Diplomacy,states and secrecy in communications

This paper examines the role of secrecy in diplomatic communicatons, a subject rarely dealt with in books on diplomacy. It analyses the role of secrecy in negotiations, the importance of secrecy in communications between diplomatic missions and the sending State, state security and economic security. The concepts of secrecy, confidentiality and transparency are then considered. The next section is about codes and ciphers, Data Encryption Standard and public key systems. If human ingenuity can be used to conceal the meaning of messages, cryptanalysts can likewise break down secrecy. The last section examines the role of diplomats in preserving secrecy in diplomatic communications.     

Criminalising Academia: The Protection of State Information Bill and Academic Freedom

This article assesses the implications of the controversial Protection of State Information Bill for academic freedom in South Africa, specifically for communications, media and journalism studies. The Bill requires the security cluster to classify sensitive documents on national security grounds. Academic teaching and research can help citizens to understand whether the security cluster is acting in the universal interest, rather than the interest of a political elite; it can also be used to assess media performance in reporting on national security matters. Using a critical approach to the concept of national security, I argue that the Bill favours secrecy over openness, and South Africa’s embrace of the human security definition of national security has contributed to the problem. This overemphasis on secrecy is likely to reduce the few spaces that exist in academia for critical, emancipatory work on security issues, which could hobble the sector’s attempts to understand the deeper processes at work in the security cluster. If such enquiry is marginalised, then the higher education system risks becoming an instrument for continuity rather than change in South Africa’s existing, highly unequal power relations: relations that are being maintained increasingly by force.     

Diplomatic Interactions and Negotiations

This article examines the role of state actors, organization agencies, and individual agents in diplomatic interactions and negotiations. States as diplomatic actors, organizations as diplomatic agencies, and individuals as diplomatic agents enter into complex and interdependent relationships. Proposing a three‐level analysis of interstate interactions and diplomatic negotiations, I argue that no diplomatic negotiation happens without interactions between parties at the state, organizational, and individual levels. The agency–structure paradigm provides a conceptual framework for understanding behavioral and structural properties of international interactions and their influence on diplomatic negotiations. Diplomatic negotiation employs specific forms of interaction, using a distinct language, protocol norms, symbols, ceremonies, and rituals. The state's “self” (as a social conception of its identity, values, and interests) affects the process of diplomatic negotiation. By managing, organizing, and improving international interactions at the actor, agency, and agent levels, negotiating parties can advance the process and effectiveness of diplomatic negotiation.     

Europe's intergovernmental NGO: The OSCE in Europe's emerging security structure

The OSCE is little understood outside diplomatic circles, but has a unique and increasing role in encouraging European peace and stability. The article highlights the OSCE's historical development and its more recent role in the European security structure. The OSCE mission in Latvia, tracking the country's language and citizenship issue, is illustrative of the organization's unusual charter. A second section attempts to fix the OSCE within the context of contemporary international theory and the developing literature on nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). With a broad but thin mandate, the organization manages regime activity left over from NATO and EU disinterest or immobility and, with its extensive grassroot efforts at problem‐solving, functions much like an NGO. OSCE success may lie in the combination of regime and NGO attributes, allowing it to move easily both within and outside of formal governmental structures.     

冷战时期澳大利亚与东南亚的安全关系

冷战时期,随着外交和经济交往的日益增多,澳大利亚对东南亚的认识发生了重要的变化,东南亚在其外交和安全政策中的地位不断上升,重要性不断显现。在这种背景下,澳大利亚通过几次政策调整,最终与东南亚国家建立了一种良性互动的双边安全关系,从根本上改变了以欧洲为中心的传统政策,亚太成为澳大利亚外交和安全的新中心。     

European perspectives towards the rise of Asia: contextualising the debate

To what extent can we speak of a distinctively ‘European’ security approach towards the Asia-Pacific region? In order to address that timely question, this article examines how Britain, France, Germany and the European Union (EU) are framing their evolving security roles in the Asia-Pacific region, and how those individual perspectives intersect with each other. The article identifies a number of important common features in Europe’s approaches towards security in the Asia-Pacific, namely the tendency of most European actors to emphasize the economic and diplomatic nature of their contribution to regional security, their promotion of regional multilateral security fora, their rejection of the notion that China’s rise is inherently challenging for regional and global security, and their willingness to signal their differences towards Washington’s emphasis on military power and alliance-based approach. However, and despite the existence of common traits, individual European actors show different degrees of closeness vis-à-vis the US and China and feature different perspectives regarding which security relationships they should prioritize in the region (if any), or the appropriate balance between diplomacy and security and defence cooperation. Such divergences prevent Europeans from developing a coherent security profile in the region and preclude us from speaking of a distinctively European security approach towards the Asia-Pacific.     

