Personal Diplomacy Research Articles

Edward Stettinius – Franklin Roosevelt’s Secretary of State

The article is devoted to one of the United States Secretaries of State, Edward Stettinius, a political figure who is well known and ambiguous in American society and less well known in Ukraine. The author first reports on E. Stettinius’ emergence as a financier and a person involved in American business, and emphasizes that the victories in the business have attracted the attention of political circles in Washington and the White House. It is stated that with the outbreak of World War II, the United States introduced a land-lease program, administered at the request of Washington by Edward Stettinius. Following his successful experience in conducting a land-lease, US President Franklin Roosevelt began to think of involving E. Stettinius in leadership positions at the State Department, which could not cope with his functions due to the challenges of wartime. In addition, F. Roosevelt’s «personal diplomacy» and distrust of «foggy bottom» workers contributed to the decline in the authority and importance of the State Department in shaping the country’s foreign policy. It was for this purpose – to streamline the activities of the State Department and to put things in order inside of the structure – F. Roosevelt appointed E. Stettinius to the post of Deputy Secretary of State, and after the next fourth victory in the presidential election, he replaced then Secretary of State Cordell Hull. It is emphasized that E. Stettinius «correctly» understood his place in the issues of forming the foreign policy of the country. He did not interfere with F. Roosevelt’s «personal diplomacy», but at the same time he was always close and put his ideas into practice (as an example, the creation of the UN). And while the president was shaping the course of the country, he, E. Stettinius, was shaping the course for reorganizing the State Department.

Erdoğan’s Personal Diplomacy and Turkish Foreign Policy

Erdoğan’s Personal Diplomacy and Turkish Foreign Policy

«Новая дипломатия» Д. Ллойд Джорджа на путях от войны к миру, 1916-1922 гг.: проблема современной интерпретации

В статье предпринимается попытка в качестве основного предмета переосмыслить британскую внешнюю политику в период пребывания у власти военного кабинета и коалиционного правительства Д. Ллойд Джорджа (1916-1922 гг.) на основе концепта «публичной («новой») дипломатии». Автор исследует международно-политические изменения и перемены в состоянии общественного мнения как в Британии, так и по всему миру, наметившиеся к концу Первой мировой войны, в также их влияние на Дэвида Ллойд Джорджа, складывание его особого политического стиля и предпочтений в пользу персональной дипломатии встреч и переговоров. В силу междисциплинарного характера исследования были использованы методы как исторического, так и политического анализа. Представлены различные точки зрения современных зарубежных историков на стиль политического лидерства и внешнюю политику Ллойд Джорджа и на основе их сопоставления сформулирована новая версия истоков публичной дипломатии. Что касается конкретной проблемы, то Ллойд Джордж, обращаясь к широкой аудитории в стране и за рубежом, умело формировал благоприятное для Великобритании общественное мнение и обеспечивал продвижение британских интересов. В результате оценки достижений и просчетов британского премьера исследователь приходит к заключению о значительном вкладе британской политической элиты в становление как публичной дипломатии, так и современной политической культуры в целом.

Who Fights for Reputation: The Psychology of Leaders in International Conflict

Each of the last several years, I have taught an undergraduate senior seminar on the political psychology of international security. Over the course of the semester, we cover many of the canonical texts in the field. Keren Yarhi-Milo’s work is increasingly taking up more real estate on the syllabus. Her most recent book, as the students picked up on, is in one sense the logical extension of her previous work on the role of individuals, and the interactions among them, in foreign policy. In Knowing the Adversary: Leaders, Intelligence, and Assessment of Intentions in International Relations, Yarhi-Milo argued that perceptions derived from diplomacy—specifically, face-to-face personal diplomacy by leaders—are just as salient, if not more, than other markers of state intentions, such as costly signaling. Leaders often change their beliefs on the basis of information gathered in these personal dyadic settings. In that book, the emphasis was on interaction, and the book contributed, in masterful fashion, to a renaissance in diplomatic studies in American positivist international relations scholarship.

