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Cyber-diplomacy: The Emergence of a Transient Field

In: The Hague Journal of Diplomacy
Author:
André Barrinha Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) in International Relations, Department of Politics, Languages and International Studies, University of Bath UK

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Summary

It is only in the last two decades that states have started to focus on the need to use traditional diplomatic means in discussions surrounding cyber-policy. This article explores how these discussions have been progressively ‘diplomatised’. Diplomatisation is proposed in this article as a process which involves external and internal dynamics of institutionalisation and positioning, both of which are essential for the successful creation of a new diplomatic field. Understanding the emergence of cyber-diplomacy is crucial to recognise the successes, frustrations and opportunities associated with the (lack of) regulation when it comes responsible state behaviour in this domain. This article does so based on 40 interviews conducted with diplomats and experts involved in the emergence of cyber-diplomacy. It looks at the idiosyncratic evolution of this field within specific nation states as well as overall developments at the international level, particularly within the context of the United Nations.

1 Introduction*

The use of malicious software for strategic purposes has become an international security priority in the last couple of decades. As is often the case when an issue acquires strategic relevance, diplomacy is called on to intervene by making use of its toolbox to promote and negotiate specific priorities and interests. Cyberspace is no different in that regard. Cyber-diplomacy emerged during this period as a field of diplomatic activity responsible for dealing with issues such as the definition of norms of responsible state behaviour in cyberspace and the stabilisation of relations between rival states in this domain.1 It also emerged as part of cyber-deterrence efforts in many parts of the world, including in the European Union through its cyber-diplomacy toolbox.2

As proposed in this article, cyberspace as an international policy domain has been diplomatised.3 The concept of diplomatisation is not new to the literature. Iver Neumann has used it in two different contexts. The first is within conflict resolution,4 in which diplomatisation occurs when a ‘conflict goes from being primarily treated as an issue of security … towards being treated primarily as an issue of diplomacy’.5 In that sense, diplomatisation allows us to appreciate not only how diplomats assume a predominant role in a given policy domain, but also what happens when they do; the reasons and effects of diplomatic involvement on a given global governance matter; the nature of knowledge that comes associated with the process of diplomatisation; and (we would add) the inclusive and exclusionary dynamics it generates.

A second understanding of diplomatisation, presented in Neumann’s At Home with the Diplomats, sees diplomatisation as the appropriation of diplomatic practices by non-diplomatic groups, such as local bureaucrats and the military, but also non-governmental organisations (NGO s), businesses and even journalists.6 Neumann draws inspiration from the work of Christer Jönsson and Martin Hall, who argue for the existence of a dynamic term that enables a ‘relational and processual approach’ to diplomacy,7 which helps differentiate political spaces through the ‘reproduction of particular international societies and the institutionalization and ritualization of diplomacy’.8 This article proposes that diplomatisation is indeed a process of differentiation — from the actors and agents previously active on a given field of global governance as well as between states — but one in which diplomats, their institutions, their practices and their form of capital become prevalent in a global governance domain; in short, it is a process by which a specific domain of global governance is progressively turned into a diplomatic field. As shown in the second section of this article, there is an intimate connection between the state (individual) and the states (plural) in how new fields of diplomatic action are constituted, that is, in how internal and external dynamics create and recreate diplomacy. Within that context, the diplomatic mimicry practised by non-state actors is an outcome rather than a symptom of diplomatisation: other actors want to behave like diplomats because they understand that the domain in which they operate is now a diplomatic field.9

Nowadays, Ministries of Foreign Affairs (MFA s) seem to be at a crossroads, increasingly competing with other government agencies in representing state interests abroad but also in terms of the diversity of issues on which they are asked to play a role.10 There is a growing tendency for different ministries to have their own external relations and directly interact with colleagues from equivalent ministries from other countries.11 Diplomacy, to an extent, has become ‘a whole-of-government enterprise with a broad range of government departments involved in and often staffing overseas resident missions’.12 This has not removed diplomats and other MFA officials from these processes. It has, however, changed their role, with internal co-ordination becoming even more crucial for successful international interactions.13 At the same time, diplomats are now called on to engage in a broader range of policy areas, from trade to climate change, and to learn topics that require technical expertise, or a different skill set from those with which they are traditionally comfortable. As we face increasingly complex global challenges — from the fast roll-out of artificial intelligence tools to the climate emergency — learning how diplomacy is deployed to address new challenges is key to understanding both how those challenges are being addressed and how diplomacy is evolving in the 21st century.

This article’s contribution to this discussion is based on a sociological reading of diplomacy, which largely builds on the work of authors such as Iver Neumann, Rebecca Adler-Nissen, Mark Raymond, Vincent Pouliot and Jérémie Cornut.14 These works have signalled that the study of diplomacy is no longer the sole domain of (former) practitioners.15 Underpinning this shift is the normative concern with the diplomatic profession as an understudied key feature of International Relations as a discipline.16

The definition of diplomatisation proposed here advances a conceptual toolbox that operates simultaneously at multiple levels of analysis, from the diplomat to the multilateral forum. Its starting point is that the diplomatisation of a new policy domain involves both domestic and international dynamics that cannot be understood separately from each other. They interact in the constitution and maintenance of new diplomatic fields, which are structured around a specific type of capital: diplomatic capital (as elaborated in 2.1.1). We argue that through diplomatisation we can understand how diplomatic fields emerge in new policy domains, as is the case with cyber-diplomacy.

Cyber-diplomacy operates in this article as the prism through which the process of diplomatisation is introduced. Within this context, diplomatisation allows us to consider the details of the emergence of this new diplomatic field while offering a broader understanding of how diplomats, trained in the traditional practices of foreign policy-making, adjust to the novelty and (often) technical specificity of the cyber-domain. In that sense, in addition to the more generic contributions identified earlier — how diplomatic fields are constituted, how diplomacy engages with new issues, and the proposal of a conceptual toolbox to study diplomatisation — this article illuminates and clarifies the conceptual emergence and institutional development of cyber-diplomacy as a field based on first-hand interviews with protagonists and observers who helped shape it.

