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AbstractAlthough analysts have long held that bias disqualifies a mediator, more recent analysis, pioneered by Saadia Touval, shows that bias can be quite helpful to mediation under the assumption that the mediator delivers the agreement of the party toward which it is biased. Of course, the mediator is still expected to be trustworthy in dealing with the parties and reliable in communications. Prenegotiation and diagnosis, probably the least analyzed early stages of negotiation, are shown to be crucial to a successful negotiation and the necessary preconditions to an efficient and effective process. Leverage, the term for "power" in negotiation, is a scarce resource and takes the form of effective persuasion rather than material inducements and punishments; it depends above all on the need of the conflicting parties for an agreement, which in turn depends on the attractiveness of their alternatives or security points (BATNAs).

Negotiation is one of a limited number of decision-making modes whose characteristics, taken as assumptions, are not compatible with most of the theoretical work on negotiation to date. The concession/ convergence approach has problems of symmetry, determinism, and power, but above all fails to reflect the nature of negotiation as practiced. Negotiators begin by groping for a jointly agreeable formula that will serve as a referent, provide a notion of justice, and define a common perception on which implementing details can be based. Power makes the values fit together in the package and timing is important to making the formula stick. The article provides examples from cases and experiments are discussed, including the results of a new survey of UN ambassadors using miniscenarios. Finally, the strengths and weaknesses of the formula/detail approach are assessed.

Saadia Touval's important contributions to the study of mediation included an emphasis on the interests and motivations of mediators, hitherto often assumed to be pure or non-existent. As a result, legitimacy is usually considered to be inherent in the selfless mediator, although in internal affairs, mediation is illegitimate meddling. At the same time, much of the work on mediation either exaggerates or underestimates the nature of leverage. Public opinion also has an important but ambiguous relation to mediation. Interests, public opinion and leverage were topics where Touval helped to establish a more realistic appreciation, as illustrated in this second commemorative issue of International Negotiation. Adapted from the source document.