The October Revolution broke down the traditional Russian conception of diploamcy. Diplomacy, as the other bourgeois political conceptions, was severely criticized and conceived as a disappearing phenomenon. This sort of attitude was clearly reflected...
The October Revolution broke down the traditional Russian conception of diploamcy. Diplomacy, as the other bourgeois political conceptions, was severely criticized and conceived as a disappearing phenomenon. This sort of attitude was clearly reflected in the Trotsky's Autobiography. But with the rise of Socialism in one country, diplomacy as a tact of negotiation between States, began to be positively evaluated.
Nonetheless, academic researches on diplomacy began in the early forties when the Soviet Union fought a war against Germany along with the Capitalist States. D.B. Levin's article in 1948 seemed to be a first serious work on the Soviet conception on diplomacy.
In the Soviet Union, it seems to exist two school of thoughts on diplomacy. One is that of Bolshayn Sovetskaya Entsiklopediya, another that of Diplomaticheskii Slovak. BSE have been published three times, 1926, 1949 and 1970 respectively. Definitions of diplomacy in these BSE are very moderate and do not greatly emphasize the Nauka aipect of diplomacy. BSE explains Iskusstvo aspect of diplomacy in length. G.1. Tunkin also shares this kind of opinion.
DS's definitions are rather radical. These definitions stress the Nauka aspect of diplomacy, that is, ideological aspect in the conduit of negotiotion. Kurs MeBhdunarodnoe Pravo shares this opinion.
Being dominant between these two opinions depends on the direction of Soviet foreign policy.