Handbook of International Negotiation

Mauro Galluccio Editor

Handbook of

International

Negotiation

Interpersonal, Intercultural, and Diplomatic

Perspectives

Handbook of International Negotiation

It has become only too evident that traditional methods of confl ict prevention and resolution are no longer adequate or effective. This is why editor and

contributor Mauro Galluccio’s present volume appears to fi ll in an existing and ever more visible void in shaping an entirely new approach in modern-day

diplomacy. The signifi cance of this book can hardly be over-rated. It offers an entirely new political and psychological angle to transforming confl ict by

managing interpersonal dynamics and tailoring preventive behaviors. It alerts us to the crucial role of the mental heritage of confl icts and powerful emotions.

In brief, it enhances an entirely new type of negotiation as a fundamental tool of managing, preventing, and resolving confl ict by acknowledging the diversity

of mental viewpoints about any given reality.

This volume can indeed serve as a handbook to practitioners—diplomats and decision- makers—in educating themselves, in reshaping their own outlook,

and in even bettering themselves as individuals in positions of authority and responsibility for bringing positive change to the lives of millions of people.

Elena Poptodorova

Ambassador of Bulgaria to the United States

Galluccio has brought together a distinguished and diverse group of scholars and practitioners to address an enduring, if evolving, challenge to human well￾being: violent confl ict between nations and subnational groups. His aim is to organize the interdisciplinary character of the research, on which the authors

draw, into coherent perspectives on the causes of confl icts and potentially effective interventions designed to prevent and resolve them.

There is much that is new here. Perhaps most important, there is a focus on the personal and emotional character of confl ict—for those who engage in it

and those who intervene to mitigate it. The passion, competence, and intensity that Galluccio brings to this edited volume is striking and appropriate, in light

of the importance of the topic to those who have been or will be victims of violent confl ict, but at no point does it detract from the intellectual rigor that

characterizes the entire volume.

Robert L. Gallucci

US Ambassador-at-Large

Past President of the MacArthur Foundation

Former US Assistant Secretary of State

This timely volume and the work of Dr. Mauro Galluccio on international negotiation and mediation is extremely relevant in the current climate of confl ict through￾out the world and the potential perils that presently exist among nations. This collection of essays by renowned scholars, foreign policy experts, offi cials, psycholo￾gists, and other practitioners, ably assembled and edited by Dr. Mauro Galluccio, is so very welcome. This handbook highlights the complexity, and diffi culty, of

international negotiations. Fortunately, it also provides important and useful tools for those responsible for conducting diplomacy with terrorists and insurgents. It

is sure to be widely read, cited, and used as a valuable reference work for years to come.

Mitchell Reiss

President of the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation

Past President’s Special Envoy to the Northern Ireland Peace Process

Former Director of Policy Planning at the US State Department

Dr. Galluccio’s work on confl ict resolution and peace negotiations represents an international and multidisciplinary attempt showing us that the best way to

advance research lies in interdisciplinary cross-fertilization. The challenge is to fi nd ways to coordinate psychological expertise with the expertise afforded

through other disciplinary perspectives and in my strong opinion Dr. Galluccio’s work and this volume match high expectations.

Agostino Miozzo

Managing Director of the Crisis Response Department

The European External Action Service of the European Union

I wish to pay tribute to the editor of this book, Mauro Galluccio, a former staff member, who has invested now more than two decades in providing an ever wider

and deeper insight in the multi-disciplinarity of international negotiations. It is my opinion that Galluccio’s book is timely in light of the current climate of confl ict

among the nations throughout the world and the potential perils that presently exist among nations. It is quite fi tting, in my opinion, that a proposal for the further

development of a social-cognitive approach to negotiation and mediation would be of great value in facilitating effective agreements between various nations in the

interest of achieving international peace.

Koos Richelle

Former Director General

European Commission of the European Union

Dr. Galluccio’s edited book, Handbook of International Negotiation, genuinely breaks new ground in the study of international negotiations. It melds neuroscience,

psychology, anthropology, economics and political science in ways that provide a detailed and convincing account of the biological basis for cooperative as well as

confl ictual behavior. The results signifi cantly change the dynamics in bargaining games and directly affect the training and tactics of negotiators.

