New Realities in Foreign Affairs: Diplomacy in the 21st Century

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The most profound effect on the actual character of diplomacy of 21st century global changes is that public spheres are multiplying in modern states, especially in Western democracies, leading international academics, practitioners and observers stress in a new report.
“The fracturing of our societies, a process which is accelerating this century, has given rise to this fragmentation. Our homes, professional worlds, education, interests, experiences, and ideological orientations are increasingly differentiated,” according to the report titled New Realities in Foreign Affairs: Diplomacy in the 21st Century, published by the German Institute for International and Security Affairs.
“Therefore in diplomacy we are engaging with and responding to an increasing variety of actors that span many different and coexisting public spheres. These diverse public spheres exist side by side, some­times without touching; they can also work together or collide and split into new particles of publics."
This process of pluralization is likely to intensify, stresses the report, edited by Volker Stanzel. It adds that the process affects a society not only from the inside, but also works inter-societally – that is, cross-border. “Consequently, foreign policy developments naturally become topics within the new publics. This is of course the case when foreign policy problems are simultaneously domestic concerns, but it can also happen if a public has an interest in events outside their country’s borders.”
The new publics therefore want to influence the implementation of foreign policy through diplomacy according to their topics of interest. “Thus, diplomacy no longer only acts purely intergovernmentally for the national goals of a country. Diplomacy must now explain and justify itself domestically and mediate between a state’s goals and the public’s perspectives.”
Publics may claim that a government should behave differently from what the political leadership wants; meanwhile, the government claims to represent the interests of the public properly. Even in autocratically ruled states, the disparity between governmental decisions and public values can be observed. These conflicts shatter the confidence of the public in their political leadership and can tear a society apart.
The report recommends that Ministries of Foreign Affairs, diplomats and governments in general should be proactive in four areas:
1. Diplomats must understand the tension between individual needs and state requirements, and engage with that tension without detriment to the state.
2. Digitization must be employed in such a way that gains in efficiency are not at the expense of efficacy.
3. Forms of mediation should be developed that reconcile the interests of all sides allowing governments to operate as sovereign states, and yet simul- taneously use the influence and potential of other actors.
4. New and more open state activities need to be advanced that respond to the ways in which emotionalized publics who wish to participate in governance express themselves.

Understanding State Preferences with Text as Data: Introducing the UN General Debate Corpus

World leaders have been gathering in New York City in late September every year to address the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) to present their views on key international issues such as conflict and cooperation, terrorism, development and climate change. The statements of kings, presidents, prime ministers and other leaders are an invaluable and largely untapped source of information on governments’ policy preferences across a wide range of issues over time.
Government preferences are central to the study of international relations and comparative politics. As preferences cannot be directly observed, write ALEXANDER BATURO, NIHEER DASANDI and SLAVA J. MIKHAYLOV, they must be inferred from states’ observed behavior. Although military alliances have been used as an indicator of preference similarity, that approach provides little information about preferences when states do not have alliances. Scholars have instead overwhelmingly relied on UNGA voting records to estimate foreign policy preferences. However, UNGA voting-based methods – like all measures of preference – rely on certain assumptions and, as such, have both strengths and limitations. For example, one shortcoming is that estimates of state preference are derived from the limited number of issues that are voted on in the UNGA in a given year. Therefore, it is essential that researchers can draw on additional data and measures to avoid producing findings about government preferences that are based on one type of observed state behavior.
In their paper "Understanding state preferences with text as data: Introducing the UN General Debate corpus,” the authors argue that the application of text analytic methods to general debate statements can provide much-needed additional measures and tools that can broaden our understanding of government preferences and their effects. The use of text analytic methods is rapidly gaining ground in comparative politics and legislative studies. To date, however, there has been little effort to use speeches to estimate policy preferences in international relations. The formal and institutionalized setting of the general debate, its inclusion of all UN member states, which are provided with equal opportunity to address the Assembly, and the fact that it takes place every year, makes it an ideal resource from which to derive, using text analysis, estimates of state preferences that can be applied to systematic analyses of international politics.
The authors introduce a new dataset, the UN General Debate corpus (UNGDC), consisting of 7314 general debate statements delivered between 1970-2014, that they have preprocessed, categorized and prepared for empirical applications. They begin by discussing the characteristics, content and purpose of the UN general debate and go on to explain the process of collecting and preprocessing the statements and provide an overview of the UNGDC.
The authors then use the text as data approach to show how the UNGDC can be used as a resource from which estimates of government preferences can be derived, providing applications of these estimates. The paper concludes by outlining potential uses of the UNGDC in future research.

