[APPLAUSE]
TOM FLETCHER: Thank
you very much.
And thank you all
for coming out today.
And I think what
we're going to do
on the format is that
I'll just give you
a quick overview of my
journey to get to this point,
and say a couple of things
about this book which
I've had to resign to publish.
And so I'll explain
a bit about that.
But what I'm most
interested in then
is getting the conversation
into more of a Q and A.
But in particular, I've
been doing these events now
this last week.
And at every single
event, people
have spoken to me about Google.
I've been talking
to them about power,
and they've come right back
at me and talked about Google.
And I really want
to just reflect
on what that means in terms
of a power transition,
and what there is that we can
do together in that space, what
the challenges are.
And there are huge challenges
around trust, authenticity,
and authority there that
I'd love to talk about.
But really just open
it up at that point.
And we can talk about
just about anything
you'd like to, whether it's
this crazy period of four
years working with those
three prime ministers--
the end of Blair, the
whole of Gordon Brown,
and the first year
of David Cameron.
Or then the four
years after that,
when I was in Beirut,
and trying to use
these amazing new tools--
the smartphone superpower--
to do diplomacy in
a different way,
and to connect with
people in a way
that we've never been
able to do before.
And I can give you some examples
of how all that happened.
If you want, we can
go back further.
We can talk about my
life as a failed boxer.
I lost a boxing match
in Nairobi to the mayor,
and they had t-shirts
made up saying,
Fletcher goes home
on a stretcher,
which I pretty much did.
We can talk about my
career as a failed lead
singer for Freshly Squeezed,
very much ahead of their time.
Or indeed, anything
you'd like to cover.
So the book, "Naked Diplomacy,"
clearly no real nudity
involved.
The idea-- stolen really
from Jamie Oliver--
is what does diplomacy
look like, in the way
that he did with cooking.
If you take away all of the
paraphernalia and all the crap
that holds us back, and we've
constructed around diplomacy--
which is a very kind
of maps and chaps
world-- a load of etiquette,
and protocol, and language,
which I'm arguing isn't helping
us to connect with people.
But in a way, I'm
preaching to the choir
here, because you're disrupting
us in that space already.
And one of the things
I say to diplomats
is unless we find a way to
communicate more effectively,
and to use these new
tools and to strip away
a lot of this rubbish, the kind
of platitudes about Britain
and Cambodia have warm,
bilateral relations
on a range of mutual-- I mean,
that stuff that just switches
you off immediately.
Unless we can shift all
of that, scrape those
barnacles off the boat,
then you-- and we often
use Google in this context--
will disrupt us even more.
And I often ask
people, who do you
think will be more
powerful in 10 years time,
Google or Britain?
Who would you have on the
Security Council in 10 years
time, Google or Britain?
And increasingly, people--
we do a show of hands.
I won't do it here,
because you're very loyal.
[LAUGHTER]
And word would go back
very quickly to Eric
that whoever voted for Britain.
But the number of hands
that go up for Google
is increasing every
time I ask the question.
So that's the idea of the
naked in "Naked Diplomacy."
And obviously, because
I'm trying to sell a book,
we do chuck in a few
stories about nudity anyway.
There's a story about when my
son turned up at the PM's house
as a four-year-old
completely naked,
and the housekeeper came
to the door and said,
you're the first guest
the prime minster's ever
had arrive naked.
A sign of how professional the
British foreign service is.
There's a story in there about
the time I was at the G8 Summit
with David Cameron--
his very first summit.
And I don't know if it's
like this in your world,
but there's a kind of
physicality and theatricality
to the way that
leaders interact.
Think of Putin on his horse
and so on, and his tank.
And so I took David Cameron
swimming in the lake at Muskoka
in Canada.
So then we could brief the
other delegations, right?
There's a new kid on the
block here, strong and young--
a bit like the Justin
Trudeau effect now.
So we did all that, briefed the
other delegations, fantastic.
Word went round, and when
we arrived at the meeting,
Obama was feeling his muscles,
and Sarkozy was looking
a bit jealous, and so on.
Perfect.
And then Berlusconi
saw this and was a bit
put out that someone else
was stealing that space.
And so he disappeared off and
came back 10 minutes later
with a stack of
photos of himself
lightly oiled and wearing a pair
of very, very tight Speedos.
They were red, I
think-- though I
don't like to remember
the moment too much.
I've been trying to
forget it ever since--
and handed them around.
And for the only time
in my experience,
the leaders of the free world
were completely silenced.
[LAUGHTER]
But the only other moment of
nudity in there, I'm afraid,
is actually more of the
core idea of the book, which
is that the very greatest
diplomat was actually
the very first diplomat,
and he was maybe
almost literally naked.
He was a prehistoric
man, probably a man.
And he was the first
person to convince
his fellow
Neanderthals to go out
hunting together rather than
clubbing them over the head.
And that is these two basic
instincts we have for survival.
One, survival of the fittest, to
compete for resource, and one,
to go out and hunt together.
And at it's basic
essence, that is what
diplomacy has been ever since.