Anne-Marie Slaughter

President and CEO of the New America Foundation

Former Director of Policy Planning for the US

State Department from January 2009 until February 2011

under Secretary of State Hillary Clinton

Endorsements

A must read for all who wish to take part in managing international affairs in our complex and nervous world. The editor and author Galluccio, a political sci￾entist as well as a psychologist, has been able to provide us with a unique and penetrating insight into the political and socio-cognitive world of international

negotiation. Contributors to this remarkable book offer a penetrating analysis of the dual nature of negotiation—as a human and diplomatic experience. Their

work opens a path to understanding negotiation as the way to building trust and the will to agree, the two key conditions for any negotiation to succeed.

Danilo Türk

Former President of Slovenia

Former UN Assistant-Secretary-General for Political Affairs

Mauro Galluccio

Editor

Handbook of

International

Negotiation

Interpersonal, Intercultural,

and Diplomatic Perspectives

ISBN 978-3-319-10686-1 ISBN 978-3-319-10687-8 (eBook)

DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-10687-8

Springer Cham Heidelberg New York Dordrecht London

Library of Congress Control Number: 2014955144

© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2015

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Editor

Mauro Galluccio

EANAM European Association

for Negotiation and Mediation

Brussels , Belgium

To Laura, Michele, Lorenzo and Gabriele

When man understands, he extends his mind to comprehend things; but when he does not

understand, he makes them out of himself, and by transforming himself, becomes them.

Giambattista Vico, 1744

If a diplomat becomes so satisfi ed with himself to lose his interest in the psychology of

others. And since psychological alertness is one of the most vital factors in negotiation, a

diplomat who becomes lethargic in such matters has passed the period of usefulness.

Harold Nicolson, Diplomacy, 1939, p. 65

ix

Navigating the Geopolitical Landscape of the Future

David Hilbert, one of the world’s most infl uential and universal mathemati￾cians, gave a speech to the international congress of mathematicians in

August of 1900. Hilbert cited more than a dozen unsolved mathematical

problems bequeathed by the nineteenth to the twentieth century. Had Hilbert

presented the great unsolved geopolitical problems of that era, he would have

undoubtedly mentioned the state of world confl ict and the lack of effective

peace negotiation strategies that existed at that time.

Unfortunately, not much has changed since Hilbert’s day. The weather

vanes of conventional wisdom still point in a direction that yields disappoint￾ing results. The forecast for peace has remained tepid at best with most for￾eign negotiations. Many efforts in peace negotiation have been an exercise in

contraction as opposed to protraction. Therefore, we must ask ourselves, how

should this new world govern itself with all of the confl ict that presently

exists? How should the international system function in a manner that can

embrace more effective peace acquisition? And most importantly, how can

strategic preventive diplomacy executed by negotiators set the stage for

awareness centered interventions?

Until recently, it appears that peace negotiation strategies have been devoid

of a direct focus on conceptual distortions as well as emotional and motiva￾tional processes that seem pivotal to change. This is an aspect that is particu￾larly important among nations that maintain conservative ideologies and are

highly resistant to transformation. In this text, the contributors have highlighted

a number of important aspects of the peace negotiation process from various

disciplines which include cognitive and motivational factors, as well as emo￾tional regulation. These aspects have been largely ignored in the past with

negotiation strategies maintaining a daunting gap in the overall process.

Confl icts between nations pertain to the integrative operation of cognitive,

emotional, and motivational processes including biological aspects combined

with a preexisting repertoire of rigid supporting beliefs, world views, and

emotions that result in selective and distorted information processing.

Knowing what motivates another party’s process of decision making is vital

to unlocking the door to peace. Understanding the different nuances and cul￾tural aspects of decision making helps negotiators gain a better grasp on the

situation. Also, managing the emotional tensions during negotiation pro￾cesses is an integral part of some of the skills that are required for successful

Foreword

x

negotiations. Awareness of the emotional/cultural aspects increases with the

capacity for empathic and sympathetic involvement. In addition, much of the

negotiator’s tendencies toward self-effi cacy are necessary as a capacity and

competence in their abilities to reach the stated goal. In fact, many believe

that emotions are paramount to the process of negotiation, particularly when

working with diverse cultures. Due to the fact that emotions have the same

basic or universal cause from person to person and culture to culture, this

notion of gain and achievement of happiness is a core ingredient to success.

