BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. — The U.S. secretary of state's recent four-stop swing through Asia led to some accusations of symbolic superficiality. Perhaps — but there can be more real meaning in acts of diplomatic symbolism than what first meets the eye.
This is why, notwithstanding the immensely scary worldwide economic drama that overhangs everything now, Hillary Rodham Clinton's first tour as secretary represented a strong new beginning for U.S. diplomacy.
There are two notable extremes to symbolic diplomacy. At the Machiavellian end, there is the symbolism of intentional deception: You make nice-nice as a way of putting a fog around your intent — when the time comes — to make war-war. At the other end is the diplomatic symbolism of intentionality: You make every effort to conform your symbolic moves to the reality of your underlying foreign-policy values and goals.