Wild, Wild Web Chat on 21st Century Statecraft - Disinfectant, Control Freaks and Please, No Shots in the Heads

You must know by now that the month of January has been designated as 21st Century Statecraft month at the State Department.  Of course, what is 21st Century Statecraft without the Secretary of State’s most Senior Advisor for Innovation?  On January 10, Alec Ross had a web chat with journalists and bloggers from around the world to discuss 21st Century Statecraft.  Below are some quips that made us take out our highlighter:

On the question, "How do you work with your diplomats who might not be social media savvy?", this is what Mr. Ross had to say:

MR. ROSS: Yeah. So social media intimidates a lot of people that just aren’t used to it. I’m 40 years old, which makes me 12, 15 years older than digital natives, than people who grew up with the internet. I didn’t send or receive a single email when I was at university. I didn’t own my first mobile phone until I was in my late 20s. So I’ve had to learn this just like everybody else has.

What I tell our diplomats is that you don’t have to be a social media expert, but if you are working at our embassies, and certainly if you’re an Ambassador and leading one of our embassies, you don’t have to do it yourself, but you better find somebody in your embassy or on your team who does understand it. And then part of what we’re trying to do as a practical matter is train our diplomats – everybody from the 22 year-olds who are new diplomats, who, to be honest with you, don’t need the training because I’ve yet to meet a 22 year old, at least in the United States, who doesn’t understand social media – to train everybody from our most junior diplomats to our ambassadors.

So I personally train everybody who is a rising Ambassador. We have this thing at the State Department called the Foreign Service Institute. And you literally take classes to be an Ambassador. You go through what’s called an Ambassadorial seminar. And when you are in your Ambassadorial seminar, you get a class from Alec Ross about how to use social media. And what I tell them is you don’t have to use it, but if you don’t, you need to empower somebody at your embassy who does.

And it’s not about talking. This isn’t about pushing out a message. What I tell our ambassadors is remember you only have one mouth, but two ears. So even if you aren’t using these tools to communicate out to people, at a bare minimum, you need to use them to listen to people, because this is how people are talking to you in the 21st century.

Want more? Okay, more from Mr. Ross:

"I believe that sunlight is the best disinfectant, and as our information networks become more universal and more powerful, there’s more of this sunlight to bring to light what’s happening all around the world."

"The difference in the United States versus other places is that we do this without sacrificing universal rights. So people have freedom of expression. They have the ability to exercise peaceful, political dissent. They have the ability to communicate however they see fit"

"[W]hat social media tends to do, is it redistributes power. It redistributes power from hierarchies to citizens, from large institutions and the nation-state to individuals and networks of individuals."

"The 21st century is a lousy time to be a control freak."

"We can try to control the space, but I’m very skeptical about the degree to which we can or should control the internet. I think that it’s a losing proposition. The far better thing to do is to understand that everybody’s going to have a voice, that good points of view and bad points of view are going to be conveyed there, and what we need to do is be aggressive in getting out there and pushing out the truth."

"What I will say, though, is if hundreds of people at – let’s say hundreds of people at the State Department – if hundreds of people are using social media and one person goes a little bit off message, I don’t think that person should be shot in the head. I think that they should be corrected. But part of the – part of getting people involved in using social media means that you’re giving up a little bit of control."

"The traditional way in which the State Department got its message out was standing behind a podium and our spokesperson communicating the policy of the United States Department of State. We still do that and it’s the right thing to do. But part of what Hillary Clinton has empowered our diplomats to do is to have literally hundreds of other people out there communicating and having conversations, and I think that this is a good thing. Of course we all have to operate and communicate within the parameters of U.S. policy, but one of the things that we know is because of the hyper-transparency that comes with all of this social media, if anybody steps out of it for a minute, we hear about it."

"I think that now that we’ve been doing this for three years, I think that what we can see is that, by and large, our diplomats get this right. By and large, they understand our policies. By and large, they represent us well on social media. So I think we should be doing more of this rather than less."

"At the United States Department of State, we, like the rest of the world, are learning and adapting to a world that’s becoming increasingly disrupted by social media. This disruption can be good, it can be bad, but we live in a world of constant change. And what we’re seeking to do, even though we are historically a pretty conservative organization, part of what our boss, Hillary Clinton, has said is that we’ve got to keep pace, we’ve got to listen, we’ve got to learn, we’ve got to experiment. And so even things like this session today, this LiveAtState session today, I think is very important and very positive. Part of what we want to do is take diplomats like myself sitting here in the Foggy Bottom neighborhood of Washington, D.C. and bring them to countries around the world where you might otherwise not be able to speak with us and ask questions of us."

Oh, Alec, this is wild, just wild! 

Prior to Foggy Bottom, Mr. Ross worked on the Obama-Biden Presidential Transition Team and served as Convener for Obama for America's Technology, Media & Telecommunications Policy Committee.  He is not a career official.  He says that he personally trains rising ambassadors and the chiefs of mission seminar.  Which makes one wonder how far this flavor stick when the Obama Reelection Campaign comes calling.  Video here in case you need to show this to your boss who just slapped your hands with an imaginary bamboo stick for blogging, tweeting and touching those shiny but pesky 21st century statecraft tools.     

When the harassment and discouragement of State Department bloggers first manifested we had a chance to point out the problems to Mr. Ross. On January 2010 he told this blog, "If I'm given specific names of people doing the "discouraging" then I will take it up with those individuals (or their bosses or their boss' boss) directly."

