The handbook delves into the shifting power dynamics in diplomacy, exploring the establishment of embassies in technology hubs, the challenges faced by foreign affairs departments in adapting to digital technologies, and the utilization of digital tools as a means of exerting influence.

Feminist Policymaking in Turbulent Times offers a unique and timely reflection of the critical debates around the institutionalisation of feminist and gender-focused ideas and norms into policy. Many states and non-governmental organisations are increasingly invested in ‘feminist policymaking’ at the domestic and international levels. Yet, this liberal (feminist) agenda is also vastly disputed by critical, intersectional, and decolonial voices on the one hand, and by anti-gender movements around the world on the other hand. Indeed, while opposition to ‘gender ideology’ is mounting from reactionary, religious, and secular forces, feminist policymaking is also being challenged in important ways from within. Thus, this book situates feminist policymaking in a challenging and ‘turbulent’ global context. This book explores feminist policymaking in multiple areas of policy, examining various gender-focused programmes that states and international organisations have undertaken in the last decade, offering critical interventions and rethinking the relationship between feminism and policy. This book not only reflects on the advances of feminist policymaking globally but also critically assesses the intersectional challenges embedded within it and lying ahead. It moves the field forward by creating opportunities, based on lived experiences, for re-imagining the transformative potential of the nexus between feminism and policymaking. Interdisciplinary in scope and bringing to the fore the voices of both academics and practitioners, this book is the product of an international collaboration, forging links and dialogue that are increasingly necessary to question some of the exclusionary, militaristic, and hierarchical assumptions of policymaking which is labelled as feminist. Feminist Policymaking in Turbulent Times will be of interest to all scholars, students, and practitioners interested in the role of gender in policymaking and concerned with contestations around gender-focused projects.

This handbook integrates a range of conceptual and empirical approaches to diplomacy in the context of ongoing technological and societal change. Technological and societal disruptions affect modern diplomacy, altering its character and reforming its way. In light of such changes, this book offers both historical foundations and contemporary perspectives in the field. By doing so, it demonstrates how contemporary change impacts the work of diplomats representing sovereign states. Global diplomatic services will forever be affected by the digitalization of engagement between states during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. In this rapidly changing culture, with burgeoning geopolitical and geostrategic realignment among global powers, the tools of diplomacy have changed. The state’s foreign policy astuteness and responses to these changes could have long-term impacts. All this culminates in opportunities for improving the management of diplomatic services and efficiency of the Ministries of Foreign Affairs (MoFA) of various states. This book provides useful insights into how modern diplomacy works, especially the integration of informalities into formal diplomatic practices in complex peace and security environments, within such a framework of change.

After his Liberal Party’s surprise victory in the 2015 federal Canadian election, Justin Trudeau declared that "Canada was back" on the world stage. This comprehensive volume highlights issues in the relationship between articulated visions of Canada as a global actor, nation branding and domestic politics, noting the dangers of the politicization of the branding of Canada. It also provides the political context for thinking about ‘Brand Canada’ in the Trudeau era. The authors explore the Trudeau government’s embrace of political branding and how it plays out in key areas central to the brand, including: Canada’s relations with Indigenous peoples; social media and digital diplomacy; and the importance of the Arctic region for Canada’s brand, even though it is often ignored by politicians and policymakers. The book asks whether the Trudeau government has lived up to its claim that Canada is back, and highlights the challenges that emerge when governments provide optimistic visions for meaningful transformation, but then do not end up leading meaningful change. This book will be of great interest to students and scholars of political science, particularly those with a focus on Canada. It was originally published as a special issue of Canadian Foreign Policy Journal.

In this handbook, a group of 40 scholars and practitioners from some 30 countries takes a critical look at the contemporary practice of diplomacy. Many assume diplomacy evolves naturally, and that state- and non-state actors are powerless to make significant changes. But Diplomacy’s methods, its key institutions and conventions were agreed more than six decades ago. None take account of the opportunities and vulnerabilities presented by the Internet. Diplomacy is now a neglected global issue.The COVID pandemic and the invasion of Ukraine have highlighted some of the problems of diplomatic dysfunction. Beyond identifying current problems diplomacy is facing, the book also seeks to identify some practical options for reform and innovation. How might a process of reform be agreed and implemented? What role might the United Nations, regional organizations and Big Tech play? How can new norms of diplomatic behavior and methods be established in a multipolar, digital world where diplomacy is seen as less and less effective?

The Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) agenda is celebrated as a landmark global framework for achieving gender equality in peace and security governance. Its power is visible in two decades of United Nations resolutions, national action plans, regional initiatives, and countless activist, academic, and philanthropic projects. Yet despite this vitality, it is haunted by failure, as a lack of political will and stubborn patriarchal resistance frustrate its promise. This book offers a groundbreaking critical account of the WPS agenda, exploring its evolution in relation to the wider politics of global governance and feminism. Paul Kirby and Laura J. Shepherd argue that WPS is not a settled, cohesive policy but a field in flux, defined and disrupted by a growing number of national, supranational, subnational, and transnational agents who in turn act on an expanding catalogue of threats, from climate change to homophobia, challenging traditional boundaries of peace and security. Kirby and Shepherd reconceptualize WPS as a “policy ecosystem,” tracing interaction and contestation around the agenda across levels from the UN Security Council to military alliances to feminist activists. They combine analysis of a vast dataset of policy documents with key informant interviews and close readings of diplomacy, statecraft, the politics of indigeneity, counterinsurgency, antimilitarism, human rights, and the arms trade across the first twenty years of WPS. Far-reaching and incisive, Governing the Feminist Peace poses a provocative question: What if we abandoned the idea of the WPS agenda as a unified political project altogether?