There is global urgency, short-to-long term, to enhance diplomatic relations among nations and other actors across our globally-interconnected civilization. The 2023 Palgrave Handbook of Diplomatic Reform and Innovation highlighted that “diplomacy’s methods, its key institutions and conventions were agreed more than six decades ago.” In specific, the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations was signed in 1961, entering into force in 1964, less than two decades after the Second World War.
At that time, diplomatic relations were primarily among nations, balanced at the international level by the United Nations. In the 21st century going forward, diplomatic relations will operate across a spectrum of subnational-national-international jurisdictions with cross-connections on a planetary scale. With scalability as a requirement for diplomatic relations across Earth now and forever – it is timely to consider updating the 1961 Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations.
A starting point for such diplomatic reform would be to consider Article 3 in the 1961 Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations about:
Promoting friendly relations between the sending State and the receiving State, and developing their economic, cultural and scientific relations.
“Friendly relations” are a key to sustainable development – recognizing the destruction and unproductive dynamics of wars, which continue to plague humanity, paralyzing progress in our world.
Such mapping of concepts and reform with the 1961 Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations was introduced with the chapter about Science Diplomacy with Diplomatic Relations to Facilitate Common-Interest Building in the above book. More importantly, with durability, science diplomacy offers a scalable strategy to build common interests among allies and adversaries alike for the benefit of all on Earth across generations.
