Preventive Diplomacy

"We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny."
— Martin Luther King, Jr., “Letter from Birmingham Jail”

Beginning in 1983, I devoted years of my life as an independent school instructor to teaching international conflict resolution, before I decided that there is no such thing — at least not in the way we tend to imagine it. In the global arena particularly — where the causes of border skirmishes, assassinations, acts of terrorism, coups d'itat, or all-out warfare have such deep roots in historic, religious, political, economic, and social inequities — resolving a conflict often doesn't make it go away forever. As the daily news headlines from myriad global hot spots remind us, as long as the root causes of a conflict linger, or memories of it have yet to heal, the potential for divergence, discord, tensions, clashes, or renewed all-out conflict remains real.

As a direct result of the war- and conflict-riddled world in which our students are coming of age, I find it more helpful than ever to talk with them not about conflict resolution, but rather about conflict management and prevention, through the art of negotiation and the principles of preventive diplomacy. Young people take to preventive diplomacy naturally, even eagerly. Most children are old hands at conflict and negotiation at a personal level with parents, siblings, teachers, and peers. Some in the U.S., and even more elsewhere around the globe, have witnessed much worse, too: parents, siblings, teachers, and/or friends killed in armed conflicts, communities and whole cultures devastated by violence. In some places, children themselves are often the well-armed killers, trained by adults to do their bidding. Whatever their proximity to violence, whether they see it on television, or breathe it or feel the threat of it right in front of them 24/7, children may feel called to peace — or called to a "piece of the action" of bloodshed, of vengeance. What is clear to me now is that schools can and should play a role in helping young people — our future negotiators — learn the tools of preventive diplomacy. In this increasingly interconnected world, such knowledge may be one of our best hopes for tangible peace, today and in the future.

How do we teach students? By transporting them intellectually to a different, high-energy, experiential educational landscape within the familiar territory of their schools ... into an even more challenging, distant culture in crisis: the Middle East.

Preventive diplomacy has had a long and instrumental role in international relations. World leaders and foreign policy experts have recognized it as one of the most powerful alternatives to armed conflict, and essential if we are to prevent globally catastrophic wars and other forms of violence. Former UN Secretary-

General Boutros Boutros-Ghali described preventive diplomacy as "diplomatic action to prevent existing disputes from arising between parties, to prevent these disputes from escalating into conflicts, and to limit the spread of the latter when they occurred." In the field of preventive diplomacy, two distinct veins have emerged: Track One and Track Two diplomacy. What are these? "Track One diplomacy" refers to ongoing, formal negotiations between official representatives of nation-states — such as presidents, prime ministers, foreign ministers, and/or ambassadors — to resolve or prevent conflicts. "Track Two diplomacy" refers to more subtle social assistance by professional, nongovernmental organizations (NGO's) or persons — i.e., appointed arbitrators or organizations such as Doctors Without Borders — to ease tensions between nation-states. These non-military, Track One and Track Two diplomatic strategies have been helpful to some extent in addressing potential crises between nations or peoples before they erupt again in violence in such powder-keg areas as Northern Ireland, the Indo-Pakistani Kashmir region, and Bosnia.

In addition to these well-established forms of preventive diplomacy, I believe there to be another, equally — if not more — valuable form of international conflict prevention: Track Three diplomacy. This form of preventive diplomacy — which we employ in Axis of Hope, an educational organization that I founded in 2002 — involves creative educational efforts to teach conflict analysis, management, and prevention to students around the globe. These efforts help to deepen students' understanding of the religious, cultural, socioeconomic, and psychological roots of geo-political conflicts, and to provide them with the tools required to help bring more peaceful coexistence to these areas of conflict. How do we teach students Track Three diplomacy? In Axis of Hope, we do it by transporting them intellectually from the familiar territory of their schools (riddled as they are with their own emotional minefields) to a more challenging, distant culture in crisis: the Middle East. For one-half day to five days, middle and/or upper school boys and girls with whom we work take on the roles of Israeli or Palestinian moderates or extremists, members of a Track One diplomatic quartet, or people employed by the Track Two World Bank — roles they play based on the case study of the Arab-Israeli conflict that we authored, entitled "Whose Jerusalem?" a Harvard Business School-type case study on the Middle East conflict.

During the seminars, we begin by having students read the assigned case-study history of the Arab-Israeli conflict that details the religious, social, cultural, and economic factors integral to the analysis of the conflict and that offers an in-depth chronology of the conflict. We also offer lectures on how to analyze the conflict from a negotiator's point of view and how to effectively practice the art of negotiation. Perhaps more importantly, students participate in "intellectual outward bound" role-play exercises representing the aforementioned and other stakeholders on all sides of the conflict. By the end of the negotiating exercises, students learn valuable lessons about how they might promote peaceful coexistence in the Middle East, and how they might relate the lessons they have learned to more successful coexistence efforts right here in the U.S., in their own schools, and in their own homes.