Our analysis is based on a combination of official documents, statements, recordings of the UN WebTV from the UN Open-ended Working Group (OEWG) on Information and Communications Technology (ICT), and 40 semi-structured interviews with diplomats and experts conducted between 2017 and 2021. These interviews focused on the origins, meaning and practice of cyber-diplomacy, with questions being asked on the institutional development of cyberspace as an international policy issue within their country/ organisation, the meaning of diplomacy in this domain, and views on the conduct of some of the most relevant forums where cyber-diplomacy takes place.17 Most of them were recorded, and the quotes used in this article result from their transcription. The main aim was to determine how these practitioners perceived both the professional setting in which they operated and the issue area with which they dealt. To address Jérémie Cornut’s concern that ‘[i]nterviews have limitations, most notably the risk of diplomats expressing ex-post rationalizations of their actions’,18 this article has triangulated information acquired through interviews with other sources (published and unpublished), and it has asked verification questions to other actors present in the same events or processes. Those interviewees who were still active and not officially speaking on behalf of their countries had their identities partly anonymised. It should be noted that this is very much a Western-centric look into cyber-diplomacy, and that further research will be needed in how countries in other parts of the world, particularly in Asia, have been dealing with the emergence of cyber-diplomacy. Our positionality, combined with the limited access to diplomats from that region, certainly contributes to that limitation.19

This conceptual proposal is based on an inductive process in which key dynamics and institutional initiatives progressively gained shape with each additional interview. Although the article does not follow grounded theory per se, it is certainly informed by both its inductive approach and its idea of saturation, in which the researcher analyses the data until they find ‘the exhaustive list of properties for the category’.20 In this case, the dynamics identified in this article cover all the multiple aspects described by diplomats and officials in interviews with the author as well as those disclosed in publicly available outlets.

In terms of structure, this article starts by introducing and unpacking the concept of cyber-diplomacy, offering a brief historical overview of its emergence and exploring how these cyber-diplomats define what they do and how that compares with other types of diplomacy. As demonstrated in section 2, the presence of diplomats in a room is just part of a broader external and internal set of practices and procedures that need to be taken into consideration to understand the pillars of each diplomatic field. The article then highlights the transient nature of cyber-diplomacy and how the ubiquity of digital technology is already shifting its meaning before concluding with a summary of the key points.

2 Cyber-diplomacy: A Conceptual and Practical Novelty

The first known reference to the term cyber-diplomacy comes from a speech by the Canadian Foreign Affairs and International Trade deputy minister Gordon Smith to the Technology in Government Forum that took place in Ottawa on 18 September 1996,21 where he talks about ‘the application of information technologies to make DFAIT [Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade in Canada] more responsive and efficient’.22 Most works published prior to 2010 tended to reflect this view of cyber-diplomacy.23 One of the earliest studies to mention cyber-diplomacy as diplomacy dealing with emerging international aspects of cyber-policy and cybersecurity was only published in 2010 by the EastWest Institute, where it is suggested that ‘instead of exclusively focusing on cyber defense or cyber war, it is also important to begin to develop cyber diplomacy’.24 Two years later, Paul Meyer, a former Canadian diplomat, also published a piece in which he talks about the ‘diplomatic process of exploring possible international co-operation to build resilience in cyberspace against threats’.25

Alongside these publications, the situation was starting to change in the policy world (as we will see in the next section), but the term ‘cyber-diplomacy’ was still hardly ever used academically as demonstrated by the very limited consideration it received both in the 2015 Oxford Handbook of Modern Diplomacy,26 and in the 2016 Sage Handbook of Diplomacy.27 Although the concept is now widely used in policy circles,28 there is to date only one book explicitly about cyber-diplomacy,29 and a limited number of academic papers directly engaging with the concept.30

2.1 A Domain without a Name

A fascinating aspect of the international politics of cyberspace is that in the last few years of the 20th century and the first decade of the 21st century, policy discussions were taking place without a specific conceptual framework. During this period, we had Russia’s proposal of a UN treaty to ban electronic and information weapons in 1998, and the World Summit on the Information Society in 2003 and 2005, in what was already a highly politicised environment.31 We also had the establishment of the UN Group of Government Experts (GGE) on Developments in the Field of Information and Communications Technologies in the Context of International Security in 2004 and then again in 2009.32 During this period, and despite the high-level diplomatic discussions, there was no clear academic vocabulary with which to discuss the events taking place or the issues brought up in this context.

Looking at the GGE in 2004, Germany, Russia, China and the US were the only countries of the fifteen that participated that sent experts from their MFAs.33 The remaining eleven experts were a combination of UN delegations and individuals from a diverse set of backgrounds such as police, defence or even trade.

In 2009, there was a shift from four to seven MFA experts, as Israel, Belarus and the Republic of Korea also sent people from their national capitals. Equally interesting is that at this stage, both the Russian and the US experts — the only two to have sat through all the GGE s — had changed titles: Andrey V. Krutskikh became Deputy Director of the Department of New Challenges and Threats in the Russian MFA (and chair of the GGE), whereas Michelle Markoff was now Senior Policy Adviser in the Office of Cyber Affairs at the US State Department. This was the first time anyone in the GGE used ‘cyber’ as part of their title.

The establishment of the Office of the Coordinator for Cyber Issues in 2011,34 led by Christopher Painter, triggered others, particularly in the West, to follow Washington’s lead. After 2011, countries such as the UK, Estonia and the Netherlands adopted more proactive international policies in this domain, with consequences for the composition of subsequent GGE s. In 2012-2013 the number of experts with cyber in their title increased to three, then to six in 2014-2015, to ten in 2016-2017 and to fifteen in 2019-2021 (including related terms, as in the French and Russian cases). Particularly in the Global North, nowadays it is difficult to find an MFA that does not have some office or at least an individual responsible for cyber-related issues.

2.2 Conceptual Ambiguity

The first striking conclusion one reaches when interviewing cyber-diplomats from different countries is the diversity of views in terms of what cyber- diplomacy is. For one European diplomat, cyber-diplomacy ‘comprises all cooperation actions related to cybersecurity or cyberspace in order to prevent conflicts and to promote and maintain international peace and security’.35 For another, cyber-diplomacy is a form of mediation and translation between three separate discourses/communities: security, business and civil society.36 This is a point reinforced by an Australian official, for whom it is fundamental to bring diplomats closer to business because they work in a very different way to diplomacy.37

The distinction along group lines is also relevant in terms of defining what being a cyber-diplomat is. For the Danish diplomat, a ‘key part’ of being a cyber-diplomat is to be able to actually understand what intelligence services and technicians are saying and translate ‘that into something that our politicians and also managers, of course, internally can actually understand and comprehend’.38 This view of the cyber-diplomat as a translator was confirmed in multiple interviews as part of the diplomatic capital needed for the field. It also speaks directly to diplomats’ understanding of their role as part of whole-of-government efforts.

