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There is no university for shadow diplomacy. It is taught in no school, and grants no diploma. It is learned in the field, through experience and creating a lifelong network of trust — the experience the author describes in The Invisible Line.
From Kissinger secretly negotiating the opening to China, to today's Qatari mediators, by way of the quiet architects of the Oslo Accords, shadow operators have always done what official diplomacy could not: negotiate without committing a state, let both sides save face at once, take risks no mandate holder ever could. A parallel diplomacy, with no status and no protection — and yet decisive, in every major crisis of recent history.
This book adds a little-known chapter to that history lived by the author: the Chávez–uranium–Central African Republic–Areva–Iran chessboard, the impossible reconciliation between Israel, Chad and Qatar, the shadow mediation between Doha, Hamas and Jerusalem over Gaza, the South Africa–Morocco reconciliation — four cases lived from the inside, with examples of success and failure when officials intervened inadvertently.
From Tokyo to Washington, from Caracas to Bangui via Paris, from Pretoria to Rabat, from Doha to Jerusalem: the hidden side of world diplomacy, and the price paid by those who practice it with no safety net.
Neither ambassador, nor spy — the author is a free man with no mandate but peace.
Volume II of The Invisible Line Collection.
There is no university for shadow diplomacy. It is taught in no school, and grants no diploma. It is learned in the field, through experience and creating a lifelong network of trust — the experience the author describes in The Invisible Line.
From Kissinger secretly negotiating the opening to China, to today's Qatari mediators, by way of the quiet architects of the Oslo Accords, shadow operators have always done what official diplomacy could not: negotiate without committing a state, let both sides save face at once, take risks no mandate holder ever could. A parallel diplomacy, with no status and no protection — and yet decisive, in every major crisis of recent history.
This book adds a little-known chapter to that history lived by the author: the Chávez–uranium–Central African Republic–Areva–Iran chessboard, the impossible reconciliation between Israel, Chad and Qatar, the shadow mediation between Doha, Hamas and Jerusalem over Gaza, the South Africa–Morocco reconciliation — four cases lived from the inside, with examples of success and failure when officials intervened inadvertently.
From Tokyo to Washington, from Caracas to Bangui via Paris, from Pretoria to Rabat, from Doha to Jerusalem: the hidden side of world diplomacy, and the price paid by those who practice it with no safety net.
Neither ambassador, nor spy — the author is a free man with no mandate but peace.
Volume II of The Invisible Line Collection.