Which is good to hear at first blush but not the best response or solution to this problem. See, Mr. Ross, whatever his actual employee category is not a career employee of the State Department. He may leave when Secretary Clinton term is up, or may sign up for another term if there is an Obama II. Or he could get recycled out if there is a new tenant in the WH.

So, let's pretend for a moment that I am a State employee with a blog that is getting some flack from my boss in say, the CA bureau. I give Mr. Ross my boss' name.  Mr. Ross may take up my issue with the top honcho of Consular Affairs. If that does not work, he may take it up with the boss of the CA boss, which would be, yes, the Under Secretary for Management, pretty high up the chain.  I imagine that those bosses, whether they agree or not would listen to Secretary Clinton's Senior Advisor for Innovation; that's a given.  So I'll happily blog along, problem solved. Until, of course, Mr. Ross moves on to his next adventure and exits Foggy Bottom.  I, presumably would still continue working for the bureaucracy.  My boss, and his/her boss' boss would  still continue working for the bureaucracy.  And they would remember me as the blogger somebody who rat on them to the 7th floor using the super fast elevator.  Under this scenario, Mr. Ross' solution to "take it up" directly with the bosses is like the career equivalent of taking rat poison.   


     

Related articles

• U.S. State Department Celebrates Social Media (mashable.com)
• State Dept. Official: Governments Can't Fight Social Media (pcworld.com)
• U.S. State Department to interact with public on Twitter (thehindu.com)
• U.S State Department to Take Press Briefing Questions via Twitter (techland.time.com)

 

 

 

 

FS Blogging: An Opportunity, Not a Threat (FSJ Speaking Out)

The December issue of the Foreign Service Journal is out.  FSO, Matt Keene has an excellent piece on Foreign Service blogging -- FS Blogging: An Opportunity, Not a Threat. Mr. Keene, a Foreign Service consular officer since 1999, is currently a special assistant in the Bureau of Human Resources. In addition to overseas assignments in Jerusalem, Dubai and Sofia, he was deputy director of the Office of Maghreb Affairs in the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs from 2009 to 2011.

Excerpts below:

[...]
Anyone who has been called on the carpet for blogging — especially those who have been summoned more than once — can tell you that the only consistent aspect of the department’s feedback is inconsistency.

Blogging is encouraged by some elements within the department and is even discussed on the official page, www.careers.state.gov, complete with a substantial set of links to popular Foreign Service-related blogs. Yet even bloggers listed there are sometimes targeted for official harassment by other elements within the department for having a blog in the first place.

One colleague informs me that an A-100 orientation instructor warned his class of new FSOs not to blog — but turned out to be doing so himself. Some individuals have been warned that their careers could be harmed by their or their spouse’s blog — but when they press on this in subsequent meetings, their hair is blown back by the force of the wind generated by the back-pedaling. Others have asked whether it would be better to shut down their blogs entirely, only to be told that they would never be asked to do that. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, after all, is a big supporter of social media.

As usual, the department is about a century behind the times. Its decidedly schizophrenic approach to social media would be comical if it weren’t so serious.
[...]
Official social media outlets serve a purpose — as far as they go. But no one who wants the real skinny on a company goes to its monthly newsletter. Instead, they grab a beer with a few of the employees. Not only is the feedback there more candid, but it covers subjects that are simply inappropriate for official communication.

This is the type of benefit private Foreign Service blogs offer, one that the department itself has done a woefully inadequate job of providing to date: communicating to the American people what it is we actually do and why it matters, thus putting a human face on the diplomatic corps. No wonder Overseas Comparability Pay is so difficult to secure. The average American doesn’t have the first clue of who we are or what we do.

Social media are here to stay, and the generation of officers who have grown up with Twitter, Facebook, Blogger and Wordpress are not going to abandon what they see as a First Amendment right. State should embrace this reality and work robustly and actively to ensure that the Foreign Affairs Manual contains specific, practical guidance to officers on how public speaking and communication regulations apply to private blogs — and spells out what is inappropriate, and why. The current guidance found in the 5 FAM 700 series and its myriad cross-references is neither effectively codified nor well understood.
[...]
Foreign Service bloggers and users of social media should not be left cowering in fear, bewildered as to what might get them into trouble, and made to feel like dissidents. Instead, their creativity should be harnessed, and the adversarial relationship between bloggers and department management should be mended.

Foreign Service blogging isn’t a problem to be managed. It is an opportunity to be seized.

Read in full via AFSA/FSJ, FS Blogging: An Opportunity, Not a Threat (pdf).

The Peter Van Buren Chronicles -- John Brown Interviews State's FSO-Non Grata

John H. Brown, a Princeton PhD, joined the Foreign Service in 1981 and served in London, Prague, Krakow, Kiev, Belgrade and Moscow. He was a member of the Senior Foreign Service when he resigned from the FS in 2003 over Iraq. He blogs in John Brown's Notes and Essays and John Brown's Public Diplomacy Press and Blog Review, Version 2.0.  Excerpts below from his interview with FSO Peter Van Buren.

Would you advise young -- and not so young -- people to join the US Foreign Service?

Before getting dumped into admin leave limbo, my position was at the Board of Examiners, where for over a year since returning from Iraq I administered the Oral Exam and helped choose the next generation of Foreign Service officers. I was competent at the task, got a good performance review and, after a year on the job, it was only after my book came out that State decided I could not work there.

So, I spent a lot of time around people interested in a Foreign Service career. They did not ask for advice and at the Board we did not offer it. However, since my book came out and I have gotten some media attention, ironically more people now approach me with your same question about joining the Foreign Service. Too much irony these days.