We're trying to provide those
compromises, the negotiations,
that help the human
species kind of rub along.
And in the midst of all the
change that you're leading,
and I don't need
to tell you about,
my argument is that diplomacy
is going to matter even
more than ever, because
you'll still need people,
as we go through this period
of enormous transition,
fastest changes
ever, you'll still
need people who
can help societies,
and states, and businesses,
and ideas rub along.
Because when we've gone through
even remotely similar periods
of change in the past--
think of the printing press--
it has led to centuries
of upheaval, and conflict,
and war, and loss of
life on a massive scale.
So somehow, we're
going to have to deal
with the consequences of
all this amazing stuff
that you're doing.
The unintended consequences
of the technological change
that you are leading will
be huge political and social
change.
And so we're going
to need some people
in there trying to help
us navigate through that.
And all that's
happening at a time
when my business of diplomacy
is itself being disrupted.
I mentioned it's being
disrupted by you guys,
but it's being disrupted
by many other actors
in the media, the
businesses that
have their own foreign policy.
I use the example often
of the Murdoch empire,
or even of Google, who actually
run a very, very efficient
foreign policy apparatus.
We're being disrupted
from all sides
and also from elsewhere
in our own governments.
And so again, we're trying
to find ways to adapt,
to disrupt ourselves, so we
can still be competitive.
But at the end of the day--
and this has been really
my journey, my lesson,
coming through Number 10
and feeling that power
drain away, as time sped up,
and we got adapted to 24/7
media and then social media.
When I started, we cared about
140 words on the Sky ticker.
When I left Number 10, we
cared about 140 characters
on Twitter.
That whole sense of
speeding up, and how hard
it is now for government to
exercise the power we have.
The result of all
that is that I've
got to the point
where I've realized--
and you've worked it out
long before we have--
that we just simply don't have
the answers behind the wall.
And so we're going
to have to now form
these different kinds of
coalitions, unusual coalitions,
in order to crack these
massive problems ahead of us--
around the next energy
source, around how do we
get 75 million kids
into school and out
of potentially suicide vests?
How do we find the balance
between security and liberty
online?
How do we judge when it's
right to go to war to protect
the most vulnerable?
Those are all issues that I'm
basically saying, admitting,
we can't crack.
And so we're going
to have to find
ways to work with
these new actors--
often in competitive space--
but find ways and synergies
to try and crack those
problems together,
which is really where I'm
most interested in taking
the conversation later.
If diplomacy didn't
exist, my argument
is that we would
need to invent it,
to deal with the consequences
of all this change.
But it's now much too important
to leave to the diplomats.
So my case is that we need
others, including all of you,
to think of yourselves
as citizen diplomats,
to feel that you also
have a responsibility
to promote
coexistence, to promote
that idea, like
my naked caveman,
that we can collaborate rather
than compete for resource.
And this matters more than
ever now in the 21st century,
because the big dividing line
is not north versus south, east
versus west, rich versus poor.
The big dividing line now-- and
we see it in the Brexit debate,
we see it in the American
presidential campaign--
is between people who believe
in that coexistence-- rooms
like this, where you're
collaborating across cultures,
across races, across
religions, across ideas--
between those people, the
coexisters and the wall
builders.
And on the wrong
side of the argument,
you've got Islamic
States, who don't just
believe in attacking
the West, they
believe in attacking
the gray zone where
Islam and Christianity work
together, or live together.
You've got the hard
right in Europe
becoming louder than ever.
You've got the
hard left in Europe
becoming louder than ever.
And of course, you have the wall
builder in chief, Donald Trump,
arguing that basically the
answer to the 21st century
is just another layer of
bricks at the top of that wall.
So these arguments
matter more than ever,
but we need to build a much
bigger and more effective
coalition than we've
ever had before if we're
going to find the answers
and the creativity
and the ingenuity to help
us survive the 21st century.
Sounds a dramatic way
to end it, but I think
it is as important as that.
Thank you.
[APPLAUSE]
FEMALE SPEAKER: So
fascinating introduction.
One thing you talk about
in your book over and over
again is this idea
of citizen diplomacy
and how to avoid
armchair activism.
Can you start there?
TOM FLETCHER: Yeah.
So my main worry
about social media
is the sort of
slacktivism side of it.
In Lebanon, we tried
a number of things
to cut through to people in
completely different ways.
So, for example, when the
Iranian embassy was blown up,
rather than deliver a speech--
I couldn't go down and shake
hands with the ambassador
because we didn't have
diplomatic relations-- I
went down and donated blood
and then tweeted the photo
and it went viral in Tehran.
And it was one way of
showing the Iranian people
that what they were being told
about Britain and the West--
you know, just challenge
it a little bit.
And so we found ways
to do things like that.
They were stunts.
And many of my colleagues said
these are just ridiculous,
attention-grabbing stunts.
But they were stunts
that had a purpose.
We were trying to
use these new tools,
trying to build that
plane as we flew it,
to find different ways to reach
out and connect with people
in a way my
predecessors could never
have done using
traditional media.
FEMALE SPEAKER: Absolutely.
