations and other international structures. While the organization has rejected terrorism, it condemns the association of terrorism with a particular religion, nationality, or ethnicity, and recognizes the rights of those struggling against colonialism and foreign occupation.

Anti-Zionism

NAM’s Havana Declaration of 1979adopted anti-Zionism as part of the movement’s agenda. The movement has denounced Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. It has called upon Israel to halt its settlement activities, open up border crossings, and cease the use of force and violence against civilians. The UN has also been asked to pressure Israel and to do more to prevent human rights abuses.

Sustainable development

The movement is publicly committed to the tenets of sustainable development and the attainment of the Millennium Development Goals, but it believes that the international community has not created conditions conducive to development and has infringed upon the right to sovereign development by each member state. Issues such as globalization, the debt burden, unfair trade practices, the decline in foreign aid, donor conditionalities, and the lack of democracy in international financial decision-making are cited as factors inhibiting development.

Reforms of the UN

The Non-Aligned Movement has been quite outspoken in its criticism of current UN structures and power dynamics, mostly in how the organization has been utilized by powerful states in ways that violate the movement’s principles. It has made a number of recommendations that would strengthen the representation and power of ‘non-aligned’ states. The proposed reforms are also aimed at improving the transparency and democracy of UN decision-making. The UN Security Council is the element considered the most distorted, undemocratic, and in need of reshaping.

South-south cooperation

Lately the Non-Aligned Movement has collaborated with other organizations of the developing world, primarily the Group of 77, forming a number of joint committees and releasing statements and document representing the shared interests of both groups. This dialogue and cooperation can be taken as an effort to increase the global awareness about the organization and bolster its political clout.

Cultural diversity and human rights

The movement accepts the universality of human rights and social justice, but fiercely resists cultural homogenization. In line with its views on sovereignty, the organization appeals for the protection of cultural diversity, and the tolerance of the religious, socio-cultural, and historical particularities that define human rights in a specific region.

Working groups, task forces, committees

High-Level Working Group for the Restructuring of the United Nations
Working Group on Human Rights
Working Group on Peace-Keeping Operations
Working Group on Disarmament
Committee on Palestine
Task Force on Somalia
Non-Aligned Security Caucus
Standing Ministerial Committee for Economic Cooperation
Joint Coordinating Committee (chaired by Chairman of G-77 and Chairman of NAM)

Contemporary relevance
Since the end of the Cold War and the formal end of colonialism, the Non-aligned movement has been forced to redefine itself and reinvent its purpose in the current world system. A major question has been whether many of its foundational ideologies, principally national independence, territorial integrity, and the struggle against colonialism and imperialism, can be applied to contemporary issues. The movement has emphasized its principles of multilateralism, equality, and mutual non-aggression in attempting to become a stronger voice for the global South, and an instrument that can be utilized to promote the needs of member nations at the international level and strengthen their political leverage when negotiating with developed nations. In its efforts to advance Southern interests, the movement has stressed the importance of cooperation and unity amongst member states, but as in the past, cohesion remains a problem since the size of the organization and the divergence of agendas and allegiances present the ongoing potential for fragmentation. While agreement on basic principles has been smooth, taking definitive action vis-à-vis particular international issues has been rare, with the movement preferring to assert its criticism or support rather than pass hard-line resolutions. The movement continues to see a role for itself, as in its view, the world’s poorest nations remain exploited and marginalized, no longer by opposing superpowers, but rather in a uni-polar world, and it is Western hegemony and neo-colonialism that that the movement has really re-aligned itself against. It opposes foreign occupation, interference in internal affairs, and aggressive unilateral measures, but it has also shifted to focus on the socio-economic challenges facing member states, especially the inequalities manifested by globalization and the implications of neo-liberal policies. The non-aligned movement has identified economic underdevelopment, poverty, and social injustices as growing threats to peace and security.

Definition and Nature of Diplomacy

International Relations — Sun, 18 Aug 2013 05:41:42 +0000

Diplomacy

Diplomacy, practices and institutions by which nations conduct their relations with one another. Originally, the English term diplomatic referred to the care and evaluation of official papers or archives, many of which were treaties. In the 18th century diplomatic documents increasingly meant those pertaining to international relations, and the term diplomatic corps was used to signify the body of ambassadors and officials attached to foreign missions. In 1796 the British philosopher Edmund Burke criticizes the French for their “double diplomacy” during the Napoleonic Wars; since then the term diplomacy has been associated with international politics and foreign policy.

The term “diplomacy” refers to the interaction between nation-states. Traditionally, diplomacy was carried out by government officials–diplomats–who negotiated treaties, trade policies, and other international agreements. The process of negotiations ranges from very formal to informal, but it tends to be fairly adversarial and competitive, relying on distributive or positional bargaining strategies that assume a win-lose situation.

In simple terms, Diplomacy means the management of the international relations by negotiations; it is also the method by which these relations are carefully and intelligently adjusted and maintained. Diplomacy is the art of representing a nation’s national interests abroad, through the use of peaceful measures Diplomacy is the application of intelligence and tact to the conduct of official relations between the governments of independent states.

Diplomacy as an art of maintaining organized relations among the states is obviously, the foundation of state craft. Diplomacy also refers the skillful conduction of the relation between States. The main purpose of diplomacy is to avoid a condition of conflict or war to the last possible extent, but if war breaks out, diplomacy assumes a different form for the sake of protecting and promoting the “National Interest” of a state. The following implications may be drawn from what we have said above about the meaning and nature of diplomacy:

Diplomacy is the art of conducting negotiations with other states of the world so as to remove or narrow down the areas of disagreements and misunderstandings and thereby maintaining good relations as far as possible.
These negotiations are conducted to protect and promote “National Interest”. For this purpose foreign policy is formulated by the government and that will be implemented through the diplomats.
Maintenance of the peace without injuring the interest of the state is a major objective of diplomacy.
Diplomacy is the applied form of foreign policy. Hence, there should be no conflict or contradiction between what the foreign policy makers affirm and what the professional diplomats do.
Modern diplomacy is closely related to the state system; it is inseparably bound to inter state representation.
Diplomacy is a key concept in world politics. It refers to a process of communication and negotiation between states and other international actors
Diplomacy began in the ancient world but took on a recognizably modern form from the fifteenth century onwards with the establishment of the permanent embassy.
By the end of the nineteenth century all states had a network of embassies abroad linked to foreign departments at home. Diplomacy had also become an established profession.

