Secret Diplomacy

Synopsis

Secret Diplomacy is a political work written by Paul S. Reinsch, whose other writings include  The Common Law in the Early American Colonies, 1899, World Politics at the End of the Nineteenth Century as Influenced by the Oriental Situation, 1900, Colonial Government, 1902, Colonial Administration, 1905. American Legislatures and Legislative Methods, 1907, Intellectual Currents in the Far East, 1911, International Unions, 1911, An American Diplomat in China, 1913–1918, 1922.

The principal conclusions based on the material contained in this book were presented by the Author at a joint meeting of the American Historical Association and the American Political Science Association, in his address as President of the latter, on December 28th, 1920. 

Is secret diplomacy the evil spirit of modern politics? Is it the force that keeps nations in a state of potential hostility and does not allow a feeling of confidence and of wholehearted coöperation to grow up? Or is it only a trade device, a clever method of surrounding with an aura of importance the doings of the diplomats, a race of men of average wisdom and intelligence who traditionally have valued the prestige of dealing with “secret affairs of state”? Or is it something less romantic than either of these—merely the survival from a more barbarous age of instincts of secretiveness and chicane acquired at a time when self-defense was the necessity of every hour?

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