If you’re uttering only platitudes nobody will follow you. If you want to exist in social media you have to make some noise. But was an open society where 75 per cent of information people get is coming from social media. If I had been ambassador to China or Russia I would have done tweeting maybe about Versailles or the cathedral of Chartres. GA: Frankly Twitter is not my generation, and I did it under the instruction of the Quai d’Orsay. Some of your tweets, such as “a veto is like sex: the first time you blush and then you get used to it”, are very witty, but not very diplomatic. On your retirement six months ago the Quai d’Orsay tweeted “ Au revoir to our favourite Twitter ambassador Gérard Araud'. Q: One of the things you have to get to grips with nowadays as a modern diplomat is social media. It’s still not exactly the reflection of the reality of the French society but we are on our way. It has been democratised and it’s much more open and diverse. Right now it’s the opposite: information is everywhere and the question is to select which is important and relevant to the job.Īlso, the Quai d’Orsay, the foreign ministry, was quite hierarchical, a sort of conservative body with dynasties of aristocrats.

It was a sort of romantic vision of a diplomat trying to get access to secrecy. At the time you didn’t have internet, you didn’t have computers, and in a sense information was a bit rare. Gérard Araud: When I started my first post, in 1982, I was a young diplomat in Israel. Q: How has the role of ambassador changed during your career? (This is an edited version of an interview that is part of the Spotlight on France podcast. Pig farming, diplomacy, and Algerians massacred in Paris Spotlight on France He opens up to RFI about diplomacy in the age of social media, controversial tweets, dull dinners, sexuality and the challenge of explaining laicité to Americans. While France has the third largest diplomatic network in the world, few ambassadors are as straight-talking as he is.

Passeport diplomatique by Gérard Araud