The Foreign Service Journal, June 2017

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | JUNE 2017 19 The Golden Rule of Professionalism BY MATT TOMPK I NS Matt Tompkins is currently a vice consul in Santo Domingo, and previously served in Guatemala City. Prior to joining the Foreign Service, he held intel- ligence and policy positions with the FBI and served as an Army officer. His Speaking Out column on nonpartisanship relating to election participation appeared in the October 2016 FSJ . I n its opening months, the Trump administration has inmany ways con- tinued what it started in the campaign and transition. Previously unbroachable norms have been discarded, including habituated expectations of transparency and press access, a more genteel style of political discourse, andmany foreign and domestic policy positions that until very recently would have been considered long- resolved areas of bipartisan consensus. (This observation is neither to criticize nor commend. The administration has in most cases proudly claimed the moniker of unconventional, and both supporters and detractors have typically agreed.) For many of us in the Foreign Ser- vice—and in the Civil Service writ large— this has been an unmooring experience. The ideal of an apolitical bureaucracy seems nice, but in the face of unprec- edented decisions and actions that seem to go beyond simple left-right partisan- ship, many seem to be struggling with the impulse to resist. In the State Department, this has translated into a newly resurgent interest in understanding the specific limitations on political advocacy imposed by the Hatch Act and the Foreign Affairs Manual to better determine in what ways we as executive branch employees are permit- ted to resist or advocate. I amwriting today to make a case for the opposite response: This is a time to double-down on our nonpartisan profes- sionalism, not to test its limits. The norm and function of an apolitical bureaucracy is more important and valuable than any one leader or policy: we must be able to continue serving effectively 10 presidents and 100 controversial policies from now. Privileged Access We hold positions of privileged access, giving us more information and influence over the process of policy formation and implementation than normal citizens. For that privileged access to mean anything, political leaders must trust that our advice and implementation will be expert and unbiased, based on knowledge and experience rather than personal political leanings. Public advocacy destroys that trust, ensuring that both our political masters and the voting public know that we do have a preferred “side” and implying that our level of agreement will affect the vigor with which we support, implement (or even resist) the decisions of those voted into office. It’s easy to look at a policy that you consider to be objectively, undeniably and absolutely wrong-headed and say, “But it’s not partisan to resist that deci- sion.” The problem is that by resisting a decision we disagree with, we make our policy preferences a relevant and accept- able point for discussion. That may seem trivial when it’s a mat- ter of advocating or resisting by simply declaring that you consider a single given policy decision to be disastrous. But what about the next time, the next president, the next Secretary? Once we’ve made it a legitimate point of consideration, who could blame newly elected officials for feeling the need to assess the level of actual or likely agreement with their poli- cies before entrusting their implementa- tion to the bureaucracy? By asserting that policy implementa- tion might be contingent on our opinion of the policy, we will have set things back 100 years to a time when the hallmark of bureaucratic dependability was political loyalty rather than professional compe- tence. Yes, some might say, but some of the policies and statements from this admin- istration just go too far. They demand response. They demand resistance. In recent months, I’ve witnessed a ground- swell of colleagues express that sentiment to varying degrees. A number of them—in my Facebook feed at least—have articulated this imperative with a quote fromDesmond Tutu that seems to capture well the general sentiment: “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.” Surely there is truth to this in a tautological sense—it is a good quote. SPEAKING OUT