Despite the lack of consensus on what it is, most diplomats interviewed seem to agree that ‘cyber diplomacy is on an ascending trend’,39 and that it is a matter of growing importance for international politics — a ‘foundational issue’, ‘fundamentally tied to international politics and geopolitics, and issues around balance of power and freedom and authoritarianism’.40 Although most diplomats understand and highlight the cross-cutting nature of cyberspace, and some even go so far as to understand the need for a multifaceted approach to it, international cybersecurity sits at the centre of how most diplomats conceive cyberspace and how their respective MFA s institutionalise it.41 In that sense, most of the discussions take place around the threats emanating from cyberspace, and how they can be limited. Here the views varied between those who think the threat is not yet taken seriously enough, for example ‘I think we’re still not at a point where the cost of doing damage in the cyber world equals the damage done, to put it lightly’,42 and those who think the threat is serious but the responses fall short, such as ‘now people understand cyber is important, but they don’t know what to do about it’.43

When asked whether cyber-diplomacy is different from other types of diplomacy, the answers were invariably ambivalent. On the one hand, it is presented as doing the same diplomatic job but on a different topic (‘I’m still on multilateral diplomacy, talking about cybersecurity’),44 involving the same organisations as in other areas — EU, NATO, UN — or as having similar objectives to other areas. As noted by a Dutch diplomat, ‘it’s not that different let’s be honest: it’s all about an endeavour to work together with others to ensure that we uphold the international legal order, that we promote development and the rule of law’.45 The major difference, according to this diplomat, is that whereas traditional diplomacy tends to be mostly inter-state based, ‘in cyber-diplomacy the situation is more mixed because it is very much about multistakeholder initiatives and collaboration’ but also ‘very much linked to the impact of technological developments in international relations’.46 For the Danish diplomat, although many of the ‘general dynamics are the same’, ‘it’s very technical, not very intuitive and it’s very intelligence based’,47 an answer that takes us to another point thoroughly explored in the interviews: knowledge.

Although it was commonly recognised that the technical nature of the topic dissuaded many of the interviewees’ colleagues from engaging in the field, for example, ‘it can be scary for some diplomats, because when they’re hearing about cyber security, they think it’s technical, it’s about computers, etc.’,48 multiple interviewees attempted to demystify the level of technical expertise that is needed for the job. As mentioned by a former Canadian diplomat, ‘[y]ou don’t have to have an advanced degree in computer science to sort of understand the basic parameters of this technology and what its potentiality and its risks are and use that to inform diplomatic activity’.49 For some, the generic skills and themes are the same as anywhere else in diplomacy: ‘when we talk about international stability, when we talk about how it affects the future, in a development sense, but also in terms of security, those are policy issues’.50 Other diplomats acknowledge there is a level of specialisation required, but they then compare it to that of other technical areas and conclude that being a cyber-diplomat is ‘no more distinct than the diplomat who specializes in aviation law or the diplomat who specializes on tariff policies, or on fishery matters in that it does require a certain degree of expertise’.51 In some cases, there may be a temptation to directly translate the knowledge from one domain of expertise into another. As recognised by more than one diplomat, that raises the risk of mistranslation across domains. The fact that many of the diplomats involved in negotiations around responsible state behaviour in cyberspace came from arms control meant that for them cyberspace was first and foremost a domain where threats had to be contained.52

The practice of cyber-diplomacy pre-empted its conceptualisation by almost a decade, and to this day there is still disagreement among its practitioners regarding what it exactly means, or how different it is from other types of diplomacy. There is, however, some consensus on the centrality of international cybersecurity and that cyber-diplomacy exists primarily to prevent conflict in and through cyberspace. As we will discuss in the next section, part of this derives from how the field was progressively shaped through the encounter between different diplomatic practices, habitus and strategies brought in from other diplomatic fields.53

3 Diplomatising Cyberspace

Diplomatisation is a complex process involving many different agents, locations and power dynamics. This article distinguishes between external and internal dynamics, both of which are essential for the successful creation of a new diplomatic field. From a close reading of the emergence of cyber-diplomacy in Europe, North America and the so-called ‘like-minded countries’, it is argued that externally, a successful diplomatisation requires processes of differentiation, multilateral institutionalisation and positioning. Internally, it needs a trigger or entrepreneur, institutional accommodation and the concrete delineation of the remit of the role (see Table 1). The remainder of this section will explore each of these aspects separately.

Table 1
Table 1

The external and internal dynamics of diplomatisation

Citation: The Hague Journal of Diplomacy 19, 3 (2024) ; 10.1163/1871191x-bja10183

Source: Author

3.1 External Dynamics

The practice of diplomacy is centred in the interaction with peers in the international stage.54 For this to happen, we argue, there needs to be a triple process of justifying the crucial importance of diplomats’ specific skill set over those of other professions (professional differentiation); of having an institutional setting at the international level in which to operate (international institutionalisation); and of having a position within the emerging field (positioning). We will now look at these in turn.

3.1.1 Professional Differentiation

From a Bourdieusian perspective, capital is a form of power and the currency of each field;55 it is ‘derived from the different resources that can count as valid currency for exchange in a field’.56 In the diplomatic field, diplomatic capital is its currency. To an extent, the diplomatisation of a given global governance domain corresponds to the ascent of diplomatic capital as the main currency of that field. Adler-Nissen defines diplomatic capital as a minor form of political capital,57 which can be understood as ‘the political power enjoyed by politicians and leaders, a power derived from the trust expressed in a form of credit that a group of followers places in them’.58 This form of power is not easily exchangeable and needs constant renewal. In our view, diplomatic capital should be seen as a subset of political capital that combines material resources, knowledge and symbolic capital.59 Diplomatic capital is used not only to exert power and influence in the field, but also to define who is a ‘real’ diplomat. For diplomatic capital to take hold and become prevalent, other types of capital will have to be subsumed or considered less relevant. Alternative types of knowledge are not excluded from international discussions, but they are relegated to a secondary type of capital and therefore power. There are specific performative features linked to diplomatic capital — speaking ‘diplomatically’, following protocol correctly — that may not be as relevant in terms of political capital writ large, but that are essential for a successful performance of diplomacy. In cyber-diplomacy, these set diplomats apart from other actors in the field, including the private sector and NGO s, some of which have resorted to hiring former diplomats in the recent past to engage in this diplomatic field more successfully.

