'Who are those diplomats, with their mannerism and void language to ask for money and status, when all they do is to provide vague information, late while asking constantly for non-reaction in the name of undefined diplomatic interests?' I've been faced way too often with this attitude of decision makers during my short but eventful diplomatic career.
More than once I hated their disregard/arrogant attitude towards anyone outside their 'unaccountable elite', their lack - to be read refuse sometimes - of response to requests coming outside their establishment. I never wanted to be a diplomat myself and was always happy for cutting short a professional intermezzo that was nothing than an impressive line added to my CV.
However, my interest in things regarding international diplomacy remains and I keep reading accounts about diplomatic issues, with the interest of someone that succeeded to be inside, even for a short - but intensive - amount of time. I am particularly interested in independent, eventually critical perspectives though which are realistically outlining the constraints and challenges of diplomacy.
A former diplomat, with experience in both the bilateral and the multilateral field on behalf of the Foreign Service, Carne Ross offers in Independent Diplomat. Disparches from an Unaccountable Elite a realistic - cynical even - overview of what does it mean the diplomatic service. Founder of the Independent Group, a diplomatic advisory group, the first such nonprofit, Ross spent 15 years in the British Diplomatic Corps. He noticed the disfunctionalities and myopies of the political and diplomatic elites in dramatic situations such as the wars in former Yugoslavia or the case for WMD in Iraq.
Through personal examples and experiences, he explains how exactly the 'diplomatic mind' operates and why it is so limited in fact when it comes to grasping complex realities - 'we', the countrymen might not have any interested in getting involved in that; it is no time to waste reading about complex geopolitical realities; often diplomats are reporting about realities they acknowledge via the local media; they may just not speak the local language and don't go out of their cubicle. The realities are described in a caricatural simplistic way and tragically, some may take decisions based on such evaluations.
It is nothing to do about it, but at least this book helps to better understand the mechanisms of denial.
However, when it comes to the chances of an 'independent diplomat' to operate outside the system I am sure that more than offering advice and consulting is not possible. The system will exist as long as states will exist. It is important though to keep reminding how diplomacy really works sometimes and offer an alternative to the extremely simplified version of the reality it offers.
