Earlier this year, Anne-Marie Slaughter was invited by Democrats on the House Foreign Affairs Committee to testify on the future of American diplomacy. She was a natural choice for a witness. As a professor of politics and international affairs at Princeton University, and a former director of policy planning for the State Department under President Barack Obama, she had plenty of expertise on the hearing’s subject: “America Forward: Restoring Diplomacy and Development in a Fracturing World.”
“Genetic, linguistic, and cultural kinship is obviously not all it takes to create enduring bonds between nations,’’ Slaughter told the committee on February 24. “Political systems, geography, natural resources, and national values all play key roles. Moreover, even countries that appear very similar on the surface, such as the U.S. and Canada or Australia, still have plenty of cultural, ethical, and political differences. Still, if U.S. representatives abroad truly reflected the demography of the United States, we would have far greater cultural, linguistic, and historic channels of connection with the peoples of other nations.”
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