The Politics of Negotiation

America's Dealings with Allies, Adversaries, and Friends

Linda P. Brady

• Publisher: The University of North Carolina Press
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9780807843208, 9780807819715
• eBook ISBN: 9781469639604
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: International Relations
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Brady examines the role that politics has played in the success or failure of negotiations between the United States and other countries during the 1970s and 1980s. Drawing on her experience as a negotiator with the U.S. State and Defense Departments, she argues that security talks cannot be conducted in isolation from political influences.

Originally published in 1991.

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Part I

Introduction

There has been a dramatic change in the international environment since the end of the Second World War. In 1945 the “hot war” ended and was soon replaced by a Cold War and its associated security arrangements. Those arrangements provided stability and predictability for forty years. In 1989 the end of the Cold War was signaled by revolutionary change in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe and the fall of the Berlin Wall.

As it attempts to deal with these changes and the construction of a new security order, the United States will rely increasingly on international negotiation. Although negotiation has been an instrument of American foreign policy since the nation’s beginning, it has become even more important as we approach the end of the twentieth century. Resolving conflicts through diplomatic means and ensuring security through negotiation will be major themes in American national security policy in the post—Cold War world.

While the United States has increasingly turned to negotiation to address its security interests, international negotiation has become more difficult because the Cold War framework within which negotiations have been conducted since the end of the Second World War is unraveling. For most of this period, the United States has characterized its negotiating partners as allies or adversaries and has adopted negotiating strategies and tactics designed to achieve its objectives within that framework.

The rise of Mikhail Gorbachev on the political scene in the Soviet Union, growing concerns within the United States about the federal deficit and trade imbalances, and the movement in both Eastern and Western Europe toward greater economic and political independence from the superpowers signal major transformations in the international system that will affect how the United States negotiates and how successfully it can achieve its security objectives through diplomatic means.

The first part of this book examines how the United States has relied on negotiation during the Cold War to achieve national security objectives and why we will rely even more heavily on international negotiation in the future. The introduction also reviews two approaches to understanding the process and outcome of negotiation—negotiation as art and negotiation as science—and describes the advantages and disadvantages of each.

Finally, Part I offers a framework for understanding international negotiation based on the premise that negotiation is a political activity which takes one form between alliance partners who share a common definition of the threat and another form between adversaries who view each other as the primary threat. Perhaps the most difficult negotiations occur between friends who share neither a formal alliance nor an adversarial relationship. In each case, whether dealing with allies, adversaries, or friends, political considerations are critical influences on the process and outcome of international negotiation.

1. Negotiating America’s Security after the Cold War

Early in the 19th century, Clausewitz claimed that war was the continuation of policy by other means, and he accurately predicted an increased reliance in the use of war in the politics between nations. Today, things are different: Negotiation . . . could now be said to be the continuation of policy by other means, and it is likely that nations will rely more on this method in the future.

—Gilbert R. Winham¹

The opening of the last decade of the twentieth century brought with it signs of a revolution in the international political and economic order that had been in place since the end of World War II. Revolutionary changes in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union signaled the end of the Cold War and the fragmentation of security arrangements that had kept the peace for more than forty years.² The Cold War provided American policymakers with a framework for dealing with other nations. The division of the world into two camps—Communist and democratic—and the construction of alliances and other institutional arrangements to support that division simplified the task of identifying friends and enemies. Relationships were clearly defined, and allies and adversaries generally behaved in predictable ways.

The period ahead will be dangerous, as the relative stability and predictability of the Cold War years are replaced by the uncertainty and challenge associated with the dissolution of security arrangements grounded in the Cold War and the creation of a new international order. The pursuit of national security after the Cold War will sorely test the diplomatic, economic, and political skills of the United States. Among the most important of these skills is international negotiation—a willingness to resolve conflicts peacefully through dialogue.

Building a new security architecture in Europe is tied to transformation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the Warsaw Pact and to the creation of new political and economic arrangements for all of Europe. Negotiation will be central to the success of these efforts—whether they take place in the context of NATO and the Warsaw Pact, the European Community, the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE), or other forums. And the United States will continue to play a primary role in Europe, for both the long and short run.

During the Cold War years the United States had a mixed track record in negotiations with its allies, adversaries, and friends. On the one hand, the United States and its NATO allies successfully negotiated a number of security arrangements during the late 1970s and early 1980s. These agreements were designed to enhance NATO’s conventional force posture and, in particular, to better support U.S. reinforcements in the event of crisis or war in Europe. On the other hand, the United States generally was unsuccessful during the same period in its efforts to negotiate greater NATO support for the defense of Western interests in the Persian Gulf.

The SALT I (Strategic Arms Limitation Talks) agreements, signed by the United States and the Soviet Union in 1972, and the treaty on intermediate-range nuclear forces, signed in 1987, are considered by most observers to be examples of the successful use of negotiation in support of American national security policy. However, during the 1970s and the 1980s NATO and the Warsaw Pact were unable to achieve similar success in negotiations about the reduction of conventional forces in Europe.

America’s experience in dealing with friends—that is, countries with which the United States had neither a formal alliance nor a history of adversarial relationships—was most frustrating. Efforts to negotiate security arrangements with countries in the Middle East and the Persian Gulf were especially difficult. The limited success that the United States experienced in gaining access to military facilities in Oman, Egypt, Kenya, and Somalia was offset by its inability to negotiate the kind of explicit cooperative defense arrangements in the Middle East and the Persian Gulf that America had with its European allies.

