The Digital Transformation of the Science Diplomacy Practices during the Covid-19 Pandemic: The Case of Switzerland

The “science diplomacy” (SD) is often seen as a tool to address “the new global challenges”. The “global challenges” discourse is accompanied by the growing role of science in world politics. Increased transnational interdependence, driven by globalization demands closer collaboration between the diplomatic and scientific communities. This became even more evident at the time of the Covid-19 pandemic, which in its turn created new obstacles for SD. Digital technologies became not only the temporary tools to surmount these challenges, but also transformed the SD practices of all the actors involved in SD. As the activities of universities seem to be significant to the success of SD, this paper aims to show the main challenges and opportunities of digital transformation of the SD practices in Swiss universities and SD related organisations during the Covid-19 pandemic. The case of Switzerland was chosen due to its high level scientific achievements and long-standing tradition of SD. This study based on the analysis of documents and website materials of Swiss organizations involved in SD, as well as semi-structured interviews with representatives of Swiss universities and other organizations, engaged in SD, seeks to contribute both empirically and conceptually to the scholarly debates related to the digitalization of diplomacy. Using differentiation between concepts of digital adaptation and digital adoption (Bjola and Manor, 2022), it argues, that digital transformation of the SD practices in Swiss universities during the Covid-19 pandemic can be regarded as a process driven by external changes rather than a strategic decision to use specific technologies in the pursuit of specific goals. More generally, the digital SD does not compete with or replace offline SD, but rather augments it. Digital tools are mainly used to influence offline processes (such as use of online conferences to continue negotiations during a global pandemic) which leads to hybrid SD as a new phase in diplomacy.