TOM FLETCHER: But in that
space that we're competing for,
you've got obviously
the bad guys.
And Islamic State are
doing a fantastic job,
from their perspective,
of using gaming,
for example, to
radicalize people.
And then you've got
a bunch of people
who are just being
distracted, and for whom
social media is making them a
bit more apathetic, a bit more
cynical.
It's sort of switching them off.
And it's one of the
reasons, I think,
why people are trusting
my world of maps and chaps
and hierarchies even less,
but also why increasingly they
have less trust in
your world, as well.
Anything that looks
like authority
just provokes a sort
of cynical backlash.
FEMALE SPEAKER: Yeah.
TOM FLETCHER: And
so somehow, we have
to find a way to ensure
that people aren't just
using social media
just to flirt or look
at pictures of cute cats.
FEMALE SPEAKER:
It's interesting.
So Tom goes through
in great detail
some of the more arcane
traditions of diplomacy.
And they're insane.
They're absolutely
insane, right?
So like letting every
other ambassador
know that you'll be
leaving the country--
TOM FLETCHER: By fax.
FEMALE SPEAKER: -- by fax,
before you go anywhere.
TOM FLETCHER: Yeah.
Including people I've
never met before,
and have no
intention of meeting.
FEMALE SPEAKER: So
I can understand
why perhaps some of
these things maybe
should be changed, or
adapted, or adjusted.
TOM FLETCHER: Credentials
is one of the other ones.
When you arrive in a country--
FEMALE SPEAKER:
Exactly, exactly.
TOM FLETCHER: -- you have this
kind of three-page letter from
the queen that explains that
you are who you say you are.
Which you could do with
a Google search now.
FEMALE SPEAKER: Yeah.
TOM FLETCHER: And
you wait for a month.
And you're not
allowed to start work
until you've presented your
credentials to the leaders,
so you lose.
In any other business,
the first 90 days--
you all know this--
the most important time
to really establish yourself
and get up and running.
Diplomats are often
spending that time
at home waiting
for the phone call
from the president's
office to say
you can come down and present
this bit of paper to them.
FEMALE SPEAKER:
So it seems to me
like some of these
traditions maybe
should be disrupted
regardless, or were in line
to be disrupted regardless.
So I look at your
book, and I see
how much you talk about what
can we do, how can we change,
how can we disrupt diplomacy?
And technology helps.
But I also wonder
how much of a role
your particular
temperament played.
TOM FLETCHER: Ooph.
FEMALE SPEAKER:
It seems like you
have a bit of a disruptive
streak, or a bit of a--
TOM FLETCHER: You'd have
to ask my former bosses.
I was quite lucky for
a number of reasons.
One was because I'd
worked in Number 10,
everyone assumed I
had somehow had sign
off on what I was doing.
And so I could get
away with a bit more
than I would have
done otherwise.
As you said, I was a bit younger
than most people doing the job,
so I could do it looking
a little bit less
than like an uncle dancing
to "YMCA" at a wedding.
At times, I failed on that.
And I was also lucky, I
think, because in Lebanon--
because there's no real state,
there's no real structure,
there was no one to really
complain about the fact
that I was being quite critical
of the leaders of the country,
I could again get away with more
outrageous, provocative stuff.
I could pick more arguments.
And I needed to pick
arguments, because the people
I was in competition
with there were
Hizbullah, the Iranian
regime, the Asad regime.
Those were the people
who I was fighting
with on that
digital battlefield.
FEMALE SPEAKER: Yeah.
And you talk a lot
about connection
rather than connectivity, right?
So it's very interesting
to see how can you
forge those real connections and
how can we as citizens do that?
I think with that,
I might actually
open it up to the floor,
if that's all right.
Because I, otherwise,
will take up
all of the time
asking questions.
Please wait for the microphone.
you see the nation
state surviving
to the end of the century?
And if not, who will
diplomats be representing
at the end of a century?
TOM FLETCHER: I do.
But mainly because
I don't think we'll
come up with a better idea.
And there won't be a moment
when people say, right,
the nation state is now dead.
But I do think that many
individual states won't
survive.
And it's interesting now when
you see states existing online
before offline.
Kosovo existed on
Google Maps before it
existed on the real map.
And so there's a real
challenge to the nation state.
And I think what
you will find is
it's more of a slow ebbing of
power, away from the states
and away from the systems
of governance we've
constructed around states.
The problem is then, what
do you put in its place?
So when we had this problem
in 1815, a bunch of people
like me-- although,
I probably wouldn't
have been quite from the
right social background
to have been one of those
people at the time-- just went
to Vienna for six months,
representing states
and stitched up the world.
Did the deal that lasted
until the First World War.
But who do you have
in the room now?
Do you go to Davos and
try and do it there?
Hopefully not.
The biggest strength we
have as nation states
is the fact that no one
quite has a better idea yet.
It's not that nation
states will be
able to deliver all the
things that people want them
to themselves.
AUDIENCE: So
professional diplomats,
ambassadors, presumably,
were originally there
to represent kings and
queens and prime ministers
to other kings and queens
and prime ministers
because communication
was too slow.