Diplomacy and Foreign Policy:

Diplomacy plays a key role in the foreign policies of states and other international actors
A diplomatic ‘machinery’ (minimally a foreign department and overseas representation) may be highly developed or fundamentally depending upon the actor but it performs important functions in the making and the implementation of foreign policy
Diplomacy involves persuading other actors to do (or not to do) what you want (don’t want) them to do. To be effective, diplomacy may need to be supplemented by other instruments, but negotiating skills are central to the art of diplomacy.
Diplomacy combined with other instruments (military, economic etc.) is called mixed diplomacy. Here, diplomacy becomes a communications channel through which the use or threatened use of other instruments is transmitted to other parties.
Diplomacy usually has comparative advantages over other instrument in terms of availability and cost.
In complex, multilateral negotiations, diplomacy has become less an art form and more a management process reflecting high levels of interdependence between nation societies.

The United Nations, with its headquarters in New York City, is the largest international diplomatic organization.

Diplomacy is the art and practice of conducting negotiations between representatives of groups or states. It usually refers to international diplomacy, the conduct of international relations through the intercession of professional diplomats with regard to issues of peace-making, trade, war, economics and culture. International treaties are usually negotiated by diplomats prior to endorsement by national politicians.

The word stems from the Greek word “diploma”, which literally means ‘folded in two’. In ancient Greece, a diploma was a certificate certifying completion of a course of study, typically folded in two. In the days of the Roman Empire, the word “diploma” was used to describe official travel documents, such as passports and passes for imperial roads, that were stamped on double metal plates. Later, the meaning was extended to cover other official documents such as treaties with foreign tribes. In the 1700s the French called their body of officials attached to foreign legations the corps “diplomatique”. The word “diplomacy” was first introduced into the English language by Edmund Burke in 1796, based on the French word “diplomatie”.

In an informal or social sense, diplomacy is the employment of tact to gain strategic advantage or to find mutually acceptable solutions to a common challenge, one set of tools being the phrasing of statements in a non-confrontational, or polite manner.

Diplomats and diplomatic missions

A diplomat is someone involved in diplomacy; the collective term for a group of diplomats from a single country who reside in another country is a diplomatic mission. Ambassador is the most senior diplomatic rank; a diplomatic mission headed by an ambassador is known as an embassy, with the exception of permanent missions at the United Nations, the Organization of American States, or other multilateral organizations, which are also headed by ambassadors. The collective body of all diplomats of particular country is called that country’s diplomatic service. The collective body of all diplomats assigned to a particular country is the diplomatic corps. (See also diplomatic rank.)

Diplomatic strategy

Real world diplomatic negotiations are very different from intellectual debates in a university where an issue is decided on the merit of the arguments and negotiators make a deal by splitting the difference. Though diplomatic agreements can sometimes be reached among liberal democratic nations by appealing to higher principles, most real world diplomacy has traditionally been heavily influenced by hard power.

The interaction of strength and diplomacy can be illustrated by a comparison to labor negotiations. If a labor union is not willing to strike, then the union is not going anywhere because management has absolutely no incentive to agree to union demands. On the other hand, if management is not willing to take a strike, then the company will be walked all over by the labor union, and management will be forced to agree to any demand the union makes. The same concept applies to diplomatic negotiations.

There are also incentives in diplomacy to act reasonably, especially if the support of other actors is needed. The gain from winning one negotiation can be much less than the increased hostility from other parts. This is also called soft power.

Many situations in modern diplomacy are also rules based. When for instance two WTO countries have trade disputes, it is in the interest of both to limit the spill over damage to other areas by following some agreed-upon rules.

Diplomatic immunity

The sanctity of diplomats has long been observed. This sanctity has come to be known as diplomatic immunity. While there have been a number of cases where diplomats have been killed, this is normally viewed as a great breach of honour. Genghis Khan and the Mongols were well known for strongly insisting on the rights of diplomats, and they would often wreak horrific vengeance against any state that violated these rights.

Diplomatic rights were established in the mid-seventeenth century in Europe and have spread throughout the world. These rights were formalized by the 1961 Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, which protects diplomats from being persecuted or prosecuted while on a diplomatic mission. If a diplomat does commit a serious crime while in a host country he may be declared as persona non grata (unwanted person). Such diplomats are then often tried for the crime in their homeland.

Diplomatic communications are also viewed as sacrosanct, and diplomats have long been allowed to carry documents across borders without being searched. The mechanism for this is the so-called “diplomatic bag” (or, in some countries, the “diplomatic pouch”). While radio and digital communication have become more standard for embassies, diplomatic pouches are still quite common and some countries, including the United States, declare entire shipping containers as diplomatic pouches to bring sensitive material (often building supplies) into a country.

In times of hostility, diplomats are often withdrawn for reasons of personal safety, as well as in some cases when the host country is friendly but there is a perceived threat from internal dissidents. Ambassadors and other diplomats are sometimes recalled temporarily by their home countries as a way to express displeasure with the host country. In both cases, lower-level employees still remain to actually do the business of diplomacy.

Diplomats as a Guarantee

In the Ottoman Empire, the diplomats of Persia and other states were seen as a guarantee of good behavior. If a nation broke a treaty or if their nationals misbehaved the diplomats would be punished. Diplomats were thus used as an enforcement mechanism on treaties and international law. To ensure that punishing a diplomat mattered rulers insisted on high-ranking figures. This tradition is seen by supporters of Iran as a legal basis of the 1979 Iranian hostage crisis. In imitation of alleged previous practices supporters of the Iranian Revolution attempted to punish the United States for its alleged misdeeds by holding their diplomats hostage. Diplomats as a guarantee were also employed sometimes in pre-modern Europe and other parts of Asia.