НОВАЯ ФАЗА РАЗВИТИЯ КИТАЯ НА ФОНЕ “ТОРГОВОЙ ВОЙНЫ” С США

By the middle of 2018, there are signs of China’s entry into a new period of development, characterized by alteration of the old model “market reforms – intraparty democratization – moderate foreign policy” to another: “market reforms – Xi Jinping personality cult – offensive foreign policy”. The latter contains a risk of the arising contradiction between economic freedom and political-ideological rigidity, which can lead to destabilization of political life. However, in the light of the current positive economic dynamics, such risk may rather come out in the mid-and long-term perspective. Today, the political situation in China remains stable – despite growing dissatisfaction in scientific, expert and educational circles – due to a tightened control over the intellectual sphere by the government. The need for a new redistribution of power between central and provincial authorities could potentially disrupt political stability in the medium term, but, at the moment, is not a critical negative factor. The economic situation is positive-stable. Forecasts indicate a possible increase of China’s GDP in 2018 by 6.5%. At the same time, there are negative expectations in connection with the Sino-U.S. and potentially Sino-European “trade war”. In its foreign policy, as a response to Western pressure, China progressively uses the Russian direction of its diplomacy in the expanded version of “Russia + SCO”. The nuance here is seen in China’s adjusted approach to the SCO: first of all, not as a mechanism for cooperation with Russia, but as an organization that allows using Russia’s potential for pressure on the U.S. in the Sino-U.S. strategic rivalry. In the second half of 2018, the Chinese economy will continue to develop steadily, albeit with unresolved traditional problems (debts of provinces and state enterprises, ineffective state sector, risks on the financial and real estate markets). In politics, discontent with the cult of Xi will accumulate, but without real threats to his power. Weakening in economic opposition between China and the United States is possible due to Beijing’s search for compromises on tariffs, intellectual property, trade deficit. To find such trade-offs, Xi Jinping will use a so-called “personal diplomacy” of direct contacts with Donald Trump.

Presidents Abroad: The Politics of Personal Diplomacy

A president’s most precious commodity is time, and nowhere is this scarcity more apparent than with respect to international travel. Personal presidential involvement in diplomatic relations has proven to yield significant benefits, and yet traveling to engage in face-to-face diplomacy is often prohibitively expensive for American executives in time and attention. Given such restrictions, when and where do presidents choose to travel? We use a data set of more than 750 presidential trips spanning more than one hundred countries and a century of history to investigate the domestic and international factors influencing when, where, and for what reason presidents are likely to travel abroad. We provide a detailed examination of presidential travel over time and find that domestic political contexts influence presidential propensities to travel consistent with expectations based on allocating time and attention as limited resources.

Being Nuclear on a Budget: Churchill, Britain and “Atoms for Peace,” 1953–1955

ABSTRACTThis analysis critiques the impact of President Dwight Eisenhower’s 1953 “Atoms for Peace” initiative on Washington’s alliance with Britain, itself a newly crowned nuclear state. Prime Minister Winston Churchill’s taste for personal diplomacy led him to support his friend’s proposal without real consideration for how the contributions of fissionable materials and manpower demanded by the scheme would damage Britain’s overstretched domestic nuclear project. Membership of an international atomic agency allowed Britain to reaffirm its global status whilst depleting the resources needed to develop its native technology. In turn, the article discusses the commercial challenge posed by American nuclear firms and highlights how reactor exports quickly became a contest between the quality of British research and the quantity of American subsidies. In this way, it establishes how “Atoms for Peace” prejudiced both Britain’s domestic nuclear effort and export potential, in turn shedding light on Washington’s relations with an ailing Great Power.

Partner na trudny czas. Obraz Austrii w świetle materiałów Ministerstwa Spraw Zagranicznych Polskiej Rzeczpospolitej Ludowej z lat 1980–1983

The aim of this article is to show how the Fourth Department (Western Europe) of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Polish People’s Republic (PRL) assessed its relations with Austria in 1980–1983. This topic is analysed from the perspective of the existing research on Polish foreign policy and its relations with the West. The article mainly presents the Polish perspective of bilateral relations and efforts to restore good trade relations with Austria. Before martial law was introduced in the PRL, this neutral Western country had evidently favoured Polish affairs in the international arena. The contribution of Bruno Kreisky’s personal diplomacy to the development of trade relations with the PRL is also taken into account. There is a thesis that Austria was one of the first countries in the West which renewed diplomatic relations with the PRL after their having been frozen in December 1981. In the light of the existing studies, such measures were first taken in 1984 in the so-called fraternal countries and in 1985 in Western countries. Materials taken into account in this analysis have not yet been published, and come from the archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. In the Polish diplomatic documents from 1980–1983, Austria has the image of „a partner in difficult times”. Since 1970, the Austrian government under the leadership of Chancellor Bruno Kreisky was at first perceived exceptionally well in the PRL, compared to other Western countries. After the imposition of martial law, Vienna repeatedly confirmed its willingness to provide Poland with not just humanitarian, but also diplomatic and economic support, refraining from making negative comments on Polish authorities on the international forum. Kreisky avoided sharp statements against Polish authorities, fearing the possible escalation of the conflict. He was convinced that the shift in power was not possible at that time and in that area. He judged negatively Western economic sanctions for two reasons. As he claimed, they struck only the society and common people, having no impact on the decisions of Polish politicians; on the other hand, they threatened the interests of Austria, which was inclined to import Polish raw materials and repay the existing financial obligations. Shortly after the exchange of correspondence on the circumstances of the martial law, the Austrian side, through the Embassy in Vienna, offered to re-establish correct relations. They excluded the possibility of conducting official state visits until the lifting of martial law; however, in April 1983, the first working group meeting with Otto von Bauer, the Deputy Secretary General of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Austria, was arranged in Vienna. This event was treated as an example to follow in the other diplomatic posts of the Fourth Department.

