The PAIGC ‘Congratulatory’ Diplomacy towards Communist States, 1960-1964

Abstract

Through a critical analysis of primary and secondary sources, this paper reconstitutes the PAIGC’s main strategies and processes of diplomatic communication and engagement towards the states of the communist bloc, which were the main backers of the liberation enterprise. The paper argues that the PAIGC’s diplomacy in its first four years rested on two strategies. First, it consisted of “shoe-leather” diplomacy, as its leaders regularly attended public spaces frequented by foreign diplomats and embassy officials. Second, it involved a congratulatory diplomacy, the initiating of diplomatic communication with foreign governments by deliberately using the recipient country’s national days as the key motive for the message.