The bombastic smirking of Russia’s Victory Day parades is on a quite new scale this year. And why not? How often these days does a country get to boast to itself that it has grabbed part of some other country’s territory and seemingly got away with it? How did we […]
Here is my latest article for DIPLOMAT magazine – a review of David Owen’s fine new book on the diplomatic origins of the First World War. Thus: Readers of Diplomat will enjoy – and be startled by – many details Lord Owen gives us about diplomacy as practised a century […]
As long-standing readers know, when I left the FCO back in 2007 I qualified as a professional Mediator and had ideas about developing that line of work. It turned out not to be easy to do that if one lived well away from a seething centre of serious disputes such […]
Helpful as I am, I have written a short but comprehensive guide for Universities on the issue of inviting External Speakers. It is intended to replace the wretched rambling 44 page effort put out by Universities UK that after much huffing and puffing came down on the side of accepting […]
Telegraph Blogs have published my piece on the latest deal on Iran and its nuclear programmes: All negotiations boil down to a few existential issues: Security, Resources, Control, Reputation/Recognition and Time/Risk. Plus, depending on how the other aspects are tackled, Trust. Skilful negotiators trade both within and between these ideas. […]
How to destroy Syria’s CW stocks, now that OPCW experts say that they have demolished Syria’s CW-making facilities? Not so easy to do this within Syria with a passing civil war raging on. So take the CW stocks to somewhere safe and do it nicely there. Hmm. But where? Albania […]
We Brits are bemused by the Obamacare saga in the USA. The overwhelming mass of Brits (including me) have no idea at all how the national health service actually works. All we know is that the State has taken on the responsibility to fix us if something goes wrong. It […]
My latest piece for DIPLOMAT is up, this one on Syria. A subject about which I know nothing at all, not that that stops me saying something about it, and failing that Yugoslavia: Back in 1980 I attended my first event at Wilton Park, the FCO country house conference centre […]
My latest piece at Commentator is up, this time about Iran and why it is so difficult to build trust: Have sanctions against Iran worked as intended, by causing intense economic and other pain to the point of persuading Iran’s population and leaders alike to change course and cooperate normally […]
Over at the Ambassador Partnership we are busy developing our corporate diplomacy Technique portfolio. The broad offering is now something like this: Impact and Influencing • Key Principles of Impact and Influencing • Active Networking • Active Influencing Presentation Skills • Core Presentation Skills • Public Speaking with Impact • […]
