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This chapter describes the business goals, purpose, and strategy of public diplomatic services. It reinforces diplomatic organizations’ fundamental bureaucratic administrative culture (Tier 1). The bureaucratic culture of diplomacy is deconstructed, and each of the five layers is described in detail. The authors also explain why focusing on the artifacts and behavior layers are the dominant and essential starting points for analysis in diplomatic cultures. The public service culture (Tier 2) overlays and mediates the bureaucratic culture.

Additionally, the authors describe the influence that political appointees as leaders may play in shaping public service cultures. Next, the authors explain how diplomatic cultures reflect the core values of a state’s culture. Next, the chapter outlines the landscape of external influencing cultures (Tier 3) in diplomacy. Finally, the knowledge, learning, and collaboration (KLC) culture of diplomacy is considered, with opportunities for future growth.

Using the theoretical frameworks of public diplomacy and public relations, we mapped how the Chinese government has used panda imagery to build its national brand on Twitter and how this ‘panda diplomacy’ has facilitated its para-diplomatic actions. Our findings uncover new attempts by the Chinese government to engage in digital diplomacy. Mobilizing panda imagery on Twitter enhanced friendly relations with foreign political leaders and people and established a friendly and peaceful image of China on Twitter.

Multinational corporations (MNCs) are experiencing a number of major challenges in the international business arena. Can business diplomacy help them to deal with these challenges effectively? In this introductory chapter we conceptualize and identify the relationship between MNCs’ international business diplomatic activities and firm performance.

We conducted a literature review and interviews with five large MNCs that are operating in distinctive industries. Business diplomatic activities have been classified into three particular areas to support the analysis, namely: (1) MNC–Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) relations, (2) MNC–Host Government relations, and (3) MNC–Local Community relations.

The main findings suggest that international business diplomacy has a direct positive effect on firm performance with regard to so-called soft or nonfinancial indicators. These indicators include knowledge sharing, reputation, company image, and marketing possibilities. The effect can in turn lead to a better financial performance and market stance in the long run.

The results of this study are important for the future awareness and execution of business diplomacy in large MNCs.

The COVID-19 pandemic was unprecedented and has disproportionately affected the lives and livelihoods of people worldwide. Many governments restricted social and economic activities to curb the virus, and with the availability of the COVID-19 vaccine, many see it as providing hope to return to normalcy. Within such a context, China, Russia, and the United States (USA) have leveraged their vaccine diplomacy to gain and expand their influence. Vaccine diplomacy could help major powers cement their influence well beyond the pandemic if successfully deployed. By examining the vaccine diplomacy race in Southeast Asia, this chapter reveals the factors that motivate major powers to engage in the race and the strategies used. This chapter also assesses China’s vaccine diplomacy in Malaysia and how it has contributed to cementing a stronger bilateral relationship between Malaysia and China that would probably outlast the pandemic.

One of the reasons the science and art of business diplomacy is interesting, is because it puts the role of the nation in another, somewhat reduced, perspective. Instead of the nation, it puts a company at the focal point of an exchange of interests with NGOs and other national and international players. This is a reflection of a world that becomes ever more complicated: a truly multiactor world, implicating great global challenges for international companies.

However, changing the perspective from the nation state to that of business is not enough, no matter how multinational or big the enterprise is. To have a true perspective on the challenges diplomacy faces, it is better to add another perspective. A perspective in which the business and the multiactor aspect merge: in associations.

Here the international and diplomatic dimensions of associations are defined, a model for change is presented, and cases are discussed. Each case is discussed in terms of business diplomacy, using recent literature and definitions. Certainly not all actions by associations can be called diplomatic, but some can and these are significant.

Combining this insight and the possible impact of associations with available literature on the definition and nature of business (economic, corporate, commercial) diplomacy, a different light will be shed on the concept of business diplomacy. Perhaps it is better to speak about “multiactor diplomacy,” in which traditional, business, and other forms of diplomacy all have their place. The chapter ends with conclusions and specific recommendations.

In an ongoing process of globalization and technology improvements and due to an increase in worldwide actors in the economic sector, commercial diplomacy is an important tool for countries to support their business community during the internationalization process and afterwards. Nevertheless, commercial diplomacy literature is still in its infancy. Therefore, this chapter reviews existing research on the topic and develops a framework, which integrates the topics examined so far and provides the reader with a more complete picture of the topic at hand.

By means of a literature review, this chapter shows that the body of literature involving research of both disciplines, International Relations and International Management, is still rather limited. As a consequence, we determine a future research agenda and call for more empirical studies, especially in the field of (political) economy.

Global mass communications and advances in new information and telecommunication technology present a new challenge to the traditional way of conducting international relations. While the mode of conducting diplomacy is changing, diplomats are forced to communicate with many new actors in the international stage through new means of communication. The chapter overviews the existing digital diplomacy research reports. Against this backdrop it presents the outcomes of a 2017–2018 study of communication strategies employed by six countries of the Western Balkans, including Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro, and Serbia. The findings of the study give a first-hand data from the practical point of view on how, which, and to which extent digital tools are utilized as a tool of digital tools are utilized as a tool of digital diplomacy by the official communicators of ministries of foreign affairs (MFA) in the researched region.