The Foreign Service Journal, October 2012

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | OCTOBER 2012 59 AFSA NEWS As I write this column, the Foreign Commercial Service is facing the biggest pro- posed change in its history: the consolidation of the International Trade Associa- tion. The idea is to merge the Department of Commerce’s Market Access and Com- pliance with sections of the Commercial Service. You might be asking your- self, “Why would a govern- ment agency take on such a merger in the face of fiscal armaggedon, sequestration, the end of the Bush tax cuts and the debt ceiling crashing around our heads?” And, in case you didn’t notice, a national election. Hey, you’re not alone. Is this really the time to undertake a major reorga- nization—which, no matter Water Under the Bridge what anyone tells you, always costs money and produc- tivity on the front end? Not to mention the possibility of being hit with 8-percent mandatory cuts in January and (assuming the candidate remembers the name of our department) our very elimi- nation in a who-knows-what political environment? What’s the expression, something about rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic? This is clearly no time to be setting out to sea. We have just ended a 60-day consultation with management, which proved to be frustrating and ineffec- tual. It was supposed to be a decision-making discussion in accordance with President Barack Obama’s Executive Order 12871, which directs the management of each federal agency to work with their employee organizations to enact change through a process of organizational buy-in that makes imple- mentation smoother and the new policy more effective. Unfortunately, since nothing was changed during the pro- cess and the key decisions seem to have already been set in stone, the process was in some ways worse than the traditional bargaining because it had no real legit- imacy. We find ourselves facing one of the principal issues our FS brothers and sisters in State, USAID and FAS regu- larly confront: the deprofes- sionalization of the Foreign Service. The proposed con- solidation will eliminate what is currently our most import- ant regular FS job—the Deputy Assistant Secretary for International Operations position—and replace it with a Civil Service or, possibly, a political position. That means that the whole FCS field will be working for someone else; someone who does not know, at an experiential level, the critical international issues that drive our Service and our careers. We continue to hope that someone in this town—be they from the Hill, the White House or the Secretary’s office—will be able to under- stand the key issues we face. Sadly, it is more likely that folks will remain ignorant of the Foreign Service. n 22 states and abroad. A list of the 25 finalists, as well as current and past winning essays and other informa- tion about the contest, can be found at www.afsa.org/ essaycontest. AFSA’s National High School Essay Contest is governed by an advisory committee chaired by retired U.S. diplomat Dr. Eugene Schmiel. Essays are judged by teachers, staff and active- duty and retired Foreign Service members. n AFSA H I GH SCHOOL ESSAY CONTEST SPONSORS AFSA’s essay contest is generously co-sponsored by Booz Allen Hamilton, an international technology consulting firm, and the Institute for Shipboard Education’s Semester at Sea study-abroad program. We are very grateful for their support. Booz Allen Hamilton has been at the forefront of strategy and technology consulting for nearly a century. Today, the firm provides services primarily to the U.S. government in defense, intelligence and civil markets, and to major corporations, institutions and not-for- profit organizations. Booz Allen Hamilton is headquartered in McLean, Va. Established in 1963, Semester at Sea is a unique study-abroad program. Using the ship M.V. Explorer as its traveling campus, students, faculty and lecturers live and learn together while circumnavigating the globe each fall and spring semester. Participants earn trans- ferable credit from the University of Virginia, the program’s academic sponsor. More than 55,000 individuals representing 1,500 institutions have traveled to more than 60 countries since the program’s inception. Semester at Sea is administered by the nonprofit Institute for Shipboard Education in Charlottesville, Va. For information on upcoming voyages and to apply, please visi t www.semesteratsea.org. n Essay Winner, Continued from page 57 FCS VP VOICE | BY KEITH CURTIS Views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the AFSA FCS VP.