So now, communication is fast.
And kings and queens
and prime ministers
can talk to each other.
What's the role of the
professional diplomat?
TOM FLETCHER: There's
a crossover, actually,
between those two questions.
Just very briefly, I want to
just tell you that this time
last year, we debated sending
an ambassador to Google.
And you can see
the logic of that.
You think, OK, well
Google's coming up
the list of power brokers.
And we clearly have a whole
bunch of issues to debate,
cooperate on, argue
about with Google.
Arguably, more-- I won't pick
a random country [INAUDIBLE],
but arguably more
than many countries.
And so we really
thought hard about this,
but then decided that we
hadn't sent an ambassador
to previous commercial empires
and corporates in the past.
And, ultimately, we, as
professional diplomats now,
represent states still.
The technology point
is really important.
When the telephone came
along, Palmerston, the then
foreign secretary, said, my god,
this is the end of diplomacy.
And then when the
fax came along,
someone joked, well, you can
replace the Foreign Office
with a fax.
At every stage-- when
the stirrup came along,
I tell the story in here about
how the horseback riding meant
that one poor Chinese
diplomat in 7th century BC
was slow-sliced, death
by a thousand cuts.
FEMALE SPEAKER: This
is a horrific story.
It's worth reading.
Oh my gosh.
TOM FLETCHER: It's kind
of post-watershed story.
So there will always
be a new piece of tech.
And everyone will
say, OK, now leaders
can talk directly and so on.
But I would argue,
coming from my world,
you still need
people on the ground.
People will say, for example,
now replace the diplomats
with robots.
And I'm doing a project
at New York University,
can a robot do a better climate
change deal than a diplomat?
But I would argue
you still need people
who are curious, and
creative, and have
this focus on promoting
coexistence on the ground,
and can speak the
language, and so on.
I think we still
have a head start.
And there is still a place
for the human in that process.
But only if the human is using
the technology as effectively
as you are.
FEMALE SPEAKER: You do.
You list three different kinds
of actors in your book, right?
So those who are obviously
hostile, apparently friendly,
and then local rivals for
authority and influence.
And you put tech companies
in that second bucket,
apparently friendly.
Why apparently friendly?
TOM FLETCHER: I mean, I'll
give an example of a friendly
and example of an
unfriendly then.
I think-- I've got one
project at the moment
to get 1 million Syrian
kids into school.
And these are 1 million kids who
are in Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey.
Imagine them as future
Google employees
or imagine them as
future-- what they will
be if they don't go to school.
And we can't crack that
problem as governments.
And so what we're
trying to do now,
as the Global Business
Coalition, is go out to Uber
and say, can you help us
with the transport here?
We're actually not
looking for money.
We're not looking for
CSR, in the classic sense.
We're looking for your
problem-solving abilities.
We go out to Google
or Facebook and say,
can you help
provide connectivity
for the classrooms?
So we can get the devices
and the education--
and the content on the
devices into the kids' hands,
getting school to kids,
not kids to school.
And we're going out to Ikea
and [? Arab ?] and saying,
can you build the buildings?
Again, don't give us cash.
And in support of all that,
we found this brilliant guy
who has recently sold his
tech company in California,
who is not giving us half
his profits, but is giving us
now three days a month trying
to design the internet dating
technology-- that means
we can match people
who want to help
with people who need
the help in both directions.
So there's a whole
ton of stuff there
where we're clearly
on the same side.
But then if you look at a lot of
the security stuff-- and Apple
have obviously been
in the midst of this
recently-- that
it's competitive.
And it will have to
be because the second
that the big tech
companies are seen
to be too close to
government, then
you're going to be pretty
quickly disrupted yourselves.
So there's a natural
friction there
and a natural competition.
I also think-- another of
competition, by the way.
I was at Cambridge
University yesterday.
And this room, I'm sure,
is an example of this.
You're going to be hoovering
up the best talent.
We can't recruit the
best people anymore
because they want to
go and work at Google.
FEMALE SPEAKER: Interesting.
TOM FLETCHER: That's a
very direct competition.
We can't pay them
as much as you can.
And they're also saying
this is where the power is.
We want to go where
the action is.
FEMALE SPEAKER: So do
you think it's power
or do you think it's interest?
TOM FLETCHER: And
interest, I'm sure.
And also, your canteen
is much better than ours.
[LAUGHTER]
Yeah.
FEMALE SPEAKER: Fabulous.
More questions from the floor?
We've got one at the back.
So if you could
wait for the mic.
AUDIENCE: Thank you.
We're seeing the erosion
of the traditional nation
state in this move towards
direct digital democracy.
But if you look at
the recent thing
about the naming of a boat and
Boaty McBoatface and all that,
is our people actually ready
for that responsibility?
And as real world,
it's even more scary
than Mr. Trump due to the
kind of frivolous nature
of social media.
TOM FLETCHER: It's a
really good question.
It's a question that's
always been asked,
of course, at every
stage of political change
and democratization.
And in the book, I've got
some kind of great quotes
from old diplomats
basically saying,
the problem with
newspapers is that people
will think they have some
influence over diplomacy
and so on.
