Platform Diplomacy: Cooperation Infrastructures in a Multilateral Order

This research booklet argues that traditional models of international cooperation—based on linear planning, state-to-state diplomacy, and project-driven interventions—are no longer adequate for the complexity of today’s world. Three systemic forces are transforming the conditions of cooperation:(1) digital technologies as relational infrastructures enabling distributed intelligence and new forms of joint territorial action;(2) the circular model, which redefines how value, resources, and responsibilities flow through socio-technical systems, requiring new institutional capacities to manage material feedback loops; andThese dynamics give rise to platform diplomacy, conceived not as negotiation between states but as operational coordination among distributed territorial systems. The booklet examines how cooperation frameworks must evolve, how institutional mechanisms are becoming misaligned with real territories, and how platform-based governance can restore coherence.