Definition and types of treaties
A treaty is as an international agreement made between sovereign nations and it has to be ratified and signed (Fitzmaurice & Quast, 2007, p. 11). Treaties require the presence of at least two or more parties. When two parties are involved in making the agreement, the treaty is known as a bilateral treaty (Fitzmaurice & Quast, 2007, p. 11). In contrast to this, when more than two parties are involved, the agreement is known as a multilateral treaty. Other names which can be used to describe a treaty include; pacts, accords or conventions. When the parties involved come to an agreement, the treaty is executed becoming what is referred to as international law.
Parties may have agreements but they cannot be considered as treaties unless they have certain specific characteristics. First, the agreement has to be binding on all the parties through their consent and more so, there can only be a few circumstances where the treaty creates definite rights for another party which was not in the original agreement (Fitzmaurice & Quast, 2007, p. 12). Secondly, most of the treaties made between sovereign states have to be written although there are circumstances where spoken agreements are used but in the presence of witnesses. The treaties have to establish rules that are common to all parties and exhibit a combination of legislative features. Finally, the laws made during the agreement should be adhered to (Fitzmaurice & Quast, 2007, p. 12).
A treaty can influence change in the formation of international laws although this depends on its nature. There are various types of treaties and they can largely be subdivided into two main categories (Anderlini, 2004, p. 16). They include the lawmaking treaties and the treaty contracts (Fitzmaurice & Quast, 2007, p. 12). The lawmaking treaties are authoritative and they are used to set up the universal or general rules. Today, most nations have failed to meet their expectations in terms of economic development and other emerging loopholes in the industrial sector. As a result, the law-making treaties are introduced to deal with such issues. Treaty contracts involve two or more countries that have pressing issues or other exclusive matters that need to be discussed (Fitzmaurice & Quast, 2007, p. 12). Through the power of international customary rules, the two states may form general international laws that will help them move forward (Fitzmaurice & Quast, 2007, p. 12-13).
Other types of treaties include the defensive treaty which emphasizes that a state can be helped by another in case they need a hand in their defense during war or conflict (Krause, & Singer, 2001, p. 15). In this treaty, the nation can only get help when they are defending and therefore, cannot be aided if they are leading the attack. Usually, most nations have defensive treaties with their neighbors who can easily respond their call. In case two allies fight, the nation can only help the defender especially when the state has treaties with both nations (Krause, & Singer, 2001, p. 15). The alternate treaty to the defensive treaty is the offensive treaty although they are rare. The offensive treaties are almost the same as the defensive treaties although in this case, a state can help another nation even if they are not allies and in return, they will be involved in their wars. However, the offensive treaties are known to be expensive than others. Other treaties include the peace treaties which are made to make peace between nations and trade agreements which are used for exportation and importation of goods and services (Grossman, 2016, p. 379).

Aachen treaty
In modern research, the treaty of Aachen is no longer referred to by this name and is instead known as the negotiations which took place between 822 and 823 or commonly the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle (Ziemann, 2017, p. 125). The treaty began with strong negotiations between Britain and France with other nations following them in an aim of ending the war for Austrian Succession.
In December 1740, a war led by the young Prussian King Federick II began where the king and his men invaded the Austrian Duchy of Silesia. However, the war which was all about the Austrian succession ended after 8 years in the final months of 1748 at the peace conference held at Aachen (Lesaffer, 2017, n.p). In the preceding centuries, there were peace conferences although the Aachen conference was different from them since it lacked a series of bilateral peace treaties. To replace the bilateral peace treaties, the Aachen conference provided a single multilateral treaty which comprised more than 8 European powers. The main nations involved in the peace treaty included Britain, Austria, Sardinia, the Dutch Republic, Spain, France, Modena and Genoa which acted as auxiliaries to Spain.
France, Britain and the Dutch Republic signed a peace treaty on April 30th, 1748 although it was just temporary (Lesaffer, 2012, p. 71). The treaty was meant to reduce the damages of the war and therefore, it had multiple stipulations that contained the rights and interest of other European nations such as the permission from Austria’s cession of Silesia to Prussia. Prussia was going to be a significant nation in the next war that made Britain and France to befriend them. The treaty was also important since it settled the differences between Britain and Hanover over the right of succession for the house of Hanover. The three nations threatened the others who had not made peace that they would continue the war on their own. A few weeks later, other nations such as Spain, Genoa, Sardinia and Austria accepted their proposal to make peace.
