Are diplomats needed in the digital age?

Diplomacy is an approach to the management of international relations founded upon the use of non-violent political communications such as dialogue, negotiation and compromise for purposes of conflict resolution and problem-solving. In my experience, many serving diplomats are not entirely sure of that definition, or of how their work contributes to the achievement of international peace, security and prosperity. That observation notwithstanding, I would argue that diplomacy has never been more relevant.

Digital diplomacy, which is also referred to variously as e-,  i-,  cyber or virtual diplomacy, is part of what has been widely referred to as the  new diplomacy. That activity has been made possible by the adoption, within diplomatic institutions and government more generally, of digitally-based systems of data creation, transmission and storage using the Internet, social media platforms, computers, and a variety of wireless electronic devices.

The diplomatic means, therefore, are evolving to keep pace with the times, but the ends are largely immutable.

The threat or use of armed force will always have its place in the world, but that place is now dramatically over-represented. Since the end of the Cold War, and in the wake of disasters in Iraq and Afghanistan, the limitations associated with the continued militarization of international policy could not be clearer. The reality is that the most profound threats and challenges which imperil the planet – climate change, resource scarcity, diminishing bio-diversity, environmental collapse – are rooted in science and driven by technology. International cooperation to broach these complex and difficult issues cannot be undertaken using anything other than diplomacy, whether traditional,  public, digital,  or guerrilla, which combines elements of all three. 

Because long-term, sustainable and human-centred development has become the basis for durable security in the digital age, diplomacy must displace defence at the centre of international policy. In a globalized precincts of the 21st century, talking rather than fighting is the only way forward.   

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Diplomats are not only needed in the digital age, but are needed more than ever.  The argument that they are less useful than before rests mainly on the assumption that, since digital technology has made information easily accessible almost everywhere, almost anyone can get it – and understand it, too.  This proposition has considerable appeal in a variety of quarters. Politicians who, for political, ideological  or other reasons, distrust diplomats as intermediaries like it because it supports the case for dispensing with them (or at least for putting them in their place). Rival departments of government may like it because it can buttress their argument for pushing DFAIT – often a source of complications and delays – aside. NGOs and other attentive publics may think well of it because they are persuaded that downgrading the role of diplomats will open up more room for their own representatives to exercise influence. And so on.

But the reality is that the escalation in the volume of available ‘information’, in the speed with which it flows, and in the number and variety of players who can both consume and create it has made expert interpretation, analysis, and distillation essential if those who must make foreign policy decisions are to do their job in properly considered fashion. Digital media (and other media, too) are better at distributing factoids and opinions than at providing broadly informed analysis, and their perspective is not the perspective of those who must manage affairs of state and make the trade-offs among the available policy options. The digital world distributes wheat, to be sure, but much of it is concealed in piles of chaff. In the conduct of foreign affairs, the diplomat – the experienced “Johnny on the spot” – is the one best positioned in the field to perform the task of separating the two.

Diplomats perform a variety of functions. Intelligence analysis informed by an understanding of the interests and policy agendas of those who must govern at home is among the most important. In its absence, political leaders will be prone to acting from ignorance, and with much greater risk of falling victim to an ill-founded assumption or a thoughtless prejudice. 

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Of course – as are butchers, priests, surgeons, and artists. The enduring need to be confidential adviser, interpreter, and strategist is more critical than ever in a competitive, deconstructed and still dangerous world, and to provide meaning over ubiquitous white noise of twittered sound-bites signifying nothing. 

But diplomacy is transforming to suit an open and globally networked landscape, where success belongs to the best-connected. This means reaching way beyond private communications on behalf of official circles at home to foreign ministries and local elites. Today’s successful diplomat is an extroverted entrepreneur practising public diplomacy, accredited virtually to all of local civil society and representing Canadian civil society as well as government. Diplomats from democracies need to meet expectations they will extend solidarity and support to human rights defenders and aspiring democrats instead of situating our interests in the field in the false security of aligning with the authoritarian status quo.

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No, diplomats are not needed in this digital age; a much smaller group of diplomatic experts is needed to carry out operational matters such as consular services and specific tasks such as the Afghanistan mission in the Canadian context.

The digital age means that governments have lost their power over information…the central function of what diplomats did in the past….seeking/assessing information about any manner of things in both the host and home country; others can do this now, often with more skills and more impact. In essence, the digital age has supplanted the diplomat; the golden age of diplomacy of the 19th and 20th century is well behind us. The diplomatic function, while still a niche and important activity, needs re-tooling in this new, digital age.

