At first sight, the Brexit negotiations appear erratic. The UK and the EU invested two years in negotiating an agreement, which failed three times in the British parliament. How to explain this? This ...article argues that Brexit is a case of an overarching trend, and offers a rationalist, situation-structural approach to analysing politicised bargains. In this new European reality of a constraining dissensus, governments must ensure domestic support and international assertiveness in parallel. Politicised bargains play out as nested games, in which tied hands are not a strategy but rather a necessary given. Theresa May was forced to play such parallel and overlapping, nested games as she was pressurised by both the EU and Brexiteers. Negotiations unfolded in two phases, corresponding to two situation structures: the negotiation phase resembled a nested chicken game. The preliminary Withdrawal Agreement was a game-changer and the subsequent ratification phase, structured as a nested Rambo game, presented May with irreconcilable demands.
•Twitter has potential as a real-time barometer of public sentiment towards international negotiating outcomes.•SA can operationalise and decipher collective preferences to inform decision making in ...negotiations.•Applied to Brexit positive emotion is associated with ‘soft’ types of Brexit.•Applied to Brexit negative emotion is associated with ‘hard’ types of Brexit and ‘no deal’
We introduce Big Data Analytics (BDA) and Sentiment Analysis (SA) to the study of international negotiations, through an application to the case of the UK-EU Brexit negotiations and the use of Twitter user sentiment. We show that SA of tweets has potential as a real-time barometer of public sentiment towards negotiating outcomes to inform government decision-making. Despite the increasing need for information on collective preferences regarding possible negotiating outcomes, negotiators have been slow to capitalise on BDA. Through SA on a corpus of 13,018,367 tweets on defined Brexit hashtags, we illustrate how SA can provide a platform for decision-makers engaged in international negotiations to grasp collective preferences. We show that BDA and SA can enhance decision-making and strategy in public policy and negotiation contexts of the magnitude of Brexit. Our findings indicate that the preferred or least preferred Brexit outcomes could have been inferred by the emotions expressed by Twitter users. We argue that BDA can be a mechanism to map the different options available to decision-makers and bring insights to and inform their decision-making. Our work, thereby, proposes SA as part of the international negotiation toolbox to remedy for the existing informational gap between decision makers and citizens’ preferred outcomes.
•Three clusters of negotiation behaviors identified using latent class analysis.•Negotiator prototypes differ in their formality, commitment, and emotion handling.•Culture is a significant predictor ...of negotiation prototypes.•Opportunities for a “culturally synergetic” approach in cross-cultural negotiation.•Advantages of using mixed qualitative-quantitative methods in negotiation research.
This paper explores the relationship between culture and negotiation, identifying clusters of negotiation patterns and assessing whether the negotiator’s culture affect the probability of adopting one model over the others. We use latent class analysis on a sample of 2099 observations of negotiation behaviors in 69 countries, to identify negotiation clusters and we obtain three negotiation prototypes. One prototype is oriented to personal relationships, the expression of emotions, and a flexible agenda for a polychronic procedure. Another is formal, facts-focused, and monochronic, maximizing economic value but disregarding personal relationships. The third prototype is harder to interpret and might indicate contexts where different negotiation behaviors coexist. Culture, defined taking into account multiple sources, is a significant predictor of negotiation prototypes (beyond other socio-economic factors). Our results highlight the importance of behaviors along the relational-transactional dimension for international negotiations, as well as the advantages of using mixed qualitative-quantitative methods in negotiation research.
The international negotiations on a system of effective international minimum taxes on multinational firm profits are ongoing. Such a system has the potential to substantially improve the efficiency ...of the international tax system. Designing and implementing minimum taxes may prove to be tricky, however, as excessive compliance costs need to be avoided and double taxation risks should be mitigated. These concerns aside, there is a good chance of international agreement as the recent G20 Finance Minister Summit suggests. JEL Classification: H25, F23, F13 Auf internationaler Ebene wird aktuell uber ein System effektiver internationaler Mindeststeuern auf die Gewinne multinationaler Unternehmen verhandelt, das bis Ende 2020 beschlossen werden soll. Eine Mindeststeuer konnte die Effizienz und Effektivitat der internationalen Besteuerung deutlich steigern und den Steuerwettbewerb abmildern. Sie stellt jedoch die Politik bei der Ausgestaltung und Anwendung vor die Herausforderung, exzessive Compliance-Kosten zu vermeiden und Doppelbesteuerungsrisiken zu begrenzen. Kritisiert wird zudem, dass die nationale Souveranitat in der Besteuerung durch eine solche Reform untergraben werden konnte. Die Aussichten fur ein erfolgreiches Verhandlungsergebnis sind dennoch nicht schlecht, weil samtliche grosse Player die Reform befurworten, wie das Treffen der G20-Finanzminister im Juni 2019 gezeigt hat.
