A shared language
and shared codes of interpretation are prerequisites for diplomatic
communication. The institutionalization of mutually understood phrases and
expressions as well as rules governing the external forms of intercourse,
include significant elements of ritualization. Protocol, in this wider sense,
probably goes as far back as there have been contacts between polities. The term
protocol comes from two Greek words meaning “first glue,” and originally
denoted the first leaf glued on to a manuscript. In a figurative sense,
protocol has come to refer to the basic etiquette, or “stage-directions,” for
the enactment of diplomacy.
One can find
examples of ritualized phrases and an acute sense of protocol already in the
Amarna Letters. The address and greeting phrases of the tablets constituted
symbolic expressions of status. Only if the sender was superior or equal to the
addressee did he name himself first. Deviations were noted and given sinister
interpretations, as in this exchange:
And now, as to the
tablet that you sent me, why did you put your name over my name? And who now is
the one who upsets the good relations between us, and is such conduct the
accepted practice? My brother, did you write to me with peace in mind? And if
you are my brother, why have you exalted your name … ?
Other ritualized
formulations were used to indicate relative status as well. When a new monarch
succeeded to the throne there were pledges of, or demands for, “ten times more
love” than for the predecessor. For a demandeur, who wanted to deflate
the size of requested concessions from the more powerful Egypt, it was commonplace to use the phrase
“gold is as plentiful as dirt” in Egypt. Various expressions of
deference adhered to what scholars of the Ancient Near East call “prostration
formulae.” Kings or vassals “touched the hem” of the receiver’s garment, “fell
at their feet,” or considered themselves “dirt under their sandals.” Another
common idiom was “to strike the hand,” which was used to express refusals of
offers of alliance or breakoff of friendly relations. The phrase appears to
refer to the thrusting back of a hand outstretched in friendship or previously
clasped in friendship, and indicates that agreements were confirmed by the
perennial handshakes.
Similar examples of
a fine-tuned language can be found in Byzantine diplomacy. In fact, the sense
of protocol pervaded all Byzantine letters where linguistic nuances express the
relative status and relationship of writer and recipient. And by the
mid-fifteenth century, all the principal chanceries of Europe
had in their formularies model credentials showing how each of their neighbours
should be addressed, and most legal textbooks laid down the general rules to be
observed.
Modern diplomatic
language is replete with standardized phrases and guarded understatements. For
example, a verbal or written communication to the effect that the diplomat’s
government “cannot remain indifferent to” an international issue, is understood
to signal intervention; and the government that expresses “grave concern” over
a matter is expected to adopt a strong position. Each era, in short, appears to
have had its own set of ritualized phrases that were well understood among
diplomatic agents and rulers and enabled them to communicate even unpleasant
things with an amount of tact and courtesy.
Moreover, the
format of written and oral diplomatic communications has always been subject to
strict conventions. Already sixteenth-century BC Hittite treaties follow a set
pattern of preamble, historical introduction, provisions, deposition, list of
divine witnesses and, finally, curses and blessings. The form of the diplomatic
correspondence in the Amarna Letters is similarly standardized. After an
address, directed to the scribe who will read the letter, follows a salutation,
consisting of a report of the sender’s well-being and an expression of good
wishes for the addressee. The body of the letter consists of varying
combinations of declarations of friendship, discussions of gifts associated
with this friendship, proposals of marriage, and list of goods exchanged at the
time of marriage.
The heraldic
practices described in Homer’s Iliad indicate the existence of implicit
rules of oral presentation in Ancient Greek diplomacy. Explicit rules of oral
and written presentation were formulated in the medieval art of composing
diplomatic discourses for public delivery, ars arengandi. Resident ambassadors
in Renaissance Italy prepared two kinds of information for their rulers in
addition to their regular dispatches: “reports,” which were periodical,
carefully prepared statements of the political situation in the host polity;
and “relations,” which were their final reports on the completion of their
mission. Similar interventions are expected from ambassadors to this day.
In contemporary
official communication a distinction is made between a note, a formal
letter addressed to the foreign minister, signed by the ambassador, and written
in the first person; a note verbale, an unsigned letter from the embassy
to the Foreign Ministry, written in the third person; and an aide-mémoire or
memorandum, which records facts already known, or statements already made, and
carries no signature.
The ritualized
courtesy that we associate with diplomatic communication has oriental roots.