These pedagogical efforts provide students with a progressive form of learning in which they can hone their diplomatic skills in the safe space of an educational environment — allowing them to take risks, make mistakes, and live to tell about it. All of these efforts are based on four key points, which we call "The Preventive Diplomacy Core Principles."

The Preventive Diplomacy Core Principle

Classic negotiation and conflict resolution often eschews the "I win, you lose" negotiation style, also described as "positional bargaining" in which "hard" bargainers will do anything to win and "soft" bargainers will give up the ship to preserve the relationship with the other side's representative. Neither leads to a fair, sustainable conclusion. Preventive diplomacy training for students relies on principles and practices adapted from the work of many in the field of conflict resolution and negotiation whose insights now define approaches used around the globe in business, government, personal relationships, and other arenas. While our key concepts come from a variety of sources, the most important ideas in our teaching come from the book Getting to YES: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In, by Roger Fisher, William Ury, and Bruce Patton, of the Harvard Negotiation Project. In creating preventive diplomacy principles and practices for students, we've drawn extensively from their straightforward method for negotiation and conflict management's four basic principles: (1) focus on interests, not positions, (2) separate the people from the problem, (3) invent options for mutual gain, and (4) learn how to talk so people will listen. In our experience, these key principles quickly engage students and turn a complex subject (for example, the Arab-Israeli conflict) into an effective, hands-on learning experience.

First: Focus on interests, not positions.

For the purpose of teaching students useful conflict analysis, management, and prevention skills, the first pillar is "principled" or "integrative" bargaining, in which the negotiating parties focus on reconciling their interests rather than their positions or differences. Understanding the other side's interests gives more precise meaning to the problem.

It is important to remember: Peace is a process, not a prize.

Awareness of the fact that the most prevailing interests are most often very basic human needs is vital, too. These basic needs include power, security, a sense of belonging, and recognition. After both — or all — sides' interests are clearly defined, it is then up to the negotiating sides to find shared interests, as well as conflicting ones, because underneath differing positions there can also be subtle, shared, compatible interests between and among enemies. Although Palestinians and Israelis — or students playing the roles of these key stakeholders in the Middle East conflict — may not believe in the same faith, all of the negotiators have families, friends, personal interests, and amazing personal stories of love and loss. Students must learn to study the person or persons with whom they will be negotiating, making an effort to understand their shared personal interests — as well as how to make their, and their adversaries', interests "come alive" in negotiations. The savvy student negotiator learns how to discuss these shared and conflicting interests in creative, energetic ways, and how to bargain in concrete but flexible ways. Establishing a "common interest" focus from the outset of negotiations leads to more collaborative discussion, a better synthesis of ideas, and potentially innovative solutions for problems that previously appeared intractable.

The person with whom he or she is negotiating does not just possess the thoughts, the ideas, and the official positions of the other side's government — or the other side's grade level or sports team or social network. He or she also possesses many of the thoughts, ideas, positions, and interests that the other negotiator deems close to his or her heart as well. If a negotiator is able to smile and focus on these common interests first, instead of always focusing on conflicting ideas and frowning and arguing and walking away, he or she gains much more respect from the other side from the outset, and in the long run. As Fisher says: "Behind opposed positions lie conflicting interests, as well as shared and compatible ones."

Second: Separate the people from the problem.

Preventive diplomacy teaches students what Fisher, Ury, and Patton taught their students: "Don't be hard on the other side." To be precise, they urge us to "be hard on the problem, but be easy on the people," if we hope to negotiate successfully. Negotiators are, after all, people first. First, students learn to build a working relationship with the negotiator representing the other side. Then, they learn to tackle the problem. In doing so, they are taught to imagine why the other side's representatives are arguing their case the way they are. The talented negotiator first separates the people he or she is working with from the problem they are discussing.

The next vital step is being able to "walk in the shoes of the other side." One handy example: before using the "Whose Jerusalem?" case study as a role-play exercise, we have teachers ask students, well before the activity begins, to identify which sides they want to represent. For example, do they want to represent Likud (Israeli right wing, or conservative party members) or Hamas (the Palestinian extremist organization, with known political and terrorist wings)? If a student indicates that he or she would like to be a Likud representative, the teacher can surprise the student by assigning him or her to play the role of the

opposite position, or Hamas, requiring this student to learn to understand, and then defend, the other side. We have found that this not only allows students to learn more about all sides of a conflict, but it also helps them to be more compassionate when arguing in favor of their original position at a later date. They tend to listen more carefully to all sides, acknowledge what is being said, speak more effectively in order to be understood, and learn the importance of the old diplomatic term: "We agree to disagree." In short, students learn that a vital diplomatic skill is to research and understand all sides in a conflict. This leads to quicker, more effective negotiations and problem solving in the long run.