The ongoing negotiations for a legally binding UNCLOS (United Nations Law of the Sea Convention) Implementing Agreement for the conservation and sustainable use of marine biodiversity beyond national ...jurisdiction (BBNJ) take place within the framework of a complex landscape of existing International Organizations (IOs) addressing different aspects of ocean governance relevant to the principles and provisions of the new BBNJ Agreement. Addressing the relationship to other instruments, Art. 4 of the current BBNJ draft text indicates that the instrument should not ‘undermine relevant legal instruments and frameworks and relevant global, regional, subregional and sectoral bodies’. This article seeks to clarify which existing ‘legal instruments and frameworks’ have such a contingent relation to the BBNJ Agreement, in which provision of the draft text they may play a role, and to formulate policy recommendations based on the observed complexity. Using ethnographic data collected during three intergovernmental conferences (IGC), we give an overview about involved IOs and their relation to the BBNJ negotiations. Acknowledging the complex interrelations and overlaps between a myriad of IOs and different provisions of the Treaty, we identify the emergence of a BBNJ regime complex. We identify a total of 52 involved IOs of which 10 are mentioned in the latest version of the draft text. We argue that IOs which policymakers perceive as relevant to BBNJ need to be considered in the implementation of the BBNJ agreement and urge negotiators to carefully define relationships with IOs to strengthen cooperation in the implementation of the BBNJ agreement.
Under what conditions does the internal cohesiveness of the European Union (EU) determine its external effectiveness? In a first step, this introduction probes the frequent assumption that the more ...cohesive the EU presents itself to the world, the more effective it is in achieving its goals. The empirical contributions to this collection, which range from trade to foreign policy, highlight instead three configurations of internal cohesiveness and external effectiveness: internal cohesiveness has a positive impact on external effectiveness; internal cohesiveness has no impact on external effectiveness; and internal cohesiveness has a negative impact on external effectiveness. The international context in which the EU operates, including the bargaining configuration and the policy arena, functions as an intervening variable in these causal links. In a second step, this introduction launches a research agenda aimed at explaining these patterns more systematically and determining the impact of cohesiveness on effectiveness.
Temporal baselines constitute common elements of good policy design and are necessary to set scenarios, targets and to measure changes over time. The choice of baselines not only can have a profound ...influence on outcomes but represent a political decision when included in governmental or intergovernmental instruments. Therefore, setting up baselines has technical and political consequences and they should be evidence-based to make them politically and technically stronger. Contrary to the Climate Change regime, which has an internationally agreed baseline set up at preindustrial times, there is no baseline to measure historical biodiversity loss. This feature results in the lack of a necessary reference to foster a fair implementation and monitoring of biodiversity conventions. This article looks throughout history to find regional, temporal and material circumstances related to biodiversity loss in order to suggest an evidence-based baseline. Facts show that almost all regions share a common substantially and temporally related pattern: unsustainable deforestation processes were massively conducted once the industrial revolution began, in order to respond to the external demand for raw materials. Facts also prove that other regions and/or countries had already lost their biodiversity way before industrial times to cover their internal demand for food and wood. This research aims at showing interlinkages among history, biodiversity loss and politics to suggest an evidence-based baselines to measure biodiversity loss in order to (i) increase the ambition of the Post 2020 Global Biodiversity Framework; (ii) recognize historical contributions to biodiversity loss and responsibilities to repair it; and (iii) establish conditions for a fair transition in developing countries toward sustainable development.
•Global deforestation has been mostly caused by colonization processes after the first industrial revolution.•Only having historical baselines could make us understand the root causes of the current environmental crisis.•Historical baselines contribute to level the playing field, creating conditions for a fair transition in developing countries.•Historical baselines on Biodiversity loss can increase the Global Biodiversity Framework’s ambition on ecosystem restoration.•Historical biodiversity loss calls for the application of the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities.
In order to redefine the university-society relationship, African universities aspire to forge new partnerships with local, national, regional, and international actors. Employing a critical review ...of the literature and an analysis of the strategic plans of regional African organisations and African universities, this study explores the challenges and opportunities of creating strategic university–society partnerships in Africa. Against a backdrop of African universities fashioned after modernity, the study draws from (1) “Mode 2” knowledge production, “Mode 3” research, entrepreneurial university, and academic capitalism, (2) the helices models and epistemic cultures, (3) power dynamics in international negotiations over educational policy, and (4) uBuntu and Cosmo-uBuntu, to inspire African universities towards contextual relevance and significance. Furthermore, the study proposes a conceptual framework of strategic international university-society partnerships to inform policy making, strategic planning, and further research.
As is known, the Cyprus Peace Negotiation have been continuing for more than fifty years. For more than forty years, people in Cyprus have been spending a conflict-free and peaceful life. In this ...study, the fifty-year process of Cyprus Peace Negotiation will be summarized and explained at large within the framework of public policy analysis, analysis phases, policy preparation/implementation methods and the role of institutions in the process. The voting of the 2004 Annan Plan between the Turkish Cypriots and the Greek Cypriots during this process and the effect of the voting outcome on the negotiation process will be discussed. With the opening of the border gates that provided controlled passage to northern and southern Cyprus shortly before the Annan Plan was put to a vote, the effects of the new conditions created by the collective and free contact of two populations on the negotiation process and the future apprehension of Turkish Cypriots will be analysed. Since the study involved theoretical approaches, indirect research method was adopted as a method and domestic and foreign sources were scanned within this framework. In parallel with this method, content analysis technique was used. According to the findings, such multilateral conflicts Generals and 22 UN Special Representative behind, there is the danger of the means to turn into a goal. This possibility should not be ignored and the content of the talks and the subject of negotiation in question must be preoccupied on. It is also cumbersome to maintain the peace and the human duty to endure this hardship. It is only possible to conclude the negotiations by agreeing on the acceptance and ingestion of these facts, and perhaps by agreeing on a number of boundary regulations and similar requirements. This means that all parties agree that the actual situation is the best solution.
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