Thanks for this! I’d love to hear your views on the potential for impact in this career path. For example: (1) What are some positive examples of impact that you/colleagues have been able to have on cause areas that EAs typically care about such as reducing existential risk? How rare is this kind of impact? (2) To what extent are staff in overseas embassies influencing the policy of the UK government vs just communicating it? (3) How much has the foreign office’s chance of making a difference on important global issues been diminished by Brexit? No worries if you don’t feel comfortable answering all/any of these questions on here.
Thanks for the questions- and sorry for the delay answering. I’ll go through 1 and 2 in turn but think 3 is too political for me to answer—sorry!
1)I was instrumental in setting up and playing secretariat to a group of development ministers that convened during the beginning of the covid pandemic. This allowed like-minded ministers to share best practice and coordinate in what was a rapidly changing crisis for many developing countries. Some new principles spun from this group for how to support certain countries and I think it probably made a very slight improvement to how government’s development agencies prioritized. The aim was focused on global health and development, but it also demonstrated agility in crisis, and showed UK and Canada’s (the co-chairs) ability to convene in these situations. I mainly managed the logistics and advised the policy teams preparing for these meetings—I’d guess my involvement improved the outcomes of the group by a few percent. However, if I hadn’t being doing it, someone else would have, probably to a fairly similar standard (though I like to think not quite as well!).
For another example: My colleague set up an annual survey of the FCDO (foreign, commonwealth and development office) to forecast what future years will hold for foreign policy. In 2019, the top answer of what could be an unexpected ‘black swan’ event in the coming year was a global pandemic. I’m not sure how much impact this had on our policy- probably a little. He was in charge of the survey and it seems very plausible that had he (or possibly one of his colleagues or seniors) not been there to come up with this forecast-y question, it would not have been included. My point being that the counterfactual here, unlike my first example, is most of the impact would not have been there without him.
I’m relatively new/junior in the FCDO ranks—those working higher up would have examples of higher impact. I believe the counterfactual impact increases somewhat exponentially—as you get higher up and more experienced, you’re doing things that the civil service wouldn’t be able to find others to do.
2) Staff in overseas embassies influence the policy of UK government a lot. The FCDO is ~2/3 overseas, and a typical ratio would be e.g. 1-3 France policy officers based in the UK to 30-50 France policy officers in Paris. If a Minister is making a decision about country X, then the UK ambassador to X will be one of the key advisors- possibly the most influential civil servant in that situation. However, if you standardize for seniority, you usually have more influence on UK government policy when based in London- those 1-3 France policy officers are fairly entry-level positions and will be key to coordinating policy positions on France. Someone equivalent in the embassy will be more focused on communicating UK policy (and, more importantly, influencing French policy). If you’re looking at eg great power conflict then you might want to be working in the embassies in US or China, to influence their policy as much as possible, or working on the relevant policy area in the UK base.
Thanks for this! I’d love to hear your views on the potential for impact in this career path. For example: (1) What are some positive examples of impact that you/colleagues have been able to have on cause areas that EAs typically care about such as reducing existential risk? How rare is this kind of impact? (2) To what extent are staff in overseas embassies influencing the policy of the UK government vs just communicating it?
(3) How much has the foreign office’s chance of making a difference on important global issues been diminished by Brexit?
No worries if you don’t feel comfortable answering all/any of these questions on here.
Thanks for the questions- and sorry for the delay answering. I’ll go through 1 and 2 in turn but think 3 is too political for me to answer—sorry!
1)I was instrumental in setting up and playing secretariat to a group of development ministers that convened during the beginning of the covid pandemic. This allowed like-minded ministers to share best practice and coordinate in what was a rapidly changing crisis for many developing countries. Some new principles spun from this group for how to support certain countries and I think it probably made a very slight improvement to how government’s development agencies prioritized. The aim was focused on global health and development, but it also demonstrated agility in crisis, and showed UK and Canada’s (the co-chairs) ability to convene in these situations. I mainly managed the logistics and advised the policy teams preparing for these meetings—I’d guess my involvement improved the outcomes of the group by a few percent. However, if I hadn’t being doing it, someone else would have, probably to a fairly similar standard (though I like to think not quite as well!).
For another example: My colleague set up an annual survey of the FCDO (foreign, commonwealth and development office) to forecast what future years will hold for foreign policy. In 2019, the top answer of what could be an unexpected ‘black swan’ event in the coming year was a global pandemic. I’m not sure how much impact this had on our policy- probably a little. He was in charge of the survey and it seems very plausible that had he (or possibly one of his colleagues or seniors) not been there to come up with this forecast-y question, it would not have been included. My point being that the counterfactual here, unlike my first example, is most of the impact would not have been there without him.
I’m relatively new/junior in the FCDO ranks—those working higher up would have examples of higher impact. I believe the counterfactual impact increases somewhat exponentially—as you get higher up and more experienced, you’re doing things that the civil service wouldn’t be able to find others to do.
2) Staff in overseas embassies influence the policy of UK government a lot. The FCDO is ~2/3 overseas, and a typical ratio would be e.g. 1-3 France policy officers based in the UK to 30-50 France policy officers in Paris. If a Minister is making a decision about country X, then the UK ambassador to X will be one of the key advisors- possibly the most influential civil servant in that situation. However, if you standardize for seniority, you usually have more influence on UK government policy when based in London- those 1-3 France policy officers are fairly entry-level positions and will be key to coordinating policy positions on France. Someone equivalent in the embassy will be more focused on communicating UK policy (and, more importantly, influencing French policy). If you’re looking at eg great power conflict then you might want to be working in the embassies in US or China, to influence their policy as much as possible, or working on the relevant policy area in the UK base.
Thank you for the detailed response, very helpful!