Diplomacy and Diplomatic Studies
| Date | 01 September 1998 |
| DOI | 10.1177/002070209805300313 |
| Published date | 01 September 1998 |
| Author | Paul Sharp |
| Subject Matter | The Readers' Column |
Diplomacy
and
diplomatic
studies
Paul
Sharp
read
with
great
interest the
responses
of
Brian
Hocking
and
Andrew
Cooper
(winter
1997-8)
to
my article on
diplomatic
representation.
It
was
an
honour
to
draw the
attention
(and
fire)
of
two
scholars
whose
expertise
in
the
field
is
self-evident.
They
make two
charges:
that
my
defence
of
diplomacy
plays
into
the
hands
of
its
detractors
(Hocking)
and
that
the
state-centric
approach
on
which
my
argument
is
based
closes
down discussion
of
diplomacy
just
as
it
is
becoming
more
important
and
interesting
(Cooper).
I
will
respond
to
these
charges
before
addressing
a
more
important
question
implied
by
both
respon-
dents.
Is
it
useful
to
think
of
diplomacy
as
a
discrete
social
practice,
the
study
of
which
can
be
distinguished from
the
analysis
of
foreign
policy
in
general
or from
even
broader
subfields
of
international
relations?
To
Hocking's
charge,
I
can
reply
only
that
I
am
not
a
diplomacy
nos-
talgist
conducting
a
rear-guard
action
on
behalf
of
constituencies
which
somehow
contrive simultaneously
to
dominate
discourse
and
to
be
so
far
behind
the
times
as
to
constitute
a
danger only to
themselves
and their
friends.
I
cite
De
Calli~res,
Satow,
and
others
both
because
they
have
important
things
to
say
and
because
they
say
those
things
in
the
language
of
an
established
discourse,
although
I
suppose
this could
be
translated
into
the
language
of
horizontal and
vertical
networks,
nodal
points,
and
transmission
belts.
The
other
dead
Frenchman
I
use
is
Foucault,
passi
among
serious
theorists
perhaps
but
still
insightful
enough
for
our
field,
and
scarcely
a
club
for
which diplomacy's
old
582
INTERNATIONAL
JOURNAL
Summer
1998
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