And TV as well.
My argument is that if you
think the bottom line of my job,
of diplomacy, is
trying to prevent
people of [? dying ?] conflict.
It's a very simple way
of trying to capture it.
And at every moment when there's
been a greater democratization,
where more people have had
greater oversight of what
I do, or we do in my
world, fewer people
have died violently.
And we're now, of
course, 200 times less
likely to die violently
than 100 years ago.
So I see it on balance
as a positive thing.
The empowerment of the
mob is a positive thing.
But it does make my job harder.
And August 2013 is
a classic example
of that, the debate over whether
we should bomb Bashar al-Assad.
Under the old rules, governments
had decided we'd do it.
US, UK, in we go.
But, of course, the
reality was different.
Post-Iraq, but also
in a social media
age when people are
commenting in real time
about the decisions
you're taking,
the UK parliament said no.
And then, that gave Obama
reason to pause, and in the end,
not to do it either.
And so, on balance, who knows?
May be a good thing.
The problem with making
judgments in foreign policy
is, of course, you
never have hindsight.
But it's an example
of how actually it's
harder if you're in the more
transparent West-- it's harder
to do diplomacy because you
can't bluff in the same way.
You can't win that-- kind
of that hand of poker
against the more
autocratic regimes
and against the Russians.
FEMALE SPEAKER: I did like that
you note that not only does
Putin ride horseback, but
he has the biggest plane.
TOM FLETCHER: He has, by
far, the biggest plane.
FEMALE SPEAKER: [INAUDIBLE]
diplomatic summit.
TOM FLETCHER: You can read
all sorts of things into that.
But [INAUDIBLE] has a
pretty big plane, as well.
We arrived at one
summit on a plane
we borrowed from Led Zeppelin.
And it had leopard skin
seats and stuff like that.
I think now the UK
prime minister is now
allowed his own plane at last.
And about time, too.
Long overdue.
FEMALE SPEAKER: More
questions from the floor.
Got one over here, please.
AUDIENCE: So we
see, as governments,
tend to lean more
on digital tools,
that you enable them
to reach whatever
they got-- their goals.
You know, with this whole
digital age thing coming about.
How would you think the cyber
warfare aspect of things
and the cyber espionage
type of things
will affect diplomacy
and also the transparency
within governments and
certain regimes, et cetera?
TOM FLETCHER: It's a
really important point.
And I think one of my great
worries is that, at the moment,
as a result of Iraq, of Edward
Snowden, of Julian Assange,
the public doesn't actually
trust us enough with their data
to give us the power
we need to take
on the bad guys in that space.
And when we're
looking for evidence
of terrorist's planning and
so on, what we're looking for
is the needle in the haystack.
You've got to be able
to look through the hay
in order to find it.
And that's going to become
harder and harder because
of that loss of
trust in government.
And so somehow--
and it's something
I'm trying to do
in the book a bit--
somehow we have to try
and make the case afresh
to people for why we can
be trusted-- why we're not
some great kind of
Watergate-type conspiracy
and all we really want to
do is read your emails.
But I think we're losing
that argument at the moment.
And that is a threat to
our collective survival
because it gives an
advantage to people
who want to threaten and
terrorize our societies.
By the way though,
one of the best
follows I'd recommend on
Twitter at the moment is GCHQ.
CIA were great when they
first came on, as well.
But imagine if you're
trying to design a Twitter
account for a spy agency.
[LAUGHTER]
[INAUDIBLE] an interview
to try and challenge you.
And the trick is, of
course, to just find
a way to be authentic.
And GCHQ tweets math puzzles
and say, we love math.
Can you try this out
and see if you're
clever enough to work for us?
But also, they're proud of
their history, quite rightly.
And so they tweet
stuff from the history
of-- that they can talk about.
And I think that's a pretty
effective Twitter account.
And if you like math
puzzles, they're great.
FEMALE SPEAKER: That's fabulous.
I have a quick question about
the Official Secrets Act.
So your book has gone through
the Official Secrets Act.
What was that like?
TOM FLETCHER: It wasn't too bad.
Actually, I used to do this--
when I was inside government,
one of the things
I used to oversee
was clearing of books
by rogue diplomats.
And so I kind of knew
where the line was.
And I've taken out
lots of kind of very
salacious and racy stuff
from other people's books.
Clearly, you can't talk
about specific examples
of intelligence work.
FEMALE SPEAKER: Yeah.
TOM FLETCHER: I think you
have to be a bit careful
if you're talking about
serving leaders, quite rightly,
especially if you're
talking about--
if I was spilling the beans--
I'm sorry, it's not in here--
it would make a more
interesting book--
if I was spilling the beans
on what David Cameron thought
of Angela Merkel.
I think someone in government
should take that out,
to be honest.
Because that's not going to--
it's fun, it's salacious,
but it's not going
to help anyone.
So I was trying to stay on
the right side of that line
when I was writing it.
In fact, in the end, the
one thing that got taken out
was a reference
to representation.
And it's quite an
academic thing, this.