R2P at Ten: A New Mindset for a New Era?

Like the polarized mix of extravagant praise and merciless scorn that greeted it from the outset, the first decade of the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) has been anything but neutral. The highs have been remarkably high, the lows painfully low. R2P has gained far broader and more sustainable political support than skeptics would have imagined, but its achievements on the ground--in preventing mass atrocities and protecting populations--have fallen far short of its proponents' ambitions. Its successes have been quiet, and its failures raw and public. Now, the task is to reposition R2P to meet changing conditions and to reflect lessons learned without losing its enduring core principles, which remain every bit as compelling today as a decade ago. The world has gotten a lot rougher since heads of state and government gathered for the World Summit in September 2005 and, to almost everyone's surprise, endorsed R2P by consensus. Long-suppressed geopolitical contradictions among the big powers have surfaced, environmental and resource pressures have sharpened, and nonstate armed groups with vicious sectarian agendas have emerged to challenge the existing normative order by flouting human rights and human protection norms on a daily basis. According to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the ranks of forcibly displaced persons reached a new peak of almost 60 million at the end of 2014. R2P did not cause any of this, but these worrisome trends underscore the need for a sober assessment of its record to date and for a fresh look at how early assumptions have withstood the test of time. Experience has reaffirmed the wisdom of the summit text in at least three respects. First, the summit cast R2P in sufficiently broad terms to permit substantial adjustments as circumstances and practice demanded. That amendment process is already well under way. In designing the Secretary-General's three-pillar implementation strategy, it was evident even in 2008 that the protection principles adopted by the summit had to be extended to nonstate armed groups. There already had been several situations in which governments had failed to exercise effective control over all of their territory so that armed groups had committed mass rapes, mutilations, and murders. The Secretary-General and I understood that international engagement should be early and flexible, depending on the circumstances of each case, and not dependent on Security Council authorization when undertaken under Chapter VI or VIII of the UN Charter. Within those bounds, the Secretariat did not need to get the permission of the five permanent members to take preventive action in Kenya, Kyrgyzstan, Guinea, Cote d'Ivoire, and other places. Our efforts to convince leaders in countries under stress to take a different path did not always succeed, but we were acutely aware that personal diplomacy, often with regional partners, and the bully pulpit were unique assets of the Secretary-General and his representatives. Our responsibility was twofold: to make the members of the Security Council and other key actors aware of the risks of atrocity crimes and to be the voice of the vulnerable even when great-power politics did not permit more forceful action. And we learned in Sri Lanka the high cost of failing to be sufficiently outspoken. Second, for all of its ups and downs in practice, in political and normative terms the progress of R2P has been remarkably rapid, especially compared to other human rights and human protection norms. Among the member states, there are still questions about implementation--as well there should be--but not about the validity and legitimacy of the prevention and protection principles that lie at the heart of R2P. The level of understanding, not just acceptance, today is much deeper and much wider than when I crafted the Secretary-General's initial statements and report seven years ago. We turned what most observers claimed was the Achilles' heel of the summit agreement--the General Assembly's continuing consideration--into a series of annual reports and Assembly dialogues on different aspects of R2P that have sharpened doctrine and advanced acceptance of the norm. …

War on the Line: Telephone Diplomacy in the Making and Maintenance of the Desert Storm Coalition

President George H.W. Bush’s use of personal diplomacy has been a frequently noted but little studied subject in the scholarly literature. For the first time, this analysis examines the transcripts of telephone conversations between Bush and foreign leaders during Operation Desert Shield and Operation Desert Storm to determine the nature and purpose of these communications. Bush used these conversations more to build relationships than to persuade. He valued the contributions of the French president, François Mitterrand, over those of the British prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, and the assistance provided by the Turkish president, Turgut Özal, over that of the Egyptian president, Hosni Mubarak. The tensions of crisis and war did not bring Bush and Saudi Arabia’s King Fahd closer together, and a rupture occurred in his previously close relationship with Jordan’s King Hussein. In this process, public opinion in the United States and abroad remained of paramount concern.

