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IJCMA 24,1

The exit option: mediation and the termination of negotiations in the Northern Ireland conict
Dochartaigh Niall O
School of Political Science and Sociology, National University of Ireland, Galway, Ireland, and

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Isak Svensson
Department of Peace and Conict Research, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden and National Centre for Peace and Conict Studies, Otago University, Dunedin, New Zealand
Abstract
Purpose The purpose of this study is to examine the mediation exit option, which is one of the most important tactics available to any third party mediator. Design/methodology/approach The paper analyzes a crucial intermediary channel between the Irish Republican Army (hereafter IRA) and the British Government utilizing unique material from the private papers of the intermediary, Brendan Duddy, including diaries that cover periods of intensive communication, extensive interviews with the intermediary and with participants in this communication on both the British Government and Irish Republican sides as well as recently released ofcial papers from the UK National Archives relating to this communication. Findings The study reveals how the intermediary channel was used in order to get information, how the third party and the primary parties traded in asymmetries of information, and how the intermediary utilized the information advantage to increase the credibility of his threats of termination. Research limitations/implications The study outlines an avenue for further research on the termination dynamics of mediation. Practical implications Understanding the conditions for successfully using the exit-option is vital for policy-makers, in particular for peace diplomacy efforts in other contexts than the Northern Ireland one. Originality/value The paper challenges previous explanations for why threats by mediators to call off further mediation attempts are successful and argues that a mediator can use the parties informational dependency on him in order to increase his leverage and push the parties towards settlement. Keywords Mediation, Northern Ireland, Violent conict, Back-channel, Negotiation, Negotiating, Conict Paper type Research paper

1. Introduction
International Journal of Conict Management Vol. 24 No. 1, 2013 pp. 40-55 q Emerald Group Publishing Limited 1044-4068 DOI 10.1108/10444061311296125

Finally, by mutual consent we both stood up. But, not before I had walked him into it, asking, Am I to take it that the people you represent do not wish to continue this link? He visibly turned grey, as I knew he would. Most certainly not! he almost shouted. I simply stared through him, as I knew full well that he would be crucied if he came back with the report that I had walked out [. . .] (Brendan Duddy, diary entry for 5/12/75. POL 35/62, Duddy papers).

The exit-option, that is, the mediators potential to put an end to mediation efforts when confronted with major obstructions or stalemates, is a crucial tactic for mediators aiming to end violent conicts and nd peaceful settlements. Paradoxically, the main aim of threatening termination is to avoid termination. In fact, since the mediators withdrawal tactic implicitly underlies all other tactics (Princen, 1992), understanding the conditions under which it can be successfully used is crucial for understanding why some mediators are more successful than others[1]. Previous research suggests that threats of termination are effective when made by powerful mediators, who have important resources to withhold from the parties (Princen, 1992); or when blame can be allocated in front of an audience that can punish the primary parties for their obstructions (Kydd, 2005); or when the termination of mediation is performed in a mutually hurting stalemate, and the mediator is the way out of this stalemate (Touval and Zartman, 2001). We challenge these previous explanations by examining a case of successful use of termination threats to change the positions of parties to a negotiation by a mediator lacking resources, acting in secrecy, and without a mutually hurting stalemate existing between the parties. We analyse a crucial intermediary channel between the Irish Republican Army (hereafter IRA) and the British government utilizing unique material from the private papers of the intermediary, Brendan Duddy, including diaries that cover periods of intensive communication[2]. We also draw on extensive interviews with the intermediary and with participants in this communication on both the British Government and Irish Republican sides[3]. This material is supplemented by recently released ofcial papers from the UK National Archives relating to this communication OBra daigh, the key Republican contact in this channel and the private papers of Ruair in the 1970s[4]. We outline the circumstances under which a private individual acting as an anonymous mediator in back-channel negotiation can credibly and effectively threaten termination and the complexities surrounding the use of the exit-option. This case cannot be explained by previous theories of mediation termination, and we develop a new argument in order to explain it. The premise for our argument is that a mediator can be an important source of information between the parties (Kydd, 2003, 2010; Rauchhaus, 2006; Gilady and Russett, 2002). Given that the intermediary possesses critical information, the primary parties have incentives to not jeopardize the relationship with the third party. Therefore, even if they are not interested in maintaining good relationships with the other side, or seeking to end violence, or seeking a solution, or seeking to avoid public blame, the parties have incentives to uphold the relationship with the mediator as a critical source of information. We argue that mediators can exploit parties informational dependency in order to maximize leverage. One implication of this is that the longer a mediator has been involved at the intersection between two parties and utilized the asymmetries of information to exert pressure there, the more likely that this termination threat can be used effectively. In line with our theoretical argument, we nd that both sides have incentives to avoid taking responsibility for termination. Thus, even when they seek to terminate they do it by trying to manoeuvre their opponents into terminating. For instance, parties terminate without formally announcing termination, in order to force the other party into formal termination. Thus, the Provisional IRA (hereafter IRA)[5] renewed armed action in late 1975 without formally ending its ceasere while the British effectively ceased negotiating in mid-1975 while continuing to attend meetings with