What I tell them is this: think very, very carefully about a Foreign Service career. The State Department is looking for a very specific kind of person and if you are that person, you will enjoy your career and be successful. I have come to understand that the Department wants smart people who will do what they are told, believing that intelligence can be divorced from innovation and creativity. Happy, content compliance is a necessary trait. The Department will not give you any real opportunity for input for a very long time, years, if ever. Even Consular work, which used to offer some space, now has fallen victim to standardization as posts must conform web sites to a single model, for example. There is no agreed-upon definition of success or even progress at State, no profits, no battles won, no stock prices to measure. Success will be to simply continue to exist, or whatever your boss says it is, or both, or neither. You may never know what the point is other than a Congressional delegation go away “happy,” whatever that even is.

At the same time, State has created a personnel system that will require you to serve in more and more dangerous places, and more and more unaccompanied places, as a routine. That sounds cool and adventurous at age 25, but try and imagine if you'd still be happy with it at age 45 with a spouse and two kids. What are your core obligations with a child who needs some extreme parenting as you leave your wife at home alone with him for a year?

Understand that promotions and assignments are more and more opaque. Changes in Congress will further limit pay and benefits. Your spouse will be un/under employed most of his/her life. Your kids will change schools for better or worse every one, two or three years. Some schools will be good, some not so good, and you'll have no choice unless you are willing to subvert your career choices to school choices, as in let’s go to Bogota because the schools are good even if the assignment otherwise stinks. You'll serve more places where you won't speak the language and get less training as requirements grow without personnel growth. As you get up there, remember your boss can arbitrarily be a used car salesman who donated big to the President's campaign. Make sure all these conditions make sense to you now, and, if you can, as you imagine yourself 10, 15 and 20 years into the future. It is a very unique person who can say “Yes” truthfully and after real soul-searching.

The full interview with Mr. Van Buren is here.



John also reviewed Peter's book for American Diplomacy here.  Plus here's a couple of other book reviews from FS folks below.

from Well, That Was Different

"If you’re going to torpedo your career, you should have a good reason.  And this is a story that needed to be told. I wish Peter Van Buren all the best in what appears to be his second career as a writer. And I hope that some day, a person in a position to make a difference will have read and carefully considered his story before pulling the trigger on a similar crusade mission."

from Dan Simpson of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Dan Simpson, a retired U.S. ambassador, is the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette associate editor.  He previously served as United States Ambassador to the Central African Republic (1990–92), Special Envoy to Somalia, and Ambassador to the Congo-Kinshasa (1995–98).

"Mr. Van Buren's best question is, "So how did we end up accomplishing so little when we meant well?" He tries to answer it effectively from the corners of Iraq that he worked in, but I suspect that the real answer lies at a pay grade much higher than his in a maze of bad decisions, too-short tours of duty and massive American misunderstanding of Iraq and its people. The book is short, very readable and has humor as well as profound points in it. If the State Department is given the opportunity, Mr. Van Buren's next assignment is likely to be Mogadishu or Garry Trudeau's Berzerkistan."

Related articles

• Peter Van Buren: Veteran's Day: Knocking on Heaven's Door (huffingtonpost.com)
• Peter Van Buren: State Department Fixing the Facts Based on Policy in Iraq (huffingtonpost.com)

Devastating Tsunami Hits Peter Van Buren, Security Clearance and Diplomatic PPT Swept Away in Foggy Waters

The diplomat of 23 years experience now has to use the Visitor's Entrance of the U.S. State Department?  Well, that's what it looks like.  Some folks are quite happy with that - to see Mr. Van Buren's work bag inspected and Mr. Van Buren wanded every time he goes into the Big House.  I suspect that the somebodies rather that he does not show up, but so far, they have not yet figure out how to fire him. They're pouring over the FAM on what regs to cite for that. I hate to think how much manhour-cost the taxpayers are expending just for this very important task.

The good news is, anonymous officials of the State Department can now tell their media contacts that Mr. Van Buren is officially under investigation. But don't worry, the official spokesman will continue to say that this is an internal, personnel matter that he/she is unable to discuss publicly for privacy reasons. 

I can't say for sure who in the Big House reads our blog. But somebody took our advice not to order a tsunami on the book launch of Peter Van Buren's We Meant Well last September 27. It would have looked, you know, bad and vindictive. Well, they followed that advice until today.

On October 18, the ordered tsunami finally hit the cubicle of FSO Peter Van Buren. He was stripped of his security clearance. Well, stripped might be too strong a word. His Top Secret security clearance was officially "suspended" pending the outcome of an ongoing investigation. The suspension of security clearance is, of course, not formal revocation, nor does it indicate that a revocation is in the works.  It is an ongoing investigation, you see.

They also took away his diplomatic passport. Perhaps, they were afraid, he would run away and fly back to Iraq using his black passport. That must be it.

I can't find anywhere in the FAM the regs governing the confiscation of a diplomatic passport. Regs must be behind the firewall.  The Bureau of Consular Affairs has a special issuance unit that does just the issuance of diplomatic and official passports. But it sounds like the "somebodies" at the State Department can also demand the surrender of the black passport at any time; need not even have to be officials of the Consular Bureau.

Well, anytime, they don't want you to run away to Iraq. It's for your own protection. 

So after 23 years, the veteran diplomat's ability to handle protected information is now in question. 

It has nothing to do, of course, with writing a critical book about our reconstruction boondoggle in Iraq.

Yo guys, that sounds suspiciously lame, you realized that? 

.....You don't care?

Well, tigers must eat meat ....

