Editing Diplomat (section)

== Psychology and loyalty ==
{{Further|Clientitis}}

While posted overseas, there is a danger that diplomats may become disconnected from their own country and culture. Sir [[Harold Nicolson]] acknowledged that diplomats can become "denationalised, internationalised and therefore dehydrated, an elegant empty husk".<ref>Harold Nicolson, ''The Evolution of Diplomacy'' (New York: Collier, 1962) at 107.</ref> Nicolson also claimed that personal motives often influenced the diplomatic pursuit of the national interest. For example, he wrote: "Nobody who has not actually watched statesmen dealing with each other can have any real idea of the immense part played in human affairs by such unavowable and often unrecognisable causes as lassitude, affability, personal affection or dislike, misunderstanding, deafness or incomplete command of a foreign language, vanity, social engagements, interruptions and momentary health."<ref>Harold Nicolson, ''The Congress of Vienna: A Study in Allied Unity, 1812–1822'' (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Co., 1946), 19.</ref>

To prevent disconnection and apathy from their own state, many foreign services mandate their employees to return to their home countries in between period serving abroad.