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Diplomats are needed more than ever in the digital age. They must just engage in and be part of that age. This involves more than the knowledge of how to use the technology; it requires cultural change. This normally comes quite naturally as new recruits, familiar with FaceBook and Twitter, replace those for whom email and Internet searches were a challenge. Diplomats of the digital age are dealing with a much vaster number of actors than was the case with people my age (the biblical three score years and ten). There is a much vaster amount of information that is available. Diplomats of the digital age must be able to find the wheat and separate it from the chaff. The skills of analysis have never been more important. Negotiating skills are of critical importance. The same is true for the skills of policy advice, assuming, of course, that such advice is welcomed. Governments will need to let go of the degree of central control that seems now to be established, at least in Canada. The British and the Americans are already moving in this direction. I know thought is being given in Ottawa to the impact of the digital age on diplomacy, more broadly on the management of Canada’s foreign relations. This is good news. Given the degree of interdependence in the world and the seriousness of the challenges we face, we need a diplomacy on the cutting edge. That means experimenting with the ways in which Canada’s capabilities can be both focused on what matters and projected around the world. Digitally speaking, my handle on Twitter is @GordonSmithG20 – talking about “rapid response,” one only has 140 characters to communicate! It can be done.

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Professionals are always required and diplomats are in that category in international relations. Gifted amateurs are no substitute. Would you take the advice of a sports professional on your heart operation ?

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In January 1969 Pierre Elliott Trudeau famously declared that “the whole concept of diplomacy today is a little bit outmoded.”  All that all one needed to know what was happening abroad, he said, was to read “a good newspaper.”  Although Trudeau changed his mind about the usefulness of Canada’s foreign service, some Canadians persist in deriding diplomats as high-spending functionaries engaged in activities made passé by the advent of digital media.  But governments that have been inclined to act on such views by slashing the easily-targetable budget of the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade have quickly discovered just how much Canada’s diplomats abroad are needed – to make sense of the world beyond Canada’s borders for the government of the day, to press Canadian interests abroad, to provide services to Canadians overseas. 

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Actually, Wikileaks made clear how thoughtful many US diplomats are and also how hard they work in the service of their country.  Information overload threatens us all.  Distilling the important from the ambient white noise is both increasingly important and increasingly difficult.  Effective advocacy and successful communication on strategic economic and political goals are skills generally not picked up overnight.  Thus, while the form diplomacy takes will continue to change, with the political level of government ever more engaged and very usefully so, as a student of international relations, I believe the role of diplomats remains a useful, and in many cases an indispensable one, at relatively low cost to tax-payers, particularly relative to some of the alternatives.

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In an age of over-abundant information, easy travel and instantaneous communications, some are tempted to conclude that the services of professional diplomats are no longer required. As Canadian Prime Minister Trudeau is reported to have said several decades ago, “Why pay good money to keep an army of diplomats abroad so they can report something I have already read in my morning newspaper?”.

Of course, diplomats do a lot more than just report on events in their country of accreditation and the smart ones have long ago stopped trying to compete with the media in this regard.  Their value-added is the profound understanding of the outside world that they can bring to bear on the consideration of issues of interest to their country. Such understanding cannot be acquired simply by watching the news on television, by exchanging e-mails with distant partners or by occasional visits to foreign lands.  It is the fruit of a life-long commitment to the field of international relations and a willingness to spend a good part of one’s life away from home, steeped in the realities of foreign societies and cultures. Professional diplomats will never match the knowledge of technical experts and should not pretend that they do. But they are best placed to map out the strategy and identify the tactics to achieve national goals internationally.

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The consensus, on this page and beyond, is that more diplomats are always welcome at the cocktail party. I, too, will throw my top hat into that ring, but then add the question: “Who is a diplomat in the digital age?”

Even before email began to replace the telex, the definition of diplomat began to expand. Embassies began to fill with officials from departments other than the Foreign Office. Increasingly, as international relationships become more diverse and deeper, they require more diverse and deeper knowledge to manage them. Gradually, the generalist in pin stripes has been replaced by the specialist in agriculture, technology, and finance.

The definition continues to expand as non-state actors such as corporations, NGOs, cities, and individuals play increasingly pivotal roles in diplomacy. US author Parag Khana has gone so far as to argue that in the age of Twitter and Facebook we are all diplomats now, that in a post-Westphalian world we can all drive international agendas and change. As a former diplomat myself, I agree with this, and believe I have a bigger impact on the issues I care about now, than I did when I had a burgundy passport.

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Policy-savvy diplomats are needed, but they require much greater subject-specific and scientific skills in order to help solve cross-border problems.

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