Video of the Week: Peter Van Buren Talks About State Dept Tigers and More

State Department tigers are not real until they bite you. Video via RT. Please don't throw shoes at your monitor:

Related articles

• The Saturday Profile: U.S. Envoy, Peter Van Buren, Takes Caustic Pen to Iraq War (nytimes.com)
• We Meant Well: How I Helped Lose the Battle for the Hearts and Minds of the Iraqi People (csmonitor.com)

 

 

 

Peter Van Buren: How the State Department Came After Me

Image via Wikipedia

The State Dept probably need FSI to create a training module later on how to deal with FSO-Os with funny bones, sharp pens, acerbic tongues; particularly those who also have the talent for pillar and punch and bright red boxing gloves in the wordy world.

Peter Van Buren may be the first, but he won't be the last. The Afghanistan-PRT Experience Project is a book just waiting to happen. And it's not because the State Department has adopted DHS' "If You See Something, Say Something™" campaign.  It will happen, it's just a matter of time, because folks can only tolerate beings hamsters on wheels for so long.  The PRT model started in Afghanistan and was exported to Iraq. Now that the Iraq-PRT Experience has turned into a book, the Afghanistan book is bound to happen. It's only a matter of time, and we've got time between now and 2014 and between 2014 and who knows when ...

As I was getting ready to post this, I also received a note from a Diplopundit reader and long-time State insider who pointed out that this is not the first time that Peter Van Buren has put himself in the crosshairs.  Remember the 2007 passport fiasco that got everybody all up in arms?  Apparently, back in late 2006, Mr. Van Buren sounded the alarm to his top boss in Consular Affairs that "she was going to need a lot of extra bodies to handle the coming surge in passport applications."  According to my source, Mr. Van Buren's "reward" was to be transferred from the Consular Bureau to Public Affairs. That is obviously fine and good if you're a PD officer, but not so good if you are a Consular Officer. So, perhaps the April Foolly-press guidance is not too off the mark after all. I am republishing the piece below in full. It seems like an important thing to share with others. I am sympathetic with Mr. Van Buren's plight but not sure the Big House will be as sympathetic; pies are hard to clean up.

How the State Department Came After Me
For telling the truth about what I saw in Iraq

by Peter Van Buren
[Reprinted with the author's permission.  The original is here. Also cross-posted in Foreign Policy here]

I never intended to create this much trouble. 

Two years ago I served 12 months in Iraq as a Foreign Service Officer, leading a Provincial Reconstruction Team. I had been with the State Department for some 21 years at that point, serving mostly in Asia, but after what I saw in the desert -- the waste, the lack of guidance, the failure to really do anything positive for the country we had invaded in 2003 -- I started writing a book. One year ago I followed the required procedures with State for preclearance (no classified documents, that sort of thing), received clearance, and found a publisher. Six months ago the publisher asked me to start a blog to support the book.

And then, toward the end of the summer, the wrath of Mesopotamia fell on me. The Huffington Post picked up one of my blog posts, which was seen by someone at State, who told someone else and before you know it I had morphed into public enemy number one -- as if I had started an al Qaeda franchise in the Foggy Bottom cafeteria. My old travel vouchers were studied forensically, and a minor incident from my time in Iraq was blown up into an international affair. One blog post from late August that referenced a Wikileaks document already online elsewhere got me called in for interrogation by Diplomatic Security and accused of disclosing classified information. I was told by Human Resources I might lose my job and my security clearance, and I was ordered to pre-clear every article, blog post, Facebook update, and Tweet from that point out. A Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs wrote, without informing me, directly to my publisher, accusing me in writing of new security violations that had apparently escaped the sharp eyes at Diplomatic Security, and demanded redactions. The publisher refused, citing both the silliness of the actual redactions (everything was already online; one requested redaction came from the movie Black Hawk Down, and another from George Tenet's memoirs) and the First Amendment.

It seemed kind of sad, kind of desperate, and maybe a little bit unfair. I always took my obligation to protect information seriously, and all my material went through a careful vetting process with the publisher as well as with State to make sure nothing had slipped through.

I wrote about all this on the blog TomDispatch, and before I knew it, the story went viral. I found myself returning calls to the New York Times, the ACLU, Reporters Without Borders, CBS, NPR, and about a million blogs and radio stations. I had hoped to promote the book I had written, which came out yesterday, but the story ended up being about me and the State Department instead.

I never intended this to be a fight against my employer of 23 years, and I never intended to become a poster child for the First Amendment. However, I'm not one to back down when bullied, and I am afraid that in their anger and angst, the Department of State has acted like a bully. In addition to false accusations of security violations, State has used its own internal clearance requirements as a blunt weapon.

The State Department, on paper, does not prohibit blogs, tweets or whatever is invented next. On paper, again, responsible use is called for -- a reasonable demand. But this rule must cut both ways -- responsible writing on my part, responsible control on State's part.

And responsible standards for clearance. The department's "pre-clearance" requirements are totally out of date. Originally designed for a 19th-century publishing model, its leisurely 30-day examination period is incompatible with the requirements of online work, blogs, Facebook, and tweets. But the department has refused to update its rules for the 21st century, preferring instead to use the 30 days to kill anything of a timely nature. What blog post is of value a month after it is written, never mind a tweet?

In addition, the pre-clearance rules are supposed to be specific in their goals: to prevent classified or privacy protected information from going out, stopping info on contracts and procurement, and blocking private writing that seeks to pass itself off as an official statement from the Department. In my case, however, any attempts to pre-clear blog posts ran into the Department of Silly Walks. My bland statements about the military in Iraq made using easily Googleable data were labeled "security risks." When even those were clipped out, everything I wrote was labeled as possibly being confused with an official statement, even though my writing is peppered with profanity, sarcasm, humor, and funny photos. Say what you want about my writing, but I can't imagine anyone is confusing it with official State Department public statements. As required, I always include a disclaimer, but the pre-clearance people simply tell me that is not enough, without explaining what might be enough other than just shutting up.