Most historians may argue that the multilateral treaties began in the Congress of Vienna during the end of Napoleonic war which was held in 1815. However, it is clear that the peace treaty of Aachen was a significant precedent to the Congress of Vienna. The treaty of Aachen was mostly considered to highlight two main aspects which are; its political or cultural importance to the areas in the southeastern frontiers which are located in the Carolingian Empire and the significance of the treaty to Charlemagne (Ziemann, 2017, p. 125). The two aspects relate to the significance of the treaty to the history of the Croatian region. The choice of using a multilateral treaty in the conference held in Aachen was moved by the need to dictate a coalition policy between the European powers.

Multilateral treaties treaty of Aachen, and how they evolved diplomacy
Multilateral treaties were unknown until the introduction of the early European treaty practice. They were considered significant in forming alliances between various states (Haas, 2015, p. 143). An example of a multilateral treaty is the grand alliance that started as a bilateral treaty between the Dutch republic and Britain where they had invited other European powers such as Austria. When the other nations accepted the invitation, they all agreed to make a multilateral treaty that they called the grand alliance and it comprised of Austria, Britain, the Dutch republic, Spain and France. Multilateral treaties that took place before the Aachen treaty did not succeed and mostly ended up being bilateral treaties among the various states involved. Research shows that there were two major reasons why this happened and the explanations forwarded were the conceptuality of the treaties and their practicality (Che & Willmann, 2009). The conceptuality of the treaty is derived from the traditional ways in which early-modern treaty laws were carried out. In the 16th and 17th centuries, sovereign states were introduced and this separated private treaties from the public ones therefore getting rid of the personal characters from individual nations. However, some characteristics from the ancient treaties were maintained while making the multilateral peace treaties (Van der Wusten, Denemark, Hoffmann & Yonten, 2011, p. 499).
The practical approach maintained the use of legal techniques and other methods for peace making. From a legal perspective, the war that took place before the Aachen treaty did not comprise of the single conflicts between several belligerents but rather a collection bilateral conflicts. However, this did not necessarily mean that certain members from a coalition would declare war on other members from opposing groups individually. The introduction of multilateral treaties was important since it solved the conflict especially when different coalitions fought each other (Van der Wusten, et.al 2011, p. 499). Additionally, there could be war between coalitions but not all the members were at war with each other. One of the main reasons for having the multilateral treaties was to solve the distinction between belligerents and auxiliaries. The two parties were just present to support certain nations but were not formally at war with the opposing states. The main aim of auxiliaries was to offer support when it was needed and in return, they got money, resources troops and other benefits (Che & Willmann, 2009, p. 1).
The development of the multilateral treaties during the treaty of Aachen was critical in enhancing and evolving diplomacy as a preferred method of solving disputes, wars, or conflicts among countries. The overall goal of multilateralism is providing opposition to the bilateral discriminatory arrangements that were catalysts to providing advantage to the powerful nations over the weak and often increasing the conflicts (Kahler, 1992, p. 681). On the other hand, diplomacy is about conducting successful negotiations with different representatives of nations. In principal, diplomacy is about states communicating with each other with an aim of having them have complex and regular relations (Berridge, & Lloyd, 2012, p. 70). Thus, multilateral treaties from the Aachen treaty were significant in putting diplomacy as the preferred method of resolving conflicts.
Types of diplomacy and which ones were used in this treaty
The first type of diplomacy is the politics of pacification, which is the unwillingness to come up with various contradictions which exist in different countries (Watson, 2013, p. 9). An example of this diplomacy is the one between France and Britain before World War II when the two nations tried to resist the rule of Hitler. The other type of diplomacy is the gunboat diplomacy, which insists on demonstrating the ability to get certain foreign goals internationally (Watson, 2013, p. 9). The gunboat diplomacy recognizes the legitimacy of using force from the military in order to achieve certain objectives from foreign nations.