Diplomacy and espionage

Diplomacy is closely linked to espionage or gathering of intelligence. Embassies are bases for both diplomats and spies, and some diplomats are essentially openly-acknowledged spies. For instance, the job of military attachés includes learning as much as possible about the military of the nation to which they are assigned. They do not try to hide this role and, as such, are only invited to events allowed by their hosts, such as military parades or air shows. There are also deep-cover spies operating in many embassies. These individuals are given fake positions at the embassy, but their main task is to illegally gather intelligence, usually by coordinating spy rings of locals or other spies. For the most part, spies operating out of embassies gather little intelligence themselves and their identities tend to be known by the opposition. If discovered, these diplomats can be expelled from an embassy, but for the most part counter-intelligence agencies prefer to keep these agents in situ and under close monitoring.

The information gathered by spies plays an increasingly important role in diplomacy. Arms-control treaties would be impossible without the power of reconnaissance satellites and agents to monitor compliance. Information gleaned from espionage is useful in almost all forms of diplomacy, everything from trade agreements to border disputes.

Diplomatic resolution of problems

Various processes and procedures have evolved over time for handling diplomatic issues and disputes.

Arbitration and mediations

Nations sometimes resort to international arbitration when faced with a specific question or point of contention in need of resolution. For most of history, there were no official or formal procedures for such proceedings. They were generally accepted to abide by general principles and protocols related to international law and justice.

Sometimes these took the form of formal arbitrations and mediations. In such cases a commission of diplomats might be convened to hear all sides of an issue, and to come some sort of ruling based on international law.

In the modern era, much of this work is often carried out by the International Court of Justice at the Hague, or other formal commissions, agencies and tribunals, working under the United Nations. Below are some examples.

Hay-Herbert Treaty Enacted after the United States and Britain submitted a dispute to international mediation about the US-Canadian border.

Conferences

Other times, resolutions were sought through the convening of international conferences. In such cases, there are fewer ground rules, and fewer formal applications of international law. However, participants are expected to guide themselves through principles of international fairness, logic, and protocol.

Some examples of these formal conferences are:

Congress of Vienna (1815) – After Napoleon was defeated, there were many diplomatic questions waiting to be resolved. This included the shape of the map of Europe, the disposition of political and nationalist claims of various ethnic groups and nationalities wishing to have some political autonomy, and the resolution of various claims by various European powers.

The Congress of Berlin (June 13 – July 13, 1878) was a meeting of the European Great Powers’ and the Ottoman Empire’s leading statesmen in Berlin in 1878. In the wake of the Russo-Turkish War, 1877–78, the meeting’s aim was to reorganize conditions in the Balkans.

Negotiations

Sometimes nations convene official negotiation processes to settle an issue or dispute between several nations which are parties to a dispute. These are similar to the conferences mentioned above, as there are technically no established rules or procedures. However, there are general principles and precedents which help define a course for such proceedings.

Some examples are

Camp David accord Convened in 1978 by President Jimmy Carter of the United States, at Camp David to reach an agreement between Prime Minister Mechaem Begin of Israel and President Anwar Sadat of Egypt. After weeks of negotiation, agreement was reached and the accords were signed, later leading directly to the Israel-Egypt Peace Treaty of 1979.

Treaty of Portsmouth Enacted after President Theodore Roosevelt brought together the delegates from Russia and Japan, to settle the Russo-Japanese War. Roosevelt’s personal intervention settled the conflict, and caused him to win the Nobel peace prize.

Diplomatic recognition

Diplomatic recognition is an important factor in determining whether a nation is an independent state. Receiving recognition is often difficult, even for countries which are fully sovereign. For many decades after becoming independent, even many of the closest allies of the Dutch Republic refused to grant it full recognition. Today there are a number of independent entities without widespread diplomatic recognition, most notably the Republic of China on Taiwan. Since the 1970s, most nations have stopped officially recognizing the ROC’s existence on Taiwan, at the insistence of the People’s Republic of China. Currently, the United States and other nations maintain informal relations through de facto embassies, with names such as the American Institute in Taiwan. Similarly, Taiwan’s de facto embassies abroad are known by names such as the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office. This was not always the case, with the US maintaining official diplomatic ties with the ROC, recognizing it as the sole and legitimate government of all of China until 1979, when these relations were broken off as a condition for establishing official relations with Communist China.

The Palestinian National Authority has its own diplomatic service, however Palestinian representatives in most Western countries are not accorded diplomatic immunity, and their missions are referred to as Delegations General.

Other unrecognized regions which claim independence include Abkhazia, Transnistria, Somaliland, South Ossetia, Nagorno Karabakh, and the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. Lacking the economic and political importance of Taiwan, these nations tend to be much more diplomatically isolated.

Though used as a factor in judging sovereignty, Article 3 of the Montevideo Convention states, “The political existence of the state is independent of recognition by other states.”

Informal diplomacy

Informal diplomacy (sometimes called Track II diplomacy) has been used for centuries to communicate between powers. Most diplomats work to recruit figures in other nations who might be able to give informal access to a country’s leadership. In some situations, such as between the United States and the People’s Republic of China a large amount of diplomacy is done through semi-formal channels using interlocutors such as academic members of thinktanks. This occurs in situations where governments wish to express intentions or to suggest methods of resolving a diplomatic situation, but do not wish to express a formal position.

Track II diplomacy is a specific kind of informal diplomacy, in which non-officials (academic scholars, retired civil and military officials, public figures, social activists) engage in dialogue, with the aim of conflict resolution, or confidence-building. Sometimes governments may fund such Track II exchanges. Sometimes the exchanges may have no connection at all with governments, or may even act in defiance of governments; such exchanges are called Track III.

Paradiplomacy

Paradiplomacy refers to the international relations conducted by subnational, regional, local or non-central governments. The most ordinary case of paradiplomatic relation refer to co-operation between bordering political entities. However, interest of federal states, provinces, regions etc., may extend over to different regions or to issues gathering local governments in multilateral fora worldwide. Some non-central governments may be allowed to negotiate and enter into agreement with foreign central states.

Cultural diplomacy

Cultural diplomacy is a part of diplomacy. It alludes to a new way of making diplomacy by involving new non governmental and non professional actors in the making of diplomacy. In the frame of globalization, culture plays a major role in the definition of identity and in the relations between people. Joseph Nye points out the importance of having a soft power besides a hard power. When classical diplomacy fails, a better knowledge can help bridging the gap between different cultures. Cultural diplomacy becomes a subject of academic studies based on historical essays on the United States, Europe, and the Cold War.

