It is hardly news that the world is beset by a bewildering array of complex and difficult challenges, ranging from how best to manage the global commons, to diminishing biodiversity, to resource scarcity. Most of these pressing issues have a major scientific and technological (S&T) component, both in terms of generating the problems and in the search for solutions.

In the age of globalization, S&T cuts all ways. That much is clear. Yet at a time when humanity’s needs have never been greater, our collective capacity to innovate, to organize and to cooperate internationally in response seems grossly inadequate. Whether the subject is climate change, weapons of mass destruction, pandemic disease or ecosystems collapse, across a wide spectrum of unaddressed threats we seem to be approaching a tipping point beyond which recovery may be impossible.

Not least because the risks of failure are catastrophic, the arguments favouring efforts to improve performance are compelling.

But that’s an inconvenient truth, and neither governments nor markets are listening.

Read more…

Editor’s note: As a treat for readers of the GD blog, it is a pleasure to present this guest post by colleague and friend Ali Fisher. It approximates a presentation he made via videoconference to my MA class on “Science, Technology, Diplomacy and International Policy” at Ottawa University on October 10.

Towards for a more resilient public diplomacy

With the right tools, smarter networks and collaborative strategies there is potential to deliver a more resilient and sustainable public diplomacy.

Context

• Public diplomacy is regularly cast as a long term activity, often around building lasting relationships or impact and frequently focused on engaging young people or the ‘next generation’.

Read more…

Last weekend, as I participated in a conference entitled Armed Intervention: Lessons from Afghanistan, the US reported its 2000^th military death in that long-running conflict. Although the exact circumstances remain rather murky, the killing was apparently the result of an Afghan recruit turning upon his ISAF trainers.

Like so much else about the Afghan conflict, NATO’s exit strategy is not going according to script.

Read more…

The sacking of the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, the tragic deaths of U.S. ambassador Chris Stevens and three of his staff, and the continuing protests outside U.S. embassies throughout the Greater Middle East raise a host of vexing questions.

Unfortunately, when it comes to striking an appropriate balance between the competing demands of effective diplomatic representation and optimal personal security, for the most part one is left with an uninspiring ensemble of compromises and trade-offs.

There are no bromides or panaceas, no good or easy answers.

Read more…

Back in mid-June, I wrote a retrospective piece entitled “Rebranding Canada: From the Siege of Sarajevo to Rio Plus 20”. In that essay I tried to highlight the extent to which Canadian foreign policy has been transformed over the past several decades, and argued that although gradual and in large part unnoticed, the reorientation has in fact been profound.

The one-time cheerleader for North-South cooperation, environmental sustainability and world peace has morphed into something quite different.

Canada is now the tough talking, free-trading, warrior nation, extolling the victories attained in long forgotten wars, and investing in the preparation for new ones.

At the level of political rhetoric, and as expressed even more convincingly in terms of allocating resources in favour of the military, this is very much the new script.

It may be time for a re-write.

Read more…

Irony and paradox, as elements of art, add texture, depth and complexity.

The same is true in life, and perhaps nowhere more so than in the ever-surprising case of Julian Assange, the founder of Wikileaks and for many a champion of the freedom of information, a resister of arbitrary authority and a defender of the public interest.

Holed up in the Ecuadorian Embassy for the past two months in the swank Knightsbridge district of London, Mr. Assange has been granted asylum but is locked in a stand-off with British authorities over his bid to leave the UK. There have been reports that Britain is prepared to suspend the Embassy’s diplomatic status and enter the premises in order to execute a court order and arrest and extradite Assange to Sweden, where he faces lurid allegations of sexual impropriety.

I believe that threat unlikely to be executed.

Diplomatic premises are deemed inviolable under the Vienna Convention, and those conventions are widely enforced. While it is true that under situations of exceptional instability the protections afforded by the Convention are occasionally breached – think of the US Embassies in Saigon in 1975 or Tehran in 1979 – the effective removal of the Ecuadorean Embassy’s sovereign immunity would under these circumstances be very difficult to justify, even if a national legal basis exists.

Respect for international law is an important plank in UK foreign policy, and Britain would not likely wish to establish a precedent which would invite retaliation against its own representatives abroad.

In a world network node like London, moreover, the media coverage attending any forced removal would be a PR disaster.

Still, a decision to abstain from storming the chancery does not mean that British authorities must grant Mr. Assange safe passage should he attempt to leave the Embassy. The upshot of it all is that unless something fundamental changes, Assange may find himself a guest of his Ecuadorean  hosts for a some time.

That might not suit him; unlike the members of the shadowy hacker collective Anonymous, Assange relishes the spotlight. It was through his talk show on Russia Today that he met the person who is now his most useful advocate, Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa.

