DA FAVORITA PAPER 02/2007 (2008)

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CONTENTS

FOREWORD, AMBASSADOR JIŘÍ GRUŠA5

PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 6

1. INTRODUCTION, SETTINGS AND AIMS15

2. TRAINING AND ITS CONTEXTS: ON THE TWO EMERGENT FORMATS OF DIPLOMATIC TRAINING 24

2.1. Bifurcation as a double opening salvo242.2. The variable geometry of fit322.3. Adjustment trends and institutional sedimentation

38 3. A HANDFUL OF CONTEMPORARY TRAINING BLUEPRINTS IN THEIR POLITICAL, ADMINISTRATIVE, HISTORICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL SETTINGS 47

3.1. The general panorama in the European Community andoutside it 53

3.2. The varied landscapes of the Americas833.3. The Middle East923.4. Greater Asia973.5. Sub-Saharan Africa110

4. PATTERNS OF DIPLOMATIC TRAINING AS ADAPTIVE MECHANISMS AND AS EXPEDIENTS FOR CLOUT: A GENEALOGY OF THE PORTUGUESE COUNTER-EXAMPLE 116

4.1. The far vicinity: the politics of corporatistbureaucracies 116

4.2. The near vicinity: the corporatism of bureaucraticpolitics 123

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5. ARCHITECTURAL PHASES IN THE GENEALOGY OF MODERN DIPLOMATIC TRAINING MODELS REVISITED

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ANNEX. CLUSTERS OF DIPLOMATIC TRAINING IN CENTRAL EUROPEANINITIATIVE COUNTRIES AGAINST A COMPARATIVE BACKGROUND 142

BIBLIOGRAPHY 162

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FOREWORD

To seize the moment, to grab your opportunity when itarises and to be bold enough to work on the internationalstage, be it in public service or in the private sector,today requires an intimate alignment of expert knowledgewith human skills. For diplomacy in the post-nationalistera combines efficacy with ethics, economics with culturalawareness. Founded in 1754 the Diplomatic Academy of Vienna(DA) thus has an obligation to the old virtues in order tomaster the new challenges: the wisdom to create balance,the courage and moderation to transmit this public goodfurther. In the past year we have strengthened our facultyand expanded our premises. We offer an interdisciplinaryprogramme to anyone ready and open to dedicating theirintellect and individuality to the acquisition of criticalanalysis and communicative competence. And, as theDiplomatic Academy of Vienna is a stage forinternationalism and equal opportunity for everybody, nomatter their country of origin, we crown our programmeswith a firm commitment to plurilingualism. The teaching ofinternational relations is based upon cooperation with aworldwide network of partners. As an independentinstitution we place great emphasis on the Europeantraditions and standards of diplomacy and it is here thatwe wish to make our primary contribution.

The idea for this book came to my mind at the InternationalMeeting of Deans and Directors of Diplomatic Academies andForeign Relations Institutions in Maputo in 2007. And mydear colleague, Armando Marques Guedes, an internationalexpert in the field of diplomatic training, agreed to bringit to life. I want to thank him for all the effort he putinto this project and I am proud to present the results inthe Academy’s Favorita Papers series.

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My special thanks also go to the Chief Executive Office –International Relations of the City of Vienna for makingthis book financially possible.

Ambassador Jiří GrušaDirector of the Diplomatic Academy of Vienna

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PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The seed for this study was a substantially shorter articlethat I wrote with a younger political scientist, Nuno CanasMendes, in Lisbon – although in itself a lengthy paperpublished by the Portuguese Ministry of Foreign Affairs inlate 2005. A tightly argued comparative essay, itnevertheless amounted to little more than a reasonedjustification for the novelties I had then had theopportunity to introduce as part of the induction traininggiven to budding Portuguese diplomats – to not-yetconfirmed young ‘cadets’ who had recently passed thenational entrance examinations that put them on to a pathwhich would eventually give them a place in the diplomaticcareer they had chosen.As is often the case, the actual conception of the presentbook took place elsewhere, in Maputo, and later, inSeptember 2007. The venue was the 35th Meeting of Deans andDirectors of Diplomatic Academies and Institutes ofInternational Relations – at an annual event, theInternational Forum on Diplomatic Training. More precisely,virtual fertilization and labour pains (which,inexplicably, made themselves felt together) began at agala dinner hosted by Thandi Lujabe-Rankoe, the South-African High Commissioner to Mozambique, in the ballroom ofthe famous Hotel Polana. Some hundred plus people werepresent, mostly Directors of Institutes and Academies fromaround the world.The well-attended reunion took place in the south-easternAfrican country so as to symbolically mark the inception ofthe ‘African Chapter’ of the group. Fittingly, the Maputomeeting was co-chaired by a living legend: former PresidentJoaquim Chissano of Mozambique.At the kind invitation of our host, perhaps because thatvery morning I had presented to the Plenary a long paper onterrorism and diplomacy– I had the pleasure of sitting atHigh Table. Food was good and plentiful. The banquet wassplendid. While eating and talking, we were accompanied by

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the most exquisite South-African artist who, from under hisblack Borsalino hat, recited for us soft but vibrant old-timemelodies. To me, after a busy working good day, the eveningwas going very well indeed, the dinner fuelling livelyconversations. Unsurprisingly, I hang mostly on to the dialogues withwhich I was myself involved. Casimir Yost, Director of theInstitute for the Study of Diplomacy, at the Edmund A.Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University,wished to continue an earlier discussion which we had bothstarted at lunch, on the meanders of Theodore Roosevelt’sforeign policy; every now and then his eyes shone as henodded in acknowledgement to a rendition of one favouritehit or another. Alan Hunt, the head and heart of theForeign Service Programme of the University of Oxford, atQueen Elizabeth House, was a delight to discretely trail:he sang along, with whoever dared to join in (I did, everynow and then), tunes we all remembered from our youth.Thandi took care of us all magnificently – she not only litthe table but the entire ballroom with her crystal-clearlaughter of pure joy which she showered on us at regularintervals during the dinner. Half-way through the meal shewanted to dance, and I had the honour to be first in hercarnet. It felt good to be alive.It was however Jiří Gruša, the illustrious Czech Directorof the Diplomatic Academy of Vienna (one of the convenersof the meeting) who made the night for me, with hisconstant flow of conversation – especially when he struck anerve by challenging me to write a book-length study ofdiplomatic training, a theme we had earlier discussedduring tropical evenings on the hotel terrace. After abrief moment of surprise, I agreed. This study is the endresult.

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What follows is a short monographic reading of some of theinstitutional dimensions of modern diplomatic training. Thesubject of this book is the evolution of the pattern and

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structure of diplomatic training against a comparativebackground. More precisely, this is a preliminary study ofsome of the ‘constraints’ which format modern training fordiplomacy. In an even finer-grade detail, this studytouches upon some of the most relevant distinctions whichwe can make in what concerns diplomatic trainingstrategies, and it in addition it focuses on thedistribution of these training formats among States –incidentally showing that the answers found for each ofthese two enquiries is not independent of the answers foundfor the other: in other words, showing that some groups ofStates favour some types of training over others for theirdiplomats, while others do not, and this is something Ialso try to track down and explain.In doing so, I do draw out a large variety of types oftraining. But by no means do I try to be exhaustive. Forinstance, I avoid bringing into the discussion the manyforms of training for diplomacy provided in multilateralentities like the UN and the EU, to name just two obviousexamples. This does not, of course, mean that I think themirrelevant or uninteresting. I do not. I see them asfascinating and immensely relevant – but I decided to steerclear of such varieties of training for reasons of textualeconomy and internal coherence. Their absence simplyreflects my analytical conviction that, althoughsurprisingly similar in substance and even ‘gist’, they arenot quite amenable to the same kind of political readingsand understanding as those I put forward for the featuresand ‘sequencing’ of modern State-centred strategies formaking diplomats. As will become clear from the outset, Ifirmly place the modern ‘edification’ of diplomats as astrategic pathway States take in the context of theirengagement with their homologues in the wider framework ofthe international State system. International organizationsdo not quite manoeuvre in equivalent realms; thus, many ofthe more marked aspects of, and constraints on, thetraining offered by States to national diplomatic personnelare absent from the ones they offer their mainly technicalstaff.

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A few preliminary hands-off methodological comments aboutmy chosen subject-matter are fitting here. Geographically,I cast my net wide. Although my approach is mainly one ofempirical description and theoretical analysis, I alsoventure into comparison. My aim is atypical: rather thanattempt a ‘history’ of training within State institutions,I look at these as part of – and as figures against – thegeneral background of the unfolding ‘genealogy’ oftraining. In other words, I reverse the tables. Empiricaltraining schemes – my foreground – I make out as‘architectural expressions’ of an interplay of responses toan ‘emergent foundational tension’ between two ‘congenital’moulds (one Parisian, the other Viennese, both from theseventeen hundreds) and also to exogenous pressures ofvarious sorts. These are all terms I shall endeavour tocircumscribe – without ever really trying to define themmore than operationally – as I go along. I try to always place training at the centre of my analysesand descriptions. This ‘reversal of tables’, as I calledit, does not of course mean I believe that in any sensediplomacy is somehow ‘determined’ by training; in fact, Ibelieve we are facing a two-way street. It suggests,rather, that its conduct is, in an important sense, partlyconditioned by it; that is, after all, why it is carried out– because of its perceived efficacy in patterningdiplomatic practice. The centrality I bestow on traininggenealogies and architectures expresses my conviction that,although I do not think training formats have ‘autonomousgenealogies’, they may safely be given the foreground, asdiplomatic action is not autonomous from training either.And diplomatic training does form, after all, my chosentopic, so it is surely amply justified to focus in earneston its re-shufflings and strategic pathways.Now a few lines on my decision to include in this work whatI call ‘the Portuguese counter-example’, – and indeed, mychoice to spend a considerable amount of time scrutinizingit. Much as this decision might appear to be imputable topersonal or national preferences, this was not so. Myoption to do so had little direct connection to my

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nationality or any other kind of whim of that sort. It isindirectly linked to it, however, as it does indeed resultfrom the fact I happen to know much more about this thanany of the other cases (I have, after all, been responsiblefor Portuguese diplomatic training for the last threeyears), and from a recognition that this sui generis casesomehow apparently challenges, very constructively albeitalso somewhat fundamentally, not a central but still andimportant part of my explanatory modelling. The progression of Portuguese diplomatic training is, infact, exemplary in the two senses of the term. First, as anapplication of a particular theoretical outlook, it allowedme to dwell on the model that I put forward in the presentstudy in much greater detail than I was capable ofachieving in other instances. But it is more than anapplication; it is also a sort of ‘counterfactual’ casewhich makes it possible through some contrastive extra-lighting on the others. At a second level, to put it intoother words, it is an exemplary counter-example, an extremevariation that highlights many of the constraints that Iallude to in my monographic work, by outlining them outvery starkly. It is not excessive to declare that withoutmy ‘participative knowledge’ of the meanders of thePortuguese example this would be a very different book.

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This is as good a place as any for me to dig into mymethodology a little further. A few good books and articleshave been published on changes in the patterns of moderndiplomacy. Some take as their focus the very range ofvariation in the array of contemporary diplomaticpractices. Others, instead, choose to try to squeeze somedrops of political meaning from the vast transformationswhich, for a while now, have been taking hold of thesedomains. A sizeable number of research works, mostlyessayistic in form, prophesize impending doom (some go sofar as to ring the death knell) for the actual jobsfulfilled by classical diplomacy – or, at the very least,

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foresee a long-drawn petering-out of an institutionalinternational solution that is feared to be growingobsolete, particularly since it has been shown to be notreally capable of adapting itself to some of the newsituations being confronted by modern States today.Very few studies, however, have squarely tried to look intothe intricacies of the adaptive mechanics of diplomaticchanges – that is, the technical-administrative engineeringby means of which traditional approaches change so as tobetter face current requirements; in other words, how theyare designed to guarantee a better fit of many venerablediplomatic profiles and silhouettes to contemporaryinternational topographies. Rarely have research effortsfocused on the extraordinary feats of balance and shape-shifting actually achieved in the hands-on planning for theon-going reform of modern State diplomacy – and very fewtook on the observable profile of the veritable tours de forcethat such adjustments often entail. This, of course, to mymind, is where diplomatic training fits into the picture –as a strategy for reconfiguration, designed to givepermanence and durability to a profession. Certainly, some authors have reflected, sometimes ratherdeeply, in fact, on matters of training for diplomacy.A.H.M. Kirk-Greene took stock of many of them in anenthralling way; so too, from their own angles, didDomenico Polloni, Rolando Stein, and also, of course, lastbut by no means least, Paul Meerts. I also dived into thesomewhat wider-ranging literature on the institutional – orsociological, or organizational – dimensions of diplomacyin its ‘entirety’ (from to A. Cascone to Robert Cooper toJozef Bátora, and from A. Watson to J. Der Derian) and thatconvinced me of the centrality of analytical comparativelabours. But while there have been a few other studies on diplomacyand diplomatic training written in the recent past, andeven if I have learned much from them, none quite providedwhat I was looking for. Thus I myself have had tolaboriously piece together what is still a very rudimentaryand surely inadequate account of diplomatic training and

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some of its variations in time and space, to use the well-worn cliché. Nevertheless, I largely proceed down a pathmarked by the ideas of my predecessors though there arefew. In what follows I strive to go down partly similartrail, trying to tread lightly on their footprints. Thesuccess or failure of my efforts should be measured by theswiftness with which they will be overtaken by richer ones.It is in any case worth remarking that, as things stand,any interesting conjectures reached in studies ofdiplomatic training from multidisciplinary research effortsare always bound to be controversial, irrespective of theirscope. For this as for most other kin issues, there is nocommonly accepted paradigm. It is naïve to expectdefinitive agreements in the face of competing claims aboutwhat may count as relevant evidence and competing viewsabout the conclusiveness, or even the credibility, ofpreferred approaches. Ultimately, more than simplequestions of method these are epistemological issues, boundup in the different packages of biases and a prioripreconceptions which analysts build into their researchenterprises. Given the lack of evidence that can beaccepted as decisive by all, different epistemologiesresult in conclusions which are, therefore, alwaysconditional on the unstated assumptions that underlie aparticular research program, as that are fully warrantedonly within the boundaries of a particular conceptualframework. So here are some of my own ‘pre-comprehensions’. Although Iam no historian, I am of course fully aware thatcontemporary diplomacies, like historical ones, have notarisen out of a vacuum, but from processes of an unevensedimentation and a growth which have been a long time inthe making. In turn, these processes have been criticallyshaped by the changing ways in which the variousconstraints that format them have interacted with eachother over time – and they still do. It is to me quiteclear that these twin pressures form a two-way street.Understanding this two way interaction between the patternand evolution of diplomatic training as one aspect of

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diplomacy, on the one hand, and the constraints that actupon it in multifarious ways, on the other, is the mainpurpose of this work. The attentive reader will have noticed that my successivephases in the evolving transformations of diplomatictraining (eras would be too strong a term, as what Idelineate is a sort of ‘punctuated equilibrium’ model, withshort spurts of change interspersed with long periods ofrelative stasis), have been demarcated mostly by majoroutbreaks of sudden changes, for whatever reasons these maycome about. Each phase may be seen as one more or lesslengthy period of relative stasis in which a given form oftraining is conducted within micro- and macro-politicalframeworks established by the previous major break, andthat that is, in turn, altered by the outbreak of the next,thus setting the stage for the next training phase, and soon. The importance I attribute to diacritical moments in the‘genealogical’ progression of this type of training doesnot really flow out of any aprioristic preference for bigevents as precise historical markers, or from anyformalistic ‘juridification’ of the processes oftransformation I look at in this study. Rather, it reflectswhat I believe we should conceive of as a curious‘property’ of the data under scrutiny. The ‘equation’ maybe formulated with relative ease, as soon as we give allthese formal considerations some empirical content: as arule, with few exceptions, momentous and relevant‘constitutional’ changes in diplomatic training rarely takeplace outside the context of major tectonic shifts onStates’ positions in the international State system. Theyoften follow wars, sudden and radical regime changes, andother major upheavals. It is thus perhaps not abusive toclaim that empirical facts show that raising diplomats andaltering the ways of doing so is something that does notcome cheap or easily. I want to be very clear on this point; namely what I mean by‘empirical content’. A feature of this study that may strikesome of its readers as peculiar or surprising – although it

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will seem entirely commonplace to political scientists,international relations specialists, or even historians – isits sustained emphasis on bureaucracies, politics, and largescale war-induced change. As I point out below, thegreatest, the most significant and permanent transformationsof diplomatic training – the spurts between phases – havetended to come not from the intellectual tâtonnement of a fewfictional Illuminist philosophes or from the generosity ofwell-meaning and benevolent diplomats, but from momentouschanges in global political and economic patterns ofinternational relationships, the barrels of Gatling or Maximguns, the calculations of grey accountants in their lairs,the points of spears and the edge of scimitars, the courageof rebellious irredentism, the lucid dimensions of academicback-stabbing, or the ferocity of terrorist suicide bombers.A slightly different way of putting this is to stress theobvious: diplomatic training is not just part of domesticpolitics; it is also part of international politics.That this should be so, is a matter I believe that no neo-realist would have any difficulty simply explaining awayand digesting. For them, such empirical contents are mere‘images’ or ‘expressions’, they are nothing but refractionsof ‘international anarchy’. From my own less realist andmore constructivist liberal perspective, however,explaining why this should be so constitutes a challenge,and so it is one of the central questions that this studytries to tackle. Thus the gathering of data on diplomatictraining proper is only one aspect of the task that I havehad to undertake so as to respond to Jiří Gruša’s amicablechallenge. Wherever I can, that is, I put it into context.Moreover, I try to interpret these types of training asperformative forms of political action – domestic as wellas international forms, to be sure, but also cosmopolitanones, if only for some of the unintended consequences theyentail.

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A final note on data collection strategies for this studyand what they entailed as well as many acknowledgments.Data gathering was indeed a fascinating process, if attimes a rather laborious one. As readers of the followingtext will quickly notice, I have extensively consulted theextant bibliography (an easy thing to do as there is notvery much of it around!) on diplomatic training. Thisincluded both the “primary” materials available in loco, onofficial Internet sites and, in the case of European Unionmember-States, in Brussels – as well as secondary sources,which as a rule arrived in the form of studies (academic orprogrammatic). These readings were rewarding, although attimes a little dry; they nevertheless allowed me to digdeeper into my subject-matter. Above all, they forced uponme the realization that not very much has been written onthis theme which deserves far more attention andconsideration. So the efforts I made for the production ofthis study were not brought to an end with preliminary arm-chair empirical and theoretical data gathering. Althoughthis study itself was written in a few weeks, itspreparation took, of course, much longer and I haveaccumulated an embarrassingly long list of debts along theway. In most cases I was able to go a bit further than merereading and consultation, and this was, not unexpectedly,immensely rewarding.As a result, a few words of acknowledgement are in order.Firstly to hospitality; material as well as intellectual.As President of the Portuguese Diplomatic Institute – apost I held for three very full years, between April 2005and April 2008 – I had the pleasant opportunity to visitmany of the diplomatic training entities I decided to writeabout; and sometimes did so more than once and quite oftenfor extended stays. In not a few instances, I becamefriends with the people in charge of them, my lateralequivalents as it were. For three years I also participatedin periodic (semesterly) EU Diplomatic Training DirectorsMeetings, chairing one of them, during the third PortuguesePresidency in the last six months of 2007. In parallel, Iopened the 8th European Diplomatic Training Program, for

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young diplomats of the member-States – (and was present atthe beginning of the 7th, in Helsinki, Finland). I alsotook part in a 2006 meeting of diplomatic trainingdirectors in Madrid, and a further such meeting in 2007 inMontevideo, both steps toward the annual Ibero-AmericanSummits. Such in loco ‘field-research’ (or, at least, ‘hands-on data-gathering’) proved invaluable, as it took me offthe remote ivory tower-like high ground that I could easilyhave drifted to.Against the backdrop of my preliminary and posteriorreadings, I felt ready to try and recast an initial formalunderstanding of idealized training and administrativeschemas in terms of what I regard to be a far morerealistic setting. But perhaps, as is the case with manybooks, this one has been written for the primary benefit ofthe author. With hindsight, it is clear that I did not doenough in this regard and that more hands-on datacollecting would have me led to re-colour, or re-calibrate,my interpretations closer to actual practices; and I haveno doubt studies which will surpass mine will follow thatlead. By looking into actual procedural dynamics ofoperation on the ground, some of the intricate world oflocal organizational cultures becomes visible and amenableto scrutiny. Moreover, through even a light – albeitsustained – experience of “participant observation”, Ibecame able to pin-point micro and often macro-politicalskewing and distortions which would otherwise have misleadme. In public and other organizations, things are neverwhat we wish them to be, and indeed they rarely conform towhat we may have to, or want to, pretend they are.Participant observation enabled me, for example, to avoidfollowing blindly many of the extant ‘institutionalist’hints and temptations (intellectually fascinating andcoherent as they may be) I might have initially had on thesubject; by presuming a systemic closure of sorts, thesestrike me as little more than ‘internalist’ readings whichserve to legitimise some of the inertias of diplomaticactors and State machineries via a mechanism of ‘self-reference’. The inference, therefore, is that ‘fieldwork’

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does a great deal more than complement arm-chair research –it actually puts its results under a very different light,one that often changes deeply the shape of the objectsunder scrutiny.Sadly, much of the rich data I collected at first hand Inever actually got around to using. For a variety ofreasons, for example, I do not discuss the cases ofdiplomatic training in Greece, Lithuania, Uruguay,Mozambique or Algeria, five countries I examined rather atlength and which I deeply admire for the high professional,academic, and human qualities they display. Ironically, Iactually actively participated and gave presentations –sometimes more than once – in seminars held at the GreekDiplomatic Institute, the Lithuanian Institute forPolitical Science and International Relations, theMozambican Institute of International Relations, and theAlgerian Diplomatic Academy; and I gave a long talk inMontevideo, Uruguay, at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, on‘comparative diplomatic training’. Not all was lost,however: although I hardly mention them in the presentstudy, they were greatly influential in the effort I hadlaid down for myself of complementing “the extantbibliography” – they allowed me to better put things intoperspective, in the strong sense of the expression.My debt is, in some cases, more substantial. A large partof the text of the analytical core of this small volume isthe result of combined research and composition initiallycarried out with my friend and colleague Nuno Canas Mendes,to whom I owe an enormous debt of gratitude. This workbegan with him; and in other fronts, such as in an articleabout the concours which permits initial access to thePortuguese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, it continued withhim. As mentioned, a previous version of the following text– which amounts to only a fraction of the size of thepresent monograph may be read in Armando Marques Guedes andNuno Canas Mendes (2006). Much of what is included here,namely in sections 3. and 4., is heavily based on what wewrote in the first half of August 2005. That seminalarticle benefited immensely from various critical readings

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by many who were kind enough to engage in them. With theseappraisals it underwent additions, severe cuts and variousinflections, and it gained modulations which much improvedthe text. A Romanian translation of that shorter paper waspublished in Bucharest, in 2006, in Armando Marques Guedes,Trei Conferecie, Bucuresti, Romania – the first title of thedistinguished Biblioteca Diplomatica of the Romanian DiplomaticInstitute.The present, much longer and significantly re-focusedmonograph and its annex benefited a great deal fromcollegial critical eyes, ears, and minds. I presented someof the themes discussed here in talks I gave in Bucharest,Cairo, Montevideo and Moscow, and from those a few ratheruseful new ideas resulted. Many of the comments I receivedwere invaluable. Most inputs, in one way or another, endedup crawling into my study. However, responsibility for thefinal text lies exclusively on my shoulders, as thedefinitive text represents none but my own personalposition. I want to thank, in alphabetical order, thefollowing people who were kind enough to give generously oftheir time: Walid Abdel Nasser, Ravi Afonso Pereira, JoãoAmador, Mladen Andrlić, Jorge Azevedo Correia, LisenBashkurti, Jan Claudius Bujak, Jamie Darke, Bruno DiasPinheiro, José Augusto Duarte, Radu Dudau, Diogo Freitas doAmaral, Ana Leal de Faria, Aldo Matteucci, Armando M.Marques Guedes, Mircea Naidin, Vlad Nistor, FranciscoPereira Coutinho, Dan Petre, Gerhard Reiweger, HeitorRomana, Rolando Stein, António José Telo, Pedro Velez,Colin N. Wills and Zoran Vodopija. Without them this wouldbe a different and much poorer study.I owe very special thanks to Ambassador Jiří Gruša, who inmany ways fathered – or at least imagined – this book. ToRadu Dudau, whose friendship and collegiality have beeninvaluable and to whom I owe some of the most enlighteningdiscussions on my ‘model’. To Marc Simon, who took on thetough task of reading through an often convoluted text.And, last but not least, to Wolfgang Lederhaas, who gentlypushed for its development and finally delivered it as ifit were his own.

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1. Introduction, settings and aims

Experience is the hardest kind of teacher. It gives you the test first, and the lesson afterward.

Anonymous

It is striking to note that the changes which thePortuguese Ministry of Foreign Affairs undertook in late2005 at the level of training programmes planned fordiplomats – despite being rather weighty ones – were intruth quite trivial when compared with what takes place inother States. Courses with generic characteristics such asthose of the Course on National Foreign Policy (Curso dePolítica Externa Nacional), inaugurated in October of that yearand repeated with a few minor tweaks in the last semesterof 2006 and the first of 2007, are far from exceptional. Inmost cases – in fact in the large majority of cases, if wemainly focus on comparable countries – courses like thePortuguese one are in fact greatly lacking in much of whatis really required for an adequate grounding incontemporary diplomacy.Indeed, important pedagogical restructuring is a currentpractice in parallel institutions in other countries –institutions, as shall be seen, as a rule far older andmore sophisticated than the Instituto Diplomático and usuallyvery much more in tune with the concrete requirements ofthe modern world. The norm is for the in-depth trainingadministered by Ministry of Foreign Affairs type entitiesabroad [from here onwards, MFAs] to be complemented bybrief modules of teaching and learning with diverseapplications or, more specifically, focal points, whichflesh out choices that naturally respond to theparticularities of the structures and conjunctures of theirrespective foreign policies. The general direction ofchanges carried out on the training front has thereforebecome evident as inevitable, should we want to be on anequal footing to those States (and the many other non-Stateentities) alongside whom we must act on the international

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stage. One does not need to invest a great deal ofattention and intellectual effort to realize that, ingeneral terms, the training administered to diplomats ischanging, and is doing so, both swiftly and profoundly, theworld over. In effect, the most superficial ofjuxtapositions with examples abroad demonstrates it withease and clarity. Transformations at the level of methodsand contents of that which is taught have beena virtually universal constant for the many differentInstitutes, Schools, Centres, and Academies whose job is totry to guarantee the professional aptitude of diplomats atthe levels required by the many new competencies with whichhave been charged. It should further be noted that it is not only on the widergeographic plane that these changes can be detected: indiachronic terms it is easy to highlight the evidence ofa constant flux of changes in the central field of trainingof diplomatic staff and agents. The 19th and 20th Centurieshave been diacritical. The general panorama, bothsynchronic and diachronic, appears, as a whole, prettyclear-cut: in the last hundred years very much has changedin an irreversible manner as far as the trainingwhich diplomats have undergone is concerned – mainly in thecase of "Western" countries, in the more than half acentury since World War II and given the reorganization ofthe international system which it engendered.It is easy to pinpoint the main iconic moments, or‘phases’, of the rapid progression of the manychanges which have reconfigured processes of diplomatictraining. Interestingly, changes in diplomatic trainingempirically often have been post-conflict events. Toenounce briefly a broad-spectrum periodisation1 to which Ishall return often: the Vienna Congress, in 1815, was,undoubtedly, a key first milestone. However, the Berlin1 A.H.M. Kirk-Greene (1994), The Sons and Daughters of Maria Theresia, AnAnniversary History of the Annual Meeting of Directors and Deans of Diplomatic Academiesand Institutes of International Relations, [s.l.]: Edmund A. Walsh School ofForeign Service, Georgetown University, , p. 1. As may be seen, Ifind Kirk-Greene’s periodization of diplomatic training compelling,although I try to add to it a few new ‘phases’.

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Conference of 1884-1885 may possibly have been the discreteoccasion which spelled out the emergence, in time, of agreater line of division, at least in what concerns the‘Imperial’ and ‘imperialist’ powers, to use a terminologycommon at the time. But that was, nevertheless, only abeginning. In reality, with 1919 and the Versailles Peace –and the last of the fleeting whims of any sort of Concertsof Nations or Ententes Cordiales which would come todefinitively pacify the international system – a new layerwas increasingly added as multilateral entities ofcollective security such as the League of Nations wereborn. Generalized formal training for diplomacy then reallytook off in earnest. Professionalization became part of alist of requirements subordinated to formal educational andinstitutional processes in those areas which the newdiplomacy turned toward in a deeply altered world. All thisstarted to change after 1945, and above all for those wholived at the end of the 1950's, during and after thereconstruction of a devastated post-war Europe – that is,in a period of ‘thickening’ whose pioneer role (or, perhapsbetter put, its operation as a sort hinge) cannot beunderestimated. It is actually not too difficult to understand why this isso. Repercussions of changes on such a tectonic scale werefelt early, and they inexorably made their way and came tofruition. In hindsight, it surely could not have beenotherwise. With the successive deep reorganizations ofinternational order a lot changed in the field of “thestructures of conjunctures”, as they were famously called,that followed each other. After Vienna in 1815, Berlin in1884 and 1885, and, certainly, Paris in 1919, diplomacy wasno longer mainly about style, courtesy, and the celebratedwell known (but no less normative for that) principle ofthe great Talleyrand, sourtout pas trop de zèle. It became“specialized”2. Some paradigmatic examples of this

2 I use the terms “specialized” and “specialization” throughout, inreference to the technical dimension of training. I do not imply by thisuse of terms any necessary preference or position as the ongoingpolemics between those who believe Ministries should choose between a

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‘Copenican shift’: the commercial, consular andjuridical dimensions (to focus on but three angles) quicklybecame of crucial importance for the practical life ofdiplomats. While the real political priorities (in the most“courtly” meaning of the expression) became fewer in number– if not also specifically less weighty – the fact is thatprocesses of multilateral negotiations, which changes inthe post war international order required, expanded rapidlyand had to be coped with professionally. Respite was shorlived, as such seminal political andeconomic transformations were soon amplified by rathermajor technological upheavals which often made them spiral.With Potsdam, Dumbarton Oaks and S. Francisco in 1945,things began to move fast again. Consequences werecumulative: diplomacy started to take on new imperatives,it acquired new meanings and unexpected dimensions and itfound itself impelled, mostly after the 60’s and 70’s, toincorporate new techniques and take into account theimportance of novel technologies that had meanwhileemerged. The 90’s only broke a short lull, and from then onthe pace has picked up noticeably. Hand in hand with theresulting reorientations, diplomatic practice has acquirednew strategies and a new mechanism, both aimed at theconstitution of the professional managers whichinternational life needed – and the key to thisprofessionalization was largely to be found in the modernmethods of training and teaching. At that level, the break with the past has been notorious.Up to then, the training and learning designed for themembers of the elites who entered the Ministries of ForeignAffairs operated as if through osmosis – if we can thus

strict division of labour between diplomats and a “generalist” modelin which all should be inter-changeable, which seems to me to be arelated but quite distinct issue. It may be noted, however, that thisis really an outdated and sterile discussion. Since at least threegenerations of medical doctors decided to go for a “specializedmodel” of professional practice in which “general practitioners” areactually in a majority. This is only possible since, contrary to whatis intuitive, “specialist practice” is actually a bigger box than“general practice”.

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characterize the traditional ways of diplomats’ preparationand recruitment. We then crossed a threshold into a newworld: if the old model has not really disappeared, it isnow largely doing so; it was, in fact, the sort ofprofessional training typical of labour conditionsportrayable by a clockwork inexorableness of tasks. Thecontext in which it took place did change and thus theformats which the teaching and training had assumed endedup being relegated to an inferior position in regard toacademic processes, processes that were found to be verymuch more in tune with the many changing and complexrealities which diplomatic staff increasingly ran into —and hence felt the growing need to know how to prepare themto face these. In what follows, I shall develop (and Ishall try to unravel) this contrast further. Doing so incontext allows me to avoid pervasive opposition indiscussions of diplomatic training that hides more than itreveals: that between ‘university vs. professional’teaching-learning. My focus, as should be clear, is on formand process, not content. This is founded on a much moreappropriate opposition between ‘on the job’ and ‘rote’learning, on the one side, and formal, systematictheoretical and practical learning, on the other. Ratherthan base myself and labour in simple contrasts, I shallcircumscribe this central one as my study unfolds3.

3 A brief example of how complex the meanders of this contrast can bein real life: in November 2005, Alan Hunt, the Director of the OxfordUniversity Foreign Service Programme (FSP), could state that, at theFSP: “[t]he balance between academic and professional components waschanging. At Georgetown, for comparison, the course was approximatelyone-third academic, two-thirds practitioner-orientated. At Oxfordthere was increased demand for academic content; hence the launch ofa masters degree qualification” [for this and many other interestingpoints, see the summary athttp://textus.diplomacy.edu/textusbin/env/scripts/Pool/GetBin.asp?IDPool=1166, retrieved on 18. 07. 08]. At any rate, theclassification of curricular items as ‘practitioner-oriented’possibly relates to content (say ‘protocol’ or ‘multilateralnegotiation’) and not necessarily to teaching strategies; in otherwords, in the terms I follow here, these courses would likely fallunder the heading of ‘academic’ training. Another matter, as we shall

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Well then, how has Portugal been faring in the task ofeffectively training its diplomats for the contemporaryworld? The short answer is poorly – if not almost counter-cyclically. As we shall see in chapter 4, until veryrecently Portugal has unfortunately done largely withoutany serious sustained preparation of its diplomats and haspersisted in maintaining a “training” format which, atleast in terms of time and program, appears less ambitiousthan those of its many partners with whom we have greaterand more regular political diplomatic contact – and mosthave ensured an increasingly better grounding for theirdiplomats to face the new types of tasks expected of them.As such, the rudimentary forms of training supplied havenot really resulted in much; the didactic methods used havebeen insufficient; instruction has been given in a ratherloose and vague manner and very often in a disjointed one.As a rule we have not known how to achieve the quality ofteaching and learning required to act and react on theexternal stages of the contemporary world4 with the desiredeffectiveness.Surely the most surprising is the fact that such acomparative deficiency, far from being seen as sad, orenvisaged with the indignation which us could be lead toroll up our sleeves and solve a problem, has been regardedby many sectors which should have known better with a quietbonhomie — and by and large continues to be so looked upon,

see, and again by no means simple, is the eventual reduplication, by,or via Ministries of Foreign Affairs, of what Universities do. It isinteresting to note that Jovan Kurbalija’s innovative Swiss DiploFoundation e-learning programmes are explicitly built aroundessentially modern academic models. I shall deconstructively returnto this dichotomy over and over again.4 The Instituto Diplomático was founded only in 1994, which puts Portugalbehind Malta, a country that created its lateral equivalent — ajustly renowned training institution known as The Mediterranean Academy ofDiplomatic Studies — in 1991 and has a much larger scope than that of thePortuguese institution. In the vast majority of other EuropeanStates, similar institutes were started very much earlier. And thePortuguese Institute, weighed down by initial minimalist design, neverknew, truly, how to become a real "diplomatic school", contrary tothose which have, for decades, existed over all the continents.

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when it is not seen as a type of curious trump card: thefirst impression one gets when talking to Portuguesediplomats, the sort of spontaneous reaction they show,appears to be that they mostly consider it is good thatthis be the case. Such a curious attitude should surely beassociated with the verification that decision makers didnot, either because they could not, or because they wouldnot, impose a more ambitious and modernized model. But itis also obviously linked to a curiously outdated depictionof the intrinsic nature of diplomatic tasks. On the surfacewhat appears to prevail among many Portuguese diplomats isthe belief that good diplomacy is “an art form”, a figure –or rather, an outline – associated with the capacity toestablish good political connections and the notion thatthere is some intrinsic splendour similar to the classicaristocratic Corps Diplomatiques of old: an image articulatedwith the conviction that diplomatic action need only, to beeffective, have a smattering of glamorous activity, or atleast be marked through style, charm, distinction, and mostsurely a heavy dose of astute shrewdness. The keyexpressions through which this very image is normallyconveyed are those of "echelon", "diplomatic profile","presentation", “finesse” and "ability".Clearly, an idealised representation such as this, for allits quaintness, cannot today survive a serious scrutiny.Indeed, such a profile suffers from what I am tempted tolabel as a terminal structural inadequacy: it embodies ahardly modern idea, a vision which is associated with amarkedly Eurocentric and hierarchic world which is nolonger really all-pervasive; it is attached to a historicalarena in which diplomacy was practised as a largelyspontaneous expression of dominant social groups with avirtual monopoly on formal political power, a type ofintuition that was often conceived of as hereditary, andthat indubitably was a sub-product of a wisdom which flowedout of learning processes linked (so it was believed) to anintimate sharing of knowledge carried out between young“apprentices” and elder “masters” – with the latter deemedas less ignorant because they were buried in the

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instructive toil of “concrete life” in their Chancelleries.By and large the implications of such out of date self-representations are anything but pedagogically neutral.More than any actual instruction achieved through formaltraining strategies, what has been sought in Portugal hasbeen a greater effective involvement of diplomats withtheir professional activity stricto sensu – the type ofactivity which, in the organic framework of the State, wasab initio attributed to this professional grouping and whichthey are supposed to reproduce. Largely as a result,training has in essence assumed a format close to that of amimetic initiation. The costs of this attitude have been high, given Portugal’simmersion (expressed, for example, in terms of anincreasingly complex level of economic, military, andsocio-cultural interdependence) in an ever wideningassortment of States which have managed to achieve a widerregional and global standing by means of precisely theopposite strategy: a very much more intense technical andspecialised preparation for their diplomatic staff, in acontext of change that constantly imposes speed andprecision in the constant re-adjustments it requires fromus all. A specialized technical preparation which involves,as other forms of modern education in other domains,processes of acquisition of knowledge, skills, attitudes,and values, i.e. competences, as lifelong strategies ofprofessional learning. That this really ought to be soshould come as no surprise, as other professional analogiesabound; it is surely unthinkable, for example, to supposethat, instead of receiving a full and diversified formaltraining, “apprentice” engineers, doctors, or modernjurists, should be instructed according to a system basedsolely on the connections and the personal transmission ofexperiences and practices of their respective “masters”5 –5 Namely, in the case of the Portuguese military, whose trainingprocesses have for some decades included a solid and very prolongedacademic-scientific dimension, apart from theevidently indispensable "practical" one. The now extinct Instituto de AltosEstudos Militares, the "classic" higher training college of the Army, inits last thirty years included a Staff Course (for officers with the

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although, of course, informal learning of that sort hassurely always had an important ancillary role. As we shall see, the reasons for reactions to change suchas the ones have I just outlined arise from a number ofvery diverse causal planes – although they are planes whichare neither new nor atypical. Apart from the hesitationsassociated with the tacit adhesion to a collection ofoutdated images about what the nature of the role ofdiplomats in the modern world is, various factors should beadded to the mix that renders intelligible a not uncommonopposition to formal training. On the one hand, thatresistance flows from the rather vehement corporateresistance of a body quite closed in on itself – andbecause of this, reluctant to accept any input which itconsiders to be external. On the other hand, it is anoutcome of a marked defensive and protective conservatismwhich results in a tension (a tension that is to someextent present everywhere, not only in Portugal) extantbetween bureaucratic-administrative requirements of “theservices” – a pressure to keep diplomats “at work”, inother words – and the pressing need to temporarily andperiodically free them from this, so they can acquire thein-depth technical know-how indispensable to the betterorganization and fulfilment of their modern roles.

rank of Major, as part of the requirements to be eligible to become aColonel) and another course, one of Command and Direction, aimed atthe selection of future Generals. Large percentages (often as many ashalf) of the staff teaching these courses were "civilian" academics.The Portuguese Navy and the Air Force held similar courses andinstitutions until October 2006. Of course, these teaching-learningloads were only possible given the existence of enough militarypersonnel for such prolonged (an academic year in full time or more)"leave of service". Interestingly, the creation of a militaryUniversity for Advanced Studies, entitled Instituto de Estudos SuperioresMilitares, almost exactly to the day coincided with end of conscriptionin Portugal: both happened at the end of 2005. The lesson should belearned: when the lack of available labour became most pressing,modern training was considered more indispensible – even if that didmean a pause in the usage, by the hierarchy, of the available workforce. Of course, the military do have to face up to wars which canbe visibly won or lost.

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To emphasize that this is not only the case in Portugal, itis helpful to underline the generality of its occurrence:the difficulty in simultaneously managing the urgent needsof Ministerial departments in relation to personnel andtheir acquisition of competencies does indeed seem to be anormal thing. As Italian diplomat Domenico Pollonipointedly noted in rather neat sociological-organizationalterms, “one constant in many countries is the conflictbetween training requirements and the operative pressuresof the Department, which creates bad feeling andmisunderstandings between the training body and the otherMinistry departments and causes viscosity in the managementof young diplomats who are the preferred recipients of thetraining” 6.My suggestion is quite straightforward and it is that, ifseen in an appropriately comparative light, theannouncement of the start, in mid October 2005, of thealready mentioned Curso de Política Externa Nacional (CPEN, thefirst domestic Course created within a central service ofthe Ministry of Foreign Affairs and aimed at deeper studyof Portuguese foreign policy, conducted for the most partby academics, and above all targeting a better“professional training” as a start for young people whorecently joined the diplomatic career) was not at allsurprising. What does constitute a surprise is that itsemergence came about so late7.

6 Domenico Polloni (1996)., p. 39, my own stress. But this has by nomeans kept things still. As we shall see, and as has been the case alittle bit everywhere, reality has imposed itself and training hasbeen intensifying, even when that did not mean increasing thepersonnel available for daily working tasks. Quite correctly, thehierarchy in the Portuguese Ministry believes that there is aninsufficient number of diplomats, given the international obligationsof the State. What is difficult to understand is why the hierarchyprefers to forfeit training rather than convince the Ministry ofFinance (or the Prime-Minister) to allow an increase in their number.7 Similarly straightforward was the avowed intention (also thenannounced, but to no great avail) of at least partly indexing theprogression of diplomats in their professional careers on the formaltraining they actually receive; again, this kind of change would havebeen hardly new, as the lightest of comparisons easily shows us.

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Surprising too is the fact that – as may easily be verified– for quite a while now both this incipient training fordiplomacy in Portugal and the associated formal mechanismswhich have been in place with the aim of guaranteeing theapplication of a modicum of meritocratic criteria fordiplomats’ progression in their professional careers haveconsistently followed what are often markedly academicmodels8. In the following chapter I try to dig a littledeeper into this last point by comparatively looking atgeneral conditions for the dynamics of emergence of suchdevelopments. In other words, I strive to outline aninterpretation of the new training processes against thebackdrop of a kind of “general theory” of theirestablishment. I shall try to do that through means ofrapid – and not too detailed – juxtapositions: mostly quickand light comparative assessments, but ones carried out ina fairly systematic manner. In what follows, I will also be more ambitious than acomparativist would be – and much more than I would be if Imerely stuck to matters pertaining to the Portuguese case.In order to clarify how I attempt to take a few stepsfurther than that an additional, if brief, methodological

8 A secondary suggestion is that these trends will most likelyintensify in the years to come. According to Rolando Stein, in hisrich and detailed Final Report on ‘Building a Professional ForeignService’, presented at the 33rd Meeting of Deans and Directors of DiplomaticAcademies and Institutes of International Relations held in Peru, this academicset of pre-requisites was not only very general, but actuallyspreading. From survey data gathered in 81 countries, it resultedthat, in 2005, “85% of new entrants to foreign ministries joined as aresult of competition by public examination. The rest were drawn fromother branches of the civil service or (in 46% of ministries) werebrought in at mid-career level with special expertise. 90% of foreignservices required an academic qualification (BA) for entry; 11%required postgraduate degrees (MA and above)”. For a summary ofAmbassador Rolando Stein’s fascinating data (the former Director ofthe Chilean Diplomatic Academy) data, penned by John Hemery asRapporteur, seehttp://textus.diplomacy.edu/textusbin/env/scripts/Pool/GetBin.asp?IDPool =1166, already cited, retrieved on 18.07.08. This does notmean, of course, that the process is one of linear accretion, or thatit is spread homogeneously.

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statement is surely appropriate here. “Genealogy” and“architecture” are two notions, ideas, or ‘concepts’, whichI freely make use of in what follows. As I employ them,architecture and genealogy entail some degree of intrinsicconnection between a subject-matter and its veryidentification, on the one hand, and the imputation, on theother hand, to that subject-matter, of some unity ofprinciples which it is the business of genealogy andarchitectural mapping to uncover. As such they are‘concepts’ – or, perhaps rather, ‘operational roadmaps’ –closely linked to underlying notions of diachrony andsynchrony. They are also clearly from the realm ofrepresentation. I use them rather as Paul W. Kahn does inhis The Cultural Study of the Law, as pertaining to the domain ofsemiotics, such that “the former [genealogy] traces ahistory of the concept; the latter [architecture] maps thepresent structure of belief”9. The two concepts areobviously interconnected. As I wield them, the notions arerelatively close to the likes of ‘tradition’ and‘arrangement’, or, perhaps better, Michel Foucault’s use ofthe same (généalogie and architecture) in the major context ofhis umbrella notion of episteme. The notions are anchored inideas such as those of the intertexte of Roland Barthes,paradigm of Thomas Kuhn, deep structure of Noam Chomsky, oreven longue durée of Fernand Braudel. The use I make of thesenotions allows me to identify and compare patterns withoutfalling into the quagmires of organicist (that is‘Hegelian’-style and pointedly teleological) historicism orsociologism.In my next section – chapter 2 of this study – I endeavourto sketch out a comparative assessment of the genealogical‘history’ of recruitment and orientation processes invarious modern States. As I stated earlier, my main goaldoes not include historical claims: foregoing this, Iattempt instead to trace lines of force in the convergencesand divergences of the progressions which have taken place.In a second and longer section (chapter 3) I ponder the

9 Paul W. Kahn (1999), The Cultural Study of the Law: Reconstructing LegalScholarship, University of Chicago Press, p. 41.

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results of my very selective comparisons. The purpose, inthis case, is to highlight dominant features; or, in otherwords, to strive to pinpoint in generic terms trends whichI perceive as more relevant in the cumulative changesmapped; my aim, here, is to bring to light “backbones” andgeneral tendencies rather than to equate any precise macro-comparative analysis – an effort which would be of littleuse given the modest aspirations of what amounts to a verypreliminary study. In the fourth part of this shortmonograph, I shall focus my attention exclusively on thegreat master-lines of progression of the Portuguese case.Finally, in the last chapter of this introductory study,the fifth, I attempt first a general balance and then areturn in context to that which I previously unearthed; Itry to do so with the goal of better placing the Portugueseas well as other examples (namely most Central European Initiative(CEI) ones, which I treat in a special Annex) within mygeneral framework of analysis. As I hope will become obvious, the discussion I engage inaims to fulfil two major desiderata: besides suggesting afoundation — one which tries to be simultaneouslygenealogical, comparative, and functional — for the modernsurge in diplomatic training in many States from allcontinents (which includes the decisions announced in 2005for the Portuguese case), what I seek to offer is a firstglimpse at a theoretical framework which purports to helpus better understand the general panorama of the manyundertakings taking place in contemporary areas of teachingand learning for diplomacy.

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2. Training and its contexts: on the two emergent formatsof diplomatic training

There are always antecedent causes. A beginning is an artifice, and what recommends one over another

is how much sense it makes of what follows.Ian McEwan, Enduring Love

If Enlightenment is to be equated with ‘modernity’, then we will need to recognise that its vision of modernity has been stretched and shaped to fit very different circumstances,

in its own time as well as since. We may also need to admit that its ‘fit’ to different contextswas neither uniform nor equally convincing, even in its own century.

John Robertson, The Case for the Enlightenment

Without wanting to go into excessive minutiae – if only forthe sake of the economy of this undersized text – it iscertainly worth our while to begin by illustrating withsome choice examples the manifold processes to which I havealluded. Before that, however, it is useful to try andunderstand the ‘internal logics’ of many of the changesthat are taking place. For this, we shall take a step backand dig into some of the ‘archaeological contexts’ of thoseprocesses and changes. As will become evident, my aim hereis not really to present a historical narrative of complexprocesses – the empirical vagaries of many of which arestill unfortunately not very well known. Following a focus on the recent changes which occurred inthe Portuguese case in the last section, my aim in thischapter is to uncover some of the internal dynamics of themain ‘genealogical’ and ‘architectonic’ proclivities I deemto be in operation: where I try to ascertain what theirmain beams and hinges are, so to speak. The present section operates as a general introductory lay-out; going through it will allow me, in a final section, toreturn to these points with what I hope will be, if not ofa somewhat greater factual density, at least of a thickeranalytical one. I shall unwrap my analysis at the very“architectural-genealogical” institutional starting pointsof formal diplomatic instruction.

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2.1. Bifurcation as a double opening salvo

From the 17th Century onward – and beginning with the fullrecognition, in and after Westphalia, of the importance ofdiplomacy as an instrument of foreign policy of Stateswhich successive treaties celebrated (in which thoseprepared by A.N. de La Houssaye and A. Moetjens10 standout) – European public authorities came to underline withclarity the necessity of bringing together birth, study,and experience, as essential qualities, or ingredients, ofthe diplomat. Pedigree, style, wisdom, and practice thuscame to make up the basic traits or, rather, the mainelements, of what became a consecrated formula throughoutthe Old Continent.It was a generic recipe which, mutatis mutandis, survivedcontextual changes rather well. For a long time to come,notwithstanding the fact that the end of the Old Regimemodified the way in which the first of these requisites wasunderstood, the second and third of that trio of‘structural’ ingredients have remained inextricably linkedto one another – at least in the heads of those whoseintention it was to embrace and progress in their career,and in the minds of those who pondered over this. As aresult, the criteria used for the selection and training ofdiplomats have always distinctively placed at the top oftheir agenda medium- and long-term questions as to theprofile of diplomatic agents in these very specific terms,particularly those linked to their adequacy to thepolitical functions they were expected to carry out. By and large, the variations that became patent as timewent by – and there have been some – tended to be connectedto the contents attributed to such requisites much more

10 Abraham Nicolas Amelot de la Houssaye was a Sécretaire at the FrenchEmbassy to the Venitian Republic and in the mid-17th Century publishedan Histoire du gouvernement de Venise. Adrian Moetjens, was a famous“Marchand libraire, prés la Cour, à la librairie Françoise”, in The Hague, who editednumerous Treaty collections.

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than to their survival and permanence. Birth was from thebeginning taken as an indisputable fact, although a littlelater it became a matter to be looked into, as inheritancewas partly overrun by criteria such as willingness andintrinsic quality. But study and experience, all the same,also exhibited a priori, inescapable outlines which were onlyrather loosely defined: Perhaps for this very reason, itwas at their level that much greater contextualfluctuations in what concerns methods as well as contentwere to be felt. Bringing to light the main moments and traits of thisprogression is surely instructive. The first Academies forthe preparation of diplomats11 appeared in France, at thehand of Torcy12, in 1712, and in Austria, in 1754, withEmpress Maria Theresa’s Orientalische Akademie13. They bothmarked similarities to each other, albeit they had their

11 Although the earliest formal training institution was establishedby the Vatican in 1701 (i.e. before the latter’s recognition as aState), and this was an entity with rather special interests andfocuses, it is difficult to compare to others as it really did nothave ‘lateral equivalents’. At any rate it did not generate a‘descent’.12 Here is some history: Jean-Baptiste Colbert, the Marquis de Torcy –often referred to as Colbert de Torcy – was a French diplomat with afamily pedigree in this rising professional domain: he was the son ofCharles Colbert, Louis XIV’s “Foreign Minister”, and the nephew of legrand Colbert, the Sun King’s chief advisor and the man for whom theTorcy title had originally been created. Himself a gifted and ratherbrilliant law student, our Torcy started early as an assistant to hisfather in his often sensitive diplomatic maneuvers. Building upon hisearly start, as a young adult Torcy took off in earnest and betweenJuly 1689 and September 1715 (just after Louis’ death) he de facto(although not really de jure, as there was never a formal appointment)succeeded his father as Sécretaire d’État – and in that role he proved tobe the guiding spirit of French diplomacy at the series ofinternational Conferences which resulted in the Treaty of Utrecht(1713) and the Treaty of Rastatt (1714). In the middle of hispolitico-diplomatic rise, Torcy was also the spirit behind the Treatythat, in 1700, occasioned the War of Spanish Succession (a long-drawconflict which lasted from 1701 to 1714), in which the dying CharlesII of Spain named Louis XIV's grandson, Philippe, the Duc d’Anjou,heir to the Spanish throne, eventually founding the line of SpanishBourbons.

