The Foreign Service Journal, June 2014

26 JUNE 2014 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL that has now become acute in this age of fast- paced diplomacy. At its apex, the ministry is headed by at least four civil servants of the highest rank (“secretary to the government”); but the foreign secretary, their equal and yet the uncontested leader, bears an impossible burden. As “head of the IFS cadre,” this official must combine four major roles: principal of the foreign policy apparatus; administrative head of the IFS; direct supervisor of relations with a dozen or more key partner countries; and the adviser who accompanies the prime minister and external affairs minister to regional and global summits and major bilaterals. In contrast, though heading sizable MEA divisions, the other secretaries are relatively underworked. Regrettably, institutional practices and personal agendas have blocked attempts to rectify this over the years. A direct conse- quence is a shortage of top management capacity to undertake, for instance, implementation of decisions on important bilateral and regional issues that entail protracted domestic inter-ministry dialogue. External negotiation capacity is similarly handicapped, as former State Department analyst Dan Markey noted in a July 2009 Asia Policy study, “Developing India’s Foreign Policy ‘Soft- ware’.” Further, many foreign diplomats in New Delhi find it difficult to meet their MEA counterparts; they feel that the ministry’s overriding preoccupation is with Pakistan, China or the United States. Mindful of this, it now conducts monthly briefings for foreign embassies on key issues, led by the foreign secretary or another secretary and typically attended by 100 or more, to pres- ent the Indian view on key issues. Crafting Domestic Consensus on Foreign Policy As in every country, crafting domestic consensus on foreign policy issues has become hugely important for New Delhi. This entails sustained dialogue with official partners, be it in relation to foreign trade agreements or World Trade Organization issues, or on energy policy, or development aid projects in neighboring countries that must link with home regions. On some issues the prime minister’s office is an ally in this coordination task, but MEA has to work on its own and reach out to the relevant minis- tries. The foreign secretary is the only one with the needed clout to engage the economic ministries and other official stakeholders in such domestic diplomacy along multiple tracks. Toward that end, MEA recently held its first-ever meeting with the chief secretaries (heads of administration) of all 28 Indian states, to bring them into the foreign policy pro- cess—particularly in regard to regional and neighbor- hood issues. New thinking is needed to bring Indian states into the foreign policy process, while reaffirming the exclusive role of the central government in the delivery of the country’s foreign policy, as the Indian Constitution mandates. Beyond turf issues and contes- tation with other ministries lies the elusive goal of a “whole of government” policy. No less crucial is outreach in the form of regular, structured dialogue with domestic non-state entities such as academia, business, media, science and technology agencies, and think- tanks—all key stakeholders in what is now being called the “national diplomatic system.” MEA has no unit to oversee this as a continual task, though domestic public diplomacy has been pursued actively since 2010, with some success. The recent visa imbroglio involving Devyani Khobragade, deputy consul general in New York, showed that domestic support for MEA remains brittle, however. Progress on Personnel Issues Human resource management has undergone needed trans- formation, but still faces challenges. An equitable bidding system for overseas assignments is now in place and works well—volun- teers are available for the tough posts, such as Baghdad or Kabul, without any rotation diktat. When it comes to promotions, how- ever, MEA (like the rest of the Indian civil service) emphasizes seniority over selectivity out of deep distrust of how the merit principle might work. Selection to senior grades takes place on the basis of the official’s year of entry. But within each “batch,” or cohort, greater selectivity is now the norm, partly as a natural consequence of growth. On only two occasions (in 2005 and 2007) the foreign secretary was appointed via “deep selection,” bypassing an entire batch and choosing a person from the following year’s list. That led to court appeals and a few resignations. Subsequent appointments have reverted to selecting the most competent officers, but strictly from the senior-most batch. Contrast this with the method in most other major diplomatic