Speech by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Uri Rosenthal, during Foreign Secretary William Hague’s visit

Toespraak | 09-07-2012

Ladies and gentlemen,

Charles Darwin told us that the capacity to survive doesn’t depend on being the biggest or the strongest, but on the ability to adapt to new circumstances. This is also true for diplomacy. Diplomatic excellence is not about being the biggest or strongest. It’s about protecting our national interests in ever changing circumstances.

We’ve come a long way since Thomas Jefferson, who once said: ‘For two years we have not heard from our ambassador in Spain; if we again do not hear from him this year, we should write him a letter.’ Well, as you know, we live in a world of mobile phones, email and social media like Twitter and Facebook. People start to panic if they can’t reach someone in fifteen minutes. But technological progress is not the only driving force behind our changing profession. Our whole world is in flux. And this new world requires, definitely a new form of diplomacy. The diplomatic profession needs to adapt.

Firstly, we have to re-think our network of missions. We have to do more with less. Today’s financial challenges are forcing us to become more flexible and more effective. As a trading nation, we still have a big global presence. But we need to be more flexible in how we achieve this. Of course our traditional embassy will remain at the core of our network. But we will also develop new forms of representation. We want some of our diplomats to fly in and out of certain hot spots. The Swedes call these men ‘roving ambassadors’. We are creating small missions supported by regional hubs. And we will rely more on expert local staff.

Ladies and gentlemen,

Secondly, we are seeing the rise of new economies, like the BRICS, MIKT and Next Eleven. The Rapid Emerging Countries, like Bangladesh, for example. And even though their explosive growth of recent years has now slowed, we can’t ignore their growing global importance. The Indian expert Parag Khanna has described the new world order as the new Middle Ages. ‘A world without any single power in control’. But many of the new players don’t play by our rules. Our existing partnerships are under pressure and new alliances are emerging. We need to adapt. Again, as Darwin said.

The starting point is the national interest of the Netherlands. We are a trading nation. The world is our market. So we are focusing more on our economic interests abroad. This means that we need to turn relationships based on goodwill into trade relations. We have to turn contacts into contracts. It also means we need to expand our network to places of strategic importance. So in the near future we will be restructuring our Dutch diplomatic service even further.

Thirdly, our world has become a network society. Our missions are no longer the logical starting point for people who travel or trade abroad. They can easily get information through internet and social media. This means that the diplomatic profession needs to adapt to the reality of the 21st century.

The internet influences the diplomatic agenda to a very substantive degree. The YouTube film 'Kony 2012', for example, triggered worldwide outrage against war criminal Joseph Kony. More than 100 million people watched the film within a month. It had a large impact on the diplomatic arena. This shows why social media like YouTube, Facebook and Twitter need to be part of our diplomats' standard toolkit.

So it's clear that professional diplomats need to prove themselves in the new network world. A world in which states, companies, NGOs and individuals all play a role. Sometimes individuals have a huge impact. Our diplomats need curiosity, an analytical mind and excellent communication skills. Offline and online. They need to know local networks so they can help our businesses abroad. And we need to objectively measure the quality of our diplomats. We need to show the world our diplomatic service is doing a good job. And we must also let our young diplomats know they are on track. So I am introducing mentorships and trial periods for our young diplomats, which the United States already have for decades.

It is important to keep the internet free. This became clear during the Arab Awakening: dissidents, cyber activists and bloggers used the internet from abroad to rise up against their oppressors. So a free internet is crucial. This is why we hosted a conference about Freedom Online in The Hague in December last year. We play an active part to create a coalition of countries helping to ensure freedom of expression on the internet.

To come to a last point, the internet is the first entry point for all our consular business. Only last month we launched a Foreign Office App. With one swipe of your smartphone, you can gather all the up-to-date information you need. It’s, so to speak, the whole world in your pocket. Telephone numbers and email addresses for our missions, but also information about emergencies like earthquakes and floods. The App has been a hit in the App store, with nearly 30.000 downloads in a month.

Ladies and gentlemen,

We are moving towards a new diplomacy. A future-proof diplomacy. A diplomacy that promotes our national interests abroad. And a diplomacy that makes full use of our young diplomats’ potential. My dear colleague William Hague and I have already shared some thoughts on this, and I am very pleased that he is now going to share his views with us all.

Thank you