As mentioned earlier, after 2010 we witnessed a transition in cyber-diplomacy in which there was in the eyes of a close observer ‘a greater recognition of this as a political discussion, not a technical discussion’.60 The fact that the 2009-2010 GGE concluded with a consensual report led to ‘a kind of an after-action review in ministries about how influential was their participation in the outcome of 2010. And they realised that what they needed were negotiators, not tech at the table, and that’s what they put in going forward’, and that ‘those countries that nominated technical people really found that they were actually quite side-lined in the discussions’.61

In interviews involving participants or close observers of the GGE process, it is common to find this notion of ‘technical people’ in opposition to the ‘diplomats’. According to James Lewis, rapporteur and senior adviser to four UN GGE s, ‘sometimes people say “we need people with technical expertise at these meetings” and the answer is no. It’s like putting bunny rabbits in a cage with a tiger.’ The same applies, to a certain extent, to a third group, the ‘lawyers’, who also need to be taken ‘out of the room’ as much as the ‘technical people’, as they also often proposed ‘things that had absolutely no chance of being endorsed by their governments’.62 The same opinion is corroborated by a European cyber-diplomat, who is ‘full of fear of these international lawyers because they always know how things should be. How good is the right and what is wrong, and they give me the creeps.’63

Although these views are not necessarily consensual, they are revealing of a logic of differentiation within cyber-diplomacy in which the diplomats (political experts) are expected to act differently from the ‘others’ (technical or legal experts).64 They also highlight the centrality of negotiation skills in diplomatic capital and reinforce the existence of a hierarchy when it comes to decision-making in cyberspace, one in which the political experts (i.e. the diplomats) should always have the last word.65

3.1.2 International Institutionalisation

There is a mutually constitutive relation between the forums and processes where discussions are taking place on given global governance issues and the actors that take part in them. As we will see in terms of internal dynamics, the creation of the UN GGE s and later the OEWG both served as a trigger for the establishment of cyber-diplomacy posts around the world and helped in the institutionalisation of those at the national level. The fact that these discussions were taking place under the framework of the UN General Assembly meant that cyber-diplomacy was given to multilateral relations departments in some countries. In others, as discussions were taking place within the First Committee of the General Assembly — responsible for international security issues — the matter was put in the hands of national security departments.

For some diplomats working in the field around the 2010s, a problem with cyber-diplomacy was that there were too many informal or ad hoc forums and initiatives without there being one that concentrated attentions; it was difficult to decide what to prioritise. Progressively, the UN became the focus of international discussions on the role of ICT s in international security, particularly with the GGE’s growth in stature. In that regard, the OEWG offered a significant boost in consolidating these practices,66 and in involving in these discussions many other states previously left out of the closed format of the GGE s,67 a view publicly defended by the Chair of the OEWG, Ambassador Jürg Lauber,68 and confirmed by multiple interviewees. In short, institutional stability matters is crucial for the diplomatisation of a given policy area.

3.1.3 Positioning

Diplomatisation takes place when a domain is seen as having strategic value and key actors have antagonistic positions to the point of not being able to easily accommodate different interests without loss to one or more sides.69 In that regard, the actors sitting at the table need to actively defend a point of view. This international positioning can be sustained on national strategies (assuming they have an international component), on dedicated international cyberspace strategies (as is the case of the US and Australia) or in previous public declarations regarding the application of international law and norms to cyberspace (as was the case of states such as the UK, Estonia and France).70 In addition to defending the positions stated in those documents, diplomats engage in an interactive process with other peers (and actors) by issuing statements (for example, in the OEWG), intervening in debates, or simply having bilateral and multilateral cyber-dialogues. These often take place in an inter-state environment, but they can also occur in multistakeholder settings, including in track 2 or 1.5 events, which include a wide range of actors, from academia to the private sector.71

These positions are partially linked to more general pecking orders,72 but new partnerships can also be created.73 States can use the diplomatisation of a new domain to position themselves more ambitiously in the international sphere. Countries such as the Netherlands, Estonia and Singapore are good examples of this in cyber-diplomacy, as they are perceived as key actors in the field either through visible diplomatic engagement — as mentioned by many of the diplomats and officials interviewed — or through the enhancement of their cyber capabilities.74

Diplomacy requires a combination of the individual and the state, with the diplomat effortlessly moving between both.75 International positioning also requires a combination of the two: it is constrained by pecking orders, general perceptions of that state and official lines defined by the ministry, but it is also affected by the diplomatic capital of specific individuals. These will contribute to enhancing, specifying or diluting an international stance. For example, the fact that the US and Russia have had the same experts sitting in on every single GGE — Michelle Markoff and Andrei Krutskikh, seasoned diplomats who have acquired a significant amount of diplomatic capital over the years — has certainly helped in setting the US and Russian delegations a notch above everyone else. In this case, it has also meant that these two countries are the leaders of the main bloc of countries in the discussions, not only at the GGE, but also in the OEWG. It is not a coincidence that the resolutions setting up the sixth GGE (A/C.1/73/L.37) and the first OEWG (A/C.1/73/L.27), both in 2018, were sponsored by the US and Russia respectively. Therefore, this positioning cannot be understood without looking into the individuals who practise it; however, it also depends on the resources available and the domestic institutional setting within which these individuals operate, as we will see next.

3.2 Internal Dynamics

Despite the international nature of the profession, diplomacy is very much rooted in national dynamics and processes: from inter-ministerial rivalries to budgetary turf wars, diplomats need to negotiate their position internally almost as much as they do externally. In order for change to take place, it is necessary that something or someone generates the sort of impulse that has knock-on effects on structures and institutions. Change has to be triggered.76 Once that happens, it is then necessary to accommodate such change institutionally. Finally, within the ministry, it is necessary to delineate the roles and competences of those responsible for cyber-diplomacy. From the interviews conducted for this article, there were a few dominant dynamics identified across multiple domestic processes. How they tend to materialise varies significantly, as we will now discuss.