“The East had … long been accustomed to a studied courtesy, and it was from its
more polished manners that Western Europe was later to acquire those polite
forms of intercourse which marked the age of chivalry.” The emphasis on
ceremonial can also be traced back to Oriental diplomacy.
Eighth-century BC descriptions of
the reception of envoys in the multistate system of Ancient China detail the
formalities of offering and declining gifts. One study of diplomacy in the
Ch’un-ch’iu (Spring and Autumn) period, 722–481 BC, elaborates on the great
amount of ritual in the relations between the states, which strove to outdo
each other in their ceremonies to such an extent that their ability to put on a
rich ceremonial front frequently determined their position among their
associates.” The elaborate rituals served as a reflection of economic strength
and, since their rigidity required much discipline, as an indication of the
efficiency of the current regime. The extreme formality of diplomatic relations
required a lot from the emissaries. For example, they could not attend any
ceremonies to which their rank did not entitle them; at banquets in their
honor, they had to be able to respond appropriately to toasts, which usually
involved the ability to select for the occasion a fitting verse from the
well-known songs of the time; and practically all the major events in the life
of a ruling family required some sort of diplomatic representation. It is
significant that still a millennium later, in the seventh century, China’s
diplomatic relations were handled by officials at the Court of State
Ceremonies.
Byzantine emperors
similarly attached extreme importance to ceremonial and the reception of
ambassadors. In fact, one emperor, Constantine Porphyogenius wrote a detailed Book
of Ceremonies, which apparently served as a manual for his successors. Byzantium pursued a
“diplomacy of hospitality,” a routine of lavish receptions and banquets at the
palace with a large number of foreign guests in attendance whose obvious
purpose was to create an impression of greatness and world power. A special
department, skrinion barbarôn, arranged the reception of foreign ambassadors
and saw to it that they were suitably impressed. The ceremonies were designed
to reflect the orderliness and stability of celestial and imperial power, with
a heavy emphasis on the association of the emperor with Christ. The skrinion
barbarôn eventually developed into a virtual foreign ministry.
The close
relationship between Byzantium and Venice provided a channel
of transmission of such attention to ceremonial to the Western world. Thus, in
Renaissance Venice a record was kept, the Libro Ceremoniale, of the
exact ceremonies performed for each visiting dignitary. This served as a manual
for the ritual treatment of future guests.
For each visitor a
raft of ceremonial decisions had to be made: how far into the lagoon must the
senators (and how many senators) go to meet the visiting dignitary; should the
doge – the Venetian head of government – rise from his seat or come down from
his daise in the Collegio in order to greet an ambassador; how valuable should
the gold chain be that was the customary gift to foreign representatives; and
what were the Venetian officials to wear at the reception?
The elaborate body
of rules governing the behavior of participants and the minutest details of
ceremonies reduced the possibility that inadvertent acts of diplomats might
lead to miscommunication with foreign rulers. Diplomatic envoys had varied
ceremonial functions in the late Middle Ages, a period of “a thousand
formalities”:
Marriage ceremonies
required the presence of ambassadors representing states friendly to those
becoming allied through marriage, and a reluctance to send ambassadors or
orators to grace a wedding would tend to indicate a coolness toward at least
one of the parties. The death of a friendly prince or a member of his family
was another of those climactic events surrounded with solemn pageantry and
calling for an embassy to share the grief and offer condolences. “Funeral
diplomacy” has been resurrected as a variant of summitry in modern times, but
then less for its ceremonial functions and more as an opportunity for valuable
contacts between the successors in power and politicians from other countries.
The exchange of
gifts as part of the diplomatic ceremonial from antiquity onwards could of
course degenerate into bribes, and the line between the two was diffuse – much
in the same way that information gathering may convert into spying. While much
less elaborate and significant, some ceremonials remain in modern diplomacy.
For instance, the reception of a new ambassador is still surrounded by rituals.
And state visits have retained time-honored ceremonial forms, including the
exchange of gifts and banquets.
The conclusion of
treaties seems to have been associated with rituals throughout history. In the
Ancient Near East treaties invariably ended with summons to the deities of both
parties to act as witnesses to the treaty provisions and explicit threats of
divine retribution were envisaged in case of violation. The number of deities
assembled as treaty witnesses was often substantial, in some cases approaching
one thousand. Oaths were sworn by the gods of both parties, so that each ruler
exposed himself to the punishment of both sets of deities should he fail to
comply.