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IRA representatives. Neither party wanted to be blamed for the ending of the ceasere and this fact gave leverage to the intermediary who could play a role in allocating blame by choosing the timing of termination and providing information to others in a position to publicly allocate blame. This cannot be explained by previous theories. Therefore, only by applying an informational perspective on mediation can we understand the dynamics of the exit-option. This paper is structured in the following manner. We start by outlining the theoretical discussion about the exit option in mediation, develop our critique about the limitations in previous explanations and our argument about how mediators can credibly and effectively threaten to terminate their efforts. Thereafter, the use of the exit option in the secret channel in Northern Ireland is empirically explored. We end by discussing the implications of our ndings and theories for termination theory in particular, and mediation research in general. 2. Theoretical discussion International mediation is by denition voluntary (Bercovitch and Jackson, 1997). Therefore, both of the parties in conict have to accept mediation for it to occur, and the mediator also needs to agree to supply the mediation services. This acceptance on the mediators part can, however, be withdrawn. The mediator can consider the exit-option: to call the mediation effort to a halt and end his or her efforts to bring a conict to an end[6]. The exit-option has been widely used. Examples of its use include during the Middle East peace process in 1991 by the US Secretary of State James Baker (Baker, 1999); in the former Yugoslavia, by the American negotiator Holbrooke in confronting the Bosnian-Serb leader Karadzic (Holbrooke, 1999); and by US Assistant Secretary of State Chester A. Crocker in the negotiations in Southern Africa at the end of the 1980s by using the fact that impending US elections and a probable change of administration would effectively bring the mediation efforts to an end (Crocker, 1999). In other cases of conict mediation, mediators have been reluctant to utilize the exit-option as a strategic mean of getting the parties to move towards a solution because it implies pressurizing and threatening the parties. This was the view taken by Ambassador Jan Eliasson, for example, in the various armed conicts in which he acted as mediator (Svensson and Wallensteen, 2010). The exit-option has been recognised as an important source of leverage for mediators by using the exit-option a mediator can inuence the parties to take the mediators efforts more seriously, to make progress towards a solution and get the sense of urgency that might be needed in order to get to a deal (Touval and Zartman, 2001; Crocker et al., 2004). The exit-option is used to maintain momentum, to produce concessions that will help to move the process forward. In this sense the aim of the threat of termination is to prevent the termination of negotiations by one or other of the parties, or to prevent the negotiations dragging on with no prospect of success. Termination threats can vary in their character depending on the position of the parties involved. In negotiations that the parties all wish to see continue it can be invoked against all of them as a threat to allocate blame equally. In a situation where the mediator sees one party as recalcitrant it can be invoked to pressure that party to shift position through the implicit threat to allocate blame and to position that party unfavourably in the subsequent stage. Where the mediator is holding one side back from renewed violence with great difculty it is effectively a threat to cease acting on behalf of the other party to restrain their opponents.

