New French Foreign Minister Stephane Sejourne told his counterpart Wang Yi during talks in Beijing on Monday that “we are clearly expecting that China will send very clear messages to Russia.” The larger context concerns the Ukrainian Conflict’s seemingly inevitable escalation ahead of Russia’s reportedly planned offensive, which precede Switzerland’s presently unscheduled peace talks this summer. Chinese President Xi Jinping is also expected to visit France sometime in early May before both probably happen.
France knows better than for its Foreign Minister to demand that China condemns Russia, however, but this latest faux pas just goes to show how much its diplomacy has changed its recent years. The Valdai Club just published an insightful report a few days prior that sheds light into why this happened. Titled “Crafting National Interests: How Diplomatic Training Impacts Sovereignty”, it compellingly argues that there’s a strong relationship between these two that’s worthy of closer study by interested observers.
According to their research, “The effectiveness of a country’s diplomatic corps, influenced by diplomatic personnel training, manifests itself differently based on its position in the international relations system.” France is assessed as having a “deep tradition of teaching international relations” characterized by a national epistemology and functional approach to diplomatic training, “but the diplomatic profession is experiencing a crisis in France amid reforms introduced by the Élysée Palace.”
They warned that “There is a possibility that this shift could lead the French school towards a more global functional approach, potentially diminishing the national tradition in the study of international relations.” With respect to newly appointed Foreign Minister Sejourne, he has no prior diplomatic experience and is therefore a radical example of this trend’s final manifestation. France’s top diplomat represents global interests and lacks any fundamental knowledge of the sphere in which he works.
To be sure, many of the permanent members of his country’s diplomatic bureaucracy still promote national interests as they’re broadly understood by this class as a whole to be and have extensive expertise, but they weren’t able to influence their boss during his trip to Beijing. This is proven by him demanding that China condemns Russia, which its career diplomats knew better than do, let alone express in a public statement. It’s very embarrassing and reflects poorly on all of France.
The reality is that China won’t condemn Russia since it practices a policy of principled neutrality towards this conflict and envisages itself competing for leadership of the Global South with India, which has the same approach for similarly pragmatic reasons. Neither wants to push Russia closer towards the other amidst their increasingly fierce rivalry, let alone risk discrediting themselves in the eyes of developing countries, some of whom have voted against Russia at the UN but only under Western pressure.
China is a Great Power that describes itself as a major country but functions as a superpower in the international system so any condemnation of Russia via the “very clear message” that France “clearly expects” that it’ll send to that country would amount to it complying with a much weaker country’s demand. That’s completely unacceptable for a proud millennia-long civilization-state that regarded itself as the center of the world for most of its history and is yet another reason why this won’t happen.
The takeaway from this incident is that French diplomacy is changing even more rapidly than the Valdai Club assessed, with the publication of its latest research into this subject being very timely since it helps observers better understand why this happened. France’s shift from a national to a global approach towards diplomatic training began before President Emmanuel Macron entered office seven years ago, but it accelerated under him to the point where its diplomacy is nowadays becoming unrecognizable.
