The effects of information technology (IT) on the operation of the diplomatic service

At first glance it might look as if diplomacy has not changed all that much due to the advent of IT, as if diplomacy were to resist change. To some extent this is true, since there are no doubt retarding factors, such as a slower generational change in comparison to the business sector but also the particular relevance of the temporal factor in diplomatic procedure. In diplomacy, probably more than in other professions, a fast decision is not necessarily the best decision. Most importantly, however, we should keep in mind that - again in diplomacy more than in other professions – human input, the human factor has considerable importance. Thus personal contacts, human expertise and experience, in-built controls and feedback mechanisms, characteristic for diplomatic procedures and not necessarily fast or highly efficient, will continue to exert influence over diplomacy making the re-engineering of diplomatic procedures a more subtle and complex exercise[23].

At the same time even in very traditional diplomatic services many changes due to the advent of IT have already occurred, sometimes not easily noticeable since they follow trends that we are observing also elsewhere in society. Some changes are in the early beginnings, so that their true impact has not yet gained too much attention within the diplomatic community. In the following, in view of their likely importance in the near future, these developments and emerging trends will be described in some detail.

Internet as information tool for the diplomat:

Today it has become quite standard for the modern diplomat to have a tailor made mosaic consisting of the web sites of different national and international news agencies on his or her computer desktop or laptop and to consult them first thing in the morning. Secondly, every diplomat needs to have the homepages of all organisations and institutions, relevant for his work, ready on her or his list of ”favourites”. Diplomats today will be electronically connected with colleagues all over the world and thus can quickly and informally gather important information. A tremendous shift in the main focus of diplomatic work occurs: no more factual reporting, no tele-copying of documents that in former times would have been obtained only after using a lot of diplomatic charm on some insider. Internet access increases the amount of information readily available. However, this information needs to be sorted and also be put in context. Factual reporting is best left to the public media. Diplomacy, even more than it has done hitherto, must concentrate on in depth analysis and drafting recommendations for action and reaction

While information gathering has become so much easier, information management has and will continue to become much more important. The days of the old filing procedures are gone; new electronic procedures need to be worked out and established. They need to make collected and saved information accessible to all those within an organisation who need to have access to them. The danger that only highly personalised storage systems are developed must be countered. Easier information access brings more knowledge, which must be administered and managed well. Information managers need to be educated and given adequate places in the hierarchy of foreign ministries.

Let us turn now to the question of working procedures within a ministry: what has the introduction of Intranet systems changed, where will the development go? In the Austrian Foreign Service today, as a matter of course, every officer up to the highest echelon and the great majority of officers abroad are linked up and have easiest electronic access to each other. In addition to electronic mail, electronic files have been introduced in the ministry; speeding up the decision making process without paper that has to be moved up and down the ministry’s scale of hierarchy.

The introduction of Intranet-systems has brought about most important changes for the diplomatic service. Among them:

- direct contacts between all officers, without the need for prior authorization, to get a message, an inquiry, an information note out or to get it received. The welcome results are higher motivation, no loss of time and greater sense of responsibility among younger colleagues;

- development of an informal reporting style;

- teamwork: officers can – independently from their geographic location – work together on a report to the minister, a draft statement, a position paper. The strict delineation between central authority and missions abroad is slowly vanishing;

- ministerial structures and lines of command at missions are being redefined, flatter authority, more delegation of responsibility are necessary by-products;

- introduction of task-oriented structures independent of the physical location of the diplomats involved: limited and geographically dispersed experience or academic background in particular areas (e.g. international law) can more easily be pooled together electronically, thus also creating incentives for the continuous upkeep of specialisation (particularly important for smaller services);

- the introduction of Intranet systems leads to flatter lines of authority and increased possibilities for team working. Task-oriented organisation will change the relationship between the ministry and missions abroad;

- missions ought to be better integrated into the overall structure of the ministry, including decision making;

- integrated resource management needs to preserve the standard functions of missions abroad in relation to their geographic location and combine these functions with new tasks relating to the available expertise in individual missions, which can be employed for specific projects.

Within the EU the ”COREU” system (Correspondence Européenne) is used for exchange of information and position shaping in the context of the Common foreign and Security policy (CFSP). All foreign ministries, the Council Secretariat and the Commission are interconnected. Per year some 13.000 COREUS are exchanged. Over the last years this number has undergone a steady but fairly slow increase. The number of COREUS initiated by individual countries figures between app. 300 and 700 according to size and related foreign policy importance. Countries holding the rotating presidency generate higher numbers of COREUs. The COREU-System has quickly developed into an excellent information network, an important means for substantial co-ordination and an operative tool to draft and finalise position papers, EU Statements and demarches.

