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Hello, I'm here with Professor Stephen Casey from the LSE.

Steve, what do you consider diplomacy to be?

>> Well I think in the most simple terms, it is simply the effort by two or

more states to sort of reach agreements on areas of conflict through negotiation and

bargaining.

I think in the American context, it often is heavily focused on this idea of

bargaining, but also as well, the way I've encountered it in my own

research on the 1940s and 1950s is, I think it's sort of three ways.

The first way is very much through summit diplomacy.

So, looking at the Interactions between the leaders at the very top,

the Roosevelts and the Churchills.

Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin, so Tehran, Yalta, these conferences.

The second way, which increasingly I've looked into as well because I've

focused more and more on military history, is actually when the military get involved

in diplomacy as they did in the Korean War, the last two years of the Korean War.

Truce talks there and looking at the types of problems that when,

not the State Department, not the normal civilian officials get involved.

But what the military brings or doesn't bring to the whole process of diplomacy.

And then thirdly as well, for

me, increasingly, the focus has always been on the public side of diplomacy.

I think we look now very much at summits, and

then the constant summits that we now see between political leaders as big

news events and symbolic moments, but they've almost always been there.

It was always there for instance right from the start, but

it was there in 1940 with the Wells Mission, which you know a lot about.

There was an important symbolic element behind that.

So looking at how this diplomacy plays out in the public sphere

when the press is allowed in, the conditions under which

these diplomatic actions are reported I think is an important element.

And it also feeds into some of the other problems that some diplomats have,

be they either civil or

military when they try to interact with other diplomats from other countries.

>> Great, thanks Steve.

Just to pick up on one point though in given your expertise, and

that relationship between diplomats undertaking diplomacy, and

the military of officers undertaking diplomacy.

What do you see as sort of the main challenges in

furthering that relationship?

>> Well, I think particularly,

and while it wasn't unique to the Korean War because of course there was also

a process throughout the Vietnam War as well, where something similar happened.

But this whole idea of talking or

negotiating while fighting, raises a whole series of very interesting problems.

So actually, the diplomatic interactions between the military

in the Korean War between and the American military and the Chinese military.

They were actually, also at the very same moment in time, fighting a war.

So the extent to which this was diplomacy, and I think it was because there was some

effort to try and reach agreement so the guns would fall silent.

But also that was bound up very much with the way in which the military would then

try to fight the wars.

So, for instance, launching operations in order to

exert leverage at the diplomatic bargaining table.

And also finally as well, because there's an ongoing look at just the military

struggle in Korea, but also a more general Cold War struggle going on.

These so-called diplomatic interactions also became very much

bound up with propaganda.

So, both sides were making points as well, and

I think the fundamental element here was just how much more difficult it was for

the military on either side to reach agreement.

Now, it was bound that with some of these problems that I've discussed, but I think

it was also bound up with sort of these characters just weren't trained in this.

Rosemary Foot argues I think very well in her book on the Korean War,

A Substitute for Victory, that actually the military mind and

the whole military upbringing isn't really prepared for sort of the giving and take.

It's very much sort of what can we coerce these others into doing,

rather than where the way we might see a sort of traditional,

sort of suave diplomat basically playing a sort of perpetual, subtle game.

>> Okay, great.

In terms of your experience and the research you've undertaken,

how do you know when diplomacy has gone well?

What are the measures of success in diplomacy?

>> I think for an historian that's particularly difficult,

because I think it relates to obviously the time, the timing afterwards.

So, I think for instance, a great example of this was at the Yalta conference.

Roosevelt comes back from Yalta in early 1945 as a major success.

And actually, in Roosevelt's own terms, and I think those around him,

it was a major success.

Because it had a very real goal, and

that was to bring the Soviet Union into the war against Japan.

And that was a key goal in that moment in time, the atomic bomb hadn't yet

been tested, and so that was a key goal.

So it was viewed I think publicly as a major success, but it was also viewed as

a success because of the way in which the leaders defined their own objectives.

Now you take a different vantage point, a year or two, five years later,

and of course, it looks very, very different.

So, and you can say that with lots of these sort of big summits,

even summits where perhaps less controversial,

it really depends pretty much on your point of view in time.

Helsinki in 1974 is another good example.

To what extent where the Americans really that interested in an outcome that

might have actually helped to undermine the Soviet war in eastern Europe?

Which is part of the claim that was made in the 15 or so years later.

At the time, they were viewing it very different.

So trying to, I think, two ways, obviously,

is trying to sort of establish as you can, with the primary focus as an historian,

what were the leaders' objectives going in?

And to what extent did they achieve them in the short term?

But then secondly, saying how much can we read into this particular moment in time,

for what later advantage, but it's very easy to read back a lot into it.

So I would take very much what the leaders are trying to achieve and

very much in the sort of short term, is it actually achieved then.

Because things look very different from 10 or 15 years later and

I think it's very easy to sort of read too much back into all the success or failure.

>> Okay, and in identifying those sort of,

those measures of success in diplomacy, how do we know when diplomacy has failed?

What are sort of the benchmarks in that regard?

>> Well again, it is, and

I think trying to establish what the desired outcome is to begin with.

And another perhaps a way of trying to view this is, and

I'm viewing very much through the lens of say,

summit diplomacy or the truth talks that I've discussed before.

One obvious starting point, at least where it does get involved very quickly in

politics, to what extent is this a bargaining process?

And to what extent have the various governments got clear sort of red lines,

fall back positions?

What's acceptable, and how much of that can they

actually achieve is the obvious way as a historian of trying to establish that,

particularly as we are often through the basis of sort of becoming available.

We are unable to establish what their position was going into this so,

I think that's one obvious way.

But diplomacy isn't always about this bargaining give and take.

