Diplomacy from Time to Time
When
you go to International Relations Major, the first job you think undoubtedly is
to be a diplomat. Diplomacy thing has been started since the Greek civilization
in their heyday until these days. In the first chapter of this book, Lauren
wants to tell us about how diplomacy evolves. Furthermore, he told us about 3 systems
of diplomacy in the next chapter. They are the diplomacy which is done by
balancing their power. Then, make defensive alliances and the last making
bipolar alignment.
It
was all started when city-states in Greek begin multiplied fast and granted conflicts
between them. Seeing that, Thucydides revealed that this war will never end as
long as the weak one never have chance to fight back. So, he provoked an idea
that which was better, to fight alone or make a company. Consequently, they
would settle the conflict in a peace way. As a result, they come up with an
idea that every city-state has a representative who is sent to other city-state
to make an agreement of cooperation. This diplomatic way started to proliferate
until Rome. But, different from the Greeks, Rome wanted to have a bigger role.
For that reason, they made an organization to gather the other states.
According to this book, Rome made his own rules about the war and peace which
have to be obeyed by the states that joint this organization.
As
time passed, people evolved so do the military grew stronger. One by one of
these city-states started to feel insecure for fear that other city-state will
attack them. In order to overcome the
worry, Italian city-states not just sent their representative if there was a
conflict but they want to their delegate to settle down in other city-states to
kept an eye on them. Many of people criticized what actually these diplomats
do, but the important is they have to give their home city-states an exact,
detail and specific report about the city-states where they live.
Go
forward to seventeenth century when the modern states started to emerge. States
that succeed get through the war even it end after the time that has been
defined became the Great Powers. They are Britain, France, Austria, Prussia and
Russia. How they could success is because of these 3 characteristics that are
revealed by this book. They are: Effective armed forces; an able bureaucracy
and a theory of state (pp.8). The idea of
raison d’état said that the states go
to war not only because their leader want to do so but they wage war if they
need not because they want it. For instance, Cardinal Richelieu that
implemented this idea and successfully made France to be one of the Great
Powers in that time. Unfortunately, this idea made statesmen just think about
how to win the war and how their political interest to be accomplished. In
effect, they didn’t looked down to the citizen that lost their human rights.
Thus, it leaded that war only can be waged under the agreement people within
states. They began to centralize their power to minimize the friction within
their states. Lauren said in this book that, the best states at that time is
France who could use their resources effectively and efficiently and do the
centralization to maximize their power. France’s power increased day by day and
started trying to dominate others. Seeing that, the other states started
seeking ally with other states to do the balancing and this was becoming the
pioneer of diplomacy in seventeenth century.
Ironic,
the best word to describe what was happened in the eighteenth century. The
appearance of Immanuel Kant who yelled out the human rights and democracy make
a contrary which is this century also known as the most violent era. Whereby
every states wanted to occupy others to expand their territory (pp.13). This
tragedy made they realized that they should have not war among others and made
their citizens suffered. Hence, they start to consider that they should have
tried to not be greedy. As in the book is written that, “They consider the
possibility that their own national self-interest might be well served by
considering their collective interests as a whole (pp. 22). “
Continuing
the idea that they should walk together is in the next chapter. Lauren writes 3
different diplomatic systems that were used in eighteenth century. First of
all, the leaders of Great Powers agreed that they should be oriented in peace.
In order to maintain a peaceful world, they had a meeting in Vienna to
distribute their power. This system emphasizes in the allocation of the
territory and has a sanction for those who break the agreement. Henry Kissinger
told us that this deal didn’t satisfy any states for the purpose of a stable
condition. He said that, “if there was a state that satisfy then the others
would felt dissatisfy and it will lead to an occurrence of jealousy among the
states (pp. 26).” Except that, they also need people who have responsibility in
dealing with the systems and willingness to maintain and defend it (pp.28).
Luckily,
this system has succeed in postpone the occurrence of war. Solving the conflict
with diplomatic ways and also prevent the situation which can trigger a
conflict. These are what they have done in order to restrain a war, such as:
minimize friction, avoid misperception and miscalculations, made clear
distinctions between legitimate and illegitimate ends and means in the pursuit
of policy (pp. 29). Even though the ideologies between those states are
different, they still could cooperate under the same collective interest. Regrettably,
some of statesmen are unsuitable with this condition therefore made other
governments feel insecure and could spark a violence.
As
time goes by everything has changed. One by one of the states started to broke
their agreement in Vienna meeting. War began again as a result of the
insecurity of the statesmen not because a thread that is really existed. They
asked for a renewal of the distribution of the territory seeing that emerge
unfairness between the allocations of it. Besides, economic factor also play a
role in that time such as tariff wars and colonial competition (pp. 33).
Consequently, Bismarck argued that every state needs great military. This
defensive system became the second system that Lauren wants to tell us about.
To restrain the thread that comes from other states, a state should have a
strong army and have defensive allies. In this case, to maintain Germany power
so he couldn’t dominate others (pp. 34).
But,
Germany didn’t stay still. He encouraged other country to join him in attacking
and occupying other states. Britain who never joined this agreement couldn’t do
anything while France chose to stay isolated. The aggressiveness of German made
tighten the tension. To prevent the same mistakes like France did in the other
time, a new system emerged. They made a bipolar alignment which is consisted of
two different alliances: The Triple Alliances (Germany, Austria, and Italy) and
the Triple Entente (Britain, France and Russia) (pp. 38). From the two formerly
system, this third system also include the Balance of Power and collective
interest of the Great Powers. But, it is more secret between two big alliances
and more unstable and inflexible (pp.38).
To
sum up, diplomacy has been believed to be used as the only way to avoid war.
Peace is a dream of all people especially the citizen who always suffered if
there was a war. The main actor of these three systems is Great Powers of
Europe. They are the central of all the decision are taken. Diplomacy is used
to restrain a state who tried to be a hegemonic state. How? They made a win-win
solution between states. No one has full satisfaction of their needy so they
have same feeling and no one feel being intimidated by others. Everyone realize
that no one could stop war, the only way we could do is to make a limitation to
wage a war and war is only legitimate for a political objectives. War also
could be legal if there is a state who wants to dominate. Nevertheless, this
system won’t work if there aren’t people who execute this. Trained diplomats,
big responsibility and willingness to protect this system based on the advice
of de Callières (pp. 43). Finally, if we can afford a peace world why war
should be waged?
Bibliography :
Lauren, P. G., Craig, G. A., & George, A. L. (2007). The Emergence of Diplomacy and the Great Powers. In FORCE and STATECRAFT (pp. 3-13). New York: Oxford University Press.
Lauren, P. G., Craig, G. A., & George, A. L. (2007). The Classical System of Diplomacy, 1815-1914. In FORCE and STATECRAFT (pp. 24-40). New York: Oxford University Press.