It's a good list. It could be improved with better history choices and perspectives from outside the USA. I would add Richard Overy Causes of War, John Darwin After Tamerlane, Dr S Jaishankar The India Way, and something by Kishore Mahbubhanni. Oh and drop Kissinger.
Thank you - just graduated with my master's in international public policy but can't wait to dig into this list for some of the topics/concepts I missed taking classes in. Super valuable resource!
This should be a course syllabus for all diplomats and foreign affairs civil servants—beginning during Orientation but continuing in a required, structured program for the first several years of service, followed by required “CLE” for the remainder of our careers. I would love to work my way through all of these, but to do so I would have to find the time and energy on my own time—an impossible proposition. State Department needs to integrate this learning into our work and promotion requirements or even the strongest believers will never be able to do more than dream wistfully…
I think recent events have thrown this whole list into the dustbin. There is no longer a desire for trained foreign policy expertise in government, only political loyalty. Any real estate billionaire can manage complex diplomatic negotiations just as well as an FSO, and without conflicting loyalties to dead institutions and agendas. The best guide for how to be a successful diplomat today is to study the careers of Ribbentrop, Molotov, and Ciano and how they succeeded or failed at implenting autocrats' personal agendas.
If you believe that there’s nothing that differentiates an amateur from an expert, then you’re reading the wrong Substack. I think expertise in foreign policy necessarily leads a country toward stability and prosperity, unlike the State failure presided over by Ribbentrop et al.
It's a good list. It could be improved with better history choices and perspectives from outside the USA. I would add Richard Overy Causes of War, John Darwin After Tamerlane, Dr S Jaishankar The India Way, and something by Kishore Mahbubhanni. Oh and drop Kissinger.
An incredible resource. Thank you for putting this together.
Thank you 👍
Thank you - just graduated with my master's in international public policy but can't wait to dig into this list for some of the topics/concepts I missed taking classes in. Super valuable resource!
This should be a course syllabus for all diplomats and foreign affairs civil servants—beginning during Orientation but continuing in a required, structured program for the first several years of service, followed by required “CLE” for the remainder of our careers. I would love to work my way through all of these, but to do so I would have to find the time and energy on my own time—an impossible proposition. State Department needs to integrate this learning into our work and promotion requirements or even the strongest believers will never be able to do more than dream wistfully…
I think recent events have thrown this whole list into the dustbin. There is no longer a desire for trained foreign policy expertise in government, only political loyalty. Any real estate billionaire can manage complex diplomatic negotiations just as well as an FSO, and without conflicting loyalties to dead institutions and agendas. The best guide for how to be a successful diplomat today is to study the careers of Ribbentrop, Molotov, and Ciano and how they succeeded or failed at implenting autocrats' personal agendas.
If you believe that there’s nothing that differentiates an amateur from an expert, then you’re reading the wrong Substack. I think expertise in foreign policy necessarily leads a country toward stability and prosperity, unlike the State failure presided over by Ribbentrop et al.
I think I've read the one just above her head.
Thanks for sharing, but no Ian Bremmer on this list?