The present invention discloses a solution which delivers routing systems with less path setup latency and causes them to be less susceptible to network loading, by providing them the ability to setup diverse paths as a result of specifying network resources to exclude as part of a path setup. The invention proposes an extension to RSVP-TE in the form of a new RSVP-TE object, known as an Exclude Route Object, which will allow, in a path setup request, the specification of a set of abstract nodes and resources to be explicitly excluded from the path. Additionally, the invention introduces a second type of exclusion which is achieved through a modification to the existing Explicit Route Object (ERO) by allowing a node to specify, in a path setup request, the exclusion of certain abstract nodes and resources between a specific pair of abstract nodes within an Explicit Route Object.