Public diplomacy can only be carried out by specific people in the nation such as diplomats and politicians. Through public diplomacy, a certain state can influence the society of another nation by offering them attractive offers and bribing them (Gilboa, 2008, p. 55). Politicians who use public diplomacy aim at communicating with members from a different society in a different nation and teach them their cultural values in an aim of making them citizens of their nation. In the case of Aachen treaty, the public diplomacy can also be considered to have been used. The Aachen treaty was characterized by compromises among the involved countries. For instance, nations such as France and Great Britain had to ‘surrender’ what they referred to as advantages that they had conquered or attained via brilliant strategies for the rest of the countries involved to accept the terms of the treaty. Today, technology has taken over and therefore, the digital diplomacy has enabled people to deal with various technological issues by the internet and other communication technologies (Barston, 2014, p. 112). The digital diplomacy involves new technology such as social media, blogs and other media platforms used to communicate globally.
Further to this, diplomacy can be divided into four main categories namely track 1, track 2, track 3 and multi track diplomacies (Watson, 2013, p. 9). Track 1 diplomacy is used where official negotiations are involved especially when dealing with high profile states or people. In most cases, the track is carried out between military leaders and other political leaders and the main negotiations include peace talks held after war or conflict incidents, treaties, cease fires and other agreements. The heads of states from various nations meet and release statements from the negotiations. In the case of the Aachen treaty, the track 1 diplomacy was largely used by the parties involved. The Aachen treaty was as a result of negotiations between political leaders of the involved countries.
Track 2 diplomacy involves unofficial dialogues and other problem solving negotiations which aim at improving relationships. Because it is unofficial, this type of diplomacy can include religious leaders, academic leaders and other NGO leaders among others rather than the high ranked officials. Track 3 diplomacy is also known as people-to-people diplomacy and it involves private groups and individuals (Barston, 2014, p. 32). The people-to-people diplomacy is conducted at the grassroots levels which involves conferences, organized meetings, political and legal advocacies among other groups. The final main classification of diplomacy is the multi-track diplomacy which is a term used to describe multiple tracks simultaneously. Therefore, the diplomacy may involve all the other diplomacies such as the official, unofficial, business negotiations, athletic activities, scientific exchanges and conflict resolution conferences among others (Gilboa, 2008, p. 55).
Impact of the type of diplomacy used in the Aachen treaty
Using the Track 1 diplomacy and the public diplomacy in the Aachen treaty was critical for a number of reasons. First, previous attempts to have the conflict end had failed. Parties were unwilling to accept proposals as they felt they were disadvantageous to them. The use of the Track 1 diplomacy would mean that countries accepted the proposed terms of the treaty as dictated by France and the Great Britain. Countries such as Austria agreed to renounce some of the territories and also recognize the conquest of Silesia. At the same time, France had some colonies returned while it withdrew from the Austrian Netherlands. Importantly, this type of diplomacy was significant in establishing new a new approach of solving conflicts between nations and consequently, it established a journey of peace in the regions involved. While reactions to the treaty based on the type of diplomacy utilized were different among the countries that signed the treaties, a nation such as Italy gained stability for 1st time during the 18th century (Sosin, 1957, p. 516). Nonetheless, because of the suspicions between countries and internal political competitions consequent wars would be experienced but caused by different factors.
Conclusion: How this treaty evolved diplomatic practice
In conclusion, the Aachen treaty was critical in evolving the diplomatic practice during conflicts and wars. Today, the most utilized approach to solve looming international crisis among nations caused by natural resources, boundaries or nuclear weapons is diplomacy. The practice is widely used across the world by governments and the United Nations to restore peace in regions under conflicts. The Aachen treaty established the principal of give and take. In other words, when parties are negotiating, they should be willing to reach a compromise. Diplomacy is all about reaching an agreement that all the parties feel comfortable with. Diplomatic practice is the easiest form of conflict resolution as representatives are encouraged to have an open mind to ensure a win-win situation. In the case of Aachen treaty, France and the Great Britain had to forfeit some of the ‘advantages’ that they had to allow other nations to accept the terms provided initially at the Congress of Breda.

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