Introduction
This memorandum is aimed at planning the forthcoming negotiations between India and Pakistan. It will discuss the way how the representatives of India can act during the negotiations, the applicable strategies to follow, the possible opportunities and obstacles for the negotiations. We hope that this briefing paper will be helpful in the preparation for the negotiations and will contribute to their effectiveness.
First of all, it should be said that the future negotiations between India and Pakistan can play an important role in the development of the history of the both countries.
In case the parties manage to find a consensus, the existing problems will be solved, and the war of interests that lasted for more than a century can finally end. This is a considerable motivation for arranging a sufficient negotiation strategy, which will be prolific and will let the both countries move forward from the standstill they appeared at.
Framework
Before discussing the opportunities that the negotiations can bring it is worth thinking of the pre-negotiation work that can be done by India. First of all, there is an undisputable need for social network to be done. In case of intractable conflicts management, it is vital to create a peace infrastructure, which will be responsible for preventing the military actions or violent attacks.
This infrastructure should better be represented by an independent organ, in order to be impartial in attitude to the parties. What is more, India may consider involving civil society of its own and of the confronting party, in this case of Pakistan, into the peace establishing program. Such network can serve as a profound basis for successful negotiations.
This is due to the fact that the studies have shown, that the introduction of unofficial third parties into the conflict can contribute significantly to its resolution (Chigas, 2008).
There is also an option of introducing an independent agent, who will be able to produce fresh views on the problem and offer some new solutions (Salacuse, 1999). In addition, the independent mediators can help to design a coherent political strategy for the parties (Crocker, 2003).
In addition, while the representatives of government have a power to negotiate and make decisions, there are some spheres which can only be controlled by the civil society (Saunders, 2001). For instance, only the citizens of Kashmir are able to establish certain attitudes towards Indian and Pakistani rules, and only the citizens of the opposing sides are able to be either tolerant or confront each other.
Therefore, in order to achieve the desired results at the negotiations, you need to consider the interests of the mentioned nations, which can both serve as a support for your ideas or prove an impediment to achieving agreement.
Opportunities of negotiations
Obviously, the representatives of India should be ready to present the ideas about what innovations can be implemented in the current policies. In order to produce these ideas, it is important to analyze the interests of the two parties. Lying on the surface are the opposed interests, which have been the reason of the multiple controversies between the countries.
For instance, both India and Pakistan are willing to take political control over the territory of Kashmir, and none of the parties is ready to give up this target. Each of the parties has a solid ground for its position, and it seems that there is no resolution that I going to meet the requirements of the both sides.
Therefore, at this point the negotiations can either leave the issue unresolved or lead to the acceptance of one of the party’s options. However, in case one of the sides weakens its position or expresses a will to compromise, there can appear new options for the conflict resolution. However, in order to do this, there have to be some stronger interests found.
For example, for both countries the interest above sharing Kashmir may be a will to establish peace and respect after more than 50 years of disagreement. Therefore, you need to know exactly what the hierarchical order of Indian interests is, in order to be able to define the primary and secondary ones during the negotiations.
There are also compatible interests; to be specific, on one side India demands the stop of the terrorist attacks, which, according to the country’s version, are being organized by Pakistani people. On the other side, Pakistani government has been trying to unite the Muslim professionists, which is impossible again because of Kashmiri conflict.
What is more, the both parties show impartiality in response to each other’s demands, and refuse to take the responsibility for the ongoing events. Indeed, Pakistan government rejects the fact that the terrorist attacks are organized or anyhow sponsored by them, stating that this is a choice of Kashmiri to take such measures (Cheema and Nuri, 2005).
Similarly, India denies the conflict of religions and expresses an opinion that the religious differences do not prevent Kashmiri people from peaceful coexistence with Indian citizens (EPDMA, 2007). In this case, the compatible interests are connected with the domino principle. This means that in case either of the parties refuses from its position, the other party will also have to give up.
Therefore, the possible options here for India are to agree with the division of population and territory according to the religious preferences, or to convince Pakistan to contribute to the preservation of peace on the territory of Kashmir.
The both variants exclude the need for terrorist attacks in future and can bring agreement on this level. Thus, your task is to decide in advance, how flexible, or, in contrast, how strong are you going to be in respect to this issue.
