Embassies do not play on home turf. Therefore, it is indispensable for the embassy staff to acquire local knowledge. The staff members need to study the host country’s language, culture, history, policies, and practices. It is also helpful to understand the host country’s social customs, patterns, and etiquette. Only on the basis of a thorough understanding of the host country can an embassy’s political section give assessments and make suggestions with a sense of confidence. Local knowledge must be accompanied by contacts that are useful as sources of information. Access to the bazaar of rumors is easy; each cocktail party provides an opportunity to pick up the latest talk of the town. It is, however, a demanding task to establish reliable contacts with governments, parliaments, and non-governmental institutions of all kind. In authoritarian countries information gathering can be quite difficult, and political officers have to rely, to large extent, on open sources. To establish and maintain contacts on a working level is the duty of the political officers. Information acquired from high-level contacts by the ambassador or the deputy chief of mission (DCM) has to be considered as well: good results are achieved if the information known to various members of the staff is pooled. Therefore, an embassy must work as a team. Large embassies employ several officers in the political section. In small embassies only one or two of their staff members work in the political section.