ABSTRACT
This chapter examines why we need diplomacy and diplomats. The first section begins by surveying historical, anthropological, and sociological stories about the origins of diplomacy and what diplomats do. It examines their accounts of the consequences of human beings living in separate groups, the simple diplomacy to which this gives rise, and the diplomatic encounters which have taken place between different groups in the past and may possibly take place in the future. The second section then looks at the distinctiveness of what diplomats do. It examines functional and sociability arguments for why people live in separate groups, positive and negative aspects of identity, and the differences between intra-group or in-group relations and the inter-group or out-group relations in which separateness results. Inter-group relations are harder to conduct than intra-group relations, and it is this difficulty which gives rise to diplomacy as a way of handling them. The final section concludes by examining a series of challenges which diplomats must confront if they are to be successful.
