The Foreign Service Journal, May 2015

22 MAY 2015 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL ers are chronic and protracted, but still require relentless atten- tion. Some must be contained and managed; and others require concerted, collaborative intervention over a sustained period of time. Even a partial list of the challenges is dizzying: • Interstate conflicts, border incursions and so-called “fro- zen” conflicts that threaten established norms of interna- tional behavior and longstanding negotiated agreements; • Intrastate conflicts, including civil wars, and the flows of refugees and internally displaced persons they generate; • Failed and failing states that affect a wider region; • Nonstate actors, many of them lethal and capable of desta- bilizing whole regions (e.g., the Islamic State group, Boko Haram, al-Qaida in Yemen and al-Shabaab in Somalia); • Transnational threats, most notably terrorism and violent extremism; • Narcotics trafficking, organized crime and trafficking in persons; • Cyberthreats, an increasingly acute risk; • Nuclear, biological, chemical and missile proliferation; • Economic and financial challenges, including disruption to energy supplies and extractive industries; • Challenges to the rule of law, internal governance and civil- ian justice, including human rights abuses; • Environmental and climate changes, which put pres- sure on food security, supplies of water and other natural resources; and • Health-related issues, including pandemics and virulent pathogens that ravage populations and sow fear. Given the speed of transportation and information, the relentless news cycle and the social media revolution, we often face very short response times—whether to address the substance of the challenge or to get out our message about what we are doing. In many cases, analyzing the problem is relatively easy; devising prescriptions is harder, and applying a remedy harder still. A Crowded Arena Second, we must deal with a more complex domestic environment. From a high point during the Truman administra- tion, the State Department’s preeminence in foreign policy has waned. Executive-legislative dynamics—notably, in regard to prerogatives, authorities, policy priorities and budgets—have affected the role and capacity of State and other departments in foreign policy. Since 1945, and particularly since 2001, many more federal departments and agencies participate in foreign policy advo- cacy and execution. Congress, with its committees, powerful chairs, caucuses and activist individual members, is a conse- quential player. Other actors have entered the foreign policy arena, as well: states, cities and localities; nongovernmental organizations, policy advocacy groups, and constituency, trade and commer- cial groups; the media; and the courts, usually via cases brought before them contesting prerogatives, legislative acts, obligations and rights, and compensation for terrorist acts. The department must take that complexity into account. Institutional Growing Pains Third, the State Department has internal stresses arising from feast-and-famine hiring and from institutional growing pains. Over the past 15 years, the department has undergone a significant transformation. Even more than before, we need great employees from diverse backgrounds, who are prepared to serve in tough places and do tough things. We have gone through institutional shifts, folding in the U.S. Information Agency and the Arms Control and Disarma- ment Agency and forging a new relationship with the U.S. Agency for International Development. After 9/11, we added bureaus for Energy, Conflict Stabilization and Counterter- rorism. We restructured other bureaus, shifting personnel to where they were most needed and staffing “mega” embassies. We added 500 Arabic-language speakers and 40 Pashto speak- ers. And we opened 20 posts in Muslim countries and focused greater attention on religious freedom, anti-Semitism, traffick- ing in persons, global health and global women’s issues. Since 2002, the Foreign Service has grown 42 percent, with 22-percent growth since 2008. (On a parallel track, State’s Civil Service has grown 45 percent since 2002.) One-third of the Foreign We face an unprecedented array of external threats and dangers that demand our attention and leadership.