Munich agreement

International Relations — Sun, 18 Aug 2013 05:41:42 +0000

The Munich Agreement was the agreement signed on 29 September 1938 between Britain, France, Germany and Italy. It was signed after fears of an outbreak of war during what was known as the “Czech Crisis” or “Sudetenland Crisis”.

Background
Czechoslovakia was a country created by the Treaty of Versailles that was hated by the Germans. Amongst its population were nearly 3 million German speaking people who lived in the Sudetenland area. It also contained various other nationalities within its borders. The Czech crisis developed for several reasons. Firstly, Hitler had a deep rooted hatred of the mix of nationalities living in relative harmony in Czechoslovakia. He hated the Slavs who were living there, as they had betrayed Germany in First World War. Czechoslovakia also had alliances with France and Russia. Hitler viewed Russia as a future conquest. Czechoslovakia had a prominent strategic position; it was well protected by the mountainous terrain and had excellent airfields. It also served well for Hitler’s idea of expanding the living space for growing German population. The Germans living in the Sudetenland never properly integrated into Czech life. By March 1938, Germany had occupied Austria under the leadership of Adolf Hitler. This broke the
Treaty of Versailles, but Britain and France did nothing. Hitler then turned his attention to the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia. Since its formation, Czechoslovakia had been wary of possible German advances. There was unrest in the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia mainly because of the Sudeten German Party. The Sudeten German Party was formed in 1931 and the party worked to bring the region under German control. The party was strongly supported by the German people living in Sudeten region. Because of the German threat, Czechoslovakia had secured military alliances with France and Soviet Union. Sudetenland was an important region for Czechoslovakia since the region contained a vast array of natural resources as well as significant amount of the nation’s industry and banks. Also, the independence of Sudetenland it may cause other minorities in the country to seek independence
from Czechoslovakia. In 1938, Hitler ordered his generals to begin making plans for an invasion of the Sudetenland. Hitler needed to begin a campaign and ensure he was not the aggressor. Germany claimed that the people
of German origin living in the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia were discriminated by the Czechoslovak government. Hitler instructed the Sudeten German Party in Czechoslovakia to cause trouble. It was Hitler’s hope that those supporters would cause enough unrest that it would show that the Czechoslovaks were unable to control the region. It would then provide an excuse for the German Army to cross the border. In response to the actions of the Sudeten German Party, the Czechoslovak government was forced to declare martial law in the region. Following this decision, Hitler began demanding that the Sudetenland immediately be turned over to Germany. Hitler offered to give part of Czechoslovakia to Poland and Hungary in return for allowing the Germans to take the Sudetenland.
As the crisis grew, the threat of war spread across Europe causing Britain and France to take an active interest in the situation. Both Britain and France were willing to avoid a war for which they were not prepared. In an attempt to calm the situation, British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain sent a telegram to Hitler requesting a meeting with the goal of finding a peaceful solution. In the meeting with Chamberlain, Hitler demanded the turning over of Sudetenland to Germany by Czechoslovakia. Chamberlain was somewhat sympathetic to Hitler’s claims regarding Sudeten Germans. He was prepared to give Germany the Sudetenland. Chamberlain also came to an agreement with Hitler that any area of the Sudetenland with 50% German population would be handed to Germany.
On September 19, the British and French ambassadors met with the Czechoslovak government and recommended ceding those areas of the Sudetenland where Germans formed more than 50% of the population. The Czechoslovaks were forced to agree. Having secured this concession, Chamberlain returned to Germany and met with Hitler. Chamberlain was stunned when Hitler made new demands. Hitler demanded that German troops be permitted to occupy the entirety of the Sudetenland, that non‐ Germans be expelled, and that Poland and Hungary be given territorial concessions. If the demands were not met, Hitler was willing to take military action against Czechoslovakia. Hitler gave Britain and France an ultimatum of 2 p.m. on 28 September, after which he said he would invade Czechoslovakia. Such demands were unacceptable for Britain and France. In response to the German ultimatum, both Britain and France began mobilizing their forces.

The Munich Conference
Though Hitler was willing to risk war, he soon found that the German people were not in favor of entering into war. As a result, he stepped back from the plan and sent Chamberlain a letter guaranteeing the safety of Czechoslovakia if the Sudetenland were ceded to Germany. Eager toprevent war, Chamberlain replied that he was willing to continue talks and asked Italian leader Benito Mussolini to aid in persuading Hitler. In response, Mussolini proposed a four‐power summit between Germany, Britain, France, and Italy to discuss the situation. The Czechoslovaks were not invited to take part in the negotiation. Two Czech representatives were allowed to sit in the room next door when the negotiation was taking place. Russia, that had guaranteed Czechoslovakia, was also not invited. Gathering in Munich (Germany) on September 29, Chamberlain, Hitler, and Mussolini were joined by French Prime Minister Eduardo Daladier. Mussolini presented a plan which called for the Sudetenland to be ceded to Germany in exchange for guarantees that it would mark the end of German territorial expansion. Though presented by the Italian leader, the plan had been produced by the German government and its terms were similar to Hitler’s latest ultimatum. Desiring to avoid war, Chamberlain and Daladier were willing to agree to the “Italian plan.” As a result, the Munich Agreement was signed on 30 September, 1938. The Czechoslovak delegation was informed of the terms by Chamberlain and Daladier. Though initially unwilling to agree, the Czechoslovaks were forced to agree when they were informed that if a war occurs, the Czechoslovaks would be held responsible and it would receive no support.
The day after the agreement, the Czech Foreign Minister Dr Krofta met the British, French and Italian Foreign Ministers. He said: ‘Today it is our turn, tomorrow it will be the turn of others’ and told them to get out.