Moreover, the
conclusion of treaties was accompanied by sacrifice and other gestures symbolic
of the punishment that would follow a breach of the treaty. Several letters
refer to the sacrifice of an animal, most often the foal of an ass. For the
nomads, the donkey was their sole auxiliary at a time when horses were
virtually unknown. Thus the sacrifice of a donkey stressed, by its costly and
spectacular nature, the importance of the consecrated event. In connection with
swearing the oath, each ruler was said to “touch his throat.” Possibly he drew
a knife, or perhaps a finger, across his throat, symbolizing the fate of treaty
breakers. It is unclear whether the animal sacrifice and “touching the throat”
were alternative or complementary ceremonies.
There is a striking
similarity with treaty rituals in Ancient China. There, too, an animal –
usually a calf or an ox – was sacrificed. The treaty document was bound to the
sacrificial animal, whose left ear was cut off. Both the document and the lips
of the principals were smeared with blood from the ear. The document, one copy
of which was buried with the sacrificial animal while the signatories kept one
copy each, contained an oath invoking the wrath of the gods upon anyone who
violated the covenant. When the Romans concluded a treaty, officials had the
treaty read aloud to the envoys of the other contracting party, pronounced a
curse on any violator of its terms, whereupon they cut the throat of a sow with
the lapis silex, a dagger of immense antiquity. In short, early diplomacy in different parts
of the world seems to validate the common view among anthropologists that
ritual sacrifice is a substitute for the primal violence that threatens to
destroy society.
In Ancient Greece,
on the other hand, the conclusion of a treaty was accompanied by a libation to
the gods, spondai, and was generally affirmed by oaths, horkoi.
Both terms came to be used figuratively to refer to treaties. The ritual
sacrifice had thus taken on a more symbolic form, which has survived until our
days in the form of the ritual champagne toasts accompanying the signing of
modern treaties.
The practice of
uttering religious oaths as part of the ceremony of signing treaty documents is
found in early Byzantine diplomacy as well. The Byzantines accepted
non-Christian oaths of validation, in a way reminiscent of the Ancient Near
East practice of invoking multiple deities as witnesses. Religious appeals, at
a time when Gods were considered as real as the material world, had its
advantages; “since divine sanction rather than national consent gave ancient
international law its obligatory quality, it was in some respects more feared
and binding than modern international law.”
In sum, different
historical eras have developed a sense of protocol that has enabled diplomats
to concentrate on substantive issues without adding unnecessary disagreements
about the external forms of intercourse, while at the same time allowing for
discrete signaling through deviations from ritualized forms and expressions.
?After-reading activities
1 Comprehension questions
1
What is required for diplomatic communication?
2 What
is protocol?
3
When and where can we find first examples of diplomatic protocols?
4 What
are the earliest examples of courtesy and fine language in diplomacy?
5 How
can modern diplomats make use of refined language? Give examples.
6
What are the traditional conventions of formal written and oral diplomatic
communication?
7What
is the difference between note, note verbale and memorandum?
8
What are the traditions and implications of gifts in diplomacy?
9
What are the ceremonies connected with reception of ambassadors?
10
What are the traditions connected with signing treaties and agreements?
Work with the
dictionary and consult the text to do tasks 2 and 3
2 Translate
words and word combinations from
English into Ukrainian and use them in
your own sentences
Institutionalization; intercourse; ritualization; protocol; figurative
sense; etiquette; enactment; greeting; tablets; deviation; to upset; to exalt; formulation;
pledge; demandeur; to deflate; concession;
to adhere; prostration; garment; alliance; breakoff; to thrust; to clasp; perennial;
fine-tuned language; credentials; replete; standardized phrase; understatement;
indifferent; grave concern; courtesy; convention; preamble; provision; deposition;
scribe; salutation; heraldic practice; implicit rule; note verbale; signature; chivalry; emissary; lavish; dignitary; doge;
inadvertent; miscommunication; pageantry; condolences; bribe; deity; retribution;
foal; ass; nomad; consecrated event; signatory
3 Translate from Ukrainian into English
Передумова; відносини, зв’язок; протокол; умова, положення; статус; формулювання; поступка,
концесія; союз, альянс; вірчі грамоти; применшення, стримане висловлювання; інтервенція;
глибоке занепокоєння; дипломатичний представник; ввічливість; передмова, вступ;
положення, умова; оголошення; офіційне повідомлення, депеша; міністр
закордонних справ; вербальна нота; пам’ятний листок; емісар, агент; сановник; небажання;
співчуття; хабар, підкуп; порушення; клятва; діяти відповідно до правил; який
підписався чи взяв участь у підписанні; відносини, зв’язок
4 Complete
the sentences with words or phrases from the list
Missions; status; institutionalization; protocol; violations;
concession; credentials; memorandum; declarations; dispatch; formulation; alliances;
foreign minister; allied; intervention;
1.