ASEAN's diplomatic and security culture: a constructivist assessment

In the wake of the Asian financial crisis and the subsequentviolence that built up and then tore apart East Timor in 1999,serious criticisms were levelled at the Association of SoutheastAsian Nations (ASEAN) and its diplomatic and security culture.This article examines to what extent members of ASEAN –after the Hanoi Summit in 1998 until mid-2001 – collectivelyembraced new understandings in relation to norms associatedwith the ‘ASEAN way’. This question is exploredwith respect to four initiatives: the initiation of the retreatof ASEAN foreign ministers, the participation of ASEAN membersin United Nations missions in East Timor, the adoption of theASEAN Troika concept, and the passing of rules of procedureof the ASEAN High Council. It is argued that due to concernsabout ASEAN's image and reputation, some of the shared understandingsintrinsic to ASEAN's long-standing diplomatic and security culturehave been relaxed, particularly the principle of non-interference.While this development reaffirms the value of constructivisttheorizing in international relations, the article also demonstratesthat the aforementioned initiatives and agreements do not yetamount to a radical change in ASEAN's diplomatic and securityculture. The main reason for this is that norms associated withthe ‘ASEAN way’ are still perceived to serve theimportant and necessary function of helping to mediate estrangementand insecurity among ASEAN leaderships, as well as limitinginterference by non-ASEAN states.     

Party Politics and Changes in Australia's China Policy

Relations between China and Australia have remained on a very low level in recent years due to a series of events, which have thrown their bilateral relationship into its most difficult period since diplomatic ties were established. Since late 2017, the Australian media and individual politicians began to play up the issue of political "penetration" by China in Australia, which severely undermined the atmosphere for sound bilateral relations. In August 2018, the Australian government barred Huawei, China's leading company in information and communications technology, from its 5G network on national security grounds, which set a notorious precedent of rejecting Huawei's 5G technology among Western countries and cast a shadow upon the prospects of improving relations.     

俄罗斯与韩国经济合作探析

俄韩双方无历史积怨,建交后重视和积极推进双边合作,在能源、科技、交通等领域合作都有重大进展,从建设性伙伴关系发展成为全面合作伙伴关系,并在推动东北亚地区合作中发挥了重要作用。俄韩加强合作对我国既有促进作用,在某些领域又增添了一些竞争因素。     

印度加强对非关系

印度政府清醒认识到非洲在当代国际战略格局中的地位和作用,近年来开始把非洲纳入其外交战略的优先考虑方向。印非之间在资源、经贸、外交以及军事安全各个领域的合作正在得到全面的加强与深化。非洲丰富的资源和广大的市场可以为包括中印两国在内的大国经济拓展与合作共事的舞台。     

Japanese diplomacy during the Cambodian peace process and Japan's post-Cold War role in Southeast Asia: the legacy of the Fukuda Doctrine, 1989–1993

Japan's role during the Cambodian peace process after 1989 is often considered a successful case of post-Second World War Japanese diplomacy. In contrast to claims in the existing literature that Japan began to consider and initiated its involvement in the settlement only beginning in the late 1980s, this article demonstrates that Tokyo's role built upon a diplomatic platform that the Japanese had constructed through peace efforts since the Cambodian conflict erupted in 1979. The policy framework, objectives and initiatives of Japan's Cambodia diplomacy during the peace process represented the culmination of a ten-year diplomatic endeavour. Ultimately, Japan's involvement in the Cambodian settlement, guided by its Southeast Asia strategy of promoting coexistence and cooperation between ASEAN and Indochina, legitimated and favoured Japan's attempts to expand its post-Cold War role in regional political and security affairs.     

中韩安全关系的现状及前景展望

中韩建交15年来,在传统安全和非传统安全领域均建立了良好的合作关系,为两国关系的全面发展发挥了积极作用。但是,由于复杂的历史和现实原因,两国安全关系的发展还相当缓慢,远远落后于两国政治、经济关系的发展。展望未来,由于中韩已经建立了"全面合作伙伴关系",两国安全关系的发展潜力巨大,可望从建立军方高层会谈机制、军事教育交流机制、互相观察演习及进一步加强非传统安全领域的合作等多个层面,全面推进两国安全关系的深化发展。     

The British consulate-general in Hanoi, 1954-73

Traditionally, there has been a rigid distinction made between British consular and diplomatic missions abroad: the former is concerned largely with trade, visas and the more mundane tasks of foreign representation, while the latter deals with the glamorous political world of interstate relationships at the highest level. As a general rule of thumb this may be true, but in accepting unequivocally this notion one overlooks those instances where a significant political role has been played by consulates. This article examines one such instance and in doing so raises questions relating to diplomatic and consular relations, disguised embassies, political reporting and the importance of experienced onsite personnel.     

The Surprising Logic of Transparency

The article examines the concept of transparency and its effect on international crises. It tests two possible "logics" of transparency, one positive and one negative. In the former, transparency is seen as defusing international crises by illuminating other states' peaceful intentions and ameliorating the security dilemma. In the latter, transparency is seen as exacerbating crises by overwhelming diplomatic signals with the "noise" of domestic politics and confusing opponents about which domestic voices are authoritative expressions of state policy. The authors conclude that, surprisingly, transparency makes conflicts worse more often than not—a conclusion that casts doubt on one possible explanation ofthe democratic peace.     