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differences too. The occupational vocation of bothAcademies was training, and both of them focused on theacquisition of a collection of very concrete prerequisites,considered to be helpful in serving the raison d’État: in somecases the emulation of prior models, well tested throughexperience, and the pursuit of personal attributes fortheir trainees in one way or another held as essential –such as, for example, “alacrity, sagacity, and above all, alot of deceitfulness”, as was noted in Portugal, at thetime, by the renowned and influential Cunha Brochado14. Although Paris and Vienna followed alternative paths inorder to achieve these common aims, mapping outconvergences and divergences, however briefly, is surelyenlightening. It is true that, in the two cases, ancientdocumentation was studied, and in both these articulated ashared confidence that the practical experience of theirillustrious predecessors was particularly effective in thefulfilment of the Royal Houses’ interests. Equally, in bothAcademies efforts were made to guarantee that studentsobtained a minimal mastery in the use of languages, in the

13 Maria Theresa, the Austrian reigning Archduchess, Queen of Hungary,Croatia and Bohemia, and Holy Roman Empress, was the eldest daughterof Elisabeth Christine of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel and Emperor CharlesVI. The latter promulgated the so-called Pragmatic Sanction, to allowher to succeed to the Habsburg throne. Although territorialconcessions were made for this purpose, this was far from peacefuland opposition led to the War of the Austrian Succession, in 1740.Emperor Charles VII then claimed the throne, but when he died merelyfive years later, in 1745, Maria Theresa became Empress Consort asshe inherited the crown from her husband, Francis I, the Duc deLorraine and Holy Roman Emperor. She was the de facto ruler of Austro-Hungary, helping initiate major financial and educational reforms,vigorously promoting commerce and the development of agriculture, andreorganizing the Imperial Army. An “enlightened absolutist”, thedevout Catholic Empress did much more than to create the DiplomaticAcademy, at the behest of her Chancellor, Wenzel Count Kaunitz, in1754: in 1772 Maria Theresa founded the Imperial and Royal Academy of Scienceand Literature in Brussels; with the general goal of forming an educatedclass from which civil servants could be recruited. Mandatoryeducation was introduced throughout the Empire in 1774.14 I. Cluny, op. cit., p. 36. I translate as “deceitfulness” theoriginal Portuguese term, dissimulação.

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knowledge of juridical orders, and some proficiency incommercial practice. Trainees were cast as apprenticeswhom, through interaction with experienced men, absorbedthe fine rules of assuming postures and attitudes requiredfor good quality performance in the arts of diplomacy, incunning, and in the ballroom – all of these being traitswhich characterised the couth interactions betweenpolitical communities that made up the social and culturalworld of the era.In both cases, moreover, it was well understood thatfluency in the handling of court etiquette was what weighedgreatest in the definition of the expected qualities of anexemplary student. Wagered on the essential in attemptingto secure an image of credibility and integrity amongst thelocal elite for the practitioners of the art of diplomacy,the educational system provided in France and in Austriaarguably aimed, above all, at equipping their apprenticeswith social alacrity, cultural promptness, and manners, asthese were in fact the essential traits accepted throughoutas a “strong currency” for political legitimacy by theruling European elite.The nature of the training offered flowed from thisultimate aim. In the first as well as in the second of ourpair of cases, the results were achieved by efforts carriedout on two essentially complementary fronts. On the onehand, by drawing candidates almost exclusively from thearistocratic classes – that is from the actual niches wherethe behavioural rules to which this legitimacy wasattributed were defined, and which the constant exchangesand matrimonial alliances within the noble families hadbeen, for a long time, spreading throughout the Continent –a carefully driven pre-selection which maximized chances ofsuccess. On the other hand, by placing the main emphasis ofthe actual training offered and acquired onto the mimeticreproduction of this hegemonic symbolic universe, aconsolidation of sorts was duly ensured. In general terms, in other words, for the Austrians as forthe French, recruitment and training were largely centredon modalities of reduplication – ones carried out with a

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minimum of corrective adjustments – of what was taken asconstituting the profiles adjusted to a strongly desiredreal-world efficacy, actual or imagined; a preference whichwas well corroborated in the extant framework ofstandardised relationships, and which, in turn, came fromthe apparently unchanging historical repetition of a pastas unchangeable as it was taken by most actors involved toconstitute an exemplary set of precedents. At issue was thereplay of a past which, for that very reason, the studentsof the two Academies were systematically taught tocultivate with due reverence and awe.It should however be stressed that a finer-grade view ofdetails shows that there were, nevertheless, demonstrabledissimilarities between the first and the second case.These were differences that made all the difference. Inpractical terms, Vienna and Paris were really not at allfollowing the same paths, and it is surely worthdescribing, albeit cursorily, what the diacriticaldifferences were which so essentially separated the twoprojects. Such may easily be made clear without being more thanindicative: in 1712, the then acting French Sécretaire d’Etat,the Marquis de Torcy, founded an Académie Politique, in Paris,with the avowed intention of better preparing thediplomatic staff seen as necessary to a France that wascoming onto an international stage which was clearlybecoming increasingly more complex and demanding15. The

15 For a more focused piece of work on the general background to thecreation of the Académie, see Joseph Klaits (1971), “Men of Lettersand Political Reform in France at the End of the Reign of Louis XIV:The Founding of the Academie Politique”, The Journal of Modern History, vol.43, no. 4, pp. 577-597. Although further discussion on these themeswould surely fall outside of my scope here, it is surely worth oureffort to read three exquisite articles published on topics somehowconnected to this, the first one about the education Torcy’s cousin,the Marquis of Seignelay, received from his father, le grand Colbert, thelast two on the education the latter’s father offered his own son:John C. Rule (1996), “A Career in the Making: The Education of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Marquis de Torcy”, French Historical Studies, Vol. 19, No.4, Special Issue: Biography, pp. 967-996; and Jacob Soll (2008), “TheAntiquary and the Information State: Colbert's Archives, Secret

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training course that was sketched out and started bore arather direct connection to the earlier foundation – itsestablishment had happened two years before, in 1710 – ofthe historical diplomatic archive of the Kingdom: itsavowed purpose was to allow study of an increasinglyvoluminous and rich diplomatic correspondence, so thatpolitical and diplomatic agents could, via that veryexertion, search for inspiration in the actions andactivities of the Founding Fathers of a diplomatic practicewhich was being strengthened.To that effect, young nobles from Torcy’s Académie began tocollect and catalogue the papers of successful previousMinisters and they undertook the scrutiny and study ofthese documents with great care and minute detail.Alongside this they received methodical training in foreignlanguages and the “arts of diplomacy”16. In the frameworkof what we would today call an “analogue method”, what theystruggled to do, in fact, was to absorb the possibleteachings of “History”. On the basis of such a model oflearning they would one day become able – at least this iswhat they thought – to prepare detailed memoranda of thesame sort as those which had, in the heyday (Peace ofWestphalia old-timers Cardinals Richelieu and Mazzarin werefavourites, of course), proven to be useful for the designof French foreign policy, and that, in the future, wouldagain guarantee the same sort of victories. The pedagogical method favoured by the Académie had clearscholastic strategies and it was carried out collectivelyor, in other words, by teams. That not only facilitated

Histories, and the Affair of the Régale, 1663-1682”, French HistoricalStudies, 31: 3-28, which is nicely complemented by Jacob Soll (2008a,posted on the 3rd of April), “How to Manage an Information State:Jean-Baptiste Colbert’s Secret Notebooks and the Education of HisSon”, Archival Science, Springer Online, this latter retrieved atwww.springerlink.com/index/x20j0514545h28g3.pdf, retrieved on16.05.2008.16 The Académie had normally twelve students, a nice symbolic number.This batch was as a rule divided into two – six working at thearchives, the other half-dozen on more wide-ranging forms ofdiplonmatic practice.

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learning; it also most certainly helped the creation andgrowth of what we would today call “epistemic communities”.It further displayed what we may perhaps term a more“scientific” pedagogical, or didactic, dimension: inparallel with providing for individual study, the Academyalso held regular seminars, study meetings and work inwhich the old memoranda of big names were analysed andevaluated17, by a group of chosen students, under thetutorship of one or more teachers chosen from among peoplewith experience in the tasks under scrutiny. Without going too far down a purely interpretative path, wecan surely read some political-institutional content intothe experiment. In hindsight, it is perhaps not excessiveto estimate that with the Académie Politique Torcy wanted togive body to the equivalent of what we would today call “aforeign service bureaucracy”; but if he did, he also surelydid so on his own terms. The times – and the structuralposition of Louis XIV’s Court in an era of unprecedentedgrowth which saw the affirmation of new powers that aFrance in its apex had to contend with, and thecorresponding political, legal, economic, and militarytensions thus engendered – most certainly favoured thecrystallization of specialized international functions andthis, in turn, demanded a wave of new institutionalcreativity. Which ever our historical and sociologicalreferences and preferences may be, it is surely tempting todetect a sort of Weberian rationality arising here. AsLucien Bély18 wrote in a recent text produced for his17 M.S. Anderson (1993), The Rise of Modern Diplomacy, 1450-1519, Longman,London, pp. 92-93.18 From a rich historical study generously if rather dryly entitled Ladiplomatie au XVIIe siècle, from http://www.paris4.sorbonne.fr/e-cursus/texte/CEC/bely/BiblioG%E9n%E9RI.htm, retrieved on 16.05. 2008. It may be noted that this newbureaucracy bore what I am tempted to call a taxonomic template, thatit had come to stay, and that it involved what we would surelynowadays frame with a “public diplomacy” dimension. As L. Belystressed, “Colbert de Torcy s'efforça, pour la France, de conserver et de classer lesdocuments ayant trait aux pays étrangers, constituant des archives spécialisées, comme unemémoire de l'Etat, et il recommanda aux postes importants comme Rome d'en faire autant.Le département des affaires étrangères s'attacha aussi des écrivains chargés de défendre la

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Sorbonne students: “[d]errière les ministres, une bureaucratie se mit enplace au cours du XVIIe siècle avec des commis, des secrétaires, des interprètes,des spécialistes du chiffre: les premiers commis en France, lesundersecretaries à Londres, les Referendare à Vienne. Si les missions deprestige leur étaient fermées en raison de leur origine sociale (bourgeoisie oupetite noblesse), ils pouvaient être employés dans des négociations officieusesou au cours de congrès comme plénipotentiaires, voire s'élever dans lahiérarchie gouvernementale.  Les juristes étaient nombreux dans lesnégociations en Allemagne”. Specialists were not only needed,

politique française (l'académicien La Chapelle, l'abbé Legrand, l'abbé du Bos). Mais de telspropagandistes existaient aussi auprès des autres gouvernements: Lisola ou Leibniz pourl'Empereur, Swift et Defoe à Londres”. Whatever our reading of the case, itseems clear both le grand Colbert and his nephew, Colbert de Torcy, thehomonimous J.-B. Colberts, developed an “archival” perspective onthe nature of Louis XIV French State in what came to be seen as thecountry’s Grand Siécle – or at least on the ideal design for the Statefunctions that should be carried out on its behalf. Quite clearly ifwe follow Jacob Soll’s (op. cit., 2008a, p. 5) interpretation, the firstMarquis de Torcy internalised his convictions on the matter so deeplyhe actually decided to bring up his eldest son, the Marquis deSeignelay, whom he sent to the port of Rochefort in “apprenticeship”with his own cousin, Colbert de Terron, the Intendant du Port, alonglines which curiously echoed his own early creation of a archive inthe Louvre in 1710, two years before his short-lived Académie Politique.In the first page of his article, Soll pictures things such that itappears Torcy engaged in forming his son as he had trained hisdiplomats: upon arrival at Rochefort, “[Seignelay] possessed a set ofwritten orders from his father: work from dawn until dusk; spendthree hours early in the morning reading all naval code books, rulesand treatises. And after having acquired the ‘general knowledge’found in these books, he was to ‘descend into the particulars’ of theconstruction and maintenance of ships” (ibid., p. 1). As Soll astutelyremarks – although he never draws the parallel himself – “[Jean-Baptiste] Colbert imagined his governmental creation as a virtualmachine. He saw the state as sets of lists and documents collected byhis agents, which would form a practical tool for the governing ofthe kingdom of France and its new colonial empire. When he thought ofpolitical action, he thought in terms of the mechanics of statepaperwork and his information system” (idem, p.5). A curious‘fetishism’ of forms indeed, which seems to have stayed in thefamily.

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they were actually desired by many19. The stress was onform, in the multiple senses of the word.All that was not, in truth, superficially very differentfrom what was carried out in the Austro-Hungarian frameworkof the Orientalische Akademie which Maria Theresa installed inVienna half a century later. However, although the solutionfound there was similar to the Parisian one in both methodand content, its emphases were in reality very differentand the systematisation and impersonality of the teachingand learning methods preferred were considerably moreresponsive to the outside world. Times had indeed changedin that half century and so the type of State underconsideration was not the same. In terms of itsinternational impact, the Austrian model would eventuallyreveal itself as longer-lasting and much more influentialthan the French one: in effect, other than during theSecond World War, its activity has not been interruptedsince its founding in 175420. Following a division oflabour that would soon arise from it came — in the time ofEmperor Francis Joseph — a partial Doppelgänger entity, theKonsularakademie; and, as we shall see, this was followed by

19 In fact, although the abbé Dubois summarily closed Torcy’s AcadémiePolitique in 1731, claiming that some of the students appeared to bemore ambitious than hard-working and far too critical of the newKing’s government, in 1724 a sort of soft clone of the outlawedAcadémie was established at the Place Vendôme, which became known as theClub de l’Entresol – as its meetings took place on a mezzanine floorrented by the abbé Alary in the house of Charles-Jean-FrançoisHénault, the “président à mortier” at the Parlement de Paris. Alary was aprotégé of the powerful tuteur of King Louis XV, the man who two yearslater replaced the Duc de Bourbon as Prime-Minister and became theCardinal Fleury. Enlightened aristrocrats, assorted bourgeoisthinkers, and respected and influential members of the clergy metthere regularly, as a ferment of what was to come in the last quarterof the Grand Siécle.20 Although it experienced a lot of ups and downs, as may be seen fromits constant reorganizations and even changes in location.Nevertheless, all through its many avatars the Vienna Akademie hasalways remained faithful to its initial enlightened design as anacademic institution devoted to the production of expert civilservants.

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a plethora of other reorganisations, some major, othersmore minor in scope.It is surely helpful to briefly detail somewhat further theoriginal nature of the institutional novelty. The rationalebehind the initial proposal for the creation of EmpressMaria Theresa’s Austrian Orientalische Akademie (later renamedDiplomatische Akademie) was the preparation of young diplomatsand imperial consuls for the Near East; the justificationsadduced took particularly into account the formal relationswith the Ottoman Empire which Austria held, along a lengthyborder, close relations with whom it often entertainedprolonged tensions. The Akademie actually dealt with anutterly new initiative, on this front: that of providing asystematic training – and doing so at a fully-fledgedacademic level – to its representatives, so the ImperialHouse would be able to better pursue its relations with thenon-European world, or at least an importantly adjacentpart of it. Something for which, shared forms, or thereduplication of former experiences, was not of much use.The Vienna Academy inaugurated, in this way, a style oftraining that was to make history. This was academictraining understood not as training strictly focused onmerely traditional academic subjects, but one carried out byacademic specialists fighting for the sedimentation of acritical mind-set in their students, even when (asobviously sometimes had to be the case) the subject-mattersversed were of a practical, that is to say,‘professionalising’, nature. It was a composite, or hybrid,training, anchored, not as in Universities, on theoreticaldiscussions and outlooks, but rather on the interaction offactors crucial for the dynamics of real-world contemporaryissues – although, of course, suitably theoretical in reachso as to ensure that new emergent realities could bereadily understood by the diplomatic student-professional.The general design-format that supported the teaching-learning processes in Vienna was undeniably “modern” and byand large it emulated that of the universities of the time.Apart from the systematic acquisition of Eastern languages(Turkish, Arabic, Persian), there were also ex-cathedra

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classes and seminars on the cultures of the many peoplessettled in the extensive regions under the control of theOttoman Sublime Porte. It is interesting to note that in anage of national and State-focused international tensionsand animosities, language and culture had of coursepolitical as well as communicative aspects, and this muchwas quickly recognized throughout post-Westphalia Europe:the British made a major attempt to improve foreignlanguage training for their diplomats in 1724 with thefounding of twin Regius Chairs of Modern History at Oxfordand Cambridge – Chairs still in existence today, howeverfulfilling other roles21.The creation of the Austro-Hungarian Diplomatic Academy wasby every measure a success: rather quickly, besides theimportance it acquired in the drafting of the Habsburgdiplomacy as a whole, it became an element of relevance inthe life and general formation of the Empire, stimulatingthe cosmopolitan and knowledgeable attention of many othersectors of Viennese society22. Besides diplomats, many were21 For an interesting contextualisation of this, see D.B. Horn (1961),British Diplomatic Service 1689-1789, Oxford University Press, who claims(p.131) that the Chairs were created mainly so as ‘to obviate thenecessity of employing persons of foreign nations in the civil anddiplomatic services’. 22 It still does. A little background to this: in 1833, Prince KlemensWenzel von Metternich, widely known with both affection and scorn asMetternich "The Coachman of Europe", decreed – in what may surely beseen as one of the reforms he felt necessary and could actually carryout – a two-track study programme for the Orientalische Akademie, coveringLaw as well as Diplomacy and languages. Half a century later, in1898, the Akademie was reorganised into the Konsularakademie, anddivided up into an Occidental and an Oriental section; following theneeds of the time, it also expanded its Economics programme and afive-year study course was instituted. In 1921, again adapting tochanges, the Vienna Akademie was reorganised anew and a two-yearcourse created. The Consular Academy closed in 1941; in 1945 itspremises became the seat of the post-surrender US MilitaryAdministration for Austria, and later the US Embassy in Vienna. In1964, the Diplomatische Akademie was reopened with pomp and circumstance,by Austrian Chancellor Bruno Kreisky, as a state-run institution,offering a two-year Diploma course tailored particularly towardstraining young Austrians for their national diplomatic service(although from the very beginning many international students flowed

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the Austrian and Hungarian men of State who enrolled in itwith the objective of deepening their own education, someof them even reaching the coveted position of Chancellor23.

2.2. The variable geometry of fit

Indeed, as Ian McEwan admirably put it, “a beginning is anartifice, and what recommends one over another is how muchsense it makes of what follows”. With time and the passingof events the superiority of the Vienna model over theParis “archival experiment” of old became apparent, and itshould come as no surprise that it was the tonic of theformer and not the latter which essentially led to thecontemporary developments in the realm of diplomats’training. However, the twin birth, as it were, left itsmarks: as we shall be able to easily make out, in the manydevelopments that ensued there has always been a cleartension between the two polar models of training, theFrench and the Austrian, which, therefore, we should see asembodying the generative template of what was to follow. Itis, however, worth keeping in mind that behind suchvariations of detail constant lines of force sustainedunderlying strong family resemblances between the overllthere too) in the reconstructed (the building had been heavilydamaged during the war) “Consular Wing” of the Theresarium (a largebuilding in central Vienna it shares this large with an eliteAustrian secondary school, aptly also called the Theresarium). Attachedfrom 1964 to the Austrian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in 1996, theDiplomatische Akademie became an independent public institution, and in2006 its academic programmes were reformed and fully integrated intothe structure of the Bologna Declaration. It is as if its ‘genetic’reaction to forms condemned the Akademie to endless ‘song and dance’.23 M.S. Anderson, op. cit., ibid., p. 91. For a good overview of MariaTheresia’s reforms of the Empire, see the authoritative two-volumework by G.M. Dickinson (1987), Finance and Government under Maria Theresia,1740-1780, Oxford, Clarendon Press, a rather splendid and certainlypioneering archival effort. Studies such as Dickinson’s go a long wayto dispel the image of reactionary blind conservatism Maria Theresialargely carried as a legacy from her husband, Francis I, whom sherevered to the extent of dressing in mourning for fifteen yearsfollowing his death.

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formats pursued; a fact that was reproduced in theanalogous institutions which slowly but surely in theeighteenth, then the nineteenth and the twentieth and nowin the 21st Century, caused similar ‘models’ to spring upin various points of Europe and later the rest of theworld. This was a medium-long duration trend, as time would show.In truth, the few variations felt were essentiallyvariations on a single theme. Effectively, and despite thevery many changes which occurred on the surface, 19th

Century Europe did not significantly change its prevailingand deep-seated conceptions of recruitment and training ofdiplomats. Notwithstanding the long-drawn-out impacts ofmajor tectonic changes such as the French Revolution, thegeneralised movements of independence in the Americas, andthe galloping Industrial Revolution, the nitty-gritty factof the matter was that on a macro level the socio-politicalorder, both internal and international, was kept tant bien quemal. Indeed, the family-hereditary nature of corporativechain-like succession in recruitment24 and the centralityof economic “independence” and self-sufficiency, althoughthey did indeed progressively decline25, held on asdetermining factors throughout the entire period; the rareexceptions did nothing more than confirm the norm24 In Portugal, the aristocratic tradition remained strongly settleduntil the 20th Century, the influence of true dynasties of diplomatsbeing notorious, one flagrant example of which was the network whichinvolved the Family Palmela-Teixeira de Sampayo.25 Most of what follows in the next few pages is tributary to theanalytical efforts of a small bundle of expert works on the evolutionof diplomacy, namely Lucien Bély (2007), L'art de la paix en Europe.Naissance de la diplomatie moderne XVIe-XVIIIe siècle, Paris, PUF,; (ed.) G.R.Berridge (2004), Diplomatic Classics: Selected texts from Commynes to Vattel,Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan; G.R. Berridge (2005), Diplomacy: Theoryand Practice (3rd ed), Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan; R.A. Jones,(1983), The British Diplomatic Service 1815-1914, Gerrards Cross, ColinSmytheMacmillan, and A. Watson (1991), Diplomacy: The Dialogue betweenStates, London, Routledge. H. Nicolson (1945, although the firstedition was from 1939), Diplomacy, London, Oxford University Press, andthe more recent and here oft quoted M.S. Anderson (1993), The Rise ofModern Diplomacy: 1450-1919, Longman, Harlow, represent toweringachievements in the study of this historical domain.

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applicable to the whole of Europe and to those parts of theAmericas that were commencing to play the diplomatic game. The functional mechanics intrinsic to this model are easyto generalise without too much violence to facts whichtended to be variations on a common theme: the prestige ofa diplomat was at the time heavily dependent, first, on thenetwork of contacts and relations that high social originallowed and made possible; and second, on his talent andability; they also were very much a function of hispersonal fortune. If it is certain that the changesentailed were little more than superficial, it cannot besaid that they were all also in any real sense neutral. Theadjustments engaged in all pointed in the same direction –toward an indispensable and progressive movement, in asense a broad-spectrum fine-tuning, to a new order ofthings to which the initiatory “classical” models were notreally very adequate. To attentive observers of the era,deeper change most surely would in all probability sooneror later show its colours. The relative immobility ofproceedings and habits plainly seemed, in effect, to beless and less congruent with many of the transformationswith which the world was suffering, and thus something wasbound to give. And so it did. Little by little, but in an inexorablemanner, needs and systematic constraints accumulated,requiring, demanding, some profound structural changes. Itis relatively easy — easy, in any case, if we remain at amacro level — to recognize sequential stages in thefruition of the embedded propensities which progressivelymade themselves felt. Mapping out a few of the mostimportant of these is revealing as to when and how such‘phase changes’ took place. In the Vienna Congress of 1815, which responded to ageneralized impotence of traditional diplomacy in evenchecking, much less controlling, the re-emergence of a pan-European imperial impetus, the need for radical change ofthe roles and condition of the diplomat would become clearand discernible, to which, as we saw, were somehow met asthe Conference itself responded via the introduction of a

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incipient transnational professional standardization thatfollowed what were taken to be the day’s ‘best practices’.That was, however, soon to be recognized as not enough. Bythe middle of century increasingly greater pressures on the“old diplomacy scheme” started producing their effects: itgrew to be indispensable for the diplomatic services to berigidly and systematically organised so that efficiency andmerit would begin to be immediately and duly repaid.Although responses to this were both varied and not whollyforthcoming, to put it blandly, on the face of it the newcircumstances clamoured inexorably that status should besuperseded by achievement, at least for those States whowanted to earnestly and boldly identify and pursue theirown “national interests” 26. A few did go with the tide.Note that the more full-bodied structural adjustments whichemerged had a archaeology of sorts: institutionally, theold paradigm had started to shift at around the time of theFrench Revolution; historically, it is fascinating to notethat quite a few States probably preceded France in theirinstitutional adaptive moves. From a genealogical perspective, professionalization andinstitutionalization as emergent propensities were merely asort of preliminary peak of a rather long-draw process,indeed. This came together with a proper name for the newavatar of an old entity it was only with Edmund Burke – andas late as 1796 – that the term “diplomacy” was applied tothe slowly sedimenting institutional mechanisms throughwhich modern States conducted their internationalrelations. From a historical and institutional perspective,26 Among the many studies devoted to the Vienna Congress, I amparticularly partial to the polemical monographic data of AdamZamoyski (2007), Rites of Peace: The Fall of Napoleon and the Congress of Vienna,HarperCollins, for it’s vivid descriptions of political backgroundviews of the participants and their diplomatic decisions, as well aswhat one reviewer called the “eight-month-long carnival that combinedpolitical negotiations with balls, dinners, artistic performances,hunts, tournaments, picnics, and other sundry forms of entertainmentfor the thousands of aristocrats who had gathered in the Austriancapital”. From my perspective, it reads like a ‘fast-forwardalmanach’ of the incipience of an ‘international civil society’, anidea to which I shall return.

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taking good stock of that was indeed a complex process:with growing demands for salaries in arrears to be paid toposted diplomats, with the creation of what we would surelytoday call “metropolitan techno-structures” throughoutEurope – the rise of bureaucratic institutional constructswhich effectively took away from the sovereigns theconduction of foreign policy27; all this initially came tofruition in a few momentous (albeit insufficient)collective decisions made during the Vienna Congress.Rather consistently – and perhaps more as a result ofinstitutional dialogue and growing interdependence in alegal framework of a fairly strict reciprocity than as ahypothetical result of a then still very incipient sharedand conscious “epistemic outlook” – this crystallisation ofa general model spread out fairly speedily: the creation of

27 The “French system of diplomacy” is as good a template as any forthese changes in the autonomisation, the stabilisation, and theprofessionalization of diplomatic careers. As it has recently beenput by Oliver Lewis, in early 2008, in a paper entitled “To whatextent was diplomacy professionalised in the French system?”, “anagreed hierarchy of distinct representatives was not establisheduntil the Règlement of the Congress of Vienna in March 1815 whichdefined representatives thus; (1) ambassadors, papal legates andpapal nuncios, (2) envoys extraordinary and ministersplenipotentiary, (3) ministers resident and (4) chargé d’affaires”.After Vienna in 1815, progressively professional diplomacy settledin. As “[e]ntrance to the diplomatic services of all the majorEuropean powers was controlled, based on competitive examination orsimilar formal academic requirements. This was recognition ofdiplomacy as an occupation requiring specific training to develop thenecessary specialist knowledge that would enable a practitioner tocarry out the functions of a diplomat. Inevitably, the entry andtraining prescribed in each European state reached varying levels ofprofessionalization that mirrored different understandings of how tobest train a diplomat. The MFA, in securing jurisdiction over foreignpolicy, acted as the professional body for its state’s diplomaticservice; it controlled the entry, regulated standards, disciplinedmembers of the service, administered the financial aspects ofdiplomacy and managed the careers of diplomats”; [the article may befound at http://www.e-ir.info/?p=428, retrieved on 18.07.08, a pageof the justly famous e-International Relations produced by Oxford,Leicester and London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE)International Relations students since November 2007].

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the British Foreign Office in 1782 and the US StateDepartment in 1789 were examples of a general trend thathad begun earlier in Europe. They also implied a newinstitutional coherence, in more professional terms, inthat in each and every one of these very different casesthey denoted a common will to bring the administration ofdiplomacy under the jurisdiction of a single ministry28.Even allowing for different rhythms and interpretations ofwhat was called for, the emergence of these bureaucraticmachineries was rather quick. By the early 19th Century the‘Diplomatic Services of the [European] nations’, as HaroldNicolson argued, ‘had been recognised as a distinct branchof the public service in each country’29 – and that was anew development which had come to stay. In an accelerating world, more lay ahead. The Conference ofBerlin (the ‘colonial’ one), which lasted from 1884 to1885, only served to confirm the rigidity of a trend whichcame from the past: that of a rearrangement of processes interms of greater functional efficiency. Such did not meanthe idea of “traditional diplomacy” – if one chooses tocall it that – with its strong marks of a rather quaintarchaism, had become grindingly inefficient in the mannerwith which it dealt with States – if only because this olddiplomatic style was, just like the latter, very muchdependent on the influence of personalities and elitegroups, and these remained in the main intact. However, theroad-signs increasingly spelled out, as much as itsignalled, the urgency of States in pro-actively engaging,sooner rather than later, in important structuraladjustments; and these amounted to changes which wouldaffect the training and recruitment of diplomats; both ofwhich, naturally, continued to be essential in a suddenlymore intricate, thick, and opaque, world – but not one yettransformed beyond recognition.

28 G.R. Berridge (2005), Diplomacy: Theory and Practice (3rd ed), PalgraveMacmillan, op. cit., p. 6.29 For an authoritative ‘classic’ discussion on this see, once more,Harold Nicolson (1945), Diplomacy: p. 33.

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So,and it seems from the documents grudgingly, someadaptive steps aimed at keeping pace were taken, but onlyas constraining circumstances pressingly demanded it.Certainly, we ought to be a little more precise here as tothe actual reach of these two markers adduced, the 1815 andthe 1884-1885 ones. The 1815 Congress of Vienna veryhastily and fairly thoroughly altered the structural placeof diplomatic endeavours – and with that the assumed rolesof diplomatic practitioners were neatly transformed. Thesame may be said, although perhaps in a less clear-cutmanner, with respect to the impacts of the BerlinConference of 1884 and 1885. Let me try to briefly resolve some of the internalintricacies of these two phases. In the first case, that ofVienna, in a sense diplomacy was recast with a quantitativeamplitude which had until then its only parallel in thedistant past of the Westphalia Peace of 1648: just as hadhappened a mere century and half before when numerousentities aspiring to a status of sovereignty organizedthemselves up against an ever clearer inefficient RespublicaChristiana, in middle of the second decade of the 19th Centurymany States tuned in and congregated to reorganise a Europewhich was profoundly unhinged, to coin an image, afterNapoleon’s exuberant military adventures. True, qualitativechanges were much thinner on the ground and thereforetransformation meant little more than mere amendments thatsimple re-orientations could handle in the real imperfectworld30. However, new types of know-how became indispensable in aworld in which matters not only multiplied but alsoincreasingly took on new facets. As was to be invariably

30 It would be interesting and surely revealing to carry out a studyon the sort of ‘slow-motion’ setting-in of Weberian rationality in aprofessionalizing universe as socially and culturally protected asthe diplomatic one, both nationally and internationally – a researchproject carried out, for instance, with the aim of bringing out themany varied bureaucratic ideological constructs which surely hedgedaround the institutional inertia which becomes so patent in thelightest reading of diplomatic epistolar correspondences of theperiod Eric Hobsbawm famously called “the long 19th Century”.

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the case from then onward, this new knowledge was rapidlybuilt into the inventory of ‘expertises’ required ofdiplomatic agents. True, on the surface, it could be arguedthat not much of what was traditional and essential hadreally been fully transformed, that somehow the‘organizational field’ and the old ‘logic ofappropriateness’ remained31. After all, as had been thecase until then, it was still up to diplomats to represent,negotiate, implement and apply themselves to the very oftendifficult métier of international relations. But that is atthe level of appearances: in fact, much had changed in thesubterranean coordinates in which it would be done – ifanything due to an effect of scale and no matter howprecarious the awareness of this was on the part of theactors involved. Nevertheless, the readjustments demanded31 A theoretical side-comment and a very rapid one as I do not want toshift my focus from the domain of diplomatic training and itspolitical and institutional ecosystems. My allusions here are to theworks of DiMaggio and Powell and of Marsh and Olsen, cited in JozefBátora (2003: 2ff.). Although obviously essential for a faithfulrational reconstruction of the internal logics of the organizationalsystems under scrutiny, the use of such concepts serves for littlemore than analyses of eventual actor’s representations – in this case,those of diplomatic agents. I want to stress the obvious: that whatdiplomats think of their functions (or what they communicate to non-diplomats and among themselves about them, their ‘identities’, if youwill), albeit essential, amounts surely to just a fraction of all thatgoes on in the operation of a diplomatic system – political power, inthe form of politicians decisions, for instance, also plays a rolehere. And this whether we presume a surrounding ‘anarchy’, as do neo-realists, or not – if, for instance, as I do, we assume a liberal andmore constructivist posture, albeit with a strong institutional bent.I am inclined to rather look at such self-representations asparticipatory expressions of that important segment of the emergent‘international civil society’ which diplomats integrate. This issurely something that States are often weary about. Although themouthpieces of choice for States’ politicians, diplomats are often atodds with them as there is a tension between their respectiveoutlooks and interests. Indications of this abound. Note that for along time States, keen on maintaining a grip on their diplomats,forbade their marriage to foreigners without their express (and oftenonly given case by case) authorization. In many countries, too,diplomats cannot vote – and this does not only have an internaldimension.

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could be handled by mere changes in focus. The system ofthe Concert of Europe (something we would now more likelycall “reinforced co-operations”), with its periodicalConferences and, later, the appearance of the first avant lalettre ‘international organisations’ – the Commissions of theReno and Danube, the Universal Postal Union, and so on –gave flesh to some of the innovations which illustrate thisprocess quite well: they were answers to the new demands ofinternational life and novel methods of establishingrelationships between States which required an increasingfunctional and technical specialisation. In the second case, that of the Berlin Conference, althoughthe epicentre of the international system still continuedto be firmly located in Europe, the famed scramble, orrush, for Africa (and Asia) spelled out new worries andnovel fronts for at least rationalizing action. It is truethat not all late States felt that directly, but ‘Imperial’ones like Great Britain, France, Germany, Russia, orPortugal surely did, quite as ‘imperialist’ ones likeItaly, Japan, Turkey, or the United States also did. Thiswas a pressure that merely quantitative changes and simplereorientations were harder put to have an effective gripon. The colonial nature of the problems Europe would haveto face from then on, had, for example, intense commercial,consular, and juridical dimensions, and those were very newangles which quickly acquiring a crucial importance in thelife, priorities, and actions of diplomats. Thesealterations brought much more than just simple adaptations.What was throw out the window, although not everyone thenunderstood this — or took from it the consequences due —was the venerable image of charm, graciousness, and panache,of the ambassadorial figures such as the Metternichian(and, publicly, at least, very rarely Machiavellian)masters of an ancient art marked by style, protocol, by thesymbolic minutiae and elegance of palatial courtesies, aswell as by the associated development of specificcompetencies as regards astuteness, verbal and non-verbalindirectness, and dissimulation.

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So a variety of strong pressures for change did loom largeon the horizon and by means of momentous spurts of re-organization they did accumulate inexorably; and although asource of strong discomfort, that was bound to be heeded.Once again, renewed and intensified training appeared to bein the order of the day. The often unfathomable “wisdom”which many diplomats spontaneously demonstrated soonerrather than later had to transmute into the acquisition ofan assortment of special technical know-how and knowledge –and that spelled a weighty change of gear that for the moreattentive actors of the period did not go unnoticed. Thespectrum of professional specialisation would arrive by wayof new functional imperatives which, after Vienna, Berlinspelled loud and clear – for the main player States atleast, be they ‘great powers’ or smaller ambitious ones. Anew epoch was indeed dawning. But it would still be sometime in coming. I have already pointed out that it was only after the mid-19th Century that any forms of systematic formal training ofdiplomats developed. It may be further noted that when thatemerged it actually did so it only in the Old Continent32.

2.3. Adjustment trends and institutional sedimentation

32 For the sake of clarity, let me reiterate that some few early‘experimental models’, if I may call them that, effectively emergedbefore then, but these were really ad-hoc ones. As I underlined, ahandful of Academies, always of limited scope, appeared early: theywere nevertheless the outcome of individual efforts of greatcharismatic states-persons, Torcy and Maria Theresa included.Treatises also emerged during the same interval, from the samesources, and with the same genealogical rather than outrighthistorical nature. The role of great charismatic statesmen was indeedessential in this pre-institutionalization interval. As Oliver Lewiswrote, as concerns the British case, “[t]heir authority and strengthof will held together ideas of diplomatic training, most of whichwent with them to retirement or the grave. It was only as the sourceof sovereign authority shifted away from individuals to a collectivethat systematic training began to be adopted”. Also a Weberian point,quite clearly, one which stressed ‘institutionalization’, and onewhich I believe may be generalized well beyond the British case.

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As could perhaps be expected, awareness of theinexorableness of such trends did not come about in theinternational State system in a homogenous manner– and thatwas so notwithstanding all the evidence of a rather urgentneed for a rapid collective prise de conscience. Rather, itspread unevenly. Moreover, the changes in perception thatdid occur were not entirely synchronised with one another.And when they did occur, they were not by any meansautomatically included in the catalogue of the types ofexpertise demanded of diplomatic agents.The first States to react, reconfiguring the models ofrecruitment and training used until then, were those moredirectly subjected to the pressures and constraints of theinternational order: the States from the very centre of theinternational system, to use an image from another context;and, among these, mainly those whom the ongoing changesmost put at risk. In places such as Great Britain33,33 Again, some history and again O. Lewis, 2008, op. cit.: “[t]he 1861report from the British government’s House of Common’s Select Committeeto inquire into Constitution and Efficiency of Diplomatic Service and a later committeechaired by Edward Bouverie examined the question of diplomatictraining and instituted changes to the attaché system and encouragedthe post-appointment study of international law. This method oftraining was to remain the staple of the British diplomatic serviceright up until the First World War”. Further detail may be useful soas to build a richer historical picture: “[t]he evolution ofrequirements for entrants of the British diplomatic service is anillustration of the similar process undergone by many Europeanforeign ministries. Prior to 1856 the only qualifications required ofBritish entrants was a private income of not less than £400, twomonths’ probation in the Foreign Office and nomination by the ForeignSecretary; hardly the recipe for a professional diplomat. Beginningwith Lord Clarendon’s introduction of an entrance examination in1856, the requirements shifted their focus to a candidate’s qualityof handwriting and grasp of foreign languages. Further changes underLord Lansdowne in 1905 brought the diplomatic service and ForeignOffice closer to the Civil Service, requiring candidates to takefirst the Civil Service examination followed by an additionalexamination in French and German. Shortly thereafter the selection ofcandidates passed out of the hands of the Private Secretary and intothose of a semi-independent ‘Selection Board’”. Mutatis mutandis, andcertainly with often very different rhythms, this could be

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France, the United States of America, Austria-Hungary, orthe recently unified Germany, diplomats recast their self-image, and to a large extent actually redesigned themselvesas professionals; in tandem, Ministries launched the ideaof submitting their candidates to “examinations” (as a rulethen not especially selective ones) for what began to beseen as a “career” – and they had to submit to those on parwith what they already did as regards the systemisation oftheir analysis of historical-professional documents andtheir parallel acquisition of linguistic aptitudes.The reasons for such changes are fairly easy to appreciate,at least as far as central States “in crisis” in a changingsystem were concerned. The development of commercialrelations generated an unstoppable multiplication ofConsuls and this took away from Ambassadors topics whichuntil then had been well under their direct jurisdiction –but for which they nevertheless felt increasinglyunprepared34. New questions of law were budding within thepurview of international matters, first in reaction toNapoleon, later as a response to the race for Africa andAsia, once the Americas were lost. The evolution in thetechniques and the growing scope of the wars in turn gaverise to the appearance of military and naval Attachés. Fornon-hegemonic States, first and foremost, the new diplomacyrequired was becoming ever more specialised in areas suchas economics and culture. This was, however, manifestlyunevenly felt; such requirements were not altogetherengaged in in similar manners in the case of, say, a majorpower like Great Britain, whose rapid global ascent allowedfor atypical reactions which often resulted in the

generalised as a pan-European paradigm. Differences, however, cannotbe overlooked: see, for instance, the Spanish, Italian, and Germanexamples, in the next section of this study.34 For an excellent historical perspective of the uneasy butwidespread conjunction of these transformations, see the alreadyquoted and in so many senses magisterial M.S. Anderson, The Rise ofModern Diplomacy: 1450-1919, London, Longman, 1993, pp. 119-128; see alsomostly in what concerns the post Berlin Conference period, RenéGirault, Diplomatie européenne: Nations et impérialismes 1871-1914, Paris, ArmandColin, 1997, p. 9.

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substitution of diplomacy with pure hard power, and that ofa budding one like the United States – which until at leastthe late eighteen hundreds preferred as a rule to expandoutward its economic interests instead of its political andmilitary clout35. But even in States vying for great powerstatus, the need to rapidly and radically adapt was rathercogently felt: in the environment of the time, of course,in Britain as elsewhere, diplomatic ‘conservatism’ couldnot survive for very long. A consequence of the rapidprofessionalization of diplomacy was an inevitable –although slow – democratisation of the Foreign Service. I have already underlined the impact on these impendingadjustments of some of the new forms of politicalparticipation (namely, representative democracy) which madethemselves patently evident after the American and theFrench Revolutions and increased their pace throughout “thecivilized world”. The formal recognition of any activity asa ‘profession’ was itself a product of the changing socialand political climate suffered in early modern Europe andNorth America. In the Old Continent political power wasbecoming more and more concentrated in the emergentEuropean parliaments – away from monarchs, Churches andeven aristocratic networks. With hindsight, it seemsobvious that sooner or later diplomacy would have to fallinto step and open itself up to participation from the‘professional classes’. In Britain it soon did36. The

35 For these and many other points, in what concerns the latenineteenth Century and after, see the notable Richard Hume Werking(1977), The Master Architects: Building the United States Foreign Service 1890-1913,University Press of Kentucky, Lexington. A rich study which allowsfor wonderful comparisons, at these levels of social composition andprofessionalization, of the North-American case with those of theBritish and French.36 For this point, see the classic work of Harold Nicolson (1945), op.cit.: p. 76. It could be thought banal that a “rationalisation” wouldtake place. But note, yet again, that dissimilar rhythms (thus adiverse pace) and strategies were followed in different social andadministrative environments: in the UK, the Macdonnell Committee of1914 abolished the traditional “income qualification” of the Britishdiplomatic service, thus improving the chances of those withoutprivate means being able to pursue a diplomatic career.

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process France engaged in was by no means the same: there,while middle and lower ranks of the diplomatic servicebegan to include commoners, the majority of diplomats inthe French system – particularly those at a “senior level”– were members or compagnons de route of the governingnational elite, and there too, notwithstanding politicalupheavals, of predominantly aristocratic extraction. It istrue that in the British diplomatic service effectivepatronage continued long after the home “civil service”evolved; but perchance not quite as nakedly as across theChannel. The sociological mechanics of the French systemwere summed up particularly well by R.A. Jones, namely atthe level of actor’s representations, who remarked that “bythe 1860s [there were] sufficient career diplomats withboth the aspiration to occupy, and the expectation ofoccupying, the top posts in the profession that, not onlywas the appointment of ‘outsiders’ considered to be anaffront to the service, but within the service selectionhad to be made by performance and ability rather thansimply by influence and patronage” 37.The initial stubborn avoidance of the various inescapableand progressively more clear-cut distinctive social andpolitical trends was, however, not to last for very long.Many were the pressures which pushed for a full recognitionof new realities and they slowly led States to reconfiguretheir training strategies so as to better respond to them.These were plainly not easy decisions to make and perhapsas a result, in actual fact it all seems to have come to37 For this, see R.A. Jones (1983), The British Diplomatic Service 1815-1914,Gerrards Cross, Colin Smythe, p. 48. For the sake of comparison, letme return for a moment to a historical narrative: in France, whileentrance into the Ministry was a competitive affair largely based onability, the type of candidate who applied for service tended to bearistocratic. Once within the service, career progression took place,particularly by the late 19th Century, according to seniority andability. “Historically”, a generalisation is still thereforeapparently possible: the French as the British diplomatic service wasa profession, but because of the financial demands made on adiplomatist, the aristocratic ethos of diplomacy and the importanceattached to ceremony, it was a profession dominated by the privilegedclasses.

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happen by means of sudden surges. World War I — the GreatWar — and the devastating effects attributed to secretdiplomacy by influential personages like Woodrow Wilsonquickly brought to discussion his model for a League ofNations and concretely the very first of his famousFourteen Points: the one in which he emphasized he deemedessential to encourage the “opening” and “democratisation”of decision-making processes in foreign policy, thusinsisting – with the rather heavy dose of idealism which sostrongly characterised the forceful American President –that revealing diplomatic measures to public opinion was ameasure which reinforced democracy and thus contributed topeace38. Subsequent reactions were to show that suchessentially Kantian notions were by no meansenthusiastically accepted by most States; although that didnot impede the appearance and formation of a conscience ofan unavoidable need to revise the status and preparation ofdiplomats that were still being sent to the “frontline” ofever more vital international relationships. This did not, nevertheless, at all mean that the oldmethods of recruitment and training had started to blur andas a result had begun to be abandoned. Mostly, they did

38 And it somehow partly did, at least in the short-medium term. Againsimply to point to the background of these changes, see a modernclassic, which more than simply focuses on the peacemaking Council ofFour – representing Britain, France, the U.S. and Italy, the victors– looks closely at the agendas of the many people, from diplomats topoliticians who went to Paris for the peace negotiations whichfollowed the Kaiser’s defeat: the splendid Margaret Macmillan (2002),Paris 1919: Six Months That Changed the World, Random House. To my mind, M.MacMillan is at her best when scrutinizing Woodrow Wilson. For acontrary view, highly critical of Versailles’ achievements andlegacy, see the more recent David A. Andelman (2007), A Shattered Peace:Versailles 1919 and the Price We Pay Today, Wiley. According to RichardHoolbrooke, in a raving review of the book, “[t]he Balkans, theMiddle East, Iraq, Turkey and parts of Africa all owe their present-day problems, in part, to these negotiations. David Andelman bringsit all back to life – the lofty ideals, the ugly compromises, thelarger-than-life personalities who came to Paris in 1919. And helinks that far-away diplomatic dance to present day problems thatilluminates our troubled times”. The two studies point easily to themomentous changes which ensued after the long-drawn Paris event.

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not; they were, as a matter of fact reconfigured at thelevel of functional adequacy, so as to better satisfy thedemands of a world which was growing ever more complex —and doing so with the efficiency and competency which thenew types of emergent problems required39. Such was notonly achieved by the type of accumulation of “continuous”changes to which the previous century had been witness: newentities, such as the Soviet Union and Japan had entered onthe stage, insisting on immediate alternative models forthe extant world order40. In the blink of an eye, a newtype of ‘hard’ multidimensionality had arrived and it haddone so with a bang.Soon, indeed, a new level of complexity was to be reached.After the Great War, World War II, and their consequencesas concerns the rapid increase in the number of States andthe appearance of their respective diplomatic corps, cameto greatly widen the spectrum of competencies with which

39 As happened, for example, in the United States with the creation,in 1919, of the School of Foreign Service in Georgetown University.40 Again avoiding an unwarranted historical narration, here is, inmore intricate juridical-administrative detail, some of the noveltype of institutional architecture then erected at this level: afterVersailles 1919, and as the already cited O. Lewis (ibid.) claimedbased on many of the authors I have quoted earlier, “entrance to thediplomatic services of all the major European powers was controlled,based on competitive examination or similar formal academicrequirements. This was recognition of diplomacy as an occupationrequiring specific training to develop the necessary specialistknowledge that would enable a practitioner to carry out the functionsof a diplomat. Inevitably, the entry and training prescribed in eachEuropean state reached varying levels of professionalization thatmirrored different understandings of how to best train a diplomat.The MFA, in securing jurisdiction over foreign policy, acted as theprofessional body for its state’s diplomatic service; it controlledthe entry, regulated standards, disciplined members of the service,administered the financial aspects of diplomacy and managed thecareers of diplomats. Recognised as a full-time occupation diplomatsreceived regular salaries that were increasingly standardized, andcould claim expenses for the costs incurred in diplomatic affairs. Asa distinct professional body diplomats were accorded specific rightsand immunities that applied only to them, which further cemented thegrowing sense of community and corporate identity that was expressedmost successfully in the diplomatic corps”.

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diplomats were charged – moreover, this spelled a greatersophistication of international organisations, and itintensified debates over issues such as economics,development, and regional integration41. The generaldirection of changes was that which the beginning of the19th Century had somehow anticipated. Once again with allthis came the establishment of a progressively more complexformal and informal international State system. The greatlyincreased number of interlocutors, the densification ofthemes and the diversification of fora inexorably imposed toall an ever greater level of specialisation – and itrequired from them a much augmented capacity fornegotiation, which naturally was rapidly added to theinventory of necessary expertises thus brought in to thecatalogue of training items. With the pace of change in international arenas, nothingwould ever be the same again, and it was surely World WarII which would see to that in an irreversible manner. Majorredesigns in diplomacy were imperative indeed and mostinternational actors understood that and were ready forinstitutionally assuming it – although a few could, if notignore them, simply go through the motions and stall fortime, as that was domestically convenient. As A.H.M. Kirk-Greene wrote, what occurred in 1945 was not a comma, butrather a caesura, in the history of international relations,a discontinuity which imposed a radical enough cut with thepast, one which consequently led to a rupture in thetraining methods designed for those “whose responsibilityis to negotiate, promote and put diplomacy into practice”42

– and it did so, of course, because as a result of that

41 A.H.M. Kirk-Greene (1994), op. cit., is especially intricate in themany impact fronts of World War II on diplomatic training. As weshall see in the next section (chapter 3) it is simply not possibleto sketch the progression of formal training for diplomacy in many ofthe European States, in North America, and elsewhere, withoutbringing up a variety of the innovations and changes in focus whichthen occurred. Legal scholars apparently concur, as theirperiodizations tend to place the same sort of emphasis on tectonicshifts at the time and during the few years right after the war.42 A.H.M. Kirk-Greene, op. cit..