Aftermath of the Munich Agreement

As a result of the agreement, German forces crossed the border on October 1 and were warmly received by the Sudeten Germans while many Czechoslovaks left the region. Returning to London, Chamberlain proclaimed that he had secured “peace for our time.” While many in the British government were pleased with the result, others were not. The people and politicians of Britain were divided over their reaction to the Munich Agreement. Many were aware that appeasing Hitler could no longer continue. Most people supported Chamberlain’s success with a belief that a war had been avoided. Hitler was expecting that he had to fight to claim the Sudetenland. Hitler was surprised that Czechoslovakia’s allies abandoned the country in order to appease Germany. Realizing the Britain and France’s fear of war, Hitler encouraged Poland and Hungary to take parts of Czechoslovakia. Hitler moved to take the rest of Czechoslovakia in March 1939. The German move to occupy Czechoslovakia met with no significant response from either Britain or France. In the end, the Germans took much more land than had ever been given at Munich.
The invasion of Czechoslovakia started to turn British people against the policy of appeasement. It now provided Hitler with a very important strategic position in which to continue with his expansion program. He could now easily attack Poland which would leave Britain with a very tough decision to make. In is interesting that the German generals believed that, if there had been a war in 1938, the German army would have been easily defeated. It is sometimes said that Chamberlain gave Britain the chance to prepare for war – but he gave time to Germany also.

Post World War II

International Relations — Sun, 18 Aug 2013 05:41:42 +0000

World War II brought American isolationism to an end.
The crucially important Lend-Lease Act (11 March 1941) that, even prior to Pearl Harbor, introduced the United States into the front stage of world diplomacy and at the same time gave the latter an entirely new form.
Traditional diplomacy had been conducted between great and small powers, and Wilsonian diplomacy had established the principle of equality, diplomacy after lend-lease assumed a dual nature.
On the one hand, relations between nations deemed to be equals continued to be conducted by ambassadors.
On the other hand, there emerged a new form of relationship between two countries, whereby one became the aid donor and the other the aid recipient.
Thereafter, actively involved in the life of the international organization, the United States found that it had adopted Wilsonian “internationalism,” which constituted a break with tradition.
The main preoccupation of American treaties following World War II was security cooperation in a postwar climate characterized by ideological conflict with the Soviet Union, bipolarization of the world between these two powers, destruction of the colonial empires and the emergence of nearly ninety new nations, economic inequality, and reliance on atomic weapons as a deterrent.
Almost all have been of a new type. They have included aid accords, participation in the United Nations, peace treaties, treaties of alliance, treaties linked to deterrence, and treaties dealing with a far wider range of issues than had traditionally been the case: human rights, ecology, the environment and resources, global warming, the outlawing of chemical and other weapons of mass destruction, access to and the future use of outer space, copyright and the protection of intellectual property, and biotechnology and human cloning.
The Treaty of Paris (October 1954), ended the occupation of Germany, replacing it with the presence of “security forces.” These negotiations (between council ministers of five powers) were brought to a halt by U.S. adoption of containment policy (the Truman Doctrine of 12 March 1947 and the Marshall Plan of 5 June 1947), the
creation of the Kominform by the Soviet Union, and the increasing tensions of the Cold War in 1948 (the Berlin Blockade).
The Atlantic Pact of 4 April 1949, which created NATO, was a reaction to the Cold War.
The Warsaw Pact (formally, the Treaty of Friendship, Co-operation, and Mutual Assistance, sometimes, informally War Pac, akin in format to NATO) was a collective defense treaty among eight communist states of Central and Eastern Europe in existence during the Cold War.
(14 May 1955), Motto: Union of Peace and Socialism

Realism

International Relations — Sun, 18 Aug 2013 05:41:42 +0000

Realism is perhaps the most widely‐used theory in International Relations.

Realism (sometimes called ‘political realism’) claims to offer an account of world affairs that is ‘realistic’, in the sense that it is hard‐headed and (as realists sees it) devoid of wishful thinking and deluded moralizing.
Realists of all schools trace their intellectual heritage back to Thucydides, Hobbes.
Realism was the dominant way leaders in Europe in the seventeenth through early twentieth centuries understood international relations.
After World War II, scholars of international relations embraced realism as the dominant perspective for explaining global politics.
The chief advocate of the realist theory of international politics was Hans J. Morgenthau, considered the father of modern realist thought. His classic text, Politics among Nations: the Struggle for Power and Peace, was first published shortly after World War II and carefully defined the realist theoretical perspective that most scholars would then adopt.
Because of this dominant position, in many ways, all of the other theoretical perspectives for understanding
global politics are reactions to and criticisms of realism.

Realism emphasizes that the international politics is anarchic: lack of authority in the international system, states have to look for self-help/Survival.
Realism views power as a defining feature of international politics that state face. –power link to military force/capability. The realism answers the question, why do states act the way they do in international politics? It is the maximization of power that is in a state’s interest.
Realism envisions states as essentially unitary actors, disregards other domestic actors. For realists, it is these states, and not their leaders, their citizens, business corporations, or international organizations, that are the key actors and determine what happens in the world.
Realism sees states as rational actors, making rational decision making Rationality does not mean that states always make the best or the “right” decisions, but rather that states “have consistent, ordered preferences, and that they calculate the costs and benefits of all alternative policies in order to maximize their utility.”
Realism analysis opposing states: states assess each other in terms of their power and capabilities, not in terms variations that exists within states like regime type.
Realism tend to see states as the key actors in the international system. Realists argue that international institution play a less important role than states. Hardcore realist believes that IO is established to manipulate great power interest in international relation.
Realism associate with its bottom line states exist in an international system that is characterized by competition and war and conflict is inevitable.

General Theory of International Relations

International Relations — Sun, 18 Aug 2013 05:41:42 +0000

The first thesis
A general theory of international relations needs to deal with the relationships between at least three fundamental concepts: Structure, Purpose and Situation. Power, and restraints on power, will be considered as subsidiary concepts. Structure- not just as nation but all other influential factors.

The second thesis
A general theory of international relations needs to permit of a multiplicity of viewpoints ranging from that of a responsible member of a particular group at a particular time (say, the Secretary of State of the United States today) to one that approximates, as far as may be possible, to that of a hypothetical observer from Mars studying the emergent characteristics of an interacting system of many cultures, races, states, classes, etc., over the full course of history.

The third thesis
A general theory of international relations needs to deal with two realms: the realm of fact and the realm of value — of “should” propositions — and with the interrelations between these realms. In almost every problem of international politics the first question to be asked is, in the particular context, who is to be regarded as the “we” and who is to be regarded as the “they.” The Phenomena of External and Internal Means of Balance of Power: Alliances
serving as external means and Increased armaments as internal balance of power. The recent world order in terms of economy, ideology and political system are becoming just as aspect of purpose. The means-ends concepts works better in international relation.