The American experience in negotiating with allies, adversaries, and friends since the end of the Second World War offers lessons for international security negotiations after the Cold War. Certain negotiating skills, such as patience, self-assurance, and the ability to see the problem from the perspective of one’s negotiating partner, are timeless and can be taught. Negotiators who practice these skills may enhance their chance of success. But the successful negotiation of international agreements—both during the Cold War and in the emerging security environment—ultimately depends upon far more than negotiators with an impressive repertoire of interpersonal skills.

Successful American negotiators, more often than not, are steeped in the history, culture, context, and politics of negotiation. They know that techniques that work in one situation may fail in another. A negotiating style that is effective with American allies may be ineffective in dealing with adversaries or friends. And negotiating styles that made sense for America’s dealings with its allies and adversaries during the Cold War may be inappropriate and ineffective as we move into the new political and economic environment of the twenty-first century. In this new environment, old relationships between allies and adversaries will be transformed, and relationships between friends will comprise more of the agenda of international politics.

This book assumes that the context, or the nature of the prior relationship between the United States and its negotiating partners, influences how common interests and objectives are defined as well as decisions about whether and when to negotiate, when to compromise, and how to structure international agreements dealing with national security concerns. Political factors operate differently and may be more or less critical in explaining the success or failure of international negotiation, depending upon whether the United States is negotiating with allies, adversaries, or friends. Moreover, negotiations between allies about issues that are considered to be outside the scope of the formal alliance relationship reveal their own unique political dynamics.

Perhaps the most important influence on the course and outcome of international negotiation is politics. Negotiations are influenced by (1) international politics, especially the structure of the international system and the perceived global balance of power; (2) regional politics, including the balance of power and perceptions of regional threats; (3) domestic politics, particularly the electoral process and the nature of a negotiating partner’s political system; and (4) bureaucratic politics. All of these factors must be taken into account in the design of negotiating strategies and the consensus-building process that leads to the successful conclusion of international agreements.

The prevailing academic view of international negotiation conflicts with what international negotiation actually entails—namely, politics. Many analysts argue that misperceptions of national interests are the fundamental causes of international conflict and that negotiation is a rational process. Recent literature suggests a trend toward thinking that such concepts as the balance of power are irrelevant, when in fact the structure of the international system and the relative capabilities of its members do influence decisions about whether and when to compromise or to rely on instruments other than negotiation to achieve national security objectives. These considerations are just as important in explaining America’s dealings with its allies and friends as with its adversaries.

While political considerations often are incorporated in the development of negotiating strategies, some scholars are reluctant to admit that political factors may drive the negotiating process, or at least strongly influence the outcome. This reluctance may stem from a belief that it is easier to manipulate perceptions than to understand or modify political and strategic relationships. In any event, the result has been to “depoliticize” explanations of American success and failure in international negotiation.

The conflict resolution approach to negotiation, which was extremely popular in the 1970s and the 1980s, attempts to define a successful formula for agreement and a set of negotiating tools that can be applied to any negotiation. According to some scholars writing in this genre, negotiating an arms control agreement with the Soviet Union is no different than buying a used car. In my view, this approach—one that neglects critical historical, cultural, and political differences between parties to a negotiation—creates unrealistic expectations about the ability to resolve every conflict and may make already difficult negotiations impossible.

A framework for explaining the effects of history, culture, context, and politics on the process and outcome of international negotiations is the subject of chapter 2. The remainder of this chapter focuses on two issues. First, how has the United States used international negotiation since the Second World War in support of national security policy? And, second, how have scholars conceptualized negotiation, and what relevance do the major themes in the literature on negotiation have for an understanding of the politics of negotiation?

Negotiating Security during the Cold War

Negotiation has been a key instrument of American foreign policy since the close of World War II. Many of the international negotiations in which the United States has been involved have been in support of national security interests and objectives. The primary legacy of the Second World War was an increased American role in international affairs. The growth of United States economic and military power and interests demanded greater participation in the international system. The greatest influence on America’s use of international negotiation in support of national security objectives was the outbreak of the Cold War and the policy of containment of the Soviet Union.

The negotiation of the North Atlantic Treaty, signed by the United States and eleven other Western nations in 1949, signaled extensive American military support for the defense of Europe and demonstrated the U.S. commitment to a coalition strategy. Despite greater reliance on international negotiation to achieve security arrangements designed to counter the threat of Soviet expansionism, the United States continued to run the show. American economic and military power in the immediate postwar period enabled the United States to have its way—albeit in the context of negotiated agreements—with its European allies. The Europeans had no other choice.

These relationships remained relatively constant throughout the 1950s and into the 1960s, although by the mid-1960s economic, military, and political changes had occurred that seriously affected how the United States negotiated and with what degree of success. The deepening involvement of the United States in Vietnam, the Soviet achievement of strategic parity by the late 1960s and early 1970s, and the economic recovery and growing independence of the European states and Japan changed the way in which the United States pursued international negotiations in support of its security interests. A perceived shift in the global balance of power resulted in a reassessment of U.S. commitments and strategy—reflected in the Nixon Doctrine— and increased support for negotiated settlements in Vietnam, with the People’s Republic of China, and with the Soviet Union.

These shifts in the balance of power led to greater reliance on negotiation with American allies. No longer could the United States take for granted the automatic support of its allies for U.S. policies abroad. The economic successes in Europe and Japan and the greater political independence that followed led the United States to rely increasingly on negotiation to achieve its security objectives, even when dealing with countries that shared a formal alliance relationship. Disagreements between the United States and its European allies were especially serious on issues that ...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Halftitle Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Preface
• Part I: Introduction
• Part II: Bargaining with Allies
• Part III: Negotiating with Adversaries
• Part IV: Dealing with Friends and “Mixed” Relationships
• Part V: Conclusions
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index