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conflict and of the remaking of world order it broughtabout diplomatic functions which had changed conspicuously.For the plethora of States which had suffered directly fromthe war, novelties were such that they could not but deeplyaffect not only contents, but now also training methods andprinciples of recruitment. Hand in hand with this,professionalization continued sweeping soil away from theceremony and talent traditionally favoured, not only bymeans of the sheer intricacies of the freshly articulatedinternational conjunctures, but also via the development oftechnological resources which became available and forcedStates to face up to new requirements in commercial,consular, and juridical plans – namely by demanding fromthem fast and effective action in new and ever morenumerous multilateral stages43. New dominions would have tobe opened up. The international juridical consecration ofthese grand transformations was consigned to the ViennaConvention on Diplomatic Relations, signed in 1961.By then a truly different general chessboard was beingdrawn. The cadence, the break that occurred from 1945onward, largely surpassed the rhythm of all 19th Centurytransformations; with the first years of the Cold War, oncemore changes took place on the surface of events. Andagain, behind the variations, constant lines of forcemaintained a clear family similarity with deeply heldconceptions which had roots in World War II as to therecruiting and training of diplomats. Emphases werealtered, with a marked increase in political, military, andeconomic commercial dimensions, with an added centrality ofpolitical alliances imposed by the bipolar alignment of theforces present in the new ordering of the world. Behindthis, however, the structure of the system remained, atleast for a few years. Specialists could be brought in forbraving the new kinds of know-how demanding tasks. So43 This was, understandably, the lengthy and stretched-out periodwhich saw the rise of new-fangled concepts (some of them recuperatedfrom previous ‘phases’ of the acheminement of diplomacy) such as thoseof “conference diplomacy”, “parliamentary diplomacy”, and then“multilateral diplomacy”. Pierre de Sernaclens, La politique internationale,2nd edition, Paris, Armand Colin, 1998, p. 148.

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change for a while actually only meant that diplomaticprofiles had to be ‘thickened’ rather than really alteredin any structural sense.Nevertheless, this type of slow-motion adjustment was to beshort lived. ‘Thicker’ multidimensionality was to makeitself noticed. The colonial independences of the 50’s,60’s and 70’s of the 20th Century, synchronised with thesecond phase of bipolarization, changed in a trice:although the playing field and its implications had notbeen essentially altered, all was done in such animpenetrable intricate manner that a growing awareness ofmany of the new requirements for a more constructive andeffective diplomacy became practically inevitable. Thenumber of States which made up the international systemmore than doubled in a generation, as did the diversity oftheir agendas. Under the cloak of the bipolar divide, anovel type of multi-polarity was dawning. Perhaps, moresignificantly, in the new post-colonial States as much asin the older ones, and irrespective of whether they weremetropolitan or not, problems non-existent until then beganto emerge at the level of recruitment and training ofdiplomats44. The urgency of limiting the clear differencesup to then patent in training plans had never been somarked. Alignments and alliances acquired unusual meanings.A divergence of agendas therefore became unavoidable. In aworld that was once again profoundly transformed, brand newquestions were raised for a diplomacy that had to catch up.For post-war diplomacy, stasis was really becoming a‘premium commodity’.The need for adaptive change was soon to gear up onceagain. Relentlessly, the implosion of the Soviet Union andthe end of the bipolar order which was one of its results,the ethno-nationalist explosions that followed it all overthe place, and the processes of regional integration which44 Too recent for historians, too politically loaded for objectiveanalyses, and too close for it to be feasible for us to ascertain itsmore relevant traits, this is perhaps one of the less well knowintervals of the changes that diplomatic training underwent. This gapshould, nevertheless, be rather easy to fill, through further studieswhich will undoubtedly be produced in the next few years.

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were rapidly accentuated in a world rapidly flowing into anera of globalisation all converged to give no rest to thealterations made. More and more a fine tuning of diplomatsand of diplomacy was expected, as the number and types offronts which necessitated prudent, wise, but alsoknowledgeable professional, action spiralled. Teaming upwith area and domain experts was good, but effectiveinterfacing with them became crucial – and for that to befeasible training had to change rather fundamentally. InEurope, at the periphery of the old Soviet Empire, oftenwithin the old borders of the “Workers Paradise”, as wellas in the more recent Yugoslavian dream, a spurt of nationand State-building loudly demanded renewed attentions45. Onthe opposite side of the scale – but with similarimplications as far as diplomacy was concerned – winds of asometimes unexpectedly successful and often speedy regionalintegration were blowing throughout the world. In a novelformat, Europe and the US were regaining, or perhapsretaining, a centrality many thought forever lost. A rapidrecruitment – sometimes of necessity carried out by afrantic outsourcing – of ever growing corps of specialists— some regional, others thematic – became a burningnecessity for those States who had betted on surviving inthe new structural order of a curiously and enthrallinglyrearranged international system.For some, this meant either a decline of diplomacy or itsradical transformation into something wholly new. It is

45 See the relevant segments of my next section (chapter 3), as wellas much of the data in the Annex I include at the end of this study.This ‘phase’ has been accompanied by the most radical explosion ofdiplomatic training ever. Never had such a large number of Statesengaged in formally educating its diplomats as much as in the late80’s and 90’s. Also new has been the cross-fertilization of methods,contents and even specialists which we are witnessing, with entitieslike the Vienna Diplomatische Akademie, Clingendael, the Diplo Foundation,and others playing important roles in the design and establishment ofnovel diplomacies worldwide. The explosion has been such that an‘external’ and in many senses ‘public-private’ market for free-lancediplomatic training experts has been created and, even if it is stillincipient at many levels, it is now fully functional. Anotherfascinating theme for future study.

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probably far too early to tell if this is really so, andsurely far too risky for States to act on that presumption.The increase in risks felt appears to make it improbable,at any rate, for any solutions to be attempted which wouldchallenge the institutional inertias that as a rule thrivein such junctures. For the time being, no matter what ourdeepest convictions as to the serenity of the “diplomaticmodel” itself may be, we seem to be condemned to massivequantitative changes – which, nevertheless, oftenspontaneously flow into qualitative ones, which surely willnot for very long let things be as they were for a shortspan of time.The signs are loud and clear but also impossible tointerpret with certainty. All of these momentous changesoverflowed into a process — or rather, a series ofintertwined developments — which September 11th 2001 andall the dramatic events brought up about it intensifiedeven further. Its consequences are surely many and almostall of them impossible to predict46. But one thing hassurely been established: and that is that the recruitmentand training of diplomats is a question once again on thetable, now with both centrality and urgency. In theprocess, a new cast of contents came to fruition – contentswhich range from a renewed importance attributed toquestions of security and defence which the fluid characterof “normal” daily events has rendered blatantly imperative,onto an ever increasing centrality of multilateral and notrarely, multicultural, negotiations.In the next section I will strive to take a look at theimpacts of these recent changes at the general level of therestructuring of the training of diplomats. I will do so byfocusing my attention on the systematic similarities and

46 Although of course, it is not impossible to speculate about theseconsequences in an informed manner. For a powerful defence of ageneralized ‘ state transition’ which led us into a new “epochal war”cycle and thus to very altered patterns of internationalrelationships and their attendant paraphernalia, see the very recentPhilip Bobbitt (2008), Terror and Consent. The Wars for the Twenty-First Century,Alfred A. Knopf.

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differences patent in the actual training models adopted bya variety of contemporary States.

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3. A handful of contemporary training blueprints in theirpolitical, administrative, historical and geographicalsettings

The Queen propped her up against a tree, and said kindly, ‘You may rest a little now’. Alice looked round her in great surprise. ‘Why, I do believe we’ve been under this tree the

whole time! Everything’s just as it was!’‘Of course it is’, said the Queen, ‘what would you have it?’

‘Well, in OUR country’, said Alice, still panting a little, ‘you’d generally get to somewhere else –if you run very fast for a long time, as we’ve been doing’.

‘A slow sort of country!’ said the Queen. ‘Now, HERE, you see, it takes all the running YOU cando, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice

as fast as that’!”Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass

Before presenting and discussing a few choice paradigmaticinstances of contemporary diplomatic training, there areobvious rewards, in terms of analytical convenience, intrying to define a typology for the very many differentkinds of institutions devoted to it. Although a rigorousand crisp taxonomic arrangement of such institutions isprobably neither entirely possible nor really veryadvantageous, the gains that may be obtained from a priordelineation of a general mould for aggregating suchentities are obvious – at least if this delineation is castin the many dimensions along which both training and itssupport institutions unfold. The effort allows us to accomplish a more judiciousscrutiny of the various cases studied, by making itpossible to gradually throw a coherent light on thedistinctive characteristics of the various examples weponder. This, in turn, will allow us to air more solidhypotheses as to the articulation between the internallogics of the training processes shown and their externalcontextual environments: in other words, the taxonomicexercise, when properly conducted, renders empiricallybased interpretations possible. That much is obviouslyuseful if our aim is to sketch and place side by side a

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variety of institutional forms, as we shall endeavour toattempt in this third section of the present work.To do so, a convenient starting point is the model proposedby Paul W. Meerts, of the Clingendael Institute, in Holland,which seems particularly useful if and when the intent isto draw systematic comparisons, as is the case here47, inwhat concerns relationships of legal-administrativeproximity and distance between the places of insertion ofthe training given to diplomats and their respectiveMinistries. The Dutch researcher suggested breaking up hisoverall model into four main sets, which actuallycorrespond to just as many alternative juridical-administrative designs. Here is his grid:1. Diplomatic Academies (normally called “diplomatic institutes” and“diplomatic academies”): this is a grouping which encompassesthe Institutes integrated within their respectiveMinistries of Foreign Affairs, as entities often run by anAmbassador or a University Professor and that as a ruleinclude staff predominantly recruited within the Ministry —such is, for instance, the case in the vast majority ofLatin countries, including most of the Latin AmericanAcademies.

2. Foreign Service Schools: these are University Departments, insome cases public, others private, which prepare studentsat undergraduate or postgraduate levels in the area ofdiplomacy (as is the case of Georgetown School of ForeignService and of those of the diplomatic preparation on offerat the Universities of Nairobi and Yaoundé, to give butthree examples) in close and formal conjunction with theirrespective Ministries.

3. Institutes of International Relations: these are organisationsformally independent of their Ministries of ForeignAffairs, although, from a material point of view, they canbe (and in the majority of cases they are), directly or

47 Paul W. Meerts, A Short Guide to Diplomatic Training, The Hague: ClingendaelInstitute, 1992, p. 6.

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indirectly subsidised by the respective governments— suchis the case, for example, of Clingendael itself, in Holland.

4. Institutes with headquarters in International Organisations: a finalset, brings together some multilateral internationalorganisations, which take on functions of diplomatictraining, and are financed for such either by thegovernments which integrate them or by private entities(such is the case, for example, of UNITAR — the UnitedNations Institute for Training and Research).

There are, evidently, other types of entities which cannotbe entirely lodged within any of these four majorcategories. Such is, for example, the case of the FrenchÉcole Nationale d’Administration (ENA), or the celebrated Colléged’Europe, in which “preparation courses for diplomats” areon offer. These exceptions, it is worthy to note, are onlypartial ones, and we can easily connect them back, as itwere, to the underlying considerations concerning theplaces of insertion of the processes of teaching-learningin the four classes previously delineated. All the same,should we associate them with other observable examples oftraining of diplomatic staff — and there are many of those,especially in respect to (partial or whole) preparation, inthe European ex-Metropolis, or in regional institutions, ofdiplomatic staff from, for example, recent African ex-colonies, or from a few of the countries in the post-Soviet space — the insufficiency of Meerts’ administrativegrid becomes patent; at the very least, it appears usefulto add to these four classes at least a fifth one, whichwould encompass Diplomatic Training in States, or groups of States, withwhich special historical relations prevail.Paul Meerts’ model goes further than linear institutionaldesigns – he goes for formal articulation as well. Focusingnot quite on the curricula themselves, but instead on thepedagogical timing his administrative entities exhibit,Meerts distinguishes four main types of diplomatic trainingprogrammes, along the lines of the following criteria: (i)they take place before, or after, the admission processes

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to the Ministries; (ii) they may either be full or parttime; (iii) they vary in duration and levels; and (iv) theyencompass, or do not, groups that have specificallycomplementary benefits, for example university students,diplomats at the beginning of their career, diplomats andother civil servants taking on leading roles (e.g. DirectorGenerals or Service Directors and Heads of Mission)48. Thisfurther criterion, note, is also in a sense a formal-administrative one – it pertains to the administrative locus(in some cases, the application point) of the teaching-training efforts carried out within the wider context ofthe diplomatic profession, of the respective Ministries inwhich it takes place and, when the State structuresinvolved permit or demand it, in the still wider stateapparatus within which it is embedded. In an interestinglycomposite and neatly amalgamated way, Paul Meerts thusmanaged to classify, through grouping them into formaladministrative families of sorts, the various moderneducation systems in place for training the diplomaticstaff of Ministries of Foreign Affairs. Note once again, however, now at the curricular level, thatthe taxonomy proposed by Meerts would benefit from theinclusion of more criteria, and particularly pedagogicalones. Let me point to a few of these. Chiefly, I believethat there would be advantages in detailing some of theemphasis put on the training given and the didacticmethodologies actually followed. Indeed, only in this waycould one, in truth, neatly manage to attribute asubstantive general meaning to the empirical differencesfound in the various organizations which we are looking at– given that it is really only according to criteria suchas these that can we formulate hypotheses concerning theintentions defined in and by the training strategies chosenon a case by case basis. In the absence of such essentialcriteria, it is evident that the typology proposed by theClingendael researcher manages little more than formal andabstract associations of administratively ‘kin’ entities(‘homologues’ is how we tend to think of them) of what48 Idem, ibid., p. 7.

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are, in reality, crystallized expressions of aggregates ofinstrumental processes designed within the realm of legal-administrative range of possible State formats which do notvary very much, but which, in actual fact, ‘hardened’ witheducational objectives which do not always coincide. By wayof which his four-fold grouping actually loses sight of thecomparative empirical adequacy and efficiency ofalternative methods of teaching: and this is surely afundamental question, at any rate if the intent of ourjuxtapositions-comparisons is to render us capable ofappreciating the value and raisons d’être of the methods andprocesses used in the real world. While fully recognizing the value of Meerts’ approach, Iwant suggest that rather than a typological set ofinstitutional-administrative arrangements, we ought to belooking for patterns of a more ‘inchoate’ nature, multiplexsets of relationships, topological clusterings rather thanideal-legal crystallised forms. So, starting from the veryuseful generalised modelling sketched by Meerts, and doingso in the reformulated terms suggested — albeit withoutdepending on them with macro-comparative rigidity whichwould certainly be unwarranted and not called for in apreliminary study — I shall in the following pages present,in a by no means exhaustive manner, some of the sets ofcourses available for the training of diplomats in avariety of States. Like Meerts, I always keep in mind the“normative” dimension (the considerations of efficacy) towhich I believe we must allude from the very outset. Forreasons already adduced, I will group them according totheir demographic-continental distribution. There are,indeed, other orders of motives to favour looser forms ofcomparison. The strongest of those results from the factthat my objective is not really to draw any extrapolativeconclusions from the assessments undertaken. Anotherconnects to the relative analytical arbitrariness of Meerts’criteria, essentially descriptive ones. I shall return tothis point.A futher matter concerns our choices of cases and theordering preferred for our laying of examples. Let me focus

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on the last issue, or ordering strategy. Note that manyalternative strategies to arrange data would obviously bepossible, which go from a cultural ordering of cases(ascertainable by adhering, for example, to a gradient ofsuperficial similitude) or a geographic one (achievable bybraking up our examples by, say, size or in terms ofscale). All these would surely be significant and thusrevealing. But they all would also be relativelyincomplete. In what follows, I preferred to order instancesalong geographical-continental axes. For each continentalunit I look into natioanl examples in a relativelyarbitrary order. It is useful to remember that my mainobjective is not at all to formulate exact comparisons (since,at any rate, my finalities are not really comparative, in astrict sense), but rather to draw light conclusions by asystematic process of comparative exercises carried outwithout great rigour — the method I follow here is one of‘relatively uncontrolled comparisons’, to coin a concept.Ultimately, the rationale for my ordering preferences isconnected to my choice of cases. I try to go further thanMeerts did. I strive to identify ‘conglomerates’ (both atthe micro level of teaching-learning mechanisms case bycase, and others at a macro one, at the more inclusivelevel of families of such complexes) by searching for whatmay perhaps be called overall structure and intrinsicrelevance. I do so by a sort of aggregate clustering of thedata unearthed. In other words, bringing more elements intothe mix, I forego a merely (direct or indirect)administrative focus, preferring, instead, to look formacro- and micro-patterns, for what systems analysts andtopologists call ‘vicinities’, connectedness, centrality,proximity, reach, structural equivalence, lateralequivalence, and ‘small-worlds’, for patterns as types ofclustering, as well as for ‘the strength of weak ties’.Another way of putting this is to underline that I try,simultaneously, to drop a monistic approach and to take awider view. That is to say, I do not aprioristicallypresume the ascendency of any one ‘determinant’,institutional-administrative or of any other gist. So as to

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make the effort analytically manageable, I decompose thestructures I identify (a not always easy effort in itself)into sets of constraints which, in one way or another,converge for their emergence. I find that the many possiblere-combinations, achieved by processes of rationalreconstruction, of the constraints identified, make thecases I initially chose fall into often unexpectedpatterns49.The numerous comparative advantages of this strategy areworth mentioning at the very outset. Allow me to start witha readily observable macro-result: as we follow empiricalexamples it will become obvious that the more “modern” andefficient methods tend to be restricted to those States inwhich the academic teaching and research institutions arewell established. In a weakened version, the same can besaid in the case of States without such institutions ofexcellence, yet with special intimate relations with otherswho have them — the typical example here would be that ofmany ex-colonies vis-à vis their respective ex-Metropolis.Surely neither one case nor the other will come as asurprise. But this would surely be left invisible if welimited ourselves to a more or less mechanical applicationof monotonous taxonomic criteria. ‘Uncontrolled comparison’ also allows me to find patternsand locate constraints all the way down, as it were.Somehow on par with such sorts of macro-examples – which inthemselves have as an end result the immediate ‘intuitive’identification of relatively smallish sets of relatedinstances, even if, understandably, weighty and influentialones – by using the strategy such as the one I suggest wecan with no real difficulty make out another variety ofclustering, one in turn rooted on quite different logics.‘Uncontrolled comparison’ of the sort I advocate shows, ineffect, that methods which are modern and effective for theproduction and raising of technically suitable and thusmore efficient diplomats tend, in most cases, to be adopted

49 To put this in a slightly different manner: my method allows me toeasily detect what Ludwig Wittgenstein, in his Philosophical Investigations,famously called ‘family resemblances’.

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by two easily circumscribable subgroups of States: one thatbrings together States with a significant internationalscale and the responsibilities which tend to come withthat; and another, which is, in a symmetrical and inversemanner, integrated by small States with an ambition forinternational protagonism (be it regional or global) whicha limited scale does not mechanically give them. States,that is, which for one reason or another want to “punchabove their weight”, as it were. Such ‘spreads’ and clusters are, once again, unsurprising:these two groups are, in essence, those which have strongermotives to decide to dedicate a supplementary effort, atthe level of the training of their diplomatic staff as wellas on other complementary planes, which is very often quitesignificant. In the first of these groups are countrieslike the United States of America, Germany, Great Britain,Russia, India, Brazil, Japan, or Spain, to name just a fewof the many examples we are going to scrutinise. In thesecond group are others, such as Norway, Sweden, Holland,Israel, the Czech Republic, Poland, or the Baltic States. The following pages draw on these and other examples. Eventhough I do not pretend to achieve any real exhaustivenessin what follows, an ambition that would be uncalled for ina study such as the present one, I do not want to miss theopportunity of including in what follows sundry otherexamples; this is done so as to widen the comparativeplatform, thus enriching it and so hopefully allowing us tobetter detect eventual general trends in the currentevolution of training – a point I shall return to in thefinal section of this study. A word of caution. Although I do indeed gather quite a lotof ‘multidimensional information’ in what follows andalbeit I do that, or so I believe, in a manner sufficientto show the insufficiency of more ‘monotonous’ models –that is in a way that shows their incapacity to account forthe varying scope and the wide-ranging formats adopted fordiplomatic training – it is clear I simply do not have theamount of detailed data necessary for any sort of ‘grandtheory’ about it. Further research efforts are needed in

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order to garner it. As a result, I do not even attempt toformulate it. All things considered, that is perhaps a goodthing, since this relative information poverty allows me torather elegantly avoid ever-present essentialisttemptations. I have deep doubts about the value, or eventhe use, of any ‘general theories of diplomatic training’,even if merely formulated at a Weberian Idealtypen level.Much more seriously, the paucity of data experienced (whichis understandably visible in some cases more than inothers) makes it hard for me to display, as unambiguouslyas I would wish, the potentialities of the ‘constraintsmodelling’ I suggest in the present study. Luckily, I will be able to display them in the follow upsection, the one devoted to the Portuguese example.

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3.1. The general panorama in the European Community and outside it

I begin with Portugal’s Iberian neighbour, Spain, whoseState, at least insofar as its juridical-political plane isconcerned, shows a few similarities with the Portugueseone. In the Spanish case there is much to be said, even ifmy approach is the merely indicative one preferred in thisstudy. A moment of attention shows us that not only doesSpain have a notable ‘global’ past, but that – as we shallsee in detail in the following section of this monograph –it is trying hard to regain that sort of role after acouple of centuries of what Spaniards often perceive as arelative decline50. In other words, in terms of themodelling I earlier suggested, Spain is attempting toregain a lost international status. This is coupled to ageneralised conviction, widely held in the country andoutside it, about the quasi-inevitability of such near-

50 Indeed, there is no lack of assertions as to these points. In avolume edited in 1980, entitled (ed.) James W. Cortada (1980), Spain inthe Twentieth-Century World: Essays on Spanish Diplomacy, 1898-1978, Greenwood Press– a collection of articles by specialists which emerged during theshort interval between Spain’s democratic transition and thecountry’s accession into the European Union, the editor, James W.Cortada, was able to write that “[t]here is very little goodliterature devoted to Spain's role in international affairs for mostcenturies (p. xiii), a point echoed in greater detail, over a decadelater, by Javier Rubio, a Spanish Ambassador, when he wrote that“[s]obre la falta de estudios de la política exterior de España se hallamado la atención con cierta frecuencia. Y ciertamente no sinrazón, pues si es justo reconocer que en los dos últimos siglos – nosreferimos especialmente a la época contemporánea – la proyecciónexterior de España ha tenido un tono menor, de escasa relevancia enel concierto internacional de naciones a consecuencia de una serie decircunstancias que no son ahora el caso de examinar, también lo esque la referida proyección es un componente del que no se puedeprescindir a la hora de abordar el examen de la historia de nuestropaís”[in La Escuela Diplomática: cincuenta años al servicio del Estado (1942-1992), abook review by a Spanish Ambassador, Javier Rubio, published inCuadernos de Historia Contemporánea, 17, Servicio de Publicaciones,Universidad Complutense, Madrid, 1995 (the quote is from its p. 205).The volume reviewed was published two years earlier, and is LuisTogores y Jose Luís Nieto (1993), La Escuela Diplomática: cincuenta años alservicio det Estado (1942-1992), Escuela Diplomática, Madrid].

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future regaining of a lost prominence by the larger of thetwo Iberian States – a claim for which, with or without aheavy dose of a quite understandable messianic wishfulthinking, there is no local lack of expression. A higher level of international protagonism is surelywithin Spain’s reach. Spain’s inevitable return to theworld stage, was, characteristically, justified by thealready cited James W. Cortada who explained in what mayperhaps best be heard as a reinvindicative geopoliticaltone: “because other European countries eclipsed Spain'spolitical and military importance during the eighteenth andnineteenth centuries, most students of European events haveassumed that Spain's day in the sun is but history.However, the historical fact remains that since the days ofthe Roman Empire, the Iberian Peninsula played aninteresting and usually significant role in the evolutionof North African and European societies and, later, ofcultures in the New World and parts of the Pacific. Closerto home, Spain's influence was tied to its geographicalposition--being the point at which the southern end ofEurope meets the western entrance to the Mediterranean; thedistance to North Africa is so short that on a clear dayone can see it from Gibraltar. Thus, early in the affairsof European and Atlantic communities, Spain served as acultural conduit up and down the western half of Europe.Early it pushed itself into the role of an importantmaritime power in the Mediterranean, and later it became ajumping-off point for exploration and use of the Atlantic.Its geopolitical position clearly suggested that one couldexpect Spain to continue its traditional role as a bridgebetween Europe, Africa, and the Americas. Inevitably,Spain's geographical position would be translated intopolitical constants, which were evident in its activitiesover many centuries. Historians acknowledge that Spanishparticipation in the diplomatic and political activities ofWestern Europe has been significant; both when Spain was agreat power and when it played the perceptive observer,Spaniards have identified themselves with the fundamental

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activities of European, North African, and Americansocieties”51.Some genealogical background is appropriate here. In 1911,the Kingdom of Spain a seminal training institution wascreated specifically to form diplomats and consularofficers. This timely innovation was but a first move; asit is stressed in the Spanish Ministry’s official internetsite, during the last World War Spain quickly stepped aheadof its international potential rivals: “España fue uno delos primeros Estados en crear una Escuela Diplomática(1942). Podría afirmarse que un Centro de formación paralos miembros de las Carreras diplomáticas y consular yahabía sido creado en 1911, bajo patrocinio de la RealAcademia de Jurisprudencia y Legislación y con la ayuda delMinisterio de Estado se creó el Instituto Libre deEnseñanza de las Carreras Diplomática y Consular y Centrode Estudios Marroquíes. Se trata del primer precedente dela Escuela Diplomática”52. 51 James W. Cortada (op. cit.: pp. ix-x). In what understandably becamea mantra for academics and politicians in democratic EU Spain, JamesCortada claimed in 1980 that “authors […] acknowledge again whathistorians, political scientists, diplomats, and economists believeand continually prove: Spain still influences the world in many ways”(ibid: p. xii). Although it could be argued this is by no means a newambition in Spain, Cortada was hardly enouncing a triviality. Whileit is true that Franco also wished for this sort of influence andoften actively sought it, the fact is his regime options tended toinhibit Spain from going very far along those lines, something onlyovercome with democracy and the country’s accession into the EuropeanUnion.52http://www.maec.es/es/MenuPpal/Ministerio/Escuela%20Diplomatica/Paginas/escuela_diplomatica.aspx, retrieved on 19.07.2008. The samesite contains some interesting legal and historical background toSpain diplomatic past: “Fernando el Católico tenía Embajadorespermanentes cerca de la Santa Sede desde 1475 y en otras capitalescomo Londres, Borgoña, el Imperio, Lisboa, Venecia, Nápoles y París,todas a finales del S. XV. Estas Embajadas permanentes exigían laexistencia de oficinas o Cuerpos que centralicen la políticainternacional, y se inicia con el Rey Fernando la especialización delos secretarios del rey en los asuntos, bien por razón de la materiao de territorio. Durante el s. XVI la red diplomática más extensa esla de España y es Carlos V quien institucionaliza los órganos delservicio exterior creando el Consejo de Estado (1526). La Secretaria

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For the sake of comparison with the French and Britishcases touched upon earlier, it is surely worth our while toquote extensively from this very same document as concernsthe institutionalization of ‘a diplomatic career’ in Spain,specifically its connection to the evolution of training:“[e]n España la primera norma que regula el acceso alservicio diplomático es el R.D. 17.07.1816.El R.D. de 4 demarzo de 1844, siendo Ministro de Estado González-Bravo,establece la primera norma que organiza de forma estable yunitaria la Carrera Diplomática española, fijando elsistema de acceso, ascensos, categorías y nombramientos. ElR.D.  exigía un examen previo para ingresar en la CarreraDiplomática. Ahora bien, como la primera categoría era lade agregado sin sueldo, esto convertía la Carrera en uncoto cerrado. Esta situación era parecida a la establecidaen el Reino Unido o en Francia. No se suprimió estacategoría hasta el R.D. Ley de 29 de diciembre de 1928. ElR.D. de Bravo Murillo de 18 de julio de 1852 constituye elprimer cuerpo normativo que merece el calificativo deEstatuto general de la Función Publica en España. Elverdadero comienzo de una organización moderna de laCarrera Diplomática data de la Ley Orgánica del MinistroVega de Armijo de 14 de marzo de 1883 que establece elsistema de ingreso por oposición a la manera del grandconcours francés.En 1911  se crea el primer precedente dela actual Escuela Diplomática. El Decreto-Ley de 29 deseptiembre de 1928 estableció la fusión de las antiguasCarrera Diplomática y Consular. Con la República en 1932 seestablecieron como obligatorias las lenguas francesa einglesa”. La Escuela Diplomática se crea por el R.D. de 7de julio de 1942 para la formación de diplomáticos a travésde un curso selectivo. El Reglamento de 31 de diciembre de1944 establece las normas de ingreso en la Carrera quefueron modificándose a través de sucesivos decretos hastala aprobación del Reglamento Orgánico de la CarreraDiplomática de 15 de julio de 1955, y posteriormente delR.D. 1475/1987, de 27 de noviembre, por el que se

del Consejo se convierte en Secretaría de Estado cuando se nombra aFco. de los Cobos”.

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reorganiza la Escuela Diplomática, y de la Orden de 5 deoctubre de 1988, por la que se aprueba el Reglamento de laEscuela Diplomática”53.It is surely interesting to note that academic overtones,not too dissimilar to those that, for parallel motives, hadformed the rationale behind the creation of the ViennaDiplomatic Academy, were still somehow present in the early20th Century laterally equivalent entities in Spain –perhaps given the somewhat convergent dual focus on Law andMorrocan Studies. It is also fascinating, if only as athought experiment, to note the rather clearsynchronization between the professionalization ‘stages’and the training ones.In the Spanish as in the Austrian case, such a tonic oncoordination was to be intensified with time. In 1942,under General Francisco Franco’s military dictatorship, alarger offspring was born, a much more sophisticated andextensive institution, with an even clearer universitaryfacies. In the Ministério de Asuntos Exteriores y de Cooperación anenormous and very well equipped Escuela Diplomatica emerged,with its own corps and with established umbilical links tonumerous entities in the Spanish university world, namely(although not exclusively) the justly famous UniversidadComplutense de Madrid54. The Escuela Diplomatica is a public organism which has as itsprimary objectives of action the training of youngcandidates to the Ministry and the improvement ofdiplomatic staff55. In effect, in the pursuit of its53 Of particular relevance in this ‘genealogical declination’ in whatconcerns comparisons are the coincidence of facts and timings of‘constitutive moments’ like the creation of a ‘French-style’accession grand concours, the introduction of salaries so as to widenthe social bases of recruitment, and the establishment of trainingcourses.54 More than simple connections to a University system of which it isa part, even in its adhesion to the Bologna Declaration, the Escuelaalso, for instance, houses the Asociación Española de Profesores de DerechoInternacional y Relaciones Internacionales, as well as the Spanish NationalCommission for UNESCO.55 The site indicated above contains a detailed mission statement forthe Escuela. On this very subject and with objectives identical to

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legally defined ends, the Spanish Ministerio de Assuntos Exterioresconsiders study, academic reflection, and criticaldiscussion, as being absolutely fundamental aspects of thepreparation of its diplomats56. The number of seminars,subjects and thematic round tables which the Escuelaorganises for diplomats at various moments of their careeris extraordinary. They are frequented by as many Spanishnationals as staff and citizens from Latin American States,and many others from elsewhere — by way of illustriousnessand edification, the Spanish Escuela stands out in the factthat, since the East Timor rise to Independence, it hasorganised special courses dedicated to the training ofdiplomatic staff of this small Portuguese speaking country.Although in this as in other cases, I shall mainly limit myfocus to the training provided to young diplomats right atthe start of their career, it is worthwhile underlining thefact that in the Madrid Escuela emphasis is placed on anincreasing specialisation of the audience – this issomething which is both assumed and sought, with an everincreasing percentage of special sessions dedicated tothemes such as foreign cultural action, economic diplomacy,the defence of Human Rights, or prevention of terrorism57.Attendance to the basic course which the Escuela Diplomaticaholds (with a mainly theoretical curricular content, albeitthose I have here, the Escuela Diplomatica published in 2005 amagnificent volume co-authored by Nicolás Cimarra Etchenique, HelenaMaría Cosano Nuño, Magdalena Cruz Yábar, María Luisa MartelesGutiérrez del Álamo e Jorge Mijangos Blanco, entitled Los procesos deselección y formación de funcionarios diplomáticos en los principales países del mundo. Itcovers the cases of France, UK, USA, Canada, Germany, Sweden,Denmark, Norway and Finland.56 Domenico Polloni explains its mission well: “The EscuelaDiplomática is tending to develop into something between a diplomatictraining centre, a public administration college and an academy fordiplomatic studies”, Domenico Polloni (1996), Birth of a Diplomat..., p.14. Its curriculum covers, in any case, a fairly novel propensity-tendency for mid-carrier development training which the Escuelarecognises explicitly.57 There is no mistaking the importance Spain attributes to theEscuela: the formal closing ceremony of the School year is alwaysattended by the Spanish King and Queen, as well as by the Minister ofForeign Affairs.

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with smatterings of practical work, very clearly a coursespecifically geared towards a deeper knowledge of thepriorities of Spanish foreign policy) is a sine qua non offull access to the national diplomatic career. This is easyto understand if we take into account the main aims of theEscuela: after the relative worldwide marginalisation whichit suffered during the Francoist period, it is oneinstrument used to try to guarantee a full reinsertion ofmodern democratic Spain into the international system ofStates, and to do so assuming its new status of ascendingmedium-sized global power58. Let us stick to the paradigmatic case of the “basicinduction course” of Spanish young diplomatic staff. Thiscourse has a markedly academic nature — patent in the linkit keeps with the Universidad Complutense de Madrid; we shouldnote, first, that it is intensive, obligatory, and designedto cover “all the aspects of life of a diplomat, includinga period which involves practical experience in theMinistry” 59. It has a variable duration, oscillatingbetween a length of 6 and of 8 months. This longish corecourse is, later, complemented by various shorter ones, ofvaried dimensions and contents, but normally with a natureheavily weighted towards an academic style “post-graduation” 60. The pedagogic format followed and, equally,

58 For a general overview of modern Spanish foreign policy, see the attimes somewhat formalistic but always serene Ignacio M. A. deCienfuegos y Fernando R. Rodriguez (2002), “Las TransformacionesOrganizativas de la Politica Exterior Española”, Revista de EstudiosPolíticos (Nueva Época), n. 117: 173-220.59 Idem, op. cit., “Programmes de Formation des MAE de l’UE et institutions de l’UE”,in the section relative to Spain.60 Since the 2004-05 academic year, in any case, the Escuela, inconjunction with six Spanish Universities, offered two Magistersdegrees (now Second Cycles). These degrees came to complement thebasic training, offered at the level of an “undergraduate degree”,which the Escuela had offered, for quite some time, to the studentsstarting their Spanish diplomatic career. Run by a non-diplomat anduniversity professor, these courses had entirely academiccharacteristics. Note that these courses occurred before the“induction” course, that took place after the public entrance exam,and which was destined only to those who completed it successfully.

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the curricular composition chosen in defence of what itconsiders to be Spain’s national interest – and, thus thecurriculum is annually made available by the Escuela in bookformat. This is evidence of the importance attributed bythe Spanish State to amplifying the capacity of creativeadaptation and inter-articulation of its large and nowadaysvery active diplomatic staff abroad.Still within the European Union, let us now move a littleto the East. Italy has an Istituto Diplomatico Mario Toscano(ISDI), created in 1967 by the eminent jurist MarioToscano, a well-known Professor of International Law and agreat master of History of Treaties and InternationalPolitics. The very name chosen, that of a renownedacademic, signifies the intent to establish a para-universitaryinstitution which presided over the creation of the Istitutoby the Italian State. We begin by underlining that the ISDIis firmly rooted in the State apparatus. It is one of theDirections-General of the Ministero degli Affari Esteri (MAE), withincidence in the areas of training diplomatic personnel andfor the management of candidates to the access exams forthe diplomatic-consular career and the internationalorganisations in which Italy participates.A historical backdrop helps understand its emergence. TheIstituto Diplomatico came about as a result of a restructuringof the Italian Ministry which took place in 196761. Theidea that drove its creation was to fill a perceived gap,given the aims and objectives of the Italian State. Itsexplicit main aim was and is to try to improve and completethe professional qualification of staff, both diplomaticand non-diplomatic, through its courses and the trainingand revision initiatives, as well as preparation of

61 For an interesting early study on some of the political andadministrative traits of Cold War foreign policy constraints,envisaged as they directly and less directly echoed in the ItalianState, see Norman Kogan (1963), The Politics of Italian Foreign Policy, Praeger;for a much later study (and a more risqué one) on an earlier period,including Benito Mussolini’s Fascist consulate Or consulates, if oneincludes the short-lived 1944 Republica de Saló) , see H. James Burgwyn(1997), Italian Foreign Policy in the Interwar Period, 1918-1940, GreenwoodPublishing Group.

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candidates in the entrance exam for the diplomatic career.It included courses elaborated for not-yet confirmedinitiates, or cadets, richly called Secretari di Legazione inProva. It also included substantially more in depth coursesfor the Conseglieri di Legazione, special preparation coursesbefore postings, courses for “operatori area promozione culturale”,and others including computer sciences, languages and long-distance learning (e-learning) of various types of subjects.This was all reviewed and enlarged in a general re-structuring which took place in 1999 and re-ordered theIstituto Diplomatico Mario Toscano in 200062. Let us once again focus chiefly on the training madeavailable to young diplomats at the beginning of theircareer, the ones locally entitled Secretari di Legazione in Prova.These are obligatory courses with the duration of 9 months.Their format is mixed, they include an academic part, butabove all their aim is the acquisition of practicalexperience. Various sorts of outsourcing are common: for62 The Ministry and the Italian State in its entirety were re-structured in 1999, and this naturally led to an organic recasting ofthe Istituto Diplomatico Mario Toscano: as the official site claims,this envolved, among other things, an extension of training [“con laLegge 266 del 28 luglio 1999, relativa al riordino della carrieradiplomatica, il Parlamento ha concesso un’ampia delega al Governoanche in materia di formazione ed aggiornamento professionale deifunzionari diplomatici”]. Because of lack of scale, this meansoutsourcing to Universities (namely La Sapienza) and otherMinistries, as the Defense one; again the Italian MFA is explicitabout this, stressing the comparative short-comings, as concerns withit refers to as the ‘traditional European’ scale of DiplomaticAcademies, of the Istituto Mario Toscano: “L’Istituto Diplomatico nondispone di una struttura e di una dimensione tale da potersiannoverare tra le tradizionali accademie diplomatiche europee”. TheItalian administration then follows this diagnostic with a bundle ofsolutions to the encumbering unequality, and they all spell whatshould certainly be called a sort of rationalisation: “[e]sso si ponepiuttosto, sempre più, come un vero e proprio centro di managementdella formazione, nel fare soprattutto ricerca, programmazione edorganizzazione dell’attività formativa e nel costruire itinerariformativi personalizzati alla ricerca delle risposte coerenti emirate alle esigenze ed alle aspettative dei destinatari dellaformazione. La gestione dei corsi è poi data, in genere, in outsourcing,a specialisti sia del settore pubblico che di quello privato”.

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example, the ISDI does not itself format and organise thislast aspect of the courses, given that it includes visitsto multilateral and foreign international institutions, aswell as on-the-job training sprees at Italian Embassies,Permanent Missions, and Consulates abroad. In a mannersimilar to that of the previous example of Spain, the wholeprocess envisions, with clarity, a full preparation ofdiplomatic staff, so as to better guarantee, while facingan ever more complex and changing international reality, aninformed and able defence of the interests which theItalian State politically defines as its own. Perhaps morethan in most cases, this is relevant in Italy, with boththe many cyclical political mutations it suffers, and thelarge impact of domestic constraints of its delineation ofa national foreign policy63.63 Again some perhaps useful historical and political lines of force,now as concerns both of these ingredients: for two good overviews ofpost-World War II Italian foreign policy, see Paolo Tripodi (1996),“A half-century of Italian foreign policy”, Contemporary Review, andFabio Fossati (2008), “Italian Foreign Policy after the Cold War”,European Foreign Policy Unit, working paper 2008/ 3, London School ofEconomics and Political Science. In the first of these shortarticles, Tripodi succintly and rather superficially comments ingeneral terms about his country’s policies claiming that “Italianforeign policy is characterised by permanent elements that can berecognised since Italy became a single political entity during thelast century. Its geopolitical position and its historical approachto foreign affairs, with different degrees of intensity, have beenconstantly present in its foreign policy. Currently the main featuresof Italian foreign policy are the outcome of the events following theend of the Second World War. The new political system adopted inItaly after the collapse of fascism, as well as the creation of abipolar system on the international scene, reshaped the aims ofItalian foreign policy and its style. Italy has three main fields ofinterest on the international scene: NATO, the EU and thosegeopolitical areas involving its economic and strategic interests,the Mediterranean Sea, the Arab world and more recently the Balkans”.Much more theoretically minded, the second article insists on both atypology of the evolving Italian foreign policy and its domesticrootedness: “after 1994 Italy’s ‘second republic’ is characterised asa small power, while during the Cold War the first republic adopted a‘low profile’ foreign policy. The second section seeks to attributethis low profile to the anti-system (anti-market and anti-NATO)stance of the Italian Communist Party, rather than to the constraints

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It is, however, at the more advanced level of trainingoffered to the Conseglieri di Legazione that the academicdimension of the preparation of Italian diplomats appearsin its plenitude. There one notices the country’s ambitionfor the acquisition of greater national weight oninternational stages. For the progression to EmbassyCounsellor, the Italian Ministry requires from candidatesthe attendance of, as well as a good result in, anintensive course of 6 months – a track for which “HighLevel Seminars, with academics, scholars, politicians, on aseries of international and important domestic questions,[are] required. [This training] even includes visits topublic institutes, and updating in current affairs of apolitical, cultural nature, in questions of nationaleconomic policy, etc” 64. The model elected clearly pointsin the direction of a training that is more technical andscientific than bureaucratic-administrative; a trainingwhich the Italian State has come to plan for its diplomatsaccording to a logic which is rooted in its will togradually draw up, and then guarantee, its own wider anddeeper implantation on world stages: a project the more

of the bipolar international system. The third part describes post-1994 foreign policies of the two coalitions (broadly, the right andthe left) as consistent with either neo-conservative ideology or theconvergence between conservative and ‘constructivist’ politicalcultures” (p. 1). An interesting, if surely arguable, periodization.The insistence on the internal, domestic, roots of Italian foreignpolicy has re-emerged time and again in the analyses, local as wellas foreign, carried out since World War II; a recent study on this isto be found in Filippo Andreatta (2008), “Italian Foreign Policy:Domestic Politics, International Requirements and the EuropeanDimension”, Journal of European Integration, vol. 30 (1): 169 – 181, whichcompares Romano Prodi and Silvio Berlusconi’s attitudes in relationto the EU and the US; as the author puts it, again domestic politicscame into play, now in what concerns “the attitude on the Europeandimension of Italy's foreign policy, which has become a partisanissue”. 64 Idem, op. cit., “Programmes de Formation des MAE de pays de l’UE et d’institutions del’UE ”, in the section relative to Italy. See also Domenico Polloni,Birth of a Diplomat, Procedures for recruiting and training diplomatic staff, a comparativestudy, p. 9.

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specialised, more professional, and more creative trainingmodel chosen fits rather well.Comparing and contrasting these two southern European Latincases with the Anglo Saxon example of Great Britain,embedded in a diverse politico-administrative matrix, is aparticularly revealing exercise. As we shall see, it isparticularly useful if we give the matter some furtherhistoric depth, beyond that already offered in my lastsection, most of which I avoid repeating here. The readeris well advised to refer to the earlier section where, inthe footnotes, I have tried to align both the moments, orspurts, of politically induced legal and administrativechanges, and the longer periods of relative stasisinterspersed between them – mainly anchored on works byG.R. Berridge, R.A. Jones, A. Watson and, of course, thefamed Conservative Churchillian politician and one timeacademic ‘angry young man’, Harold Nicolson, and passingthrough ‘constitutive moments’ such as the initial LordClarendon’s introduction of an entrance examination in1856, the House of Common’s Select Committee Committee to inquireinto Constitution and Efficiency of Diplomatic Service recommendations of1861, Lord Lansdowne’s innovations, which in 1905 broughtthe diplomatic service and Foreign Office closer to theCivil Service by requiring candidates to take first theCivil Service examination followed by an additionalexamination in French and German, and those of theMacdonnell Committee of 1914 which abolished thetraditional “income qualification” of the Britishdiplomatic service, thereby improving the chances of thosewithout private means being able to pursue a diplomaticcareer.An example of such matricial politico-administrativediversity will stand for all: the famous Chatham House (orThe Royal Institute of International Affairs)65 was an institution65 Chatham House, as an independent organization, typically includessome governmental departments as its “associate members”, in a kindof sui generis public-private partnership. It is certainly a goodexample of what in Britain are often called QUANGOs (Quasi non-Governmental entities) or GONGOs (Government-organized non-Governmental Organizations).

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created in the UK, in 1920, in the private domain. It doesnot exist alone, in any case: at the heart of the ForeignOffice, in the middle of the 19th Century, a group ofresearchers materialized, people who were linked to thelibrary and the archive, an entity which came about as aresult of the occasional necessity for ad hoc groups, suchas the one that prepared the Peace Conference ofVersailles. Years later, in 1943, the Foreign Office ResearchDepartment was formed, under the inspiration and aegis ofthe celebrated historian Arnold Toynbee, who, as early as1939, had recruited a collection of members of Chatham Houseand some outstanding academics, with its headquarters inBalliol College, Oxford, so as to produce studies forWinston Churchill’s Whitehall-centred “think tank” duringthe then recently begun World War II. The tradition of an intense interconnection betweenministerial preparation and academic education thus has –it is worth pointing out – deep historical roots in theBritish case; training is, in good Anglo-Saxon tradition,as diversified as it is entrenched in layers that graduallysettled one upon the other. It must be mentioned that, atanother level, one of the foremost University anchors ofthis type of training had been for a very long time Oxford,which runs a Foreign Service Programme with students brought infrom a large variety of mostly developing countries: itboasts a post-graduation in Diplomacy, created in 1969,whose international body of students, selected by theirrespective governments, engage in a four module course ofInternational Politics, International Law, InternationalCommerce and Finance, and Diplomatic Practice66. Britishdiplomats receive, in the Foreign Office, a not toodissimilar training, normally in a more compact and fine-tuned modular arrangement.The overlapping “stratigraphical” layering which is such adistinctive characteristic of the British model, involvesthe convergence of a variety of entities. Other highly

66 See http://www2.qeh.ox.ac.uk/oufsp/, a site last consulted18.08.05; alternatively, http://www.qeh. ox.ac.uk/centres/about-oufsp, consulted 19.05.08.

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prestigious institutions, such as Cambridge University, theLondon School of Economics and Political Science, theSchool of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), WestminsterUniversity or Winston House, develop matching complementaryefforts, with obvious advantages for the level ofpreparation of a British diplomatic corps capable ofgetting supplementary and often highly specialized trainingfrom different sources. The Italian diplomat and nowinternational civil servant Domenico Polloni is categoricalon this point: “all this, together with the opportunityopen to intermediate level officials to apply forsabbatical leave for study, updating purposes and personalresearch, makes the British diplomatic corps still one ofthe most cultured and best prepared in the world” 67.The training given in the UK, however, is not exhausted inthe privileged connections entertained with the localacademic world. A good part of it takes place inside theForeign Office itself. This surely merits examining.Keeping in mind the enormous multiplicity of functionalspecialisations seen as necessary, it becomes ratherdifficult to define the training given by the Ministry toBritish diplomats at the beginning of their career. It willbe enough to underline that to the solid academic base oftraining is added an important practical re-dimensioning,one which tests the real capacities more that previouslyacquired knowledge. The formatting of such on-the-jobtraining aspects is particularly interesting, given that,more than centred on particular organic units (structuralentities a lot less defined in the British model of publicadministration than in the European continental States), itis clearly rather focused, instead, on specific problems68.

67 D. Polloni (1996), op .cit., p. 24.68 The patent specifics in the British model clearly bring out some ofthe limits of the linear applicability of the ‘Meerts grid’ that Isummarized earlier: by not only largely disregarding the intrinsicrole of administrative geometry and topology, but also byunderestimating pragmatic success and failure, the British example,in spite of its germinal role, influence, and impact, emerges as asort of anomaly. Polloni bitingly observed, in what concerns the sosui generis British case, that “the vocational training system is part

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The Foreign Office thereby for example requires of itsyoung diplomats that they attend – and that they achievehigh grades – in small professional courses, orspecialisation ones, in the commercial and consular areas.Each has a short duration of 2 or 3 weeks; yet each andevery one of them is as a rule highly intensive andadministered full time69. The Foreign Office then offersthem thematic modular courses (some optional, somecompulsory), which are also intensive but shorter trainingexercises dealing with questions such as “counter-proliferation and weapons of mass destruction”, “counter-terrorism”, “crisis management”, “data protection andfreedom of information”, “drugs and international crime”,“effective speaking”, “human rights”, “international law”,“rapid-reaction consular responses”, and very many more,including brushing up and learning of foreign languages. Anaspect that should be stressed is the pre-post preparationoffered70, in which the courses to be attended depend onthe tasks to be carried out. The objectives of a pedagogical arrangement of this sortare obvious. And they are patent in at least two planes;firstly, in terms of the creation of a body marked by anenormous specialised division of work, when it comes to theprofessional profiles of the diplomatic officials who arepart of it; and secondly, in its rather direct connectionto a central concern, which clearly commands all, with

of a fairly flexible, loose structure which looks to make new staffoperative immediately and to complete theoretical grounding later”;in Domenico Polloni (1996), op. cit., p. 19.69 Jorge Mijangos Blanco, “El modelo de acceso a la carreradiplomática en el Reino Unido”, in M. C. Etchenique (2005), op. cit.(263-324), p. 306.70 D. Polloni (1996), op. cit., p. 24: “the bulk of the training takesplace in the pre-posting stage, with courses on specific geographicalareas, cooperation in development (1-5 days), courses for commercialattachés (a fairly intensive course which lasts 5 weeks on average),consular courses (3 weeks), accountancy courses, courses in resourcemanagement and administration (...) and introductory seminars oneconomics, history, international law, current internationalpolitics, etc.”.

