Introduction
According to international peace academy peace keeping is essentially prevention or ending, or dealing with the effects of conflict, containment, moderation and termination of hostilities between or within states through third parties intervention. The process is organized and directed internationally by use of multinational military impartial between conflicting parties, in practice, at least four or five nations participating (Roger Fisher et al, pp 79). The operation also uses the police and civilian personnel to restore and maintain peace and has rules of engagement and actual practices on the ground ensuring minimum use of force consistent with achieving of the mandate of the force (SNOW, par 34).
Main body
Conflicts are defined as disagreements between parties perceiving a threat to their needs, interests or concerns. States respond to the perceived threat through hostility or wars, as the durability of the interests and concerns of the parties transcends the immediate presenting situation. Participating states in a conflict tend to respond on the basis of their perceptions of the situation. As such, they filter their perceptions (and reactions) through their values, culture, beliefs, information, experience, and other variables (Ting-Toomey, pp 64).
In most cases states or governments that find themselves in conflicting situations with neighbours or within their boundaries are forced to avoid the eventuality of peace keeping forces when the acknowledge that their citizens should be spared the effects of conflict. International pressure makes them realize the importance of peace and peaceable behaviour so as to promote stability in their regions and other regions.
These issues make the states or governments to negotiate with their antagonist to arrive at agreeable solutions to the causes of hostility. Negotiations help them facilitate further economic cooperation and trade promoting even further forms of cooperation’s and restorations of positive images of their states in cases of humiliations or defeats where war was involved.
A case study of the Israel Egypt conflict and the acclaimed Camp David accords highlights the need for negotiations in conflict resolution. The 1978 Camp David accords were made after 13 days series of negotiations between Israel and Egypt. The negotiations took place under American mediation with Egypt president Anwar Sadat and Israel Prime Minister Menachem Begin. They were taken at the time to be the most comprehensive agreements between Israel and Arab nations. Credit is given to the Israel’s president’s effective bargaining tactics which were optimal by the then standards of foreign policies. tangible results of the accords was that Israel traded the Sinai peninsular captured in the war for peaceful coexistence with Egypt, while both states ended up with financial and aid packages from America. There by terming the negotiation successful.
During the negotiations Egyptian objectives were primarily financial as the wars of 1967 and 1973 had left the Egyptian state drained financially. the war ended catastrophically for the Arab nations with Israel having occupied the Sinai peninsular, Golan heights, the whole of Gaza strip, west bank including Jerusalem. The illusion of the Egyptian military might in the Arab nations besides the financial recovery need public reaffirmation. The new president Anwar Sadat after the death of the previous president Nasser had very little options but lay claim to the occupied land as Sinai peninsular was part of the sovereign Egypt. To regain integrity and honor lost during the wars. But as noted by the president himself the cost of the war was much greater financially than the loss of land. During the same period other Arab nations had benefited greatly from the proceeds of oil but Egypt had not instead lost a lot. He reasoned that the nation would gain more in peace initiatives than war and the gains were to come from the American aid. As previous financial aid from the soviet unions had not improved their financial need the president reasoned that negotiating with Israel and making some concessions in line with the American interests would give him the much needed financial aid to reconstruct his country. The Egyptian president was the first to initiate the discussions of ceasing hostility as while the war was on he made a call for international conference to be held under the United Nations for establishment of peace in the Middle East. The president went further even to offering the Israel people the idea of peaceful coexistence with him traveling the border of the two nations. But he had two objectives in his mind, to reclaim the lost land and to get financial aid.
Even if the same problems that were facing Egypt at the time were evident with the Israel as a state, the need for peace in the Middle East by freeing most of the defense budgets for the more productive uses, Israel had not only the financial objectives but also the territorial aspirations in the proposed negotiations. By way of decreasing the defense budgets both countries under negotiations realized well that they would be boosting their development by intra regional trade specializations and cooperation in joint economic projects besides taking advantages of comparative trade.
