Published by De Gruyter

Volume 11 Issue 2 - Editors’ Forum: The Evolving Embassy: Changes and Challenges to Diplomatic Representation and Practice in the Global Era, Guest edited by Giles Scott-Smith

Issue of New Global Studies

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Contents
Journal Overview

Publicly Available August 26, 2017

Articles

July 1, 2017

Abstract

The need to maintain embassies as essential outposts of diplomatic recognition and representation has been questioned by many observers. Critics deem them increasingly irrelevant in a globalized context of multiple, more adaptable actors, whereas their advocates hold on to the ongoing role of the nation-state in structures of global governance. Both sides agree that change is necessary, although they disagree on its goals and how far it should go. This Introduction sets out the main arguments present in the debate, laying the foundation for the articles that follow which explore how embassies, diplomats and diplomatic representation have all been adapted and transformed by the changing political context of the global era.

August 1, 2017

Violent Conflicts and Neutral Legations: A Case Study of the Spanish and Swiss Legations in Wartime Japan

Pascal Lottaz

Page range: 85-100

Abstract

This article explores the way in which the Spanish and the Swiss legations in Japan acted and reacted to violent change in the international environment. By looking at the period of Japanese wartime aggression in Asia and the Pacific from 1931–1945, it analyzes key moments for both diplomatic missions, when changes abroad or at home led their respective diplomats to take a stance beyond the regular representation of national interests. The article argues that violent conflicts impacted the diplomatic behavior of the legations in Japan heavily. They were shaped by new policies in reaction to the violence, while sometimes also engaging in shaping such policies themselves.

July 1, 2017

Global Trends in Local Contexts: The Finnish Embassy in Paris, 1956–1990

Louis Clerc

Page range: 101-115

Abstract

A group of recent publications have reflected on the way the diplomatic machineries of small states have adapted to recent changes, upgraded engagement with global questions, reached out to experts and private actors, and increased organizational flexibility. This article aims to participate in this discussion. We will draw on Cristina Archetti’s insights in her study of the localized practices of foreign correspondents in order to inform a presentation of changes in the Finnish diplomatic representation in Paris. The case study suggests that the drivers of local evolutions are to be looked at not only in global trends but also in the interplay between the characteristics of the Finnish diplomatic network, the specificities of the country of residence, and wider political, cultural and commercial structures. The article makes the case for a localized, contextualized, fine-grained approach to the influence of global trends.

July 1, 2017

Bevin’s Boys Abroad: British Labor Diplomacy in the Cold War Era

Geert Van Goethem

Page range: 117-131

Abstract

In this article the rise and fall of the position of the labor attaché in British diplomacy during the Cold War is analysed. Experts from outside the diplomatic corps worked, and continue to work, in British embassies alongside diplomats. Labor was a prominent domain of expertise during the entire Cold War era, but this has almost disappeared today. It could therefore be claimed that British diplomacy was able to adapt to changing political circumstances. However, this is a story with multiple layers and contains not only elements of change but also continuity over the longer term of the diplomatic enterprise that, despite flexibility and increasing openness, remains a world apart.

July 1, 2017

Edges of Diplomacy: Literary Representations of the (Honorary) Consul and the Public-Private Divide in Diplomatic Studies

Giles Scott-Smith

Page range: 133-150

Abstract

This article investigates the relevance of consular positions, and particularly the honorary consul, through their representations in modern literature and the arts. Although the honorary consul’s official status is codified in the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations of 1963, this document clearly identifies the limits to diplomatic immunity for this position, such that the honorary consul occupies a hybrid space on the boundary between the public and the private. This hybridity opens up the possibility for ambiguity in terms of conflicts of interest and divided loyalties. Acknowledging this hybridity requires re-examining the position of honorary consul beyond formal descriptions in mainstream diplomatic studies which are often evasive on the position’s actual status. In contrast, their representation in modern literature and the arts offers a more candid insight into the ontology and practice of consuls and consular work. As a result, the article makes the claim that the honorary consul illustrates that the public/private divide in contemporary diplomacy is less stable than is generally presented, and that the rise of private entities as diplomatic actors is therefore more a question of intensity than the emergence of something entirely new.

