Multilateral negotiations on worldwide challenges have grown in importance with rising global interdependence. Yet, they have recently proven slow to address these challenges successfully. This book discusses the questions which have arisen from the highly varying results of recent multilateral attempts to reach cooperation on some of the critical global challenges of our times. These include the long-awaited UN climate change summit in Copenhagen, which ended without official agreement in 2009; Cancun one year later, attaining at least moderate tangible results; the first salient trade negotiations after the creation of the WTO, which broke down in Seattle in 1999 and were only successfully launched in 2001 in Qatar as the Doha Development Agenda; and the biosafety negotiations to address the international handling of Living Modified Organisms, which first collapsed in 1999, before they reached the Cartagena Protocol in 2000. Using in-depth empirical analysis, the book examines the determinants of success or failure in efforts to form regimes and manage the process of multilateral negotiations.

The book draws on data from 62 interviews with organizers and chief climate and trade negotiators to discover what has driven delegations in their final decision on agreement, finding that with negotiation management, organisers hold a powerful tool in their hands to influence multilateral negotiations.

This comprehensive negotiation framework, its comparison across regimes and the rich and first-hand empirical material from decision-makers make this invaluable reading for students and scholars of politics, international relations, global environmental governance, climate change and international trade, as well as organizers and delegates of multilateral negotiations.

This research has been awarded the German Mediation Scholarship Prize for 2014 by the Center for Mediation in Cologne.

About the Author
Kai Monheim researches on negotiations and international cooperation. He is Visiting Fellow at the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, London School of Economics and Political Science, UK. He holds a Harvard Kennedy School Master in Public Policy and attained qualification as a lawyer in Germany.

Reviews

"Structures of power and interest, shaped by domestic politics, tightly constrain international negotiations. Yet How Effective Negotiation Management Promotes Multilateral Cooperation shows in fascinating and well-researched detail how the quality of negotiation leadership both varies a great deal across negotiations and affects the processes that ensue." -Robert O. Keohane, Professor of Public and International Affairs, Princeton University

"The world faces twin challenges of managing climate change and fostering development. The policies to tackle these challenges are clear and many countries are already acting strongly as they see new markets and opportunities for low-carbon investment and growth. But we will do better as a world and accelerate action if we act together. This book considers in detail the essential elements of how we can manage complex multilateral negotiations better. It provides helpful tools to assist future organizers of global climate summits. It also offers helpful insight for students of multilateral negotiations."-Nicholas Stern PBA,FRS, IG Patel Professor of Economics and Government, London School of Economics and Political Science, and Chair of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment

"A valuable addition to the growing number of studies that document and analyze the process of international negotiation. This book shows that state power and domestic politics are not the whole story. Leaders managing multilateral talks also can encourage or inadvertently scupper agreements. Future chairs can find here a practical map to the pitfalls." -John Odell, Professor Emeritus of International Relations, University of Southern California

"Distilled into a readable policy brief, Kai Monheim's opus conveys a perceptive analysis of the "power of process" in guiding multilateral negotiations to constructive outcomes. While the national interests of the heavyweights remain the key drivers, Monheim's contrasting examples of successes and failures show that a skilful presiding officer, backed by an effective secretariat and working through transparent and inclusive consultations, can contribute to fashioning the broader consensus that confers legitimacy. This is valuable reading for aspiring conference presidencies." -Michael Zammit Cutajar, Executive Secretary of UNFCCC from 1991 to 2002

"Perhaps Monheim should ensure that Laurent Fabius, President-elect of the forthcoming landmark climate change conference COP 21 in Paris, is sent a copy of his book - the future of the planet may depend on it." -Joanna Depledge, Global Policy Journal

"Dr Kai Monheim of the ESRC Centre for Climate Change Economics and Policy at the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at the London School of Economics and Political Science carried out confidential interviews with senior negotiators from all coalitions involved in the United Nations climate negotiations process, high-level UN officials, lead host organisers and other summit observers. His research confirmed that a breakdown in transparency of the negotiation process and deep divisions within the Danish host country contributed greatly to the breakdown." - Frank Came, 4 Green Business

"This is simply a good book, practically relevant and academically valuable... the conciseness and political relevance of results of this work are delighting." - Professor Lars Kirchhoff, Director of the Institute for Conflict Management, Viadrina University Frankfurt (Oder)

Book Information
ISBN 9781138225909
Author Kai Monheim
Format Paperback
Page Count 290
Imprint Routledge
Publisher Taylor & Francis Ltd
Weight(grams) 430g