So instead of using pre-clearance as it is on paper, a tool to guard only against improper disclosure with which I have no disagreement, it is used as a form of prior restraint against speech that offends State. Me, in this instance.

We have been battered to death with public statements from the Secretary of State on down demanding the rights of bloggers and journalists in China, Burma and the Middle East be respected. While the State Department does not lock its naughty bloggers in basement prison cells, it does purposefully, willfully, and in an organized way seek to chill the responsible exercise of free speech by its employees. It does this selectively; blogs that promote an on-message theme are left alone (or even linked to by the Department) while blogs that say things that are troublesome or offensive to the Department are bullied out of existence. This is not consistent with the values the State Department seeks to promote abroad. It is not the best of us, and it undermines our message and our mission in every country where we work where people can still read this.

I have a job now at State that has nothing to do with Iraq, something I enjoy and something I am competent at. To me, there is no conflict here. I'd like to keep my job if I can, and in the meantime, I'll continue to write. I have no need to resign in protest, as I don't think I've done anything wrong absent throwing a few pies at some clowns and bringing to daylight a story that needed to be told, albeit at the cost of some embarrassment to the Department of State. That seems to me compatible with my oath of office, as well as my obligations as a citizen. I hope State comes to agree with me. After all, State asks the same thing of governments abroad, right?

Related articles

• When freedom's not free at the State Department (cbsnews.com)
• Interrogated by the State Department (salon.com)
• Peter Van Buren: Freedom Isn't Free at the State Department (huffingtonpost.com)
• State Department's search for a WikiLeaks scapegoat | Peter Van Buren (guardian.co.uk)
• State Department Employee Faces Firing for Posting WikiLeaks Link [Wikileaks] (gawker.com)
• State Department Employee Faces Firing Over WikiLeaks Link (wired.com)

Foreign Service Blogging: Tigers Have Teeth, Rather Sharp ... Rawr!!!

Our blog pal, Donna of Email From the Embassy recently posted about trying to figure out "why some State bloggers are allowed to blog, while others are, shall we say, vigorously discouraged."

A while back someone else also wrote to inform me that he/she was "strongly reminded" that blogging can lead to at least pulling the security clearance, forced (involuntary) curtailment, followed by loss of job, arrest, detainment and prosecution.

Understandably, that blog is not here or there, anymore.

The Tigers roared baring fangs, which means the threat of no food on the table, arrest, detainment, well, just about everything, really.  Except they forgot to include non-promotion and career suicide. Of course, if you lose your job, there would be no point worrying about a promotion or a career.

Exactly. See how that works?! Big Rawr! 


They also forgot to mention perpetual detainment at Gitmo. First amendment, my foot! If your blog links to any cable released by WikiLeaks, the Tigers will probably bite you for secondary leaking of classified materials. Or worse, espionage!


Fear as we all know is a great motivator.  And it is probably worth noting that Tigers are stalk-and-ambush hunter, and the stripes are good camouflage in the long grass. Check with the Post Report if your next assignment has long grasses.

In some places, the Foreign Service is now like a scene out of Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, only this time, the letter one wears in not "A" for Adultery but "B" for Blogger. You blog at your own risk under the Big House's 21st century statecraft jungle regardless of the nice things they say about freedom and the Internets.

Here are a few things I'm kicking around the campfire concerning the various disappearances of Foreign Service bloggers through the years. A quick caveat: I am talking out loud there, so try not to misconstrue the following as an advice in any shape or form; they're not.  Also please do not write and ask for "real" examples of "Tiger" blog take down.  They are not my stories to tell and I respect the privacy of the bloggers who make no public explanation of their online death.

"Vague" Blogging, More Confusing Than You Think

One of my correspondents write that it seems like "FS bloggers should never mention *anything* about work."  Why? Probably because vague blogging isn't as vague as you think and you never know who's reading your blog?  Even if Diplomatic Security sees no problem with your blog, your regional/functional bureau or post management may have issues with it.  I don't think it has anything to do with what you write per se, it has everything to do with fear and the lack of control. Fear from management that your blog has a ready, captive audience and fear that you might write something out of turn. And there is the notion that you have a direct connection to an audience and your right to self expression has not undergone any sort of vetting by the higher-ups who luv their red pens!

A misplaced fear, for sure. No FS blogger as far as I know has caused any international incident to-date. Can't say the same for our non-blogging diplomats at the US Consulate in Hyderabad, and the US Consulate General in Chennai who both suffered from foot in mouth disease here and here.

You're all smart, of drinking age and can vote, so what's the problem?  Well, I think perhaps the Tiger daddies are wondering -- what if you're like a car with no brakes when it comes to blogging? Thus, FSOs are trusted with classified materials but cannot be trusted to know what they can/cannot write publicly online.  Spouses and partners (aka: Eligible Family Members or EFMs) on the other hand should be seen but not read because they ought not have opinions about anything whatsoever, being just spouses and all with no  logons (no logons = not real people). EFMs have long been declared their own persons under the Big House rules. Apparently, they are their own person but there's no reason why they should have their own opinions!

Borderline idiotic to put it politely.