However, the negotiation theory states that “all-gain agreements an only be achieved when the parties stress the cooperative, and not just the competitive, aspects of their relationship” (Cruikshank, 1989). This, our task is to search for some common interests, if such exist. The deeper analysis of the struggle for Kashmir shows that the territorial distribution is not the ultimate purpose of the conflict.
In fact, both India and Pakistan express an opinion that the citizens of Kashmir should not have their rights violated. On one hand, Indian government states that Kashmiri will have their rights and liberties defended under Indian rule, motivating it by the contrast with Pakistani rule where human rights are being violated (Wirsing, 2007).
On the other hand, Pakistani government argues that the citizens of Kashmir should be able to choose the ruler for themselves; the representatives are deeply convinced that Kashmiri seek either to gain independence, or to become a part of Pakistan rather than be a part of India (PA, 2010).
Thus, despite the different points of view about the situation, both India and Pakistani are eager to protect the political and social rights and liberties of Kashmiri people. From this perspective, the interest of protecting the liberties of Kashmiri is common for both of the negotiations participants.
The last mentioned interest, shared by the two parties, increases the possibility of finding the zone of possible agreement (ZOPA). Indeed, there is a multitude of point where India and Pakistan agree, for example:
- Kashmiri people should choose the government themselves
- The citizens of Kashmir are free to confess any religion
- It is essential that both India and Pakistan take part in helping to determine the development of Kashmiri politics, due to the history of the countries.
Taking into consideration the named arguments, it can be derived that the Kashmiri conflict can be weakened if not resolved by setting the ZOPA at the protection of rights and liberties of the Kashmiri people. With this purpose, you could offer Pakistani government to organize a set of activities, which will be supported by Pakistan and India, and will be aimed at helping the citizens of Kashmir to make their choice.
These activities can include creating a Constitution of Kashmir, offering the country the options like separating into an autonomic Republic, or dividing into pro-Indian and pro-Pakistani parts, etc. This approach will also need a series of studies and social investigations to be carried, and their costs can also be shared between the parties.
In this way, neither India nor Pakistan will have to give up their positions, and the resolution of the situation will be determined by Kashmiri people as by an impartial member.
However, the main point about ZOPA is helping Pakistani government to see it and to motivate them to reach it, as the consensual knowledge is vital for establishing agreement in negotiations (Hampson, 1999). You should keep in mind that the opposed site has a skeptical attitude to your offers, so it is important to prepare a solid foundation for your arguments.
The mentioned decision is only one of the options available for the negotiations. It is worth remembering that your task is to achieve joint gains, and for this purpose you will need to (a) be able to share information effectively; (b) be ready to deal with the new appearing problems, and (c) be eager to continue improving the decision during the negotiations (Brett, 1998).
These three factors can make the negotiations prolific and bring benefits to all its participants. However, you should remember that the mentioned joint gains need to be seen by Pakistani government, and if they are not, your task is to show them.
In order to do this, you have to be ready to present to the Pakistani government a list of advantages they would face in case of reaching the ZOPA. This will increase the chances for the negotiations to be successful.
Possible obstacles
Besides the mentioned above opportunities of the forthcoming negotiations, there is a number of factors, which can prevent the negotiations from being successful, in particular for India. These factors should be taken into consideration in order to be managed during the negotiations process.
The very first barrier to the negotiations progress is the general rule, which claims that “the prolonged nature of intractable conflict gives rise to self-reinforcing escalatory dynamics” (Chigas, ). In case of India-Pakistan conflict, which lasted for more than 60 years, this rule is likely to work.
The situation suggests that the absence of progress in the conflict has lead to the deep convictions of the both sides of their rightness and of the incontestability of their decisions. Due to this fact, there is a little chance for any party to weaken the opposing BATNA, or to prove the dominance of their own ones.
This inflexibility and unreadiness to accept another position increase the deep-rooted nature of the conflict and prevent it from being resolved with the negotiations.
As for the measures that can be taken in order to overcome this barrier, one of the options is to call for bringing the relations between the countries to a new level. You can demonstrate Pakistani representatives all the negative consequences of the long lasting conflict, and show them the promising perspectives of accepting a new, flexible position.
Another possible obstacle for the negotiations success is the divergence of ideology and belief systems of the two parties. This factor belongs to the ones that usually create additional conflicts and make it harder to settle the agreement (Hampson, 1999).
Besides the political conflicts, there is an underlying foundation of cultural peculiarities, which determine the religions, social attitudes, moral rules, norms of behavior, etc. In other words, what seems to be a perfect solution for Indian people, might be viewed as absolutely unacceptable by Pakistani people, and vice versa. Tolerating these differences is often hard because of their significance for each of the parties.