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ensuring the development of an continued functionaladequacy of their profiles to the contemporary world71.The Netherlands are a particularly interesting case interms of the comparative framework that I chose: once aState with a substantial global reach, Holland is todaystill as ambitious but of small to medium dimension.Reminiscent of both the United Kingdom and Portugal orFrance, it has to cope with the Copernican Revolutionspelled by the loss of its colonial Empire72. The end ofthe bipolar world led to other changes; thus, in 1995, adocument titled The Foreign Policy of the Netherlands: A Reviewoutlined a new general direction for Dutch foreign policy.As a result, nowadays, both the diplomacy and the foreignpolicy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands are based on fourbasic pillars: the Trans-Atlantic cooperation (meaningmembership in the Atlantic Alliance and the nurturing of a‘special relationship’ with the US), European integration(it is, of course, one of the six founding members of theEU), international development and International Law (forthese latter two items, portraying itself as a privilegedbona fide aid provider and international mediator, followingwidely shared public perceptions)73. 71 It is interesting to take note of the notable similarity betweenthese very intricate British processes of specialized training andthe high professionalism of its diplomats and that patent in theRepublic of Ireland.72 From among a plethora of others, for an in many senses exemplarystudy of how imperial ideologies impacted foreign policy, see DuncanBell (2007), The Idea of Greater Britain. Empire and the future of World Order, 1860–1900, Princeton University Press, which only refers to the UnitedKingdom’s case.73 Perceptions which, indeed, have a wide empirical basis, which the1995 Review decided wisely to use to its advantage (something which,as we shall see, mutatis mutandis Norway also did. For this last caseand that of Canada, see Jozef Bátora (2005), “Public Diplomacy insmall and medium sized States. Norway and Canada”, Discussion Papersin Diplomacy, Clingendael); with a slightly different title, thepaper was presented in Malta that very year as Jozef Bátora (2005),“Multistakeholder Public Diplomacy of Small and Medium-Sized States:Norway and Canada Compared”, an unpublished paper presented to theInternational Conference on Multistakeholder Diplomacy, Mediterranean DiplomaticAcademy, Malta, February 11-13, 2005. As the official Dutch MFA site

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All this, of course, requires the assumption of a newprofile by Dutch diplomats. And that, in turn, demands newtraining focuses, if not strategies. Historically a neutralState, from the World War II onward the Netherlands becamea member of a large number of international organizations;it has been, since 1949, a full member of NATO. The Dutcheconomy has as a rule been very open and since timeimmemorial relies rather heavily on foreign trade. Duringand after its Renaissance and post-Renaissance Golden Age,the Dutch built up a commercial and colonial empire, oftenwith private and public-private entities and consortia likethe Dutch East Indies Company and its counterpart, theDutch West Indies Company; all this colonial outreach andimplantation quickly fell apart after World War II. Many ofthe historical ties established during its long colonialpast still influence somewhat the network of foreignrelations the Netherlands is involved in. What does allthis mean? The 1995 effort at renewal spelled a reneweddesire for a global projection – punching above its weight,as it were – of this small- medium-sized European State74.stresses, “[the Netherlands is] eager to promote values such asdemocracy and human rights, to which Dutch society attaches greatimportance. The Netherlands hosted the first world peace conferences,held in The Hague in 1899 and 1907. It is also home to manyinternational organizations, including the International Court ofJustice, the Permanent Court of Arbitration, the InternationalCriminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, the Organization for theProhibition of Chemical Weapons and the International Criminal Court.In addition, the Netherlands seeks to strengthen the role of theOrganization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) inpreventing conflict, keeping peace and protecting human rights”.These missions were largely a result of the 1995-1996 revamping Ihave already alluded to. [quotation retrieved on 19.07.08 fromhttp://www.minbuza.nl/en/welcome/Netherlands/general,Foreign-Policy.html]. It would be fascinating to produce a comparative studyof the Dutch ‘public diplomacy’ embodied in this change, and theefforts of Norway and Canada so ably scrutinized by Josef Bátora. Foran earlier study on Dutch elite perceptions on democratic control oftheir foreign policy decisions, see the interesting Baehr, Peter R.(1980), “The Dutch Foreign Policy Elite. A descriptive study ofperceptions and attitudes”, International Studies Quarterly 24 (12): 223-261.74 For two outstanding ‘classical’ monographic studies on Dutchforeign policy, see J.J.C. Voorhoeve (1979), Peace, Profits and Principles. A study of

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It also spelled the urgency of a not always understoodchange in diplomatic training.Unsurprisingly, the Netherlands responded, in part,according to its administrative tradition, as indeed it hadbefore, by outsourcing much of its diplomatic trainingeither to indirectly administered State Universities, or toa sort of public-private entity. A few words about the most important historical partner intraining of diplomats of the Dutch MFA, the ClingendaelInstitute: In a small country with a size not dissimilar tothat of Portugal, the private organism Clingendael Institutehas, among various research and consultancy activitiesdeveloped as a think tank, a diplomatic academy whichstructures its training course for young diplomats on thebasis of their necessity to acquire linguistic andcommunicative competencies, diplomatic and consularcompetencies, in what concerns the subjects also taught:International Law, International Economics, InternationalPolitics, Foreign Policy, European Integration andInternational Negotiation, and in the various evaluationprocesses it conducts – above all in the role play ofmeetings, conferences and negotiation. Clingendael alsoorganises more advanced recycling and updating courses fordiplomats halfway through their career, especially suchwhich deal with political planning and the respectiveapplication process75.

Dutch foreign policy, The Hague, and Wels, C.B. (1982), Aloofness & Neutrality.Studies on Dutch foreign relations and policy-making institutions, Utrecht.75 It should be noted that Clingendael has not been the main provider ofinitial training or Dutch diplomats in the last few years: this haslately been adjudicated to Leiden University.http://www.clingendael.nl/cdsp/training/, consulted 19.05.08.Highlighting the establishment of excellence that the Clingendaelachieved in diplomatic training, which in part can be attributed tothe fact that, not being under the jurisdiction of the Dutch Ministryof Foreign Affairs, as Polloni observes, the Institute “does not havediplomatic staff controlling it; it encourages independentdevelopment and concentrates training in the hands of specialists; onthe other hand, great attention is paid to the specific needs of thetrainees (...)”: in Domenico Polloni (1996), op. cit., p. 18.

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Apart from this “umbilical” link to the Clingendael Institute,the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs itself, alsoorganises courses dedicated to young diplomats who havejust entered their professional careers but who still havenot been posted. The objective is – as one would expect –to guarantee the acquisition of “diplomatic skills”, and toensure a better understanding of “foreign policy” andspecifically Dutch “objectives of foreign policy”. Suchcourses are compulsory, intensive and have the duration of3 months. Before being posted, young Dutch diplomats aresubjected to a course of two months, of a very much morepractical nature, which envisages the improvement in areassuch as: “communication, management, operationalmanagement, personal performance, thematic courses,consular courses, safety, automation, language training” 76.Administrative things considered, and if we exclude thereliance on the “Oxbridge” axis, the Dutch model, as may beseen, is not very different from the British one. A simpleglance at the contents of the courses offered by theMinistry and Clingendael (an, of course, the syllabus onoffer at Leiden University, which I do not go into here),shows the importance of the technical-scientificmeasurement of training drawn up for the younger diplomatsof the Netherlands.A particularly remarkable case, due once again to thesimilarity of scale and in many senses also of ambition, isthat shown by Austria. Faithful to its tradition from the17th Century, Austria today has a Diplomatic Academy whichorganises a Diploma Programme. For candidates who have nobackground studies in Law, Politics, or Economics itsattendance is a legal requirement to enter the Ministry ofForeign affairs.77. Although I shall return to this case inthe Annex at the end of the present study, I would like tosay a few words about the Austrian case at this point. The finalities of the Austrian Diplomatic Academy of Viennaprove, nevertheless, to be vaster, seeing that it aims to

76 Idem,., op. cit., “Programmes de Formation des MAE de pays de l’UE et d’institutionsde l’UE ”, in the section relevant to Holland.77 Domenico Polloni (1996), op. cit., pp. 16-17.

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supply the students who attend with the necessarypreparation for an international career, not only indiplomacy but also in business and finance, internationaland non-governmental organisations. At this level theechoes of traditions originating from the Imperial Austro-Hungarian meticulous structure ring clearly. The Austriancase, for this very reason, is particularly interesting incomparative terms. Once a State of high standing and with astrong regional influence, Austria has seen itselfrelegated to the status of a small but ambitious State, andhas learned how to act in conformity by adapting an oldstructure to these new national ambitions.The Academy also offers two other programmes: a Master onAdvanced International Studies (MAIS) and a Master of Science inEnvironmental Technology and International Affairs (ETIA). The MAISprogramme is intended for university graduates of alldisciplines and all nationalities who wish to extend theirknowledge of international relations through a multi-disciplinary two year Master’s programme. Under the rubric“European Integration in a Changing World” the MAISprogramme equips participants with the analytical skillsnecessary for a better understanding and assessment ofcurrent European and global trends in the fields ofpolitics, law and economics. MAIS is a joint programme ofthe Diplomatic Academy of Vienna and the University ofVienna. The ETIA programme– a cooperation project of theVienna University of Technology and the Diplomatic Academyof Vienna – is designed for graduates of all disciplineswho are interested in broadening their knowledge ininternational affairs and the scientific and technicalissues relating to the environment. It lasts for two years,one of which is spent at the DA and the other at theTechnical University.The centrality attributed, on the one hand, to thebasically academic training of young Austrian (and other)diplomats — in a tradition that, as we have seen, is aslong as they come — could hardly be plainer. The same canbe said of the integrated character of the programsoffered: the objective of preparing diplomats capable of

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confronting a complex and multifaceted world in a way thatpreserves autonomy and personal creativity withoutannulling group co-ordination, could not be more explicit.Let us now look westwards, to Germany, where theestablishment of a professional diplomatic career, receivedvia a venerable Prussian tradition, dates back toBismarck’s foundation, in 1871, of the Second Reich. Whatis immediately striking is that very origin itself:according to Magdalena Cruz Yábar, who presents her datawith an evident historic-comparative lucidity andprecision, “the professional training in the Ministry ofForeign Affairs followed the conservative tendencies of itsremote Prussian origin”78. However, such tendencies, as weshall see, show that the structures’ dynamic follows arhythm which is not necessarily more conservative than thatof other European cases studied here, even if somehistorical particularities and contingencies cannot beunderestimated. Again, learning strategies and schemas areapparently ‘indexed’ to the design of nationaladministrative structures. As far as Germany is concerned (and it must be rememberedthat ‘Germany’ has always been an entity with a variablegeometry), this ‘indexing’ is quite clearly there79. In78 Magdalena Cruz Yábar, “El modelo de acceso a la carrera diplomáticaen Alemania”, in Etchenique et al., op.cit. (109-180), p. 123. See alsoDomenico Polloni, op. cit., p. 9.79 Once more some historical background will make it easier to putthese changes into context. As always, my aim is by no means to justoffer data on foreign policy, but rather to throw some light on theevolution of training via that context. The "reorganization" ofEurope has historically been a recurrent justification, as well as anexpressed goal, of German expansionist policy. At the time of thefoundation of the German Empire in the late 19th Century (1870-1871)this "reorganization" was already being carried out, at the time bymeans of war against France. Kaiser Wilhelm II recast the old mouldin novel terms. The result was disastrous. But it was most surelyAdolf Hitler who gave a definitive meaning to this general Germanobjective. When he came to power in the early 30’s Hitler had as oneof his main aims the restitution, to Germany, of its great powerstatus. He wanted to do that by a series of measures which includedgoing back on the hated Versailles settlement, building up a highlymechanized army, recovering lost German territory such as the Saar

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effect, the evolving Germany has always managed to somehowcombine central control and decentralization, and the areaof diplomatic training has by no means been an exception asan example of adaptation to this pattern: the legacy of apredominantly aristocratic German 19th Century presents uswith a model for the acquisition of specific knowledgeresulting from the diplomat’s academic title and also froma willingness to have diplomats engage in the learning ofother necessary skills (languages, law, etc.) outside theBerlin Ministry. Kaiser Wilhelm II, with his reputed“personal diplomacy” preferences, induced what amount to,in some senses, a hiatus to this composite solution80, but

and the Polish Corridor, and bringing within the Reich all of themany dispersed German populations. This last aim would involve theannexation of Austria and the acquisition of territory fromCzechoslovakia and Poland, both of which had large German minoritiesas a result of the Versailles Treaty. Among analysts, there is somedisagreement about what Adolf Hitler intended beyond these aims. Mosthistorians believe that the Anschluss of Austria and parts ofCzechoslovakia (namely the Sudetenland) and Poland was only abeginning, to be followed by the seizure of the rest of thosecountries and by the conquest and permanent occupation of SovietRussia at least as far east as the Ural Mountains. This would givehim what the Germans called Lebensraum, which would provide food forthe German people and an area in which the excess German populationcould settle and that they could colonize. An additional advantagewas that the threat of soviet style communism would be destroyed.However, not all historians agree about these further aims; A.J.P.Taylor, for example, famously argued that Hitler never reallyintended a major war and that he at most was prepared for not morethan a limited war against Poland. Whatever may have been his long-term intentions, however, the fact of the matter is Hitler began hisforeign policy with a series of rapid and brilliant successes, one ofthe main reasons for the rapid growth of his popularity in Germany.By the end of 1938 almost every one of Hitler’s initial aims had beenachieved, without war and with the tacit approval of NevilleChamberlain’s United Kingdom. Only the Germans of Poland remained tobe brought within the Reich. When he failed to achieve this bypeaceful means, Hitler took his fatal decision to invade Poland.80 Again, a historical backdrop. For discussions of what the well-known German historian John Röhl called Wilhelm II ‘personalmonarchy’, and his “personal diplomacy”, arguably the darker side ofGerman history in this period, see the articles by Ragnhild Fiebig-von Hase (2004), “The uses of ‘friendship’. The ‘personal regime’ of

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in the aftermath of the development of the events andfollowing the First World War, it was realised that suchmodel could not survive much longer in its essence. Theconditions for its implementation had, in fact, changed. Inpractice, during the Weimar Republic, the training ofdiplomats would take up three years, mixing a theoreticalcourse with the matters of the Office81. After World War II and the “de-Nazification” which ensued,the sheer lack of professionals lead to the creation of atraining centre, which was inaugurated in 1950, whereintensive 3 to 4 months courses were taught as a foundationfor candidates and junior diplomats. By 1956, the initialcycle had already been widened to three years, including ayear of placement abroad. After that, the system did notchange considerably, until it was reformed in 2003, when itwas decided, for functional reasons that training given inloco, as indispensable as it may be, should not last longerthan a year82. Today, given the extraordinary diversity ofthe recognised functional specialisation deemed necessaryfor international political actors, it has becomeparticularly difficult to define what training is offeredto the young diplomats at the beginning of the career. As a result, the German Federal State offers threealternative models of “pre-service training”83 to theirrecently recruited diplomats, according to the profilewhich they will have been previously attributed. The threeprofiles at the beginning of the career are defined as“executive level”, “Consular officer or Administrator” andthe “Executive Assistant”. The German gamble on exhaustive

Wilhelm II and Theodore Roosevelt, 1901–1909”, and the one by MichaelEpkenhans (2004), “Wilhelm II and ‘his’ navy, 1888–1918”, both ofwhich are included in (eds.) Annika Mombauer and Wilhelm Deist, TheKaiser. New Research on Wilhelm II's Role in Imperial Germany, Cambridge UniversityPress.81 For a detailed and thoughtful study of the ill-fated WeimarRepublic, it is worthwhile to read Eric D. Weitz (2007), WeimarGermany. Promise and Tragedy, Princeton University Press.82 Magdalena Cruz Yábar, ibid., p. 124.83 “Programmes de Formation des MAE de l’UE et UE institution”, in particular thesection relevant to Germany.

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training as part of a national effort to re-conquer aposition as a major player on the international stagescould not be clearer. Moreover, the German diplomatictraining strategies are clearly rooted on a functionaldivision of labour, which most certainly underlines amarked professionalization of the States’ internationalpersonnel.To show how this is ‘technically’ carried out, it is usefulto dive into the architecture of the training offered. Thecontingent in the first of these groups receives a year offormal instruction. The naturally compulsory courses, aremixed in nature, but with the emphasis on and in termsessentially academic, and refer to “history, consular andinternational public law, economics and job-related topicssuch as development policy, negotiation skills, languagetraining in English and French and preferably anotherofficial UN-language”. The pre-requisites are of anessential academic nature; and they are high. I shall quotethe German Ministry, as to the description it gives to thiscourse: “University graduates (Master's or doctoral degree)are hired by the MFA as trainees after passing an extensiveconcours. They then go through a 1-year-training-courseduring which various exams have to be passed. The objectiveis to prepare the future diplomats for their jobs in allits aspects. After passing final exams, they start off as3rd Secretaries in a diplomatic or consular mission abroador are assigned to a desk at MFA”. The character of the training received, simultaneouslyacademic and practical, is clearly formulated in theprofessional routing of this first group: “6 monthsintroductory course in the Foreign Office Training Centre in Bonn(which moved to Berlin in early 2006), 5 months internshipat the MFA in Berlin, 6 months training at the Universityof Applied Sciences for Public Administration and LegalAffairs, 1 preparatory month followed by a 9-months-internship at a mission abroad, 1 month of intensive

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language training, 7 months of theoretical training plusfinal exams”84.As far as the second group is concerned, the instructiongiven lasts for three years. The central aim of thetraining offered is to effectively prepare for a career thenatural essentials of the consular career. The baserequirements are fewer but by no means non-existent:“minimum requirement for admission to the concours is aBaccalaureat/Abitur. The trainees go through a 3-year-training-course with the emphasis on legal and consular affairs,equivalent to a Bachelor degree or Paralegal training.Internships in the MFA and at diplomatic or consularmissions abroad are also part of this 3-year program. Afterfinal exams, the graduates are usually assigned to amission abroad”. Once again — and the legal-administrativeformulations employed make this abundantly clear — theacademic preparation specifically given in the GermanMinistry precedes the “professional” on the job preparationand training. Finally, for the third and final group (a group ofessentially administrative civil servants) the training hasan intercalary duration of 21 months. The stages of thetraining are as follows: “introductory course (4 ½ months)consisting of courses in administrative and consular law,financial administration and English, 2 months internship

84 In informal conversations in the new Berlin installations, many ofthe young German students (in what is a common tradition, a largepercentage of them trained in Law) I engaged in conversationcommented about some repetition, in their training which, in manycases, went over again what they had learned in University. Most,however, were rapid to stress that most subjects (say, Economics,Politics and International Relations or History, in the case ofjurists, or Law, Politics and International Relations or History inthe case of economists, and so on) brought them into contact with newand very useful subject-matters and angles of analysis. This, ofcourse, is generally applicable, as most young diplomats almosteverywhere rarely studied more than one area (as a rule virtuallyeverywhere, Law, Politics and International Relations, Economics, orHistory) when they were college students. A point generally, andoften rather studiously, overlooked by critics of an academicmodelling for diplomatic training.

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at the MFA, 8 months internship at a mission abroad, finalcourse (5 ½ months) preparing for the final exams in civil,constitutional and consular law, nationality andimmigration law, and financial administration”. The notablething is that even in this last case — that in which thetraining of administrative staff is at cause— the scholarlyacademic tone is so very marked. The requirement and alsothe timbre of the exams that end these study cycles isconfirmation of the aptitude of the young attachés: shouldthey be successful, they are placed in the “Referent”category in the Ministry, or as initiates in Germandiplomatic representations abroad. The overall outcome of this authentic training andinstitutional machinery is to produce what should perhapsbe seen as a highly effective diplomatic steamroller whichfits well with Germany’s ambition the regain its status asa great power. Since the end of the Cold War and, morepointedly, since long-yearned for unification of thecountry, the Federal Republic of Germany geographically is, andpolitically considers itself to be, a Central Europeancountry. It is, among others, a member of the European Union,the G-8 and NATO. The Federal Republic is one of the world'sleading industrialized countries and it is also the biggestmarket economy of Europe, with "windows to the East andWest"85. Since its reunification in 1990 Germany has laboured toextend ever further its responsibilities and centralposition in both regional European and global affairs. Diplomatic training in France is organized along what, toall effects, can be characterised as a sui generis model,parallel to – albeit very different from – the ‘Britishexception’ I described above. One of the reasons for this

85 For one example of the many divergences which both plagued andenriched the foreign policy of one of Germany’s (the West German)incarnations, see Clay Clemens (2005), “Polarization and Consensus inWest German Foreign Policy, 1949-1990”, Taiwan Journal of Democracy, vol.1, no.2: 25-48. As in the Italian and the Dutch case (and, as weshall see, the North-American one) there is an endless ongoingdiscussion among many German foreign policy specialists as to therelative position of domestic and international politics in thecountry’s political system and strategic decision-making.

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is certainly the existence, in the French Universitypanorama, of Grandes Écoles, special elite academic entitieswhich function as a privileged platform for recruitment offuture diplomats and other civil servants. Another, resultsfrom the actual specifications of the State structure ofImperial Napoleonic inspiration, with its “new civilorder”. Perhaps as important as both these motives could bethe weight of a co-operative tradition, which, in the caseof training and instruction in the area of diplomacy, inultimately genealogically ascends (as we had theopportunity to verify) to the Académie Politique of theMarquis de Torcy, born as a type of guild aprés la lettre in afully pre-revolutionary Ancien Régime86. On the surface, at least in the last few years, the FrenchState seems to have adopted a model similar to that whichwas installed as a norm in post-World War II Western Europeas a whole. An Institut Diplomatique was created – and thensignificantly restructured in 2001 – as an organic unit ofthe Quai d’Orsay. It organises training courses, during aperiod that is named “of internship”. It was placed in thedirect dependence of the Secretary General of the Ministry,that is, ‘the head of the bureaucratic machinery’. Itprivileges practical exercises, personal experiences, andinterventions of experts of the métier and of the milieu – andit does so since it is considered that training “more thanthe simple acquisition of knowledge” must have more as itsobjective the passing on of experience and experiences87.The course as usually organised is broken up into four

86 Shifting for a moment our attention to the specificities of Frenchforeign policy, it is perhaps worth stressing the role first CardinalRichelieu and then the much more recent the already quoted Talleyrandand General Charles de Gaulle had on the laying of its groundwork, soto speak. For the former, we still benefit a great deal from readingthe ‘classic’ Hilaire Belloc (2006, original edition 1929), Richelieu,Gates of Vienna Books, Norfolk, Virginia. For the latter’s impact onFrench external security politics, often a paradigmatic subset offoreign policy, see Philip H. Gordon (1993), A Certain Idea of France. FrenchSecurity Policy and the Gaullist Legacy, Princeton University Press.87http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/fr/ministere_817/emplo.../institut_diplomatique_7261.htm, consulted 06.07.2005.

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modules, only one of which is turned to “theory”. Theothers are eminently oriented towards “the practical”,highlighting topics such as the profession, the tools,practices and the action time of diplomacy, as well as aspecific European angle to which the French State is soobviously pledged. A relatively large (although variable) percentage of youngdiplomats who attend come out of the elite and powerfulÉcole Nationale d’Administration (ENA)88, an entity founded in194589. The truth is that in recruitment, much like intraining, a few distant echoes of the old French Académieof Torcy are perhaps apparent, only now dressed in newclothes90.

88 ENA was founded in October 1945, under the initiative of GeneralCharles de Gaulle, with the objective of shaping the higher cadres ofthe most central public administration sectors.89 The ENA also offers training for foreign diplomats, as a rule whatit calls “hauts fonctionnaires d'administrations étrangères”. In2008, for instance, at least seven short courses were in operation:namely, Tourisme et développement durable, Le protocolediplomatique, Le métier de diplomate, Gestion Internationale descrises : de la prévention au post-conflit, La protection des droitsde l'homme, Pratique de la négociation diplomatique, Les intégrationsrégionales en pratique. See details of this at ENA’s official sute athttp://www.ena.fr/index.php?page=formation/catalogue/ri. Clones ofENA are common throughout the Francophonie, from Africa to Québec,where the local ENA, true to its roots, entitles itself “the publicadministration university”.90 Although largely true, this sounds rather unfair, if we stick toits self-representations and pragmatic and legal-political raison d’être.The ENA holds a legal quasi-monopoly on the access to some of themost prestigious positions in the French civil service. The schoolwas created so as to ensure a more rational and democraticrecruitment of personnel for various bodies of high administration.By means of a meritocratic system based solely on academicproficiency and competitive examinations, the reasoning goes,recruitment for top State positions could be made more transparent,without suspicion of political or personal preferences. A historicalargument commonly used by énarques which much of French public opinionfinds harder and harder to buy into. As is well known, both JohnKenneth Glabraith and Pierre Bourdieu have written, rathercritically, about the domestic political impact of ENA.

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Keeping the economy of this study in mind, it is not worthit to get into too many details insofar as the evolution ofthe training which, in France, is aimed at the preparationof the diplomatic agents dedicated to the externalrepresentation of what the French State considers itscherished national interests. However, with the aim of, onthe one hand, making the continuities relative to Torcy’shistorical model evident and, on the other, showing theprinciple lines of force of teaching used in the Quaid’Orsay, a description of the composition of the teachingadministered to young French diplomats starting theircareer is surely called for. It should be noted that herethe only matter at issue is the teaching offered within theMinistry, given that the diplomats recruited through anadministrative mechanism of competition and according tothe specialisation mirrored in the categories of staff(Counsellor Corps, brought up mainly from ENA, and thelower-ranking Secretaries of Foreign Affairs Corps, comingfrom elsewhere)91: all other academic training, excellentas a rule, is as if disregarded – and in the French case,as I have had the occasion to underline, such distinctionsare crucial. The real training is considered as thatobtained in the Grandes Écoles and their rare equivalents:above all, we repeat, the ENA; but also, and increasingly,the Institut de Sciences Politiques. I would argue that such is only possible in atypical caseslike the French one, cases in which there is an enormous“umbilical” linking – as it might be called – between theteaching and training offered in a handful of elite publicinstitutions and the apparatus of the State. The contrast –partial but at any rate fairly well marked – what has beenthe general evolution that occurred in the majority ofother modern States is patent and bald-faced. It is notreally necessary to go very far to verify thisconclusively. The emphasis in traditional methods of

91 Note that the Counselors belong to “cadre d’Orient”, while theSecretaries can be placed in the same “cadre d’Orient” or in the “cadregénéral”. As in many other European cases, this terminology is a sortof ballast from the State’s diplomatic past.

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“initiatory induction” becomes immediately visible in thedefinition of the only objective of initial training of“lauréats catégorie A” (the diplomats): “[une] connaissance duMinistère et des métiers de la diplomatie”92; and no more. It would bedifficult to assert in a clearer manner, the focus placedby the French State on the pure and simple reproduction ofthe old practices endogenous to the Ministry. This is a recipe for growing inadequacy, of course, in anever-changing world. With this type of ritualizedreproduction carried out in the tradition of the venerableAcadémie Politique of old, efficiency is at a premium: it isonly possible when one assumes, as a starting point, anexcellent prior preparation of the recently recruited youngdiplomats and, at the finishing line, the intention toguarantee a mere continuity. In accordance with theanalytical efficacy model I put forward, it appearsinevitable, in any case, that the French State will finditself, in due time, in the contingency of having to carryout deep re-structuring in its training strategies ofdiplomats, and namely that of indexing their progression intheir careers, bringing it a little closer to the modernEuropean standard: the risk, should it not do so, is tocontinue losing the global role which it has been so eagerto try to maintain. It is not at all surprising that

92 All the data quoted here was supplied by the French State to theEuropean Commission, with a view to the publication, in 2004, of amanual entitled “Programmes de Formation des MAE de l’UE et de insitutions de l’UE”.For the “lauréats catégorie B” (limited to “diplomates ou personnel administratif,selon les fonctions”), like, therfore, those of “catégorie C” (or “personneladministratif”) also of highly significant form, the four centralfinalities which preside over the first formative steps: they arelisted as those of “acquérir une vision d’ensemble du Ministère desAffaires Etrangères; se familiariser avec les règles propres auMinistère; favoriser l’intégration des nouveaux lauréats dans leMinistère; [et la] mise à niveau (ou remise à niveau) de notionsindispensable (budget, droit, administration)”. While for beginningFrench staff of “category A”, the training lasts 2 months, for thoseof “category B” only 6 weeks, while, for those of “C” 3 weeks areapparently believed to be sufficient.

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“insufficiency” is the main critique levelled at the Frenchcase as far as diplomatic training is concerned93.The Swedish case contrasts strongly with the French. Thisis not particularly surprising, as both the Swedishadministrative structure and its foreign policy are verydifferent from the French ones. Swedish foreign policy hasfor quite a long time rested on the twin pillars ofavoiding constraining military alliances in peace-time andstaying neutral in times of war (although the Swedishdoctrine does explicitly permit “cooperation in response tothreats against peace and security”). Very worried with its domestic obligations, Sweden pays ahuge amount of close attention to foreign tradeopportunities and world economic cooperation. It also trieshard, and rather successfully, to use its nonalignment andits democratic credentials to enhance its internationalpolitical and trade status, as well as its internalaccountability94. In order to do so more effectively, itinvests rather heavily in diplomatic training both of itsown personnel and of nationals from other States.A brief peek renders this obvious. Apart from the very highquality of many Swedish Universities (Stockholm,Gothenburg, Uppsala, are all excellent institutions indomains such as Political Science, International Relations,

93 Such speculative doubts as to the sustainability of the Frenchmodel are not new: see, for example, Helena María Cosano Nuño, “Elmodelo de acceso a la carrera diplomática en Francia”, in M. C.Etchenique et al., op. .cit., p. 54.94 One paradigmatic example of such preoccupations, in the regularreports (they are locally called ‘Communications’) the SwedishGovernment presents to the national Parliament. The first of thesewas entitled Human Rights in Swedish Foreign Policy, and was produced in 1997;it was the first comprehensive presentation of the role of humanrights in Swedish foreign policy. As the follow-up Communication of2003 claims: “[t]he Communication describes the developments thathave taken place in the relevant areas and how Sweden has been ableto contribute in various ways to strengthening efforts to protecthuman rights in the world”; it is titled Government Communication2003/04:20.Human Rights in Swedish Foreign Policy, retrieved on 21.07.08, fromhttp://www.manskligarattigheter.gov.se/dynamaster/file_archive/040301/3e2f0d255a5e3a6938c1bc0678ff7d8e/s200304_20e.pdf.

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Law, and Economics) they usually graduate from – and whichguarantees a background training of sorts – Swedishdiplomats are subjected to an intensive course which isboth compulsory and full time lasting 9 months. The course,in the words of Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs,“provides the participants with a broad overview of allaspects of Swedish foreign policy. A variety of subjectsare covered (such as Foreign and Security Policy, Economy,Trade and Export Promotion, International Law and HumanRights, etc.) through lectures, seminars, workshops andvisits to various Swedish and international bodies, as wellas three periods of internship at the MFA, other governmentagencies and organisations” 95. This famous course isproudly entitled The Swedish Diplomatic Programme. It has aninternal organisation which tries to harmonise variedtheoretical and practical seminars96 with tasks carried outin some of the departments of the Ministry, and even insome of the Swedish representations abroad.The main Course is followed by numerous short courses ofmore specialised training, which are meant to be offeredbefore and straight after the first post and, later, byothers offered at various stages in the careers of manySwedish professional diplomats. A small country with fewerthan ten million inhabitants, Sweden appears to beunmistakably intent on using its diplomatic structures,which are well prepared and equipped, to try and assure abigger and more important presence for itself on the

95 Idem, op. cit., “Programmes de Formation des MAE de l’UE et institutions de l’UE”,in the section relevant to Sweden. See also Domenico Polloni, op. cit.,p. 20.96 These are some examples of its mostly “theoretic” nature: ForeignPolicy and Security; Questions of the European Union; Economy andCommerce outside Sweden; Human Rights and Democracy; InternationalCo-operation and Development; Cultural, Media and InformationQuestions; Juridical, Consular and Immigration Policy Questions;Workings of Public Administration; Questions of Protocol. There are,of course, others of a more practical nature: Writing Information andTelegrams; Techniques of International Negotiation; Relations withthe Media. Cf. Etchenique (2005), op. cit., Los processos de selección..., p.31.

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emerging global stage: and it certainly has so farsucceeded in doing so97. Staying within the general scope of member-States of theEuropean Union, it is especially interesting for us toreturn to examples of countries of the old “Eastern Europe”that were recently admitted into the Union and into theAtlantic Alliance. These are states that in the last decadeor so left the now extinct Soviet Bloc, with elites of anaverage to high level of education but very poor in theirown international influence, and with an understandableambition to gain it; if we overlook political realities onthe ground, abstract general conditions appear favourablefor a diligent training of new diplomats especially apt foreffective action on international stages which have beensubject to profound changes.For obvious reasons, we will first focus on two of theseStates, those that appear to us to be the most capable ofusing their recent integration into NATO and the EuropeanUnion to be able to make a leap to such understandableambitions: Poland and the Czech Republic. Although theydisplay a few striking similarities, these two examples aresomewhat different from one another, due not only to markeddissimilarities in their State traditions but also to theirdifferent scale. Notwithstanding that and given that my aimis to show how the pursuit of common strategic objectivesspells out the installation of new formal mechanisms ofteaching-learning of diplomats, we will deal with themtogether.

97 For an old but clear-sighted analysis of Sweden’s internationalstance, see Nils Andren (1968), “Power-Balance and Non-Alignment: APerspective on Swedish Foreign Policy”. International Affairs (Royal Institute ofInternational Affairs 1944-), vol. 44, no. 3: 518-519, For a Cold War-stylegeopolitical take, it is useful to read Ian Ronald Barnes (1974),“Swedish Foreign Policy. A Response to Geopolitical Factors”,Cooperation and Conflict, vol. 9, no. 1: 243-261. For a more recent study,mostly still ‘applicable’, see Ulf Bjerefeld (1995), “Sweden'sforeign policy after the end of the Cold War - from neutrality tofreedom of action"; in. (ed.) R. Lindahl and G. Sjöstedt, New Thinkingin International Relations. Swedish Perspectives, Utrikespolitiska Institutet,Stockholm.

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A rapid and succinct survey of the training required in theinitial phase of the career of Polish and Czech diplomatswill be enough. I begin with the Czech Republic which,following the demise of both the Communist regime and thepartition of the old Czechoslovakia, and accession intoNATO and the EU saw its Ministry of Foreign Affairs gothrough a much needed large-scale re-structuring98. Thisinvolved the transformation of the old type of diplomatictraining into newer and more adequate formats. This came tolight in the new Diplomatic Academy. The Czech Ministry isvery clear as to the administrative scope and mission ofits modern diplomatic training institution: “[t]heDiplomatic Academy – DA – trains the diplomatic staff ofthe Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs. This is arequirement for their career development. The DA plans,organizes, co-ordinates and evaluates education programs,co-operates with internal and external lecturers andinstructors and develops contacts with Czech and foreignpartners. The DA is a subdivision of the Ministry, withinthe section of the Minister of Foreign Affairs [that is,under His direct supervision and control; my comment]. The director of the Diplomatic Academy co-operates inshaping the education programs jointly with the Academic

98 For a very recent and fairly detailed study of the re-structuringof the Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs, see Roger Murphy (2008),“Czech Diplomacy: Challenges and Opportunities”, East European Politics &Societies; 22: 595-629. As Murphy underscores, “[l] Like all foreignministries, the MFA must adapt to the changing nature of diplomacy,where the distinction between foreign policy and domestic policy hasbecome increasingly blurred. The MFA must compete in a more crowdedforeign policy-making environment. However, the MFA has also beentransformed by the collapse of communism. The ministry has beenpurged and forced to re-evaluate its operations, goals, andinstitutional culture”; this is precisely what His article tries tofollow through. This follows a longer article by R. Murphy,“Diplomatic Adaptation in Post-Communist States” a paper prepared fordelivery at the 2006 Annual Meeting of the International StudiesAssociation, San Diego, March 22-25. This wider-ranging study isavailable for download at http://www.allacademic.com//meta/p_mla_apa_research_citation/0/9/7/9/7/pages97974/p97974-1.php, retrieved on20.07.08.

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Council. The members of the council are appointed by theMinister of Foreign Affairs”99. Historically, “The Diplomatic Academy of the MFA wasfounded in October 1997 as a result of an analysis of theeducational requirements of Czech diplomatic staff and acomparative study of the foreign education systems forcareer diplomats. This resulted in a “Basic draft of theeducation system of Czech career diplomats“. This project,prepared together with the Netherlands Institute ofInternational Relations in Clingendael and the DiplomaticAcademy Vienna was approved by the governing body of theMFA in December 1996. It was also supported by the EuropeanCommission Delegation. In 1997 and 1998 the establishmentof the DA was financed through a PHARE contract togetherwith the Finish Institute for the Civil Service. Thefinancial support included the costs of the foreign andCzech experts, hardware and supplementation of theInstitute of International Relations library. Since 1999the DA is fully financed from the budget of the MFA. 1.1.2007 the DA became a part of the MFA and the staff andparticipants of DA 1 are now employees of the MFA. Thegraduates of the DA receive a General Diplomatic EducationCertificate, which is a qualification requirement for adiplomatic career and progress to higher diplomatic

99From http://www.mzv.cz/wwwo/MZV/default.asp?id=10399&ido=8352&idj=2&amb=1, retrieved on 20.07.08. The creation ofthe new training Academy for diplomats was largely driven by OttoPick, a notable refugee from the sequence of totalitarian politicalregimes that afflicted his native Czechoslovakia, a man how went toOxford and the London School of Economics, enrolled in the BritishForeign Office, worked in the State Department with Henry Kissinger,a former First Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of the CzechRepublic, Ambassador at Large for the Czech Republic, then aProfessor of Political Science at Charles University in Prague and atthe Czech Military Academy in Brno, still Chairman of the DiplomaticAcademy’s Academic Council. Although it is too early to assert itwith certainty, it appears the new Academy tends to be led bypersonalities, like its Founding Father, with a dual academic anddiplomatic background.

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education which is required for promotion to higherdiplomatic positions”100.The recently recruited diplomats in the Ministry aresupplied with a “theoretical part of the course for newlyrecruited diplomats who successfully passed exams of therecruiting contest which is held by the Ministry of ForeignAffairs every year. [The] course develops the diplomaticskills (negotiation, presentation, etiquette) and furtherdevelops knowledge in the subjects important for diplomaticcareer (international relations, international law,economics etc.)”101. This course, defined by the Czechauthorities as “theoretical”, has the duration of 5 months,and is compulsory and full time; it is a demanding andextremely intensive course which envisages a generalimprovement visible in the quality of trainees who undergoit. I shall return to the Czech – and the Polish – case infurther (and rather different) detail in my Annex.Matching this, in Poland, post-Communist young Polishdiplomats who enter the Ministry of Foreign Affairs aresubmitted to local intensive and formal training courses,which are full time affairs that last for a period of 6months (a recent lengthening, started not long ago, theduration was only 10 weeks102), in entirely academicsubjects: “international relations - history and theory;economy; European integration (history, European law,economic integration); International security (legalframework, institutions, proliferation, terrorism);globalization; international organisations and Polishmultilateral diplomacy; the history of Polish diplomacy;Polish bilateral relations; International law theory”. Thistraining is complemented by theory modules, but these lastones have an applied nature: “consular service; diplomaticprotocol and correspondence; negotiations and public

100 Idem.101 Idem,, op. cit., “Programmes de Formation des MAE de l’UE et institutions de l’UE”,in the section relevant to the Czech Republic.102 Personal communication received in Warsaw, 17th November 2005,from the then new Director of the Polish Diplomatic Academy.

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relations” 103. Finally, the Poles add to their training ofdiplomats a fundamental theoretical-practical level. Likein the Czech case, the Polish “theoretic” training isconducted, for the most part, by academics from theNational Academy of Sciences: in both in both casesentities tributary to earlier State models and whichsurvived their demise; to these are added, today,University professors from the many public and privateUniversities in existence in the two countries. In both cases, Polish and Czech, it is highly academically-trained diplomatic staff (many of them with doctorates) whoare responsible for the more professional training carriedout in order to try to improve – both directly andindirectly – on what is often a not-so-simple post-communist ministerial integration104. In the Polish case,the intensive full time six months that the young Attachésspend in the Diplomatic Academy straight after they passthe exam to enter their Ministry, are followed by anotherhalf year of placement “in central Ministerial services”105,deemed essential for them to receive some supplementary onthe job training. “If and when there is availablefinancing” the final third of the eighteen months, the lastsegment of the interval between entrance and confirmation,are used for the placement of young Attachés in postsabroad, in “a regime of experimental internship” – they aresent, as a rule, to Embassies and Consulates in othermember-States of the European Union, the main Polishpriority.

103 Idem, op. cit., “Programmes de Formation des MAE de l’UE et institutions de l’UE”,in the section relevant to Poland.104 There are few academic studies on the changing landscapes ofPolish foreign policy, although this promises to become a boomingindustry. For all, see the splendid Wladyslaw Bartoszewski, BronislawGeremek, Stefan Meller, Dariusz Rosati, Jacek Saryusz-Wolski,Aleksander Smola et al.(2006), Continuity and Change in Polish Foreign Policy,Stefan Batory Foundation, Warsaw; and that of Kerry Longhurst andMarcin Zaborowski (2007), A New Atlanticist: Poland's Foreign and Security PolicyPriorities, Blackwells/Chatham House, Oxford.105 Idem, personal communication.

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Another interesting example is that of Estonia — and it isnot too different a case from those of the “Eastern”countries which we have already looked at. Just like in myprevious examples, we will limit ourselves to traininggiven to Estonian diplomats at the beginning of theircareer. The preparatory entry course offered in theEstonian Ministry includes academic subjects, which are, inmany cases, taught by “in house” staff: “how EstonianForeign Service works; priorities of Estonian ForeignPolicy; international organizations and Estonia’s role inthem; Estonia and EU; security policy, NATO; bi- andmultilateral relations; trade policy, foreign economicrelations; international law; consular affairs”. It alsoincludes training more directly aimed at internal life ofthe Ministry and at its institutional relations with theexternal (both national and international): sessionsconcerning “protocol and etiquette; negotiation training”are therefore offered. The similarities with the Polishcase are very easy to see, as are also the examples of thetwo other Baltic States, Lithuania and Latvia. In the firstcase, the recently recruited Latvian diplomats receive twoseries of classes: one composed of 32 sessions, the otherof 33. In the second, the young Lithuanian diplomats aresubjected to an intensive course of 2 months full time,with classes in areas so varied as “public administration,constitutional law, international law, internationalorganizations, international economics, strategic planning,etc. Specialized courses cover international relations,diplomacy, diplomatic protocol, professional skills,psychological training, etc.”. The Lithuanian Ministry ofForeign Affairs specified unambiguously that in thesecourses “lecturers are university professors and Ministryofficials” [sic].What is perhaps more interesting in the Estonian case isthe composition of the group of students who attend thesecourses, which have a stipulated duration of “92 academichours”106: On the one hand, we are faced with “a 2 month

106 “Academic hours”, in the traditional European model, correspond toone hour and a quarter, or to an hour and a half, of “clock time”.

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compulsory course” as far as the young diplomats who haverecently joined the new Estonian professional career areconcerned. However, on the other hand, the course is open:“non-diplomatic staff can join on a voluntary basis”. Afterthis course two other courses follow on the young Estoniandiplomats’ professional route. Immediately before theirfirst posting, a second one with the duration of “24academic hours” takes place. And a third course,complementary to the earlier two and with a strong locallanguage emphasis, is given once they are already posted,with the duration of “50 academic hours”. The Estonianeffort to obtain a stronger European and world influence bycutting ties with a Soviet model that had, for half acentury, been imposed on them, is palpable. Visible too istheir wager on a full-fledged intensive training model witha strong academic component to it. As pointed out, the samemay be said for the other two Baltic Republics.Let us now turn briefly to the Russian example. The oldtraining model used in Russia was defined at the heart ofthe Diplomatic Academy of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs ofthe Soviet Union, at the time the most important trainingand research institute in this strategically essentialdomain. From its inception, it was an entity which grantedUniversity degrees, Masters and Doctorates in InternationalRelations and International Economics. Its progression is edifying. Founded in 1934, under Stalin,but with antennas spread over all the USSR, the MuscoviteAcademy suffered successive reform – the last was dated1974, during the Brejnev era – and had an important role inthe formatting of generations of both Soviet diplomats andtheir future colleagues from countries under Sovietinfluence; its substitution was only accomplished after theimplosion which occurred at the beginning of the 90’s. Inits wake, a Diplomatic Academy of the Russian Federation’s Ministryof Foreign Affairs was created, and came to take its place.Its aims were training, revision and specialisation ofstaff from Russian local and federal government, those“lateral equivalents” coming from the Community of

Curiously, in Russia, it appears to correspond to only 45 minutes.115

Independent States [CIS] and from other countries’governments, particularly those with which it hadmaintained closer relations — namely, in the earlier post-communist years some of Central and Eastern Europe, andlater still Vietnam, North Korea, Cuba and Mongolia; in apattern common to good schools operating in prominentStates, politicians and businessmen flowed in, as well,mostly from the same domestic and foreign sources. Such cross-fertilisation induced some homogeneity acrossthe regional board, of course; for a little while,throughout this informal linkage, the Russian model wasrather influential in this group of States. The Sovietparadigm was as follows: to enter a diplomatic career –which was really only possible, at least for beginners,with a degree given by the Academy – there was an initialtraining course. As was the case for France and GreatBritain (and, we shall see, the United States) thisfunctioned as a sort of pre-selection filter, in a countrywhich can boast such remarkable institutions of higherlearning as MGIMO and IMEMO, or the State Universities ofSt. Petersburg and Moscow – and in each cohort of young‘cadets’ entering the Ministry the percentage of graduatescoming form these Colleges was almost always significant.The often superb Soviet diplomacy attested to the relativesuccess of this composite method of training – an efficacywhich was, paradoxically, if not totally neutralized, asleast quite often subjected to meritocratic distortionswhich resulted from political interferences in theselections processes carried out.With some adaptations, this general template is stillfollowed in the new Academy of the Russian Federation; now asbefore, the initial academic course has a continuation, amore advanced phase of training actually, in short coursesorganized for Ambassadors, Ministers-Counsellors, andGeneral Consuls. The areas of research and publications arein the hands of the Institute of Contemporary International Studies107.True to tradition, the teaching corps is mainly made up of

107 http://www.dipacademy.ru/english/index.shtml (retrieved on19.05.08) and Domenico Polloni (1996), op. cit., p. 32.

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academics, both professors and researchers; some of themore pre-eminent politicians and diplomats are also invitedto give lectures and conferences to the trainees. Manydiplomatic trainees from CIS and other ‘friendly’ Statesattend108. It is difficult to determine to what point allthis has residual political-ideological connotations, orare simply the mechanical result of institutional inertia,a sort of default setting of sender States prone to thatkind of malaise. The focuses of the training nowadaysoffered, nevertheless, are somewhat changed.Against what background does which all this becomes moreintelligible? It is easy to retrieve The foreign policy concept ofthe Russian Federation, a document approved by the thenPresident of the Russian Federation, Vladimir Putin, onJune 28, 2000109. It is not surprising that, from its veryoutset, this document claimed that “[t]he internationalsituation that has taken shape by the beginning of the XXIcentury has required reevaluation of the overall situationaround the Russian Federation, of the priorities of Russianforeign policy and the possibilities of ensuring it withresources. Along with certain strengthening of theinternational positions of the Russian Federation, negativetendencies are in evidence as well. Certain plans relatedto establishing new, equitable and mutually advantageouspartnership relations of Russia with the rest of the world,as was assumed in the Basic principles of the foreignpolicy concept of the Russian Federation, endorsed byDirective No. 284-rp of the President of the RussianFederation on April 23, 1993, and in other documents havenot been justified”. Something was bound to change, and itsurely did.

108 The already cited diplomat, Domenico Polloni (1996), op. .cit., p.32, commented, to this very purpose, and in allusion to the Russianmodel: “the process whereby new diplomatic officials are actuallyselected for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs today is not verytransparent, as may easily be imagined”. The extension ofapplicability of this statement of D. Polloni is not obvious. 109 At http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/russia/doctrine/econcept.htm(consulted on 19.07.08).

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The change of guard, to the extent there was one, therapidly mounting oil prices which could not but enrichenergy-producing States, and growing international disputesthat put Russian interests at odds with European and North-American ones, accelerated the process: on July 15, 2008,almost precisely eight years (or two full Presidentialmandates) after its last version, the new RussianFederation President, Dmitry Medvedev, ratified a newforeign policy paper on the general direction of thecountry's diplomatic efforts, as well as its relations withthe United States, Europe and NATO. Sooner or later, thisis bound to have an impact on training. I repeat, my aimwith these digressions is by no means to just offer data onforeign policy, but rather to throw some light on theevolution of training via that obviously crucial context.So what should we actually gather from this rather amplecontextualization110? Regionally as well as locally, as maybe seen, an effort of aggiornamento appears to stand out; butit has not really led to the automatic disappearance of the“hegemonic Russian predisposition” (or, in any case,locally dominance) over certain States of the previous USSRas well as many the few socialist regimes which survivedthe Cold War. As may be gathered from, on the one hand, thevery high quality of recruiting grounds for futurediplomats but, on the other, from the vagaries of the lasttwo decades or Russian foreign policy, it would be wellnigh impossible for sustained mechanisms of good diplomatictraining to produce continuously good results. To quotefrom its official site: “[the Academy is housed in anancient four-storied building, a 19-th [sic] centuryarchitectural monument, has three computer classes, 60classrooms, two conference halls, 100 and 60 seats, as well

110 It would be nonsensical to try and summarize the virtuallylimitless bibliography on past and present Russian foreign policy.Three books relating to different periods of its progression willsuffice: Gabriel Gorodetsky (2003), Russia between East and West: RussianForeign Policy on the Threshold of the Twenty-First Century , Frank Cass; LeszekBuszynski (1996), Russian Foreign Policy after the Cold War, Praeger,; andNicole J. Jackson (2003), Russian Foreign Policy and the Cis: Theories, Debates andActions, Routledge.

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as two lecture auditoriums, 60 seats each, thus providingfor the study of 1400 trainees. The educational processmakes use of modern equipment and information technologies.The Academy has four local computer networks and Internetaccess. The department of technical aids for education isequipped with modern appliances: "congress-system"(synchronous interpretation in three languages), satellitetelevision (32 TV channels of various countries), cassetteand video recorders, 26 video classes, sound recordingstudio, sound amplifiers and copiers”. An interesting, ifrather quaint, description of an institution with a great –and surely, as yet, not totally realized – potential.But let us move on. Keeping our attention on non-EuropeanCommunity Europe, we now may briefly look, first, at theNorwegian case, with its plethora of satelliteorganisations such as NUPI (the Norwegian Institute of InternationalAffairs, which hosts an important department of theInternational Policy), ARENA (the Centre for European Studies,University of Oslo) and NORAD (the Norwegian Agency forDevelopment Co-operation – an entity, which, among its otherattributions, has the role of giving “professional in thefield advice” to the many national Royal Embassies. Thediplomatic training area is, nevertheless, contemplated inthe central governing structure of the MFA, in theNorwegian Foreign Service Institute (NFSI), an entity whichorganises and offers highly specialised courses in tightcollaboration with the formerly mentioned NORAD – thesecourses are supported by a permanent team of academics whokeep them zealously up to date – so they may be able tosupply Norwegian diplomats with instruments which willallow them to carry out their functions in more precise andefficient manners.In any case, and in order to assure a suitable enrichmentof training without fattening too much, the NSFI formspartnerships with other institutions, be they public andprivate, national and foreign; as a rule, of course, theseare entities whose contribution is considerably highlyvaluable, be it in the first cycle (3 intensive years,partly practical, but in essence theoretical) or in the

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second cycle, which, naturally, above all dives into morespecialised areas. A good example of the complementaritiesachieved is the outsourcing to particular academicinstitutes for very specific topics, can be seen in theattribution, to the Chr. Michelsen Institutet, in Bergen, of thetraining and research on current topics such as“corruption” or “failed States” – the teaching of thesetopics being as problematic as the subject they cover.These courses are aimed not only at Norwegian diplomaticstaff, but also to all agents and civil servants andprivate entities of both Norway and friendly countries whomaintain relations abroad111.

