Why does diplomacy exist? How does it contribute to a country’s national interest? How critical is it to national security? The answers to these questions are important as much for people in government as for those on the outside. A country’s diplomatic service is the steward of its national interests abroad. International civil servants, who work on the staff of multilateral organizations like the United Nations and the European Union, are supposed to serve global or regional interests. Both bilateral and multilateral diplomats manage and participate in the daily conduct of international relations. In carrying out their duties, they work within a diplomacy architecture–systems that have been established at the national and global levels. Before we discuss these systems, we need to understand how diplomacy relates to other key terms and concepts, such as national interest, national security and foreign policy.

The period 1929 to 1939 is a neglected period in the study of Irish-American and American-Irish diplomacy. It was bookmarked by two wars and characterised by unfettered US capitalism which extended to the international stage and it ended with a global war arising from the unchecked rise of fascism spreading from Germany. There is much to be learned about bilateral diplomatic relations during this period of peace and gestating crises including changes of government from W.T. Cosgrave to Éamon de Valera and Herbert Hoover to Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1932 and 1933 respectively. It argues that not only did leadership matter in the operation of diplomacy but also the role and character of the diplomat vital and that his family should be examined to decipher how 'soft diplomacy' operated at this time.