Diplomacy: The Role of the Wife. A Symposium

In 1972 the State Department directed that spouses (meaning wives in almost all cases) of Foreign Service officers were free to pursue their own careers. They did not have to go to foreign posts and they were not to be mentioned in the efficiency reports prepared on the F.S. officers. But directives do not change reality, and husband and wife are still a team on many foreign assignments. Here are 25 personal commentaries by wives (both American and foreign), husbands, and diplomats on an intricate and important problem which lacks easy answers and which has ramifications far beyond the Foreign Service.