3.2.1 Triggers and Entrepreneurs

Although different states reached the stage of appointing officials to deal with cyber-diplomacy in different ways, multiple interviewees referred to the importance of designating someone to hold discussions with important counterparts, or of mimicking what other (allied) countries were doing, as reasons for establishing those offices or bureaus. The creation of the Office for the Coordinator of Cyber Issues in the US State Department seems to have been one of those cases, with officials from the UK, Chile and the Netherlands identifying Christopher Painter’s role as a source of inspiration.77 However, this was not simply a case of the US leading by example. It was very much part of the Office’s ambition to promote the creation of those counterparts. As Christopher Painter remarked, it was initially difficult for the US to find counterparts for discussions on cyberspace: ‘there were no foreign affairs counterparts. We would go to a meeting, and they would send their interior ministries or their justice people. It was very seldom we would get someone from foreign affairs.’78

If in some cases it was US institutional innovation pushing other MFAs to mimic the State Department, in other cases it was political entrepreneurs at the domestic level who contributed to institutionalising cyberspace nationally. That was the case of Foreign Secretary William Hague in the UK, as well as of Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull in Australia, who ‘put his emphasis on this [cybersecurity], as one of his key topics’. This led to a dramatic change in the ‘landscape in Australia quite considerably. And that’s definitely what led to the uplift in terms of our international relations effort and created this position within the system.’79 Similarly, in the US, the fact that Barack Obama’s presidential campaign had been hacked made cyber ‘one of his initial priorities’. And although cybersecurity was ‘spinning up in the last year and a half of the Bush Administration’, when ‘Obama came in, given the experience he had, given the interest he had, he was someone who wanted to prioritise this’.80 Political interest at any (significant) level makes it easier for other agencies and ministries to be convinced of the need to act — the need to create something new.

Often, a combination of different factors and political will goes hand in hand with other key triggers. The example of the Netherlands is a case in point. For the Netherlands, in addition to the already mentioned US influence, there were three other factors leading to an increase in interest and investment in this area. The first was the sentiment that the initial steps taken by the US under Christopher Painter were ‘laying out the formal structures for international cyber-diplomacy’. The second was a significant cyber-attack against a digital registrar (DigiNotar) in the Netherlands in 2011, which helped raise political and public awareness around the security challenges emanating from cyberspace.81 The third was the organisation of and participation in international forums, in particular the Freedom Online Coalition Conference in 2011 and the Global Conference on Cyberspace, held in the Hague in 2015. All of this meant that the Netherlands ‘could not stay behind’ and that it ‘had to develop proper cyber policy structures’.82

Significant incidents or the organisation of major cyber-related events were indeed mentioned by more than one interviewee as common reasons for institutional developments at the national level. In Brazil, Snowden’s disclosure of the National Security Agency’s hacking of President Dilma Rousseff’s mobile phone and the organisation of a large-scale event in 2014 (NetMundial) contributed to the development of concrete policies regarding cyberspace,83 whereas in Chile, a major cyber-attack helped to focus the minds of decision-makers.84

Participation in UN forums could also spur prioritisation of the topic. In the case of Canada, for example, pressure to engage in the GGE or in the 2019 OEWG led to a recognition that ‘if we weren’t really engaged, we would lose out, and that I think helped at least to get the substantiation for requests for additional resources’.85

Whereas some of these posts were created directly as a follow-up to these internal dynamics, the elaboration of strategies — whether on cybersecurity or international cyberspace — seems to have played a central role in initiating, developing or consolidating the issue. That was the case in the US, where writing the international strategy was a ‘useful exercise’ that got the different ‘agencies to see what different perspectives there are and how to approach them’.86 This was also the case in Canada (where the 2010 strategy included a commitment to develop a cyber foreign policy), in Finland and in Romania.

Overall, it has been possible to identify six main triggers for action in cyber-diplomacy: peer influence, political entrepreneurs, international responsibilities, major incidents, major events and strategies. For most countries, more than one of these triggers contributed simultaneously to the development of cyber-diplomacy posts and offices. Fundamentally, they helped shape the notion that something should be done — that action needed to be taken.

3.2.2 Institutional Accommodation

Foreign ministries do not tend to vary significantly in structure. As a result, in most countries we find remarkably similar organisational arrangements that combine ‘functional, geographic, protocol, legal and administrative divisions’,87 with cyber usually falling within the ‘functional’ category: ‘it’s a bit like climate, or human rights, or one of those topics which is not related to any geographical location’.88 Although there seems to be a push in recent years towards greater ‘balance between geographic and functional departments’,89 geography seems to remain at the core of the daily operations of a typical MFA.

The directorate or division where cyberspace lands is often a good indication of how cyberspace is perceived and how much of a priority it is. As mentioned earlier, many states have included cyber as part of their security policy, whereas other have included it in multilateral affairs. In some cases, such as Germany, cyber has shifted between the two departments.

In general, there is a sense that policy issues around technology are posing institutional challenges to MFA s. As mentioned by a Danish diplomat, ‘our bureaucracies are struggling a bit with how to deal with this issue organizationally, because emerging tech is everything from drone swarms to social media to what have you. So, how do you reflect such a horizontal issue in an organizational structure?’90 Similarly, Christopher Painter highlighted the difficulty of dealing with new issues that cut across multiple areas: ‘especially institutions like ministries of foreign affairs are not used to change, particularly when you have a subject that is so cross-cutting — it involves economic issues, human rights issues, security issues — it is hard to get people together’.91 The adjustment between the realm of possibility within a ministry and the cross-cutting need of a subject can often result in the latter being subsumed under the bureaucratic arrangements of the former. This can be as true in terms of scope as in terms of access to the decision-making level, as some cyber-offices are buried deep within the MFA’s structure, whereas others have relatively close access to the political level.92 Although each role is constrained by the position it occupies within the ministry, much will then depend on the articulation between the remit of the role, and what their incumbents do with it.