Blogging About Anything With a C is Bad For Your Health

Another correspondent suggested that maybe folks should never blog anything that could be perceived as critical towards the Foggied Bottom, the Foreign Service, the host country, or ones clients (visa applicants, AmCits, official contacts, etc. etc.), even if you're only complaining about somebody sneezing or snoring loudly.

Concerned about all promotions going to Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan hands regardless of actual performance? Okay, but that may not be the best subject to blog about, most especially if you're bidding.

Big House functionaries talking about internet freedom really hurts your ears now? Okay, but it won't do any good to talk about the cause of that ear ache in your blog.

You cannot/cannot blog about the smell you have to endure as you sit in your visa interview window because it's bad form to talk about body odors, period. You cannot/cannot blog and complain about seeing boobies with nursing mommies as you conduct visa interviews because breastfeeding is udderly not optional when you have a screaming infant. Trust me on this.

You cannot make snarky comments in your blog about your Amcit clients no matter how loony and unreasonable their demands might be (they are covered by the Privacy Act of 1974). You cannot complain in your blog that your host country has no sidewalks, it might upset the Tourism Bureau. You cannot complain in your blog about getting Montezuma's Revenge because it might upset the host country's Sanitation Bureau.  And on and on ...you get the drift? Somewhere there's a fill in the blank form in the shared drive on what FSOs should not blog about, but don't look for that list in the FAM.

EFMs must not blog about how every transfer is like a reinvention of wheels at the Big House because it would make the HR Bureau look bad. Gawd lord! They should not blog that their spouse's HR Technician kept messing up their Travel Orders because it makes the HR staff look incompetent (and some of them are). They should blog zilch /nada about housing, because hey, it's free housing and the leaking roof should not be a big deal! They should not blog about the American school because isn't it enough that you are in a country with an American school? EFMs above all should not blog too loudly about the lack of embassy jobs; didn't ya know that 9.1% of Americans in the United States of America are out of work?! Somewhere there's a fill in the blank form about what EFMs should not blog about, but it's a secret until they call you or your spouse for that Talk.  (I'm having a hard time locating my sarcasm off button, sorry!)

Blogging in Lake Wobegon, the International Edition

Still one more correspondent wailed that she only blogged about her life, what's wrong with that?  Well, I don't know what's wrong with that either.  It looks like if you blog about yourself and your hobbies OR your feelings (I had a bad day, I'm lonely in my new country, the singles crowd sucks, I can't use the APO or pouch for my home business, my spouse is too attentive to his FSN, or whatever else is the color, flavor or heartache of the day) the Tigers may do more than growl. Because obviously, if you are not happy in your host country, you are not/not trying hard enough at it. Readers and Tigers may feel you're not a great fit in this lifestyle of the not so famous possible evacuees.  You are the face of Lake Wobegon International, after all; a less than perfect or happy example is not/not a good thing.

5 FAM 790 (Using Social Media): A Lamppost of Discouragement

The Big House makes a big deal about freedom of expression and internet freedom in the public square but in reality those things do not mean a lot inside the big house. Even as the organization tries to project itself as being innovative, it is hindered by its outdated structure, regulations and hierarchy.  5 FAM 790 (Using Social Media) is a pretense of sorts by virtue of its impracticality.  Even in private writings, FSOs are supposed to request permission for their blog posts, tweets and anything they write under the  "of official concern" umbrella.  Which is like the whole world, see from Algeria to Zimbabwe. 

Under the regs, the agency gets at least 30 days to review submissions. Who has the time to do that? More to the point, who has the time to approve such personal writings done outside of work? And if one FS blogger is expressly required to obtain multiple clearances for his/her blog posts/tweets/etc but others are not, what does that mean?  And if  the blog posts are not cleared in 30 days, is the blogger then free to publish all his/her stale blog posts/stale tweets/stale etc. and private ruminations without the Tigers growling?  Most blogs carry the necessary disclaimers required under the regs, but I understand that the Big House can still declare them insufficient.  Which makes me now think that 5 FAM 790 which cites 27 legal authorities is there not really as a guide but as a lamppost of discouragement. 

It's as if it is saying -- you are free to blog/tweet/summersault online in this great free country of ours, but it's best for your own sake, if you don't.

The regs says that "As a general matter, the Department encourages the responsible use of social media consistent with current laws, policies and guidance that govern information and information technology. Department organizations will not arbitrarily ban access to or the use of social media."

I think the key phrase is "responsible use" which is, of course, subject to interpretation but -- not your interpretation of what is "responsible."

"Allowed" to Blog, Much Better for Mini-DipNotes?

I am convinced that some bloggers are "allowed" to blog by default because their bosses have no idea what a blog is. Seriously. 

Some bloggers are "allowed" to blog because maybe they are lucky enough to have adult bosses with no control issues who recognize that warts and all are part and parcel of real life, even in organizations. As long as your blog does not end up in NYT or Al Kamen's column, you're safe. Of course, their bosses may have blogs, too :-) and did not want to be outed!

Some bloggers are "allowed" to blog because no one has yet complained about them, or the blog is obscure enough it does not register on anyone's radar screen.

Some bloggers are "allowed" to blog because their bosses look the other way.  These blogs are usually like mini-DipNotes. What's the harm in letting them PR blog for free? And if they write something nice about their bosses, then that is super great, too.

Finally, I think some bloggers are "allowed" to blog because the Big House has not yet found the right stick to scare them to death and make them stop.  In almost all instances  they eventually find the right stick, so the blog disappears. Unless ... the blog stays .... in which case ... well, that's another story down the road.


