Syllabus

Short Course Description

Negotiations take place every day in a wide variety of contexts; between politicians, diplomats, country representatives, business partners, roommates, landlords, parents, bosses, spouses, and even friends. We negotiate our salaries, whether we will exchange prisoners of war, allow asylum seekers, where to go to dinner, and even who will take the garbage out. Although negotiations are an inseparable part of our everyday lives, many of us know very little about our own behaviors in negotiations, the best strategies, and what makes an effective negotiation. Why did we succeed in a specific deal or with a specific country and not another? How come we can?t achieve the same outcome in a different context? Why do some people always get the best deals while others do not?

Negotiation is the art and science of getting what you want from the other side through back ?and- forth communication. It is the art of securing agreements between two or more individuals who are both attempting to maximize their own individual, organizational and/or country?s outcomes.

This course provides an exposure to advanced analytical tools, frameworks, a series of simulations and debriefings with the purpose of providing class participants the opportunity to identify, analyze and develop their negotiation abilities in our complex global world. The basic premise of the course is that negotiation skills are best learned through practice grounded in deep analysis and self-reflection. Although theoretical concepts and principles will be presented in class lectures and in readings, the course will focus primarily on improving practical skills in dyadic and group situations through a series of in-class simulations. Each simulation has been carefully chosen to address a diverse set of negotiation problems that are faced by diplomats, officials, ambassadors and country representatives in various private or public organizational settings. The simulations aim to build on each other and raise issues that complement diagnostic and technical skills taught in other courses in the program. A key focus is not only teaching participants a diverse set of skills, but learning to select the most effective strategy and how to apply the learned skills in a given situation/context.