The Foreign Service Journal, January-February 2015

84 JANUARY FEBRUARY 2015 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL AWalk in His Shoes: A Fictional British Diplomat Gets Real What Diplomats Do Sir Brian Barder, Rowman & Little eld, 2014, $44.00, hardcover, 226 pages. R M A Many retired American diplomats wonder what can be done in our country to rectify the woeful lack of interest in and understanding of professional diplomatic service and its many contributions to the nation. We write books, lecture, lobby and generally proselytize, but we are still falling short. What Diplomats Do , based on Sir Brian Barder’s experience in the British Diplomatic Service, can make that e ort more successful, and should be useful to universities and libraries, as well as inter- esting and enjoyable for the general pub- lic. It is a remarkably thorough account of the many dimensions of diplomatic work and life—not a turgid manual, but a simple story; not a novel, but almost a parable. Sir Brian creates a ctional man, Adam, who applies to the UK Diplo- matic Service just as he graduates from university. After going through a rigorous battery of tests and interviews, he is accepted and goes on to serve in a variety of assignments in Africa, North America and the Middle East. Along the way, he marries a woman, Eve, who is similarly new to international relations. Together, Adam and Eve work their way around the world and up Adam’s career ladder, shar- ing their experiences and their “on-the- job” education with the reader. We learn about the Diplomatic Ser- vice from Adam and Eve’s experiences, BOOKS and from the education and advice that others (supervisors, friends, British colleagues and foreign counterparts) give them. is is very e ective, because the author creates additional interest through the personality of the adviser. He or she may be a clever character who is charming and compel- ling, or a boring and pedantic character who is ridiculous or shocking—but the reader remains engaged. In addition, the author periodically takes the reader aside and interjects his own actual experiences to expand the perspective of ctional narrative. Some of these asides are impressive, such as quietly talking the Ethiopian government out of bomb- ing unauthorized relief convoys during the famine. Some of them are amusing, such as trying to explain to an Austra- lian businessman in Sydney that as high commissioner in Canberra, Sir Brian is supervising the British consul general in Sydney, not working for him. e book addresses most of the elements of diplomatic work and life: competing to get in and arriving at one’s rst overseas post; life and work in over- seas posts; life and work at home; dealing with host country o cials overseas; dealing with home country o cials from overseas; consular and commercial work; entertaining; and the impact on spouses and children. ough the author is talking about life and work in the British Diplomatic Service, the descriptions are remarkably similar to what one sees in the American Foreign Service. e two major di er- ences are size (the American presence is substantially larger) and the need to deal diplomatically with the Americans. Concerning the latter, Sir Brian is gener- ally complimentary, though he has some critical—and sadly accurate—things to say about inexperienced and clumsy political appointee ambassadors. Reading this, I sometimes wished that in my own career I could have crafted some of the clever and sophisticated word dances that he and his characters use to rebut accusations and still allow their counterparts “face” and the room to back o ; or that I had his patience to achieve the mix of clarity and ambiguity necessary for multilateral consensus. In What Diplomats Do , Sir Brian sticks to his subject. He describes the interac- tion of British diplomats with di erent parts of their own government, but does not digress into politics. He hints on several occasions that various reforms of the diplomatic service have not been improvements. And at the end of his career, Adam blasts private management consultants, perpetual reform, budget cuts, increased workload, responding to circulars and questionnaires, etc. For prescriptive solutions—either bureaucratic or diplomatic—you need to go to Sir Brian’s blog (www.barder.com/ ephems), which also o ers a 30-percent discount on the book! Marshall P. Adair retired from the Foreign Service as a minister counselor in 2007 after a distinguished 35-year diplomatic career. He is the author of Lessons from a Diplo- matic Life: Watching Flowers from Horse- back (Rowman & Little eld, 2013). He is a former president of the American Foreign Service Association (1999-2001) and current retiree representative to the AFSA Governing Board.