Diplomatic Mission

International Relations — Sun, 18 Aug 2013 05:41:42 +0000

A diplomatic mission is a group of people from one state or an international inter-governmental organization (such as the United Nations) present in another state to represent the sending state/organization in the receiving state. In practice, a diplomatic mission usually denotes the permanent mission, namely the office of a country’s diplomatic representatives in the capital city of another country.

Naming
A permanent diplomatic mission is usually known as an embassy, and the person in charge of the mission is known as an ambassador. Missions between Commonwealth countries are known as High Commissions and their heads are High Commissioners.

All missions to the United Nations are known simply as Permanent Missions, and the head of such a mission is typically both a Permanent Representative and an ambassador. Some countries have more particular naming for their missions and staff: a Vatican mission is headed by a Nuncio and consequently known as an Apostolic Nunciature, while Libya’s missions were for a long time known as People’s Bureaus and the head of the mission was a Secretary. (Libya has since switched back to standard nomenclature.)

In the past a diplomatic mission headed by a lower ranking official (an envoy or minister resident) was known as a legation. Since the ranks of envoy and minister resident are effectively obsolete, the designation of legation is no longer used today. (See diplomatic rank.)

In cases of dispute, it is common for a country to recall its head of mission as a sign of its displeasure. This is less drastic than cutting diplomatic relations completely, and the mission will still continue operating more or less normally, but it will now be headed by a chargé d’affaires who may have limited powers. Note that for the period of succession between two heads of missions, a chargé d’affaires ad interim may be appointed as caretaker; this does not imply any hostility to the host country.

A Consulate is similar to (but not the same as) a diplomatic office, but with focus on dealing with individual persons and businesses, as defined by the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations. A Consulate or Consulate-General is generally a representative of the Embassy in locales outside of the capital city. For instance, The British Embassy to the United States is in Washington, D.C., and there are British Consulates in Los Angeles, New York City, Houston, and so on.

The term “embassy” is often used to refer to the building or compound housing an ambassador’s offices and staff. Technically, “embassy” refers to the diplomatic delegation itself, while the office building in which they work is known as a chancery, but this distinction is rarely used in practice. Ambassadors reside in ambassadorial residences, which enjoy the same rights as missions.

Extraterritoriality
Under international law, diplomatic missions enjoy an extraterritorial status and thus, although remaining part of the host country’s territory, they are exempt from local law and in almost all respects treated as being part of the territory of the home country. They are also only required to pay taxes equal to their respective countries’ guidelines.

As the host country may not enter the representing country’s embassy without permission, embassies are sometimes used by refugees escaping from either the host country or a third country. For example, North Korean nationals, who would be arrested and deported from China upon discovery, have sought sanctuary at various third-country embassies in China. Once inside the embassy, diplomatic channels can be used to solve the issue and send the refugees to another country. Notable violations of embassy extraterritoriality include the Iran hostage crisis (1979–1981), the Japanese embassy hostage crisis (1996) in Lima, Peru, 2006 embassy burnings in Iran, Lebanon and Syria of Danish, Norwegian and Chilean embassies.

Role
The role of such a mission is to protect in the receiving State the interests of the sending State and of its nationals, within the limits permitted by international law; negotiating with the Government of the receiving State as directed by the sending State; ascertaining by lawful means conditions and developments in the receiving State, and reporting thereon to the Government of the sending State; promoting friendly relations between the sending State and the receiving State, and developing their economic, cultural and scientific relations.

Between members of the Commonwealth of Nations there are no embassies, but High Commissions, as Commonwealth nations share a special diplomatic relationship. It is generally expected that an embassy of a Commonwealth country in a non-Commonwealth country will do its best to provide diplomatic services to citizens from other Commonwealth countries if the citizen’s country does not have an embassy in that country. Canadian and Australian nationals enjoy even greater cooperation between their respective consular services, as outlined in Canada/Australian Consular Services Sharing Agreement. The same kind of procedure is also followed multilaterally by the member states of the European Union (EU). European citizens in need of consular help in a country without diplomatic or consular representation of their own country may turn to any consular or diplomatic mission of another EU member state.

The rights and immunities (such as diplomatic immunity) of diplomatic missions are codified in the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations.

Nations that are not recognized have legations overseas but these are not recognized as having official diplomatic status as defined by the Vienna Convention. These de facto embassies are usually referred to as Representative Offices. Some examples of these types of missions: the Representative Office of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus in Washington, D.C.; Somaliland’s representatives in London, Addis Ababa, Rome, and Washington, D.C.; the Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh has a representative office in Washington, D.C.; the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Washington, D.C. (representing the Republic of China); and the American Institute in Taiwan (representing the United States in the Republic of China). Under United States law, such offices are regarded by the State Department officially as “information centers” and the persons working in them do not have diplomatic visas, nor are credentials from their chiefs of mission accepted.

Countries that are not sovereign states may set up offices abroad, as in the case of Hong Kong, which government has set up Hong Kong Economic and Trade Offices in various locations. Such offices assume some of the non-diplomatic functions of diplomatic posts, such as promoting trade interests and providing assistance to its citizens and residents. They are nevertheless not diplomatic missions, their personnels are not diplomats and do not have diplomatic visas.

Some cities may host more than one mission from the same country. An example is Rome, where many states maintain missions to Italy, another to the Holy See and even another to the Sovereign Military Order of Malta. It is not customary for these missions to share premises nor diplomatic personnel. Presently only the Iraqi missions to Italy and the Holy See share premises; however, two ambassadors are appointed, one to each country. Geneva, a Swiss city hosting many international organizations, also has many missions.

Structure
The structure of a diplomatic mission varies according to its size and purpose. The executive office usually consists of a Head of Mission, Deputy Chief of Mission, and is supported by sections including but not limited to:

Consular Section
Consular sections are responsible for assisting and protecting overseas citizens in distress, processing visa applications, and issuing and renewing passports.

Political/Economic Section
Political/Economic sections provide reporting and analysis on political and economic issues, usually by producing cables for their home government.