The ideology also affects the perception of the situation by the parties, suggesting that the war of interests is becoming even more intense. For instance, while India took a liberal position in attitude to Religion, for Pakistani people this issue is a matter of life. Indeed, it is known from the history that Muslims are famous for their devotion to faith, which is often proved by violent means.
Moreover, violent attacks are often seen as the only way to demonstrate one’s faith. In contrast, Hinduism rejects any form of violence, and treats the means of Muslims as unacceptable. Similarly, the differences in value systems affect the perception of Kashmir conflict by the parties, which suggests that there is an increased risk of misunderstanding in the negotiations.
Due to the two obstacles mentioned above, there appears another one, which is a mistrust between the parties. To be specific, Indian government accused Pakistan to sponsor the terrorist attacks for many times. However, Pakistani government keeps rejecting this version and in addition to this refuses to contribute to providing peace.
Thus, until the guilty ones are found, there will be a mistrust from the side of India, which can hinder the negotiations. In order to overcome this, Indian government has to do everything possible to make sure that Pakistan is not motivated to organize such kinds of attacks. It should also be noted that Pakistani government also has some bias towards Indian rule.
The reason of their distrust lies in the fact that Indian government failed to carry a referendum for Kashmir independence, promised more than 50 years ago (The Economist, 1999). In order to remove this condition, the government of India has to provide a guaranty of implementation of all the resolutions accepted at the negotiations; for example, with this purpose a corresponding contract can be signed.
In addition to the discussed impediments to reaching a compromise, there is one that can be decisive for the negotiations. This impediment is the existence of many official parties. You should take into consideration, that there is a number of fundamentalist groups, which are fighting either for Kashmir independence or its joining Pakistan. These groups will most possibly be used by Pakistani spokespersons to support their arguments.
The parties like US or China are also likely to support Pakistan, while the UN is on the side of Kashmiri and their right for independence. These multiple parties introduce the newer and newer views on the situation, which, as a result, hampers making one right decision at the negotiations.
With the addition of new interests, the task of the negotiations is not to finally resolve the Kashmir conflict in Pakistani or Indian way, but to meet all the requirements and leave nobody dissatisfied. The existence of multiple parties has always been one of the main barriers to decision making, and the more parties are there, the more complex the conflict becomes (Hampson, 1999).
What is more, even when the third party has a benevolent intention to help to resolve the conflict, it is often doomed to fail because of its inability to consider the non-objective factors (Chigas, ).
For instance, even though the UN tries to evaluate the situation objectively, it will never be able to realize the deepness of the cultural differences and values, which suggests that there is a very little chance for the UN to introduce a solution, satisfactory both for India and Pakistan.
It has to be utmost clear to the both parties that their conflict has a very deep and broad nature. Besides the Kashmir conflict, there is also a number of other problems of political, economical, social, religious character, which make the relations between the countries tense. Therefore, an expectation to resolve all the issues at once is rather unrealistic, and can bring above disappointment.
The main mistake here is the strong belief of each party that the successful negotiations are those which can meet all their requirements. Thus, in order to overcome this obstacle, you should be ready to accept a different negotiation scenario, which will suggest making quick decisions right at the place if it is needed.
After all, the experience of the composite dialogue of 2003-2005 suggests that the step-by-step problem resolution can be more effective than rapid efforts to introduce dramatic changes (Kux, 2006).
Strategy advice
Now that all the opportunities and obstacles of the negotiations have been discussed, and the needed framework was mentioned, it is important to plan the way of handling the negotiation process. In order to do this, you need to choose a negotiation strategy that would be appropriate for the situation.
Obviously, in the conditions of a prolonged and complicated struggle of interests, it is impossible to find one appropriate resolution for all the existing problems. However, several aspects can be considered, which can help to improve the general situation and increase the chances for the negotiations to be successful.
In case if your only task were to reach your aims at any costs, the appropriate strategy would be positional bargaining. However, in the modern world, where the civilized society suggests that there is a need to tolerate differences and compromise, this strategy is unacceptable. In addition, in case of conflict with Pakistan, positional bargaining would only aggravate it and cause the greater resistance from the opposing side. That is why, integrative bargaining is much more beneficial for both parties in this case.
