Committing to Bargain: How Mediation Contributes to the Onset and Success of Peace Talks Open Access

Abstract

Disputants can use the time during negotiations, especially ones that occur in the context of a ceasefire, to increase their fighting capacity. Disputants thus may move for negotiations with no intention of bargaining. Colloquially, they may bargain in bad faith. Capable, interested third parties can help ameliorate this problem by enforcing the tacit commitment to bargain. By threatening to punish disputants for bargaining in bad faith, third parties can help disputants reach the bargaining table, and strike bargains once there. This dissertation examines the commitment problem that adheres during and because of bargaining, and the extent to which third parties can help them overcome this strategic problem. After developing the theory formally, I test propositions about the relationship between mediator characteristics and bargaining onset and outcomes on global data from 1945-1999 on civil wars mediated by states. I find that the presence of mediators who are capable of and willing to enforce the tacit agreement of disputants to bargain make it more likely for disputants to enter rounds of bargaining, and to strike bargains.

Table of Contents

1 Introduction 1

1.1 Failed Peace Processes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 1.2 Prelude to Answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 1.3 Definitions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 1.4 Core Theoretic Insights . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 1.5 How Political Science Views Bargaining . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 1.6 Solving Puzzles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 1.7 Outline . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 2 Situating the Theory 15 2.1 Bargaining Problems Precede Commitment Problems . . . . . . . . . . . 16 2.2 Bargaining, Commitment, andMediation Success . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 2.3 Mediation Onset . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 2.4 "Devious" Disputants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 2.5 Bargaining as Potentially Problematic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29 3 A Theory of Intra-Bargaining Commitment Dynamics 31 3.1 Aims of the Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31 3.2 First Principles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36 3.2.1 Ceasefires: What, When, andWhy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36 3.2.2 Bargaining Takes Time . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 3.2.3 Gains During Ceasefires . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44 3.2.4 Factors Permissive of Insincere Bargaining . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49 3.2.5 Devious Bargainers, Historically . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50 3.2.6 Mediator Actions, Interests, and Information . . . . . . . . . . . . 55 3.2.7 Informal Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58 3.3 A Game-TheoreticModel of Intra-bargaining Commitment Dynamics . 59 3.3.1 Introducing theModel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59 3.3.2 Negotiation in Equilibrium . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65 3.3.3 Equilibrium 2: Mediation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71 3.3.4 Equilibrium 3: Continued Conflict . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 3.3.5 AlternateModeling Choices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81 3.4 Implications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82 4 Empirics 1: Bargaining Onset 89 4.1 Potential Outcomes and Inference: The Onset ofMediated Bargaining . 90 4.2 Concepts andMeasurement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93 4.3 Data andModel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96 4.4 Additional Robustness Checks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107 4.5 Empirics 1 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116 5 Empirics 2: Mediation Success 118 5.1 Mediation Success in CivilWars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118 5.2 Defining Success . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119 5.3 Inference in the Study ofMediation Outcomes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120 5.4 Concepts andMeasures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122 5.5 Data andModel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124 5.6 Robustness Checks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131 5.7 Aggregation of Statistical Evidence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141 6 Conclusion 144 6.1 Questions and Answers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 144 6.2 Empirical Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146 6.3 Implications for the Study of Conflict . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147 6.4 Policy Implications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152 6.5 Limitations and Caveats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155 A Game Theory Appendix 159 A.1 Overview of the Game . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159 A.2 Negotiation Equilibrium . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160 A.3 Mediation Equilibrium . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163 A.4 No Bargaining . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167 B Statistical Appendix 171

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School	Laney Graduate School
Department	Political Science
Degree	PhD
Submission	Dissertation
Language	English
Research Field	Political Science, General
Keyword	devious disputants bargaining conflict mediation
Committee Chair / Thesis Advisor	Reiter, Dan, Emory University
Committee Members	Esarey, Justin E, Emory University Beardsley, Kyle, Emory University Carrubba, Clifford, Emory University

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