A Pyrrhic Victory: Harold Wilson, Helmut Schmidt, and the British Renegotiation of EC Membership, 1974–5

Britain's renegotiation of EC membership in 1974–5 has commonly been praised by historians as a tactical masterpiece by Prime Minister Harold Wilson in holding a divided country and party together while also keeping Britain inside the European Community (EC). By contrast, this article focuses on the detrimental effect the episode had on Britain's standing inside the EC. Using the prism of high-level diplomacy between Wilson and the German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt, it reconstructs precisely the changes in German perceptions of British positions, showing how initial goodwill towards Britain's demands soon gave way to widespread scepticism over British motives and ultimate intentions. While highlighting the strong domestic pressures driving Britain and Germany apart, the article ultimately argues that these differences were unnecessarily exacerbated by Wilson's failure at personal diplomacy on the highest level. A different handling of Schmidt may not have resulted in a radically different outcome of the renegotiations, but it may well have avoided the profound sense of distrust and suspicion over Britain's future role in Europe that the episode stimulated among the Germans. The article is based on recently declassified sources from three countries, as well as on rare materials from Schmidt's private archive in Hamburg.

Фактор персональной дипломатии в американо-российских отношениях 2001–2008 гг.: Дж. Буш-мл. и В. В. Путин

Фактор персональной дипломатии в американо-российских отношениях 2001–2008 гг.: Дж. Буш-мл. и В. В. Путин

“Like the Lord Lieutenant of a County”: The Habsburg Monarchy and Milan Obrenović of Serbia 1868–1881

On the basis of largely neglected Hungarian sources and Austrian archival material, this article argues that, with the emergence of a “Hungarian factor” in Habsburg foreign policy after 1867, policy towards Serbia increasingly relied on the Monarchy’s personal hold over Prince Milan Obrenović. This strategy in turn can be seen as part of a Hungarian surrogate “imperialism,” through which the Habsburg Monarchy would enhance Hungary’s security through hegemony in the Danubian basin. The policy was eventually consolidated in 1880–1881 by a series of treaties which made Serbia an economic and political satellite of the Monarchy, but the linch-pin of the structure remained Milan Obrenović. Milan, however, proved an imperfect instrument since he loathed Serbia, was unpopular because of his obvious subservience to Austro-Hungarian interests, and longed for the fleshpots of Western Europe. The article suggests that such a “personal policy” was increasingly unlikely to succeed after the granting of a more liberal constitution to Serbia in 1869, and as the country became politically a more complex society. The article thus demonstrates the essentially futile nature of this exercise in personal diplomacy, and the inherent impossibility of controlling an entire society through the person of its ruler.

Electoral Margins and American Foreign Policy1

Conventional wisdom holds that large margins of electoral victory contribute to presidential power. How does this variation in power impact U.S. foreign policy? I argue here that presidents who win elections by a substantial margin authorize the use of substantial military force more regularly, but do so at the expense of personal diplomacy and low-level crisis engagement. This distinction stems from the variation in the external constraint that other political actors place on these policies. New presidents who are empowered by a decisive election have more leverage and are therefore better able to pursue otherwise constrained foreign policies such as the use of major force. In contrast, those who win by smaller margins have less political capital and are forced disproportionately to the less constrained arenas of diplomacy and crisis intervention.