Due to the fact that many individuals, societies, and nations are being

forced to choose among competing interests, identities, and loyalties, this

only creates complexity with the peace process. Underscoring the threat of

competition and risk of loss with many of the confl icts that exist between

nations is what undoubtedly fuels further confl ict.

In keeping with the theme of interpersonal and intercultural perspectives,

this edited text by Mauro Galluccio appropriately promotes the social, cogni￾tive, and behavioral approach to human dynamics as a promising component

toward future peace negotiations. The interdisciplinary approach to this book

is one of the more appurtenant since it allows for adding the most appropriate

approach we can muster in confl ict across different cultural settings, increas￾ing the awareness of training insights, and providing a cognitive and emo￾tional resource for negotiators and mediators. The sacred values that

Meichenbaum speaks about in his thoughtful chapter are core to understand￾ing moral imperatives and circumstances that contribute to the notion of

using many of the psychotherapeutic skills that cognitive behavioral thera￾pists utilize in working with individuals, couples, and groups. Developing

insight into confl ict resolution in international negotiation is a fulcrum to

implementing some of the aforementioned processes, insight, and awareness

into how certain parties’ perceptions are infl uenced by their interpretive

framework. This dynamic helps us to make sense of the confl ict negotiation

interaction as they perceive it. Addressing cognitive fi lters and screening out

information that is distorted or incompatible with operating assumptions are

also germane to understanding this process and may help individuals become

aware of this importance as well. Such lenses are required in order to increase

the power of transforming the confl ict. Remaining mindful of these propo￾nents is essential to future success.

This is a timely and extremely valuable multidisciplinary volume edited by

Mauro Galluccio, who since the early 1990s has been instrumental in promot￾ing confl ict resolution and transformation. As both a political scientist and psy￾chologist, he has been able to assemble, persuade, and coordinate with

competence and passion distinguished authors from various disciplines to

investigate strategies to better apply and operationalize methods and tools to

improve both the construction of relationships and confl ict transformation. This

book is a very intuitive contribution to the literature which aims to formulate

proposals on how to best optimize the use of negotiation and diplomacy struc￾tures throughout training programs. It nicely integrates different tools presented

by a broad range of contributors. There is a pressing need to have a coherent

and tailored training program for negotiators and mediators. Galluccio’s work

in this area is cutting edge in that it is based on sound scientifi c principles for

Foreword

xi

improving international relations. This is a budding area that uses cognitive and

affective processes to shape important judgments and critical decisions and will

be used signifi cantly in widening and understanding the relational abilities of

individuals facing confl ict and uncertainty.

It is hopefully with this groundbreaking work that a new dimension of

peace negotiation can be embosomed, particularly at a time in which the

world faces continuous confl ict.

Department of Psychiatry Frank M. Dattilio

Harvard Medical School

Boston, MA

Foreword

xiii

From the beginning of my international career, I realized how the art of nego￾tiation—with its complex set of skills and techniques—was central to my

work and its effectiveness. Since then, I have dealt with both paramilitary

groups and regular (if not necessarily friendly) armed forces. I engaged in

strategizing international interventions in crisis areas, negotiating consistent

international contracts, rarely immune to political interests on all sides. I

eventually landed on what some diplomats describe as the “mother of all

negotiations”—the Middle East Peace Process. I had the privilege to live and

work in many different places: the Balkans, Turkey, Asia, the Middle East,

and Brussels. Hence my professional adventure was (and still is) shaped by

inter-culturally diverse contexts that rendered negotiations, diplomacy, and

international affairs work in general an ever-changing experience. When Dr.

