Abstract
Diplomatic agency is intriguing. On the one hand, diplomats are crucial to the management of day-to-day international relations and the negotiation of war and peace. On the other hand, most diplomatic action is highly constrained or invisible. This chapter provides an overview of the ways in which diplomatic agency has been conceptualized in International Relations theory (English School, game theory, Foreign Policy Analysis, constructivism, practice theory, post-positivism) before presenting and exemplifying major and overlapping types of diplomatic agency, including communication, negotiation and advocacy. It analyzes how professionalization, legalization, personalization and popularization of diplomacy have shaped diplomatic agency including how international law, bureaucracy, public diplomacy and new information technologies have impacted the scope and content of diplomatic agency. Finally, it discusses how diplomatic agency is linked to conceptions of diplomatic representation and legitimacy in its actual, functional and symbolic forms.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Title of host publication | SAGE Handbook of Diplomacy |
| Editors | Costas Constantinou, Pauline Kerr, Paul Sharp |
| Number of pages | 11 |
| Place of Publication | London |
| Publisher | SAGE Publications |
| Publication date | 2016 |
| Pages | 92-103 |
| Chapter | Part I, Chapt. 7 |
| ISBN (Print) | 1446298566, 9781446298564 |
| Publication status | Published - 2016 |
Keywords
- Faculty of Social Sciences
- Diplomacy
- International Relations
- Social Agency
- agency
