U.S. Institute of Peace PeaceWatch

Shultz, Wriston, and Solomon Address the Conference

Keynote speakers discuss democracy and diplomacy in the information age.

Top: Walter Wriston and former senator Sam Nunn. Bottom: Richard Solomon and George Shultz.

he world is changing rapidly and irrevocably as the information revolution sweeps across the globe, says Walter B. Wriston, former chairman and chief executive officer of Citicorp and author of The Twilight of Sovereignty: How the Information Revolution is Transforming our World. Based on developments in computer and telecommunications technologies, the information revolution--the third great revolution in history, the first two being the agricultural and industrial revolutions--has dramatically reduced the effects of time and distance, producing major changes in the way the world works. These changes are altering the balance of power globally, says Wriston, speaking at the U.S. Institute of Peace's "Virtual Diplomacy" conference, held April 1 and 2 in Washington. Wriston was a keynote speaker at the conference, along with former secretary of state George Shultz. The Institute is publishing a Special Report featuring presentations by Wriston, Shultz, and Institute president Richard H. Solomon.

Global Shifts in Power

Wriston noted in his luncheon address that information technologies are altering the balance of power, for example, by giving people everywhere a say in their own futures. Instead of merely invalidating Orwell's vision of "Big Brother" watching the citizen, information systems are enabling the reverse to happen: the average citizen is able to watch Big Brother, he said. Individuals anywhere in the world with a computer and modem can access thousands of databases internationally. And these individuals, who communicate with each other electronically regardless of race, gender, or color, are spreading the spirit of personal expression--of freedom--to the four corners of the Earth.

"The implications of this global conversation are enormous," Wriston said. "A global village will have global customs. In a global village, denying people human rights or democratic freedoms no longer means denying them an abstraction they have never experienced, but rather it means denying them the established customs of the village. . . . Once people are convinced that these things are possible in the village, an enormous burden of proof falls on those who would withhold them."

In addition, the information revolution is profoundly challenging the power structures of the world, as the bases of power are altered in fundamental ways. For example, the emergence of global markets has thrown into question much of established economic theory, which has been based on the assumption of national markets. "In the world's financial markets, sovereign governments have lost control of their ability to influence the price others will pay for their currency," Wriston said. "The market is a giant voting machine that records in real time the judgments of traders all over the world about our diplomatic, fiscal, and monetary policies. It has created what I call the 'information standard,' which is far more draconian than the old gold standard and operates more swiftly."

In the next few decades, the ability to attract and manage intellectual capital will be the decisive factor determining which institutions and nations will survive and prosper and which will not, said Wriston. Still, he concluded, neither information nor technology can substitute for courage and leadership, because in the end it is people who will have to solve the world's social and political problems.

Recent Problems in Diplomacy Unrelated to Technology

George Shultz told a dinner audience that new information technologies provide "an excellent means of communication" but cannot guarantee that "a communication is excellent." Diplomacy is essentially a human activity whose quality depends on the quality of the people engaged in it, he said. Although the information revolution poses definite challenges for diplomacy, diplomacy has suffered serious setbacks lately that have little or no relation to the new technologies.

Diplomatic integrity and credibility have been compromised in recent years largely as a result of a popular, but mistaken, belief that all parties have legitimate needs and concerns and that if only those needs are understood and addressed, then a successful outcome can be negotiated, Shultz said. This belief has led some negotiators to bargain away principles and thus to reward those who use violence with a seat at the negotiating table. Dictators have been welcomed as negotiating partners and rogue states given international recognition. Some negotiators have even made deals they know won't be honored--thus poisoning the well for negotiations in future times of need. "This is not true negotiation, but just a cheap, quick fix that merely pushes the problem down the road where eventually somebody else will have to try to resolve it," Shultz said. Unfortunately, by then the diplomatic tools will have been corrupted by misuse and abuse.

The information age poses a different set of problems, Shultz asserted. The new information technology has brought the world "an overwhelming flood of information." Indeed, today, information is so freely available that even authoritarian governments have a hard time keeping it from their citizens, and efforts to do so compromise the ability of those countries to be part of the modern world. Also, the ready flow of information is making it increasingly difficult for secretaries of state in the United States, for example, to speak with authority for their country because of competing statements not only from members of the executive branch and Congress, but also from groups with diverse and even conflicting agendas who gain attention through dramatic statements to the mass media and other information outlets. Though freelance diplomats have always been on the scene--for example, Armand Hammer in Russia--the challenge of making it clear to foreign governments whose word represents the official word will only increase. Shultz concluded that, although the way the world works has changed dramatically, the attributes of good diplomacy remain unchanged.

Communication and Conflict

Richard Solomon said in his overview presentation to the conference that understanding communication patterns is essential to managing human conflict. One of the clearest indicators of an emerging conflict occurs when one party "misunderstands" the intentions of, or imputes hostile motives to, the other party. A complete breakdown in direct communication between parties usually accompanies escalation to overt conflict. In such circumstances, a third party or mediator is needed to help de-escalate or resolve conflict by re-establishing broken communication links, helping to rebuild trust and rational communication. To accomplish this, the mediator needs to help adversaries establish "protected" channels of communication that can be trusted for accuracy, intent, and authority.

Technologies of communication, in and of themselves, cannot play the role of third-party mediators, Solomon noted. Hardware and software are "merely" instruments of action; yet they facilitate significant exchanges of substantive content. Communication technologies can help establish rational assessments of an adversary's preparations for conflict when the tendency in pre-conflict situations is to impute capabilities commensurate with ill intention. They can maintain "transparency," the contemporary equivalent of the gamblers who keep their hands on the table to relieve fears that they are dealing wild cards. They can enable coalition partners to coordinate effective action, and they can mobilize the political force of public opinion in circumstances where a repressive authority might seek to act in secret.

"Although it may be too early to assess the long-term impact of new information technologies on diplomacy or on the workings of contemporary society, we can already see some of their profound implications," Solomon said. "What Virtual Diplomacy is exploring," he concluded, "is whether these new technologies can be used to deal with the enduring human capacity for conflict in less destructive ways through 'virtual' or electronic processes of information gathering, analysis, and communication that are the pathways of the emerging global information infrastructure."

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