It territorial interests were much more in line of gaining some recognition within the Arab world. Israel needed to have some kind of buffer zone in the Sinai area and some earlier boundary changes with Egypt along the red sea. They needed a right of navigation in the red sea and the gulf of elating the negotiation Israel expected to gain a territorial controlled strip from Mediterranean to Eilat. The territorial boundary instigation were that the cultural deference between the Israel and the Arab people were seen to too big and the mistrust between the two groups was so profound as the fear of the Israel people was so high for them to be comfortable with the Arabs. The Arabs on the other hand insisted that Israel was not supposed to exist in the first place and that was the primary causes of the war. These were the differences seen in the multicultural aspect of theses negotiations (Davidheiser, para 10). The accords were therefore an attempt by the Israel’s securing existence among the Arab world.
The Camp David negotiations used the optimal strategy in negotiations for both parties for it to have been that successful as noted by many international relations scholars. The Israel’s negotiating team highly used the strategy of issue displacement. Though they new their problems were more to do with the problem of the Palestine’s west bank and Gaza strips they highly insisted on retention of the Sinai territory. This deception of the intention made the Egyptian assume that the Israel was more accommodating. Begin was able to play that game refusing to negotiate on issue of settlement to the last minute while at the same time taking the position of a bully by threatening the Egyptian all along while knowing very well the Americans had no option but to make sure the accord were successful. Begin knew very well that the Egyptian Sinai issue was central to their demands and having occupied he had all the power to threaten them so as to manipulate the American to adhere to most of the Israel’s demands such as increased financial aid. This made him to seem superior to the Egyptians and actually that position adopted by the Israel made the whole negotiations to be under very high levels of suspicions and contempt from the American and the Egyptians. The Egyptian negotiator was more accommodating and accepted much of what was given by the Israelis as he managed to regain the Sinai peninsular and the sovereignty of his country in return to cessation of hostilities against Israel. Sadat was less successful in enforcing deceptions as he is noted to have been more trusting to the mediator. This helped the America president at the time to be able to negotiate from an informed point. The optimal deception displayed by the Israel’s earned them much concession while the Egyptians amateurism in negotiation was only helped but the mediator as he had noted the openness that Sadat had started the negotiations with. while negotiations are seen as bargains for possible agreements between parties, the gains accrued for one party are a loss to the other party. The optimal bargain requires that you assume some position in the bargaining table so as to achieve maximum from the negotiations. Optimal negotiations necessitates that you have project a tough position to make the other party concede more to your demands. This is where deceptions and issue displacements as strategies come into play. These are best achieved when threats and coercions are used to achieve the desired goal.
Conclusion
Coercions with their limited use in negotiations are highly used in the games of negotiations as appropriate responses to the mutual mistrust present between the parties. Optimal bargaining are essentially position based bargaining and as such grants the party that chooses to use it a dominant position over the other party. Once dominance is established the party has the capacity to go on and issue threats and ultimatums to force the other party to concede more to your demands (Ting-Toomey, pp12). This strategy was highly used by the Israel’s negotiation team. The goals of all negotiations are achievement of a mutually agreed accord and Camp David managed to arrive at these. It is hailed as a successful negotiation as Israel managed to get to remain with the Golan Heights and the Palestine land of Gaza and west bank. the results of those accords were that the was also the cessation of hostility between the two countries along their common border as Sinai was traded by the Israel’s for increase anti terrorism activities efforts to be undertaken by the Egyptian, while both countries ended with bigger financial packages from the American.
Works cited
Camp David Accords (1978): 2008. Web.
Conflict Research Consortium Staff: Book Summary of Getting past No: Negotiating With Difficult People by William Ury, 2007: Web.
Davidheiser m. (2005): Mediation and Multiculturalism: Domestic and International Challenges: Web.
Roger Fisher, William Ury, Bruce Patton: Negotiation: Houghton Mifflin Books, ISBN: 0395631246, 1991.
SNOW D.M: Peacekeeping, Peacemaking, ISBN: 1428915281: DIANE, 1993.
Ting-Toomey S, (1994). Managing Intercultural Conflicts effectively: 2008. Web.