The Foreign Service Journal, May 2022

14 MAY 2022 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL TALKING POINTS Only in America could the daughter of refugees become Assistant Secretary of State with responsibility for refugee policy. Will roll up my sleeves and get to work. —Julieta Valls Noyes in a March 24 tweet following her confirmation. Contemporary Quote CEOs Build Corporate Foreign Policy A s the Kremlin ratcheted up violent attacks across Ukraine and the humanitarian crisis there worsened in March, hundreds of companies began curtailing ties with Russia—and looking to foreign policy experts to help them navigate the shifting geopolitical land- scape, Axios reports. Facing supply chain disruption, economic sanctions and pressure from customers, multinational executives with operations in Russia have sought advice to stay ahead of fast-moving events in the region. This expertise often comes from consultancies staffed by national security and diplomacy alumni, as well as con- gressional, administration and defense officials who help companies weigh risks and explore safe options. Robert Gibbs, for example, who served as President Barack Obama’s first press secretary, is now employed as senior counsel at Bully Pulpit Interac- tive, a D.C.-based consulting firm that describes itself as “an outcomes agency at the intersection of business, politics and policy.” Gibbs developed strategic communications for McDonald’s as it worked to close its approximately 850 locations in Russia in mid-March. In addition to managing their mes- saging, companies may need to bring on experts to navigate Russian expropriation of their operations. President Vladimir Putin announced on March 10 that the economic development ministry drafted legislation that lays the groundwork for seizing the assets of foreign-owned busi- nesses that exit the country, Radio Free Europe reported. The ministry has already created a list of some 60 foreign companies that have left the Russian market and may be nationalized, Izvestia newspaper wrote. The list includes Volkswagen, Apple, IKEA, Microsoft, IBM, Shell, McDonald’s, Porsche and H&M, among others. According to a list compiled by the Yale Chief Executive Leadership Insti- tute, more than 450 multinational corpo- rations have withdrawn from or reduced activities in Russia. Companies not at risk of asset seizure may face other threats from the Krem- lin. At the Business Roundtable CEO quarterly meeting on March 21, Presi- dent Joe Biden warned business leaders to strengthen their cyber defenses, as “evolving intelligence” suggests Russia is preparing cyberattacks against the U.S. in retaliation for economic sanctions. John Chipman, chief executive of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, has argued since Russia’s 2014 invasion and annexation of Crimea that companies cannot assume the strategic status quo will be sustained in any part of the world by predictable balances of power. “In this new reality, the most suc- cessful multinational companies will be those that make expertise in interna- tional affairs central to their operations, adopting what can best be described as a corporate foreign policy,” he told the Harvard Business Review. GAO Calls on State to Improve Crisis Response T he State Department oversaw a cha- otic evacuation of federal personnel stationed abroad at the start of the COVID- 19 pandemic, the Government Account- ability Office said in a March 16 report, and needs to strengthen policies to ensure a smoother operation in future crises. About 20 percent of the 22,000 federal employees working at more than 290 overseas posts returned to the U.S. in the first months of the pandemic, though the process was conducted on an ad hoc basis that left agencies and staff unclear on eligibility and implementation details. According to federal internal control standards, as GAO points out in the report, new policies must include the appropriate level of detail. State first issued global evacua- tion guidance in March 2020. Most employees were eligible to leave, but not required to do so. However, the department failed to communicate its plans with the approximately two dozen federal agencies with a presence over- seas, leaving them to react only after the guidance had been made public. State initially authorized evacua- tions for 60 days, subsequently extend- ing them for 30 days at a time through December 2020. GAO calls these exten- sions “disruptive,” as employees and their families did not know when they would have to return to their posts. As each 30-day period ended, employees faced uncertainty about housing, their children’s schooling and other issues. Because they did not know whether State would continue to approve the global evacuation until a week before it was about to expire each month, many