Human Security: The Making of a UN Ideology

Inspired by the conclusions of the United Nations Intellectual History Project, this article seeks to enrich the ongoing discussion on the role of ideas in UN activities. The focus here is on security, an issue often regarded as the organisation's raison d'être. The article argues that over the past two decades the ideology of human security has been the driving normative force behind the global policies advocated by the UN in the area of security. The first part analyses the UN's official discourse, and demonstrates the political importance that it ascribes to the concept of human security. The second section examines a set of global policies that illustrate how the world body has sought to put the principles of human security into practice. While recognising that these policies fall short of the ambitions articulated in UN rhetoric, the article suggests that they have opened a small but very real breach in the epistemic framework underlying the traditional conception of security.     

From Kosovo to Syria: the transformation of NATO Secretaries General's discourse on military humanitarian intervention

The civil war in Syria began approximately four years ago and has resulted in the murder of thousands by the Assad regime and the flight of millions to neighbouring countries. The international community's reluctance to intervene to halt the ongoing massive human rights violations has been explained in geopolitical, military-strategic, diplomatic, and legal terms. Yet, what does this imply normatively? And does the weakening of the military humanitarian intervention (MHI) norm support arguments regarding the poverty of constructivist security studies? This article examines these two questions and demonstrates the weakness of the MHI norm, especially in light of the new interpretations and meanings which authoritative agents ascribe to its key conceptual components in changing strategic, social and political contexts. Yet, the article employs constructivist tools to explore the endogenous challenges to the MHI norm while proving the added value of constructivist security research, not only for explaining “norm evolution” but also “norm decline”. Taking discourse as a reflection of social norms and an arena for encouraging new intersubjective interpretations of concepts, it examines the above assertions by analysing the discourse of NATO Secretaries General from 1999 (Kosovo crisis) to today.     

The ASEAN Regional Forum: from dialogue to practical security cooperation?

This article examines to what extent the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Regional Forum (ARF) has moved beyond dialogue to practical security co-operation. Focusing on terrorism, maritime security and disaster relief as key areas of ARF activities in the past few years, the paper offers four arguments: first, while the ARF primarily remains a forum for regional security dialogues and confidence building, its participants have slowly become prepared to proceed with practical security co-operation, albeit only in limited ways. To the extent that desktop and field exercises take place under ARF auspices, most have been organized in the area of disaster relief. This implies, second, that for the most part ARF participants are still pursuing capacity building and operational security responses outside the Forum. Third, the ARF's cautious embrace of practical co-operation is not the outcome of ASEAN's exercise of diplomatic centrality but the result of initiatives pursued by a small group of ASEAN and some non-ASEAN states. Fourth, at least in the short term, any expectations that participants might organize significantly more demanding practical activities under ARF auspices are premature.     

Politics,proximity and paranoia: the evolution of Kashmir as a nuclear flashpoint

This article traces the evolution of Kashmir as a “nuclear flashpoint,” and the relationship between Kashmir, nuclear weapons, and regional security. The first section discusses the concept of a geopolitical flashpoint, providing a definition and a series of historical examples. The Kashmir issue and its role in the broader Indo-Pakistani conflict fit reasonably neatly into this definition. A second section briefly traces the history of nuclear weapons programs in the region, as the potential for nuclear escalation by competing powers or their allies is a key factor in defining nuclear flashpoints (a post-1945 phenomenon). The third section examines the evolution of the Kashmir issue and successive Indo-Pakistani crises within a nuclearized regional environment from 1984 to 2003. The final section assesses the prospects for Kashmir in the near future, and concludes that due to underlying political factors, Kashmir will remain a nuclear flashpoint for the foreseeable future.     

Managing the “Helsinki Spirit” in the Balkans: The Greek Initiative for Balkan Co-operation, 1975–1976

The analysis examines the origins and implementation of the Greek diplomatic initiative for multilateral co-operation amongst the Balkan states in the aftermath of the Helsinki Act of the Conference for Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE). Notwithstanding pressing domestic and security concerns, détente and, in particular, the spirit of the CSCE process significantly influenced Greek Prime Minister Constantinos Karamanlis’ decision to instigate Balkan co-operation on a multilateral and not just on a bilateral level. The “Helsinki spirit” opened a window of opportunity for regional Powers from different blocs to come together. Despite its limited results, the political significance of the Athens Conference lay in the fact that it took place at all in view of Cold War realities and inter-Balkan rivalries.     

Leopards Can Change Their Spots: When Leaders Take Out of Character Actions

According to audience cost theories, out of character actions by hawkish leaders are likely when such leaders can use their reputations to deflect criticism. This analysis examines the theory of out of character actions, focusing on shifting international conditions and the use of secrecy to allow leaders both to lead public opinion and avoid unwanted scrutiny. The plausibility of this theory is tested in the paradigmatic case for hawkish policy reversal: Richard Nixon’s rapprochement with China in 1971–1972. Examination of four facets of Sino–American relations—the Soviet dimension, conservative opposition to rapprochement, growing domestic support for improved relations, and the secrecy of negotiations—reveal the significance of contextual factors and Nixon’s decisions in explaining improved relations. Leaders can effectively change their type with minimal political repercussions, as long as conditions are favourable and audience costs can be minimised.