111 Many other examples could be added, but so not to overload thetext and not to render it top-heavy with insignificant specifics, Iopted to put them into footnotes. Let me begin with some Europeanexamples. Croatia also has a Diplomatic Academy whose essentialfunctions are “diplomatic training, publication of relevant editions,research of foreign policy affairs, and co-operation with likeinstitutions”. In Denmark, on the other hand, the entity who recruitsand trains diplomats is a simple department of the Ministry ofForeign Affairs, and it does so by “taking into account the needs ofeach service in revision and improving knowledge”. All recentlyrecruited Danish diplomats have to go through a special period of 3years during which they must combine their work in two departments (ayear and half in both) with the attending of “theory classes” whichinclude the workings of the Ministry, and the rest of Danish publicadministration, languages, and diplomatic practice (see Etchenique,2005, op.cit., “Los procesos de selección...”, p. 43 and Polloni,op.cit., p. 21). Greece only formed its Diplomatic Academy in 1998,within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs; it is an institution whosefundamental mission is the initial and continuing professionaltraining of all the Greek Foreign Ministry staff (including,therefore, non-diplomats as well); the Greek Institute intervenes inthe promotion within the career, centered in the – held as crucial –transitional phases of involved in the passage of young FirstSecretaries to Counsellors and then to Ambassadors, consultedon19.05.08 athttp://www.mfa.gr/www.mfa.gr/en-US/The+Ministry/Structure/Diplomatic+Academy/Objectives/. Malta, as has already been noted, hosts theMediterranean Academy of Diplomatic Studies associated with theUniversity of Malta, in partnership with the Institut d’Etudes Internationalesin Genebra. As an essentially academic entity, the Maltese Academyoffers the degree of Master in Diplomacy (M.Dip.) and that of Masterof Arts in Diplomatic Studies (M.A.) – as well as a certificate and

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It is surely not necessary to underline the fact thatNorwegian diplomatic training follows a modern mixed model– one which has been gaining so much importance in theEuropean Ministries dedicated to amplifying nationalinfluence on international stages; and Norway, a smallcountry with a few more than four million inhabitants, hassurely come to achieve this amplification – thus punchingabove its weight, as it were – in a rather enviable manner.In order to achieve that, to be sure, more than justtraining was needed: punching above its weight demandedfirm and well-aimed public diplomacy moves. In the firstcouple of years of the 21st Century the Norwegian State didjust that. Josef Bátora, in an already cited articlepointed out in great detail how, in the early 2000’s, theNorwegian authorities decided that Norway’s main problemwas one of “invisibility” and decided to do something aboutit: “[t]o solve this problem, the Norwegian foreignministry had contracted the London based Foreign PolicyCentre (FPC) to develop a public diplomacy strategy forNorway. In 2002 and 2003, a number of seminars were held inOslo attended by FPC, representatives of the Norwegianforeign ministry, and a number of stakeholders ranging fromother governmental agencies, NGO activists, academics,journalists and business-people in order to identify sharedimages and value-platforms around which Norway’s imagecould be developed. These meetings had the character ofdiscussions behind closed doors where only a selected fewinfluential opinion-makers would participate. The resultwas a strategic report presented to the Norwegian public inJune 2003 and identifying four shared image- and value-platforms (or ‘stories’ to use the terminology of thereport) around which coherence in presenting Norway to theworld should be built: a humanitarian superpower; a peacemaker;a society living with nature; a society with a high level ofequality; and an internationalist society; and a society with aspirit of adventure”112. Things largely worked out as expected.

diploma in Diplomatic Studies for part time courses, held throughoutthe period of one or two years.

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Given rather similar political-administrative structuresand a somewhat parallel bi- and multilateral stance vis à visthe international system, Norway, like Sweden, is supremelyconcerned, in its foreign policy, with projecting adomestic and external image of democratic accountability.It makes a point of doing so loud and clear, as this publicdiplomatic mechanism channels a large fraction of the softpower which allows it to bat above its weight. Like theirSwedish counterparts (and to some extent their Dutch – andCanadian – colleagues), it thus becomes imperative for theNorwegian to instruct its diplomats on how to carry thisout both systematically and effectively. Here is anothergood topic for an eventual academic study.

3.2. The varied landscapes of the Americas Sticking to many of the same descriptive-analytic criterialet us now move to another continental area, the Americas.A good example to start our cursory scrutiny – although itis an example in many ways atypical, even if in nothingelse than its scale – is that of the United States ofAmerica113. The USA can boast of a deeply academic traditionin the field of diplomatic training: to go for just oneexample among many, North-Americans created, in 1919, atthe Georgetown University and not too far from Washington,the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service. Its founder, who lent112 Josef Bátora (2005), op. cit; 11. The report was published as M.Leonard and A. Small (2003), Norwegian Public Diplomacy, The ForeignPolicy Centre, London.113 For a classical and masterful analysis of the two decades of deepinstitutional transformations which leaned on internal rational-bureaucratic planes, jurisdictional protection of areas of influencewithin the old Foreign Service, and economic and trade inducementsabroad – namely the expansion of US exports – see the already citedRichard Hume Werking (1977), The Master Architects: Building the United StatesForeign Service 1890-1913, University Press of Kentucky, Lexington. Anintricately argued and data-rich study on the interplay of what Icall ‘constraints’, it allows for wonderful comparisons of the North-American case with the British and French ones; or, for that matter,the Egyptian, Japanese, and Indian examples I touch upon below.

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his name to the school, was a Jesuit priest who guided hiscourses with the aim of preparing professionals to act ininternational relations from an intercultural perspective;it is surely fair to say that, throughout its many changesand various spurts of often explosive growth, Georgetownhas never abandoned this genetic imprint. Nowadays, the School offers study programs at first degreeand postgraduate levels, and it receives students from morethan seventy different countries, giving them opportunities"to think about, analyze, and act in the world of thetwenty-first century with imagination, good judgment, andcompassion"114. As is often the case with AmericanUniversities, it is useful to quote its UndergraduateBulletin: “The School of Foreign Service was founded in1919 as a direct response to the involvement of the UnitedStates in the First World War. "Having entered upon thestage of world politics and world commerce, we assumeworld-wide obligations. Our viewpoint can never be the sameagain," wrote the Rev. Edmund A. Walsh, S.J., the School'sfirst Dean. Five years before the diplomatic corps of theUnited States was reorganized and named the ForeignService, Georgetown created a program dedicated toeducating students on global issues and preparing them forlives of service in the international arena. This missionreflected both the University's Jesuit heritage, with itsemphasis on intercultural understanding, and its origins asan institution of the American Enlightenment, dedicated tothe rights of man and the education of citizens. Today the undergraduate program of the School of ForeignService offers about 1,450 students a liberal artseducation that stresses multidisciplinary studies in aglobal context. Students devote much of the first two yearsto a Core Curriculum that provides the essentials of aliberal education and a foundation for further intellectualdevelopment. Some elements of the Core are shared withGeorgetown College and some are unique to the School ofForeign Service. During their sophomore year, studentschoose from one of seven majors focused on global issues.114 http://sfs.georgetown.edu/, consulted 19.05.2008.

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Although the majors are rooted in particular disciplines,each incorporates intellectual perspectives from severalfields. For example, the program in Science, Technology,and International Affairs (the only multi- andinterdisciplinary science studies major at Georgetown)combines course work in the biological and physicalsciences, geography, bioethics and other areas of thephilosophy and history of science, government, economics,and policy studies. This dual emphasis on internationalscope and multidisciplinary approaches distinguishes thecurriculum of the School of Foreign Service from that ofother liberal arts programs, including that of GeorgetownCollege” In the Americas, though, the first institution to award anacademic degree on matters pertaining to internationaldomains was the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, at TuftsUniversity, founded in 1933115. Like the many institutionswhich followed on its footsteps, its aim was to traindiplomatic and other agents in their relations with a worldthat was fast becoming a political and economic areas of anever more patent American growing affirmation on theinternational scene116. The founder, Austin Barklay115 http://fletcher.tufts.edu/about/history, consulted 19.05.2008.116 It would be spurious to attempt here a listing of relevant studieson the historical background to changes on the global scope of USforeign policy. For one of the multitude of studies of US foreignpolicy and its avatars at this level, see Robert Kagan (2006),Dangerous Nation, Alfred A. Knopf. Kagan focuses, mostly, on the late19th and the early 20th Centuries; most interestingly, hedeconstructs the traditional wisdom according to which Americanforeign policy would oscillate between isolationist, unilateralist,and alliance engagements, claiming, instead, the US has alwaysbehaved in terms of an aggressively interventionist mode. For a focuswhich details the 20th Century, Henry Kissinger (1994), Diplomacy,Simon & Schuster is still invaluable. For what amounts to an update,engaged in avant la lettre, of R. Kagan’s reading of Americaninternational roles, albeit from a slightly different angle, it isuseful to read Niall Ferguson on what he calls “the American Empire”,while suggesting we would better do away with the concept of‘hegemony’. His points were taken again and again in various fora,namely in Niall Ferguson (2003), "Hegemony or Empire?", ForeignAffairs:154-161, a piece originally meant as a fairly lengthy book

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Fletcher, had in mind “a school to prepare men for thediplomatic service and to teach such matters as come withinthe scope of foreign relations [which] embraces within itas a fundamental a thorough knowledge of the principles ofinternational law upon which diplomacy is founded, althoughthe profession of a diplomat carries with it also aknowledge of many things of a geographic and economicnature which affect relations between nations”117.At a macro level, the United States shares, with the UnitedKingdom and France (and, to some extent, as pointed out,with Russia), the advantages of benefiting from a superbnetwork of first class universities, from which the StateDepartment preferentially picks its diplomats. Contrary toFrance and Great Britain, nevertheless, the Administrationdoes not do so by design, but via a more open and blindmeritocratic mechanism of selection that substantiallywiden the social and educational basis of recruitment. Thisdoes not mean, however, that some socio-cultural and evenpolitical elites are favoured by the American system ofselection and accession of diplomats, as many Ambassadorsare indeed, as is well known, appointed to their posts bythe incumbent Administration. But it does push ‘freedom’upwards, while allowing for a fuller professionalization ofthe low and medium levels of diplomatic hierarchy. As the French and British (and, as we shall see, theRussians, for that matter) American diplomats often developa high degree of regional and functional specialization –for political, linguistic and cultural reasons, or giventheir chosen domains of expertise, as agents of greatpowers they tend to circulate among ‘families’ of foreignposts, rather than according to the more random patterncommon in small or medium-sized States. As in the Germancase, this cannot, of course, but spell a deeper degree ofprofessionalization by the way of a more complex divisionof labour. Also, as their careers progress, many diplomats

review.117 Cf. Russell E. Miller, Light on the Hill: A History of Tufts College 1852-1952,Boston: Beacon Press, 1966, p. 571. At least in some countries theera of modern training really has arrived early.

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find themselves developing closer ties to Defence, Tradeand Industry, or other major governmental entities, andtheir career choices and appointments understandably notseldom grow to increasingly reflect that. Again in commonwith most of the more active powerful States, US diplomatsincreasingly interface with many of the copious think-tankswhich, in the country, have carved for themselves averitable foreign affairs industry that nowadays theAmerican State Department could hardly do without. Allthese connections favour, as a matter of course, a greatdeal of informal (and often) formal training from which USdiplomats can benefit. The likes of Tufts and Georgetown and the splendid Americanprivate and public university system and its numerousthink-tanks are not, by any means, all. Inside the North-American State Department itself, there is a gargantuanForeign Service Institute, whose headquarters are located in theNational Foreign Affairs Training Centre. This is a very well reputedinstitution that it has been growing rapidly since 1993.Today, “[t]he Foreign Service Institute (FSI) is theFederal Government's primary training institution forofficers and support personnel of the U.S. foreign affairscommunity, preparing American diplomats and otherprofessionals to advance U.S. foreign affairs interestsoverseas and in Washington. At the George P. ShultzNational Foreign Affairs Training Centre, the FSI providesmore than 450 courses -- including some 70 foreignlanguages -- to more than 50,000 enrolees a year from theState Department and more than 40 other government agenciesand the military service branches”118. As John Negroponte

118 Retrieved on 19.07.08, from http://www.state.gov/m/fsi/. To quotefurther from this official site: “[t]he Institute's programs includetraining for the professional development of Foreign Serviceadministrative, consular, economic/commercial, political, and publicdiplomacy officers; for specialists in the fields of informationmanagement, office management, security, and medical practitionersand nurses; for Foreign Service Nationals who work at U.S. postsaround the world; and for Civil Service employees of the StateDepartment and other agencies. Ranging in length from a half-day to 2years, courses are designed to promote successful performance in each

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affirmed in a 2007 celebratory 60th anniversary speech,“[t]he Foreign Service Institute (FSI) is, after all,nothing less than the portal to American diplomacy. This iswhere our professionals first enter the ranks of theforeign service and the Department of State (DOS), and thisis where they update and strengthen their diplomatic skillsas their careers advance ahead of the curve, and keep inmind that the men and women we bring into America's serviceare its greatest strength”119 [the emphasis is my own].How is this ‘portal’ organized? The mammoth Foreign ServiceInstitute (FDI) houses a school of general and languages120,bestows specialized and more specifically directed training(mainly in the field of Protocol), and is oriented to thefuture work on executive functions of other agents of theAdministration – experts such as, for instance, militarydiplomats, intelligence experts, aid workers, etc..Oftentimes, the Institute establishes partnerships withprivate organizations such as the well-known Association forDiplomatic Studies and Training. The intensity of functionalspecialization of the FDI is clearly visible in the varietyof courses offered, the majority of them of academic nature– although possessing a remarkable practical component,

professional assignment, to ease the adjustment to other countriesand cultures, and to enhance the leadership and managementcapabilities of the U.S. foreign affairs community. Other courses andservices help family members prepare for the demands of a mobilelifestyle and living abroad”. It is difficult to compare the FSI toits lateral equivalents abroad, given its unparalleled scale andscopes.119 John D. Negroponte (2007), “Celebrating the 60th anniversary ofthe Foreign Service Institute”, unpublished remarks presented to theForeign Service Institute, Washington, D.C., May 21, 2007.120 As English becomes the international language of choice, the FSIhas been reducing the number of foreign (and often exotic) languagestaught. Will this ‘compression’ continue? It might well still reverseits course. The eventual decline of Western dominance in worldaffairs has, as is well known, been prophesized in many quarters. Tolist just two of these: Charles Kupchan (2003), “The Rise of Europe,America’s Changing Internationalism, and the End of U.S. Primacy”,Political Science Quarterly 118 (2), 206-231 and, with a much wider angle,Niall Ferguson (2006), The War of the World, Twentieth-Century Conflict and theDescent of the West, The Penguin Press.

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which includes seminars on the structures and tasks of theDepartment of State, on consular and diplomatic services,on communication techniques, or on international affairs,and which often associates to some of these field trips tonumerous institutions and simulation exercises121. It islikely American international obligations will increase inyears to come, thus surely also its efforts to train agents(diplomatic and other ones) in international matters of allkinds122. Let us move south now, to Latin America, a region of mostlySpanish and Portuguese influence where diplomatic careers,in the traditional view of analysts, tend not to beparticularly competitive: that, it was often claimed, wastrue to the extent that, in many cases, it was deemed to bestrictly related to "a rational either strongly oligarchicand endogamic, or markedly political"123. In good truth,

121 Domenico Polloni (1996), op cit., pp. 26-27. In Canada there isthe Foreign Service Development Program, a broad course of theory-practical training, part of which is run by the Canadian ForeignService Institute, it lasts 5 years. This including placement on postor in a central administrative institution, through which staff ofthe Foreign Service are formed. In the University world, the NormanPaterson School of International Affairs, in Ottawa, occupies aposition of importance, which has, since 1965, haled an importantrole in diplomatic research and training.122 Although it is, of course, impossible to predict the future, for avery educated guess as to what is held in reserve for the US, itwould probably be a mistake not to read the already cited PhilipBobbitt (2008), Terror and Consent. The Wars for the Twenty-First Century, AlfredA. Knopf. This very rich and wide-scope monograph received a grandeulogy in, for example, Niall Ferguson (2008), ‘“War Plans”, a reviewof Philip Bobitts’s Terror and Consent’, The New York Times, 13th April.123 D. Polloni (1996), idem. This is a rather tendentious way ofmixing and trying to attribute homogeneous contours to a combinationof situations which are, in actual fact, very different from oneanother. These old traits are, moreover, the object of moderatelysuccessful recent attempts at change, through pressures for an evergreater systematic “professionalization” by means of the impositionof principles and rules of “anonymity” and “objectivisation” on themodalities for the contracting-recruiting of diplomats and, in manycountries of the region, by means of attempts at containing“political” nominations through a restrictive system of quotas.Generalizing somewhat, Domenico Polloni, op. cit., p. 33, summarizes

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however, an image such as this one does not anymore bearthat close a correspondence to facts on the ground.Notwithstanding the influence of traditionalism inrecruitment criteria — which just reinforces the need forquality training — a trend of change is actually takingplace, one for which Brazil appears to be the most eloquentand refreshing example. Against such defeatist readings,and again with no intention of being exhaustive I shallbriefly look now at some of these Latin American countries.Chile has an Academia Diplomatica called “Andres Bello”124, anintegral part of The Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores125. It wasfounded in 1954 with the purpose of selecting, training andspecialising Chilean diplomats. According to AmbassadorRolando Stein, the former Director of the Chilean Institute(this was confirmed to me by the current one, Pedro Barros), the initial training of young diplomats of his countryincludes “un curso de formación que dura 18 meses –distribuidos en cuatrimestres – y contempla aproximadamente60 materias, muy vinculadas a la agenda internacional.[This course includes] nociones elementales de DerechoInternacional Publico, Relaciones Internacionales y

the situation thus: “(...) the main features of the Latin Americansystem are the absence or rarity of any competitions for a diplomaticcareer, the selection of future diplomatic staff from among graduatesof the Diplomatic Academy, the fact that the tests for admission tothe Diplomatic Academy are based primarily on academic criteria andnot on aptitude, a “traditional” humanistic notion of the diplomatand a sound knowledge of foreign languages”. Careful observationshows obvious differences between Central and South America, andagain between both and the Caribbean – each one of these sub-regionalgroupings not really being, in any case, entirely homogeneous. Evenif we accept a heavy dose of “political monotony”, it should be notedthat Brazil and Chile are perhaps among the best examples anywhere ofefforts at “modernization” and “rationalization” – even if comparedto Europe or North America.124 Andres Bello was an eighteen hundreds academic. One of hiscontributions towards education was the creation of the Universidadde Chile (University of Chile) in 1842, where he was the chancellorfor over 20 years, until 1865. Bello was a regular diplomatic envoyof Simon Bolivar. He was posted in London, Paris and Brussels.125 See, for further details, www.minrel.cl, the official Chilean MFAsite.

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Economia para nivelar los conocimientos de alumnos queprovienen de diversas carreras universitarias (últimamentehan sido seleccionado periodistas, un arquitecto, uningeniero electronico e historiadores, ademas de abogados yeconomistas. [...] Cuando se graduan después de 18 mesesreciben su Maestria en Diplomacia y luego desarrollan unapractica de dos anos antes de salir al exterior en suprimera destinacion” 126.The Academy has organized international courses since 1977,including the training of young diplomats from “friendlycountries”, its students originating especially fromSpanish-speaking America. The Curso Internacional en Diplomacia –without the shadow of a doubt the most important of all –gives special emphasis to Latin American affairs, havingreceived students from 48 countries. The objectives itdefined privilege a multidisciplinary focus, aspecialisation in regional affairs (in this case, aboveall, Latin American ones), knowledge of specifics ofinternational policy from the Latin American point of view,the deepening of contact with other diplomats, and a widerand deeper knowledge of Chilean reality.In both cases, the teaching of classes is assured by“diplomats and university professors”. The first of thesetwo courses is that which interests us most here. Theinitial training program for young Attachés runs, as we saw,for two quadrimestres, in the first of which the Academygives greater emphasis to general topics, while in thesecond it concentrates more on regional questions.Simultaneously, a variable number (but always a greatnumber) of seminars or short courses on different subjectmatters take place in the Chilean Academy whose emphasestend to be, in essence, academic127. While still in Latin America, we should now mention theBrazilian example and the notable courses organized in theInstituto do Rio Branco, a specialised training entity created in

126 Rolando Stein, a former Director of the Chilean Academia Diplomatica“Andres Bello”, personal communication.127 Embajada de Chile, Lisboa, Nota Verbal n.º 49/2005, de 19.07.2005, inresponse to a set of queries I formulated.

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1945 with an aim to select and raise diplomats “in acontinuous process of training”. The celebrated Institutedoes so by means of three courses: the Program of Trainingand Improvement (PROFI-A) attended by young diplomatsstarting their career; the Course of Improvement ofDiplomats (CAD), destined for Second category Secretaries;and the Curso de Altos Estudos (CAE) designed for Counsellors.The Instituto do Rio Branco also offers technical courses innegotiation and diplomacy, diplomatic practice protocol andlanguages. It also organizes, in parallel, courses forjournalist and civil servants working with foreigncommerce128. The so called PROFI-A is destined for diplomatswho have passed the admission contest and it is a trainingcycle, as well as evaluation of aptitudes and capacitiesfor the period of internship in which they are EmbassyAttachés (lasting for 2 years).Its aims — and surely the transcription I here includeseems to corroborate the idea that, in Brazil, a pathtowards a harmonious meshing of theory and practice isbeing tried out in earnest — are immediately and clearlyequated by the Instituto itself: “i) to stimulate theinterest in the profession; ii) to harmonise the knowledgeacquired on university courses with the needs of diplomatictraining; iii) to transmit and practise the teachingsparticular to the diplomatic functions; iv) to developcritical capacity in order to better understand gestationof decisions and attitudes of Brazilian foreign policy andv) to introduce to the rules of conduct and to themanagement techniques of Itamaraty”129. The instruments oftraining and improvement used throughout the course takethe form of various practical projects, lectures, exams,debates held in seminars. In the superb Instituto do Rio Brancoanalytical monographs on various foreign policy topics areregularly written, and training in posts abroad and in theMinistry for Foreign Affairs itself are made available tothe young Attachés; moreover, they are offered visits tovarious states and enterprises of the Brazilian Federation,128 http://www2.mre.gov.br/irbr/irbr/institu.htm, consulted 19.08.05.129 Idem, Portaria dated from the 10th November 1995.

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so as to acquire a wider knowledge of the country they willrepresent. But there is more, in a Brazil which is betting on a globalrole for itself130. CAD — the internship of improvementdestined for Second category Secretaries in the Braziliandiplomatic career— has as its main objective the deepeningand updating of the knowledge necessary for carrying outthe functions of the Second and First category Secretaries;its successful completion is a prerequisite of progressionin the career of national diplomats. The course has twophases, a first composed of conferences about Brazilianforeign policy and current political affairs and a secondconsisting of exams. There is also at the Instituto do Rio Brancoa CAE — literally, the course “of Higher Studies”; essentiallya second deeper CAD, a specialisation of sorts. It is aimedat Ministers of 2nd and 1st Category. No comments are really needed here — they would certainlybe unnecessary — as to the level of professionalism and thelevel of quality of training given by the State todiplomats who represent Brazil’s interests abroad131. What

130 For a well argued and wide-ranging study of past, present andfuture Brazilian foreign ties and policies, see (eds.) Foreign Policyat Brookings and Wilson International Centre for Scholars (2007), NewDirections in Brazilian Foreign Relations, Washington. An interesting analysis ofinternal stresses within the very structure of Brazilian foreignpolicy may be found in C. Santiso (2003), “The Gordian Knot ofBrazilian Foreign Policy: promoting democracy while respectingsovereignty”, Cambridge Review of International Affairs, vol. 16 (2): 343-358.According to Santiso, ”there exist [sic] inherent tensions betweenthe dual principles guiding Brazilian foreign policy, the promotionand protection of democracy abroad and the attachment to nationalsovereignty and non-interference in internal affairs”. Santiso’sstudy assesses Brazil's response to threats to democracy during thelast decade in 10 case studies. It argues that Presidential diplomacyhas played a key role in furthering the democratic commitment ofBrazilian foreign policy. For a tightly argued, crisp, and usefulrecent theoretical discussion of Brazil’s bid for post-bipolarregional hegemonic status, see Sean W. Burges (2008), “ConsensualHegemony: Theorizing Brazilian Foreign Policy after the Cold War”,International Relations, vol. 22, no. 1: 65-84.131 Once again, some relevant and useful context. It is perhaps in theofficial Itamaraty internet site

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is most striking, at any rate, is perhaps the parallels oneis tempted to establish between the Brazilian and the UScase.Other examples of the Americas can be usefully put forward.But they really bear no comparison to the three cases fromthe New Continent which I touched upon. In Venezuela theInstituto de Altos Estudios Diplomaticos “Pedro Gual” was founded in 1991(in homage to the first Chancellor of Great Colombia, the

(http://www.country-studies.com/brazil/foreign-policy-decision-making.html, retrieved on 18.07.08) that we may find a clearerdescription of the complex processes of foreign policy decision-making in Brazil: “[m]ost foreign policy strategies and decisionsoriginate within Itamaraty. A senior diplomat always occupies theposition of foreign affairs adviser within the president's office,and diplomats occupy similar liaison positions in key ministries.Since the 1980s, Itamaraty, in response to the growing complexity offoreign policy issues, has established new divisions dealing withexport promotion, environmental affairs, science and technology, andhuman rights. Itamaraty also established the International RelationsResearch Institute (Instituto das Pesquisas das RelaçõesInternacionais--IPRI) as part of the Alexandre Gusmão Foundation,which functions as a think tank and conference centre and publishesforeign policy studies. The Senate and Chamber of Deputies each haveforeign affairs standing committees. Under the 1988 constitution, theSenate expanded its treaty approval prerogative to include allinternational financial agreements, such as negotiations with theInternational Monetary Fund […] and international banks, which in thepast had been the exclusive prerogative of the executive branch (seeThe Military in the Amazon, ch. 5). The Congress also has involveditself in major government contracts with foreign companies, such asthe contract with Raytheon for an Amazon surveillance system. TheBrazilian Cooperation Agency (Agência Brasileira de Cooperacão--ABC),a foreign aid agency formally established in the late 1980s,coordinates all international technical cooperation and assistancereceived by Brazil from foreign donors (often, but not always, withinthe context of bilateral agreements). For example, in the absence ofa United States-Brazil bilateral agreement, United States Agency forInternational Development (USAID) programs in Brazil are notcoordinated through the ABC. The ABC also coordinates Brazilianinternational technical cooperation and assistance directed to othercountries, mostly through South-South relationships conducted byBrazilian government agencies, universities, and NGOs. At times otheragencies may take the lead in foreign policy decision making. Forexample, in June 1995 the economic sector, led by the Ministry ofPlanning, made the initial decision to impose quotas on imported

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Head of State of Venezuela and a historical symbol of LatinAmerican unity), with a mandate to work as an organism ofthe Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores defining it as “aforum for study, analysis and understanding of the affairsof main concern in Venezuelan foreign policy”; although itsuffered a few changes with the rise of Hugo Chaves andmodern Bolivarianism, these priority remain unaltered. Todo so, it offers training courses updating and professionalextension for diplomats, but also simultaneously, in havinguniversity status, it develops postgraduate studies. In Costa Rica, there is an Instituto Diplomatico (called ManuelMaria de Peralta), partly integrated in the Ministry ofForeign Affairs (and the Catholic Church, rathersurprisingly!), which started its diplomatic trainingactivity in 1998, in the training, updating and preparationof diplomats. It made a partnership with Costa RicaUniversity at the level of the organization of postgraduatestudies and it sought to attract teachers from CentralAmerica and the Caribbean. Peru has an Academia Diplomatica,created in 1955, in the heart of the Ministerio deRelaciones Exteriores, whose attendance, through a courseof 2 years, is a sine qua non condition of entry into thediplomatic career. Argentina has a model identical to thatof Brazil, with an Instituto del Servicio Exterior de la Nación, adepartment of the Ministry, which organises a 2-year courseautomobiles. This decision provoked a crisis within the Common Marketof the South (Mercado Comum do Sul--Mercosul; see Glossary)--becauseArgentine automobile exports to Brazil would have been affected.Itamaraty intervened, and a solution was negotiated exceptingMercosul from the rigors of the measure. The military had the finalsay on foreign policy during the 1964-85 period, when foreign policywas decided frequently within the National Security Council (Conselhode Segurança Nacional--CSN). Since then the military occasionally hasexercised some influence. When the United Nations (UN) requestedBrazilian troops for a peacekeeping force in Namibia during thedelicate, pre-election phase of transition in 1991, Itamaraty wasfavourable, but the army vetoed the initiative. The reverse occurredin 1995. After a successful peacekeeping mission in Mozambique in1993-94, the army, in search of new missions, approved sending abattalion to the peacekeeping operation in Angola. However, forreasons of economic austerity the ministries of Planning and Financedelayed the appropriation until 1996”.

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for access and another for Attachés, also of 2 years, thefirst of which is theory and the second practical132.

132 For these cases, see D. Polloni (1996), op. cit., p. 34.135

3.3. The Middle East

What about the Middle East? I shall start with the Israelicase. At another latitude and with the obvious need toproperly establish and better and more solidly mark out itsforeign action, Israel has a high quality and highlydynamic training network, connected to renowneduniversities, particularly the Hebrew University of Jerusalem andof the University of Tel Aviv.This foundational university connection is not accidental.It is, on the contrary, conscious and rather intentional.In the Israeli case the tight linkage that exists betweenacademia, the diplomatic training processes, and action onforeign policy is particularly visible. Such clusteringultimately results from both external and internalconnections. Human resources – the sector devoted to therecruitment and training of diplomats – is in a domainquite independent from that of the Centre of Policy Researchwhich also exists in the Israeli Ministry of ForeignAffairs. However, some circuitous ties are evident betweenthe latter and the former: the highly respected Centre hasa partnership with the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, with whichit organised a postgraduate programme in Diplomacy, in therespective School of International Relations133.As the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs declares in itsofficial site, “[t]he Foreign Ministry's cadet course isthe only program which trains and prepares diplomats forcareers in the Israeli foreign service. The State PublicService Commission Tender for diplomatic posts in theMinistry of Foreign Affairs is the principal mechanism forrecruiting diplomats into the Foreign Service. The numberof recruits is based on the retirement forecast of theMinistry's employees on the one hand and the deploymentforecast of missions worldwide on the other. The targetrecruits are Israeli citizens, graduates of Economics,

133http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/About+the+Ministry/Structure+and+departments/Training+in+the+Israel+Ministry+of+Foreign+Affairs.htm, consulted 19.05.2008.

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Middle East Studies, International Relations and PublicAdministration. In addition to these, recruitment includesthe full gamut of other academic fields”134. Even at a glance it is clear Israeli diplomatic training isa matter which the Jewish national State takes veryseriously. It is enough to glimpse its formal demands andcharacteristics to realize that: “[a]dmission requirementsinclude a full university education (BA), command oflanguages and passing of the cadet tender examinations. Theselection process includes three stages: writtenexaminations, assessment centres and an interview before apublic committee. The training lasts three to five years(as stated in the tender) and consists of three stages. Anintensive theoretical and academic part lasting six months,in which the cadets acquire knowledge in fields relevant toIsraeli diplomacy, while obtaining and polishing skills andabilities of the trade, all this through lectures, reading,tours, and practice. The second part involves on-the-jobtraining in various departments of the ministry. The thirdstage consists of working in Israeli missions abroad, inone of the aforementioned posts. Cadet training includesinstruction in foreign languages, in informationtechnology, and the acquisition basic diplomatic skillssuch as media presentations, public speaking, effectivewritten communication, etc.”. In an understandable defenceof the reborn Hebrew language. In the face of massivemigration for the old Eastern and Central Europe, theIsraeli Ministry also insists that “[c]ommand of the Hebrewlanguage is assumed and is needed for the examinationprocess as well as for the training and the job itself”135. It should be added that, as in Germany, young Israelicadets can chose between one of two tracks (there are threein Germany, although one of them is more logistical and

134 The above cited information was taken from the site of the IsraeliMinistry, at(http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/About+the+Ministry/Departments/Israel+Foreign+Ministry+accepting+applications+for+cadet+course+9-Nov-2007.htm);it was downloaded on 20.07.2008.135 Idem.

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secretarial), an administrative and a political one. Giventhe high quality of many Israeli Universities, this furtherlevel of training probably makes Israeli diplomats some ofthe better trained professionals in the world. This shouldperhaps not come as a surprise, in a democratic countrywith as high a level of general education, and one whoseState is somehow under siege and has, as the mainpriorities of its foreign policy, its survival in the midstof a hostile geopolitical milieu, the absorption of Jewsarriving from all corners of the world, diasporacommunities with which it naturally holds privilegedrelations, and its affirmation in international arenas136.It is perhaps not too far-fetched to claim that Israel hasto live with what 17th and 18th Century historians used tocall a “war diplomacy”137.For the Arab world, we shall limit ourselves to theEgyptian example and, once again, I will restrict attentionto the training given to young diplomats at the start oftheir career, and only in the terms of criteria which Iinitially defined. As was earlier the case with Spain,France, Great Britain or the US, to cite but a fewexamples, in order to fully put that into place, some‘genealogical administrative pedigree’ may be useful.

136 For details, see the seventeen volumes published by the IsraeliMFA (ed.) Meron Medzini (2002), Israel’s Foreign Relations. Selected Documents,Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The often thick and always very richvolumes are downloadable at http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/MFAArchive/2000_2009/2002/7/Israel-s+Foreign+Relations-+Selected+ Documents.htm, retrieved on19.07.2008. In addition, just two of the many studies available onIsraeli foreign policy: B.E. Sasley (2004, Mar) "Ideas and Power: TheConstruction of Israeli Foreign Policy" a paper presented at the annualmeeting of the International Studies Association, Le Centre Sheraton Hotel, Montreal, Quebec,Canada, from http://www.allacademic.com/meta/p72882_index.html (retrieved on19.07.08), and Alan Dowty (1999), “Israeli Foreign Policy and theJewish Question”, Middle Eastern Journal of International Affairs,vol. 3, no. 1: 1-13, retrieved on the same date athttp://meria.idc.ac.il/journal/1999/issue1/dowty.pdf.137 For an old but not really dated analysis, see, Michael Brecher(1974), Decisions in Israel's Foreign Policy, Yale University Press, New Haven.

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The establishment of the Egyptian Ministry of ForeignAffairs dates back to the first half of the 19th Century,the beginning of Mohamed Ali's rule and his attempts tobuild the modern State by benefiting from NapoleonBonaparte's Administrative Division. This division headopted as a base for Ali’s State. Back then, the Ministrywas one of the divans established in order to organize theState's internal and external affairs. It was basicallyconcerned with "trade and commerce" and later on developedto become what is now the "the Ministry of Foreign Trade",At that time, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was alludedto as the "Divan of Foreign Affairs" and it was concernedwith looking into trade and citizen's affairs. AfterMohamed Ali's rule, this same structure continued tofunction without any tangible modifications. It becameknown as "the foreign divan", one among four fundamentaldivans in his State. This divan was concerned with matterslike abolishing slavery and following up internationaltreaties. The modifications were related to the Europeanpresence in Egypt in the eras of Khedive Said and KhedineIsmail and as a result of the extensive relations Egyptthen entertained with Europe and the various privileges theEuropeans then enjoyed. To the distress of many Egyptiannationalists, the Armenian minority controlled the foreigndivan and occupied many the high level positions in it tillthe end of the 19th Century138.

138 According to the Egyptian Ministry site, “[w]ith the change ofrule in Egypt in 1878, the absolute jurisdictions given to rulerswere diminished under European pressures and the divans were replacedby portfolios. In this period, the foreign portfolio was headed bymany figures, the most prominent of whom was Boutros Ghali Pasha whospent the longest period in office (1894-1910). With the outbreak ofWorld War l, the end of the Ottoman rule in Egypt, and thedeclaration of the British Protectorate over Egypt in 1914, the"foreign portfolio" was put to an end since it was a symbol ofEgyptian sovereignty. With the reestablishment of the Ministry ofForeign affairs on 15 March 1922, Egyptian diplomacy started to beshaped in its current form. It started sending diplomatic envoysabroad, who, at that time, didn't have any genuine role orsignificance in the relations between Egypt and the outside world.Ahmed Heshmat Pasha became the first Minister of Foreign Affairs in

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As the Egyptian MFA puts it139, “[d]espite approving theestablishment of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, theBritish occupation, at that time, imposed restrictions onthe level of the Egyptian diplomatic representation abroad;it was limited to the level of "minister plenipotentiary"or "accredited politician with a minister title", exceptfor the British representative in Cairo who was a " HighCommissioner". Also, Egypt was unable to join the League ofNations at the time of the British occupation. With thesigning of the 1936 Treaty, Egypt's diplomaticrepresentation was raised to be at the same level as thediplomatic representation in London. Also, because of thisTreaty, Britain recognized Egypt's right to join the Leagueof Nations, a fact that enabled Egyptian diplomacy to havea role in the international arena. The occupation thenallowed Egypt to raise its diplomatic representation to thelevel of "ambassador" which, in turn, enabled Egypt to jointhe League of Nations, to become the 56th country to jointhe League. After the Egyptian diplomatic representationwas confined to large capitals such as London, Paris, Rome,and Washington, it spread to include many countries allover the world. This period also witnessed the beginningsof the Egyptian consular representation which was morespread out than [its] diplomatic representation because ofthe large number of Consuls who already functioned in majorcities like London and Liverpool in Britain, Paris,Marseille, and Lyon in France, Berlin and Hamburg inGermany.

1923. He laid the cornerstone of the organizational structure of thenew Ministry and took Al Bustan Palace in Bab El Louk, a palace ownedby King Fouad l, to be the first official headquarters to hisMinistry. Heshmat pasha divided the Ministry into four maindepartments, the Minister's divan, the department of political andcommercial affairs, the department of consular affairs, and thedepartment of administrative affairs. Also, the first special decreeregarding the consular system was issued in 1925, as well as thedecree regarding the system of the political positions.139 Athttp://www.mfa.gov.eg/MFA_Portal/en-GB/About_the_Ministry/historicalview/, retrieved on 19.07.08.

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The aftermath of World War II had a great impact on theEgyptian diplomatic performance through the structuralchanges made [in] the Egyptian Ministers at that time […].The July 1952 Revolution had a great impact on the radicaltransformation of the Ministry’s organizational structure.These changes were made to adapt to the extensive changeswhich had occurred in the international arena. TheRevolution had a great effect in laying the foundation ofthe Egyptian diplomatic practice. Law number 453 was issuedon 21 September 1955 to define the Ministry’s role inimplementing the Egyptian foreign policy, developingEgypt’s relations with foreign governments andinternational organizations, and protecting Egyptianinterests abroad, as well as issuing diplomatic passportsand following up issues related to diplomatic immunitiesand privileges”140. In 1966, a small a rather non-ambitiousDiplomatic Institute was created to help train youngEgyptian diplomats up t speed, as it were, as well as totry to recycle older ones. It was not a great success.But let me return to the administrative thread of mygenealogical narrative. I shall continue to follow closelythe official account, given its ‘genealogical’ focus andquality. In 1979, the Minister of State for Foreign Affairsat that time, Boutros Boutros Ghali, decided to reorganize

140 The most significant duties assigned to the Ministry included thefollowing: 1. Organizing the exchange of consular and diplomaticrelations with foreign countries, in addition to the Egyptianparticipation in international organizations and events. 2. Preparingand providing Egyptian missions abroad with diplomatic and consularinstructions and guidelines. 3. Communicating with different partiesto conclude international agreements and treaties, as well ascoordinating them and supervising their implementation in cooperationwith different ministries and institutions in Egypt. 4. Handlingcommunication between the different Egyptian ministries on one side,and foreign authorities, governments, and diplomatic missions on theother side. 5.  Protecting Egyptian interests abroad and taking thenecessary measures to safeguard them within the limits ofinternational law and conventions. 6.  Collecting information thatmight influence the policies of foreign countries and providing theirrespective ministries with all the necessary information, studies,and statistics related to Egypt’s international relations.

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the Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs to deal with thenew circumstances that arose following the Peace Treatysigned with Israel. In the next year, the Minister ofForeign Affairs, Kamal Hassan, reorganized the Ministry inorder to develop the internal work mechanisms, and he alsoworked on ‘enhancing’ the Diplomatic Institute. When HosniMubarak came to power in 1981, the Ministry went through acomprehensive process of reform. The legal provisionsrelated to the Diplomatic and Consular Corps were modifiedfor the first time in 30 years. Consequently, law No. 45 ofthe year 1982 (regarding the Diplomatic and Consular Corps)was promulgated to cope with the new panoramas and horizonsfaced the Egyptian diplomatic and consular relations – thatwas naturally done in accordance with the two ViennaConventions on Diplomatic and Consular Relations, whichEgypt had joined in the 60’s. To quote directly from the Egyptian MFA’s account: “[i]nthe beginning of the 90’s, a restructuring of Egyptiandiplomatic practice took place. This process was influencedby the new international climate which had prevailed in thebeginning of the 90’s after the end of the Cold War and thedisintegration of USSR which, in turn, necessitateddeveloping the Ministry in order to cope with the newinternational and regional variables. New factors affectingthe international arena included the technologicalrevolution, the information revolution, the evolution ofmany international blocs, the increase in the role of non-governmental organizations in international relations, inaddition to the emergence of economic globalization. Thisprocess also aimed at improving the decision-making processin the Egyptian foreign policy and boosting the skills ofdiplomats in various fields of the diplomatic practice”.It was then the “enhancement” of the Egyptian DiplomaticInstitute took place141. The modern Institute for Diplomatic Studies,141 The following modifications took place in the work structure ofthe Ministry as a result of the previously mentioned transformations:1. Establishing and developing departments to address issues of toppriority on the international arena. In this regard, separatedepartments were established to handle various topics such asarmament race matters, development, human rights, environment, and

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a transformation of the light entity created in the heartof the Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1966, nowoffers a wide variety of courses which, while “open tocivil society”, are above all oriented towards the trainingheld as essential for personnel of various categories inthe diplomatic career. The Institute nevertheless givesparticular importance to young Attachés. They are offeredcourses with the duration of one year which privilege areassuch as Politics, Economy, Strategy, International Trade,Diplomatic Practice, Language Learning, Protocol andConsular Affairs (including workshops and field trips)142.The model has marked academic smatterings which combinewell with a solid professional in house training as a rulecarried out within the institutional framework of theEgyptian Ministry143. It avowed aim is to help Egypt recast

the Non-Alignment Movement, in addition to the departments dealingwith the UN and its specialized agencies. 2. Cooperating with therest of the state authorities and institutions in a new framework ofteam work to combine the diplomatic practice with academic knowledge.3. Enhancing the Diplomatic Institute in order to train diplomats fortheir assignments. 4. Stressing the concept of specialization in theMinistry departments which are based on geographic division.Departments have been replaced by sectors headed by AssistantMinisters, each sector includes analogous departments or sub-sectorsrelated to the same geographic location.142 http://www.mfa.gov.eg/MFA_Portal/en-GB/institute/, consulted20.05.08.143 Given Egyptian centrality and its crucial and ever-changinggeopolitical role, there is a substantial bibliography on its foreignpolicy, which it would be spurious to review in this study. I shalllimit myself to a couple of articles with ‘insider’ views on theimpact of two of the most important events which caused majorinflections on the Egyptian’s State posture: the Suez crisis of 1956and the Peace Treaty Egypt signed with Israel. They are: MohamedHassanein Heikal (1978), “Egyptian Foreign Policy”, Foreign Affairs, vol.56, no. 4: 714-727, a star journalist and editor of Al Ahram (1957-1974), the largest circulation newspaper in the Middle East, a manwidely read in the Arab world and internationally who also served asadviser to Egyptian Presidents Nasser and Sadat; reputedly Nasserrelied on Heikal for much of current information, and according toformer US Ambassador Lucius Battle, Heikal wrote important foreignpolicy speeches for Nasser in the early 1960s. And Ibrahim Karawan(2005), “Foreign Policy Restructuring: Egypt's Disengagement from the

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its foreign policy in a changed regional and internationalenvironment, while trying to insure it a higher standing inthe international State system144.

3.4. Greater Asia

Pushing our attention to other, further, latitudes,specifically to the Asian Continent, it will be worthlooking quickly at diplomatic training in the four powerswith perhaps a vaster international projection: China,India, Japan, and Indonesia.As we glance at the old “Empire of the Middle” we muststart by noting that unfortunately the data available isreally not very rich: it is worth mentioning that theChinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs includes a structure,called the Faculty of Foreign Affairs (locally known as theChinese Foreign Affairs University, or CFAU145) – with theformat of a university – as the name suggests, a Facultywhich offers a variety of courses and diplomas, such asfirst degrees, masters degrees, and doctorates. It ismainly aimed at diplomatic staff and it is made up of thefollowing departments: Diplomatic Studies, English andInternational Studies, Foreign Language Studies (English,French and Japanese), Institute of History of InternationalRelations, and Institute of International Law146; these arerather large entities, of which, unfortunately, little ofgreater operational substance is readily known.Arab–Israeli Conflict Revisited”, Cambridge Review of International Affairs ,vol. 18, no. 3 : 325-338 ; Ibrahim Karawan is Director of theUniversity of Utah's Middle East Centre, an associate professor inthe Department of Political Science . For a general theoretical take,see (eds.). R. Hinnebusch and A.H. Ehteshami (2002). “Introduction:The Analytical Framework”, The Foreign Policies of Middle East States. Boulder:Linne Rienner.144 Old nut not dated, is A.I. Dawisha (1976), Egypt in the Arab World: TheElements of Foreign Policy, Wiley, New York.145 Founded in 1955, the CFAU was reformed in 2005. It was formerlyknown as the Foreign Affairs College; the change in its denominationsuggests an administrative restructuring we know little about.146 Domenico Polloni (1996), op.cit., pp. 32-33.

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It appears CFAU nevertheless follows the pattern common toequivalent great power entities, such as the ones I alreadybriefly looked at. As its official site underscores, it isthe recognized training entity for Chinese diplomats:“China Foreign Affairs University, the only institution ofhigher learning under the guidance of the Ministry ofForeign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China, aims totraining personnel for professional careers in ForeignService, international studies as well as in other careersrelated to international business and law. The universitywas founded in 1955, at the personal urging of the latePremier Zhou Enlai”147. Although not a mammoth endeavourreally comparable to the American FSI, its ChineseUniversity counterpart is a rather sizeable institution:“CFAU offers Baccalaureate, Master and Doctoral degrees148.CFAU also offers year-long professional and languagetraining programs designed for both domestic and foreigndiplomats. At present, CFAU enrols over 2,400 Chinesestudents and around 100 international students in various

147 Retrieved on 19.07.08 athttp://www.language-learning.net/site_14173_28346_2.html. 148 Idem. In full agreement with Polloni’s data, we are furtherinformed that the “CFAU has the following departments: Department ofDiplomacy, Department of English and International Studies,Department of Foreign Languages, Department of International Law, andDepartment of International Economics. It also houses the ResearchInstitute of International Law, Research Institute of InternationalRelations, Graduate School, Institute of Continuing Education,International Exchange Centre, International Students Section, andother teaching and research facilities. The China International LawSociety and the China Society of International Relations have theirsecretariats on the campus. CFAU has concurrently a 400-strongfaculty and staff, among whom 170 or so are licensed full-timeinstructors. In addition, CFAU has engaged some 70 guest professorswho are renowned scholars, specialists, academics and seniordiplomats. Every year, more than 20 foreign experts and instructorsin related specialties are recruited from around the world to augmentthe teaching staff”.

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disciplines”149. Perhaps it is closer, as a model, to itsprototypical Soviet (now Russian) homologue.Somewhat similarly, the Indian Foreign Service Institute, with itsorigins in British colonial times, is now a part of theMinistry of Foreign Affairs of the great South Asiandemocracy. Indian foreign policy is, naturally, conductedand executed by a professional diplomatic corps. Itsmembers are recruited through an annual concours whichincludes written as well as oral competitive exams; thecandidates come from a variety of regional, social andeconomic backgrounds, although traditional elites arestrongly represented there. I shall return to this below,in context.Interestingly, it is easy to trace the pedigree of India’sForeign Service Institute150. Pedigree- and genealogy-wise,the FSI can ultimately be traced back to British rule whena so-called Foreign Department was created in order toconduct business with “Foreign European Powers”. In atypical British fashion, this genealogy embodies afascinating twin process of accretion and fragmentation onthe one hand, and transformation on the other. In September13, 1783 the Board of Directors of the British East IndiaCompany passed a resolution at Fort William, Calcutta,creating a department which could help “relieve thepressure” on the Warren Hastings administration in

149 The academic dimension of the Foreign Affairs University is clear.For an interesting article on the pedagogical innovations broughtabout by the CFAU, see Shangtao Gao (2007),. "The Transformation ofInternational Affairs Education in China: The Case of China ForeignAffairs University" a paper presented at the annual meeting of theInternational Studies Association 48th Annual Convention, in which the old ‘teacherexplaining—students listening—assignment grading’ has, to greateffect, been superseded by the more congenial ‘active learningmethod’, decomposable into three different forms of ‘ActiveTeaching’, respectively named “history-oriented teaching,interaction-oriented teaching and theory-oriented teaching”. Thearticle was retrieved on 20.07.08, http://www.allacademic.com/meta/p181219_index.html150 Most of the following information was gleaned form the officialIndian MFA site, http://fsi.mea.gov.in, under the heading Indian ForeignService: A Backgrounder.

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conducting its “secret and political business”. Thedepartment became known as the “Indian Foreign Department”,and it went ahead with the expansion of diplomaticrepresentation, wherever necessary, to protect Britishcolonial interests. In 1843 it went through the woes of anadministrative reform, as Governor-General Ellenboroughmade sure the Secretariat of the Government was subdividedinto four distinct departments – Foreign, Home, Finance andMilitary. Each was led by a Secretary. The Foreign Department Secretary was entrusted with the“conduct of all correspondence belonging to the externaland internal diplomatic relations of the government”. Fromthe very incipience of this Secretariat, a distinction wasmaintained between the “foreign” and “political” functionsof the Foreign Department; relations with “Asiatic powers”(including native princely states of India during theperiod of the British Raj) were engaged in as “political”ones, while those with European powers were ratherenvisaged as “foreign”. Although the Government of IndiaAct of 1935 sought to delineate more clearly the functionsof both the “Foreign” and “Political” wings of the ForeignDepartment, it was soon realized that it wasadministratively imperative to bifurcate the old Foreigndepartment. This meant, in practice, an upgrade of sortsfor the “Foreign” entity, as the External AffairsDepartment was set up separately under the direct charge ofthe Governor-General. The idea of establishing a separatediplomatic service to handle the external activities of theGovernment of India originated in 1944. In September 1946, the eve of India’s independence fromGreat Britain, the ‘Government of India’ decided to createa service it named the Indian Foreign Service, a bodydevoted to India’s diplomatic, consular and commercialrepresentations abroad. In 1947, from these roots flowed anear seamless transformation of the Foreign and Politicaldepartment of the British India government into what becamethe new Ministry of External Affairs and CommonwealthRelations. In 1948 a first batch of ‘cadets’ was recruitedunder the combined Civil service examination system of the

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Union Public Service Commission joined the service. Thissystem of entry has remained, to this day, the staple modeof accession into the MFA.A middle power, but a potential superpower, India has inrecent years seen its international influence rise151. Sinceindependence in 1947, the world’s largest democracy – as itlikes to portray itself – has moved from a non-alignedposture in the 50’s (it is one of the Founding States ofthe Non-Aligned Movement, in 1961) to an ally of the SovietUnion to counterbalance Pakistan and has now joined manyinternational organizations and developed close ties,military as well as economic, with the US. India is one ofthe largest troop contributors to UN peacekeeping missionsand, for a few years now, has been currently seeking apermanent seat in the Security Council. It legal briefincludes articulation with a vibrant diaspora of sometwenty million Indian migrant workers spread throughout theworld. The principles of India’s foreign policy have beencrystallized on the local concept of Panchsheel, a termwhich, loosely, translates as pragmatism added to thepursuit of its national interest. Its connections focusheavily on its regional neighbourhood, and also on links toStates, like South Africa and some East African countrieswith strong Indian minorities and, as a booming economy anda nuclear power itself, with great and ascending middlepowers One of the eighteen departmental divisions of theIndian MFA is the Policy Planning and Research Division which

151 Information collected (19.07.08) form www.indianembassy.org andfrom http://fsi.mea.gov.in the first the site of India’s Embassy inWashington (under the heading India's Foreign Policy - 50 Years ofAchievement), the second its MFA site. For a series of sectorialanalyses of India’s foreign policy fronts, see the massive collectionof articles by some 50 specialists, from academics to diplomats,published by the FSI and titled (ed.) New Delhi Foreign Service Institute(2007) Indian Foreign Policy: Challenges and Opportunities, Academic Foundation,New Delhi. For further details see, for instance, Kishan S. Rana(2005), “E-Learning for Diplomats”, Foreign Service Journal: 62-65, numberpublished in July-August. From the same author, see also Kishan S.Rana (2002), “Inside the Indian Foreign Service”, Foreign Service Journal:36-42, number published in October.