2.1 Conditions for successful use of the exit-option For termination threats to be successful, the belligerents must consider mediation to be valuable; and believe that the mediator will carry out the threat if the desired actions are not taken. A rst line of thought links the use of the exit-option to the value of mediation. According to Touval and Zartman (2001), the conditions under which the exit-option is successful depend on the structural conditions of the overall conict: if the mutually hurting stalemate is present, they will be sensitive to the threat of leaving. This implies that the threat will not be effective if a stalemate does not exist. Clearly the mandate a mediator enjoys also affects their use of threats of termination. A mediator who is backed by a powerful organisation or a state has a much greater capacity to exert pressure by threatening termination. In this case the threat of termination might effectively be a threat to withhold or withdraw resources or even to deploy coercive force on behalf of one of the parties. Princen (1992) suggests that it is difcult for mediators without resources to set deadlines in a credible manner. A second condition for the successful use of the exit-option has to do with the mediators credibility. Given that the threat of collapsing the talks is aimed at ensuring the continuation of talks there is an inherent credibility problem with such a threat. The fact that mediators also have a strong normative preference for continued negotiation (that is, after all, most often the reason why they choose to intervene in the rst place) compounds this credibility problem. Abortive attempts to utilize the threat of termination can reduce a mediators credibility further still. As Watkins (1999) notes premature efforts to drive for closure can easily backre, triggering breakdown or undermining credibility (emphasis added). Kydd (2005) suggests that the mediator can overcome this credibility problem by casting blame on one of the parties in front of an audience, by which it is important for the obstructing parties to be perceived as cooperative. If the mediator is powerless, there must be some other powerful audience before whom the parties wish to appear accommodating, which in turn trusts the mediators word about which side is being intransigent. Thus, front-channel mediators are in the public eye and are in a strong position to inuence the allocation of blame in the media by publicly terminating in a way or at a time that damages the parties. 2.2 Problems with previous theory and our argument We have seen that previous explanations for the successful use of the exit-option emphasise structural conditions (mutually hurting stalemate), the resources of the third-party mediator, or the presence of an inuential audience that the mediator can convince of who is to blame. Yet these explanations cannot explain the occurrence and success of the exit-option for secret mediators with few resources in on-going conicts. The threat of termination must operate differently for different kinds of mediators. Back-channel mediators are not in a position to directly inuence media allocation of blame because they have not established a public prole and record in relation to their mediation role that will lend authority to their analysis. This weakness is not accidental. In fact, the inability of ofcial blame-allocation that a mediator can potentially wield through threats of termination in back-channel negotiation might help to explain the preference of parties for this form of contact. It is less likely that the mediator can become a signicant independent source of pressure on the parties. Our argument builds on the assumption that one of the key aspects of mediation is to provide information about the parties, thereby mitigating the problem of

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information failure (Kydd, 2003, 2010). Parties in conicts have strong incentives to misrepresent information, and this may cause them to incorrectly estimate the likelihood that their strategies will be successful in pressuring the other side to concede. It follows from this theory that parties turn to mediators because of the value of acquiring information. Hence, Rauchhaus argues that mediators are frequently selected, or self-selected, precisely because they possess or can gain access to private information (Rauchhaus, 2006, p. 214). Thus, the informational advantage of mediators may help to explain why they are accepted or requested as mediators. We argue that the exit-option can be feasible when the mediator can put his own relationship at stake. Threats of termination can be credible because mediators can invoke their own interests and preferences as plausible reasons for termination. Being blamed by the mediator for ending the mediation would put the relationship with the intermediary at risk, and this potential source of information would be difcult to replace or restore. The implication of this is that mediators are most likely to threaten termination when they can plausibly blame one of the parties for the breakdown and thus credibly raise the prospect of a breakdown in relationships with the intermediary. Another implication of this is that the value of mediation will increase over time, hence making the threat of termination much more costly in later rather than earlier phases of conict mediation processes. The extent to which the role of mediator has become established in a negotiation process is therefore important. A threat of termination made by an individual who has just begun their involvement in a negotiation or who has not established a central role will have less force than a threat from a gure who has become established as a long-term, active and central participant in negotiation. The more information a mediator has the greater its ability to bargain, and, hence, the more inuence it has over the disputants (Princen, 1992). Therefore, a mediator involved in a situation for decades might be much more willing to use the tactical threat of termination at a later stage than an earlier stage. 3. Empirical analysis: Northern Ireland 3.1 Context Almost 3,500 people were killed in the violent conict that broke out in Northern Ireland in 1969 and that continued until the mid-1990s (Dixon, 2001; Tonge, 2006). Irish in, the political party with which it was associated, Republicans in the IRA and Sinn Fe aimed to reunite Ireland as an independent Republic by bringing an end to British sovereign control of Northern Ireland through the use of violence. The unionist majority in Northern Ireland sought to remain within the UK and loyalist paramilitary groups used illegal violence to supplement state efforts to defeat the IRA. The conict was ended through a negotiated settlement in 1998 that drew in armed militants from both republican and loyalist organisations (Hancock, 2008; Arthur, 2000; Bew et al., 2002; MacGinty and Darby, 2002). During three key phases of this conict Brendan Duddy, a Derry businessman with strong and extensive political connections, acted as an intermediary between the IRA and the British Government. He was at the heart of intensive contact between the two parties in the early and mid-1970s and acted as intermediary again in negotiations aimed at ending the 1980 and 1981 Republican hunger strikes in which ten IRA and INLA[7] prisoners died. He was also the key gure in the contacts between 1990 and 1993 in the approach to the crucial IRA ceasere of 1994 (Mallie and McKittrick, 1996; Mallie and McKittrick, 2001; ODochartaigh, 2009; Powell, 2008; Taylor, 1998; Taylor, 2001; Rowan, 1995).