3.2.3 Remit of the Role

Even if some states are now moving towards a more structured approach to cyberspace and cybersecurity within their ministries, a common perception among those practising cyber-diplomacy in the first half of the 2010s was that they had been given ample room to define the specific remits of their cyber activities.93 This had to do in part with the novelty of the field, but in some cases it was also linked to the lack of real political clout cyber-diplomacy seemed to hold initially — it was important to include it in the structure, but it did not deserve a prominent position or a clearly delineated role within it. Even among some of the major powers in this field, cyber-offices comprised a handful of staff. In some cases, they were really ‘a one-person show’.94

There was a sense, at least among some of the leading nations in the area, that the field was there to be shaped. As expressed by Christopher Painter, the State Department ‘essentially created a whole new field of diplomacy. This was not really a diplomatic issue before. There were bits and pieces, but it wasn’t seen as a major diplomatic issue.’ Also, ‘cybersecurity in particular, but even “cyber” writ large was always seen as this kind of boutique, technical issue. If you went to ministers, or presidents or prime ministers and talked about this, their eyes would glaze over, and they would say “just let the technical people deal with that”.’95

In the US, the pitch given to foreign service in terms of cyber was:

lots of areas are so established that you go, you read the demarche, you follow the orders, the positions are all set. Unless you are at a high level you really don’t have much impact on policy. Here, this really is blue sky, this really is a frontier. We really are creating the rules. We are leading the international community by example.96

Similarly, in Australia, the Cyber Ambassador was given ‘a complete blank sheet to invent’.97 This lack of a blueprint contributed to developing a stronger esprit de corps among those initially tasked with dealing with this issue.98

In that sense, to be a cyber-diplomat can have different meanings depending on the country: ‘for some it’s exclusively political-military issues around hacking or UN cyber-norms, or attribution; for some it also includes emerging technology; for some it includes data and across board data flows and digital regulation’.99 As mentioned earlier, what they all have in common is a deep concern with international cybersecurity.

Understanding the remit of the role in a diplomatisation context helps us assess the importance given to the issue by each state but also to learn how that specific state perceives the field in which it is operating, what it prioritises in international discussions and how it links cyber to other foreign policy domains. From the perspective of the diplomat, it is also the moment when they are able to reflect on who they are and what they do. The remit of the role delineates the raison d’être of these diplomats within a particular institutional setting. Analytically, we thus have a two-level insight into the process: that of the state, and that of the diplomat — the structure and the agency, both embodied in how the latter practises cyber-diplomacy. As we will see in the next section, it is when discussing the remit of the role that diplomats are called on to reflect more deeply on what they do, on the field in which they operate, and on the profession more broadly.

4 The Transient Nature of Cyber-diplomacy

Whereas one can argue that diplomats and their way of doing things shape how discussions around cyber-policy take place, the limits of the field are constantly being renegotiated by the continuous adjustment dynamics happening at both national and international levels. The fragility of diplomatisation resides exactly in its heterogeneity of reasons, institutional developments and role remits. It asserts forms of knowledge and ways of doing things, but it is far from being a sedimented process. This process of structuration thus is also one through which change can happen. This is particularly visible when one asks where cyber-diplomacy is heading.

The idea of both cyberspace and cyber-diplomacy being in a transition phase fits within this logic. As argued by the UN official, ‘there is no good reason why those who are discussing responsible state behaviour in the use of ICT s are not the same exact people discussing the use of increasing autonomy in weapon systems, or AI in international security’.100

There is also a difference between those on the front line of cyber-diplomacy and those who are only now taking their first steps in the field. Whereas many states, particularly in the Global South, only started to pay attention to cyber-diplomacy with the OEWG, some states in the West already seem to be evolving towards something different or more encompassing. In some cases, we have the addition of new responsibilities, including disinformation (as in the case of Portugal) or 5G (as in the case of Finland). In others, we have the creation of new, more encompassing roles, such as the Tech Ambassador in Denmark or the Digital Ambassador (Ambassadeur du Numérique) in France; or the inclusion of emerging or critical technologies as an addition to the cyber-policy remit, as was the case in Australia, where Tobias Feakin became the Ambassador for Cyber Affairs & Critical Technology. In the US, a new Bureau of Cyberspace and Digital Policy was created in 2022 with nearly 100 staff and the appointment of Nathaniel C. Fick as the first Ambassador at Large for Cyberspace and Digital Policy.101

In a sense, cyberspace, cybersecurity and cyber-diplomacy are floating signifiers defined by each diplomatic actor depending on their institutional role, remit and country’s position, that is, in how cyberspace was diplomatised in their respective country. In turn, those domestic dynamics are intimately related to the external features — professional differentiation, international institutionalisation and positioning — previously identified.

5 Conclusion

This article reconceptualises diplomatisation, proposing a set of external (professional differentiation, international institutionalisation and positioning), and internal (triggers or entrepreneurs, institutional accommodation and remit of the role) dynamics that contribute to explaining the emergence of diplomacy in a given global policy domain. It does so anchored in cyber-diplomacy and the views of those at the forefront of its development. Indeed, as we had the opportunity to explore, were it not for the institutional foundations — domestically and internationally — and the prevalence of diplomatic capital as the currency of the field, one could question whether cyber-diplomacy ‘exists’ given the constructive ambiguity surrounding the concept among those who practise it. And yet, when watching the OEWG sessions on the UN WebTV, one has to admire the repetitive, ritualistic nature of the event, as if all the actors participating in the room had agreed on what to do beforehand: the monotonous tone of the pre-prepared scripts being read, the language employed, the deep engagement in what for those outside the field could easily be taken as superfluous discussions.102

Having diplomatisation as a model for analysis show us that those sessions are but the tip of the iceberg, the moment of multilateral gathering backed by a multiplicity of heterogeneous dynamics, practices and institutions. But it is precisely in the porosity of the field that one finds what diplomatisation does to a given policy area: it selects and prioritises specific forms of knowledge subsumed under some form of diplomatic capital; it legitimises certain institutional settings over others; and it reinforces the statist nature of the international system. Fundamentally, and despite all the domestic and international challenges diplomacy currently faces, diplomatisation operates as an important ordering process of international relations, albeit one sedimented on fragile foundations.