Read more…

Much of my time during 30 years at DFAIT – in addition to performing many and varied day jobs – was spent doing whatever I could to encourage reform. Trying to change the system from within did not result in 20 years of boredom – far from it. And that protracted struggle may even have helped to get me elected to a record five terms on the Executive Committee of PAFSO, the diplomats’ professional association and bargaining unit.

On balance, however, except for vivid memories, some entertaining anecdotes  and a few useful lessons learned, I have little to show for my efforts at encouraging better public policy and administration.

Looking back, what had changed over three decades?

Not the number of levels in the organizational hierarchy, which remains the same at seven between desk officer and Deputy Minister.

Not the bureaucratic culture, which remains cloistered, conservative, almost inert.

By my reckoning, DFAIT now has fewer friends, less influence, and more diminished discretionary resources than… probably ever.

This amounts to just about the opposite of what has become of the Canadian military, whose star, relative to other federal government departments and agencies, has in recent years continued to rise.

So…Does the sidelining and marginalization of Canada’s foreign ministry really matter?

Read more…

This spring marks the 20^th anniversary of two international events of signal importance in the history of Canadian international policy – the start of the 44 month siege of Sarajevo (April 06) and the UN’s Rio Conference on Environment and Development, or Earth Summit (June 03-14).

I was reflecting on the significance of this pair of occasions a few weeks ago while participating in the Meseuro Foundation Workshop and the Dubrovnik Diplomatic Forum, two conferences sponsored by the EU, UN, and several universities. The geographic context was Euro-Mediterranean, and both events are part of a larger effort to avert a clash of civilizations and to bring peace, stability and prosperity to the region. Of special interest are the southern and eastern tiers, whose populations might otherwise be tempted to relocate north and west, en masse.

Following five days of discussions on “Diplomacy and the Intercultural Dialogue” in Dubrovnik, I used the opportunity to do some travelling in the Western Balkans, visiting the Adriatic island of Korcula, the birthplace of Marco Polo, as well as ancient Kotor, in Montenegro, and finally the still-troubled cities of Mostar, Trebinje, Stolac and Sarajevo in Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Beautiful.

Beguiling.

Blood-soaked.

The Balkans.

Read more…

In the previous three entries in this series I have tried to compare and contrast various aspects of PD and branding – two related, but nonetheless distinct approaches to the management of a country’s international relations through public engagement, image projection and reputation management. In the last installment (Part III), I undertook to comment upon a central and abiding paradox which inevitably afflicts all forms of diplomacy.

Let’s begin with that.

Vitiated messaging

Diplomats, however well-intentioned, are hardly disinterested parties – they work for governments or international organizations and this can make them suspect from the start. The messenger can subvert the message.

Governments exist to defend and pursue national interests, to advocate policies and to promote values. In these respects they rely on the apparatus of the state, of which diplomats are an integral part. When members of civil society encounter diplomats, therefore, the encounter is not likely to be entirely unconditional, and this can give rise to suspicion and mistrust. Chances are, the diplomat, especially if he or she have initiated to exchange, will almost certainly be after something – an expression of support, a shift in position, a useful insight, a gem of intelligence. Of course there is nothing at all the matter with that. But it is not a neutral point of departure. Just as the best communications cannot compensate for flawed policy, no amount of active listening can overcome the handicap of seeking scripted outcomes or pre-ordained conclusions.

While this does not necessarily undermine or devalue the activity per se, it does leave open the possibility of eroding the integrity of the exchange, and in so doing could prejudice the chances of arriving at a mutually beneficial outcome.

For these reasons, the messenger, being somewhat suspect from the start, may vitiate the message – and the, quite possibly, the results.

Read more…

One of the defining attributes of being in a centre of global commerce and culture is the feeling you get when walking down the sidewalks.

In London, I found the experience of strolling a few blocks from where I was staying to the downtown campus of UEA London, in large part along the fabled Brick Lane, to be a source of energy and inspiration.

Now back in Ottawa for a month, I find the contrast especially striking. Almost painful. The narrow, crumbling  sidewalks along the anonymous streets in the Canadian capital’s exquisitely excrescent central business district seem to drain any joy or enthusiasm. With each step, you can feel the spirit ebbing.

Whereas London is a great place to be in the midst of, Ottawa is a great place to leave.

Fortunately, that is easily done, and its wonderful environs make the prospect irresistible.

As places, both London and Ottawa have brands. London is a world city and global network node, less an exemplar of things English or British than a vibrant cosmopolitan crossroads that just happens to be the capital of the UK.

Ottawa is a blandly pleasant frontier town and bureaucratic outpost on the fringe of the settled part of the North American continent.

All of which is to say that brands, not least because they exist mainly in the minds of the beholders, have personality and complexion. And on that note, I would like to return to, and weave further a few of the analytical threads comparing branding and public diplomacy (PD) first presented in Chapter 10 of Guerrilla Diplomacy.

Read more…