Diplomacy for the Next Century

New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998. Second printing [stated]. Hardcover. Very good/Very good. [8], 191, [1] pages., Notes. Index. Signed with comment on the title page: Best wishes from Abba Eban. Has chapters on A Credentials Ceremony; September 15, 1950; The Cold War Remembered; Dilemmas of Diplomats; The Perils of Analogy; Human Rights Seldom Win; The Intrusive Media; Where--If Not at the Summit?; Still Too Many Wars; The United Nations: No New Order. Eban concludes with thoughts about the quest for peace in the Middle East. In this wise and eloquent book, one of the world's preeminent senior statesmen presents his views on the challenges of diplomacy in the post Cold War era. Abba Eban draws on his years of experience and knowledge to offer an overview of diplomacy as practices in today's world. Interweaving historical data with personal reminiscences, Eban reviews the Cold War period and its end in 1989, praising the diplomatic restraint in the years that have followed; discusses the ethical confrontation between power an conscience in a range of international decisions and actions; and points out the difficulty of reconciling the promotion of human rights with respect for national sovereignty. Eban goes on to deplore the lack of privacy in international negotiations that is the result of an intrusive media, and shows that nuclear warfare is not a restraint. Instructive, erudite, and witty, Eban's tour through diplomatic history vividly demonstrates that the wisdom of the past can be immensely valuable as we seek to negotiate and maintain peace in the future. Derived from a Kirkus review: Eban obviously enjoyed himself during the Castle Lectures at Yale (collected here), as he ranged like a well-trained bull through a china shop of political correctness. Eban, for many years foreign minister of Israel and the author of many books, may not have much to say about the problems of the next century, but he has a sharp eye for the follies of the last, including summitry); the UN; the revisionist view that the Soviet threat during the Cold War was never a real one; Ostpolitik, which he thinks was a Soviet victory, equivalent to the recognition of its military victories; and the US's reluctance to accord diplomatic recognition to countries of which it disapproves. He is also tough on Israel, and in particular on the ``draconian punishments inflicted on the entire populations of the West Bank and Gaza'' in retaliation for the 1996 Jerusalem bombing. In all, or at least most, of these views he reflects the attitudes of professional diplomats, a group ``dominated by a sense of limitation proceeding from a somber view of human nature'' and pursuing ``relatively modest goals,'' but even here he has some sharp observations on the ``extraordinary record of strategic surprise'' in the last 60 years, a pattern of failure which may proceed from their training. As sharp, shrewd, and candid an assessment of at least the current state of international relations as we are likely to get. Abba Solomon Meir Eban (Aubrey Solomon Meir Eban; 2 February 1915 - 17 November 2002) was an Israeli diplomat and politician, and a scholar. During his career, he served as Foreign Affairs Minister, Education Minister, and Deputy Prime Minister of Israel. He was the second ambassador to the United States and the first Permanent Representative of Israel to the United Nations. He was also Vice President of the United Nations General Assembly and President of the Weizmann Institute of Science. At the outbreak of World War II, he worked for Chaim Weizmann at the World Zionist Organization in London from December 1939. He served in the British Army in Egypt and Mandate Palestine, becoming an intelligence officer in Jerusalem. Eban left the United States in 1959 and returned to Israel, where he was elected to the Knesset as a member of Mapai. He served under David Ben-Gurion as Minister of Education and Culture from 1960 to 1963, then as deputy to Prime Minister Levi Eshkol until 1966. From 1966 to 1974, Eban served as Israel's foreign minister. He defended the country's reputation after the Six-Day War by asserting, in a speech to the United Nations General Assembly, that Israel acted in response to an imminent threat: "So on the fateful morning of 5 June, when Egyptian forces moved by air and land against Israel's western coast and southern territory, our country's choice was plain". He played an important part in the shaping of UN Security Council Resolution 242 in 1967, as well as Resolution 338 in 1973. His comment that Arabs "never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity" (i.e., for peace), made after the Geneva peace talks in December 1973, is often quoted.