I was saying I didn't feel I was
just Her Majesty's Ambassador,
HMA.
But I felt like I was the
British people's ambassador.
I was representing Bond,
and Beckham, and Benedict
Cumberbatch, and
all the rest of it.
And the feeling was
that that might not
go down well with the palace.
I've discussed it
with the palace.
They're quite relaxed.
They do you feel that
that's what ambassadors do,
you represent the
wider national brand.
And that it's as important
to represent that soft power
as it is to represent--
to judge your power by how
many bullets you can sell.
FEMALE SPEAKER: Absolutely.
More questions from the floor.
AUDIENCE: So how do you
evaluate a diplomat?
It was mentioned
in the introduction
that you were one of the
youngest ambassadors out there.
I always imagine that diplomacy
is a very hierarchical,
I guess, industry.
There are no shortcuts.
You have to do your
time as a junior attache
in some [INAUDIBLE] country,
and again, and again, and so on.
So can you comment on that?
TOM FLETCHER: It is
very hierarchical.
It's opening up.
And so you've got lots of
slightly younger people coming
through slightly earlier.
Although, it's very
striking for me moving out
of a business
where I always felt
I was the youngest
person in the room.
And now, I'm kind of
doing things [INAUDIBLE]
and I'm the oldest in the room.
Much like anyone else, you
get evaluated every year.
You get an annual appraisal.
And they will look at
the key competencies.
I guess you go
through similar thing.
You had working with others,
leadership, problem-solving,
and so on.
I've just done a big review
of the Foreign Office.
And what we're trying
to re-orientate towards
is looking at the
skills as well.
We've gone a bit too far in
the direction of competencies
and away from the skills.
So we need to get
back to evaluating
people's courage, and
creativity, and curiosity,
and so on.
Those things that have always
made diplomats very, very good.
You go through-- there's
an assessment center
kind of halfway through your
career, which is very, very
hard to get through.
Before you become
a diplomat, you
have a year of being
tested and assessed.
And they go out--
maybe this is something
that Google in its terribly
sinister way is now doing.
But they used to go
out and talk to-- you'd
give them three names from your
life of people who knew you.
They would ask those three
people for three more,
and then, three
more, three more.
They'd fan out until they got
to people who you didn't really
know.
And then they would ask the
truth about what you were like.
And then, they'd get you
back in and say, so that time
at that youth
hostel in Jerusalem,
on the roof when this happened--
and you'd be so shocked.
The whole idea of
that was that they
wanted to ensure that you
weren't black mailable.
They weren't going
to kick you out
because you'd smoked
something funny at some stage
or you'd spent the night with
someone funny at some stage.
It was all about ensuring
they had all the information
that our opponents could
otherwise use to blackmail you.
FEMALE SPEAKER: Fascinating.
Question just behind.
AUDIENCE: Yeah,
one of the things
that struck me when you
were talking earlier
about the culture that
you wanted to build
seemed very similar to Google.
We want a collaborative
environment.
And we're quite fanatical
about protecting that.
And if we start to
see that it's shifting
in one direction or another,
we have entire departments
dedicated to that.
How do diplomats think
about shaping culture?
And is there stuff
we could learn
from you guys, or vice-versa?
TOM FLETCHER: I
think actually one
thing that British diplomats do
very well is share information.
You'd think in
most institutions,
like the Foreign Office, there'd
be a hoarding of information.
And that's the kind of classic,
kind of hierarchical thing
to do.
And I can pretty much guarantee
that this morning, our
[INAUDIBLE], our
ambassador in New York,
is going into the
Security Council
with more information than
anyone else in the room.
Because he will have
read this morning
reports-- we call
them telegrams,
but they're really like
kind of long emails;
they're not really telegrams--
from all the relevant countries
that they're debating
that day in the hall.
And he'll have got a
message from Number 10.
He'll have got messages
from the Foreign Office.
And his people have
curated all that data
in a way that means he's
got that head start.
It's amazing how often,
as a British diplomat,
other diplomats come
to you to ask what's
happening in their
capital, because they're
hoarding information to
a much greater degree.
So that, I think, is perhaps
the key thing, the key strength
that I would try to
take from the world I
was in into other worlds.
AUDIENCE: Does the
lobbying industry
provide an effective diplomacy
channel for non-state actors
like Google to nation states?
TOM FLETCHER: I
think it's making
lots of people very rich.
I think there's lots that
I try to use in the book
that we can learn from
watching lobbyists
and how they operate
in order to be
better diplomatic lobbyists,
which is one of the core things
that we do.
I was frustrated in Number
10 that in four years
I was lobbied a lot
by arms dealers,
but I wasn't lobbied
anything like enough by NGOs.
And yesterday, I went to talk
to a group of NGOs to say,
here's how you can
be more effective.
Here are the moments when
you can really change
our views inside government.
I think that lobbyists,
they wouldn't
exist if they weren't
moderately effective.
But they're much less
effective than they tell you
when they're pitching.
AUDIENCE: You talked there
about summarizing information,
and Google's always
tried to make information
accessible by
making it searchable
so you can access everything
with the right search phrases.