August 5, 2017

Coda: Ten Questions for a Diplomat

Kenneth Weisbrode

Page range: 151-155

Abstract

Thomas Niles served as a United States foreign service officer from 1962 to 1998. His service included three terms as ambassador: to Canada, the European Community, and Greece. He reflects here on the continuities in the diplomatic profession, and, in particular, on embassies, during a period of notable historic change. While many of the protocols and responsibilities of embassies remained more or less the same as they had been for over a century, there were hints that those, too, were about to change in unforeseen ways, even calling into question the central role of embassies as representing and serving the nation-state, as the other articles in this issue discuss. Nevertheless, to this ambassador, at least, even dramatic changes in technology, politics, and culture rarely happen all at once; and the institutions and the people adapting to them may be more cautious or durable than they sometimes appear in retrospect.

Book Reviews

August 15, 2017

Van Vleck, Jenifer: Empire of the Air: Aviation and the American Ascendancy

Owen Gutfreund

Page range: 157-159

August 23, 2017

Copper John F.:China’s Foreign Aid and Investment Diplomacy

Steffen Rimner

Page range: 161-163

About this journal

Objective
Local, universal, world-historical, world-systemic, or global historiographies as well as work in sociology, anthropology and international relations have shed increasing light on the common history of humankind. Only comparatively recently, however, has human global self-awareness broken through the confines of scholarly specialization, and begun to enter the everyday popular life, action, psyche, imagination and consciousness on a mass, global scale. The step into space and the resultant view of the planet, the new computer and media technologies of mass communication, the global spread of multinational corporations and human rights, the unprecedented environmental changes and challenges, the promise and threat of nuclear power and explosions, all have led to the increasing self-experiencing of the globe as a “spaceship earth.”

The field of interest of New Global Studies (NGS) therefore is both multidisciplinary and global. New Global Studies interprets globalization with a historical and sociological angle as opposed to history or sociology with a global angle. The journal addresses the process going on around us as a whole, and developing over time. It addresses globalization with a holistic perspective, which gives us a view on the past and present of the globalizing phenomena that will be invaluable to all who seek to comprehend this fundamental aspect of our society and its development. Our focus is unabashedly on the new globalization that has manifested itself so vigorously in the period starting sometime after World War II. Starting from this relatively contemporary perspective, we are fully aware that there are deep roots in the past that must be explored. Nevertheless, and in contrast with most historical journals, our primary emphasis is on the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.

Topics
We welcome articles on all aspects of globalization: economic, social, cultural, and political. In particular, we encourage analyses, both theoretical and empirical, of the following:

Transnational manifestations of culture, and cultural synthesis
Patterns and local effects of economic globalization
Elite and popular perceptions of, and reactions to, global change
Global institutions and organizations, both public and private
The global media, and the emergence of a "global society"
The degradation and preservation of the global environment
Global pedagogy

Article formats
Research articles, Review essays, Book reviews, Documentations, Commentaries

Volume 11 Issue 2 - Editors’ Forum: The Evolving Embassy: Changes and Challenges to Diplomatic Representation and Practice in the Global Era, Guest edited by Giles Scott-Smith

Issue of New Global Studies

Frontmatter

Introduction

Abstract

Violent Conflicts and Neutral Legations: A Case Study of the Spanish and Swiss Legations in Wartime Japan

Abstract

Global Trends in Local Contexts: The Finnish Embassy in Paris, 1956–1990

Abstract

Bevin’s Boys Abroad: British Labor Diplomacy in the Cold War Era

Abstract

Edges of Diplomacy: Literary Representations of the (Honorary) Consul and the Public-Private Divide in Diplomatic Studies

Abstract

Coda: Ten Questions for a Diplomat

Abstract

Van Vleck, Jenifer: Empire of the Air: Aviation and the American Ascendancy

Copper John F.:China’s Foreign Aid and Investment Diplomacy