Monthly Bookworm Challenge - January 2021.
Paul Widmer is a former Swiss diplomat, historian, author, former lecturer on international relations and current columnist for NZZaS. When I was studying for my bachelor's degree at University of St. Gallen, Switzerland, I took both of his classes on Diplomacy and never regretted doing so.
Years later, this is the second book of his I've read as part of my "a book a month" challenge after "Swiss Foreign Policy". His writing style is extremely easy and enjoyable to read for the complexity and, at times, dryness of the content. Knowing him in person, it really feels as if he's just sharing his experience with you - his writing style matches my impression of him very closely. Not for nothing, I think he's also one of the best columnists in the Swiss german-language media landscape today. To anyone interested in Diplomacy, international relations or Swiss history, I can highly recommend picking up one of his books and reading his columns. Unfortunately, as far as I know, his work is only available in German.
As any attempt to "sum up" the book would be futile, I'll just leave it at this excerpt: "Diplomacy is power politics in mannered form".