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Электронное приложение к журналу «Международная жизнь»
Author : Ye. Grebenkina
Postgraduate student, International Relations Department, Novosibirsk State University of Economics and
Management
THE SCIENTIFIC and technological revolution (information rev-
olution) that started in the 1960s became a catalyst for globalization
with its concomitant processes, which continue today and involve
practically all spheres of public life, including diplomacy.
It is gradually resulting in network-based interaction between actors,
with increasing use of new types of diplomacy - public diplomacy,
paradiplomacy, e-diplomacy, and "net diplomacy." To better under-
stand the degree of influence of network interaction on diplomacy,
let us dwell on each of these types in some detail.
Today, this form of diplomacy has entered a new phase known as
"new public diplomacy." Dutch scholar Jan Melissen, in the book
entitled The New Public Diplomacy: Soft Power in International
Relations, argues that public diplomacy "is operative in a network environment," where there
are numerous actors in addition to states, "rather than the hierarchical state-centric model of in-
ternational relations." This reflects important structural changes in international relations, which
are examined below in this article.
Paradiplomacy or regional diplomacy is participation of individual regions of countries in inter-
national organizations and in near-border, interregional and transregional cooperation.
Paradiplomacy is a product of integration processes, namely either closer cooperation between
regions lying at intersections of transportation or trade routes or between regions bordering for-
eign countries or having stable contacts with foreign states or with individual regions in them.
Paradiplomacy is normally based on geographical or economic similarities, on the possibility of
exchange of technologies, experience or skilled labor, etc.
E-diplomacy comprises a great diversity of subtypes, including twiplomacy, social media diplo-
macy and Internet diplomacy. Increasing use is made of video conferences and e-negotiations.
The Russian Foreign Ministry, for instance, has an official website and accounts on Facebook,
Twitter, YouTube, and Flicr, as well as in VKontakte, Russia's main social network. In effect, the
websites and accounts of diplomatic services may be regarded as their countries' diplomatic mis-
sions in virtual space.
Due to modern technology, neither spatial distances nor temporal differences are serious obsta-
cles to communication. One can, in fact, make one addition to Latour's list - the values and in-
terests of each actor, which explain their desire for communication, determine their choice of
the actor to communicate with and affect the process of communication in one way or another.
The main values of what is defined as net diplomacy in Russian political discourse are flexibility,
transparency, minimal roles of formal and hierarchical aspects, enlargement of ranges of par-
Modern Diplomacy as Part of the Networked World