"Diplomacy is essential to the conduct of foreign policy and international business in the twenty-first century. Yet, few international actors are trained to understand or practice effective diplomacy. Poor diplomacy has contributed to repeated setbacks for the United States and other major powers in the last decade. Drawing on deep historical research, this book aims to 'reinvent' diplomacy for our current era. The original and comparative research provides a foundation for thinking about what successful outreach, negotiation, and relationship-building with foreign actors should look like. Instead of focusing only on failures, as most studies do, this one interrogates success. The book provides a framework for defining successful diplomacy and implementing it in diverse contexts. Chapters analyze the activities of diverse diplomats (including state and non-state actors) in enduring cases, including: post-WWII relief, the rise of the non-aligned movement, the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, the U.S. opening to China, the Camp David Accords, the reunification of Germany, the creation of the European Union, the completion of the North American Free Trade Agreement, and relief aid to pre-2001 Afghanistan. The cases are diverse and historical, but they are written with an eye toward contemporary challenges and opportunities. The book closes with systematic reflections on how current diplomats can improve their activities abroad. Foreign Policy Breakthroughs offers rigorous historical insights for present policy"--

Very few Americans regretted seeing Thomas Jefferson leave the White House in the winter of 1809. The man who led the Republican party from opposition to power and who overwhelmingly defeated Charles C. Pinckney in 1804 had had a disastrous second term. The military stalemate in Europe with Napoleon controlling the continent and the Royal Navy ruling the seas ushered the Franco-British war into a new phase of blockades and counter-blockades with both sides raiding neutral American shipping. The administration responded by prohibiting all American exports to the belligerents. The Embargo brought the booming American economy to a screeching halt, and as economic distress grew resentment over the measure spread from merchants to farmers and mechanics.The Origins of Jeffersonian Commercial Policy and Diplomacy examines the evolution of Jefferson's commercial ideas and policies from his days as a young revolutionary to his presidency. It analyzes the way in which Jefferson worked out his conflicting approaches to commerce not only as a thinker but also as a policy maker. It examines the tensions between rejecting commerce altogether as a threat to republican virtue, and promoting commerce as a necessary vehicle for the maintenance of American prosperity. It traces Jefferson's life-long commitment to the policy of commercial coercion and places American policy in the context of the global competition between England and France. Without deviating from the narrative format, Professor Ben-Atar reflects on a variety of contested issues in early American historiography, from the debate over eighteenth-century republicanism to the birth of American foreign policy.