The gift as diplomatic theory

Marcel Mauss’s Essai sur le don remains the go-to reference for scholarship on gift-exchange in the social sciences and humanities. Also in the field of International Relations did a literature develop around the work, which seeks both to describe tangible practices of gift-giving and to exploit the purchase of the gift as a theoretical metaphor. In this latter regard, it has been argued that the gift should be interpreted as an expression of colonial ideology. This article assesses that charge and develops a complementary, diplomatic interpretation of the essay. Notwithstanding (and in a certain sense: due to) its status as a colonial artifact, the Essai sur le don can serve as a creative resource for diplomatic theory. It draws attention to the ambivalence of diplomacy, including in what appear to be its more humanistic manifestations. Ambivalence marks diplomacy-as- theoria , its commitment to relationality, and its pursuit of peace.