Bridging the gap between Self and Other? Mediterranean paradiplomacy as homo-diplomacy

One of the defining features of the new international environment is the advent of a plethora of new diplomatic actors, including sub-national entities. There has been a growing interest in the phenomenon of paradiplomacy, as the diplomatic activities of these new actors are labelled. Since most attention has been paid to a relative small number of paradigmatic cases (Catalonia, Québec, Flanders), most conceptual reflection on paradiplomacy has been geared to the commonalities of these ‘usual suspects’. Consequently, a good few sub-national entities have been overlooked, though an analysis of their diplomatic practices is of particular interest for a better understanding of diplomacy as a means to mediate estrangement between internationally acting human collectivities (Der Derian, On Diplomacy, 1987). In this paper I argue that paradiplomacy can be regarded not only as a means to regulate different degrees of separation (Sharp, Diplomatic Theory of International Relations, 2009), but can also overcome the divide between a diplomatic Self and a diplomatic Other. How the dynamics of the Self-Other nexus shape a particular diplomatic environment will be illustrated by analyzing the practices of a number of Mediterranean regions. During the last decades, paradiplomacy has become an integral part of the Mediterranean diplomatic landscape. Not only Spanish autonomous communities such as Andalusia and the Basque Country but also French and Italian regions like Provence and Emilia-Romagna have all set their first and next steps beyond the border. Their diplomacies can be described as “tous azimuts”, going in all directions. The diplomatic modes and tools they are making use of are as manifold as their diplomatic interlocutors: transnational networking, cross-border cooperation, public, economic and cultural diplomacy are all instruments to manage their relations with partners in the Southern Balkans, Northern-Africa and the Middle-East. Moreover, what previously could be defined as domestic politics, namely the engagement with the central state and with other sub-units of that state can now be interpreted as part and parcel of a region’s diplomacy. A double dynamic is at work in this context. First, by diplomatically engaging with third parties, these sub-national entities acknowledge the ‘otherness’ of their counterpart and at the same time stress their own ‘self’. Second, by advocating a multiple diplomatic identity – regional, national and macro-regional, these regions are engaged in an idiosyncratic Mediterranean mode of what Costas Constantinou (On homo-diplomacy, 2010) calls homo-diplomacy, a form of diplomacy focussing on the homology between the self and the other. By analyzing how French, Spanish and Italian regions are managing their relations with their Mediterranean counterparts, stressing what unites them as Mediterranean and aiming at the realization of civilizational convergence of the region, I intent to provide a better insight into the motives and outcomes of sub-national diplomacy.