United Nations Peacekeeping Operations: Environmental Sustainability

United Nations Peacekeeping Operations (UNPKO) are deployed to create, maintain, and secure peace in countries and regions struggling with violence and war. The environmental sustainability of UNPKO mission sites is not essential to the purpose of each deployment, but good sustainability practices can benefit the mission, host nation, troop-contributing countries, and the global environment. As a major contributor to UNPKO efforts, the United States has a direct interest in improving the sustainability and cost-effectiveness of each mission.
In this paper, PHILIP STOCKDALE, REBEKAH KIRKWOOD, JULIE SAPP and JONATHAN DANIEL identify gaps in sustainability practices at local and organizational levels and
recommend an increased focus on sustainability practices that can benefit the mission, host nation, troop contributing countries, and the environment.
The United Nations Interim Force In Lebanon (UNIFIL) is a long-term mission, likely to be in place for at least another five years. Investments in active technologies such as solar energy and electric vehicles are already paying dividends. Expansion of these programs, as well as standardized environmental awareness training and improvements to UNIFIL’s water management practices would enhance the sustainability of the mission.
The United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) is a relatively recent mission, staffed with a high proportion of illiterate peacekeepers, in a politically unstable country with a harsh natural environment. Although required by Security Council resolution to manage its environmental impact, MINUSMA lacks the financial resources, manpower and timeline to invest in complex technologies with up-front cost. To comply with its environmental mandate, the mission should implement short-term, passive measures to improve water management and solar/thermal protection, as well as
standardized environmental awareness training. If the situation in Mali stabilizes and MINUSMA is extended to a longer mandate, then the mission should follow the lead of UNIFIL and implement active technologies that are environmentally friendly and will save money over the life of the equipment.
All of these recommendations can be applied, to some extent, to all UNPKO deployments. UN
headquarters should take the lead in standardizing environmental training, technology and practices for all UNPKO missions. Cost-benefit calculations will always be important, but the overall benefit of good sustainability practices will extend to people and the environment from the local to the global level.

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Strengthening Multilateralism and the Role of the UN

On Friday (November 9) the United Nations Security Council is planning to hold an open debate on “Strengthening multilateralism and the role of the United Nations”. China, as President of the Council for November, has circulated a concept note in advance of the discussions:

- How to better uphold multilateralism? The most basic principle of multilateralism is that when dealing with matters in the international arena, it is necessary to uphold fairness, justice and the participation of all countries in discussing actions to be taken; actions must be taken in accordance with rules agreed upon by all; and the interests and concerns of all countries must be taken into account. Currently the international environment is becoming increasingly unstable and uncertain. Countries need to engage in in-depth discussions on how to adapt to the trend of the times, how to foster unity and cooperation, and how to enhance mutual understanding and trust.

- How to further promote the role of the United Nations? The United Nations is a critical pillar of multilateralism. In the new environment, we must ask how we can better uphold and carry forward the purposes and principles of the Charter; how we can deepen coordination and cooperation between the United Nations and regional organizations; and how we can better support the central role of the United Nations in international affairs and make the Organization relevant to all people.

- How to effectively address global challenges? Global challenges such as terrorism and risks to cybersecurity loom ever larger, requiring countries to formulate a coherent strategy and take collective action. How can we more effectively safeguard this collective mechanism? How can we promote peaceful resolution of disputes through dialogue, consultation and the path of political settlement? How can we enhance the role of United Nations peacekeeping operations in ensuring lasting peace and sustainable development?

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