Steve Kaiser is a Captain in the US Army Reserves, 492d Civil Affairs Battalion. He completed a successful deployment to Afghanistan as a Civil Affairs Team Leader in December 2008. This book offers a first-hand look at Captain Kaiser's experiences in Afghanistan, combining notes and correspondence written during his deployment with more recent reflections to depict the inner workings, successes, and failures of America's new "soft power" policy in Afghanistan. The book also gives a full, vibrant look at the Afghan people and their daily lives. Includes more than 100 photos.

1. Diplomacy at Large No come, no go - no one seems to bother about; Chanakyapuri-II in the making; Indian diplomacy at its best; Successful Performance from Diplomatic to Cricketing Field; Changing Face of Latin American Diplomacy; Solidarity in the Golden Year of Independence; Evolve Diplomacy to Fetch Global Business. 2. State Visits: Goodwill Missions Kants Visit to Brazil; Indian NAM Camaraderie with Yugoslavia; Ticklish Issues and an Ambassador-at-large; Indian NAM Camaraderie with Yugoslavia; Its time to Befriend Again; On Firm Economic Footing; Prodigal Visits Fatherland; When a Prime Minister Travelled into History. 3. Bilateral Taste of Pudding Dalai Birthday to be a Private Affair; Gaping Holes; East-west Divide in South Block; Pakistan Scores Yet Another Diplomatic First; Lessons from Argentina Nuclear policy; This Brazilian Left Wont go Right; India has High Stakes in Hong Kong Integration; When it Comes to Sahara, Even Gujral, Surjeet, Gupta have no Say; An Analogy by Default: Korea and Kashmir; India, Pak should Stop Playing Spy Catcher; Who Divides the World into Haves and Have-Nots?; Latin Americans Stay Loyal Despite Indias Faux Pas; Kabul Decides to Divide Hindus and Sikhs; Coalition Governments are Here to Stay, World Over; 6 Diplomacy: Initiatives and Responses India must Tread Cautiously in South Africa; Parliament Plays Diplomatic Host; Friends from Central Asia; Try Tashkent This Time, Instead of Mumbai. 4. Saying it Culturally When a Pakistani Diplomat Plays Host; Latino Ties and a Farewell; Trade can Wait, Its Culture Time; Diplomacy of No-Coloured People from Africa; Sports and Diplomacy; Forging Cultural Linkages; Of Diplomatic Parties and National Days; Time for Independence Celebrations; Happy Union ; Of Venezueian Fuel, Mansingh and Caricatures; Panama Picks up Indian Ambassadors of Mania; Demolishing Language Barrier; Lalit Mansingh and his Spice Girls; Whats French for Soccer?; A Diplomats Hospitality; Saying Shalom to India; Of Parties and Delegates; Occasion-Free Interaction should be Encouraged; Partying the Night Away; Bbye India, Hello China; Of Thai Cuisine; Live Carol Band and Smiling, Santa for CRY Kids; Learning Cultural Diplomacy, the Hard Way; The Bamboo Curtain Rises; Mexican Charmer; The Guests Who didnt Come to Dinner; Desert Flavours in the Capital; Not All that Black; The Russian and the Bindi; Role of Diplomats Spouses in Foreign Land; Why did Vivan Stop Painting?; Adding Colour to a Dull Meet; A Diplomatic Victory; Oriental Features and Acceptance in Japan; Be There . 5. First Hand Experience Making their Diplomats Our Envoys: A Users Guide; Sri Lanka Sends One Ivlan Army to Catch Indian Travelers; The Nicaraguan Lesson; Rotterdam, Gateway to Europe-92. 6. Journal Cultivating Relations with Nations Through Ambassadors; Ticklish Issues and an Ambassador - at - Large; Welcome on Board, Homai Saha; Kenya has 8,000 Ambassadors in India; Former Ambassadors Flocking to Delhi. 7. In the End Its the Word Chamber Diplomacy; Common Man and Foreign Policy; The Way Australians Do It; Academic Tribute to Narayanan; Gifts from Venezuela; Dixits Diplomatic Diaries; Link with Mexico Launched; Global Diplomacy; Where Book is a World; Education Industry of Australia; Diary of an Endless Yugoslav Night; Wanted an African Cultural Centre; Move over IIC, Here Comes IHC; Reaching out to the World; Dharmshila to Panchsheel as Rescue. 8. Diplomatic Space Musical Chairs in the Embassy Bazaar; Germans and Scindias Vie Over Chancery Building; Dream-Houses ... Made of Waste. Index

