MARGINAL COMMENT
By HAROLD NICOLSON
THE White Paper upon the Reform of the Foreign Service is a document of importance.. For more than thirty years there have been many of us (both inside and outside the Service) who have longed and striven for some such reorganisation. The scheme now foreshadowed is more fundamental than any readjustment of departmental machinery ; it is an indication that the whole system of our representation abroad is to be radically altered ; it is a plan which only a man of Mr. Eden's imagination and personal authority could have devised or could hope to carry through. The proposed reforms fall under three main headings. An entirely new method is provided for the recruitment, selection and training of candidates ; the Diplomatic Service, the Commercial Diplomatic Service and the Consular Service are to be amalgamated into a single unit ; and legislation is to be introduced to enable the Secretary of State to remove lethargic officials before they reach the prescribed age of retirement. Each of these three reforms is an improvement ; in combination they should provide the country with a Foreign Service perfectly adapted to any New Order which may emerge. The main criticisms which have in the past been directed against cur Foreign Service are three in number. It has been contended (not always with full knowledge of the circumstances) that the Foreign Service is a privileged profession reserved for the sons of the rich and great. It has been said, and with greater justification, that the qualifications and functions of our younger diplomatists are so narrow as to limit their capacity for dealing with the economic and social problems of the age. And it has been asserted that their origins and training unfit them for mixing easily with every class of society in the foreign countries to which they are posted. The reforms now proposed should remedy these defects by widening the basis not only of recruitment, but also of training and experience.
Under theheading of recruitment the scheme throws the Foreign Service open to all competitors : the Foreign Office Selection Board is to be abolished. It is true, of course, that this Board did not, as some supposed, reject candidates who had not been educated at a leading Public School, nor did it, in fact, attach importance to purely social qualifications. Yet the existence of the Board did in practice deter many admirable young men from undergoing the ordeal of a personal interview in fear lest rejection might imply some slur upon their charm or breeding. I am delighted that the Board will cease to exist ; its value was always outweighed by the prejudice and suspicion it aroused. The framers of these proposed reforms were, however, wise enough to see that it was not merely the exist- ence of a preliminary Selection Board which frightened many of the poorer candidates away. It is essential in any Foreign Service that candidates should possess a perfect knowledge of at least. two foreign languages ; to learn such languages necessitates prolonged residence in the countries in which they are spoken ; and the fact that during this period of study abroad a young man was withdrawn from employment tended in itself to limit recruitment to those who during their nineteenth and twentieth years could afford to live on their own resources. This difficulty will be met by providing candidates who have passed the first examination with travelling studentships for a period of eighteen months. The examinations and training expected of candidates will fall into three distinct stages. First there will be a competitive examination similar to that for the Home or Indian Civil Service, requiring no specialised knowledge. As an alternative to this examination, and admittedly as an experi- ment, a certain proportion of candidates will be " selected " mainly on the basis of their record or personality. Candidates who have either passed the first examination, or have been " selected " on their general merits, will then be accorded travelling studentships to enable them to study abroad. On the completion of this stage they will return to London and be subjected to a second examination in the foreign languages and specialised subjects which they will have studied during their period of studentship. If they pass that examination they will become members of the Foreign Service. The second of the proposed rearms provides for the fusion the three existing branches (the Diplomatic, the Commercial and th Consular) into a single amalgamated Foreign Service. The advantag which will be gained by this fusion requires some explanatio Under the old system these three branches were kept in wale tight compartments ; a Consul was discouraged from occupyin himself with political matters, and a Diplomatist was not supposed to be interested in trade or commerce. Moreover, whereas the ambitious Consul had practically no prospect of ever becoming an Ambassador, the laziest Diplomatist (provided the bricks that gi he dropped were few or silent) could count with ease upon obtaining in at least a Legation. The effect of the amalgamation of the three branches should be most beneficial. It will immediately increase the area of interest and energy throughout the Service ; it will give the able Consul or Commercial Counsellor the chance of competing for the highest posts. on equal terms ; it will provide the Secretary of State with a larger reservoir both of appointments and of men to fill them ; and it will furnish the younger men not only with• better and more varied prospects of advancement, but also with more intensive and extensive experience. I am well aware, for instance, fc that if during my two and a half years in Turkey I had worked in the Vice-Consulate at Adana, I should have learnt far more about the Middle East than I ever did as Attaché to the Embassy in Constantinople. There is another danger, inherent in all pro- fessional service abroad, which these reforms seek to mitigate. In the old days the men who remained in Downing Street were apt to be dangerously ignorant of foreign conditions, whereas those who spent their life abroad tended to forget all that they had ever known of England. Measures are envisaged by which the members of the Foreign Service shall from time to time be given refresher courses at home and opportunities to acquaint themselves not merely with conditions in Great Britain, but with Dominion and Imperial Affairs. This, assuredly, is a prudent provision.
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The third of the drastic reforms suggested is that by which, under a Superannuation Bill, the Secretary of State can remove from the Service men whose laziness or incapacity is widely recognised. Hitherto the Foreign Office have hesitated to dismiss a man who had not yet qualified for a pension and whose past services, although futile, had given no cause for scandal or extreme reproach. A bottle-neck was thus created, and the more energetic men, dis- couraged by the wedge of incompetents in front of them, were apt to resign and seek their fortunes elsewhere. It is noticeable in this connexion that in the present Parliament those who exchanged diplomacy for politics have all, in one way or another, reached the front bench. It is to be hoped that under the revised system the ambitious men will be encouraged to stay. It is to be hoped also that, once the Superannuation Bill is passed, the ridiculous com- promise by which even the ablest Ambassador was retired at sixty will be allowed to lapse.
* * * * The scheme as outlined in the White Paper is to my mind wholly admirable. I have only one suggestion to make. - Now that the Diplomatic Service is to be enlarged, it will no longer be possible for those responsible for making appointments to have intimate personal knowledge of all the candidates for promotion. The man who has been favoured by fortune, opportunity or an enlightened chief will have an unfair advantage over the man who has never had a proper chance or who has had the misfortune to incur the dislike of his Ambassador or Minister. If appointments are not to be largely fortuitous, some sieve or test will be necessary. The only possible sieve is a Staff College, on the analogy of the Army, into which a man enters at the age of thirty to thirty-five. Those who pass the Staff College will have in principle a prior claim to the plums of the profession. Without some such thinning-out of the middle category of aspirants the danger may arise that ambitious men will seek to attract attention by dramatic deeds or to gain favour by agreeable despatches. This could only do the Service harm.
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