Appendix: List of Interviews

FIG000002

Citation: The Hague Journal of Diplomacy 19, 3 (2024) ; 10.1163/1871191x-bja10183

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André Barrinha

is a Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) in International Relations at the University of Bath. His work has been published in journals such as International Affairs, Mediterranean Politics, Third World Quarterly, the Journal of Common Market Studies, European Security and the Journal of European Integration. He is one the authors of International Relations Now and Then (Routledge). Dr Barrinha is currently working on cyber-diplomacy as an emerging field in International Relations. In 2019, he was awarded the Best Article in Global Affairs Award for a piece co-authored with Thomas Renard on cyber diplomacy and the English School.

*

This work was supported by the Leverhulme Trust [grant no RF-2019-466].

1

Barrinha and Renard 2017, 355 define cyber-diplomacy as ‘the use of diplomatic resources and the performance of diplomatic functions to secure national interests with regard to the cyberspace’. Interview with European Cyber-diplomat 1, October 2020. We follow Rebecca Adler-Nissen’s Bourdieu-inspired definition of field as ‘a relatively autonomous social system comprising a pattern of practices and beliefs, which encourage conforming with rules and roles’ (Adler-Nissen 2014, 50). On the question of the analytical value of the field, see Leander 2011.

2

On cyber-deterrence, see Daniel 2021; Brantly 2020; Fischerkeller, Goldman and Harknett 2022. On the EU’s cyber-diplomacy toolbox, see Latici 2020.

3

Here it may be helpful to distinguish between cyberspace as a policy domain (public) and as an operational (secret) domain, traditionally under the responsibility of intelligence services. Our argument only applies to the public domain. This distinction was made by a former British Cyber Coordinator in an interview with the author (February 2021). See also Chesney and Smeets 2023.

4

For an application of Neumann’s concept, see Nasirzadeh and Wastnidge 2020.

5

Neumann 2012a, 8. This comes as part of his previous work on securitisation theory (see Neumann 1998), where diplomacy appears as an alternative to the securitisation-induced escalation of hostilities. As a minor point, we would argue that as diplomacy covers a vast (growing) panoply of issues and areas — from the environment to finance — there is no requirement for the issue to be primarily dealt with as a security issue.

6

According to Neumann, ‘these groups copy diplomatic practices in such areas as establishing missions abroad, information gathering, reporting between those missions and home headquarters, and turnover of personnel’ (Neumann 2012b, 177-178).

7

Jönsson and Hall 2005, 15.

8

‘Political space’ in the sense of the space where international politics ‘happens’; Jönsson and Hall 2005, 25.

9

A good example of this is Microsoft, which has proposed international norms, hired former diplomats to speak on their behalf and even opened an office within the United Nations. On the role of private companies in this domain, see Hurel and Lobato 2018; Jacobsen 2023.

10

On the changing role of MFA s, see Dittmer 2020; Lequesne 2020.

11

This is what Robert Keohane and Joseph Nye call transgovernmental relations, which they define as ‘sets of direct interactions among sub-units of different governments that are not controlled or closely guided by the policies of the cabinets or chief executives of those governments’ (Keohane and Nye 1974, 43).

12

Cooper, Heine and Thakur 2015, 26.

13

In that regard, Robert Putnam’s 1988 two-level games (domestic–international) could be seen to apply even more forcefully to the contemporary practice of diplomacy.

14

Neumann 2012b; Adler-Nissen 2014; Raymond 2019; Pouliot 2016; Cornut 2015. See also Pouliot and Cornut 2015.

15

Kuschnitzki 2013.

16

Neumann 2012b.

17

The majority of the interviews were conducted online due to multiple travel restrictions imposed in response to the Covid-19 pandemic.

18

Cornut 2015, 390.

19

Of the 40 diplomats and experts interviewed, five were from Africa, two from Asia, two from Oceania, six from Latin America and the remaining participants from a combination of Europe and North America.

20

Konecki 2018, 554.

21

Gordon S. Smith (1997) published his views the following year in the Chatham House journal The World Today.

22

This reference appeared in a 2002 edited volume that, despite having ‘Cyber-diplomacy’ in the title, focuses on the use of ICT in diplomacy not as a diplomatic matter, as digital diplomacy rather than cyber-diplomacy (Cooper 2002, 131). For a similar critique and distinction between cyber-diplomacy and digital diplomacy, see Barrinha and Renard 2017.

23

See also Potter 2002; Kleiner 2008.

24

Gady and Austin 2010.

25

Meyer 2012.

26

Cooper, Heine and Thakur 2015.

27

As one can read in the only passage of the handbook mentioning cyber-diplomacy, ‘[t]erms such as “cyber diplomacy”, “digital diplomacy” and “e-diplomacy” are gaining currency. Often they refer to efforts at reaching out to other audiences rather than governments and are seen as new forms of public diplomacy’ (Jönsson 2016, 88).

28

The EU Cyber Direct — EU Cyber Diplomacy Initiative is an excellent example of this; see https://eucyberdirect.eu.

29

Riordan 2019.

30

See, for example, Barrinha and Renard 2017, 2020; Goldman 2020; Lancelot 2020; Manantan 2021; Meyer 2015. Although not using the term, but engaging with the practice, see also Raymond 2021.

31

Carr 2017.

32

The GGE was a forum created in 2004 to address Russia’s concern with the use of ICTs for strategic purposes. Initially set up as a one-off forum composed of a mixture of experts and officials to address an emerging issue in international relations — as is often the case within the UN context — it ended up turning into a process, with five subsequent iterations. Its conclusions particularly since 2012-2013 have been endorsed by the General Assembly and became the basis for the normative framework that defines responsible state behaviour in cyberspace. For a discussion of the GGE as a process, see Tikk and Kerttunen 2017.

33

China sent an expert from the Department of Arms Control and Disarmament, Germany sent the Head of Division of Conventional Arms Control, and Russia sent the Deputy Director from the Department for Disarmament and Security Matters. Only the US expert, Michelle Markoff, was not directly coming from arms control or disarmament (although that is also her background): she was the Senior Coordinator for International Critical Infrastructure Protection, Bureau of Political Military Affairs, within the State Department.

34

For an overview of US developments in this field, see Lilli and Painter 2023.

35

Interview with European Cyber-diplomat 1, October 2020.

36

Interview with European Cyber-diplomat 2, January 2021.

37

Interview with Australian Official, March 2020.

38

Interview with Danish Diplomat, July 2020.

