The Foreign Service Journal, February 2006

The joke always seems to put the crowd at ease, but it also carries an important message for her State Department employees: I am one of you, and all of you — even the interns — are important. “There are no unimportant jobs,” Rice has said repeat- edly in laying out her vision of “transformational diplo- macy,” a concept that has proven to be the overarching theme of her first year in office. That philosophy, which Rice illustrates with tales of the Foreign Service’s work during the darkest days of the post-World War II era and beginnings of the Cold War, is about furthering the spread of democracy — particularly in the “front-line” states of the Middle East and Asia — instead of just maintaining the status quo. For some State employees, the words have been inspirational. But to others, the pep talk just sounds like a slick repackaging of what Foreign Service officers have always striven to do. That split in perception captures the overall debate within Foggy Bottom about Rice’s record after one year on the job. Some admire “Condi” for raising State’s pro- file after years in the wilderness during which the Pentagon dominated foreign policy. But others are equally adamant that she is mainly interested in defend- ing President Bush’s policies and hasn’t shown nearly the same level of attention to management of the depart- ment, and receptiveness to employee input, that won widespread praise and admiration for her predecessor, Colin Powell. With such differing views out there, it’s not surprising that there is no clear consensus within the Foreign Service about Rice’s management agenda, and its impact on the quality of life of officers and their families. In an online survey of active-duty State Department Foreign Service employees conducted last summer by the American Foreign Service Association, 32 percent said they believed working conditions were improving, 28 percent thought they were worsening, and 40 percent felt they were staying the same. In contrast, two reports (2003 and 2005) issued by the Foreign Affairs Council — a coalition of groups repre- senting current and former State employees — hailed Powell’s four-year tenure as “historic.” The studies cited his success in rebuilding a depleted Foreign Service through his Diplomatic Readiness Initiative, a focus on information technology that finally brought Internet access to every departmental desktop, and attention to training that reinvigorated officers through an intensive leadership curriculum. The FAC hasn’t had enough time to make a fair assess- ment of Rice, says director Thomas Boyatt, a former AFSA president and ambassador to Colombia. But he does observe that “the Secretary has many times and in many public and private forums said that she wants to sustain Powell’s momentum. It’s sincere rhetoric, but it still has to be tested against the exigencies of reality.” For Under Secretary of Management Henrietta Fore, Rice’s top management aide, Powell’s tenure is an impor- tant touchstone, but Rice only sees it as a first step. “We want to build on the building blocks and momentum left by Secretary Powell and his team, but we want to increase the pace,” Fore said in an interview with the Foreign Service Journal . (Rice’s staff did not respond to a separate interview request.) Delays in filling two key positions have hampered Rice’s ability to put her own stamp on the department, however. Under Secretary Fore, a former U.S. Mint director, only took office in August 2005. And the Foreign Service Institute has had an acting director since Katherine Peterson stepped down last summer to become ambassador to Botswana. However, Fore says she expects a new director will be named shortly. The Baker Model Among Foreign Service officers, the analogy most often drawn is between Rice and James Baker, a key play- er during the George H.W. Bush administration. (Colin Powell is most often compared to George Shultz, who earned his stripes during the Reagan administration more for improving management at Foggy Bottom than for his globe-trotting.) Rice, like Baker, has set records for overseas travel. “Rice has firmly established herself as Secretary of State, and the encroachment of Defense on State issues seems to have ceased,” says management officer Bruce Knotts. “She’s won that battle.” But even as some officers take pride in that bureau- cratic victory, others say that Rice has done it largely with- out the advice and guidance of Foreign Service officers, just as Baker did before her. That camp cites the assess- ment of Washington Post columnist Jim Hoagland, who wrote last August that President Bush “had sent Rice, his first-term national security adviser, to quell the hotbed of F O C U S 18 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / F E B R U A R Y 2 0 0 6 Shawn Zeller is a senior staff writer for Congressional Quarterly.