I would actually view Roosevelt as somebody that we both worked on,

as somebody who was actually was less interested in necessarily haggling over

the particular details.

More interested in establishing a relationship,

particularly a relationship with Stalin throughout the war,

which would he would then hope be the sort of centerpoint of his post-war strategy.

So one obviously way is not simply saying,

okay, this particular set of leaders, before they went into this process,

wanted X, Y, and Z, and they only got X and Z, so it was only partly a success.

But actually I think diplomacy is more than about that.

It's often about sort of particularly when you're dealing with allies, it's often

about trying to sort of construct a relationship, trying to begin a process.

So it might be a sort of series of moments in time.

And I think that's much more difficult to establish whether that succeeds or fails.

Of course in the instance of World War II, there was a spectacular failure

when it comes to American-Soviet relations because of course, the Cold War rather

than a close relationship between the Americans and Soviets breaked out.

But was that a failure of Roosevelt's diplomacy, or was that just simply

a function of Roosevelt dying before the war comes to an end?

These things are very difficult to judge.

But I think trying to sort of establish what the goals are,

I think is just the obvious prerequisite.

>> I'm inclined to agree, but I think that's a very valid point.

In terms of your sort of individual experience of life and

watching the world go by as it were, where else do you see diplomacy at work?

Where else does diplomacy happen other than perhaps in our mutual interest in

the 1940s?

>> Yeah, well I think one of the things that you could easily say or

one of the things that's clearly happened actually.

And I think one of the reasons why I think the 1940s is

an interesting starting place is because this era of summitry begins.

Now with the growth in particularly transportation, of

course you see a thickening of that going on through the Cold War era and beyond.

And also an institutionalization of that process as well.

So not only did the post-war era see these institutions,

NATO, the European Union, and so on, G7, grow up but

they also became a forum for very much established regular routine interactions.

And if we go all the way back to the Roosevelt's view of sort of a full

policemen of some sort, I'm trying to formalize relations between allied actors.

And perhaps what we've seen over the past 60, 70 years is a thickening part of that.

And it's become pretty much an established part of all leaders' mode of operation.

The President of the United States will spend X number of days or

weeks of the year outside of Washington just in case of these very much

formulaic often, meetings, on a whole host of areas.

Not just hard security issues as there were in the 1940s,

but increasingly economic and obviously environmental as we're seeing now.

So I think what we've seen in the periods since we've both

focused on it is it's just a thickening institutionalization, and

I suppose also the bureaucratization of the whole process.

So I think what we also need to think about

now is to what extent is any business now done pretty much between heads of states.

To what extent has actually it all been bureaucratized, and

has the actual summit become more of a symbolic moment,

rather than a moment when real negotiations is taking place?

So, has diplomacy sort of become a more sort of day to day

function of the bureaucracies beneath the very top leaders,

is I think an interesting case in point.

And these are no longer the exceptions, these are the norms.

>> Okay, but in terms of the work you've done and

indeed perhaps more general observations if they apply.

Who do you identify as a very good diplomat?

What are the key characteristics of a good diplomat that you can see in

particular individuals?

>> That is a very, very tough one because I think it's easier probably to look at

what a bad diplomat is, actually, as well.

And one of my PhD students has recently published a book looking at, well,

one of the major focal points is Jimmy Carter.

And I think Jimmy Carter's an interesting case in point,

because I think he had many of the attributes that we might want

In a very good diplomat and he focused heavily on the Camp David Agreements.

Now Carter very much micromanaged that.

He got very much involved in the real nitty-gritty details of that

particular diplomatic process with very real short term successes.

But I think they came at such huge political cost for

his administration and Democratic party more generally, and

it is hard to see what ostensibly looked like a major achievement in 1978.

>> Mm-hm.

>> It was very hard to see that as ultimately a success.

So I think what a very good diplomat at the very top levels

which is where I've focused most of my work and my thinking.

I think what there also needs to be is an element of detachment

from the whole process as well.

So there needs to be a balance between knowing when to get involved and

when to sort of step back.

Knowing when is where I think the politics of it comes in as well,

knowing how to sort of portray this so

ultimately, the achievements then become perceived to be achievements.

But they're not constantly becoming a sort of political football.

So I think those skills, which are very,

very difficult, sort of knowing the right balance.

And I think, the other major difficulty of course, that you

have in trying to sort of really establish who is a good and who is a bad diplomat,

is looking at the underlying realities behind the process, as well.

There clearly are occasions when it's just easier for leaders to come to agreement.

So if you can trust Carter, and I would say who had the weaknesses of his

strengths almost, even Carter with Reagan in the 1980s, and

it's very easy to come up with a glib assumption that Reagan was the opposite.

He wasn't a details person.

He was very successful.

But was he successful because he was a great diplomat and

he had some very good people around him, or was he simply successful because of

the chaos that was beginning to unfold in the Soviet Union?

And so again, going back to the measures of success and

failure and the thought of what is good, what is bad.

I think it's hard to come up with any hard and fast rules.

But my own starting point is really just knowing when to get involved and

when to step back, when to basically,

or how to basically sell this as a package domestically.

We're looking at the moment with Cameron who got engaged in a number of

diplomatic arrangements or interactions with his European partners.

Now the success or

failure of that would in large part be governed by what the outcome

is then subsequently domestically, very obviously, in the referendum.

So not only is it Cameron's ability to deal with his European partners,

but it's also his ability then to come back and create domestic constituency.

And those two things going together, I think,

are a crucial way of ascertaining whether someone is a good or a bad diplomat.

>> Okay, great, Steve.

Thank you very much.

[MUSIC].

Prof Stephen Casey

Global Diplomacy – Diplomacy in the Modern World

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