A Place for Science Diplomacy?

In the age of globalization, public diplomacy – not defence – should be front and centre in international relations, and science diplomacy is a critical component.

In my book Guerilla Diplomacy, I argue that if development is the new security in the age of globalization, then diplomacy must displace defence at the centre of international policy.

If policymakers were to accept this formulation, then diplomacy, and in particular public diplomacy (PD), would be placed front and centre in international relations. Science diplomacy (SD), which involves both the use of international scientific cooperation to advance foreign policy objectives and the use of diplomacy to achieve scientific ends, represents a critical component within the broader public diplomacy ambit. Science diplomacy is an expression of soft power. It is perhaps best understood as a way to liberate scientific and technological (S&T) knowledge from its rigid national and institutional enclosures and to unleash its progressive potential through collaboration and sharing with interested partners world-wide.

Framing and contextualizing science and technology within international relations

In the globalization era, the most profound challenges to human survival – climate change, public health, food insecurity, and resource scarcity, to name a few – are rooted in science and driven by technology. Moreover, underdevelopment and insecurity, far more than religious extremism or political violence, represent fundamental threats to the world order. In that context, the capacity to generate, absorb, and use S&T could play a crucial role in improving security and development prospects.

By way of comparison, the continuing pursuit of the global War on Terror – under whatever new name – tends to have the opposite effect.

To compound further the complexity of this calculus, S&T is haunted by an abiding paradox in relation to international policy. While it can provide the remedies that contribute materially to the achievement of security and development, for instance through remote sensing, agronomy, or the introduction of game changing information and communication technologies, it can also give rise to the opposite: insecurity and underdevelopment. Here I refer to the scourge of weapons of mass destruction, the mismanagement of toxic wastes, the repression of human rights and civil liberties, and so forth. In other words, when it comes to understanding the dynamics of contemporary international relations, S&T plays the part of a powerful, two-edged sword.

Hold that thought, but not at the expense of my main point, which is that development – addressing the needs of the poor, and bridging the digital divide – advances the cause of security, and accordingly should become a preoccupation of diplomacy in general, and of science diplomacy in particular.