Hyperlinks:

With the further advance of IT the technique of using hyperlinks in reports and information notes will provide additional opportunities. Hyperlinks can lead the reader towards specific paragraphs of a document, background material or other related reports. This technique, once accepted has the potential of reforming substantially the format of reporting and information sharing.

Web-sites:

As a matter of course most Foreign Ministries and more and more individual missions nowadays maintain their own web sites. They assume important information functions: presentation of leading personalities, photographs and CVs, lists of embassies and opening hours, what to do if you are about to become a ”consular case” in a far away country. In addition web sites can be used as policy oriented tools to:

- provide important statements and position papers with some background note (hyperlink);

- put more information within easy reach of visitors: statistics, archival sources;

- publicise position-papers;

- guide visitors through indication of useful links;

- create interactive programmes to generate interest in foreign policy issues or to sound out public opinion, web-chats with the minister, letterbox, etc.

Web-sites assume an important function in the ”representation” of a country, one of the traditional functions of diplomacy. Web-sites need to be professionally developed and maintained. There has to be close co-ordination of the ministry’s central web-site and those of missions abroad to prevent contradictions and in order to demonstrate corporate identity.

Negotiating per Internet:

Within the EU there is by now a fairly well established and totally unspectacular use of the email-system: in many domains EU foreign policy co-operation occurs through working groups. They meet at more or less regular intervals in Brussels. In between meetings, members of the group quite successfully are in contact with each other by COREUs, or less formally, by email and comment on a draft, which might have been established by the chairman of the group (presidency delegation). When they meet again, they have a text on which a fairly large extent of agreement has already been established and in their discussion they can concentrate on the remaining points of divergence.

Techniques for group editing of texts make it possible to integrate IT even more in the negotiating process. There is, however, as yet only limited reported practical experience on the usage of information technology for negotiations. The author has experienced some of the advantages of the tools provided by modern technology for the conduct of complex negotiations when in 2000 and 2001 he served in a pro bono function as the head of the Austrian negotiating team on the issue of restitution of property rights to victims of the national-socialist Regime in Austria. This experience was encouraging enough to recommend the wider use of this tool in diplomatic practice. The conclusions summarized here are drawn from that recent experience.

Negotiating per Internet - Advantages:

- concentration on content and substance, no ”emotional noise”;

- clarity, lucidity of formulation, less misunderstandings;

- facilitates comparison of texts proposed;

- transparency, easy to maintain record of proposals made and revisions added;

- time factor: each delegation can work according to its rhythm, time difference can be turned into advantage;

- easy and reliable method of establishing the final text;

- more than two parties can participate;

- cost efficient

Preconditions:

- partners must share a common view on the purpose of the negotiations and the timeframe;

- ground-rules need to be established (who are the active negotiating partners? with whom can you share the text? who establishes the final text?)

- it helps to have a central facilitator who maintains control over the process and convenes meetings in person, when needed;

- basic trust among negotiating partners must have been established in prior face-to-face meetings and further personal meetings at regular intervals will be needed to advance the process;

- within delegations there has to be a clear understanding about delegation of authority (once a proposal has been made electronically it cannot be easily withdrawn); as head of delegation you must be comfortable with a fairly flat structure of hierarchy within your team;

Knowledge management:

Modern communications technology offers the diplomat easy and fast access to broad areas of information and speedy and reliable methods of transmission. Information gathering has thus become easier, its management, however, more difficult at the same time. The problem, of course, is known in fields far beyond diplomacy: how to filter out from the bottomless resources of the World Wide Web the information that is reliable and useful; how to connect different streams of information to a coherent whole? Modern organizations have to change from being one in which you are rewarded for how clever you are in obtaining information to an organization in which you are rewarded for how useful the information is to the team. The fact that information is so much at the center of diplomatic activity makes this a primary challenge for the diplomat.

The easy access to information and the more ”democratic” means of information transfer offered by the Internet and Intranet also change (or at least need to change) the structures of foreign ministries and the relationship with and among representations abroad. The flow of information can no longer be monopolized and hierarchically controlled. In modern diplomacy, as in the modern business world, we need flatter hierarchies and the encouragement of teamwork, going beyond traditionally established boundaries and partitions of labor between the central authority and the field. In his famous book ”The Lexus and the Olive Tree” Tom Friedman recounts the advice he received from a seasoned businessman: ”We are not saying that headquarters doesn’t matter. But we are redefining what the center means in ways that are more inclusive, in ways that allow us to move faster and be more responsive. Any hierarchy that bases itself on denying information to its employees is not going to work. Now it has to be much more of teamwork”. The use of electronic communication seems to have the inherent result of not only calling for but also facilitating teamwork and a broadening of organisational structures. Substantive authority has to replace formal authority. Only those services, which are willing to bring such changes about, will be able to fully make use of the emerging vast new possibilities

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