Negotiation: an overall framework

NEGOTIATION is involved, either at personal, group or international levels, in managing almost every arena of human affairs. In particular, joint solutions are required in many public spheres, both domestic and international, sometimes with grave consequences to the welfare of larger collective communities. Many international actors argue over the terms of settling territorial boundaries, arms control, termination of long-term hostilities, reduced pollution, protection of endangered species, free trade, monetary systems or other shared problems. When more than one solution exists, actors may have different preferences for types of mutually desirable agreements. This produces dilemmas for negotiation. Negotiation is a unique set of social interactions in which negotiators differ but have complementary needs or desires. Facing one of the largest threats to the future of humanity, for instance, every reasonable person would accept the necessity for collective action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions responsible for the irrevocable damage to the global atmosphere, but it has proven difficult for governments to agree to measures to be taken to obtain the objective. Though it has now become part of history (from the 1950s to the early 1990s), the United States and the Soviet Union kept increasing their stockpiles of nuclear weapons the use of which would have left neither side with any chance of survival. Although both sides realized the need to control the arms race through negotiation, they still competed to gain military superiority. It took more than two decades and cost approximately one million lives to end the civil war between the Sudanese government and the south's ‘liberation forces’ prior to the conclusion of a peaceful settlement in 2005. In all these incidents, any one actor's security and welfare cannot be achieved alone, requiring mutually agreed actions. In entering negotiation, each party has certain expectations, but one's objectives cannot be realized without joint solutions to the shared problems. In negotiation settings, a mutually acceptable solution is sought by two or more parties, who have differing preferences over feasible outcomes. Even if the attainment of one party's goals is in fundamental conflict with those of the other parties, negotiation still takes place due to converging interests as well as opposing ones. Incompatible preferences can be resolved through the recognition of the interdependence in which cooperation becomes an inevitable part.