Public Affairs Section
Public Affairs sections serve as both press offices (handling official spokesman duties and liaising with local press) and cultural offices (supporting home government outreach programs/performances, managing cultural and academic exchange programs such as the Fulbright Program).

Management/Administrative Section
Management/Administrative sections handle the day to day operations of the mission with responsibilities over maintenance, payroll, human resources, etc.

Foreign Aid Offices
Foreign aid offices such as USAID (at American posts) and DFID (at British posts) oversee the disbursement and implementation of foreign assistance.

Office of Defense Attachée
Defense Attaché’s offices handle the official military-to-military contact for governments, support home government military visits, and produce reporting on military and battlefield intelligence.

Other Offices
Other attachée offices usually exist in larger missions handling issues such as agriculture, commerce, science, military sales and health.

Diplomatic rank
The system of diplomatic rank has over time been formalised on an international basis.

Traditional diplomacy
Until the early 19th century, each European nation had its own system of diplomatic rank. The relative ranks of diplomats from different nations had been a source of considerable dispute, made more so by the insistence of major nations to have their diplomats ranked higher than those of minor nations, to be reflected in such things as table seatings.

In an attempt to resolve the problem, the Congress of Vienna of 1815 formally established an international system of diplomatic ranks. The four ranks within the system were:

Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary, or simply Ambassador, who is a representative of the head of state. Equivalent, and in some traditions primus inter pares, is the Papal nuncio. Amongst Commonwealth countries, the equivalent title High Commissioner (who represents the government rather than the head of state) is normally used instead.
A diplomatic mission headed by an ambassador would be known as an Embassy; one headed by a High Commissioner is called a High Commission. Ambassadors and high commissioners are entitled to use the title “His/Her Excellency” from the government and the people of the country they are appointed to.

Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary. Usually just referred to as a Minister, an envoy is a diplomatic representative with plenipotentiary powers (i.e. full authority to represent the head of state), but ranking below an Ambassador. Where Embassies are headed by Ambassadors, Legations are headed by Ministers.
Minister Resident or Resident Minister, or simply Minister, is the, now extremely rare, lowest rank of full diplomatic mission chief, only above Chargé d’affaires (who is considered an extraordinary substitute).

Note that both the Minister Plenipotentiary and the Minister Resident are diplomatic ministers, which are not the same thing as government ministers or religious ministers. A diplomatic mission headed by either type of Minister would be called a Legation. As they formally represent the head of state, they are entitled to use the title “His/Her Excellency”, which originally was reserved for Ambassadors.

Chargé d’affaires, or simply Chargé. As the French title suggests, a chargé d’affaires would be in charge of an embassy’s or a legation’s affairs in the (usually temporary) absence of a more senior diplomat. A Chargé d’affaires ad interim or simply “a.i.” is generally serving as head of mission during the temporary absence of the head of mission, while the Chargé d’affaires e.p. or en pied maintains the same functions and duties as an ambassador, and is accredited not to the head of state but to the minister of foreign relations of the receiving state.
As it turned out, this system of diplomatic rank did nothing to solve the problem of the nations’ precedence. The appropriate diplomatic ranks used would be determined by the precedence among the nations; thus the exchanges of ambassadors (the highest diplomatic rank) would be reserved among major nations, or close allies and related monarchies. In contrast, a major nation would probably send just an envoy to a minor nation, who in return would send an envoy to the major nation. As a result, the United States did not use the rank of ambassador until their emergence as a major world power at the end of the 19th century. Indeed, until the mid-20th century, the majority of diplomats in the world were of the rank of minister plenipotentiary.

In diplomatic parlance, all the diplomats that are assigned to a nation are known collectively as the diplomatic corps; one of these diplomats is recognized as the primus inter pares—in practice rather a protocolar honor—who acts as the spokesperson for all, known as the Dean of the Diplomatic Corps or as Marshal of Diplomacy (generally based on the date of arrival in country or presentation of credentials to the head of state, although in some Catholic nations it is held automatically by the Papal Nuncio).

After World War II, it was no longer considered acceptable to treat some nations as inferior to others given the United Nations doctrine of equality of sovereign states; therefore most legations were upgraded to embassies, and the use of the rank of Minister for diplomatic missions’ highest-ranking officials gradually ceased. The last U.S. Legation, in Sofia, Bulgaria, was upgraded to an Embassy on November 28, 1966. Where those ranks still exist, their incumbents usually act as embassy section chiefs or Deputy Chief of Mission (deputy to the Ambassador).

Modern diplomats
Bilateral diplomacy
The distinction between managers and officers is not necessarily as apparent. Senior officers (such as first and second secretaries) often manage junior diplomats and locally-hired staff.

In modern diplomatic practice there are a number of diplomatic ranks below Ambassador. Since most missions are now headed by an Ambassador, these ranks now rarely indicate a mission’s (or its host nation’s) relative importance, but rather reflect the diplomat’s individual seniority within their own nation’s diplomatic career path and in the diplomatic corps in the host nation:

Ambassador (or High-Commissioner in Commonwealth missions)
Minister
Minister-Counselor
Counselor
First Secretary
Second Secretary
Third Secretary
Attaché
Assistant Attaché
Chargé d’affaires and Chargé d’affaires, ad interim (or simply i.) is a separate title used when an Ambassador (or other head of mission) is not present, has not been appointed, or is otherwise not able to discharge duties in a specific location. Generally, the ad interim (temporary) “chargé” (as they are often referred to) is another staff member (usually the second-most senior officer) accredited in the host country for the head of mission’s temporary absences. In such cases, the diplomatic mission advises the local government (usually the foreign ministry) by means of a diplomatic note that a specific individual has been appointed chargé for a specific or indefinite period of time. In contrast to an Ambassador, the specific agreement of the host government is not required.
In certain cases, a Chargé d’affaires may be appointed for long periods, when a mission is headed by a non-resident Ambassador, when countries have established diplomatic relations but not exchanged Ambassadors, or when they have recalled their Ambassadors for a period of time (to express displeasure or serious disagreement) but not yet taken the extremely serious step of breaking diplomatic relations. It is not unheard of for Chargé d’affaires to remain in place for an indefinite period. Since a Chargé d’affaires does not need to present letters of credence to the host head of state, appointing a chargé may avoid a politically sensitive meeting or implying some form of approval or recognition of that head of state or government. Equally, the receiving country may express displeasure by declining to receive an Ambassador, but maintain diplomatic relations by accepting a Chargé.