FS Blogs, a Questionable Future...Maybe, Maybe Not

I've lost count the number of FS blogs that have gone dark.  A trend that is both disturbing and sad.  In the end, I think every FS blogger must decide on his/her own comfort level and decide how much grief he/she is willing to put up with in order to blog, tweet or FB.  As long as the Big House considers blogging a "dangerous" hobby or preoccupation even in its employees/family members private capacities, this is also a "livelihood" issue.  When you butt head with city hall, you will get more than a headache.

They presumably can dig up everything "bad" you have done previously (what, you did not recycle in Caracas?). Apparently, they can also yank your security clearance, which would make it almost impossible to do work anywhere in the Foggied Bottom except cleaning latrines, if you're lucky. As to why they are running after spouses who blog, who after all are not employees of the U.S. Government and have long been declared their own persons, I can't say.

Below is a snippet on blogging by Mitch Joel dubbed the "Rock Star of Digital Marketing:"

I had the opportunity to interview Lemmy from Motorhead. Within the rock circle, Lemmy is the equivalent of Jesus. A true pioneer. But, unlike most rock stars, Lemmy has a couple of really big warts on his face, very greasy hair and truly lives the "sex, drugs and rock n' roll lifestyle." Basically, he says and does what he wants and never answers to anyone but himself.

A Blog can't be Bon Jovi. A Blog is much more like Lemmy.

You can get away with mis-spelled words, non-precise grammar and it's supposed to have more of a stream-of-consciousness flow to it. A Blog is the glory of a personal voice - warts and all. That is why people are gravitating toward them.

Just so you know I am not advocating a free for all blog world, please read my post, Secretary Clinton on #NetFreedom ... excuse me for not clapping ... where I talked about the restrictions that come with being an employee and the trade offs we all make whether in the public sector, the private sector or even my own nowhere place.  The trade-offs, remember? 

The Scaredy World of Blogging

The genie if out of the bottle. It refuses to go back in!

When I started blogging a few years back, there were a few dozen Foreign Service bloggers.  Today, there are close to 500 blogs by Foreign Service officers, specialists and family members. Even as I watch blogs go quietly dark, I have also seen the number of bloggers grow like weeds.   Some blogs go silent especially after a scaredy session at A-100 but others eventually return online. Some blogs get password-protected, others eventually come out in the open.

And as blogs go dark, other blogs soon take their places.  The cycle of life mimics itself even online.

Unless the Big House makes reasonable tweaks and accommodations in its unhelpful regulations on blogging and the use of social media, there will come a time when it'll need be forced to create a new office: the Office of Professional Responsibility in Participatory Media.  The new office obviously would need a new staff just to keep track, and monitor this active writerly group in the Foreign Service community. It would also need new staff to process and clear blog posts, tweets, FB posts, public forum posts, etc. etc. from Foreign Service community members.  It would need new staff to write up pink slips for those who write outside the chalk marks. Above all, it would need an Ombudsman to ensure that the 30 day clearance requirement is adhered to and is not an excuse to derail the scheduled blog post of any member of the community.

I'd like to hear how they'll explain that personnel expansion to Congress.

Truth to tell, I have not seen or heard of Tigers actually yanking anybody's clearance due to an offending blog. I am aware of private sessions of discouragements, issues with onward assignments, and of course, threats of various colors and stripes among FS bloggers.  And as far as I know, they have not technically kicked out anyone who blogs either --  unless you call the "push" to retirement a payback kick.

Fear as we all know is a great motivator.  Sometimes, a Tiger's growl is just that, a growl and enough to do the job. Of course, it does not mean that the Tiger will not also eat you!

Housekeeping

1) If you would rather that I not link to you in my side bar, please send me a quick email at http://www.contactify.com/29ca0. I will promptly remove the link.

2) I have stopped the practice of highlighting FS blogs at DiploPundit. If you write something  interesting that I absolutely must link to, or highlight for my readership, I will send an email request for permission before I do so.

3) Somebody asked if anyone has ever threatened this blog. The answer is no. But if it happens, the threat will be publish in full.

4) Do make a mental note that I do not/not work for the Big House. I monitor the goings on in the Foggied Bottom because, why not?  It's a hard job, somebody's gotta do it.  Please read my disclaimer.

Another Day, Another FS Blog Gone Dark - Goodbye SassAndSweet (^ _ ^)

She never wrote anything remotely controversial, but now she's gone. I imagine that like most Foreign Service bloggers, she took to blogging because she enjoyed it, and it is a great way to keep family and friends informed of the goings on in her overseas life. Also, I would not at all be surprise if an added part of the attraction is the sense of family and community that most bloggers get from this Foreign Service group. 

Unfortunately, she's not the first one to disappear and she most certainly will not be the last. The blogosphere usually knows the who and what but never the why.  I hope this is not a prelude of things to come in "The Disappeared" on HD (as in Handling Directive for bloggers).  Presumably there is a story behind the blog disappearance but her story is hers to tell.

I'm saying goodbye -- jeez, as Yogi Berra said, it's like deja-vu, all over again!

Goodbye SassAndSweet. I will miss your presence online, sniff. Take care wherever your journey takes you.

State Dept on French-Vietnamese Blogger Currently on Trial in Vietnam -- Bonus Entry, the "Unless" Clause

This was in response to a taken question in the Office of the Spokesperson of the State Department on August 10, 2011:

Question: Do you have a comment about the French-Vietnamese lecturer and blogger who is currently on trial in Vietnam?

Answer: We are dismayed by Vietnam’s conviction of French-Vietnamese blogger Pham Minh Hoang to three years in prison and three years under house arrest. No individual should be prosecuted for exercising the right to freedom of opinion and expression. Vietnam’s prosecution of individuals for expressing their views contradicts the government’s commitment to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Human rights are and will remain a key component of our relationship with Vietnam.