“Less Bound to the Desk”: Ban Ki-moon, the UN, and Preventive Diplomacy

WHAT SORT OF DIPLOMATIC STRATEGIST IS BAN KI-MOON? SINCE BAN TOOK office as Secretary-General of the United Nations in 2007, there has been a great deal of discussion about his personal diplomatic style. Until the Arab Spring, he was typically characterized as an archetypal (though not always effective) quiet diplomat. In January 2011, Human Rights Watch accused of having an undue faith in his professed ability to convince by private persuasion when dealing with repressive governments in cases such as Myanmar, Sudan, and Sri Lanka. (1) As I argued in a previous article for Global Governance, Ban's belief in diplomacy meant that he took too little Interest in peacekeeping during his first term leading the UN. (2) Since the beginning of the Arab Spring, however, appears to have lost some of his faith in diplomatic niceties. He spoke out early in favor of the protestors in Egypt, became a consistent supporter of military action in Libya, and publicly condemned the Syrian regime's violence against civilians as early as May 2011. (3) As the Syrian crisis deteriorated in 2012, appointed first his predecessor, Kofi Annan, and later the stalwart UN mediator Lakhdar Brahitni as envoys to Damascus but repeatedly escalated his own criticism of President Bashar Al-Assad. Previous leaders of the UN have experienced similar tensions between the imperatives of quiet diplomacy and the impulse to speak out over certain crises. Indeed, it is standard practice to evaluate each Secretary-General according to how he has balanced the two. (4) Given Ban's change of priorities in 2011 and 2012, it is likely that future biographers will use a similar framework to examine his record. In judging Ban's performance as diplomatic strategist, however, it is necessary to look beyond his statements and consider his broader impact on the UN's diplomatic machinery. Experts on the UN often distinguish between the personal political role of a Secretary-General and his managerial functions. (5) This distinction is only partially justifiable. It is equally possible to distinguish between the personal role of a national foreign minister and the ministry that he leads. But to understand the minister's performance overall, it is necessary to judge his or her relationship with and impact on the bureaucracy. It is often argued, for example, that Hillary Clinton's tenure as US secretary of state has been defined not only by her own diplomatic aptitude but also by her widely noted ability to motivate the State Department. (6) An assessment of the Secretary-General's record must similarly take into account his ability to shape the broader diplomatic performance of the UN during his tenure. (7) In my earlier contribution to Global Governance, I concluded that, as of mid-2011, Ban had not transformed the UN's intellectual agenda, at least as far as peacekeeping is concerned. (8) If this was, in part, because was more interested in diplomacy than in peace operations, did his leadership make an appreciable difference to the UN's diplomatic structures, missions, and practices during his first term? It was his stated intention to have such an impact, specifically through boosting the Department of Political Affairs (DPA). In his first two years in office, he emphasized the need to significantly strengthen DPA to help it become more proactive in tackling global crises, especially in the realm of preventive diplomacy. (9) This article addresses whether did indeed equip DPA to undertake preventive diplomacy more effectively (it does not cover other aspects of Ban's diplomacy, such as his interventions at climate change summits). This is meant to complement my article on peacekeeping but is also relevant to analyses of Ban's personal diplomacy, before or after the Arab Spring, as I place his individual efforts in an institutional context. To address these issues, the article does three things. First, I review the state of DPA as inherited it in 2007; the department was generally agreed to be in severe need of renewal. …

A NEW PARADIGM OF FOREIGN ENGAGEMENT: THE LEGACY OF DR. JAMES H. ROBINSON

Dr. James H. Robinson founded Operation Crossroads Africa, which enabled young North Americans to work at the grassroots level with young Africans. At a time when the image of the United States on the African continent was a mixed bag, Robinson was welcomed everywhere and had direct access to the new leaders seeking to build independent nation-states. He recognized the importance of personal diplomacy, the soft power of generosity, and the smart power of cultural exchange and foreign aid. He understood how faith could help build social capital, shape the moral discourse, influence civic participation, transform communities, and provide direct services.

An Atlantic triangle in the 1900s: Theodore Roosevelt's ‘special relationships’ with France and Britain

This article aims at highlighting two ‘special’ transatlantic relationships whose cultivation resulted from Theodore Roosevelt's personal diplomacy. One of them was between America and Britain – the celebrated ‘special relationship’ par excellence – and the other – the lesser-known one – was between America and France. The latter bilateral rapport was by far the most satisfying one for Roosevelt as the outcome of personal ties; it rested on a fascinating character, France's ambassador to Washington, Jean Jules Jusserand, who assisted America's 26th president on both sides of the Atlantic through his contacts in France and Britain. Transatlantica, which would owe a lot to Roosevelt's cosmopolitanism, was then in the making, paradoxically marked in its incipient stage by Anglo-American bickering over the Alaska boundary and US honeymooning with the French. The Gallic factor, thanks to Jusserand, would bring about diplomatic cooperation and harmony between America and France throughout Roosevelt's major fore...

