Introduction
International negotiations may comprise a number of different channels during a peace process. Negotiations between states may take place in public front channels or they may be veiled to maintain secrecy of the bargaining process. This essay will look at the later and examine whether the beneficial effects of secret diplomacy can also yield negative consequences. This essay will be divided into three sections. The first section will define secret diplomacy, referred to as back channel diplomacy (BCD), and outline some of its characteristics. The discussion will outline why parties use BCD and convey the benefits and disadvantages. The second section will outline the function of BCD in two negotiation case studies. The first will look at Israel and Palestinian negotiations leading up to the Oslo Accords in 1993. The second case study will examine British negotiations with the IRA and Sinn Fein in Northern Ireland leading up to the Good Friday Agreement in 1998. The third and final section will evaluate the use of BCD in both cases and convey some lessons for policymakers. This essay argues that whilst BCD can be helpful in facilitating a peace process, it can be damaging if it is not managed with front channel diplomacy (FCD).
What is Back Channel Diplomacy?
Secret diplomacy, also known as ‘back channel diplomacy’ (BCD) refers to ‘official negotiations conducted in secret among the parties to a dispute or even between a party and a third party intervenor, which may complement front channels, and are potentially at variance with declared policies’ . Wanis-St. John has also described them as the ‘black markets’ of negotiation. This is because they provide a separate negotiation space away from public diplomat...
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...ic Use of Multiple channels of Negotiation in Middle East Peacemaking’, 2001, A Thesis Presented to the Faculty of The Fletcher School Of Law And Diplomacy Tufts University, viewed at http://repository01.lib.tufts.edu:8080/fedora/get/tufts:UA015.012.DO.00003/bdef:TuftsPDF/getPDF on 10 April 2012 .
• Wanis-St. John, Anthony, Back Channel Negotiation: Secrecy in the Middle East Peace Process, Syracuse, 2011, chapter 1, pp. 1-22.
• Wanis-St. John, Anthony, 'Back-Channel Negotiation: International Bargaining in the Shadows', Negotiation Journal, April 2006, pp.119-144, at http://www.aupeace.org/files/Wanis_BackChannelNegotiation.pdf .
• Wanis-St. John, Anthony, 'Peace Processes, Secret Negotiations and Civil Society: Dynamics of Inclusion and Exclusion', International Negotiation, 13 (2008) 1–9, at http://www.aupeace.org/files/Wanis,%20Intro%20JIN%2013.1.pdf .
Lewicki, R. J., Saunders, D. M., & Barry, B. (2005). Negotiation, Fifth Ed. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Irwin.
Lewicki, J. R., Barry, B., & Saunders, M. D. (2011). Essentials of negotiation (5th ed.). New
Ben-Gurion, David. “Status-Quo Agreement.” In Israel in the Middle East: Second Edition, edited by Itamar Rabinovich and Jehude Reinharz, 58-59. Waltham: Brandeis University Press, 2008.
The article Sharks, Saints, and Samurai: The Power of Ethics in Negotiations was written by Mark Young, for the April 2008 edition of the Negotiation Journal. The article discusses the power of ethics in negotiations. Mr. Young discusses three observations concerning the balance of power and ethics in politics and business. The first observation discusses Nelson Mandela and the South African government in 1986. The second and third observations are about two business contract negotiations made in the 1990’s in the United States and Germany. Young explains the three approaches to negotiations: tactical, prudential, and principled. He then anecdotally illustrates these three approaches by categorizing the negotiators who use them as saints, sharks, and samurai. This paper will discuss the negotiation approaches employed by the negotiators and how their worldview, comprehension, desire for power, and ethics is what determines whether they are a saint, shark, or a samurai. Based upon the observations of the Samurai, Nelson Mandela, Hunt Wesson (HW), and The Trust agency of Germany, as a Christian I believe that it is best to adhere to principled negotiations because ethics can be a major source of power.
Many disagreements would arise in the negotiation process of the Camp David 2000 Summit that would eventually lead it to be unsuccessful. Disagreements such as the division of territory, the dispute over Jerusalem, Security and Refugee arrangements arose in the negotiation. Unfortunately this paper cannot explain all of the disagreement, it will mention some.
Many situations present the important synchronization of internal versus external negotiations. Many individuals have studied how each side in the negotiation is able to manage the internal opposition to agreements being negotiated. This can also be known as “on the table”, or what exactly is on the line in a heated argument. Each individual involve in an argument has a particular position to be managed, and often times own personal interests are widely expressed. This paper will expand upon the case of Fischer collecting needed funds from Smith with proposals and ideas for a manageable negotiation.
Lewicki, J. R., Barry, B., & Saunders, M. D. (2011). Essentials of negotiation (5th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw Hill. ISBN-13: 9780073530369
Brubaker B. and Asher M., (2007). A Power Play for Juwan Howard. Lewicki-Barry-Saunders: Negotiation: Readings, Exercises, and Cases, Fifth Edition. The McGraw-Hill Companies, 2007
M. E. McGuinness (Eds.), Words Over War: Mediation and Arbitration to Prevent Deadly Conflict (pp. 293-320). New York: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Negotiations and back-room dealings happen in any possible setting at any possible moment. Regardless of whether a bargain is two people negotiating a business deal, eighty people silently weighing the pros and cons of drawing attention to themselves, or one single person unconsciously deciding to give up individuality to wrest some semblance of power from the system, a choice is being made between various options.
Lewicki, R., Saunders, D.M., Barry B., (2010) Negotiation: Readings, Exercises, and Cases. 6th Ed. McGraw-Hill Irwin. New York, NY
Gerner, Deborah J., and Philip A. Schrodt. "Middle Eastern Politics." Understanding the contemporary Middle East. 3rd ed. Boulder, Colo.: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2008. 85 -136. Print.
Ripeness and readiness are good theory’s to explain why conflicts ends. They both show how multiple factors come into play to end a conflict. “Ripeness is not sudden, but rather a complex process of transformations in the situation, shifts in public attitudes and new perceptions and visions among decision-makers” (Rambotham, 2011: 180). The Oslo negotiations and the peace process are good examples of the readiness theory and its ease explaining the resolution of these conflicts. The Cambodian conflict poses more difficulty being explained through ripeness. When conflicts are multilateral poses a challenge to readiness theory. Adapting readiness theory
Lewicki, R. J., Barry, B., & Saunders, D. M. (2007). Essentials of Negotiation. New York: McGraw-Hill/ Irwin.
Lewicki, R. J., Saunders, D. M., & Barry, B. (2010). Negotiation: Readings, exercises, and cases. New York: McGraw-Hill Irwin