File away in the press clippings folder; might be useful as Exhibit A when the "Tigers" over at the State Department run after you and your blog.   

Of course, it goes without saying (but I'll say it anyway) that the official response did not say anything about the "unless" clause.  What's the "unless" clause?  It's the "no individual should be prosecuted for exercising the right to freedom of opinion and expression" .... unless (INSERT reason here).

The following is a non-exhaustive list of possible reasons, in no particular order: 

No individual should be prosecuted for exercising the right to freedom of opinion and expression ....

---- unless your unofficial mockery written during off hours require cause your State Department bosses to take Xanax.

---- unless your blog tell stories about the leadership and management misimpressions of your boss.

---- unless your blog tell stories about the impression management strategy of your bosses ailing with promotiontitis.

---- unless you write about funny things reported in the media that talks about odd strange foreign policy misadventures and expense.

---- unless you write about a less than perfect life and private pains in your foreign adventures because didn't you know that a shrink is always better than a blog?

--- unless you write about countries with diplomatic relations with the United States.

Not sure the "unless" clause covers Bhutan and Taiwan, but it should should cover Cuba, Iran and North Korea. But before you make fun of Kim Jong Il's hairdo, be sure to check with the North Korea desk for blanket permission to blog or tweet about the Korean Peninsula's hair model of the century.

More later ...

(This entry was originally posted on 8/17/2011; updated with "unless" clause)

Related articles

• EFF Calls for Release of Vietnamese Blogger Pham Minh Hoang (eff.org)
• Vietnam jails dissident blogger (bbc.co.uk)
• Vietnam blogger jailed for attempted subversion (guardian.co.uk)
• Vietnam jails French-Vietnamese teacher over blogs (seattletimes.nwsource.com)

Peter Van Buren: Oh, dude -- WHO did you get "more than upset" at the State Department?

Peter Van Buren, an FSO and 20+ year veteran of the State Department with a book coming out in fall had an interview with Rose Lichter-Marck of Publishers Weekly.  It is a brief interview, but here for the first time, a Foreign Service Officer is on the record on what type of pressures and threats the Foggy Bottom "tigers" engage in when they are not/not fond of your writing.

And it's only July, his book is not even out until September. I can't imagine what this will be like when reviews start coming in.  This darn new media thing, you can't sweep anything under the rug, anymore.  

Excerpt:

PW: Did you struggle with the decision to write about working for the State Department?

Van Buren: I did, and I continue to do so. The State Department, where I have worked for 23 years, is like a Mafia family: one doesn't talk about family matters outside the family. I can't name one objective book written by a State Department Foreign Service Officer—the few who do write things stay strictly within the exciting travel memoir genre or, if they are former Ambassadors, the "I was right all along" personal insights. When a colleague learns about my book, the first question is always "Are you in trouble?" I am afraid the answer is yes. State started an investigation against me—a hearing is scheduled coincidentally just about the time the book comes out. My current boss also told me she was asked to "deliver a message," just like in a gangster movie, from a "senior Department person" that my writing had left people at Foggy Bottom "more than upset" and threatened additional discipline, including suspension, if I continue.

Continue reading, The Whistleblower: PW Talks with Peter Van Buren.


Peter is the author of We Meant Well: How I Helped Lose the Battle for the Hearts and Minds of the Iraqi People (American Empire Project). The book will be available on September 27. You may pre-order it here. 

By its title alone, one can surmise that this is not one of those happy talk books about blundering into Iraq and the subsequent national building, excuse me, reconstruction.  This is also something that would not merit a look in official dissent awards. That's the one where you disagree over a policy, write a cable, and it travels slowly up the stairs to the 7th floor, or wherever it is these cables end up these days. The awards are for dissenting quietly, in house, in well ordered arguments that does not topple the chairs.  Books and blog posts are excluded, of course.

One example of a dissent awarded in recent years was persuading the State Department to issue commissioning certificates for FS specialists. One of this year's awards was for dissenting on official policy not to send a U.S. government representative to the annual Peace Memorial Ceremony in Hiroshima. In August 2010, 65 years since a US bomb left Hiroshima in ruins, the US Ambassador to Japan attended the ceremony for the first time. 

The State Department prides itself with its dissent channel. Even AFSA says that this is "absolutely unique within the U.S. government in that the foreign affairs agencies encourage dissent through the dissent channel." Supposedly, sending a dissent cable does not harm your career and a list of FS luminaries are cited as proof of that. 

But -- but, if the relevant issues of our time are not showing up in this "absolutely unique" dissent channel, doesn't that tell us something?

Anyway sorry, FSO Peter Van Buren, no award for you this year.  Next time you have something relevant to say about where our young men and women are dying, and where billions of taxpayer dollars are siphoned into a black hole everyday, please do not write a book or blog about it.  Bundle them into cable format and send off quietly and nicely upstairs, please. The American public won't ever get to hear the gritty details but you just might get an award for it, instead of being subjected to an "investigation."

Bonus points -- you won't get anyone "more than upset" over in the big house and you'll still have assignments and promotions to worry about.



Related posts:

• FS Journal: The Foreign Service Blogosphere 2011 Plus More ... | Jun 04, 2011
• 21st Century Career Suicide - No Longer Just Unauthorized ... | May 16, 2011
• New FS Blog: We Meant Well, Plus a Book Coming Out This Fall ... | Apr 14, 2011
• You can't serve in Iraq if you're on MEDs? | Diplopundit | Jul 22, 2009