What J. William Fulbright proposed in 1946 was the ______ of his own
overseas odyssey.
2.
All social groups can be reached in this way, although
the higher in the hierarchy
of a profession one aims for, the more prestigious the program has to be, and
the likelihood
increases that the person will be unable to accept due to work pressure or
simply ________.
3.
This, of course, is subsumed within the broader debate
regarding the present ________ and future role of professional diplomats and the
environments in which they operate.
4. In Gareth Evans’
and Bruce Grant’s ______________ of the ‘niche diplomacy’ idea, both
countries, but more especially Norway, have also concentrated resources ‘in
specific areas best able to generate returns worth having, rather than trying to
cover the field’.
5.
Public diplomacy is particularly important for
implementing GRIT as it can be used
6.
to make clear the cooperative nature of a _____________
and the desire for a reciprocating action by an adversary.
7. His challenge was
not to build lasting _______ or mergers of Arab states, but to loosen the political
framework within
which Arabs found themselves.
8.
The growth of civil society and global social movements is
changing the character
9.
of multilateral diplomacy, as its intergovernmental _______
are redefined in the
light of growing participation by non-governmental organizations.
10. The most glaring
recent example of disunity
was the Iraq
crisis, but the problem of an obvious discrepancy between lofty ideals as expressed in EU _________
and concrete action is
notorious.
11. In 1936, an
Associated Press _______ from Paris
noted that Leftists were
applauding the pledge of the new (and short-lived) French premier Albert
Sarraut to “use ‘public
diplomacy’ in foreign affairs.”
12. _______ abroad are
typically small, with perhaps only two or three diplomats to cover the
whole range of diplomatic tasks.
13. It can pursue a
wide variety of objectives, such as in the field of political dialogue, trade and foreign
investment, the establishment of links with civil society groups beyond the opinion
gatekeepers, but
also has ‘hard power’ goals such as alliance management, conflict prevention or
military ______________.
14. It was Gareth
Evans, when serving as ______
________ of ‘middlepower’ Australia, who gave ‘niche
diplomacy’ its name.
15. The value of
international cultural interchange is to win respect for the cultural
achievements of our free society, where that respect is necessary to inspire
cooperation with us in world affairs’, according to a 1950 ________ from the
Bureau of the
Budget that differs little from the utilitarian approach that governs US cultural
diplomacy today.
16. US policy-makers could have learned from their
experiences in Yugoslavia and the Gulf Wars of the 1990s that a political
mandate from the ‘international community’ (preferably the UN Security Council)
comes with the handy permission to use foreign bases, _______ troops, financial means
to fund the operation, and – most importantly – the credibility and status of
legitimacy.
17. Asia worries about China’s economic and political rise; Europe mainly
about China’s _______ of
human rights; and the US worries about
both.
5 Say if the following statements are true according to the text.
1 Diplomatic
protocol is rooted in ritualization.
2 The term protocol
comes from two Greek words meaning ‘ritual’.
3 Modern diplomatic
language is full of exaggerations.
4 Each century has
had its own set of phrases understood among diplomatic agents.
5 Conventions
govern written and oral diplomatic communications.
6 In history diplomatic relations were not very
formal.
7 Diplomatic
ceremonial of exchange of gifts could result in bribes.
8 The conclusion of
treaties was often accompanied by human sacrifice in Ancient China.
9 Ritual sacrifice in
ancient world symbolized the danger of violating the treaty.
10 Protocol helped to develop similar discreet signals for
diplomats.
Write an essay on Amarna
Letters or Ch’un-ch’iu (Spring and Autumn) and their role in history of
diplomatic protocol.