James Eayrs is a keen and articulate observer of international politics. His incisive critiques of the moral turpitude and inefficiency of the diplomatic profession in Right and Wrong in Foreign Policy and Fate and Will in Foreign Policy provoked unflattering attention and attempts at rebuttal by the statesmen and politicians who shape our foreign policy. This volume makes these two controversial studies available once more, bringing them up to date with discussions of the 'October crisis' in Quebec and other recent events, and incorporating the author's selection of his recent writings on the irrelevance, or deliquescence, of modern diplomacy. All three parts of the book hold to a single theme – the decay of diplomatic method. In the incisive prose characteristic of all Eayrs' writing, these discourses present a convincing view of the tragi-comedy of foreign affairs. The general reader and the student of politics and international affairs will find this a perceptive analysis of statecraft, full of insights into the workings of government.

This innovative new book argues that diplomacy, which emerged out of the French Revolution, has become one of the central Ideological State Apparatuses of the modern democratic nation-state. The book is divided into four thematic parts. The first presents the central concepts and theoretical perspectives derived from the work of Slavoj Žižek, focusing on his understanding of politics, ideology, and the core of the conceptual apparatus of Lacanian psychoanalysis. There then follow three parts treating diplomacy as archi-politics, ultra-politics, and post-politics, respectively highlighting three eras of the modern history of diplomacy from the French Revolution until today. The first part takes on the question of the creation of the term ‘diplomacy’, which took place during the time of the French Revolution. The second part begins with the effects on diplomacy arising from the horrors of the two World Wars. Finally, the third part covers another major shift in Western diplomacy during the last century, the fall of the Soviet Union, and how this transformation shows itself in the field of Diplomacy Studies. The book argues that diplomacy’s primary task is not to be understood as negotiating peace between warring parties, but rather to reproduce the myth of the state’s unity by repressing its fundamental inconsistencies. This book will be of much interest to students of diplomacy studies, political theory, philosophy, and International Relations.

Exile, Diplomacy and Texts offers an interdisciplinary narrative of religious, political, and diplomatic exchanges between early modern Iberia and the British Isles during a period uniquely marked by inconstant alliances and corresponding antagonisms. Such conditions notwithstanding, the essays in this volume challenge conventionally monolithic views of confrontation, providing – through fresh examination of exchanges of news, movements and interactions of people, transactions of books and texts – new evidence of trans-national and trans-cultural conversations between British and Irish communities in the Iberian Peninsula, and of Spanish and Portuguese ‘others’ travelling to Britain and Ireland. Contributors: Berta Cano-Echevarría, Rui Carvalho Homem, Mark Hutchings, Thomas O’Connor, Susana Oliveira, Tamara Pérez-Fernández, Glyn Redworth, Marta Revilla-Rivas, and Ana Sáez-Hidalgo.

Imprisoned, tortured, and forced into exile, he fought to clear his name. Instead, it would be misunderstood forever. Born into a modest family in fifteenth-century Florence, Niccolò Machiavelli navigated his way through the violence and political uncertainty of Renaissance Italy. Recognized for his keen mind and understanding of human nature and government, Machiavelli courted kings and popes as the leading ambassador for his beloved Republic. But it was a time of treachery, collusion, and war. Wrongfully accused and convicted, Machiavelli lost everything when the Medici returned to power, except his mind and his quill. Hoping to write his way back into Florentine society, he drew upon his experiences and the villains of his time in his novellas, histories, plays, and political treatises such as the Discourses on Livy, The Art of War, and his irreverent masterpiece, The Prince, earning his place in history as the father of modern political science.