The Growing Role of Parliamentary Diplomacy in a Multipolar World

Abstract

The development of contemporary world politics puts new demands on the diplomacy of the 21st century that has rapidly transformed into a multilevel and complex system. The remarkable features and, at the same time, imperatives of diplomatic relations include globalization and multipolarity, turbulence and the multifaceted nature of the foreign policy process, rapid accumulation and processing of information, integration and regionalization, increased national consciousness of States, extensive interaction with non-state actors of international law. In the context of this long-term trend, the most important place belongs to the new actors of the foreign policy process that find themselves in the formats of international dialogue often more competitive as compared with formal, classic mechanisms of diplomacy. Thus, currently, public, economic, digital, sports, regional, scientific, and electoral diplomacy are actively manifested as key trends. The institution of parliamentary diplomacy plays a significant role in the implementation of foreign policy goals and objectives. The uniqueness of this diplomatic course is manifested in the fact that it organically combines the features of official diplomacy and public diplomacy, as parliamentarians act as legitimate representatives of their countries, elected through democratic procedures and representing the interests of their constituents. In the Russian Federation, parliamentary diplomacy is recognized as conceptually important, demanded and promising format of global interaction, which has been repeatedly mentioned at high level of the State.