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conducts research and prepares briefs and background papersfor Ministry officials and policy makers. Within it is also included a Foreign Service Institute devoted todiplomatic training. Diplomatic candidates receive sixmonths of training in a civil servants’ training academy,the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy; they then pass on to theForeign Service Institute (FSI), which gives them theoreticaltraining, for ten months, in areas of History,International Relations, International Law, Diplomacy,Political Science and Economics, Management and languages.Founded in 1985 by initiative of Rajiv Gandhi, thisregionally famous Institute has an enviable and everstronger and more dynamic influence in the region, takingin trainees from many of the ex-Soviet Republics of CentralAsia152. Although not much data is, unfortunately, available, aparticularly interesting example of diplomatic training andits evolving and adaptive nature is that of Japan153. Thestaff of the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs includesan career foreign service corps, recruited on the basis ofa competitive examination and trained by the Ministry'sForeign Service Training Institute. The handling of specific foreignpolicy issues is usually divided between geographic andfunctional bureaus. In general, bilateral issues areassigned to geographic bureaus, and multilateral problemsto functional ones. The Treaties Bureau, given its wide-ranging responsibilities, tends to get transversallyinvolved in a whole spectrum of issues. The InformationAnalysis, Research, and Planning Bureau engages in

152 D. Polloni (1996), idem, ibid., pp. 30-31.153 Although I often draw on quite a few other sources, and never shyfrom giving my own opinions, much of what follows stays close to theLibrary of Congress Country Study on Japan, available (21.07.08) athttp://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/jptoc.html. Its Chapter 7, on “ ForeignRelations”, was written by Robert G. Sutter, and its Chapter 1, onthe “Historical Setting” , by Robert L. Worden. For an authoritativeinsider look, by a formidable former Japanese diplomat, of thethinking behind the changes in post-War foreign policy and diplomaticpostures, see Kazuhiko Togo (2005), Japan's Foreign Policy 1945-2003. The Questfor a Proactive Policy, Brill Academic Publishers.

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comprehensive and coordinated policy planning and thematicresearch. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is, of course,under the direction of its Minister154.Mutatis mutandis the progression of diplomatic recruitingfollowed, in Japan, a path not too different from what wasthe case in Europe and North-America. Traditionally aprofession of fairly high social prestige, diplomaticservice from the Meiji Period through World War II was apreserve of the Japanese upper social strata. In what, aswe saw, was a common 19th Century pattern, important pre-war requirements for admission were proper social originand standing, family connections, in addition to formalqualifications, namely, as a rule, graduation from TokyoImperial University (the present-day University of Tokyo).After World War II, these requirements were changed as partof the democratic reform measures introduced by the UStransitional occupation governmental authorities, butdiplomacy continued to be a highly regarded career. Although social pedigree and connections retained someimportance, they were largely superseded by meritocraticcriteria of selection. By and large, after World War II

154 A formal note on Japanese foreign policy decision-making.Nominally, the Minister of Foreign Affairs decides what Japaneseforeign policy should be, although formally the ‘chain of command’ ismore intricate. Under the 1947 Constitution, the Cabinet exercisesthe primary responsibility for the conduct of foreign affairs,subject to the overall supervision of the National Diet. The PrimeMinister is required to make periodic reports on foreign relations tothe Diet, whose upper and lower houses each have a Foreign AffairsCommittee. Each of these Committees reports on its deliberations toplenary sessions of the Chamber to which it belongs. Ad hoc Committeesare formed occasionally to consider special questions. Diet membershave the right to raise pertinent policy questions to the Minister ofForeign Affairs and the Prime Minister. Treaties with foreigncountries require ratification by the Diet. As Head of State, theJapanese Emperor performs the ceremonial function of receivingforeign envoys and attesting to foreign treaties ratified by theDiet. As the chief executive and constitutionally the dominant figurein the political system, the Prime Minister has the final word inmajor foreign policy decisions. The Minister of Foreign Affairs, asenior member of the Cabinet, acts as the Prime Minister's chiefadviser in matters of planning and implementation.

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Japan saw an intensification of a professionalization ofdiplomatic careers which, in Western States, often happeneda few generations earlier. It was, nevertheless, anincomplete one: in common with the likes of Great Britainor France, the prior academic completion, by Japanesecandidates, of given courses (Law, for example) in choiceUniversities continued, in practice, to constitute anessential criterion for accession to the Ministry ofForeign Affairs. True, a rather demanding Higher Foreign Service Examinationwas introduced as a sine qua non for entry into theMinistry. Most career foreign service officers had to passthis post-war Examination before entry into the diplomaticservice. But, in spite of the formal ‘openness’ of thesystem, in practice many indeed of these successfulexaminees were graduates of the prestigious Law Faculty ofthe University of Tokyo. With the creation of the ForeignService Training Institute a modicum of specialized academic,linguistic, and professional (protocol, negotiation, andgeneral diplomatic practice, for example) training wasformally given within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, withthe aim of streamlining the profile of these graduates forthe tasks required by Japanese foreign policy and thedemands placed on the diplomatic agents who were to carryout the bulk of its execution.Unsurprisingly, it was modelled (even in what concerns thepreference for specific prior academic background formchoice Universities as a sort of filter) after its fewWestern counterparts of the period. As to theprofessionalization of Japanese diplomacy, it proceededapace and, by the mid-1950s, almost all ambassadorialappointments were made from among ‘veteran’ diplomats. Inthat, as in many other fronts, Japan was gearing up tospeed in the path of full integration into a system it hadchallenged a generation earlier155.

155 In a common developed world pattern, Japan’s Ministry of ForeignAffairs also includes in its orbit an administratively independentacademic think-tank-style entity named The Japan Institute of InternationalAffairs (homed online at

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This did not, however, happen in a linear manner; on thecontrary, and albeit the direction was always clear, therewere some significant back and forth oscillations whichshould not be overlooked. All this becomes fullyunderstandable when placed against the background of thetonic and progression of Japanese foreign policy, and that,to say the least, was sui generis. A few words about will,therefore, be apposite. As could be expected, the post-Warforeign policy of Japan, like that of Germany, bore themark of its prior defeat and unconditional surrender inWorld War II and was designed to look forward to help Japanguarantee a future stable and peaceful standing in theinternational State system. After World War II – and notonly regionally, in what had been the greater Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere a war-prone Imperial Japan had carved foritself, but with respect to the world at large – Japanesehttp://www.jiia.or.jp/en/aboutus/index.php,retrieved on 21-07.08). Asits charter claims, “[t]he Japan Institute of International Affairsis Japan's foremost centre for producing and disseminating ideas oninternational relations. As an academically independent institutionaffiliated with the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, JIIA is asource of authoritative interpretations of Japanese foreign policy.Building on its work of publication, international scholarlycollaboration and policy recommendation, JIIA is a forum for informedpublic debate. In 1959, former Prime Minister Shigeru Yoshida foundedThe Japan Institute of International Affairs to deepen Japan'sknowledge of world affairs and to bolster the foreign relations of ademocratic Japan. In this effort, he garnered the support of keymembers of parliament, luminaries including the foreign minister,president of the Bank of Japan, chairman of the Japan Federation ofEconomic Associations, as well as leading figures of the academy andmedia. As prime minister, Yoshida steered Japan through the post-1945democratic transformation, stepping down from office in 1954. Yoshidathen served as the first chairman of The Japan Institute ofInternational Affairs. In 1960, JIIA received accreditation as anindependent foundation from the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs.JIIA is a policy think-tank dedicated to researching medium-to-longterm issues of international political and security affairs. JIIA (a)investigates international issues, (b) promotes the exchange ofinformation on and knowledge of international affairs, (c) encouragesresearch of international affairs at universities and researchinstitutions, (d) examines Japanese foreign policy and providesconstructive ideas for policy making and (e) positively contributesto fostering world peace and human progress” (p. vii).

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foreign policies avoided political issues in their externalengagements and instead concentrated attention on moretangible and far more ‘neutral’ economic goals. In formalterms, throughout the entire post-war period (which,politically, is still ongoing today), Japan adhered topacifist principles embodied in the 1947 Constitution – amainly American-designed document which included, from itsvery incipience, severe inhibitions on the development ofArmed Forces other than the minimum required for coastaland territorial defence purposes – referred to as the‘Peace Constitution’. As stands to reason, this led to theproduction of a very special breed of diplomatic agents. Amore detailed look at external Japanese political choiceseasily underscores why that is so.Political decisions to act non-political, particularly inthe context of military compromises always inevitablyembody what cannot be called anything but unstablebalancing acts. Under a so-called ‘omnidirectionaldiplomacy’ [the expression domestically used], Japan soughtto cultivate friendly ties with all States and nations,proclaimed a policy of ‘separation of politics andeconomics’, and adhered to a neutral position on some thethen raging East-West issues. Overall, this policy washighly successful and it allowed Japan to prosper and growas an economic power – but, of course, it was feasible onlywhile the country enjoyed the security and economicstability provided by its post-War close ally, the UnitedStates156. And that was not without caveats and provisos.156 Some legal-political history might be useful: Japan regained itssovereignty in 1952 and the country re-entered the internationalcommunity as an independent nation; it found itself in a worldpreoccupied by the Cold War between Socialism and Capitalism, East andWest, in which the Soviet Union and the United States headed opposingcamps. By virtue of the Treaty of Peace with Japan signed in SanFrancisco on September 8, 1951 (effective April 28, 1952), ending thestate of war between Japan and most of the Allied powers except theSoviet Union and the People's Republic of China, and the MutualSecurity Assistance Pact between Japan and the United States, signedin San Francisco the same day, Japan essentially became a dependentally of the United States, which continued to maintain bases andtroops on Japanese soil.

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Understandably, Japanese foreign policy goals during mostof the early post-conflict period, in themselves aimslargely drawn up by the US Administration, focusedessentially on regaining viability for its national economyand establishing credibility credentials as a peacefulmember of the international community. As alreadyindicated, national security was entrusted to theprotective shield and nuclear umbrella of the UnitedStates, which was permitted under the Security Pact thatcame into effect in April 1952 to deploy its forces in andabout Japan. The Pact provided a framework governing theuse of United States forces against military threats –internal or external – in the region. Japan’s interlocutorsabroad saw the ultimately irresolvable tension to whichthis ‘duality’ gave body and were often quick to their ownadvantage. A further role – in many senses a ‘classical’diplomatic one, that of a careful compromiser – was pushedupon Japan’s foreign servants, and again, for that to beduly carried out a level of technical expertise wasrequired. The task, of course, was that of trying to slowdown and downplay an inexorable internal pressure157.

157156 Of particular interest on the felt need for deep re-structuringof the Japanese MFA is the Chapter IV-A. Of Japan Ministry of ForeignAffairs, from its Diplomatic Bluebook 2001, titled “Japan's DiplomaticStructure” which, underlining a series of corruption scandals andstructural inadequacies, stresses the urgency of administrativereforms, since “[a]s the globalization of the international communityand the consequent interdependency among countries intensify, theimportance of diplomacy is greatly increasing, and the volume ofrelated work continues to rise. There are now approximately 800,000Japanese nationals living abroad, and more than 16 million Japanesetravel to foreign countries each year. Thus, the consular worksconducted by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, including theprotection of Japanese nationals overseas, are continuing to expandand to become more diverse. (For example, the number of Japanesetravelling abroad in 1998 was about 1.5 times the 1990 level).Various international initiatives are being taken to secure peace andprosperity in the international community as a whole in the 21stcentury. It is incumbent upon Japan to continue activelyparticipating in such efforts and to fulfil a role that befits thenation's international status. In order to respond more actively andpromptly to these diplomatic needs, which are expanding both

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It is indeed possible to equate this rather crisply withoutundue simplification. A rapid rewind. During the 1950s and1960s, Japan’s foreign policy actions were guided by threebasic principles: first, close cooperation with the UnitedStates for both security and economic reasons; second,promotion of a free-trade system congenial to Japan's owneconomic needs; and third and last, internationalcooperation through the United Nations (UN)—to which it wasadmitted in 1956—and other multilateral bodies of which itbecame a member. Adherence to these principles workedrather well, and it contributed to a rapid economicrecovery and growth during the first two decades after theend of the US occupation. In the 1970s, these three basicpost-war principles remained essentially unchanged – butwere approached from a new perspective, owing to the‘pragmatic’ demands of practical politics at home andabroad. There was growing domestic pressure on thegovernment to exercise more foreign policy initiativesindependent of the United States, without, however,compromising the vital security of Japan and its by thenmany economic ties. External constraints converged withthese internal ones. The so-called ‘Nixon shock’ and the‘ping-pong diplomacy’ that surrounded it – involving thesurprise visit to China by US President Richard Nixon andthe sudden reconciliation in Sino-American relations – alsofavoured a more independent Japanese foreign policy. Asimilar move in Sino-Japanese relations naturally followed.

quantitatively and qualitatively and becoming more complex, it isessential to improve and strengthen Japan's diplomatic administrativestructure. Specifically, while moving forward with administrativereforms, the number of staff working at the Ministry of ForeignAffairs, which is still insufficient compared with the diplomaticstaffing levels of other developed countries, needs to be increased.(While exact comparisons are difficult, the number of Japanesediplomatic staff is about one-fourth of that in the United States andlower than that in France, Germany, and the United Kingdom.)Furthermore, efforts must be advanced to improve Japan's diplomaticorganizations, to reinforce the functions of Japanese diplomaticmissions abroad, and to expedite the adoption of informationtechnologies”; retrieved on 21.07.08, at http://www.mofa.go.jp/policy/other/bluebook/2001/chap4-a.html.

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In other words, centrifugal forces appeared to be at workwhich pushed for the assumption of an increased autonomy ofJapanese positioning in international arenas. Inevitably,Japanese diplomats duly adjusted, Japan’s Foreign ServiceTraining Institute trying to follow behind these changes158.Things were not, of course, going to stand still for verylong, and so further adaptive moves were called upon. Thenation's unexpectedly fast economic growth had made it aranking world economic power by the early 1970’s and hadgenerated a sense of pride and self-esteem, especiallyamong the younger generation, which could only push tostrengthen these propensities. And so it did, as the demandfor a more independent foreign policy reflected theconvergence of this enhanced self-image with the pressureof rapidly changing and often adverse exogenous conditions.The deepening Sino-Soviet split and confrontation, thedramatic rapprochement between the United States and China,the rapid reduction of the United States military presencein Asia following the War in Vietnam (the Second IndochinaWar, which lasted from 1954 to 1975), and the 1970’s

158 For an interesting early to mid-90’s post-First Gulf War study onthe changes to Japan’s diplomatic place in the post-bipolar world,see (ed.) Danny Unger (1993), Japan's Emerging Global Role: An Institute for theStudy of Diplomacy Book, Lynne Rienner. As Unger writes in his Preface,“Through the 1980s, Japan's emergence as an economic power grewincreasingly visible. Its diplomatic profile, however, changed lessdramatically. In fact, Japan has been undertaking important newinitiatives in its political and security policies; but these do notseem to add up to a coherent international posture. It remains clearto observers both inside Japan and abroad that the country has notyet adequately identified its global interests and the means by whichit proposes to pursue them. Meanwhile, pressures continue to mountfor Japan to acknowledge forthrightly its stakes in the internationalpolitical economy and to act to serve those. With economic andtechnological strength becoming increasingly important bases ofinternational power, Japan clearly has some of the capabilitiesneeded to shape the international system to suit its interests.Certainly Japan finds it increasingly difficult to watch theunfolding of global economic and political struggles from thesidelines. Although it played a large role in funding the Gulf War,its voice was not heard in decision-making circles. And it resented"taxation without representation".

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expansion of Soviet military power in the Western Pacificall required a re-evaluation of Japan's security positionand overall role both in Southeast Asia and the so-calledfar East and in Asia as a whole. Changes in world economicrelations during the 1970’s also encouraged the preferencefor a more independent external political stance. After awell-manoeuvred reaction to the 1973 oil crisis whichinsured it direct access to energy supplies via bilaterallinks with producers (drawn by Japanese politicians at homeand largely shored up by its diplomats abroad), Japan hadbecome less dependent on the Western powers forresources159. In the early 80’s the United States continuedits 70’s slide to become to the world's largest debtor atthe end of the decade. Japan became the world's largestcreditor, an increasingly active investor in the UnitedStates, and a major contributor to international debtrelief, financial institutions, and other internationalassistance efforts. By that period, Japan had also becomethe World’s second largest donor of foreign aid. Naturally,once again, the training of Japanese diplomats was bound tofollow pressures to adapt to these new economic and oftenmultilateral tasks and, to some extent, it did so with somesuccess.In good truth, it had to. As in often the case,bureaucratic inertia tends to join forces withtraditionalist postures, and this as a rule impedesnecessary adaptive moves. But by the 90’s Japan's foreignpolicy choices appeared to often challenge the nationalleadership's tendency to steer clear of radical shifts andto rely, instead, on small incremental adjustments. Thistranslated into some changes, and ones to which, again andagain, Japanese diplomats had to adjust. Although stillgenerally supportive of close ties with the United States,159 This involved unusually robust Japanese diplomatic action. Oil,for example, was obtained directly from the producing countries inthe Middle East and not from the Western-controlled multinationalcompanies. Other important materials also came increasingly fromsources other than the United States and its allies, while trade withthe United States as a share of total trade dropped significantlyduring the decade of the 1970s.

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including the extant military alliance relationship,Japanese leaders – and, increasingly, non-State actors whohad come into the game mostly in these post-bipolar years160

– were well aware of strong and sometimes fairly vocalAmerican reactions of frustration with Japanese economicpractices (particularly if they conflicted with USperceived interests) and with Japan's growing economicpower in proportion to that of the US. Once more, it iseasy to see how the regional and global conjuncturesfavoured that. The collapse of the Soviet Union and thegrowing preoccupation of its former Republics and the so-called Central and East European States with internalpolitical and economic problems increased the importance toJapan of economic competition, rather than military power.Most of these formerly communist countries were seekingaid, trade, and technical benefits from the developedcountries, and Japan was a major ready and willing providerof those. The partly financial containment of North Korean‘blackmail’ was costing ever more dearly. The power ofJapan's ally, the United States, was also seen by manyJapanese as waning. As a matter of fact, the US were led tolook increasingly to Japan and others (such as Germany) toshoulder a large share of both the financial burden160 A few comments on non-State domestic opinion makers which, aselsewhere, in Japan affect foreign policy often decisively. Insidethe country, both elite and popular opinion expressed growing supportfor a more prominent international role, proportionate to thenation's economic power, foreign assistance, trade, and investment.But the traditional post-World War II reluctance to take a greatermilitary role in the world remained unscathed. Except for security-related matters, most foreign affairs issues involved economicinterests and mainly attracted the attention of the specific groupsaffected. The role of interest groups in formulating foreign policyunsurprisingly varied according to the nature of the interestsinvolved. The role of national public opinion in the formulation offoreign policy throughout the post-war period has been difficult todetermine. Japan continued to be extremely concerned with publicopinion, and opinion polling became a conspicuous feature of nationallife. The media is the chief source of demands that the governmentexercise a more independent and less ‘dovish’ diplomacy in view ofthe changing world situation and Japan's increased stature in theworld.

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entailed in the transformation of former communisteconomies in Eastern Europe and that of other urgentinternational requirements such as localized wars thatexploded a bit everywhere in this turbulent post-bipolardecade. As elsewhere, new diplomatic areas ofspecialization were called for – as thus new roles wererequired of the Foreign Service Training Institute. Japanesediplomats nowadays must be prepared to be more thaneconomic facilitators. As could be expected from a highlyorganized State like Japan, their training curriculumfollows suit. Even though Japan is a member of a wide range ofmultilateral entities, some of them with real clout, as theG-8, its international high standing is a in a non-irrelevant part a product of its role as a world first-class economic powerhouse. In a largely Hobbesianinternational scenery we might be tempted to envisage thisas an example of soft power or, perhaps rather, of‘structural power’161. While this is true, it is only partly so; Japan’s closepolitical and military ties to the United States mean wecannot think of it as a much bloated Switzerland, butshould, instead, understand it – as many Japanesepoliticians increasingly do, sometimes with some discomfort– as an ‘emissary potency’ struggling to emancipate itselfand gain autonomy. The rise of competing economic giants inthe region at large adds to the national politicalconundrum. It is perhaps not too great a risk to think ofthis as the next grand challenge Japan’s diplomats must beprepared for. Its bid for a permanent seat at the UN showstheir awareness of that general panorama162. Reactively or

161 See Susan Strange (1996) The Retreat of the State. The diffusion of power in theworld economy, Cambridge University Press. In a manner somewhatreminiscent of Joseph Nye’s distinction between ‘soft power’ and‘hard power’, but with a diverse analytical scope, S. Strangecontrasts ‘structural power’ to ‘relational power’.162 For a good summary on the more recent internal overview of Japan’schanging international roles, it is worth our while to read thespeech by Taro Aso, Minister for Foreign Affairs, on the occasion ofThe Japan Institute of International Affairs November 30, 2006 Seminar entitled

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pro-actively, Japan will in the next few years re-adjustits position in the world163. Surely Japan’s many admirers and allies hope the ForeignService Training Institute will be capable of rising up to meet itwith the efficiency that comparatively lean institution hasso far been able to demonstrate. Adaptive additions mostlytook the shape of capacity-building curricular adjustments,instead of full-fledged pedagogical and institutionalreforms. The Japanese diplomatic training institution alsoreflects unchanging characteristics of Japanese teachingand learning – individual efforts guided by a seniors andlifelong specialization refreshed by ongoing seminars. Isthat enough?In what concerns the most populous Muslim country in theworld, Indonesia, there is a Centre for Education & Training (CET)of the Foreign Ministry (locally termed, for administrativereasons, the Department of Foreign Affairs) which wascreated at the beginning of the 70’s; this entity had apedigree, as it followed the establishment of a ForeignService Academy founded in 1949 – during the struggle for

"Arc of Freedom and Prosperity: Japan's Expanding DiplomaticHorizons" (a detailed and thoughtful document found online athttp://www.mofa.go.jp/announce/fm/aso/speech0611.html on 21-07.08).It is instructive to read this speech in parallel with the book-length study by Yutaka Kawashima (2005), Japanese Foreign Policy atthe Crossroads. Challenges and Options for the Twenty-First Century, BrookingsInstitution Press . A former Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs from1999 to 2001, Kawashima was Japan's highest-ranking foreign serviceofficial who, after his retirement carried out research as aDistinguished Visiting Fellow at the Brookings Institution's Centrefor Northeast Asian Policy Studies and taught at the John F. KennedySchool of Government, Harvard University. 163 A tectonic shock might rapidly drive Japan into a more proactivediplomatic stance. In an already quoted book, Yutaka Kawashima (2005,op. cit.: 21), makes some interesting claims, like the following: ‘theoil crisis’ – later called the ‘oil shock’ – was the first instancesince the end of World War II in which the Japanese acutely felttheir vulnerability to dependence on foreign resources. Its imprinton the national psyche will not fade easily and may quickly reappearif another crisis affecting the oil supply should erupt”. Food forthought.

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independence from Holland – by Minister Ahmad Soebardjo164.In an initial phase the Centre was exclusively destined tothe training of diplomats; today it has been widened toinclude non-diplomatic staff of the Ministry and traineesfrom other Ministries, as well as members of local andprovincial governments. The CET is run by a senior diplomat and, in its fold,courses for diplomats at the beginning, middle, and end oftheir careers are organised and delivered. A trulyecumenical entity, the Centre defines “the training ofdiplomats, non-diplomats, the co-operation with otherinstitutions, universities, international organisations,concessions of grants and administrative help” as its mainobjectives. The pedagogical model followed is marked by itshybridity: the initial training cycle lasts for a period ofalmost two years, with an introductory module of one monthand another of a year, focused on theory (emphasisingsubjects such as Law, Economics, and languages); it thenincludes as a final requirement the presentation of adissertation, before finally placing trainees in aMinisterial department and on post165. Indonesian authorities appear to be keenly aware of theneed to enhance and modernize their training of diplomatsas a sine qua non for the country’s standing in thecontemporary world166. As the official site of the

164 For a remarkable study on the applicability of Western concepts toIndonesia’s foreign policy, see Daniel Novótny (2004), “Indonesia’sForeign Policy, in Quest for the Balance of Threats”, a paperpresented to the 15th Biennial Conference of the Asian StudiesAssociation of Australia in Canberra 29 June-2 July, retrieved on20.07.2008 at http://coombs.anu.edu.au/SpecialProj/ASAA/biennial-conference/2004/Novotny-D-ASAA2004.pdf.165 D. Polloni (1996), idem, ibid., p. 31.166 And not only via the CET; also by means of a sort of think-tankfor policy analysis and planning, the Policy Analysis and Development Agency.As the DFA states, “[s]ince implementing the organization’srestructurization [sic] on the 1st of March 2002, the Policy Analysisand Development Agency of the Department of Foreign Affairs of theRepublic of Indonesia (BPPK) has undertaken necessary steps andmeasures as to fulfil its obligations which are: first, to analyzeand to develop foreign policy; second, to formulate policy in order

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Indonesian Department of Foreign Affairs puts it, “[t]heposition [of the Department of Foreign Affairs to play theleading role in assisting the duties of the President inthe implementation of foreign relations and realization offoreign politics] becomes important considering thechallenges of the realization of foreign politics anddiplomacy of Indonesia today is very complex, with everyvariant of dynamic changes of foreign relations. Therefore,the Department of Foreign Affairs realizes the importanceof focusing the policy of foreign politics on measureswhich are capable of realizing the national interest. Theeffort can only be done optimally and effectively ifsupported by affirmation and qualification of humanresources necessary according to the policy strategyapplied. Today, the Department of Foreign Affairs will keepon continuing the introspection process which includes thedevelopment of human resource quality, as the reliable andprofessional main implementer of diplomacy. The developmentof human resources and career building for diplomats is thething that needs attention and a large amount of supportalso to be carried out wholeheartedly. Development andimprovement measures of human resources quality arenecessary to be done continuously and comprehensively”167. Ahope many of Indonesia’s friends, in ASEAN and outside it,most certainly and fervently share.

to establish future direction mainly Indonesia’s official stances oninternational issues by referring to policies defined by the ForeignMinister”. A tall order. After the disappearance of the Non-AlignedMovement, the end of bipolarity, and the painful independence ofEast-Timor, and ‘ethnic’ irredentist trouble a bit everywhere, fromthe Moluccas to Irian Jaya, Indonesia has indeed had a hard timeadapting to a changing international regional and global environment.167For this, see http://www.deplu.go.id/?category_id=12&news_id=505&main_id=1. The quotations were downloadedon 20.07.08.

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3.5. Sub-Saharan Africa

To draw to a close, it is certainly worth our while todedicate some attention to Africa. In sub-Saharan Africathere is a growing preoccupation with the training of theyoung diplomats who are to be sent to somewhere on theContinent or to the rest of the world. It is true that, inmany cases, for the initial and complementary trainingprocess of their diplomats, the new African States appealto their respective colonial ex-Metropolises. However thisis not by any means always so: there are several cases inwhich the local creation of associated Universityinstitutions – or the establishment of formal institutionalties, internal and external, which these types of entities– is becoming the rule. Of the many possible examples, I choose two, noteworthy forthe significance they had in the creation, in two verydifferent Universities, of postgraduate courses in domainsrelated to International Politics — one in an Africancountry within the historical British colonial sphere andanother one in the French. In the University of Nairobi, inKenya, there is an Institute of Diplomacy and International Studies,which offers masters degrees and doctorates inInternational Studies, and which also boasts of a post-graduation in International Relations168. In the University ofCameroon, there is a somewhat similar institution, whichwas created in 1971, the IRIC (Institut de Relations Internationalesde Cameroun), in which it is possible to obtain a Diplômed’Études Aprofondis (DEA), and even a doctorate (a Doctorat), inDiplomacy169. South African deserves special attention for its size,power, and tragic historical specificities, and for the168 See http://www.uonbi.ac.ke/faculties/faculty_page.php?fac_code=46(consulted 20.07.08) for some further information on the design andformal traits of this Kenyan Institute. 169 For this second example, that of the diplomatic traininginstitution of the Cameroon, in Yaoundé seehttp://hostings.diplomacy.edu/IRIC/(last accessed on 20.07.08). ThePresidential decree N0 71/DF/95/BIS of the 27th April 1971, IRIC isone of the five ‘segments’ that form the University of Yaoundé II.

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knock-on effect which it certainly has over the wholeContinent, or at least in sub-Saharan Africa. The SouthAfrican example is, furthermore, intrinsically interesting.In effect, this country organised a Foreign Service Institute(FSI, precisely the same name and acronym as those of itsgargantuan American analogue) for diplomatic training in apolitically relevant moment of the transformation of theconstitutional order of the country, in the 90s170. In doingso, it has appealed to a spirit of openness to civilsociety – a posture which contrasts sharply with theprevious inclinations for internal exclusiveness andinternational isolation, in which the foreign policy of thecountry was decided via highly secretive methods171.The South African initial diplomatic training (DiplomaticTraining Program, DTP) is complemented by language learningand training in administrative tasks. Their targets arediverse and different types of training are applicable todiplomats of different levels. Any Head of Mission,Ambassador, High Commissioner, or beginner diplomat, isobliged to attend the FSI – on the implicit presumptionthat its contribution will be that of reinforcing theiracademic background training through an involvement in realdiplomacy, in a modality which includes “collaboration withequivalent institutions”. Added to this is the convictionthat the best defence of the country’s interests flowslargely out of knowledge: as its constitutive legal diplomaclaims, “diplomats […] need to be familiar with the socialand economic policies of South Africa (education, health,welfare, labour, economy, trade, defence, and security),and South Africa's political, legal and justice system”.Other than that, the staff enrolled receives training invital areas of diplomacy, that is, in “the practical skillsof negotiation, conflict management and resolution,

170 John Barratt and Peter Vale, “Diplomatic Training in South Africa:Sharing Perspectives”, in Global Dialogue, volume 3.3, December 1998.171 An interesting report on the South African FSI role is to be foundin Theunis Aldrich and Prince Mashele (2003), “A Ten Year Review ofthe Foreign Service Institute”, Institute for Global Dialogue, Braamfontein,Johannesburg.

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multilateral diplomacy, trade and investment promotion,public and media relations, public speaking, preparation ofspeeches, cultural diversity and protocol and etiquette”.The valorisation of specialists and academics is another ofits priorities and, for this purpose, the FSI recruitsprofessors from the Universities of Durban, Cape Town,Witwatersrand, South Africa and Pretoria, academics who notonly give conferences and run courses there, but alsoregularly suggest new contents for the DTP. The recipe isdeemed to be rather successful. The quality that it hasachieved has made the FSI attractive for diplomats fromneighbouring countries; it also recently established apartnership with the Southern Africa Development Community(SADC), which will possibly give it a pivotal role in thesub-region. After apartheid, a renewed South Africa isobviously vying for an international weight and protagonismit never really had – and which it feels it deserves.Allow me to cite still another country which, havingrecently churned up a cycle of normalisation in itspolitical life and economy has shown a preoccupation toconsolidate its position in the Continent, although withmuch less success: Zimbabwe172. The Zimbabwe Institute forInternational Affairs (ZIIA) was created in 2002, as aconsequence of the reform carried out in the Zimbabwe ForeignService Institute. It emerged with the objective of creating adiplomatic corps prepared “with the competencies andknowledge necessary to put into practice the objectives ofthe country’s foreign policy”. The ZIIA is integrated inthe Ministry of Foreign Affairs and it organises a trainingprogram, under the responsibility of the Diplomacy andInternational Affairs Department of the MFA, aimed atdiplomats at the beginning of their career; it also makestraining cycles available to Ministerial staff and to otherdepartments of the Zimbabwean State with display “anexternal component”.

172 A position it could unfortunately very rapidly loose if thetensions and political impasses of the last few years continue toderail the internal and external situation of Zimbabwe for muchlonger.

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If only for comparative purposes, it is worth going into alittle detail of the more distinctive characteristics ofthe Zimbabwean model. The ZIIA basic course has two mainmodules, the first having a mark of initiation to thepolitical diplomatic structures of the country, withsubjects such as “the Government of Zimbabwe: Structure andProcesses; structure and functions of the Ministry ofForeign Affairs; the Political Economy of Zimbabwe;Zimbabwe's Foreign Policy; Diplomatic Practice;International Relations; International Law; InternationalEconomic Relations; Strategic and Security Studies;Regional and International Organisations; Communicationsand Media Studies”; and includes yet a second, this onevery much more pledged to the acquisition of aspecialisation: “Analytical Skills; Negotiating Skills;Economic Diplomacy; Multilateral Diplomacy; Trade,Investment and Tourism Promotion; Human Rights, GoodGovernance and Democracy; Conflict Prevention, Managementand Resolution; Administrative and Financial Skills;Language Training; Information Technology”. Making its ownan easily recognisable pattern similar to that followed alittle all over the contemporary world, the curricularcomposition of the course offered in Zimbabwe is fairlydiversified, adopting a format which includes conferences,debate, group projects, simulation exercises, case studies,presentations of projects, workshops, field trips, etc.. Inthe present state of affairs in the country, clearly toohigh an expectation.

Country Duration oftraining

Type of training

Spain 6-8 months/full time theoryItaly 9 months/full time theory/practicalUnited Kingdom Short

specialisation theory/practical

Holland 5 months/full time theory/practicalAustria 1 year/full time theory/practicalGermany 3 years/full time theory/practicalFrance ? practicalSweden 9 months/full time theory/practical

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Country Duration oftraining

Type of training

Czech Republic 5 months/ full time theory thenPoland 18 months/full time theoryEstonia 2 months/full time theory/practicalRussian 3 years/full time theoryNorway 3 years/full time theory/practicalUSA 3 months-1 year/full theory/practicalChile 16 months/full time theoryBrazil 2 years/full time theoryIsrael university/full time theoryEgypt 1 year/full time theoryP.R. China ? theoryIndia 10 months/full time theoryIndonesia 2 years theoryJapanKenya

?university

theory/practicaltheory

Cameroon university theorySouth Africa ? theory/practicalZimbabwe ? theory

Figure 1. A brief comparative table of diplomatic training as seen fromthe perspective of a professional/academic dichotomy. Note this tableonly focuses on one of the many possible ‘axes’ which subtend thetopological clustering of training modalities, to coin a concept.Many others (from real-world fit to administrative design,independence and adequacy, or linked to contents and pedagogicalmethods followed, or even bureaucratic closure vs. openness) woulddraw useful complementary dimensions to these clusters. Note thatquite a few other cases are treated in the Annex.

One could, obviously, compose a very much longer list ofexamples, just as it would be easy to look deeper (at leastin those cases where data is readily available) into eachof them and specify similarities and differences, valences,insufficiencies, and tensions. In other words, one couldeasily increase depth of detail. It appears, however, thatthis is not really necessary, as quite a few significantpatterns emerge clearly from the simplest ofjuxtapositions. Before continuing onto the next sectionwhich, as I indicated at the outset is devoted to a fullerdecomposition of the parallel constraints which act in the

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Portuguese case, let us try and pull some strings togetherfrom the various examples thus far scrutinized.After a longish tour de table, what have we been able toascertain? It is prudent to move step by step and to movedown, as it were, from the more to the less general. I haveclaimed at the beginning of this section that moderntraining strategies — or teaching-learning ones, to be moreprecise — tend to crop up, above all, in States with robusteducational systems; this, of course, is rather noteworthy,if not unexpected. I tried to show that, in fact, that isindeed the case, although by no means in a homogeneousfashion. Not surprisingly, too, modern diplomatic trainingstrategies sometimes appear also in States with less stouthigher education systems which happen to be in the orbit ofwell served ones, something I also tried to bring out in myanalytical descriptions. The data set allows us to try for additional resolution.Looking back, it is surely not far-fetched to assert thatit appears that amongst these States with healthy and full-bodied higher education systems, two quite distinctsubgroups can fairly easily be made out: one of themcomprises large scale States with a real or desired, pastor present, global or regional influence and clout; and, atthe other end of what may actually better be thought of asa continuum (this too may be elicited from the familyresemblances intuited from the data), another subset may bemade out, one which includes small, sometimes exiguous, butsimultaneously ambitious States. We can surely go further without abusing the ‘carryingcapacity’ of the data presented. If and when theycalibrated within the framework of the general scaffoldingof these groupings and the continuum to which they givebody, even those teaching-learning strategies thatapparently constitute exceptions – as is the case, at anyrate at first glance and in a partial sense, with France,Britain, and perhaps Japan – may easily be understood interms of a parallel explanation, a conjecturaljustification which does not exceed, in any way, mysuggested framework: it is precisely through an a priori

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academic selection, carried out in very good quality higherlearning institutions specifically designed to that effect,that France and Britain, and perchance Japan, can skirt andavoid – or, at least, is it by invoking such ‘filtering’and by closing ranks about it that its ruling elites haveso far been be able to stave off and keep at bay – themodern types of competitive and meritocratic trainingsystems for diplomacy which, as we saw, are focused on theindispensable technical preparation of these strategiccivil servants. Moreover, the data appears to corroborate what for many ofus are spontaneous, or intuitive, hypothesis about theshape of the most effective style of training, the stylethat, in actuality, experience shows to be more efficaciousin the raising of future diplomats. The emergent clustersin our data-set and the continuous adaptive changestraining formatting tends to undergo show, I want toinsist, that a composite academic cum professionalizingcomposite format with a marked academic skewing is quitesystematically preferred by successful States within eitherof our two groupings as a ‘best practice’. As I underlinedearlier on, what is at stake is not necessarily University-style training as such, but rather part of its methodology:that is, a composite, or hybrid, training centred, not asin Universities, on theoretical discussions and outlooks,but rather on the complex interaction of manifold(political, legal, economic, military, social,environmental, even personal) factors in the dynamics ofreal-world contemporary issues – although, of course,theoretical in reach for new emergent internationalrealities to be understood by the diplomatic student-professional. Such is openly evident not only in modern’States, but also in political-geographic ones less touchedby modernity: whether we are in Latin America, in Africa,or in many parts of Asia, a dualistic academic pattern (onecan call it that) I have defined – of academic plus‘professional’ training, with a tonic accent on theacademic leg – is, mutatis mutandis of course, clearlypresent.

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This constitutes the most interesting upshot of thestrategy of uncontrolled comparison I followed. Itcertainly is one with great potential normative impact.Although the advantages of academic-style professionaltraining should not constitute a surprise (as that, ofcourse, is also the case for most other professional typesof modern expertise), it is something which tends to be asif hidden by the canonical conventional wisdom ofdiplomatic hierarchies unfortunately keener to resolvetheir immediate administrative personnel problems andfearful of losing some control of operations in what theyoften come to regard as their own turf, than withameliorating, in the long run, the quality andeffectiveness of diplomatic roles. Unfortunately for theprofession, experience is indeed the harshest of teachers.Finally, the data set scrutinized makes it relatively easyfor us to bring to light the various constraints whichinteract to format the modalities of the diplomatictraining which actually takes place, the transformations itgoes through, and even its ‘precision’ and the intensitythat, in each case, is bestowed on it. Insofar as I hadreliable information available, I tried to bring this outas plainly as possible and without undue reductionism. Inmost examples, it was for instance easy to notice theinterplay of positive political pressures inducing changes,with negative (passive and active) administrativeresistances and viscosities inhibiting them, together withother many background ‘traditionalist’ or the few‘progressivist’ ones which generally seem to have a lessclear-cut effect. Above all, it was clear to see that wewould be hard put to presume that one size fits all, as faras training for diplomacy is concerned: it really does not.

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4. Patterns of diplomatic training as adaptive mechanismsand as expedients for clout: a genealogy of the Portuguesecounter-example

The development of strategic missiles also produced controversy over roles and missions,although it lacked the intensity of the other fights because it did not threaten the essence of

any of the services.Morton H. Halperin and Priscilla A. Clapp, Bureaucratic Politics and Foreign

Policy

Bearing these comparisons and these hypotheses in mind, Inow want to turn my attention to the Portuguese case. Thisis relevant since most – if not all – of the variedpatterns of constraints and of evolution mentioned inchapter 2 of this study were felt both in the conduction ofPortuguese external policy and in the minds of thoseresponsible for executing it, and these are matters which Ishall try to examine more closely in what follows. Theywere, however, not truly reflected in diplomatic training.As we shall see, the impact of its evolution-progression ata national level, in its various stages, was very light, atleast in comparative terms. Diplomatic training, inPortugal, in other words, was never actually given thecentrality and attention it deserves.Such is particularly intriguing as, being a small tomedium-sized State with a historical international positionto defend and the means to do so (that is, it beingactually a member of both macro groupings I spotted asthose in which a more intensive preparation of diplomats isto be expected – Portugal after all, is both a formerglobal power keen to activate its global historicalnetwork, and nowadays a small-medium sized State with aninternally widely shared ambition of batting above itsweight), the Portuguese State for a long time did notappear to behave as expected as far as the training of itsdiplomats has been concerned. Why would this have been thecase?

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4.1. The far vicinity: the politics of corporatist bureaucracies

What is, in other words, the genealogy of Portuguesediplomatic training, and how can we, in a comparativecontext, diagnose the difficulties it has faced? I onceagain want to stress that it is not at all my intention tosuggest any historical narrative, which, in any case which,would be hard to bestow autonomy in a convincing way. WhatI do intend to do is to draw up major lines of force bystressing fluctuations and duly highlighting continuities.I begin by referring to the second half of the eighteenhundreds and to an Portuguese activity abroad (diplomaticand political) with general traits which were at least inpart a result of the place it held in the internationalsystem of a country which then “weighed very little in thescales of Europe”, to use the eloquent words ViscountAlmeida Garrett. The effective influence of Portugal in itsAfrican and Asian colonies was not great. Our formallinking, in a still small and almost entirely centred inEurope international system of States, could onlyidealistically be characterised as any more than exiguous. In effect, besides and beyond the import of a already thenold relation with the “old and perfidious Albion”, with anewly independent Brazil with whom diplomatic relationswere beginning to reach a normal cruising speed, face toface with an increase in weight of the United States ofAmerica, France, Spain (and not forgetting the Holy See,with its sui generis status and exquisite diplomacy), Portugalmaintained few permanent legations in other countries. As apredictable result the Portuguese national diplomatic corpswas small and – and in this respect it not too differentfrom those of other countries – the diminutive body washeavily tributary to the particular details of the AncienRégime which formed its social and political ecosystem. The arrival of the 20th Century would mean changes in ouractive political-diplomatic incorporation into aninternational system which itself faced transformations.The end of the Monarchy – as previously had been the case

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with the Restauração that came about after independence fromsixty years of Spanish rule (it lasted from 1580 to 1640,under three Filipes) was achieved – forced the rapidopening of a new front in the arduous diplomatic battlewhich quickly arose around the recognition of the newRepublic, in 1910. An international system which struggledto achieve a consensus and a normalisation which would beas universal as possible did not coexist peacefully withturbulent revolutions at the level of sovereignty or atthat of the form of the States which were its centralpieces. The clash which developed as a result of that change wasnot, however, an isolated one, embedded as it was in aprocess of a swift deepening of our diplomatic andpolitical relationships with the outside. Indeed, in thisphase of multiple transitions, there were many othermoments of rupture. The decisive reign of D. Carlos I, forinstance, in the last few years of the 19th Century and thefirst half-dozen ones of the 20th (he was assassinated in1908) was proficuous in what concerns the involvement ofthe Portuguese State in Edwardian démarches aimed atpromoting an entente cordiale designed to sustain theperiodical warmongering impetus that so blatantly hurt theOld Continent and which Europe wanted at all costs to tryto avoid. When matters of State or of sovereignty were notdirectly and clearly at stake – and they tended to beconflated with each other – the traditionally personalisedmechanisms used for the settlement of disputes and theresolution of quarrels (based, as they were, on theparticular rationale of an order held by kinship-basedalliances between members of the European elites) would nottoil too shoddily. In a fashion quite agreeable to thetastes prevalent at the time, largely everything becamepossible given the ties of kin and kith – often based in acommon appreciation for “women, banquets, cigars, and saucyrumours” – existent between the Marquis de Soveral and KingEdward VII; in a board still so characterised byconservatism and a person-centred approach which reached

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forwards from the past, these sorts of transversalingredients worked.Soon enough, however, stakes would go up and the rules ofthe game would rather dramatically change: the survival ofan Empire threatened by the widespread scramble for Africa– thus was pondered, in the spirit of the time, much of aPortuguese global reach which was dwindling since at leastthe loss of Brazil – got Portugal involved in World War I;and that, in turn, immediately brought us into closecontact with the reality of a new diplomacy whichVersailles helped consolidate. Once again, a transformationof weight and consequence was initiated. Whether we wereready for it or not, whether we desired or not, the factwas that the need for a different diplomacy and the urgencyof a sustained planning which could anchor a real nationalforeign policy went hand in hand. Strains gradually settledin: only one generation previously, the English Ultimatumhad pre-announced them. The participations of Egas Monizand that of the much more radical Afonso Costa in thenegotiations of the post-Great War, display rather well thegrowing perception of a different sort of Portugueseinvolvement in an international order which in a shortinterval of a few years suffered great modifications. Changes rapidly followed each other in a snowball whichclearly throws light upon the interdependency of, on theone hand, pressures originated abroad and, on the other,internal domestic factors. If we focus in only one of themajor planes of what that meant in the generic domain thatwe have been alluding to, we can recall the establishmentof the Estado Novo through a military coup in 1926 and thepersonal and direct involvement, in international questionswhose impact on the national life was ever greater, of thenew President of the Council of Ministers and Minister ofForeign Affairs, António de Oliveira Salazar. And, surely,that deeply changed the style of action of the growing bodyof Portuguese diplomats. A crucial merger had taken place.It was no doubt an impetus that came from within, as itwere: but nevertheless one which, ab initio, was articulatedwith the outside.

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In the new international order that was rapidly forming,the Portuguese structural permeability to “externalities”increased in an inexorable way173. The Spanish Civil War,during the rapid and yet painful 30’s, constituted a firsttest of a renewed acceleration of changes, inducing manynew ones. But, it was doubtlessly the end of World War IIwhich, as an essential milestone, made it imperative totransform the traditional role of the diplomat by renderingthe weakening of Portuguese diplomatic influence quite anevident issue. Up to then it was difficult to access the“career”, as it was by then called, and the Portuguesenational diplomatic corps was indeed very small174.After the defeat of the Axis inflicted by the Allies all ofthat, slowly but surely, would change – and it would do so,paradoxically, while intensifying even more a propensityfor external porosity and internal political dependencewhich came from the past. In the post-war Portuguese

173 A few historically-minded works have been recently published onthis period. To cite but three authors: António J. Telo, Ana Leal deFaria, and Pedro Aires de Oliveira. All express their own particularreadings. For the interval and its background, see, mainly, themonographs written by António José Telo, the short Pedro Aires deOliveira (2006), “O Corpo Diplomático e o Regime Autoritário”, AnáliseSocial, vol. XLI, no. 178: 145-166, and Ana Leal de Faria (2006),“Sociologia dos ‘negociadores’. Perfil intelectual e social dosdiplomatas portugueses (1640-1750), Negócios Estrangeiros, 10: 341-361. Ioffer my own interpretation, one with a very different focus and moregenealogical than historical preoccupations, which does notnecessarily coincide with either of these.174 A “career”, however, only since then truly institutionalized in acentral place, which clearly exhibits a significant temporal décalagewith the much earlier French, British, or American examples I alludedto earlier. What could be seen until then was a high level ofpoliticization which afflicted the Portuguese diplomatic corps: themost important places were politically nominated — they were now byties of ascendency, now for political ideological motives, now fordeep reasons to impose the mobilization of specifically heaviernational entities, that the greatest problems (such as those whichwere multiplying) required. Until the second phase of the Estado Novo,and except in very cases, the career diplomats saw themselvesdowngraded into the small existing Legations, or in the Secretary ofState (the Foreign Ministry, as it was called in daily parlance), inLisbon.

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political-strategic attitude, within a regime at risk ofisolation and forced to survive in a new world order,foreign policy gained a greater importance: so much so thatit became urgent to find the answers to — in and out ofEurope — successive conjunctures which were not speciallyfavourable to the traditional political positions of thePortuguese State. It was ever more imperative to react in amore pro-active way, as we would say today, by changingemphases, attitudes, and behaviour. This, naturally, wasnot prevented from taking place, despite the effort seenalmost as contra natura which it actually then signified. It did that quickly and fairly effectively: both in thepost-war period and in the time of conflict, and theconsequent loss of room to manoeuvre, it was the verysurvival of the regime that was at stake. Acting rapidlyand with firmness became very important and intensifyingpolitical control deemed crucial. Recruiting new personnelwas indispensable. It also in time proved vital to changeattitudes, although in this field efforts were lesssuccessful. And there was the need to multiply the frontsof action, by immediately increasing its points ofimplementation and also by amplifying their status. As aresult, a new chapter of sorts was reached. Continuing thegrowth initiated with the sorrows of the long 19th Century,worsened by the Ultimatum, a reaction to which theestablishment of the Republic gave a strong impetus andwhich restarted in full after the Great War of 1914-1918, areorganisation was imperative in a new post-war period. AsAmbassador António Leite de Faria pointed out, after 1945the few Legations became Embassies in what became known as“diplomatic inflation”175; which, as in all cases of suddeninflation, brought out a very marked dark side.Effectively, with the end of the 1939-1945 conflict, and toa Portuguese State suddenly seen as atypical in aninternational system ever more homogenised according todemocratic criteria, not only did the demands of foreignpolicy became ever more heavy, but the means and the number

175 (org.) António José Telo, António de Faria. Colecção DiplomatasPortugueses 2, Lisboa: Edições Cosmos, 2001, p. 466.