3.2 Information From the outset both the Republicans and the British government valued this channel of communication as a source of information and this fact is central to our argument in President Ruair OBra daigh, the key about the use of the exit option. As Sinn Fe Republican link in the channel throughout the 1970s, put it:
se u saideach ar bhealach a leithe id a bheith ann mar is fe idir le daoine gn omhu ar Bh ocht nach bhfuil f or, rialtas Sasana no an tira [. . .] n amha in go raibh se u sa ideach, bh nua luachmhar a leithe id a bheith ann. se It was useful in a way to have this because people can act on information that is not true, the British government or the IRA [. . .] not only was it useful, it was valuable that this existed (personal interview with Niall ODochartaigh, 2/12/09).

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Indeed, British government ofcials regularly characterised it primarily as a process of information exchange and information gathering (Mallie and McKittrick, 1996; Rees, 1985). This was necessary in order to reconcile the use of this channel with the government ban on negotiation with the IRA, but it also captures a key dimension of the communication. At the early stages the channel was used for intensive discussion on the political positions of both parties and for information exchange on specic incidents. Thus in January 1974 the channel was used by the British in attempts to establish whether missing German industrialist, Thomas Niedermayer had, in fact, been kidnapped by the IRA, whether he was dead or alive and whether the IRA was seeking to strike a deal for his release (see Fco87/345 at the UK National Archives). No IRA statement on the disappearance was ever issued and none of these items of information was publicly available. Within a few days the British had been informed through this channel that Niedermayer had probably been killed. The information itself was of value to the British government because it came under direct pressure from the German government on the issue (see Fco87/346 at the UK National Archives). It emerged several years later that he had been accidentally killed by his IRA captors three days after he was kidnapped and that the kidnapping had probably not been authorised by the IRA leadership (Howard, 2004; Bowyer Bell, 1993; Phoenix, 2009). For these reasons the IRA had an interest in avoiding publicity and public statements on this issue while the British had an interest in the information. A secret exchange of information on the issue was in the interests of both parties. The channel was also a source of information for the British at the political level. Days after contact on the Niedermeyer case the intermediary requested that the British government make a public statement on electoral participation that would strengthen the hand of IRA moderates who were locked in struggle with more radical forces in Belfast. The account of internal divisions, related by the intermediary in order to successfully make a case for a British concession was also viewed by the British as a useful item of information in its own right:
[. . .] assuming that this intermediary has painted an accurate picture, there was apparently a real division of opinion in the Provisional ranks, with many of them seeking a way out from their present policy of violence (Douglas-Home to Dublin Embassy 10 Feb 1974, FCO87/288, UK National Archives).

In late 1974 and early 1975, as the British government explored the possibility of a negotiated settlement with the IRA, the channel acted as a source of information for the British on the IRAs political thinking and the IRAs willingness to declare a long-term

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ceasere. This informational aspect of the channel also served the interests of Republicans who sought to reduce uncertainty about their intentions. The key in President Ruair OBra daigh, saw it as Republican gure in this channel, Sinn Fe important that the British have a clear and accurate understanding of their political position:
se an-ta bhachtach a bheith soile ir faoin iomla n, agus nach bhfhe adfadh le Duddy no na Bh -thuiscint a bheith ann faoin a raibh i gceist againn. Sasanaigh m It was very important to be clear about the whole thing, and that Duddy or the English couldnt misunderstand what we meant (personal interview with Niall ODochartaigh, 2/12/09).

