The Foreign Service Journal, September 2020

14 SEPTEMBER 2020 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL TALKING POINTS State Struggles to Promote Diversity I n June 17 testimony, “Additional Steps Are Needed to Identify Barriers to Workforce Diversity,” the Government Accountability Office presented State Department data from Fiscal Year 2002 to FY2018 showing that promotion rates for ethnic and racial minorities are consider- ably lower than for whites. The testimony, delivered by GAO Director of International Affairs and Trade Jason Bair to the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight, was based on the comprehensive report it had issued in January (GAO-20-237). At the end of 2018, State had 22,806 full-time, permanent career employees, an increase of nearly 40 percent over 2002, GAO found. The number of full- time employees in the Civil Service rose by nearly 40 percent, from 6,831 in 2002 to 9,546 in 2018. The number of full-time employees in the Foreign Service rose 36 percent from 9,739 in 2002 to 13,260 in 2018. The overall proportion of racial or eth- nic minorities in the State Department’s full-time career workforce grew from 28 to 32 percent from 2002 to 2018. In the Foreign Service, that number increased from 17 to 24 percent, and in the Civil Service, it fell from 44 to 43 percent. The proportion of African Americans in the Foreign Service increased from 6 to 7 percent during that period, while the percentage of African Americans in the Civil Service decreased from 34 to 26 percent. According to the United States Census Bureau, 13.4 percent of Americans were Black as of July 2019. GAO found that all minorities made up 30 percent of Foreign Service employees at the FS-6 rank and lower, but dropped to 14 percent of the Senior Foreign Service. As of early June, only three of the State Department’s 189 ambassadors were Black American career diplomats, and only four were Hispanic. GAO also found that the overall proportion of female full-time career employees at State decreased slightly, from 44 to 43 percent, between 2002 and 2018. While the proportion of women in the Foreign Service increased from 33 to 35 percent during that period, it fell from 61 to 54 percent in the Civil Service. The proportion of women became even smaller at the higher ranks of the Foreign Service, according to the 2018 numbers, GAO reported. Women made up 68 percent of the workforce at FS-6 or lower ranks, but just 32 percent of the Senior Foreign Service. “Although State has implemented several plans, activities and initiatives to improve diversity and representation throughout the ranks of its workforce,” GAO concludes, “longstanding diversity issues—for example, underrepresentation of racial or ethnic minorities and women in the senior ranks—persist at the agency. “Until State takes steps to explore such issues, it could be missing opportuni- ties to investigate, identify and remove barriers that impede members of some demographic groups from realizing their full potential.” I n this YouTube video, former For- eign Service Officer Chris Rich- ardson interviews Professor Michael Krenn about race relations in the State Department. Prof. Krenn, the author of Black Diplomacy: African Americans and the State Department , 1945-1969 (M.E. Sharpe, 1999), teaches history at Appalachian State University. The book discusses integration of the State Department after 1945, as well as the appointments of Black ambas- sadors to African and other develop- ing nations. In the interview, Richardson and Krenn conduct a decade-by-decade analysis of State and its issues with race. The two also review various con- gressional investigations about race Site of the Month Black Diplomacy: Chris Richardson Interviews Prof. Michael Krenn (YouTube) in the department since 1949, the struggles of the first Black diplomats and what Krenn believes is needed to reform State. Chris Richardson—whose op-ed, “The State Department Was Designed to Keep African Americans Out,” appeared in the June 23 New York Times —is currently the general counsel and chief operating officer for BDV Solutions, an immigration consulting firm. Watch the video at https://bit.ly/ black-diplomacy.