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of agents who actually put it into practice also increaseddramatically. It was lived as a period of crisis, althoughit was softened by the fact that the victor powers werebusy with other worries. Moreover, the sudden growth in size and importance ofdiplomacy had a price. It was felt that, as a result ofone, the other, or both of those things, a new discrepancy,a distance, had effectively arisen between the emergentreality of a diplomatic life being reconverted in face of anew conjunction of, first, post war international politicsand, second, the need for a stubborn defence of Portugal’sposition in an international system that was increasinglyless favourable for the installed regime. Building a bridgebetween these two worlds was not an easy thing to do: amaterial fact which internal constraints — structuralrestrictions which worked as so many other limits, like theinsufficiencies of Portuguese Universities and thecorporatist rationale of our Ministries — made finding aresolution an even more difficult affair. An institutionaldeficit seemed inevitable, in the new conjunctures, and theregime could not prevent it from happening.The motives for such incapacity are, in retrospect,moderately easy to equate. On the one hand, the tensionthat grew immediately after the mid 40’s between the SovietUnion and the other Allies — and which ended up in arelatively stable bipolar order — benefited the Portuguesere-entrance, as a partner, on the international stages ofhigh politics, even without having to undergo thesignificant restructuring which was previously thought tobe imperative. In that broader framework, the entry intoNATO, as one of its founding States, was providential:Portugal had little elbow room in which to manoeuvre inmultilateral negotiations, above all on the stage of therecently created UN to which it had not been initiallyinvited, but that the country eventually ended up enteringin 1955 thanks to the definition of a contingent, or quota,produced in the rationale of that very same bipolaritywhich embodied one of the main raisons d’être of theTransatlantic Alliance. The window of opportunity was

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exploited with success by an Estado Novo in crisis butnevertheless attentive to anything that could threaten itssurvival. On the other hand, achieving the strategiccaution required by supervening changes on theinternational arenas became almost a miraculous deed, inthe framework of a Ministry which suddenly saw itselfgrowing explosively and which had to come across asengaging a very deep political reorientation whileeffectively executing as little of one as it possibly couldget away with. The presence of forces pulling in oppositedirections made it hard to adapt the Portuguese Ministry ofForeign Affairs to the crystallising new order – andrendered its reconfiguration, in face of it, all butinevitable.Reacting in a fairly characteristic way, the Estado Novotried to solve the growing institutional deficit through aninternal consolidation of wills. That, of course, involvedboth power and consent. Again the personal factor played andecisive role: it is a good example of this the privilegedaccess of the Chief of Government, Salazar – himselfMinister of Foreign Affairs between 1936 and 1937 – to thenew Minister and to then all powerful Secretary-General:the case of the so called “Santa Comba-Cartaxo axis”, aboutade referring to the proximity and the confidencebetween Salazar and Teixeira de Sampayo. The “classical”expedient and the symbolic closing of ranks that themotions signified were marked by a very characteristicvoluntarism.This manoeuvre, this tactic, however, would not allow –that much is evident to us today – either a correction inthe trade balance, or a reorganization of the internaltraits structural to both the Ministry and the Portuguesediplomatic corps in the context of the Estado Novo. Forsuch, no less than very major changes at the level ofrecruitment, and even greater ones at the kind and depth ofinstruction of the diplomats who entered the Ministry –which should, from then on, have to be much intense – wouldhave been essential. But the political regime of Salazar,enmeshed as it quickly became in endless political-

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ideological considerations which slowed it downconsiderably, and ever heavier due to an institutionalinertia typical of all corporatist systems, was not readyto recognise such changes, and much less to act on them.For that, a deep change of political orientation wouldperhaps have been necessary, or at any rate somethingequivalent to a softening of the regime; something which,naturally, was totally out of question. The steps takenwere thus by default nothing more than short and tentative,and thus amounted to mere gestures manifestly insufficientto inflate the winds of change which would be indispensableif a better adaptation was to be achieved of a smallmedium-sized country forced to live in a changing and evermore hostile world.All of that would become evident in the troubled period ofthe 60’s and 70’s, the two decades that followed thegeneralised wave of European de-colonisations of the 50’sand 60’s that the Portuguese State (courageously andimprudently) refused to ride. Systemic pressures, bothtacit and inexorable, would end up winning over a Stateever more permeable and weakened which insisted in theconservation of a model and a project that blatantly ranagainst the new victorious models of Democracy which hadlargely reconfigured the international order in their ownimage. It is true, as has been often asserted, that a groupof diplomats (small in numbers, but very apt people, as arule), during this long intermezzo and even as they faced theadversity of circumstances with remarkable mastery, managedfor a while to reconcile the full international reinsertionof the Portuguese Estado Novo with a à outrance defence ofEmpire. They did so by making use – amongst others means –of the Azores as a negotiation weapon, while simultaneouslykeeping their attention on the already by then historicallyinevitable continental and European drift of the PortugueseState – with, for example, the Portuguese entrance intoorganizations such as OEEC and EFTA. They achieved that, ultimately, by rising above theimmediacy of current affairs and thus implicitly byavoiding the pure and simple reproduction of the

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traditional diplomatic strategies learned by osmosis:instead, they managed to achieve a squaring of a circle(albeit a temporary ephemeral one) since they as a resultgained a new panoramic vision of the whole, and becausethey engaged in reflections similar to those which, in manyother countries, Universities were helping to delineate.This was the generation represented by men such as AntónioFaria (1904-2000), Ruy Teixeira Guerra (1902-1996), MarceloMathias (1903-1999), Vasco Garin (1907-1997), José Calvetde Magalhães (1915-2004) and Alberto Franco Nogueira (1918-1993), men who, with considerable bravado, had a stab atswimming against the current – although, in the end, theydid that unsuccessfully, as the ultimate defeat of theproject they embodied was of course all but inevitable. It is interesting to note that this was a generationessentially composed of professional diplomats, men whichvalued a diplomatic career whose image was not strong, evenbecause during the years of the 1st Republic and those ofthe military dictatorship which defined the 2nd Republic,the habit of political nominations of the Heads ofMission176 became a consolidated practice. A sign was beingwaved, but it was an ambivalent symptom and it was notproperly deciphered. The intellectual and academiceducation of a new breed of diplomats coming fromUniversities, allied to a practical experience that wasbecoming more and more intense was beginning to bear fruitthat should have been evident beyond a Presidency of theCouncil of Ministers – Salazar himself, of course, was aLaw Professor – which had always held that same opinion.But there are no signs to show that there was a generalawareness of this fact in a Ministry and Estado Novoseemingly insufficiently prone to critical self-reflectionand not very agile in matters of change. From what can begathered, the defensive closing of ranks arisen rendered

176 The change coincided largely with the changes which occurred afterthe war. António José Telo, stated this very well: “politicalAmbassadors, normal at the end of the 20’s, had become a minority atthe end of the 40’s and an exception at the beginning of the 70’s”.op .cit., p. 27

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more persuasive a spontaneous self-understanding accordingto which the unexpected efficiency achieved by Portuguesediplomacy in this difficult interval (although it was, tobe sure, a relative, temporary, and costly one) resultedinstead from a well-heeled esprit de corps and an inspiringpolitical vision. This was a rather reductionist self-representation which for many years was to effectively hidethe lesson that the sorry sequence of facts actually held. In any case, the true crossing of a desert to which thePortuguese State was condemned in the international stagesof the 60’s and in the first half of the 70’s surely hadsome “rationalizing effect” (once again in the Weberiansense of the expression) in what concerns the organization(if not the organics) of its foreign policy. Following whathad been happening since the 19th Century the Ministry ofForeign Affairs found itself insidiously pushed into apartial de-politicization – and led onwards to a technical“professionalization” that every day became moreinescapable. Nevertheless, that happened without a fully-fledged collective awareness of the fact, in the heat ofthe political and social fights with which changes werethen as a rule associated.

4.2. The near vicinity: the corporatism of bureaucratic politics

What then was the impact of all of this in the PortugueseMinistry of Foreign Affairs and, in particular, in itsmethods of recruitment and internal training dynamics? Ifit is accurate to claim that the successive crises intowhich the State plunged in the generations that followedthe long and fatidic 40s sharply increased the sense ofdiscipline and accentuated internal hierarchies, it alsoought to be stressed that nothing equivalent happened inrelation to the necessary rise in the training pre-requisites to which our diplomats were subjected; in anutshell, even though chastisement mounted, changes wereneither many nor rapid. In any case, if compared to foreignexamples, it is clear that few were the technical and

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academic demands which were properly and formallyfulfilled, both at the level of entrance examinations toaccede to the diplomatic career and at the level of theinitial training received by the newly recruited diplomats;and certainly almost none at the level of what wastechnically demanded of them in what concerned theirprogression in their individual careers.Such relative inertia could of course not last. Coming bothfrom inside and from outside the Ministry, a series ofconjunctural alterations of some consequence would soon befelt, thus adding a new layer to the growing demands for aprofound reconfiguration. In order to see it, we shoulddraw back for a second so as to glimpse the bigger picture.The long 60’s had left few things untouched and theturbulences of the 70’s which followed them also had animpact. However, a more radical challenge to a structurebuilt for another time was going to turn up. The twistoperated through the change of regime which occurred in1974 widened both the number of diplomats and theiracademic background: new winds of renovation and“modernity” so demanded. The young Attachés were nowrecruited according to a criterion of “equality ofopportunities” (a criterion actually introduced beforethat, in 1972177), a measure which envisaged the entrance in“the career” of any individual in possession of anyUniversity degree certificate178.

177 A petite histoire: as early as 1966, the Secretary-General José LuísArcher tried, with the support of the powerful Foreign MinisterFranco Nogueira, to open the diplomatic career to women. Theprojected text of the legal diploma framing the concours was returnedwith a written interpolation, in Salazar’s characteristichandwriting, which added, dryly, do sexo masculino [of the male gender].178Thus can be explained that, at the end of the 60’s a large numberof Attachés from the then Instituto Superior de Ciências Sociais e PolíticaUltramarina (ISCSPU) could run to the diplomatic career, in this wayreducing the hegemony held until then by the Faculties such as Law,Economics and Finances (always, curiously, in a minority position),and Historical and Philosophical Sciences. The era of the 25th ofApril, constitutes the greater number of recruits, perhaps, as aresult of being the only ones who had benefited, in Faculty, fromtraining in the three areas which came up in the “knowledge test”

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Entrance exams into the diplomatic career were still mainlyfocused on Law, Politics and, to a lesser degree,Economics. A small step was however taken in what wouldcome to mean a greater unfolding of their scope. Both theinternal and the external contexts, effectively, tended tofavour it; better, they demanded such an unfurling. Inorder to be aware of this one only has to look at the moremacro picture. In tandem with a functional specializationwhich was becoming ever more palpable, a new cycle of thePortuguese foreign policy was beginning, which gavepriority to European integration while simultaneouslytrying to knock down the obstacles faced in the newmultilateral areas which had been a legacy of the oldregime. The oil crisis of the beginning of the 1970s, theensuing entry into a diacritic phase of the bipolarinternational order that had consolidated at the end of the1940s, and the successive waves of migrations to whichPortugal was exposed, all loudly demanded reorganizationswhich were not compatible with the search for merecontinuities at the level of training, of orientation, orof decision making. If and when seen in a comparativeframework, the complexity of the transition spelled theurgency to have a larger corps, a duly professionalizedcontingent in the modern sense of the expression, apolyvalent group, a group armed with the new technicalskills which, all in all, would allow the Portuguese Stateto give a thorough answer to the challenges posed by thetimes of change it had to brave. Unfortunately, though, none of that was to truly comeabout. As we have seen, it is a fact that in the purelyanonymous and mechanic field of answers to systemic demandssomething began to move. Nevertheless this was achieved inan individual and immediate way, and thus did not imply anauthentic awareness that a more modern and intense styleand type of training was indispensable. Again, lessons werenot learned. A minimal level of imperative know-how was infact gradually established; but it settled down in an

integrated in the public access competitions: Law, Economics andPolitical Science.

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almost invisible way, as if the reception of the trainingpressures had been direct and only partial. This is rather easy to verify. In fact, besidesconstituting a pre-requisite in the access, training hadfor a long time been rather indirectly indexed to “thecareer”. Formally, and against first impressions, the nexusof the new emerging connections to the academic world werethere to stay, at least ever since Salazar’s ruling periodand in an intensified version since the end of World WarII. Those connections were obvious (or at leastretrospectively, they are so today), in processes such asthose of candidates entering diplomatic life, or thoselinked to their future progression in the diplomaticcareer: only candidates with a University degree wereadmissible and this was followed by entrance examspatterned closely on University ones179; although thatchanged by and by, the juries put together for theseentrance exams had a mixed composition, associating bothdiplomats and University professors; moreover, the sumtotal of exam subjects piled up was gradually diversifiedand deepened180, following the beat of changes whichoccurred in the ever more diversified internationalscenarios where Portugal had a role to play. That was not the only area where the adoption of a para-University model became manifest. For decades, the publicconcours to the category of Counsellor of Embassy – a majorstumbling block that had served to weed out, or at leastput into a sort of professional quarantine, inadequatediplomats – demanded the presentation of a monograph, or

179 Significantly too, as far as this parallel is concerned, theseentrance exams were wavered for candidates who had finished theirfive-year undergraduate degrees with a final average of 14/20 ormore. Salazar retained this principle and made it more demanding byonly wavering entrance examinations for candidates with marks of16/20 or above.180 For a discussion of these and other related points, see ArmandoMarques Guedes and Nuno Canas Mendes (2006), “’O Tempo e asRéplicas’. Formas de Recrutamento de Diplomatas: os concursos deacesso à ‘carreira’”, Cultura, Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanasda Universidade Nova de Lisboa: 275-309.

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thesis, in an exam where one could, ceteris paribus, recognisea clear mimetic similarity to a post-graduation accordingto the canonical scheme followed along the Universitycareers of the time181. Informally, on the other hand, anempirical observation of the biographies of diplomatsunveils the growing demand for more self-education and thesearch for a complementary extra-muros training carried outby those who were more attentive and able. We can indeedput forward various hypotheses and interpretations aboutwhich traits, on the one hand, were caused by the invisibleaction of systemic pressures placed on the formattingprocesses of Portuguese diplomacy, and on the other hand,as to what that meant. What is certain, however, is that apotentially acute awareness of the need to profoundly andradically change mechanisms for recruitment and training ofdiplomatic staff was, at long last, dawning. Radical changes did not, however, take place: and thediminutive and apprehensive steps which were taken did notallow for any tangible fruition as they themselves weredepleted of any real substance. If the 25th April 1974managed to generate new internal and external conjunctures— and it is indisputable that it did — the democraticrevolution roundly failed in altering the blueprints forrecruitment and training in the Portuguese Ministry ofForeign Affairs, on which it had no major consequences. Forthat, institutional inertia and political resistancesomehow joined ranks182. To a large extent, the samehappened with accession into the European Union, in the181 Down to the detail, in fact. As in University Doctoral andAgregação exams, Ministry examinations for Counsellors includedquestions on a series of themes which were picked at random from ahat (in most cases a black bag, actually); as in Universities, thecandidate was formally told what the listed themes were from a coupleof hours to forty-eight hours in advance and duly prepared hisanswers; the candidate then picked a piece of paper and was publiclyquestioned by the jury on the theme picked. This is still in use inone of the entrance exams for “cadets”. Others are chosen by meredocumentary “proofs”, monographic theses and “lessons” having beenabandoned. Interestingly, even these changes parallel transformationsin University practices in Portugal, not only in substance but alsoin the timing of their introduction or extinction.

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mid-80’s: although both “external” events could and shouldhave spelled “democratisation”, in reality it was onlyrather marginally and indirectly that they did so.It is important, in any case, not to generalise too much.Both democracy and, a decade later, entry into the EU meanta second bout of explosive growth in personnel, and that,in turn, meant diversification – that is, an enlargementthe social and political recruitment base; evidently, bothof those things made it much more difficult to maintain thecarefully guarded enclosed space “the House” (as it came tobe called) that had so laboriously been built. Moreover, ifonly for ‘technocratic’ pressures, in essential specificareas such as European integration and relations with themany ex-colonies in Africa and Asia, it would have beenvirtually impossible not to take at least partial accountof the inevitability of real changes: in both cases,however, the Ministry resorted to contracting technicalexperts, thus getting round, via outsourcing, many of thepressures which might have been conducive to the changeswhich new contextual frameworks would otherwise impose on

182 ‘Democratisation’ of the Ministry was, of course, inevitable afterthe revolution, as was internal resistance to it. For a preliminarydiscussion of the strategies followed in this period, see ArmandoMarques Guedes and Nuno Canas Mendes (2006), op. cit., mostly inseveral long footnotes. Suffice it to say here that the lightestsociological study shows that this was attempted via ‘a simplegenerational reproduction’, as we called it: as a result of successin avoiding a major re-structuring and ‘de-Salazarification’(to coina term) of the Portuguese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, a great dealof internal power largely remained in the hands of a small butcohesive group of influential Ambassadors, who quickly brought intothe Ministry a handful of protegés and mobilized other youngerdiplomats already in the Ministry, placing them in fast tracks forpromotion – and subsequently passing on to them control of a kind ofinformal Directoire based on the figure of the Secretário-Geral and on theConselho Diplomático, two corporatist entities empowered in theauthoritarian period. The internal impact of ‘democratisation’ wasthus mitigated. Accession into the European Union did not reallychange this, although political party pressures progressively startedcolouring this strategy in different hues. ‘Corporate’ control of theentrance concours and subsequent promotions became crucial after themid-70’s. The peak of these processes is yet to be reached.

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the Portuguese diplomatic career. The technical agents werescreened and evaluated, so as to ensure they had thedetailed and specialised knowledge that was so blatantlyneeded; this was done to the benefit of the generalistdiplomatic staff, to whom fell the “nobler” role ofrepresenting, and firmly leading, the multifacetedprocesses of novel and multiplex international interactionsin which the State was involved, who were never screened inan equivalent ‘meritocratic’ way. The outcome was far fromgood. For at least two decades the Ministry lived with adeeply held conviction that the rationale of a pure andsimple internal division of work would be sufficient tomeet the new challenges which were appearing on the horizon– albeit these were challenges whose complexity neverstopped increasing. In reality, however, little more wasachieved than a mechanical break in the espirit de corps and areactive closing of the so ardently constructed diplomaticpersonnel ranks, creating tensions and intense conflictsvia the generation of a now “dualist” Ministry in which thespecific professional preparation of diplomats turned outto be a lot less careful and profound than the one which“technical advisors” who worked at their side themunderwent – along with everyone else outside the walls. Ostensibly, only the creation of the Diplomatic Institute,in 1994, really brought to light the issue of the technicaland scientific preparation of our diplomats – the neworganism having been charged (by decree) with trainingresponsibilities, as happened in most similar institutionsin other countries183; curiously, the Institute was given noformal responsibilities in the design or conduction of theby then all-important entrance concours. So at least some ofthe expressed intentions seemed a bit more in harmony withwhat was going on in the rest of the world; but not all,and it was only the intentions that did so. Practice

183 Before this initiative, diplomatic training courses (both pre- andpost-entrance ones) had been organized in the academic framework ofthe Instituto Superior de Ciências Sociais e Políticas: an idea which re-emergedperiodically, in this and in private Universities which see in suchoutsourcings magnificent sources of profit.

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showed, in actual fact, that notwithstanding the professedpolitico-administrative purposes of the Institute’s tardybirth, the model adopted in 1994 privileged the initiaterationale of “passing the flame”; a rationale, as we haveseen, with obvious usefulness in the transmission ofknowledge pertaining to basic diplomatic practice as seenfrom a perspective of continuity and reproduction of theorganisational models of the corps; and surely oneextremely relevant in the pursue of the efficiency of theagents and of the respective chain of command. But also ina rationale wholly contrary to the spirit – clearly inharmony with was by then common practice in most othercountries the world over – which, from the beginning, leadto the very creation of the Institute184. As an understandable first move of appropriation, the newthreatening imperative of a formal raising of diplomats wastaken on board as an opportunity. Not much later, aDispatch was published by the then Minister of ForeignAffairs José Manuel Durão Barroso, a legally bindingdiploma dated 6th January 1995, one which defined the“rules of a training course for Embassy Attachés”, whichshould last for three months. This was a part and parcel ofthe plethora of changes Durão Barroso brought to theMinistry, but although innovative, it was not the best ofthe much he did for it. In fact, nevertheless, one shouldnot undervalue the effort. It gave rise to a course thatincluded a group of subjects vaguely distributed by thefollowing topics: organisation and functioning methods ofthe Ministry of Foreign Affairs; Diplomatic Practice;

184 What the successful examples we looked at show us is simple tosummarize. Let me repeat it ad nauseam: in essence it is not veryconvincing to suppose that mere “experience” will be enough fortraining interns to run up to speed. Learning from “elders” seems tobe insufficient too. Nothing in any case guarantee us, for thatmatter, that senior diplomats, swamped and frequently out of stepwith ever less trivial and more demanding and specialized matters,have the time, the didactic proclivity, or even the personalinclination, to carry out in a capable and sustained manner the jobof passing their experiences to their subalterns. Nor it clear thatthis would be of much use in a fast changing world.

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Portuguese Diplomacy and the European Union; InternationalAffairs; and Portuguese Affairs. This might seem as toolittle too late, and as a mechanism for an extension of theinternal status quo ante. And surely it is partly reducible toboth of these. But, it in fact also amounted to plantingthe seeds of an important ground-breaking innovation. It is true that that the specific training on offer wasshort and bottom-heavy, relying as it did on “practice” astaught by elder colleagues; but it was inserted in a systemwhere, before, nothing similar had existed. All that hadbeen done until then insofar as any formal teaching-learning was concerned was a brief course on diplomatictraining oriented by Ambassador J. Calvet de Magalhães,taught by a series of those diplomats who worked at theMinistry (or had worked in bygone days) and focused ontopics pertaining to the Ministry and the rules of itsoperation. The Calvet de Magalhães training strategy waslittle more than a reflection of his desire for leadershipin a partly self-appointed role, if not as the Ministry’s‘thinker’, at least as its ‘professional conscience’185.Against that backdrop, the language itself used in theearly January 1995 Dispatch was as curious as it wasrevealing. The recruitment of individuals “alien” to theMinistry was foreseen (in precisely these terms) and thenormative diploma considered it useful to implement nothingbut an exceedingly soft assessment of the young cadet’sperformance – given that the results obtained in the coursewere only one, a minor one at that, in a variety of factorsthat “should be pondered” in the “confirmation” of theAttachés effective entrance into the Ministry; and that wasto be carried out by the Diplomatic Council. The rulesembedded in the Dispatch were not really very detailed,and, if read from a comparative perspective, they were185 J. Calvet de Magalhães, himself a career Ambassador, was theauthor of a famous volume entitled Manual Diplomático. Direito Diplomático ePrática Diplomática, edited by the Ministry more than twenty years ago,in 1985, and re-edited commercially in 2001. Interestingly, the bookfollowed quite closely the format of a University “manual”, asPortuguese rote textbooks are called, and specifically the format ofa Law manual.

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disappointing in terms of objectives and means. On thesurface, they gave the newly created Diplomatic Institute agreat margin for manoeuvre when deciding the course’sformat – a leeway which mainly pertained to the trainingcompetencies foreseen, a year earlier, in the legaldocument which had created it, and which was blandlyreaffirmed. Qualitatively, however, the changes broughtabout were of little significance: it was still manifestthat they were carried out more for consumption by externalaudiences and as a sort of palliative offered so as tosatisfy domestic ones – in any case, they werereinterpreted as such; they were not really designed so asto actually develop a proper technical edification of youngdiplomats, given that what was planned could most certainlynot actually fulfil the genuine training necessities faced.Expressing, as they did, little more than the tensionspresent between training needs and purely bureaucratic andadministrative points of view locked in an unequalstruggle, the ensuing normative moves speak for themselves:two years later, through the Dispatch No. 12 242/97, signedby the then Minister Jaime Gama, new rules were approvedwhich apparently did not greatly alter the previous ones.Like many other of the novelties this noteworthy andcautious man introduced, this one managed to associaterather bold innovations with defence of the ‘local’Ministerial status quo. The diploma was clearer than ever asconcerns the definition of objectives; it submitted thespecific programme of each course “to the approval of theSecretary-General, under proposal of the President of theInstitute”, and the text went on to clarify that theselection of the teaching corps, drawn from “civil servantsfrom the Ministry of Foreign Affairs” and “individualsconnected to other institutions”, was done “according to acriterion of competence and specialisation”; such aclarification, it seems, was deemed necessary. These ruleswere also a trifle more explicit than the previous ones asregards the criteria of evaluation of the young EmbassyAttachés recruited.

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It is tempting and even alluring to appreciate such softmodulations. It would also be profoundly dicey to do so. Inpractical terms, considering the absence of a sustainedpolitical will to modernize or the lack of internal cloutof politicians not always too sensitive to intellectuallearning processes, the innovation was rapidly“domesticated” by a machine which not only did not feel theneed for it, but which also considered such ventures as athreat to well established routines and to the conveniencesof the usage by the services of a very welcome workforce ofmere pencil-pushers. What came next would reveal in anpeculiar way the heights of bureaucratic tension exhibited:following the approval of the new Regime of the DiplomaticCareer (by Decree No. 40-A/98, 27th February 1998), whichalso stated (articles 70 and 71) “the right and the duty”of professional training, a third Dispatch was issued,again by Minister Jaime Gama – Dispatch No. 16 710/99, 12th

August 1999 – a redefinition which introduced a particularand surprising change (it also contained new Rules for thediplomatic entrance exams, the public concours): the initialtraining period of young non-confirmed cadets was shortenedto one month186… In this as in many other cases, the ‘local’

186 To better understand, contextually, the reach of this and otherdecisions, it is certainly worth keeping in mind some numbers. Onestudy serves all: in 2000 , more than half of the diplomatic staff inthe Portuguese Ministry of Foreign Affairs (52.4%) in a total of 532staff, graduated with Law, mostly from the Universidade de Lisboa (67.3%);Political Science and International Relations came in second placewith 18% of staff (76% of those graduated from ISCSP, of theUniversidade Técnica de Lisboa); Humanities and Languages, above all Historyand Philosophy (64.8%) cover 17.1% of diplomats (54.9% of whichgraduated in the Faculdade de Letras of the Universidade de Lisboa); graduatesin Economics cover only 5.8% of diplomats, the vast majority of whichfrom Universities and Higher Education Institutes also in located inLisbon (96.7%). Some diplomats obtained their academic qualificationsfrom foreign universities (3.9%) while, in exceptional cases (1.1%),others came from different careers and studied in areas such asEngineering, Medicine or Architecture; postgraduates (5.4%) andholders of Masters (4.4%) or Doctoral (1.6%) degrees do not registersignificantly. In addition, two notes that seem relevant. Firstly,the vast number of those who graduated in Lisbon (79.8%) representingthe “Classic” University of Lisbon with 48% of the total of degrees.

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balance of power between politics and administration, andbetween “the House” [“a Casa”, as it was and is know in thevernacular] was made clear.In effect, this drastic reduction, was surely the result ofa sorry concession to administrative pressures carried outby a not too resolute political leadership – or at leastone unwilling to fight local inertia and the ever-presentlimits on contracting new blood imposed by the all-powerfulMinistry of Finance. It greatly diminished, in practice,the importance of the training offered at the Ministry,reducing it to little more than a merely rhetoricdeclaration of intentions. And it showed the balance ofpower which prevailed, within the Portuguese Ministry ofForeign Affairs, between labour requirements and thetechnical and professional dimension, on the one hand and,on the other hand, the one patent between the comfort andsafety of immobilism and an assumption of the hazardsalways inherent to innovation. The upshot was what wouldhave been expected. Void of most of the content initiallyplanned, the Diplomatic Institute survived tant bien que malon the margins of a Ministry of Foreign Affairs which didnot in any meaningful sense relate to it – and to which itfelt no real functional proximity. Against such a background, the surprise expressed inreaction to the institutionalisation in Portugal, in 2005,of modern ways of training diplomats – namely the modest,but groundbreaking, Course on National Foreign Policy,designed, in the line of historical examples such as thatof Vienna, according to a model clearly rooted in the bestforeign practices and models which were mentioned – could

Secondly, the competition for Embassy Attachés was open for the firsttime to women on 13 November 1974. In 1979 there were only 12 womenin the Ministry, 4.1% of the total (290); in 2000 the number offemale diplomats was multiplied by 10, representing now 22.5% ofstaff (see Ana Maria Homem Leal de Faria, op. cit.: 2003/2004: 45-56).In the group of young Attachés who were accepted in 2005, thepropensity for these changes shone once again. Most new cadets camefrom International Relations courses, followed by graduates in Lawand even fewer in Political Science. There were many more women thanmen entering in 2005. Curiously, the same cannot be said for 2006. .

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not but be seen as acutely disturbing. It augured nothinggood for an obviously necessary modernisation process. In 2006-2007 the Course had a second edition. Like thefirst one, it included more than a hundred sessions on Law,Politics, History and Economics, each with the duration oftwo and a half hours. Halfway through, it included a fewtens of sessions of a more practical nature, and a generoushandful of Seminars on current and specific affairs, aswell as including both bilateral and multilateralsimulations. And as in the first Course, and with theexplicit purpose of breaking corporate walls this secondone also brought in as “Auditors”, besides young "cadets",civil servants from other Ministries. Times have been better, however. Recent burlesquedevelopments do not bode well, to say the very least.Internal political resistance to the Curso de Política ExternaNacional (CPEN) created in 2005 achieved legal status in theDecreto-Lei no. 117/2007, of the 27th of April of 2007,which restructured the Portuguese Ministry of ForeignAffairs. It did so in a double-edged manner: first, bywithdrawing the Institute from a direct dependence on theMinister of Foreign Affairs and putting it under theSecretary-General of the Ministry, its de factoadministrative head; second, by explicitly placing theCourse in the hands of the latter, and thus taking awayfrom the Head of the Institute (which the same decreerenames “Director” rather than the classical “President”)the delineation of the training offered, and insteadputting it firmly under the control of the administrativestructure of the Ministry. In fact, alinea c) of itsarticle 14 states, in no ambiguous terms, that c) it is upto the Instituto Diplomático “to organise and minister theinitial, complementary, and actualisation of those trainingcourses of diplomatic personnel required by theirprofessional statute, in those terms which will have been defined bythe Secretary-General, as well as that of the remaining groupsof personnel of the Ministry, with the exception of the

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functionaries placed in consular posts”187. More than areturn to home-base, this was an actual retrocess from whathad been achieved in the 1997 Dispatch, which merelysubmitted the training strategy “to the approval of theSecretary-General, under proposal of the President of theInstitute”: now it was to be the Secretary-General himselfdefining that strategy; the renamed Director became a mereexecutor of the administrative will of the Ministry, as faras training is concerned. It is unlikely the CPEN willsurvive that stranglehold. Quite possibly the modernisingexperience started in 2005 is now over.The maintenance of formal training in the PortugueseMinistry will, of course, demand a new-fangledassertiveness and determination on the part of politicalpower-holders. Reactions of rejection should not surpriseus too much, nor can they really be attributed to anyone:an organic structure and composition such as those of thePortuguese Ministry of Foreign Affairs made them virtuallyimpossible to avoid. What must be guaranteed is that Stateorganisms and our shared collective institutional memoryremain able to help safeguard our capacity to interveneefficiently in a world ever more complex and changed, asindeed we all aspire that strongly.The following is worth repeating, if necessary ad nauseam:if, in Portugal, we are to successfully resist continuedinternal pressures for inertia we cannot lose sight of thecrucial role of the unavoidable international changes whichare accumulating on our horizon. Institutionalisation wasuntil recently clearly proceeding in the direction followedby other countries, particularly those with which we have‘scale’ affinities There are no doubts about the fact thatsuch institutionalisation is more adequate for contemporaryinternational panoramas; it has its place in moremeasurable processes, and due to this, it is rendered more

187 In Portuguese vernacular: “[compete ao IDI o]rganizar e realizar cursos deformação inicial, complementar ou de actualização dos funcionários do quadro diplomáticorequeridos pelo seu estatuto profissional, nos termos que forem definidos pelo secretário-geral, bem como dos restantes grupos de pessoal do quadro do Ministério, com excepção dosfuncionários colocados em postos consulares”.

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objective and things will improve more easily. In temporalterms, what is certainly surprising is the fact that thisinstitutionalisation only happened in Portugal onegeneration ago. In a less general balance the most simpleof contrasts shows that that which should cause mostsurprise cannot, in truth, be the announcement ofundergoing changes: it should rather be the fact that theyhad not appeared earlier and more intensely in Portugal. AsI wrote at the beginning of this study, it is enough toplace the Portuguese case in a comparative framework toverify the triviality of recent innovations. In effect,here as elsewhere, the long lived combination highlightsthe question of training; underlining the need for a basiswhich joins academic and technico-professional know-how. Itmay be worth reinforcing the idea that the diplomatictraining system should be more dynamic and focused onflexibility. This will be especially relevant in the nextfew years, as a result of predicted curricular reforms inthe universities under the Bologna Declaration (which willinclude a surge of new Master and Doctoral degrees). Thisprocess will also have serious consequences on the termsand criteria of recruitment and for the complementarytraining which sooner rather than later must be built in.We would be well advised to take good stock of the factPortuguese diplomacy is not an only national bilateralendeavour. Which, in turn, raises new issues. At thispoint, it is useful to quote from a recent study byNataliya Neznamova, “[f]rom the Member States’ point ofview, the establishment of the European diplomatic serviceshould not much alter the existing institutional balance inthe sphere of external action. All the Member States of theEuropean Union are to introduce reforms, especiallyconcerning the management of human resources, in order toadapt the existing diplomatic services to a new commonservice. Solidarity of the member States, coherence oftheir actions, their willingness to set joint priorities,their commitment to act together are the factors that willdetermine the success of the common diplomatic service,and, more generally, the effectiveness of the EU as a

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global actor” 188. In their original versions of 2005-2006and 2006-2007, CPEN was designed – et pour cause – as littlemore than a ‘soft’, or ‘light’, clone of pervasive Europeantraining schemas. Its eventual de-characterization will notbe inconsequent.It is predictably true that Portuguese diplomats involvedwith the European Portugal will surely benefit, in theshort run, from allotted quotas they will fight tooth andclaw to negotiate when the Lisbon Treaty (or some futurealternative to it) comes into force; losing a Commissioneris one thing, losing diplomats would be unthinkable.However, we must also ask how Portugal will fare, given itsharshly ‘protectionist’ traditions, in the up-coming‘unregulated diplomatic market’ which will undoubtedly bebrought about by the European External Action Service forthose places (and there will surely be quite a few of them)not allotted in quotas.

188 Nataliya Neznamova (2007), Does the European Union need a CommonDiplomatic Service?, Institut des Hautes Études Internationales, p. 63.

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5. Architectural phases in the genealogy of moderndiplomatic training models revisited

Stu! Knaller PrallerSchnip-Schnap-Schnur Schenepeperl—Snai!—

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

I would like to rapidly look again at the various lines ofargument preferred, but now reframing them in one another’scontexts – as a widening of the spectrum, so to speak, willbe, I believe, well worth the effort. It is surely notpointless to recognise, along the lines of what was writtenby Stephanie Smith Kinney, that diplomatic services do notonly represent and serve national interest: “they alsoserve a larger international purpose, that of knitting themulti-state system together through a web of relationshipsand common parlance, practice and values that facilitaterelations and negotiations among contending nation-states”189. In other words, they are, whether theyconsciously wish it or not, an effective vehicle for theset of transformations leading us to global integration. As I pointed out before, diplomats quite understandablytend to stress that very aspect of their endeavours and notother, more mundane ones, and that must be seen, incontext, as the eminently micro- and macro-political speechact it really amounts to: a performative elocutionary actsimultaneously aimed at empowering their professional rolein a turbulent and unpredictable international system, anda mechanism designed to shore up their centrality andunsubstitutable nature, in a bureaucratically entirelyunderstandable defence of their collective interests,standing, and special privileges. But, in spite of this

189 Stephanie Smith Kinney, “Developing Diplomats for 2010: be clearwhat we are about and why”. This is a fascinating curricular anddoctrinal article, published in the review American Diplomacy, vol. V,number 3, Summer of 2000, consulted on the site http://www.unc.edu/,downloaded on 19. 05.08.

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instrumental use of the notion, the fact remains that, trueto its aristocratic pedigree, diplomacy is best thought ofas an institutional frontline for the sorts of cosmopolitanapparatuses modernity brought about.To be capable of effectively acting on these two levels andcoping with an increasing number of interlocutors, moderndiplomacy must develop its capacities, a few of them older,some more recent: skills such as those of negotiation,conflict resolution, representation, the building ofalliances and coalitions, as well as the prevention andpreclusion of cultural shocks, the recovery andtransmission of information, or even the art of speaking toan often rapacious media. Today’s diplomat must be able tohave an integrated and panoramic vision of the questions,facing a life that tends towards sectorial specialisation.And she or he must do this in a credible manner, so as tobe able to draw near alternative points of view, anddevelop a capacity to cross check and understand differentand sometimes conflicting and even irreducible outlooks190.It is not, therefore, surprising that diplomacy has beenprogressing in firm tune with the rationale of theinternational order over which it ponders and acts. Itwould be bizarre if the volte face was such that this tightsynchronisation did not take place. Such ‘fine-tuning’ is190 A.H.M. Kirk-Greene (op. cit., p. 29) said clearly: “(...) whatdistinguishes him even more from other professions is the extent of inside andbackground knowledge needed in order to be a reliable link betweendifferent societies and nations” [the highlighting is mine]. Ageneral recognition of the need to promote combined reflection overthe subject led to the organisation of annual meetings, since 1973,of heads of diplomatic academies and international relationsinstitutes, under the initiative of the School of Foreign Service,Georgetown University and of the Diplomatische Akademie Wien. Aninitiative literally named “the sons and daughters of Maria Therese”,in allusion, suggested by its director Ambassador Breycha-Vauthier,to the fact that the Viennese School had been founded by the Empress.The purpose of those meetings was and is to establish state of theart diplomatic training and debating the individual and collectiveproblems, confronting programmes, discussing very specific topics(e.g. the evolution of relations between diplomats the media andsecurity of diplomatic missions, or diplomacy and terrorism, to givebut two recent examples).

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not, however, the only constraint acting on the structureand the evolution – or the architecture and the genealogy,to reiterate the less historicist terminology which Iprefer – that shapes its operation and design. There areothers, some functional in ‘positive feedback loops’, a fewin ‘negative’ ones, a number, yet, acting as mere limits.The characteristics of the State at stake in each case areof course important, and so we must ascertain carefully howto take them into account. It is thus essential, forexample, for us to understand the dynamics of the play ofinternal interests which, at each point, do not shy fromcausing a temporal décalage, and very often quite a markedone, between the beginning of systematic impacts and thereaction levelled against them. The crispness with which we are able to determine suchdynamics should not, however, distract us from the veryreal complexity of these ‘mechanics’. The main thing tokeep in mind is that no capable rational reconstruction ofcomplex processes such as the transformations to which themethods, as much as the strategies, of diplomatic traininghave been subjected can really avoid taking into accountthe interplay of all these external and internal factors.We have seen this happen with the United Kingdom, withFrance, and with Portugal. That was not by any meansalways, however, the view of the practitioners themselves,who often tend to prefer to believe they are unchanginglydoing what they trusted is their role: i.e. to be capableof talking to others from other lands and solve ‘tensionsand misunderstandings’ States otherwise could not. Fromsuch a perspective, of course, diplomatic training,although it might be a welcome relief from daily chores anda good path for professional and social promotion, tendsnot to be thought of as something at all central – thetransmission of the ‘epistemic experiences’ of intermingled“Diplomatic Corps” is credited as constituting the formatof election for any training, and that means that,according to many actor’s modellings, adaptive solutionsare mostly to be found in experiential accumulation via onesort or another of ‘osmosis’.

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What is the landscape like when made out and scrutinizedfrom such a higher ground? Bringing strands together at ahigher level of inclusiveness, it should now be possible tore-state in a clear manner the genealogy of the changes inthe architecture of diplomatic training up to the present.I shall try to do this telegraphically, as it were. Unlikewhat I did earlier, I shall start with the eve of the 20th

Century. It should be stated at the very outset that theimportance attributed to diacritical moments in theprogression of this type of training does not result fromany aprioristic preference for big events as precisehistorical markers, or from any formalistic juridificationof the processes of transformation. Rather, it reflects acurious ‘property’ of the data under scrutiny. This may beformulated with relative ease: as a rule, with fewexceptions, momentous and relevant ‘constitutional’ changes(constitutive seems to be, simultaneously, too weak and toostrong a term here) in diplomatic training rarely takeplace outside the context of major tectonic shifts onStates’ positions in the international State system. It isperhaps not abusive to claim that empirical facts show thatraising diplomats and altering the ways of doing so issomething that does not come cheap or easily.So let us go down, once again, the sequential string of‘moments’, of ‘amendments’, already abundantly touchedupon. Since the emergence of the concept of diplomacy, andafter Vienna in 1815 and more clearly so in the 30 yearsthat preceded World War I, the body of rules whichenvisioned defining and safeguarding the position andstatus of the “diplomat” in ever more standardised andgeneral formats grew little by little. With it naturallycame demands for more and more precise professionalprofiles. It is certain that the progression had its highsand lows, continuities and discontinuities, some of whichwere more prominent than others. Academies like the Frenchand Austrian (above all the latter) were remotegenealogical seeds of what was to come. They were so in theformal sense: profound changes, structural ones, are easilyhighlighted, seeing that they correspond to moments of

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rupture in an ever changing international order. As couldbe expected they did not homogeneously impact all States,so that, albeit the identification of a variety of adaptivechanges which took place is well founded, we would be hardput to over-generalize about them or their rhythm ofoccurrence. As could also be expected, these changes wereaccompanied, from their very outset, as the French andBritish case show us, by a variety of forms internalresistance, many of them perhaps better conceptualized aswhat should be called ‘negative feedback administrativeconstraints’.Although corporatist self-representations such as the onesheld up could of course not consistently win the day, theycould most certainly impede fluidity in adaptive moves.From 1919 and the Treaty of Versailles onwards, theinternational framework suddenly became very different andmore complex. Surely that is not surprising. With the end(or the definitive subordination) of the great Empires –and this included a reassuring image of the aristocratic-diplomat with his presumed innate gift for the conciliationof opposite interests in negotiations and secretcompensations in grand corridors, or conquests, with themastery of seduction by grands seigneurs in uniform, or coats,shining with decorations, elegant silver or white ties [theimage is taken from A.H.M. Kirk-Greene], appearing insumptuous balls to the sound of giddying waltzes – thevenerable role of traditional diplomacy started to wane.What diplomats immersed in classical diplomatic networksfelt about that was only a small fraction of the matter andat any rate not one of great consequence. Negotiatedaccommodations followed suit.The world which emerged from World War I, with itsimportant re-shuffling of both the logics of theinternational State system and a rise of a new – and hardto resist, if not hegemonic – ‘diplomatic ideology’,accelerated these processes by reducing the margins ofmanoeuvre. The end of this type of society, a profoundlyhierarchical one that flourished mostly on imperial arenas,and which the Great War came to suddenly shatter, was

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associated with an understandable reaction to the realityrevealed by the cold light thrown by a growing body ofevidence of the brutal devastations which technical andtechnological progress had made possible. Largely viaWoodrow Wilson and his close friend and confidant ColonelHouse, in both Europe and North America it came to bebelieved that the urgency of interstate co-operationrequired the creation of strong multilateral internationalinstitutions of collective security. The implications ofthis conviction were soon to be felt: one of these was anever increasing professionalization of a diplomacy which,as a result, was forced to acquire new and increasinglymore sui generis profiles. A new basis for the ‘epistemiccircles’ had to be found. Professional expertise was themost obvious one, in the language of the time. Negotiatingpositions did not shrivel, or dry up, but they surely weredeeply recast.Although to the best of our knowledge largely self-organized, most outcomes of the Great War induced re-shuffling nevertheless spoke for themselves. Theconsequences of the new profiles required and of the novelprofessionalizing pressures felt came to the surface andflowed quickly into new schemes of training for novel typesof diplomatic corps. Insufficiencies in the “classic”methods of recruitment became apparent, as did the need tostrictly and systematically re-organise the centralorganisms of the State devoted to the conduct of externalrelations. The previous training models had pure and simplystopped working at the required speed. Besides, in manycases, they became increasingly less acceptable culturally,in new millieux marked by democratic principles and by anascending meritocracy, requiring in this way (or better,under these terms) new means of recruitment. As if to heighten internal hesitations, fresh externalconstraints started to crystallise: new and unexpected websof problems relentlessly required ever more technicallyspecialised mechanisms of selection and training for theprofessional profiles that came to be in high demand. Veryoften they were required without delay. As a consequence of

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such types of systemic constraints, in various States –namely those that most suffered the impact of institutionaltransformations and which, simultaneously, had the capacityto fulfil the relevant proactive roles exacted – innovativecurricula began to be drawn up for the training of the newtypes of diplomats needed. Indeed, the various types ofknow-how required by the new formats of diplomacy that allthis meant did not come together well with the assertedspontaneity – be it innate or inherited – or with thelearning processes – initiatory and ‘by osmosis’ – of thegracious and gifted amateurs that up to then had occupiedEuropean and (to a lesser extent) North-American stages. The skills and technical knowledge required by the newlybaked style of diplomacy imposed by the new circumstancesin close relation with the novel international order weretoo many in number, they were far too demanding,excessively sophisticated to be left on their own, andhardly possible to operate according to the traditionalmechanics of a social complicity which in any case wasbeginning to disappear. Diplomacy could no longer simply beregarded as an art, innate or hereditary. Much, on thecontrary, showed that diplomatic knowledge and skills couldindeed be systematically taught, transferred, learned,perfected in its details. The acquisition of these skillsand knowledge, in turn, generated a new kind of complicity.For those who were in the eye of the storm, the mostpromising profile of the diplomat was no longer conceivableas that of someone who was born for the role – andadaptability and learning capacity began to be regarded asthe most valued traits. Once more, heterogeneity must beunderscored. Some States felt it more than others. Somealso felt it before others did. What is interesting is thequasi-synchronization of the response to the impacts feltin each of the clusterings I tried to identify.Professionalization had arrived in earnest, and with itsystematic and growingly sustained formal training beganemerging. On the aftermath of World War II, the processes to which wehave been referring accelerated explosively. This stepping

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up and quickening of transformations in diplomacy and thetraining which had come to lead to it was due, on the onehand, to the pure and simple intensification of thetendencies which were drawn in the Peace of Versailles. Onthe other hand, it was also the outcome of superveningalterations, a few weeks before the end of the hostilities,which came with Potsdam – and namely with the emergence ofa reinforced version of the by then consolidated notionthat there was going to be an unavoidable need for WoodrowWilson's collective security institutions drafted ageneration before. If anything, the pressures inducing changes were moremomentous than ever. Mapping out the redrawing of much ofthe board which actually took place, even if onlysketchily, is again very revealing. The United Nations andmany other entities, governmental and non-governmental,which followed them made the acceleration of profilechanges almost entirely unavoidable. All things considered,the increase in speed imposed was mainly a response to theappearance of a good eighty or so new States (in Africaalone more than fifty of such entities rose), adding to theabout half a hundred States that existed then, in the scopeof one generation, with which both practitioner diplomatsand politicians could see eye to eye. At the same time thatthis quantitative density increased, bipolar alignmentstypical of the era added a new layer of complexity to themix. Confronting alterity was at the very root of change,as was the death of the ‘epistemic language’ of old.Sensitive to pressures which were impossible to avoid, manyStates gave in, and reformulated in depth the pedagogicaland recruitment processes pursued in their respectiveMinistries of Foreign Affairs.In the 1970’s, in tandem with the acceleration of the bythen rather obvious processes of global integration, withthe visible multiplication of sundry international actorswhich were becoming very different from each other, and inthe face of an ever growing interdependency whichdetermined new scenarios and promised previously unknownpanoramas, a great leap forward occurred. In new and ever

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mutating conjunctures and forced to act with newly-createdStates – the so-called Third World – western diplomacies(above all those of former colonial Metropolises) werefinally obliged to undertake the major effort of rapidadaptation many had studiously been trying to avoid.Changes were imperative not only at the level ofadministrative organization of Ministries, but also as faras recruiting was concerned and on the plane of the newprofiles to which diplomats had to be formatted. It was inthat same decade that many of the new post-colonial Statesrecognised themselves the urgency of training their owndiplomats in harmony with an unexpected and very difficultnew international order which rather speedily emerged. Inparallel, higher learning institutions and‘democratization’ of access to its benefits were boomingeverywhere, and this propitiated and facilitated changes asmuch as it indeed channelled them in familiar thematic andpedagogical directions. A wave of reforms followed, as an upshot of the impact ofthese emerging constraints – the positive as well as thenegative ones – in what may perhaps be seen as the ‘bigbang’ of diplomatic training institutions191. In thisinterval, in fact, quite a few of them were created. Therationale of the system required it. In order to face thenew challenges in a proper and able way, the Ministriesmost definitely had to allow for rather deepreconfigurations, namely in the by then crucial areas ofrecruitment and training. Many were the States and theanalysts who understood this on time. Maybe above all, theMinistries of Foreign Affairs of the States politically andeconomically more ‘developed’ – i.e., in the newinternational order, the more interdependent ones but also,paradoxically, the ones more able to make their owndecisions – no longer forfeited a close and continued191 Note that neither the topography – or, perhaps rather, thearchitectural blueprint – of the very visible caesura signified byWorld War II as regards diplomatic training, nor the changes inducedby the rapid-fire waves of de-colonization are really very wellknown. Both “constitutive moments” require research which hopefullywill be carried out soon.

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contact with many Universities and Research Instituteswhich trained the civil servants who entered them, andwhere the much needed multiple specialised knowledge for abetter conceptual anchorage of their decisions, and thusfor better efficiency in a world of ever more rationalisedinteractions and, simultaneously, more multifaceted.Learning to interface became crucial. True, rapid changecaught Ministries without the personnel to conduct thereconfigurations they felt were needed. In those Stateselastic enough to do so, ‘to buy outside’ the formaltraining, often through processes of pure and simpleoutsourcing, was quickly and widely adopted as a strategicresponse192. A new phase had arrived, and it required reformactions galore. For once, the need for training could notbe bureaucratically ‘soft-pedalled’.More than ‘inevitable’, to do so was the most obvious andcunning solution to the difficulties met in an ascendingspiral, both internally and externally. The particularpolitical and administrative particulars of each of theStates filled a relevant role here in terms of the methodsused to face the need for change. As in most processes ofdeep transformation, domestic factors still found a way ofmaking themselves felt – if only by invoking the ‘rule oflaw’ and the advantages of informed internal consent forthe purposes of local actors’ ‘recognition’. In some Statesthat meant formal associations with local prestigiousUniversities. In others, it spelled out the emergence ofInstitutes or Academies, internal to the Ministries, with192 True to its genealogical role, the Viennese Akademie may once morecome in here as a good case in point. As I indicated earlier, from1964 to the mid-90’s it was attached to the Austrian Ministry ofForeign Affairs, and considered an Abteilung V des BMAA. In 1996, as wesaw, the institution was partially privatized and re-launched in amodernization process that is still underway. The institution beganoffering a Master's degree concomitant to the Diploma programme then.It then went further in the academic path: in 1999 programme waselaborated into a 2-year degree modelled on those offered by North-American institutions such as Johns Hopkins' Pal H. Nitze School forAdvanced International Studies (SAIS), and Georgetown’s Edmund A.Walsh School of Foreign Service. As also already indicated, in 2006Vienna fully adopted the Bologna Declaration.

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more or less clear-cut academic characteristics. Othersstill, given the specificities of their organisms,encouraged the creation, in the civil academicinstitutions, of entities which could carry out the newtasks. Finally, some, incapable of adopting any of thosesolutions, given their institutional shortages, foundsolutions in the Ministries, or in the Universities, ofStates with which they kept special relationships.Although, or so it seems, that much was not immediatelyentirely understood, even Portugal could not have been aradical exception in that respect, although, in its case,to do so required a mixture of copycatting (form the Frenchmodel, as it turned out) and the bold and risquéestablishment of a precedent. Overall, however, changes indiplomatic training proceeded apace, and examples fromrecently independent States in Africa, the East of Europeand the Balkans, Central Asia, and from ‘New Europe’fulfilled a promising role in that new ‘big bang’ of sortswhich should one day be scrutinized for the innovativevalue it will hopefully come to have. In a tradition inaugurated in Vienna by Maria Theresa’srather peculiar brand of ‘modernism’ and her propensity forreforms, what was thus guaranteed was a much better"technical aptitude" of the ever more necessary diplomats,allowing them to face confidently up to increasinglyspecialised questions but inserted into traditionalgeneralist wholes such as the ones which inevitably emergedin ever more multifaceted and complex international arenas.In tandem with a more technical emphasis, the growingimperative of an ever more functional specialisationarrived gradually: differentiations imposed themselveswhich contrasted with what was previously aimed at by meansof a generalised training that was generous, superficial,and diffuse. The risk faced for not doing that was and isone of obsolescence.

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ANNEX

CLUSTERS OF DIPLOMATIC TRAINING IN CENTRAL EUROPEANINITIATIVE COUNTRIES, AGAINST A COMPARATIVE BACKGROUND193

Each time something is repeated, unless it is in an obviously straightforward recapitulation,the repetition occurs in a context in which the meaning of what is repeated shifts. This shifting

itself both deepens the understanding of that particular item and shows somethingsignificant about how this thinking unfolds transformatively.

Gail Stenstad, Transformations. Thinking after Heidegger

At the level of the Central European Initiative (CEI)Member-States as in other sub-regional organizations therehas been talk of common strategies for diplomatic trainingand even for a more robust common foreign policy. In whatfollows, I shall argue this may not be as easy as it mayappear. The European Union’s example reads as a tale ofcaution, at this level, or at least it should194.