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The channel also served to provide information to the IRA about British government intentions and about internal struggles on the British side. Thus, in late 1974 the British Prime Minister, Harold Wilson, was giving serious consideration to a policy of disengagement from Northern Ireland that might produce a formula acceptable to the Republican movement (Bew et al., 2009; McGrattan, 2010). It was not practicable to communicate the extent of this thinking publicly, given the sensitivity of the issue. This channel provided a private means for this internal thinking within the British government to be conveyed directly to the IRA. Crucially, it also provided information on the extent of resistance within state security forces to government requests to reduce activity. While this information exchange could contribute to the resolution of conict by reducing uncertainty, it was valuable regardless of the intentions of both parties. Even when the British government and the IRA began to position themselves in late 1975 for the renewal of violence, this channel continued to serve as a useful source of information for both and was maintained with the agreement of both. Both the papers in President Ruair OBra daigh and the diaries of the intermediary show that of Sinn Fe the intermediary provided regular extensive analysis of the British position to Republicans, drawing on hundreds of hours of contact with British representatives. Similarly, the arguments made by the intermediary to the British in late 1975 in an attempt to draw the British back towards making a deal with the IRA provided the British with an insight into the thinking of the IRA and the state of the IRA ceasere (Rees to Wilson, 29 Nov 1975, PREM 16/958, UK National Archives). Republicans continued to use the channel even after they assessed in June 1975 that the British government was content to Let the truce slide away. The intermediarys suggestion at that point not to meet the British any more, thus causing Cabinet concern at the lack of pulse-taking illustrates the understanding that the communication was valued by the British as a source of information and that interruption of contact could thus be used to pressurise them even if they did not seek to reach an agreement (Brendan Duddy, diary entry for 12/6/75, POL 35/62, Brendan Duddy Papers). That the channel acted for the Republicans as a signicant source of information on British policy was particularly evident during the early 1990s when it was used to pass several documents to Republicans that provided detailed insights into the internal divisions on the British side, including a document describing divisions at cabinet level in, 1994). (Sinn Fe The fact that the channel was valued as a source of information by both sides, independent of their commitment to a negotiated solution, was recognised by the

intermediary as a problematic issue. He looked on meetings with British agents as a kind of struggle in which both sides sought to leverage the channel for informational purposes:
[Michael] Oatley[8] was here to do a job and that was to soak in as much data as possible, and my job was to get as much data as I could from him (personal interview with Niall ODochartaigh, 26-27/11/09).

The exit option

It seems clear that the IRA was particularly alert to this aspect of the channel in the 1990s. While the British representative sent nineteen messages through the intermediary between 1991 and February 1993, there was only one response from the Republican side, prompting the British representative to suggest that they use the channel more actively in, 1994; Mallie and McKittrick, 1996). In retrospect this seems like a calculated (Sinn Fe Republican decision to tightly control the informational aspect of the channel. After the end of the IRA ceasere of 1975 a new Republican leadership had taken over, arguing that the old leadership had been deceived by the British during the talks (Moloney, 2002). It is possible that this new leadership felt that the British had used the channel as a source of information about IRA intentions in the 1970s in order to gain political advantage when conict was renewed. They may have aimed to control the informational dimension to the channel more tightly in the 1990s in order to prevent a recurrence of this. After this channel had been revealed in 1993, the key Republican gure, Martin McGuinness, expressed the view that The contacts with Britain [. . .] had in with valuable political intelligence and that republicans gained provided Sinn Fe more than the British side from the exchanges(Rowan, 1995, pp. 70-71). His comments indicated a keen awareness of the informational dimension to the channel. Even after the prospects of a deal through this channel receded in late 1993 British ofcials argued that the contact should be maintained both because of its potential role in bringing violence to an end, and because of the political intelligence it yields (Duddy papers, POL 35/301). After the channel had been exposed and shut down in late 1993 to the great embarrassment of the British Government, at a time when the British still refused to meet directly with Republican representatives, British Prime Minister John Major regretted the loss of the back-channel (Major, 1999). The absence of this channel drastically curtailed his governments understanding of the politics of the Republican leadership. In 1993 the IRA had secretly offered a ceasere directly to the British government through this channel. By contrast, John Major rst learned of the 1994 IRA ceasere in a phone call from the Irish Prime Minister and the British intelligence agencies did not predict it (Mallie and McKittrick, 2001). The channel thus had an informational value to both sides that was independent of their desire for a negotiated agreement. As a consequence, threats of termination by the mediator could be effective regardless of whether the parties genuinely sought agreement or whether a mutually-hurting stalemate existed. They could be an effective source of leverage even if the parties were intent on returning to violence. 3.3 Termination threats in the negotiation The literature on mediation includes many examples of clear and direct threats of termination but our case illustrates that such direct threats are simply one end of a continuum of termination threats that includes implicit warnings of breakdown, negative analysis by the mediator of his or her position and of the relationships between the parties involved and deadlines for agreement set by a mediator. This is part of the dynamic in what has been labelled as deadline diplomacy (Nathan, 2006).