Third: Invent options for mutual gains.

Negotiators often offer little, demand much, and stubbornly haggle over a single quantifiable issue like money, as if they are in a bazaar trying to talk a merchant down. The good negotiator creates what Fisher, Ury, and Patton call "mutual gains" in negotiations, so that negotiators on both sides are able to achieve some — if not all — of their goals together, without compromising the interests of their own constituents.

When negotiating, students learn never to assume that there is only one answer to a question, or one way to solve a problem, or one outcome a negotiator must seek. They learn how to enter negotiations in a very open-minded way, with an ability to invent multiple options for outcomes. We teach them to listen to the outcome options or back-up plans of the other side, too. A talented negotiator will always prioritize and preview desired outcomes, invent alternatives if needed, and develop a step-by-step plan to achieve them, in a process that involves the other side's negotiator(s). We teach students to not only think about solving their problem, but to help the other side solve its problems as well. Identifying myriad interests that both sides share — and inventing options that could satisfy both parties — is crucial. This creative, inventive brainstorming process of developing multiple options is vital to achieving mutual gains.

It may be difficult to think of students agreeing to "lasting peace" in the Middle East at the end of a role-play exercise. But what if you up the ante by setting a time limit, giving students only one night, or one hour after a day of conflict-management exercises, to, say, write a letter to former British Prime Minister Tony Blair or to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice before he or she is to depart for the Middle East on a peace-seeking trip, outlining ideas about creating peace to the Middle East? In such a pressure scenario, students learn to "rally" — to invent broader and more creative options for mutual gains in a conflict. Students learn how to no longer simply represent the Israeli right wing or Hamas, but work in small groups at new negotiation tables marked "Education," "Health Services," "Defense," "Politics," and more. Here, they learn to identify shared interests and negotiate in a different environment, where new ideas — and new, creative options, rather than simply parties' interests — are being discussed. This is known as "diplomatic brainstorming for the win-win," during which time students search for new ways to create mutually agreed upon solutions in these different areas.

Fourth: Learn how to talk so people will listen.

It is essential that negotiations produce agreements amicably and efficiently. Use of proper body language, the appropriate choice of words, and the correct tone of the voice are crucial diplomatic tools students learn to refine before going to the negotiating table. The good negotiator is one who is able to establish easy two-way communications, so that his or her negotiating relationship is, from the outset, not adversarial. We teach students to build a good, side-by-side working relationship. We often ask students guiding questions. "Are you seated in a chair during negotiations, or are you standing beside the chair — or on the chair, or on top of the table — trying to show superiority? While negotiating, are you screaming or raising your voice, or are you negotiating with a firm yet respectful tone? Are you speaking in an arrogant manner, or in a humble way? Are you leaning back in your chair and crossing your arms and legs, removing yourself physically from the talks, or are you leaning forward and with arms opened, interested in and open to the negotiation procedure? And, finally, we teach students that the word "silent" spelled another way is "listen." We ask: "Do you show respect to the other side in negotiations by remaining silent and listening often?"

Peace is a process, not a prize. There is no such thing as "lasting peace." In international conflict, peace isn't something we achieve and then leave behind, assuming that a peace accord or a treaty is part of a completed task, never to be revisited. We now know that what matters is international conflict management, achieved through ongoing preventive diplomacy, including constant educational exercises in conflict analysis, management, and prevention. As future leaders, our students can learn to see peace as an architectural process that must be discussed and negotiated and drafted together, and refined over and over again — before it is even built in the form of a temporary peace treaty. And, then, as I always tell students, days or months or years later, this beautifully crafted peace model must be remodeled again.

By teaching future leaders to develop trust, compassion and empathy for one another, and for people around the world, educators can help change the landscape of conflict and help create the prospect of future peace. U.S. independent schools are doing an excellent job of focusing students on global issues, but they might contemplate taking the next step in helping students learn how to deal with these complex issues in a hands-on way. Allowing students to participate in open, honest discussions of thorny world issues will teach them essential preventive diplomacy skills that will last a lifetime.

Carl F. Hobert, a graduate of the Tufts University Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, is executive director of Axis of Hope and is completing a book entitled Axis of Hope: Teaching Global Responsibility in U.S Schools (Beacon Press). He may be reached at carl.hobert@axisofhope.org.