193 This is mostly the text of a communication I was invited topresent in Dubrovnik, Croatia, on 18th of April, 2008. The context wasthat of a Conference at the 2008 CEI Dubrovnik Diplomatic Forum, a meetingunder the topic Diplomatic Training and Regional Co-operation; my communicationthere was entitled “Diplomatic Training in the CEI Area and ItsComparative Background”. As may readily be seen from a reading of mytext, I make profuse use (sometimes repeating, almost ipsis verbis, whatI had written) of my earlier and larger study; where I do so, I ofcourse indicate it in a footnote. It should be noted that in thepresent annex I try to go somewhat further than in the main body ofthe study which precedes it. On the one hand, I describe the formaltraining systems established in many countries about which I had notwritten before. Moreover, and on the other hand, I attempt a seriesof comparisons and identify “sub-regional clusters”, again somethingnovel.194 One of the most forceful rationales produced is still thatenounced in Bruter, M. (1999) ‘Diplomacy without a State: TheExternal Delegations of the European Commission’. Journal of EuropeanPublic Policy, vol. 6, no. 2, pp. 183–205: “ [a]cting without a clearforeign policy, without a head of state, with limited resources, andwithout professional diplomats, the external delegations of theCommission are deprived of most of what traditionally unifies and

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I shall divide this annex into three segments, or parts. Inthe first, I will discuss the pedigree of diplomatictraining, that is, some of its most significant genealogy.In a second one, I shall turn to a few case studies on CEIMember-States training of diplomats. Lastly, as a third andlast leg, I will attempt to equate to pull some stringstogether, and for this I shall equate a handful of morenormative (and so less descriptive-analytical) comments.

1.

Some pedigree, then195. The most cursory comparativescrutiny of the genealogy of types and modalities ofdiplomatic training shows us it is rooted in two quitedifferent models. Even though earlier and less systematizedexperiments did take place in Italian city-states and inEgypt, the first actual Academies devoted to thepreparation of diplomats appeared in France, under the nameof Académie Politique, by the hand of the Marquis de Torcy, in1712, and in Austria a few years later, in 1754, withEmpress Maria Theresa’s Orientalische Akademie.Although Paris and Vienna did indeed follow alternativepathways in order to achieve these common aims, mapping outconvergences and divergences, however cursorily, isenlightening. In the two cases ancient documentation wasstudied, and this underlined a deeply held conviction thatthe practical experience of illustrious predecessors was tobe particularly effective in the fulfilment of the RoyalHouses’ interests. Equally, in both Academies efforts were

consolidates foreign services. They are deprived of a unique,powerful head of state, strong administration, unified politicalpositions to defend and promote, and a common diplomatic ‘culture’.Because of these unique constraints and the high expectations of thedelegations as a modern European diplomatic tool, they have had tofind some adaptive and original ways in which to formulate and carryout their activities”. ( p. 193). The problem is, of course, yet tobe resolved.195 What I present here, in the next few pages, is partly a repetitionof sorts: it amount to little more than a stylized version of what Idid in chapter 2 of this study.

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made to guarantee that students obtained a minimal masteryin the use of languages, in the knowledge of juridicalorders, and some proficiency in commercial practice.Furthermore, in Vienna as in Paris trainees were cast asapprentices whom, through interaction with experienced men,somehow by a sort of osmosis absorbed the fine rules ofassuming postures and attitudes required for a goodperformance in the arts of diplomacy, cunning, and ballroom– all of these traits which characterized the couthinteractions between political communities which made upthe social and cultural world of Europe in that era. Inboth cases, moreover, fluency in the handling of courtetiquette was what weighed greatest in the definition ofthe expected qualities of an exemplary student. Wagered onthe essential in attempting to secure an image ofcredibility and integrity amongst foreign and local elitesfor the practitioners of the art of diplomacy, theeducational system provided in France and in Austriaarguably aimed, above all, at equipping their apprenticeswith social alacrity, cultural promptness, and manners, asthese were in fact the essential traits accepted throughoutas a “strong currency” for political legitimacy by theruling European elites.In the first as well as in the second of our pair of cases,the results were achieved by efforts carried out on twoessentially complementary fronts. On the one hand, bydrawing candidates almost exclusively from the aristocraticclasses – that is from the actual niches where thebehavioural rules to which this legitimacy was attributedwere defined, and which the constant exchanges andmatrimonial alliances among noble families had been, for along time, spreading throughout the Continent – a carefullydriven pre-selection which maximized chances of success. Onthe other hand, by placing the main emphasis of the actualtraining offered and acquired onto the mimetic reproductionof this hegemonic symbolic universe, a consolidation ofsorts was duly ensured. Thus, for the Austrians as for the French, in general termsrecruitment and training were largely centred on modalities

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of reduplication – ones carried out with a minimum ofcorrective adjustments – of what was taken as constitutingprofiles adjusted to a strongly desired real-worldefficacy, actual or imagined; a preference which was wellcorroborated in the extant framework of standardizedrelationships, and which, in turn, came from the apparentunchanging historical repetition of a past as immutable asit was taken by most actors involved to constitute anexemplary set of precedents. At issue was the inevitablereplay of a past which, for that very reason, the studentsof the two Academies were systematically taught tocultivate with due reverence.But behind these similarities important discrepancies hidfrom view, for these were, in truth, two very differentformats of emergent diplomatic training. A more finely-graded examination of details shows that there weremomentous dissimilarities between the first and the secondcase. These were differences that made all the difference.In practical terms, Vienna and Paris were really not at allfollowing the same pathways, and it is surely worthdescribing, albeit perfunctorily, what the diacriticaldifferences were which so essentially separated the twoprojects. These become clear as soon as we look at thedisparity in their objectives. In 1712, the then FrenchSécretaire d’Etat, the Marquis de Torcy, founded the AcadémiePolitique, in Paris, with the avowed intention of betterpreparing the diplomatic staff seen as necessary to aFrance that was coming into an international stage in whichpolitical and institutional “navigation” were clearlybecoming increasingly more complex and demanding.Paradoxically – and that, as well as the French Revolution,may perhaps be seen as the motive for the Académie’s earlydemise – the training course that was sketched out andstarted bore a rather direct connection to the priorfoundation of the historical diplomatic archive of theKingdom, thus giving body to the presumption that good,well-seasoned, strategies remained unchanged: its avowedpurpose was to allow study of an increasingly voluminousand rich diplomatic correspondence, so that political and

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diplomatic agents could, via that very exertion, search forinspiration in the actions and activities of the FoundingFathers.To this effect, young nobles from Colbert de Torcy’sAcadémie began to collect and catalogue the papers ofsuccessful previous Ministers and they undertook thescrutiny and study of these documents with great care andin often minute detail. Alongside this, they receivedmethodical training in foreign languages. In the frameworkof what we would today call an “analogue method”, what theystrived to do, in fact, was to absorb the possibleteachings of “History”. On the basis of such a model oflearning they would one day become fully able – at leastthis is what they thought – to prepare detailed memorandaof the same sort as those which had, in the heyday, provento be useful for the design French foreign policy – andthat, in the future, would again guarantee the same sort ofvictories. The pedagogical method favoured by the Académiehad clear scholastic overtones and it was carried outcollectively, by teams: that not only facilitated learning;it also most certainly helped the creation and growth ofwhat we would today call “epistemic communities”. Thetraining on offer further displayed a more “scientific”pedagogical, or didactic, dimension: in parallel withproviding for individual study, the Académie also heldregular seminars, study meetings and work in which the oldmemoranda of big names were analyzed and evaluated196, by agroup of chosen students, under tutorship from one or moreteachers chosen from among people with experience in thetasks under study. That was not, on the surface, very different from what wasto be carried out in the Austro-Hungarian framework, theAkademie which Maria Theresa installed in Vienna half acentury later. But although the solution found there wassomewhat similar to the Parisian one in both method andcontent, its emphases were, in reality, very different –and the systematisation and impersonality of the teaching

196 See the already often quoted monograph of M.S. Anderson, The Rise ofModern Diplomacy, 1450-1519, London: Longman, 1993, pp. 92-93.

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and learning methods preferred were considerably moreresponsive to the outside world. Times had indeed changedin that half century and the type of State underconsideration was not the same. In terms of itsinternational impact, the Austrian model would eventuallyreveal itself as longer-lasting and as much moreinfluential than the French one. And it indeed survivedmuch longer: in effect, its activity has not beeninterrupted since its founding in 1753, if two exceptionsare made: one for the period of World War II, and anotherin 1964. Following a division of labour that would soonarise, from it came — in the time of Emperor Francis Joseph— a partial Doppelgänger entity, the Konsularakademie. The initial proposal of the creation of the Empress MariaTheresia’s Austrian Orientalische Akademie (later renamedDiplomatische Akademie) was the preparation of young diplomatsand imperial consuls for the Near East, took particularlyinto account the formal relations with the Ottoman Empirewith which Austria-Hungary had a lengthy variable geometryborder, the resultant close relations, and with whom itoften entertained prolonged tensions. The Akademie actuallydealt with an utterly new initiative: that of providing asystematic training – and doing so at a full-fledgedacademic level – to its representatives, often left largelyto themselves in fast changing borders subjected toshifting locations, so that the Imperial House would beable to better pursue its relations with the non-Europeanworld, or at least an importantly adjacent part of it.Rather than presume, at its core, mere historicalsimilarities and repetitions, it assumed that culturalvariations and divergences were the rule. Therefore, ratherthan propose a rote-learning by imitation and osmosis, onthe Paris Académie model, the Vienna Akademie dealt oncreative adaptation by means of schooling in analysis.With a bang, Vienna inaugurated a style of training thatwas to make history. As a line of attack it was a formatmuch more plastic than the Parisian one, so it gave itsend-users a clear competitive advantage. The format thatsupported it was undeniably “modern”, by and large it

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emulated that of the universities of the time, and thecurricula and the pedagogical methods used are indeed goodevidence for it. Apart from the systematic teaching ofEastern languages (Turkish, Arabic, Persian), there werealso ex-cathedra classes and seminars on the cultures of themany ethno-linguistic groups settled in the extensiveregions under the control of the Ottoman Sublime Porte. In afast changing world, the creation and operation of theAustro-Hungarian Diplomatic Academy was by any measure asuccess: rather quickly, besides the importance it acquiredin the drafting of the Habsburg diplomacy as a whole, itbecame an element of relevance in the life and in thegeneral edification of the Empire, stimulating thecosmopolitan and knowledgeable attention of many othersectors of Viennese society. Side by side with diplomats,many were the Austrian and Hungarian men of State whoenrolled in it with the objective of deepening their owneducation, some of them even reaching the coveted positionof Chancellor197. With the passage of time the superiority of the Viennamodel over the Paris one of old became apparent and itshould come as no surprise that it was the former and notthe latter which essentially led to the contemporarydevelopments in the realm of diplomats’ training. However,the twin birth, so to speak, left its marks on the originalDNA, as it were: in developments that ensued, there hasalways been a clear tension between the two polar models oftraining, the French and the Austrian, which, therefore, weshould perhaps see as embodying the generative template ofwhat was to follow. The French model was basically focusedon early texts and themes, and ministered by experienced“elders”. The Austrian model was not merely academic – thatwould have constituted a blatant error, obviously – but itinstead resulted from a blending of professional andacademic teaching-leaning, anchored on contemporary, future(as well as past) themes, conducted by experts chosen onmerit. The Aufklärung had quite evidently arrived.

197 Idem, ibid., p. 91. 214

I have focused elsewhere on the many transformations towhich this style of diplomatic training has been subjected,so I shall not go into that here. Dates like 1815 and theCongress of Vienna (with the rise of the then newConference diplomacy), the Berlin Conference of 1884-1885(with the emergence of new-fangled worries about consularmatters and private international as well as commerciallaw), Versailles in 1919 (with the unstoppable ascendancyof multilateralism), or San Francisco in 1945 (with itsconfirmation and an apparent end to the Clausewitziandictum that war is an extension of diplomacy by othermeans) and the massive wave of decolonisation’s in the 50s,60s and 70s of the last Century (which in point of factspelled multicultural multilateralism for anyone who caredto hear), and probably 9/11 of 2001 (although it is tooearly to know if and in what that actually did more thantweak the rules) spelled huge changes in both the subjectsneeded for the education of good diplomats, and thetraining tactics used for that purpose. It brought morethings, themes and topics, to the fore198. They also broughtabout a line of cleavage that I briefly want to bring out:a gap between some States which invested heavily intraining and some who did not.The most meagre of comparisons shows that those who do deemsustained formal training as essential, are of one of twokinds: one the one hand, States which had, have, or want toacquire or regain a regional, or even global, role, and whotherefore need to diversify their diplomats’ profiles bymeans of different paths to specializations of all sorts –I am thinking of examples such as the US, France, the UK,Russia, China, India, or Germany, to name the most obviousones199. On the other hand, small but ambitious States who198 It is interesting to note that tectonic changes in diplomatictraining appear to have by and large only occurred after conflictswhich changed the international system in ways which required thelearning of new subject-matters.199 Although not in a linear manner. Apparent exceptions to this (theUK and France may appear to be so, as they offer rather meagre dosesof diplomatic training to their diplomats) merely outsource theirtraining (both that demanded before and after accession to the

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strive for an international impact greater than that“mechanically” provided by their small or medium size, asit were, also tend to attribute an enormous importance totraining and thus have a tendency to invest rather heavilyon that front – here I am thinking of cases such as that ofThe Netherlands, Israel, Norway, Sweden, Chile, or Taiwan.Of course, these grouping are by no means mutuallyexclusive, essentialist blocs, something I shall want tocome back to; but they are nevertheless there. Naturally,too, it is evident that voluntaristic efforts mayaccomplish wonderful training schemes in States which fitinto neither of these groupings – but it will most probablynot achieve institutionalisation, as incentives will not bethere for the expenses, financial as well as human,exacted. Let me be clear about my point here. It is thatthe large majority of cases in which diplomatic training issystematic, intense, demanding, and sustainable may befound in these two sets of States: global players who areforced to do so, given the variety of scenarios they findthemselves involved in, and small eager ones whoprotractedly want to punch above their weight.Well, then, what about CEI countries, are they “clustered”at this level – if, indeed they do come together at all aspart of this set of disparate entities? Interestingly,although surely not unexpectedly, CEI countries do displaycommon denominators and, for the most part, they exhibitstriking convergences, but they do not really belong to anyof these two major groups I carved up. So what are the main“attractors” and “repulsors” at work in the CEI set, andwhat may be learnt from those? Let me turn to those two questions one by one.

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Ministries, a point I shall not dwell further into here) to externalacademic institutions, namely the Oxford-Cambridge-London School ofEconomics axis (as a part and parcel of the so-called ‘old-boynetwork’), and the École Nationale d’Administration (the French use the termles énarques) one.

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A little architecture, now200. Many, maybe most, of the CEIStates, are post-Communist entities who were eitherrecently admitted into the Union and into the AtlanticAlliance, or who are on a formal or informal NATO and/or EUtracks for precisely that; although there are a few who arein none of these paths. These are States that, for the mostpart, in the last decade or so left the now extinct SovietBloc. Apart from this political convergence, also at moredry sociological levels they do indeed in many senses crowdtogether: they tend to display elites of an average to highlevel of education, but are also rather underprivileged intheir international influence; finally, they show, as arule, an understandable ambition to gain it. In terms ofthe patterns I detected, and if we overlook politicalrealities on the ground, abstract general conditions appearfavourable for a fairly diligent training of new diplomatswho will be especially apt for effective action oninternational stages which have been subject to profoundchanges.I shall first focus on two of these States, those thatappear to be the most capable of using their recentintegration into NATO and the European Union to be able tomake a leap to such understandable ambitions: Poland andthe Czech Republic. These two examples are very differentfrom one another, due not only to marked dissimilarities intheir State traditions but also to their different scale.Notwithstanding that fact – and given that my aim is toshow how the pursuit of common strategic objectives spellsout the installation of new formal mechanisms of teaching-learning of diplomats – I shall deal with them together,since as we shall see, they “cluster”; in other words,comparatively, they agglomerate as sort of variations on acommon theme201. 200 In what follows I use the same “architectural framework” I used inthe main body of my earlier text. Some of the examples described herewere alluded to in the preceding pages; most were not mentionedthere.201 It is fascinating, although perhaps not really surprising thatthis cluster somehow overflows CEI. An interesting, because rathersimilar, set of examples is that of the three Baltic States, none of

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As stipulated from the outset, a rapid and in many senseslaconic survey of the training required in the initialphase of the career of Polish and Czech diplomats will do.I begin with the Czech Republic. The recently recruiteddiplomats in the Czech Ministry are supplied with a“theoretical part of the course for newly recruiteddiplomats who successfully passed exams of the recruitingcontest which is held by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs

them CEI Member-States. I shall mostly focus on Estonia — and its caseis not too different a case from those of the “Eastern” countrieswhich we have already looked at. Just like in my previous examples,we will limit ourselves to training given to Estonian diplomats atthe beginning of their career. The preparatory entry course in theEstonian Ministry includes academic subjects, which are, in manycases, taught by “in house” staff: “how Estonian Foreign Serviceworks; priorities of Estonian Foreign Policy; internationalorganizations and Estonia’s role in them; Estonia and EU; securitypolicy, NATO; bi- and multilateral relations; trade policy, foreigneconomic relations; international law; consular affairs”. It alsoincludes training more directly aimed at internal life of theMinistry and at its institutional relations with the external (bothnational and international): sessions concerning “protocol andetiquette; negotiation training” are therefore offered. Thesimilarities with the Polish case are very easy to be seen. As,however, are also the examples of the other two Baltic States,Lithuania and Latvia. In the first case, the recently recruitedLatvian diplomats receive two series of classes: one composed of 32sessions, the other of 33. In the second, the young Lithuaniandiplomats are subjected to an intensive course of 2 months full time,with classes in areas so varied as “public administration,constitutional law, international law, international organizations,international economics, strategic planning, etc. Specialised coursescover international relations, diplomacy, diplomatic protocol,professional skills, psychological training, etc.”. The LithuanianMinistry of Foreign Affairs specified unambiguously that in thesecourses “lecturers are university professors and Ministry officials”.What is perhaps more interesting here is the composition of the groupof students who attend these courses, which have a stipulatedduration of “92 academic hours”. On the one hand, we are faced with“a 2 month compulsory course” as far as the young diplomats who haverecently joined the Estonian Career are concerned. However, on theother hand, the course is open: “non-diplomatic staff can join on avoluntary basis”. After this course two other courses follow on theyoung Estonian diplomats’ professional route. Immediately beforetheir first posting, a second one with the duration of “24 academic

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every year. [The] course develops the diplomatic skills(negotiation, presentation, etiquette) and further developsknowledge in the subjects important for diplomatic career(international relations, international law, economicsetc.)”202. This course, defined by the Czech authorities as“theoretical”, has the duration of 5 months, and iscompulsory and full time; it is a demanding and extremelyintensive course which envisages a general improvementvisible in the quality of the trainees who undergo it. Thecourse and Institute were designed by a diplomat-academic,an extraordinary gentleman, and is now (mid-2008) led by adiplomat-academic203.Matching this, in Poland, young Polish diplomats who enterthe Ministry of Foreign Affairs are submitted to localintensive and formal training courses, which are full timeaffairs that last for a period of 6 months (a recentlengthening, started not long ago, sometime in 2004 or2005, the duration was only 10 weeks204), courses whichconsist in entirely academic subjects: “internationalrelations - history and theory; economy; Europeanintegration (history, European law, economic integration);International security (legal framework, institutions,proliferation, terrorism); globalization; internationalorganisations and Polish multilateral diplomacy; thehistory of Polish diplomacy; Polish bilateral relations;International law theory.” This training is complemented bytheory modules, but with an applied nature: “consularservice; diplomatic protocol and correspondence;hours” takes place. And a third course, complementary to the earliertwo and with a strong local language emphasis, is given once they arealready posted, with the duration of “50 academic hours”. TheEstonian effort to obtain a stronger European and world influence bycutting ties with a Soviet model that had, for half a century, beenimposed on them is palpable. Visible too is their wager on a full-fledged intensive training model with a strong academic component toit. 202 Idem,, op. cit., “Programmes de Formation des MAE de l’UE et institutions de l’UE”,in the section relevant to the Czech Republic.203 Respectively, Professor Otto Pick and Dr. Irena Krasnicka.204 Personal communication received in Warsaw, 17 November 2005, fromthe then new Director of the Polish Diplomatic Academy.

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negotiations and public relations”205. Finally, the Polesadd to their training of diplomats a fundamentaltheoretical-practical set of sessions. As in the Czechcase, the Polish “theoretic” training is given, in a largepart, by academics from the National Academy of Sciences:in both cases entities tributary to earlier State modelsand which survived their demise; to these are added, today,University professors from the many public and privateUniversities in existence in the two countries. In both cases, Polish and Czech, it is highly academically-trained but mostly diplomatic staff (many of them withdoctorates) who are responsible for the more professionaltraining carried out in order improve what is often a not-so-simple post-communist ministerial integration. In thePolish case, the intensive full time six months that theyoung Attachés spend in the Diplomatic Academy straightafter they pass the exam to enter the Ministry, arefollowed by another half year of placement “in centralMinisterial services”206, deemed essential for them toreceive some supplementary on the job training. “If andwhen there is available financing”, the final third of theeighteen months – the last segment of the interval betweenentrance and confirmation – are used for the placement ofyoung Attachés in posts abroad, in “a regime of experimentalinternship” – they are sent, as a rule, to Embassies andConsulates in other member-States of the European Union,the main priority Polish.In order to complement the points I just made, let me nowbriefly focus on two other CEI States, Romania andBulgaria, that – notwithstanding their more recent entranceinto NATO and the EU – may harbour plausible ambitions ofbatting above the weight they have had so far. What is atonce striking is both the similarities with the two earlierexamples and, paradoxically, the significant differenceswhich are patent: in Romania and Bulgaria, again DiplomaticInstitutes have somehow been placed under the control of

205 Idem,., op. cit., “Programmes de Formation des MAE de l’UE et institutions de l’UE”,in the section relevant to Poland.206 Idem, personal communication.

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academics. And, again, the model chosen has, by and largefollowed the typical 1990s European one of adding to theircompetitive entrance exams a course combining theoreticaltraining in Law, Politics, Economics and (some) Historywith more “practical”, and “diplomatic practice-focused”exercises, and with some hands-on on-the-job experience –and, when possible, even with some temporary postingexposure of the young “cadets”, if I am allowed to call itthat. For the purpose, the Bulgarian and Romanian MFAshave, like their Czech and Polish counterparts, createdDiplomatic Institutes within their administrative reach, soto speak: in both cases they are institutions with a highdegree of autonomy, dependent directly on the Ministersrather than on the Ministries they actually articulatewith. Understandably – but interestingly, nevertheless –the models chosen follow quite closely the examples of thelast two or three decades in what used to be called WesternEurope, a point to which I shall want to come back. Like in the earlier Poland-Czech cluster, the Bulgaria-Romania one congregates diplomats and academics. UnlikePoland and the Czech Republic, nevertheless, Romania andBulgaria went for a mostly academic staff for their newdiplomatic training institutions; perhaps even more to thepoint, gave these institutions some active functions assort of strategic “think tanks” for foreign policy planningin core areas of their national interests – crucial topicsand areas that is, geographically as well as thematically.Significantly, they do this along what to all intents andpurposes are two rather different means: in the case ofRomania, things are carried out via the establishment of asuperb corps of training staff largely recruited inUniversities207 and focused on paired themes (History andPolitics of Europe, for example, or International economicsand the Hispanic world, or still Russia and contemporaryRussian and CIS political dynamics, or yet again, the BlackSea and its security issues, or even CEI) – and it is these

207 The very notable Director of the Romanian Institute, ProfessorVlad Nistor, is the Dean of the Faculty of History of the Universityof Bucharest.

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people who both teach the newly arrived cadets and whoproduce briefs and short analyses (as well as some ratherlonger ones) for the benefit of the Minister and theMinistry decision-makers – irrespective of the attentionthese latter actually pay to them. In the case of Bulgaria,the mechanics of functioning appear to be somewhat looserand more personalised, as a smaller and somewhat more top-heavy arrangement prevails, in which very capable academicsand some diplomats, many of these last linked to thedepartmental structure of the MFA, join efforts to pass onsome theoretical knowledge to their young students (on whatare, mutatis mutandis, the same sort of “national interest-intensive” areas), while, simultaneously, centring theirbriefs on direct contacts and advice provided to theMinistry structure by its distinguished diplomat-academicDirector208. Before turning to other, non-EU examples within the scopeof CEI, it is interesting to note that in Bulgaria as inRomania, like in Poland and the Czech Republic, inductioncourse are obligatory, longish, and multiplex. In all thesecases the aim is ambitious: and it is not second-guessingto assert that it does not give body to a hope to reproduceold templates, but is instead focused on a strong desire toproduce diplomats who will be capable of changing, by whatmay perhaps be called “amplification”, the internationalimpact of their respective States. Induction courses takenow from 4 to 6 months, on a part-time basis in Romania(broken up into nine modules), and 3 months full-time inBulgaria (this time broken up into twelve modules): in bothcases this was arranged, by arduous negotiations with the“services” of their respective Ministries, which insist on“having people at work, rather than learning”209. As208 Namely, Ambassador Milan Milanov, a renowned Law Professor anddiplomat.209 As Italian diplomat Domenico Polloni well noted, in well appliedsociological-organizational terms, “one constant in many countries isthe conflict between training requirements and the operativepressures of the Department, which creates bad feeling andmisunderstandings between the training body and the other Ministrydepartments and causes viscosity in the management of young diplomats

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stressed before, these mainly “theoretical” endeavours arein the two cases complemented by “diplomatic” practice”;simulations, and the acquisition of language skills. As wasthe case with the previous cluster, in this later examplean obvious similitude is patent between Romania andBulgaria. This is perhaps not surprising, particularly ifwe take into account the fact that both DiplomaticInstitutes were in fact created partly under the aegis ofthe very noteworthy Dutch Clingendael.Note further that, in truth, the four examples I reviewedso far do not formally differ too much from one another.The institutional strategies followed to achieve the avowedaims of these four CEI diplomatic training institutions arenot identical, however, and this is, I believe, wellattested by the variation in trainers reactions to andattitudes about, their trainees: Czech trainers appear tofeel very collegial towards their young diplomats, whomthey seem to generally regard as competent and eager tobetter themselves; Bulgarians are clearly proud of thequality of the new generation of professionals beingproduced, something the Romanians appear to be somewhatmore reluctant to accept; Poles, I do not really know –although I do suspect they will tend to have outlooks as totheir trainees somehow similar to those of Czechs, albeitmaybe with a few Romanian-style hesitations. This becomeseasily understandable when we use a wider lens: if we focuson the relations between the generations of diplomats andnot that between trainers and trainees, in all four cases,not unexpectedly, there seems to be no love lost betweenthe old dinosaurs and the new guards of “young Turks”. Thisis the result of the fact that, behind the somewhat

who are the preferred recipients of the training” (D. Polloni, 1996.,p. 39, my own stress). Although the argument used by “the services”resembles the one traditionally used in rural societies to defendchild-labour (rather than focusing on the need to either augmentpersonnel or rationalize operations), this unfortunate attitude hasby no means kept things still. It has been the case a little biteverywhere that reality has imposed itself and training has beenintensifying, even when that did not mean increasing the personnelavailable for daily working tasks. 

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different institutional strategies pursued, there lies acommon objective: radically changing the status quo byconverging with Europe, while trying to gain a tacticaladvantage in the new game-plan. For the sake of contrast, let me now quickly focus on twoother EU Member-States which belong to CEI, one an oldmember of the Union, the other a much more recent one:Italy and Austria. As we shall see, this brings out anothercluster, and this time it is a fairly different one. Withthe intent of rendering the contrasts more vivid, andalthough given the economy of the present study I do notreally do that, one should perhaps display the entire setof formal training carried out throughout diplomatscareers, rather than focus merely on initial inductiontraining. These are well articulated, in both Italy andAustria, with the preparatory cadet formation offered.Although the former examples also include medium andadvanced training, they do so much more loosely andtentatively. Typically, this entails modules here andthere, dispersed along careers. In these two older cases, avery clear strategic depth is patent.Italy has an Istituto Diplomatico Mario Toscano (ISDI), created in1967 by the eminent jurist Mario Toscano, a well-knownProfessor of International Law and a great master ofHistory of Treaties and International Politics. The veryname chosen, that of a celebrated academic, denotes anintention to establish a para-universitary institution whichpresided over the creation of the Istituto by the ItalianState. We begin by underlining that the ISDI is firmlyrooted in the State apparatus. It is one of the DirectorGeneral offices of the Ministero degli Affari Esteri (MAE), withfunctions in the areas of training diplomatic personnel andfor the management of candidates to the access exams forthe diplomatic-consular career and the internationalorganisations in which Italy participates.The Istituto Diplomatico came about as a result of arestructuring of the Italian Ministry which took place in1967. Its explicit main aim was and is to try to improveand complete the professional qualification of staff, both

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diplomatic and non-diplomatic, through its courses and thetraining and revision initiatives, as well as preparationof candidates in the entrance exam for the diplomaticcareer. It included courses elaborated for not-yetconfirmed initiates, or cadets, called Secretari di Legazione inProva. It also included substantially more in depth coursesfor the Conseglieri di Legazione, special preparation coursesbefore postings, courses for “operatori area promozione culturale”,and others including computer sciences, languages and long-distance learning (e-learning) of various types ofsubjects210. I want to once again begin by focusing chiefly on thetraining made available to young Italian diplomats at thebeginning of their career, the Secretari di Legazione in Prova.These are obligatory courses with the duration of 9 months.Their format is mixed, and it is so fully: they include anacademic part, but above all their aim is the acquisitionof practical experience. The ISDI does not itself formatand organise this last aspect of the courses, given that itincludes visits to multilateral and foreign internationalinstitutions, as well as it is expected in on the jobtraining in Italian Embassies, Permanent Missions, andConsulates abroad. In a manner similar to that of Spain211,the whole process envisions, with clarity, a fullpreparation of diplomatic staff, so as to better guarantee,while facing an ever more complex and changinginternational reality, an informed and able defence of thecountry’s interest which the Italian State politicallydefines as its own.It is, however, at the more advanced level of trainingoffered to the Conseglieri di Legazione that the academicdimension of the preparation of Italian diplomats appearsin its plenitude. There one notices the ambition in the210 It sounds very good on paper, indeed. The system in action is anothermatter, which deserves to be more closely scrutinized than waspossible here. As will be appreciated, here I limit myself to theformal idealised model of training, an obviously necessarypreliminary step for an eventual fuller account which should becarried out in due time.211 Namely at the Escuela Diplomatica.

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acquisition of greater national weight on internationalstages. For the progression to Embassy Counsellor, theItalian Ministry requires from candidates the attendanceof, as well as a good result in, an intensive course of 6months, for which “High Level Seminars, with academics,scholars, politicians, on a series of international andimportant domestic questions, [are] required. [Thistraining] even includes visits to public institutes, andupdating in current affairs of a political, culturalnature, in questions of national economic policy, etc” 212.The model clearly points in the direction of a trainingthat is more technical-scientific than bureaucratic-administrative; a training which the Italian State has cometo plan for its diplomats, according to a logic which isrooted in its will to gradually draw up, and thenguarantee, its wider and deeper implantation on worldstages: a project the more specialised, more professional,and more creative training model chosen, fits rather well.Austria, now. Faithful to its tradition from the mid-18th

Century, Austria today has a Diplomatic Academy whichorganises a Diploma Programme. For candidates who have nobackground studies in Law, Politics, or Economics itsattendance is a legal requirement to enter the Ministry ofForeign affairs213. The finalities of the Austrian Diplomatic Academy of Viennaprove, nevertheless, to be vaster, seeing that it aims tosupply the students who attend with the necessarypreparation for an international career, not only indiplomacy but also in business and finance, internationaland non-governmental organizations, and so on. At thislevel the echoes of traditions originating from theImperial Austro-Hungarian meticulous structure ringclearly. The Austrian case, for this very reason, isparticularly interesting in comparative terms. Once a State

212 Idem, op. cit., “Programmes de Formation des MAE de pays de l’UE et d’institutions del’UE ”, in the section relative to Italy. See also the already oftenquoted Domenico Polloni, Birth of a Diplomat, Procedures for recruiting and trainingdiplomatic staff, a comparative study, p. 9.213 Domenico Polloni (1996), op. cit., pp. 16-17.

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of high standing and with a strong regional influence,Austria has seen itself relegated to the status of a smallbut ambitious State, and knew how to act in conformity byadapting an old structure to these new national ambitions.The Academy also offers two other programmes: a Master onAdvanced International Studies (MAIS) and a Master of Science inEnvironmental Technology and International Affairs (ETIA). The MAISprogramme is intended for university graduates of alldisciplines and all nationalities who wish to extend theirknowledge of international relations through a multi-disciplinary two year Master’s programme. Under the rubric“European Integration in a Changing World” the MAISprogramme equips participants with the analytical skillsnecessary for a better understanding and assessment ofcurrent European and global trends in the fields ofpolitics, law and economics. MAIS is a joint programme ofthe Diplomatic Academy of Vienna and the University ofVienna. The ETIA programme– a cooperation project of theVienna University of Technology and the Diplomatic Academyof Vienna – is designed for graduates of all disciplineswho are interested in broadening their knowledge ininternational affairs and the scientific and technicalissues relating to the environment. It lasts for two years,one of which is spent at the DA and the other at theTechnical University.The centrality attributed, on the one hand, to thebasically academic training of young Austrian (and other)diplomats — in a tradition that, as we have seen, is aslong as they come — could hardly be plainer. The same canbe said of the integrated character of the programsoffered: the end objective of preparing diplomats capableof confronting a complex and multifaceted world in a waythat preserves autonomy and personal creativity withoutannulling group co-ordination, could not be more explicit;something which, in Italy as in Austria actually in astrong sense carries, or propagates, into the more advancedstages of national diplomatic training. Never, of course,does it overlook an always crucial professional trainingdimension to their teaching-learning processes.

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Stepping now outside the EU, let us look briefly at theshape of diplomatic training in two Western Balkan CEIMember-States, Croatia and Serbia. As we shall easily see,they form another cluster, again not surprisingly: in bothcases the entities are Diplomatic Academies in a way and tosome extent tributary to the jural-administrative culturallegacy of the Yugoslav model of old. Although, as we shallsee, not really in any stationary sense: Croatia doesactually appear to be diverging from Serbia, by comingcloser to a Romania-Bulgaria type model, perchance due, atleast in part, to its Clingendael and Austrian Academyexperience.The old so-called “diplomatic school of the [Yugoslav]Ministry of Foreign Affairs”214 was subdivided with theimplosion of the country and State: in 1995, a neworganizational unit was created in Croatia (the DiplomaticAcademy of Croatia) and three years later, in 1998, ananalogous one rose in Serbia (the Serbian DiplomaticAcademy). This common progeniture was efficacious: in manysenses these are parallel entities. That much is patent inthe respective charts of the Diplomatic Academies of Serbiaand Croatia. In Serbia, “the Program of the Academy wasprimarily designed to train young professionals who arebeginning to work with the Ministry [of ForeignAffairs]”215. Croatia also has a Diplomatic Academy, but onewith a somewhat wider scope: its finalities are “diplomatictraining, publication of relevant editions, research offoreign policy affairs, and co-operation with likeinstitutions”216. What Serbia says of its Diplomatic Academyis nevertheless certainly also true for its Croatiacounterpart: “[the State’s political and social developmentmeant that] the education of diplomats gained in complexityaccording to the modern standards of diplomatic service andcontemporary international developments. With time, this

214 “School” more in the diffuse sense of a style than in anyfinalised and modern designed institutional sense.215 The phrase was taken from the Internet site of the Serbian MFA.216 The phrase was taken from the Internet site of the Croatian MFA.

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education has become institutionalized”217. In both cases,as before in Yugoslav times, the Academies remain withinthe direct administrative fold of their respectiveMinistries. The basic induction course lasts in Serbia for nine monthsand, following a timeless University tradition, it isdivided into three trimesters. In Croatia, it goes on forone year. In the two cases, similarly, the trainers arediplomats, academics (both national and foreign), as wellas other civil servants. Insofar as curricular contents areconcerned, it is fair to say that theoretical issuesrelated to Law, Politics, Economics, and History manage tolive side by side with more practical “professionaltraining”. As could be expected, at least for the timebeing, Croatian curricula focus more on NATO and EU mattersthan do Serbian ones. Equally, both Academies organizeSeminars and regularly come out with publications connectedto their particular fields of interest.Turning to a last example, now, I would like to focusbriefly on the Albanian Diplomatic Academy, interestingly –because perhaps not obviously – one obvious member of thevery same cluster as the Croatian and Serbian one. TheAcademy is private, although the President is an Ambassadorand the Executive Director an academic. The basic course onoffer is shorter, though, lasting three months full-time,and is broken up into 11 modules, half of which aretheoretical in content, the other half either practical ortheoretical-practical. Although I am not personallyacquainted with its operation218, the Albanian Academyappears to be very focused on contemporary matters andcrises, comparatively somewhat more rudimentary than itsSerbian and Croatian counterparts, and more tied tobuilding a structure ex novo than to maintaining ortransforming it. The Albanian Academy is trying to widen

217 Ibid., Serbian Internet site.218 My data was mostly obtained from the official site of the AlbanianDiplomatic Academy, although I did benefit from a variety ofconversations on the topic, namely with very helpful and wellinformed exchanges I had with Lisen Bashkurti.

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its basis and now (mid-2008) has signed legal instrumentswhich associate it with local and neighbouringUniversities.

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Pulling all this together should not be too difficult.There is really no point, I believe, in returning to thefour main clusterings I identified: even though they havedifferent historical, sociological, and administrativeroots, and even if they do indeed display diverse degreesof cohesiveness, such groupings are clearly there to beseen. Some of these clusters are as a priori entities ascould be expected; a few, however, are not at all the“classical” conglomerates one would expect to find. As wesaw, the non-CEI three Baltic States crowd together withthe Czech-Polish pair, and Albania huddles with theCroatia-Serbia one; moreover, Croatia, behind the diverseadministrative implantation of its Academy is surprisinglyakin to the Romania-Bulgaria dyad – as Montenegro willperhaps be when it matures and stabilizes. My point is easyto enounce, and it is that although one must certainly takeinto account such and surely many other caveats, plain andapparent clusters do emerge from the data gathered.Elective affinities – some of them, I repeat, ratherunexpected ones – are there, quite unmistakably. The actorsthemselves detect the existence of such clusters, as Icalled them: Macedonia, for example, was still [in midApril-2008] hesitating between the adoption of a Serbian ora Bulgarian model for its up and coming diplomatic trainingfacility. It is still not clear to me, either, where theHungarian, the Ukrainian, and the Macedonian schemes fitin. To go back to my initial comments: I noted at the outsetthat the large majority of the cases in which diplomatictraining is systematic, intense, and demanding, are to befound in two quite distinctive sets of States: globalplayers who are forced to do so, given the variety of

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scenarios they find themselves involved in, and small eagerones who want to punch above their weight. So allow me togo back to that general analytical framework and start fromthat level.No CEI States (even Italy and Austria) actually belong tothe first of these. In CEI there are no real global players.Those States who where that (Austria and Italy, again, arechoice examples here) do not really want to regain the nowlost status they once enjoyed (although it could be arguedthat Italy may be spontaneously becoming one, and that someAustrians wish that too), and there are no recent majorregional players who may want to make up for time lost(although Poland might conceivably be moving in thatgeneral direction). And if they do integrate the second setwhich I initially delineated – that is, if they have theambition to weigh heavier than what their size and scaleautomatically grants them – then they should run the extramile. And this is something that, although some of them maywell yearn for, none are really there yet.The immediate geographical (and political) neighbourhood ofCEI does, nevertheless, provide excellent examples ofStates from one, the other or both sets. East and West ofCEI, Russia and Germany are clearly global contestants,very global ones at that, and naturally their rich anddemanding diplomatic training tags along. North of CEI,Northwest, and East of it, Norway, Holland and Israel arewonderful examples of States who manage to rather heavilypunch above their weight, partly via the quality of theirUniversities, the exquisite care they take with theirselection procedures, and the well-heeled diplomatic in-house training they demand from their diplomats219. But thecold truth is that no CEI State is really in a positioncomparable to these – notwithstanding Italy’s economic and219 As I noticed at the outset, these two groupings are not, in fact,mutually exclusive ones. Notice, for instance, that The Netherlands,like Israel or Portugal – as a moment of reflection shows us – are ingood truth members of both my groups: Holland had coloniesthroughout, mainly in the Americas and Asia, and Israel has to takeinto account the dynamics of a Jewish diaspora that spreads the worldover. Portugal is like Holland here, and like Israel too.

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political dynamics and Austria’s and Poland’s potentialbids; and so it becomes difficult to mobilize resources forthe wide-aperture and high-intensity training of diplomatsthat having to contend with those scenarios in the realworld actually entails.In order to do that, however, a better coordination and athicker cooperation is needed. This could mean, forinstance, a systematic mutual exchange of people andinformation, a regular sending of stagiaires between CEIMember-States’ Ministries, the organization of jointtraining courses and, ultimately, the setting up of somesort of a mini-Bologna Declaration circuit between them.All this in the hope that a sort of ever more tightly-knitepistemic community of like-minded diplomats and Ministriesof Foreign Affairs will emerge220. Perhaps most importantly,and so as to avoid the inevitable bureaucratic viscosity Ialready mentioned, there must be clear-cut politicaldirectives on training requirements that will render itimpossible for Ministries to constantly force Academies andInstitutes to the negotiating table, under out of datelabour pressures which fit rather badly with the needs ofthe demanding kind of training needed for triumph in thehighly competitive modern-day international system; andthat, of course, requires not only a better rationalizationof the MFAs’ modes of operation, but also the accord of thenational Ministries of Finance – something which only a

220 Mai’a K. Davis Cross (2006), The European Diplomatic Corps. Diplomats andInternational Coooperation from Westphalia to Maastricht, Palgrave Macmillan, forinstance, argues rather cogently that “diplomats comprise atransnational network of experts or ‘epistemic community’ which hasbeen critical in determining cooperation and non-cooperation amongEuropean states”. Peter Haas had earlier made an in the main similarpoint in relation to ‘think tanks’ and networks of ‘policy planners’,in P. Haas, (1992) “Introduction: epistemic communities andinternational policy coordination”, International Organization, 46 (1) 1-35.

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powerful political agenda can come up with221. This is atall order indeed, but also, really, a reasonable hope.If CEI training institutions want to harmonize theirefforts, they unfortunately in all probability must becontented with meetings such as the Dubrovnik Diplomatic Forum(now, in 2008, in its eleventh leg), sharing know-how andexperiences, hopefully values and goals too, detectingcurrent trends, cooperating and coordinating so as to avoidoverlap, but also to increase synchronization.Nevertheless, they should always be conscious that doing sois not a politically neutral exercise and thus that itinvolves political choices. Diplomacy and, therefore, thetraining of diplomats, are too close to State sovereigntyand to often deeply held notions of identity for it to beotherwise. The difficulties faced by the long-drawn andarduous efforts aimed at either harmonization, or even atight cooperation among EU diplomatic training entities –and the EU is surely much further “advanced” alongintegration lines than CEI – should ring a sobering warningbell against facile voluntarism. Despite the fact that inthe EU we are looking at the looming creation of a jointExternal Action Service, convergence is proceeding at snailpace and harmonization is not really in sight. Is this really surprising? The anecdote is edifying andunfortunately still applicable even after the project of aConstitutional Treaty was replaced by a somewhat watered-

221 A quick word about “administrative proximity”, let me call itthat, and its correlates: a reality-check, in a way. If this is true,than one would expect that the capacity of a training entity inpushing away (as it must if it is to function as one) pressures from“the services” of MFAs will decrease as its administrative distancefrom the Ministries augments – or, to put this in other words, thosethat have direct dependence ties (say, Croatia, or the CzechRepublic) will likely be more capable of imposing training than thoseunder “indirect rule” from the central Ministerial structures (say,Romania or Bulgaria, who depend on the Minister rather than on “themachine”), and more so than independent ones like the Vienna Academyor the Albanian one, subjected to “the market’s” visible hand of theMFAs as consumers. Ceteris paribus, that is: for, of course, if theDirector happens to a personal friend of the Minister, things mayindeed flow along different lines.

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down Lisbon Treaty. As Simon W. Duke222 claimed in 2002,initially one overlooked aspect of the European Uniondiplomacy was the need for training. That, however, camesoon enough: “[t]he growing complexity of EU externalrelations highlighted the need for a more systematicapproach to training. This was explicitly recognized by theCommission in 1994. Specifically, it proposed theestablishment of a unified external service and a workingparty to assess and identify long-term needs. This resultedin the 27 March 1996 Williamson Report (SEC(1996)554/2).Moreover, the Commission acknowledged the need to‘professionalize’ the external service”. The process is

222 Simon W. Duke (2002), “Preparing for European Diplomacy?”, Journal ofCommon Market Studies, vol. 40, no. 5: 849–870. The quotation is form p.861. That was, of course, followed by a flurry of documents. Oneexample from the early years (the late 90’s will suffice: in rapidsequence, the Commission approved a number of communications on thedevelopment of the external service, commencing in March 1996. Forinstance, ‘Report on the Longer Term Needs of the External Service’,SEC(96)554, 27 March 1996 and the’ twin’ ‘Recomposition of Staff andRationalisation of the Network’, SEC(96)554/2, 27 March 1996 (the so-called Williamson report); ‘Development of the External Service ofthe Commission’, SEC(97)605, 8 April 1997, ‘Multiannual Plan for theAllocation of Resources of the External Service’, SEC(98) 1261, 8April 1998; ‘The Development of the External Service’, COM(1999)180,21 April 1999. As Duke stressed (ibid.), “[t]he communicationssuggested multiple improvements or adaptations for the externalservice such as: the redeployment of staff; the hiring of greaternumbers of local staff in the delegations; the creation of newdelegations; the regionalization of delegations; enhanced co-operation with the diplomatic services of the Member States; and thepromotion of better relations with the parliamentary delegations orcommittees. The reforms were, however, narrow in the sense that theyapplied to the external service only, and not to the wider externalrelations apparatus of the Union. Wider reform would have to waituntil 1999”. This was when the Directorate General (DG) for ExternalRelations (Relex or relations extérieures) was created, following theconsolidation of the geographical DGs dealing with developmentissues. Quite a lot more followed. For an early prospective study,see G. Woschnagg (2001) ‘The Future of European Diplomacy’, FavoritaPapers 02/2001 (Wien: Diplomatische Akademie/Europäisches Parlament),pp. 39–40. For a detailed map of issues, see Nataliya Neznamova(2007), Does the European Union need a Common Diplomatic Service?, unpublishedMaster's thesis, Institut des Hautes Études Internationales.

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still ongoing. From its very beginning it was marred bydisagreements as to nomenclature. There is as yet no precise agreement on terms. The Councilreferred to a European Diplomatic Academy, the EuropeanParliament to a College of European Diplomacy and, in French-speaking circles, reference was made to an École DiplomatiqueCommunautaire. Interestingly, the same issue of terminologysurfaced in the third pillar with references to both aEuropean Police Academy and a European Police College. Inspite of the difference in titles, there is littledifference in the underlying substance. Recognizing thedifficulties and trying to circumvent the, S. Duke decidedin his well-known paper that, “[f]or the sake ofconsistency, this article refers to a College of EuropeanDiplomacy”223. Let us hope that will be resolved soon. Butmay the lesson be learned. Wishful thinking, if it amountsto little more than a replay of recent EU pains should beavoided as a likely farce. As the already cited S.W. Dukewrote in 2002, “[o]ne feature of the EU’s externalrelations is the growth of ‘European foreign policy’ and,with it, ‘European diplomacy’. For the Member Statesthemselves, there is growing recognition that the politicsof scale outweigh unilateral action in external relations,leading to a collective diplomacy. Although questionsremain over the extent to which European interests actuallyconverge and, when they do, the motivation for theirconvergence, the notion that European actions lead toEuropean interests is nevertheless present in the generalliterature”224. My point is that in the European Union wewitnessed (and to a large extent we still do) theunfortunate coexistence of an idealized and often strongly

223 Simon W. Duke (2002, op. cit.: 866, note 24). This was by no meansnovel. At its meeting in Tampere, 15–16 October 1999, the EuropeanCouncil agreed to establish a network of national police traininginstitutes, which could ultimately lead to the creation of apermanent institution. The Council Decision of 22 December 2000establishing the European Police College (CEPOL) followed from thatdecision (see Official Journal L 336, 30 December 2000), after a consensuson the name was finally reached. 224 Simon W. Duke, op. cit.: p.849.

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desired united front on such matters with the unwelcomepractical recognition that ‘politics as usual’ relegatedthat source of discourse into the realm of politicalperformance.It is surely naïve to rely on the expectation that amongCEI countries things could happen otherwise.

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http://www.qeh.ox.ac.uk/centres/oufsp

http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/fr/ministere_817/emplo.../institut_diplomatique_7261.htm (consulted 6.7. 05)

http://www.ln.mid.ru/brp_4.nsf/english

http://www.mfa.gr/english/the_ministry/academy/aims.html (consulted 6.7.05)

http://sfs.georgetown.edu/

http://www12.georgetown.edu/undergrad/bulletin/sfs.html

http://fletcher.tufts.edu/about/mission.shtml

http://www2.mre.gov.br/irbr/irbr/institu.htm

http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/About+the+Ministry/Structure+and+departments/Training+in+the+Israel+Ministry+of+Foreign+Affairs.htm

http://www.mfa.gov.eg/MFA_Portal/en-GB/

243

http://www.unc.edu/depts/diplomat/AD_Issues/amdipl_16/kinney/kinney_when4.html

http://www.paris4.sorbonne.fr/e-cursus/texte/CEC/bely/BiblioG%E9n%E9RI.htm

http://www.springerlink.com/content/x20j0514545h28g3/

http://www.e-ir.info/?p=428

http://www.dipacademy.ru/english/index.shtml

244

http://www.mfa.gr/www.mfa.gr/en-US/The+Ministry/Structure/Diplomatic+Academy/Objectives/

http://fletcher.tufts.edu/about/history.shtml

http://www.mfa.gov.eg/MFA_Portal/en-GB/institute/

http://www.maec.es/es/MenuPpal/Ministerio/Escuela%20Diplomatica/Paginas/escuela_diplomatica.aspx

http://www.minbuza.nl/en/welcome/Netherlands/general,Foreign-Policy.html

http://www.dipacademy.ru/english/today_eng.shtml

http://www.language-learning.net/site_14173_28346_2.html

http://www.indianembassy.org/newsite/default.asp

http://fsi.mea.gov.in/

http://www.uonbi.ac.ke/faculties/faculty_page.php?fac_code=46

http://hostings.diplomacy.edu/IRIC/

http://www.minrel.gov.cl/webMinRel/home.do?sitio=1

http://www.mre.gov.br/index.php?Itemid=256&id=558&option=com_content&task=view

http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/MFAArchive/2000_2009/2002/7/Israel-s+Foreign+Relations-+Selected+Documents.htm

http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/About+the+Ministry/Departments/Israel+Foreign+Ministry+accepting+applications+for+cadet+course+9-Nov-2007.htm

http://coombs.anu.edu.au/SpecialProj/ASAA/biennial-conference/2004/Novotny-D-ASAA2004.pdf.

http://www.manskligarattigheter.gov.se/dynamaster/file_archive/040301/3e2f0d255a5e3a6938c1bc0678ff7d8e/s200304_20e.pdf

http://www.mzv.cz/wwwo/MZV/default.asp?id=10399&ido=8352&idj=2&amb=1

http://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/jptoc.html

http://www.jiia.or.jp/en/aboutus/index.php

http://www.mofa.go.jp/announce/fm/aso/speech0611.html

245

http://www.mofa.go.jp/policy/other/bluebook/2001/chap4-a.html

http://www.ena.fr/index.php?page=formation/catalogue/ri

http://textus.diplomacy.edu/textusbin/env/scripts/Pool/GetBin.asp?IDPool=1166

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