Shimon Peres and the French-Israeli Alliance, 1954–9

The years 1954 to 1959 mark the pinnacle in Israeli-French strategic relations. During this period, France did what no other major power was willing to do: it sold massive quantities of high-quality arms to the fledgling Jewish state, thereby dramatically shifting the Middle Eastern balance of power in Israel's favor. This article attempts to demonstrate that the ‘French connection’ was far from an inevitable consequence of mutual interests; rather, it was largely the brainchild of Shimon Peres, the then director-general of Israel's Ministry of Defense. It is shown that the situational factors that were conducive to the ‘French connection’ — for example, the mutual desire to defeat Egypt's President Gamal Abdul Nasser — were hardly apparent at that time to many key decision-makers in both France and Israel. Peres was able to succeed where the Foreign Ministry had failed by identifying situational nuances and bureaucratic opportunities that led to Israel's arms deals with France. By engaging in an active, personal diplomacy of a most unorthodox sort, Peres overcame both structural barriers and competing political interests, paving the road to the Israeli-French alliance.

스포츠를 통한 개인 민간외교의 가능성

전통적인 외교는 국가의 대외관계를 행하는 공식적인 실천이나 방법을 의미했다. 즉 대사의 교환, 공식대표사이의 메시지 전달, 그리고 직접 참여하는 것 등을 외교로 이해했다. 이러한 외교는 국가간의 외교적 승인이 먼저 이루어진 후에야 국가 간의 문화 교류가 가능한 것이다. 또한 많은 제약과 시간을 필요로 하지만 스포츠를 통한 개인 민간외교는 이념이 다른 국가는 물론 어느 국민과도 스스럼없이 만들어 지는 민간신분 차원의 개인적인 교류이기 때문에 절차와 관행적 제약에서 벋어난 외교가 될 수 있다. 이를 확인하기 위하여 신체활동의 직접참여 1건과 관전활동 3건의 프로그램연구를 통하여 가능여부를 확인했다. 신체활동의 직접참여는 메릴랜드 그린벨트 지역의 Bally Total Fitness를 조사장소로 활용했으며, 관전활동은 일반 흑인 Joe Thomas씨의 가정집(복싱), RFK STADIUM(야구/MLB), Fedex Field in Landover(프로 풋볼/NHL)을 조사장소로 선택했다. 지역적인 차이는 있겠으나 조사된 장소에서는 대한민국의 인식도 확인 결과는 기대치에서 많이 벗어났으며, 북한과 남한의 국가적 분별력 또한 낮았고, 오히려 한국을 북한으로 인식하는 대상들도 의외로 높았다. 그리고 한국제품을 일본과 중국제품으로 인식도 또한 높았다. 경제 강국으로 높아진 국가 위상을 국내뿐만 아닌 국외 또한 실제로 높이는 노력을 해야 할 것이다. 지금 보다 더 한국을 알리는 세계 속의 민간외교가 활성화되기 위해서는 한국계 미국인은 물론 미국을 방문하는 한국인 그리고 세계를 여행하거나 이주하는 한국인들은 세계 속에 우수한 한국인이라는 긍지를 가슴에 품고 만방에 알리는 자세와 민간외교에 필요한 개인의 역할 연구에 따른 자발적 외교적 노력이 먼저 시작되어야겠다.

Myanmar in 2008: Weathering the Storm

The most significant events for Myanmar in the year 2008 were the devastating tropical Cyclone Nargis that wreaked havoc in the former capital Yangon and the Ayeyarwady Delta and the constitutional referendum that was conducted soon after the disaster. Both elicited strong emotional responses from the military government's detractors at home and abroad. In fact, the tragedy brought about by Nargis provoked a storm of protest and angry calls for humanitarian intervention from opposition groups, human rights advocates, and (mainly) Western politicians over the military government's seemingly lethargic response in the storm's aftermath and its attempts to control the flow of international aid as well as access to affected areas. At the same time, the timing of the referendum that was organized in two stages during the same month in which Nargis struck as well as the overwhelming (over 92 per cent) proportion of affirmative votes led to accusations of callousness and allegations of vote rigging on the government's part. On the other hand, the extent of the devastation that required a sustained and massive relief and rehabilitation effort led to the active involvement of the United Nations (UN) ? through the personal diplomacy of Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon ? and ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) in a tripartite arrangement with the Myanmar government to coordinate and oversee damage assessments as well as international assistance in personnel, money and material. Consequently, an opportunity was created for local civil society organizations (CSO), general public, and INGOs (international non-governmental organizations) to take part in a monumental effort aimed at helping the victims of Nargis. To some observers, this augurs well for the development of civil society in Myanmar.