The term Attaché is used for any diplomatic agent who does not fit in the standard diplomatic ranks, often because they are not (or were not traditionally) members of the sending country’s diplomatic service or foreign ministry, and were therefore only “attached” to the diplomatic mission. The most frequent use is for military attachés, but the diplomatic title may be used for any specific individual or position as required. Since administrative and technical staff benefit from only limited diplomatic immunity, some countries may routinely appoint support staff as attachés. Attaché does not, therefore, connote any rank or position. Note that many traditional functionary roles, such as Press Attaché or Cultural Attaché, are not formal titles in diplomatic practice, although they may be used as a matter of custom.

Usage worldwide
Most countries worldwide have some form of internal rank, roughly parallel to the diplomatic ranks, which are used in their foreign service or civil service in general. The correspondence is not exact, however, for various reasons, including the fact that according to diplomatic usage, all Ambassadors are of equal rank, but clearly Ambassadors of more senior rank are sent to more important postings. Some countries may make specific links or comparisons to military ranks.

Multilateral diplomacy
Furthermore, outside this traditional pattern of bilateral diplomacy, as a rule on a permanent residency basis (though sometimes doubling elsewhere), certain ranks and positions were created specifically for multilateral diplomacy:

A permanent representative is the equivalent of an ambassador, normally of that rank, but accredited to an international body (mainly by member—and possibly observer states), not to a head of state.
A resident representative (or sometimes simply representative) is the equivalent — in rank and privileges — of an ambassador, but accredited by an international organization (generally a United Nations agency, or a Bretton Woods institution) to a country’s government. The resident representative typically heads the country office of that international organization within that country.
A special ambassador is a government’s specialist diplomat in a particular field, not posted in residence, but often traveling around the globe.
The S. Trade Representative is a diplomat of cabinet rank, in charge of U.S. delegations in multilateral trade negotiations (since 1962).
The UN Secretary General personally mandates Special Envoys for a particular field, e.g. Africa’s long-term AIDS problem, climate change negotiations, or ad hoc as for a (civil) war zone; states, especially (regional) superpowers, may do the same, e.g.:
To help with the Northern Ireland peace process, the United States has appointed a Special Envoy to Northern Ireland with the diplomatic rank of Ambassador. As of 2006, the position was occupied by Mitchell Reiss.
During the 2006 democracy movement in Nepal, India sent on April 18 Karan Singh, who is related to royalty in both predominantly Hindu countries, as Special Envoy to neighbouring Nepal where increasingly violent opposition started its successful challenge of the king’s autocratic rule.
In 2005, Belgium created a former cabinet member, Pierre Chevalier Special Envoy of the OSCE presidency—in fact ahead of its 2006 turn as rotatory Chairman-in-Office of the organisation; the post was never formally created—to mediate in the Gazprom natural gas-pipeline crisis involving Russia, Ukraine and the EU.
The EU appoints various Special Representatives (some regional, some thematic); e.g. in 2005—as a response to events in Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan—the Council of the EU appointed Jan Kubis as its “Special Representative for Central Asia”.
A case sui generis is the High Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Consular counterpart
Formally the consular career (ranking in descending order: Consul-General, Consul, Vice-Consul, Consular Agent; equivalents without diplomatic immunity include Honorary Consul-General, Honorary Consul, and Honorary Vice-Consul) forms a separate hierarchy. Many countries do not internally have a separate consular path or stream, and the meaning of “consular” responsibilities and functions will differ from country to country. Other titles, including “Vice Consul-General”, have existed in the past. Consular titles may be used concurrently with diplomatic titles if the individual is assigned to an embassy. Diplomatic immunity is more limited for consular officials without other diplomatic accreditation, and broadly limited to immunity with respect to their official duties.

At a separate consular post, the official will have only a consular title. Officials at consular posts may therefore have consular titles, but not be involved in traditional consular activities, and actually be responsible for trade, cultural, or other matters.

Consular officers, being nominally more distant from the politically sensitive aspects of diplomacy, can more easily render a wide range of services to private citizens, enterprises, et cetera. They may be more numerous since diplomatic missions are posted only in a nation’s capital, while consular officials are stationed in various other cities as well. However, it is not uncommon for individuals to be transferred from one hierarchy to the other, and for consular officials to serve in a capital carrying out strictly consular duties within the ‘consular section’ of a diplomatic post, e.g. within an embassy. Some countries routinely provide their Embassy officials with consular commissions, including those without formal consular responsibilities, since a consular commission allows the individual to legalize documents, sign certain documents, and undertake certain other necessary functions.

Depending on the practice of the individual country, “consular services” may be limited to services provided for citizens or residents of the sending country, or extended to include, for example, visa services for nationals of the host country.

What’s the difference between an embassy and a consulate?
A consulate is like a junior embassy. It’s generally located in a busy tourist city, and takes care of minor diplomatic tasks such as issuing visas. The word consulate literally means office of the consul, who is a diplomat appointed to foster trade and take care of expatriates. You can read some pointed essays about the role of the modern day consulate at the American Foreign Service site.

Embassies are much bigger deals. The word embassy comes from the French ambassade, or office of the ambassador. Ambassadors are high-ranking diplomatic representatives who serve as spokespersons for their national governments. If one country recognizes the sovereignty of another, they generally establish an embassy there. Embassies take care of the same administrative duties as consulates, but they also represent their governments abroad.

This can be tricky business. For instance, the United States doesn’t maintain an embassy in Taiwan (in order to maintain diplomatic relations with China), but it does operates a consulate there to take care of its overseas citizens. For an interesting online look at another prickly diplomatic relation, check out the U.S. Embassy in Malaysia, which features a reaction statement to the recent incarceration of Malaysia’s former Deputy Prime Minister, Anwar Ibrahim.

You may recall the famous photograph from 1975 of American citizens ostensibly fleeing the American embassy in Saigon. The building was in fact an apartment complex across the street, but the message was clear: once the embassy leaves, the country symbolically leaves.