bout de papier, Vol. 10, No. 4 (1993) — Fall/Winter 1993 // Automne/Hiver 1993, p. 2
This is my first issue of bout de papier as editor. I have written a number of articles in the past under the rubric External from the Internal, all of which appeared on the back pages. This is the first time I have made the front half of the magazine, let alone the first article. Being editor certainly has its perks.
I think bout de papier is a great mag. And I am not alone. For the fourth consecutive year, bout de papier has won a Certificate of Distinction for Creativity for House Organ Design at the Annual Art Direction Awards in New York in October. Professional magazine publishers and art directors are telling us (and the publishing world) that bout is one of the better house journals of professional associations.
For that reason alone, I believe PAFSO members, members of other employee groups in the foreign service, and management of this Department and other departments involved with the delivery of foreign policy should be proud of bout. It is one of the reasons I am pleased to take on the challenge of editing bout over the next year. bout is more than just a pretty face. It tells the story of life in the foreign service and the story of foreign policy in the making and in the implementing whether it is peacekeeping, election supervising, aid and humanitarian assistance, multilateral diplomacy, immigration, and bilateral political and economic representation and reporting, and whether this happens in Asia, Africa, Americas, Europe or in the Lester B. Pearson building. bout tries to capture the variety of challenges, frustrations, highlights, and humour that practitioners of Canadian foreign policy encounter as part of our careers or current jobs. bout is not an academic journal of foreign policy analysis; it is a magazine for those actively involved in the making and delivery of foreign policy. bout is a window into the foreign service but as important it is a forum for the exchange of views and information for those within the service.
In each edition, we try to examine career and job concerns to our membership and others involved with foreign policy; we look at management of the foreign service; we relate making and delivering of foreign policy at home and abroad through first person accounts covering the wide spectrum of foreign policy-peacekeeping, election supervision, multilateral diplomacy, sports, culture, immigration, and political and economic reporting; we look back at the history of foreign policy; and we publish travel and personal vignettes of life abroad, which is after all why many chose the foreign service or a foreign job.
For anyone who has been asked by curious neighbours, insatiable relatives, or eager undergraduates, what exactly do you do overseas or at headquarters, or what exactly is the reality of implementing foreign policy, bout de papier offers one stop relief.
My first issue as editor, I believe, retlects the overall goals of bout. James Trottier’s article on negotiating the Vienna Declaration of Human Rights, Barbara Shenstone’s article on election supervision in Cambodia, Brigadier General Douglas’s article on peacekeeping in Nicaragua, and Nick Coghlan’s article on soccer diplomacy in Mexico are first hand accounts of Canada using four widely diverse instruments of foreign policy on the front lines of three continents. On a historical note, Geoffrey Pearson reminisces about close encounters of the third kind behind the former Iron Curtain and John Belliveau remembers Lester Pearson. Roger Gilbert covers off another continent and another activity of foreign policy with his analysis of Algeria on the fault lines of East- West and North-South. Brendan McGivern opens up another exotic travel vista to the adventurously-inclined in his account of his travels to the top of Borneo.
As the forum for discussion with members, this issue of bout also reports on two initiatives of the PAFSO executive. Colin Robertson, President of PAFSO, wrote before the election to the major four political parties on political patronage in the foreign service. We reprint his letter. The replies will be published in the next edition. As well, Colin and a special advisor to PAFSO testified before the Senate on the transfer of the international cultural programs from External to the Canada Council. We reprint parts of their testimony.
As editor, I want to maintain the excellent quality of bout de papier as the house magazine of the Canadian foreign service. I want to match the accomplishments of my predecessors, in particular, Carol Markham, who piloted very successfully the magazine for the last two and half years. And, most of all, Debra Hulley (who as managing editor is in fact the driving force behind this whole operation), the Editorial Board and I want to convince more members and readers to WRITE ARTICLES and to BUY SUB- SCRIPTIONS FOR FRIENDS. Only in that way, will bout de papier be able to continue to tell the story of the foreign service to the biggest audience possible. Isn’t it a story worth telling?
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Originally published in bout de papier, Vol. 10, No. 4 (1993) — Fall/Winter 1993 // Automne/Hiver 1993, p. 2. Read the rest of this issue →