The essence of integrative bargaining lies in searching for optimal decisions, which can fully or partially satisfy the needs of the two parties. One of the options for implementing this strategy is dividing the main interests into several minor interests, or trying to find a number of meanings in one idea. Thus, the will of both India and Pakistan to administer Kashmir covers a number of other wishes, such as:
- gaining more territory
- becoming a more powerful country
- gaining political authority
- resolving the religious issue
In this way, we can see that the controversial ideas often have some underlying motives, which have a chance to be conciliated. That is why, you can try to apply this method to India’s interests and offer Pakistan to do the same. This will make the situation more clear and increase the chances for finding a fresh solution for the two sides.
Try to show Pakistani spokespersons, that the interests of their country are being considered, and that the both positions are equally important in this situation. Your task is to remove the mistrust that has been existing for decades, and make the opponent open to new solutions.
In fact, there is a multitude of approaches which can be helpful to lead the negotiations in this way. They include the basic speech patterns, or the way in which your speech can be organized in order to sound more persuasive. Integrating politics with linguistics can be helpful, as the “critical thinking and interdisciplinary research” can contribute into the success of the negotiations (Eagle, 2009).
For instance, sometimes such tools, as ad hominem or bandwagon effect can be used, in case if they are relevant and supported by the facts, of course (Wright, 2001). You can also use an appeal to authority, for example by mentioning how the prominent countries of the world managed the similar conflicts.
In addition, one of the most persuasive strategies is putting the interests of the community before the interests of an individual. Thus, it is important to clarify that the India-Pakistan conflict is caused because of the citizens’ interests, and that its resolution should also be based on it.
One more good strategy is to postpone the denial, or, to be more specific, to agree before rejecting the opponent’s idea. Whatever is said at the negotiation, try to show understanding of the Pakistani position and respect for it, and only after that start to give opposing ideas. All these techniques can help you to achieve the desired goals and to make the negotiation results beneficial for India.
Apart from the mentioned strategy, you should consider organizing the requirements and needs of India in hierarchical order. In addition, the general advise is to start with the minor issues, and “put Kashmir on a back burner” (Kux, 2006). This approach is based on the idea that the aim of the negotiations is to improve the relations between the countries, make them less tense and more trustful.
That is why, a gradual approaching of the countries may serve as a basis for a natural Kashmir conflict resolution in the future. Of course the main points should be discussed; however, working on economical and social problems should be put first. This will also guarantee that the negotiations will bring at least some changes for better, even if the main issue will remain unresolved.
As for the decisions you are going to introduce, remember that all the ideas should be fair, efficient, and feasible (Cruikshank, 1989). Fairness means that it is necessary for the two parties to agree on the uprightness of the decision. What is more, such conclusion is not to be left for a third independent party; otherwise, the decision is to be worked out until the both parties accept it as fair.
The decision efficiency points at the fact that its implementation will satisfy all the parties. Here not only India and Pakistan should be taken into consideration; the other parties in the face of other countries and fundamentalist groups also should agree with the efficiency of the decision. Finally, the feasibility of the decision has to provide the possibility of its implementation.
Therefore, it is not advisory to show too much expectations about a certain decision, and count on its magic effect. For example, expecting that the next day after negotiations Pakistan and India will turn into the closest political and economical partners is far from feasible.
However, making steps in this direction and gradually improving the relations between the parties is a feasible expectation. Therefore, try to be realistic, and support this attitude in the opponent.
Concerning the approach to problem solution, it is obvious that the key point for you is to look for joint gains for India and Pakistan. It was proved that even in the settings of cultural divergence, the joint gains are able to unite the countries for achieving shared aims (Brett, 1998). Therefore, even in case of inability to find a compromise, finding joint gains can be helpful in conflict resolution.
What is more, your task is not only to find the joint gains, but also to present them as advantageous to the opposite side. This is due to the fact that the attitude of Pakistan to India is rather biased, and it would be irrational to count for their instantaneous support of all your ideas.
That is why, be ready to (a) find the new joint gains in the process of negotiation, and (b) show them to Pakistani spokesperson and motivate them to reach these gains together.
Conclusion
This memorandum contains the information needed for India spokesperson to lead successful negotiations. It discusses the possible opportunities and obstacles of the negotiations, and gives suggestions about the party’s behavior during the process of negotiations. The paper is based on numerous studies about negotiations and international relations, and thus will hopefully help India to gain satisfactory results at the negotiations.
Reference List
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