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Mediation has become a common technique for terminating violent conflicts both within and between states; while mediation has a strong record in reducing hostilities, it is not without its own problems. In The Mediation Dilemma, Kyle Beardsley highlights its long-term limitations. The result of this oft-superficial approach to peacemaking, immediate and reassuring as it may be, is often a fragile peace. With the intervention of a third-party mediator, warring parties may formally agree to concessions that are insupportable in the long term and soon enough find themselves at odds again. Beardsley examines his argument empirically using two data sets and traces it through several historical cases: Henry Kissinger's and Jimmy Carter's initiatives in the Middle East, 1973-1979; Theodore Rooseveltʹs 1905 mediation in the Russo-Japanese War; and Carterʹs attempt to mediate in the 1994 North Korean nuclear crisis. He also draws upon the lessons of the 1993 Arusha Accords, the 1993 Oslo Accords, Haiti in 1994, the 2002 Ceasefire Agreement in Sri Lanka, and the 2005 Memorandum of Understanding in Aceh. Beardsley concludes that a reliance on mediation risks a greater chance of conflict relapse in the future, whereas the rejection of mediation risks ongoing bloodshed as war continues. -- Book jacket

This brief essay considers the "mediation dilemma" in the light of new analysis by Constantin Ruhe and Iris Volg. Ruhe and Volg's analysis adds to our understanding of manipulative mediation in two important ways: (a) it demonstrates how an analysis that uses a lens of survival functions clarifies the policy trade-offs beyond what is possible from an analysis that uses a lens of changing hazard rates; and (b) it demonstrates that lighter (nonmanipulative) forms of mediation have a less positive effect on peace stability than in the original analysis. This response also offers important corrections to the conclusions drawn by Ruhe and Volg: (a) ignoring the lens of changing hazard rates misses key ways of testing for the observable implications that arise from the underlying theoretical arguments; (b) Ruhe and Volg misstate some of the theoretical claims made by Beardsley; and (c) almost all of the original implications explored by Beardsley remain supported.

The UN Security Council (UNSC) confronts at least three challenges in translating its actions during armed conflict into more durable peace after conflict. First, heavy-handed interventions such as military deployments and sanctions can impede the ability of the disputants to identify and reach a self-sustaining settlement when there is insufficient follow-through. Second, coordination problems can arise in handing off peacemaking activities from actors in the Secretariat to the UNSC when post-conflict security guarantees and continuous engagement are needed. Third, explicit attempts by the UNSC to produce peace and stability make it susceptible to the problem of cheap talk when it proclaims its concerns. After characterizing these problems in theory and generating observable implications, the paper uses original data on UNSC resolutions to test the hypotheses. The results indicate that the UN can succeed as a short-term peacemaker, particularly when it relies on diplomatic engagement and sanctions. However, when there is not adequate follow-through in the form of peacekeeping, the UN struggles to improve the long-term prospects of peace in part because it tends to promote stop-gap ceasefire resolutions. With peacekeeping, active UN involvement during conflict can promote long-term stability. Half measures such as condemnations have little effect on the stability of peace.

This article examines the effect of UN actions on the duration of international crises. Four different types of action – assurance, diplomatic engagement, military involvement, and intimidation – and three different outcomes – compromise, victory, and stalemate – are considered. After building on the existing literature to develop expectations of how a third party like the UN shapes crisis trajectories, hypotheses are tested using the International Crisis Behavior (ICB) data and a new events dataset on UN activity. Results from competing-risks models reveal that UN military involvement does well to decrease the risk of one side achieving victory, and diplomatic engagement increases the ability of the belligerents to reach a compromise in the long run. Moreover, diplomatic engagement accompanied by military involvement substantially hastens the pace of stalemate outcomes. Both tactics, however, have some trade-offs. Military involvement can decrease the sense of urgency for compromise; diplomatic engagement can be used for insincere motives and increase the risk of one-sided victory over time. UN actions of assurance and simple intimidation have considerable shortcomings as crisis management vehicles.