39

Interview with European Cyber-diplomat 1, October 2020.

40

Interview with Former British Cyber-diplomat, July 2020.

41

For an in-depth exploration of the linguistic effects of terms such as cyberspace and cybersecurity in the US context, see Branch 2020.

42

Interview with Danish Diplomat, July 2020.

43

Interview with Christopher Painter, February 2020.

44

Interview with European Cyber-diplomat 1, October 2020.

45

Interview with Dutch Diplomat, January 2020.

46

Ibid.

47

Interview with Danish Diplomat, July 2020.

48

Interview with European Cyber-diplomat 1, October 2020.

49

Interview with former Canadian Diplomat, December 2020.

50

Interview with Christopher Painter, February 2020.

51

Interview with former Canadian Diplomat, December 2020.

52

According to Alexander Klimburg, many diplomats ‘come from a hard-power (political- military background) and are used to seeing the issues at hand in relatively straightforward terms’ (Klimburg 2016, 313).

53

By habitus here we follow Rebecca Adler-Nissen’s definition as the ‘unconscious adoption of rules, values and dispositions gained from an individual and collective history’ (Adler-Nissen 2014, 53).

54

As James Der Derian argues, diplomacy is, fundamentally, ‘a mediation between estranged individuals, groups or entities’ (Der Derian 1987, 6).

55

Guzzini 2013.

56

Adler-Nissen 2014, 59.

57

In the sense that diplomats work below the level of ministers.

58

Adler-Nissen 2014, 61.

59

On diplomatic knowledge, see Cornago 2016; on symbolic capital in diplomacy, see Kuus 2015, but also Pouliot 2016.

60

Interview with UN Official, August 2020.

61

Ibid.

62

Interview with James Lewis, July 2020.

63

Interview with European Cyber-diplomat 2, January 2021. For a more general discussion on cyber-legalism and the constraints it imposes in terms of strategic action, see Kello 2021.

64

This logic of differentiation is common to other professions. As stated by Neumann 2012a, 11, ‘[i]t is the key point of the sociology of professions that any profession will try to frame new issues and new issue areas in such a way that the relevance of their own profession is at the maximum’.

65

Whereas diplomats define their uniqueness in their capacity to negotiate and to understand the nuances of international politics, those on the technical side who are involved in the process take this view with a pinch of salt, preferring to highlight the benefit of a plurality of backgrounds around the table: ‘cyber-diplomats, of course, they do have an idea, but they might not be in a position to add onto the inputs and technicality what we can add in terms of that understanding so, different people from different background certainly helps’ (Interview with African Official, November 2020).

66

The OEWG on ICT in International Security was established in 2018 and extended the discussions around state responsibility in cyberspace that were taking place up to then within the UN GGE to the whole UN membership. There were multiple reasons for its establishment (see Raymond 2021), but soon after it started its work in 2019 it became clear that cyber-diplomacy had become a prerogative of a much broader number of states, and that the discussions around ICT s in international security had become more global. The OEWG (initially proposed to work for one year, later extended to two due to Covid-19-related travel restrictions) has subsequently approved a set of conclusions that reinforced the acquis of the previous GGE s, including its non-binding norms on responsible state behaviour in cyberspace. It has also seen its works renewed for five years, further consolidating the notion that the UN General Assembly has become the key hub for discussions on this matter.

67

Although not directly covered in this article, other forums, such as the Governmental Advisory Committee in the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers or discussions with the International Telecommunication Union, could also be seen as contributing to the consolidation of cyber-diplomacy.

68

Lewis and Painter 2021.

69

Barrinha and Renard 2020.

70

See Hollis 2021.

71

See Kavanagh, Carr and Berglund 2021.

72

As put by Vincent Pouliot, pecking orders are ‘eminently complex social forms: contingent yet durable; constraining but also full of agency; operating at different levels, depending on issues; and perhaps most important of all, defined in significant part locally, in and through the practice of multilateral diplomacy itself as performed within particular organizations’ (Pouliot 2016, 5).

73

The joint initiative between Australia and Mexico in proposing the creation of the National Survey of Implementation of UN recommendations on responsible use of ICT s by States in the context of international security is instructive in this regard.

74

See Voo, Hemani and Cassidy 2022, but also Klimburg 2016.

75

As Vincent Pouliot argues, ‘[i]n diplomacy, the individual representative and the country being represented are two faces of the same coin’ (Pouliot 2016, 77). See also Cornut 2015.

76

As argued by Iver Neumann, ‘[a]s long as politicians do not intervene directly, bureaucratic practice rolls on’ (Neumann 2012b, 90).

77

Elsewhere, it seems that the creation of a cyber-diplomacy post in Spain also contributed to Portugal taking action in this area (Interview with Portuguese Diplomat, May 2017).

78

Interview with Christopher Painter, February 2020.

79

Interview with Australian Official, March 2020.

80

Interview with Christopher Painter, February 2020.

81

For a detailed account of an attack that had significant global consequences, see Wolff 2016.

82

Interview with Dutch Diplomat, January 2020.

83

Interview with Brazilian Diplomat, April 2020; Interview with Professor Virgilio Almeida (Chair of NetMundial), February 2020.

84

Interview Chilean Official, January 2021.

85

Interview with former Canadian Diplomat, December 2020.

86

Interview with Christopher Painter, February 2020.

87

Barston 2019, 18.

88

Interview with Estonian Official, May 2020.

89

Barston 2019, 19.

90

Interview with Danish Diplomat, July 2020.

91

Interview with Christopher Painter, February 2020.

92

This was the case with the Cyber Office created in the State Department during the Obama Administration (Interview with Christopher Painter, February 2020).

93

Barrinha and Renard 2017, 360.

94

Interview with British Official, June 2019.

95

Interview with Christopher Painter, February 2020.

96

Ibid.

97

Interview with Australian Official, March 2020.

98

In the words of a British official, ‘I’m proud of the community that we built: a like-minded community of cyber-diplomats. People who [were] genuinely learning how to do this [cyber-diplomacy]’ (Interview with British Official, June 2019).

99

Interview with Former British Cyber-diplomat, July 2020.

100

Interview with UN Official, August 2020.

101

Schaffer 2022.

102

Mark Raymond makes a similar point regarding procedural rules in the GGE meetings. See Raymond 2021.

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