Whereas, what you
described for ambassadors
was much more about really
effective summarization.
Do you think there's things
that either side could do better
in that?
TOM FLETCHER: Yeah.
I mean, we're [? woeful ?]
at knowledge management.
And so when I used to go
and meet a Lebanese warlord,
he'd been there for
30 years and would
have basically in
his head the kind
of Rolodex of all
his previous contacts
with British ambassadors.
And I would be going in
there without any of that.
We haven't found
a really good way
to conserve the data, the
knowledge that we have.
And so again, one
of the things we're
trying to do at
New York University
now is build like a diplopedia,
which is almost your knowledge
archive as an institution.
And so that when
you go to a meeting,
you have a kind of
diplobot, or an app,
or a gadget that basically
runs through it and tells you,
OK, this is the guy.
10 years ago, he did this.
15 years ago, he told
the ambassador this.
This is the time
that he mucked up.
This is the time that
he screwed us over.
This is the time that
he collaborated with us.
And it just gives you
a much better sense
of your historical relationship
with that individual.
So that's something I
think we could really
learn from the outside world.
The reality is that Google
is doing that for us
at the moment.
Google is our best tool
for that at the moment.
And yet, still inside the
Foreign Office-- I mean,
this is the problem.
If you Google "Naked Diplomat"
inside the Foreign Office,
you get the hand saying
inappropriate content.
But you find everyone
in the Foreign Office
using Google a huge amount.
FEMALE SPEAKER:
It's interesting.
I think the question
really around how do you
summarize, and
collate, and access
the right bits of
institutional memory
at the right time is
absolutely incredible.
I think though,
it's very difficult,
this warlord with
all of his memories.
If you were to look
at those in the whole,
there'd be far too
much information
to ever ingest or use usefully.
It's the situational and
context clues, isn't it?
TOM FLETCHER: Yeah.
That's why if you can
be the person that
can curate that
knowledge and work out
what to do with it, that is
a position of real power now,
I think.
FEMALE SPEAKER: Interesting.
AUDIENCE: You said you'd
talked about sending
an ambassador to Google.
And I guess the answer
was certainly not yet.
What would be the trigger that
would actually make it happen?
TOM FLETCHER: Yeah.
I mean, I think in
reality what would happen
is you'd send a representative.
It wouldn't
necessarily be someone
who would be called an
ambassador because that then
basically suggests the
nation state is finished
and you're looking at
different model, in which case,
people would say, well, why is
it the British government that
chooses to send one or not?
I think what you will
see happening-- I mean,
we already have a really
good consul general in LA,
for example.
I think you'll find that
those hubs near where
tech companies are will
grow and grow and grow.
And you'll increasingly send
better and better people
to those places because
it's a recognition
that that's where
the arguments are
and the potential ideas are.
The problem for us
inside government
is we still-- we're
still effectively saying
to tech companies,
I think, OK, here
are the issues we care about.
Please come into
our conversation.
And I imagine that that's
a bit of a turnoff.
We've got to find
ways to say, OK,
what are the things
we can crack together?
What are the problems
we can solve together?
But I don't know.
This debate about
should Google come on
to the Security Council?
That would be a trigger
to send someone to Google.
[LAUGHTER]
AUDIENCE: Hi.
You said that the
role of diplomats
is to foster cooperation
and sort of lightly touched
on the topic of Brexit.
What do you think
about EU and what
would happen to
diplomacy if the UK were
to leave or not to leave?
What do you think should happen?
TOM FLETCHER: When
I used to advise PMs
before press
conferences, I'd always
say, be careful towards the
end of the press conference
because that's when
you start to relax
and that's when you kind
of let your guard down
and give the answer you
weren't planning to.
And this is the end of
the week of book tour.
This is the last
event, actually.
So I arrived conscious.
All right, I'm not
going to go and say
the wrong thing on Brexit.
So forgive me for
being-- all my stuff
is about being open
and honest and more
transparent about what we do.
Except when it comes
to my views on Brexit,
where I've spent the whole
week trying not to answer
that question.
I'm really worried about
the way the debate has gone.
I don't think that Britain
is a country that needs
to be scared of the world.
And the debate, I
fear, on both sides
has been much-- far too
much characterized by fear.
We must leave Europe because
those terribly frightening
people in Brussels are
dominating our lives.
Or, we must stay in Europe
because if we don't, we'll
never survive in
the 21st century.
I don't believe
either of those views.
The country I was representing--
trying to represent in Lebanon
was much more confident,
and outward-looking,
and aware of its role in
the world and its history.
We've been at our best when
we've been outward-looking,
and open-minded, and sought
new ideas and markets.
You see, I'm not answering
the question at all, am I?
[LAUGHTER]
But as I said earlier on, I'm
up for coexistence and opposed
to building walls.
And so that gives
you a bit of a clue.
[LAUGHTER]
I should explain why I'm not
answering the question, which
is that we're in a period
called Purdah where
current civil servants
and recently resigned
civil servants aren't
supposed to give
a view on the referendum.
So, sorry, that's why
I have to be so boring.
