ABSTRACT
Now that we have some insight into the organisation of diplomacy, both standard and non-standard, we are in a position to do some real work. In this chapter, we explore reasoning processes that are said to underlie diplomatic thinking. Diplomatic thinking is practical thinking, thinking that results in action. That is why we start with looking at the ‘practical syllogism’ but soon note that real-life decision-making does not work out so neatly. We unmask some other problematic forms of reasoning to end up concluding that diplomatic thinking should not so much focus on how decisions are reached (ex ante) than on how they are justified (ex post). That is what is meant by ‘political accountability’. Kahneman’s distinction between thinking slow and thinking fast helps us out of the ‘muddle’. Justification is a discursive activity that needs some solid grounding. That is why we briefly review three standard logical ways of reasoning: inductive, abductive, and deductive reasoning, each with their own strengths: reliability, plausibility, and validity. After a brief discussion of ‘conditional reasoning’, which is pervasive in diplomatic thinking, we close the chapter with a critical assessment of reasoning by analogy.