Galluccio described to me the idea behind this book, I felt it matched my own

desire (and possibly that of many other practitioners) to view negotiations in

a structured and more comprehensive way. Negotiations are part of our politi￾cal reality, part of our history, as well as part of our daily life; they are about

people who are trying to reach an agreement on a given issue. In their most

apparent form, negotiations may take place in an open market, at the store

down the road or when purchasing a second hand car. Such negotiations—

which domain gurus call distributive—focus on distributing a determined

amount of value. We also negotiate when trying to agree on an important

family matter with our spouses or partners or with our sons or daughters.

These negotiations involve the individual interests of the parties engaged, and

they refl ect areas of common interest. The value of what is negotiated is not

fi xed but perceived, explained, and promoted from different perspectives. The

importance of negotiations in our personal and professional life is self- evident

from the examples above. The ways we conduct negotiations and the forces

behind them are however much more complex and less obvious that one

might think. The complexity increases when the interest of the negotiating

parties is a collective one, whether of an organization, a state, or a group of

states. The complexity may be even greater when negotiations aim at resolv￾ing an armed confl ict or when the parties in question display no interest in

negotiating. At this point, it is necessary for others to intervene and bring

them to the negotiation table.

I recall being somewhere in the southern Balkans on a secondary road,

when I was stopped by members of a paramilitary group. They decided to

hold me and my staff at gunpoint, questioning me about the reason for the

Foreword

xiv

delivery of the humanitarian cargo transported by the truck we were escort￾ing. The conversation took place in some basic Serb-Croatian and some basic

English, hence leaving not much room for nuanced explanation. It was clear,

including their nonverbal communication, that they did not accept that our

real mission was to deliver international aid to civilians in distress. Even if

they understood that we were not foreign spies, they did not like what we

were doing and they did not want to let us through the confrontation lines.

The reader should make no mistake—that was a negotiation and a very

important one. The content of that truck was crucial to the survival of hun￾dreds of people, mainly women and children, whose lives were threatened by

the war and by the merciless Balkan winter. In this instance, the negotiation

was shaped by cultural diversity, a language barrier, misperceptions, emo￾tions, and—no doubt—divergent objectives. On the other hand, it was evident

that those guys dressed in fatigues were under no direct and strict order to

stop humanitarian convoys. They wanted to make a point, and they wanted to

express their rage against what we were doing. One thing was also clear—

that guy leading a small paramilitary unit in the middle of a secondary road

in the southern Balkans—wanted to engage and tell me something.

I will not go through the details of the conversation I had with that man.

But it lasted over half an hour, an enormity considering the language gap. To

a certain extent, it was a surreal negotiation carried out under asymmetric

conditions dictated by the barrel of an AK-47 alternatively pointed at me and

at my colleagues. My strategic interests were clear: staying alive, getting the

truck through that improvised checkpoint, and delivering aid to the people in

need. His objectives were far less evident. It was a judgment call based on his

way to look, act, and talk. His personality traits and his psychology in a politi￾cized and war environment shaped that negotiation.

I found myself in several similar situations during that period, and it was a

real education, leaving me with me some important lessons: study the con￾text, understand the multidimensional interest of the parties, and never under￾estimate the role played by the psychology of the person you negotiate with

(i.e., cognitive and emotional processes). Such lessons as well as others had

later proven precious in diplomatic negotiations.

Diplomats are only the representative of their political masters, and as

such, they cannot afford to decide what the red lines and the objectives are.

Diplomats are however relatively free to decide how to tackle negotiations.

One could also add that diplomatic negotiators are not devoid of personal

agendas and personal convictions. These latter, when related to the political

substance of the negotiations, play a huge role in shaping negotiations’

dynamics. No doubt that during my diplomatic career, I have witnessed sev￾eral instances where the personality of negotiators was behind the success or

disaster of the negotiations themselves.

On that road in the southern Balkans as much as in the formal atmosphere

of one of the severe meeting rooms somewhere in the Middle East, I came to

realize how the psychological dynamics of negotiations and the individual

psychology of negotiators take a central role in shaping negotiations’ out￾comes. Emotions as much as cognitive processes are central to what human

beings do and how they operate. When it comes to diplomatic negotiations,

Foreword