WAW, No Women? Foucault’s Reverse Discourse and Gendered Subjects in Diplomatic Networks

Abstract

This study has two aims. Empirically, it examines women ambassador networks, hitherto overlooked in diplomacy scholarship. Such women-only networks are fascinating, as they cut across state-based alignments that typically shape diplomatic networks. Using Women Ambassadors of Warsaw (WAW) as a case, the analysis is based on interviews with its members in 2020. Theoretically, the aim is to draw on Michel Foucault’s notion of “reverse discourse” to build upon but trouble prior attempts to theorise the place of women and femininities in diplomacy. Rather than coherent scripts or stable roles, I argue, “women” are better conceived as a discursive subject position that is unstable, contradictory and reversing. Indeed, the members of WAW articulate surprisingly shifting and contradictory claims about women and the rationales of a women-only diplomatic network. Reverse discourse provides leverage for understanding these shifts, the article contends, but the analysis also shows the difficulties in reversing fragmented discourse.