FEMALE SPEAKER: If we perhaps
took a step back and looked
at things a little
bit more abstractly,
as opposed to talking about
Brexit directly-- let's just
say we took one step back.
TOM FLETCHER: You
should be on the TV.
This is [INAUDIBLE].
FEMALE SPEAKER: You
know, I do what I can.
But I have a genuine question
around unpicking the EU,
or unpicking any set of
complicated agreements
is probably outside of
something I'm capable of doing
as an informed citizen.
TOM FLETCHER: Yeah.
FEMALE SPEAKER: So if we're
looking at not Brexit,
but a complicated set
of external engagements
and agreements, what's the
role for citizen diplomacy
or citizen democracy there?
How can we meaningfully
and relevantly engage?
And to what extent can we
meaningfully or relevantly
engage?
TOM FLETCHER: It's
true, actually.
I mean, I think
that's, in a way,
a reason why either
outcome actually
will have lots of officials
kind of licking their lips,
because there will be a
real job for them to do.
And in a situation where
we, for example, we
were dealing with Brexit,
there'd be masses of work.
And yet, it would
have to be done
by the professional diplomats.
So they would be at
the center of things,
actually, in that context.
FEMALE SPEAKER: But how can
citizens make those choices
and decisions?
TOM FLETCHER: That's
a really good point.
I would hope that anyone
running that negotiation
would be trying to find ways to
engage people and involve them
more in the decisions
we would need to take,
so that it wouldn't all
be done behind the curtain
by the institutions.
But I think also,
as individuals,
you would need to be challenging
government at that moment.
And saying, that vote--
whichever way the Brexit
vote goes, the public have
basically been saying,
we're fed up of everything
we've stitched up in this way.
We want more of a say
over where power is going
and how it's exercised.
So hopefully that
gives people a bit
more leverage with
government to hold
them to account and to
influence specific decisions,
rather than waiting every
five years for an election.
FEMALE SPEAKER: Right.
TOM FLETCHER: But that's going
to take more direct democracy.
FEMALE SPEAKER: Time for
another two questions.
One in the back row.
AUDIENCE: Can you follow
up about agreements
like TTIP that are being
negotiated in secret and people
do not really have any
influence about that?
And a second one would
be similar to this
because-- and touching
also on the surveillance--
because we have seen in the
past that surveillance has
been abused time and again
to actually stop people
from having an influence.
So can you comment
on that please?
TOM FLETCHER: Yeah.
I mean, I think
on the second one,
it comes back to the point
about how difficult it
is for us to build the trust we
need to keep people secure now.
Because we don't
have a great history
of doing it in the right way.
I mean, generally,
in my experience,
having been in that world,
if you go down to Cheltenham,
where we have our government
communication headquarters that
does the monitoring
work, you will
find a bunch of people who
are incredibly motivated,
and real public servants,
and very professional.
And I just wish there was a
way of almost demonstrating
that more effectively, of
showing that, actually, there
are strong values at the heart
of many of these institutions.
But it's a very
difficult argument
to win while being
secretive about--
and [INAUDIBLE] be
secretive about what you do.
There will always be a role
for secrecy in the negotiations
on the first point.
And there's always a role--
the Iran deal was done mainly
in secret.
You know, I wasn't in the
room live tweeting the Iran
deal-- just as well.
So there is still
a part of diplomacy
which has to be confidential.
Just as, you know, there's
a part of your world
when you're negotiating
to buy a company that
has to be done in secret.
And that won't go
away any time soon.
My argument in the
book is that we
have to find a way to
try to explain that,
to communicate with
people to explain
why it has to be secret,
rather than just saying,
it's all a bit too complicated.
FEMALE SPEAKER: Great.
One more question.
AUDIENCE: So you mentioned
citizen diplomacy before.
What would you recommend,
or what is there
that we can actually do now to
fight against building walls
and our ideas for the world?
FEMALE SPEAKER: Amazing.
Amazing to finish on.
TOM FLETCHER: Yeah,
brilliant note to finish on.
I think, pick the
right argument.
Take on the people who are on
the wrong side of the argument.
Think about how you can use
the smartphone superpower
that you have to get into
those debates in the right way.
Don't just assume that someone
else will do that for you.
But you're doing
this all already.
I mean, being kind of
curious and open-minded
about the world, and
taking on those people who
are getting more and more
narrow and introverted.
Joining the right campaigns.
As you are doing,
building the ideas
that we don't yet know we
need but will soon find out we
can't live without.
And then really, taking
on these big challenges
I mentioned, around
the next energy source,
around what we do about managing
the new weapons, the debates
about when we go to war and when
we don't go to war, the debates
around the balance between
security and liberty
that we've touched on online.
Those are all debates that
you should clearly all be in
and that shouldn't just be
happening behind the wall.
So I'd basically say,
seize the smartphone.
Get stuck in.
FEMALE SPEAKER: Fabulous.
Tom, thank you very
much for coming.
[? His book ?] is
"Naked Diplomacy."
TOM FLETCHER: Thank you.
Thank you very much.
[APPLAUSE]