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One might argue that no termination has been threatened unless it is explicitly stated, but as we will show below, the intermediary in this case clearly understood, and intended, the warnings he gave about breakdown, and the analysis he provided, as implicit threats of termination. As one of the few sources of leverage the mediator had, the threat of termination was deployed from a very early stage, but initially in a very tentative way, as an implicit threat. From the beginning of 1974 the intermediary regularly urged the British government to secure the transfer to Northern Irish prisons of a number of IRA members who had been jailed in Great Britain and who had gone on hunger strike to demand their transfer. He attempted to exert pressure by hinting at termination:
There was also the threat, unspoken, that I may have decided to give up [. . .] and I had to be very careful how I played that one. I had to keep them, that they wouldnt know, for denite, whether I would give up or not give up. [I would say] I cant keep doing it, were going nowhere. These negotiations are not worth it. Youre not sincere (personal interview with Niall ODochartaigh, 28/7/09).

While termination was not explicitly threatened it is clear that the intermediary sought to exert leverage by suggesting that termination was inevitable if concessions were not made. Ultimately several of these prisoners were transferred amidst huge public controversy and despite the intense resistance of sections of the British state. Later in 1974, after one of these IRA prisoners, Michael Gaughan, died on hunger strike, the intermediary pushed hard for the transfer of Frank Stagg, a prisoner in a similar position. Once again he invoked the implicit threat of termination to exert pressure:
I said to the British, look [. . .] I really cant sustain the type of work I do with you, and the type of work I do with the IRA if there is absolutely nothing coming back[9] (personal interview with Niall ODochartaigh, 28/7/09).

In each of these cases the threat of termination, as Duddy describes it, was tentative and implicit, reecting the fact that this channel was still in the early stages of development and the intermediary could not be certain how much value the British attached to it. And in each case, the implicit threat was made in order to secure a concession that might then generate a reciprocal gesture by the IRA. The key purpose of a termination threat was to maintain momentum in the process. By early 1975, however, the channel had become much better established and the role of the intermediary much more crucial as he held long regular meetings with both British and IRA representatives in between the secret formal meetings that were then daigh papers; Duddy papers, 1975 diary, taking place between the two sides (OBra POL35/62). By spring 1975 the British were backing away from a deal and the ceasere was in immediate danger. In these circumstances the intermediary began to regularly invoke the threat of termination against the British. In many cases the threats were implicit, warning the British that the ceasere was about to break down, suggesting that his role was becoming impossible, stating that the process would be over if the British did not act by a certain deadline (Duddy papers, 1975 diary, POL35/62). Occasionally however, the threats were explicit. In July 1975, for example, the British representative, Donald Middleton, phoned to say that the British might not attend the next scheduled meeting with the IRA. Duddy wrote in his diary:

I was personally very annoyed after all the work I had done to get the drift to war halted. I reacted very strongly and said I was not going to let this drift position develop. I challenged Middleton saying I would cut off the talks, and that I could then begin to enjoy life with my children, letting whoever likes do the work [. . .] I said I was fed up with the strain of holding both ends together (Brendan Duddy, diary entry for 19/7/75. POL 35/62, Duddy papers).

The exit option

The intermediary invoked personal costs and criticised the British action as undermining his personal efforts (after all the work I had done). In this case the credibility of the threat was established by highlighting the continuing personal costs and arguing that these were unsustainable. During the early period the intermediary gradually became more explicit in threatening termination as the channel became better established and thus more valuable to the parties on both sides. It does not appear that termination was threatened at any stage during the hunger strike negotiations in 1980-1981. When contact was re-established in 1990 and 1991 the intermediary was in a quite different position to the one he had occupied during the early stages of negotiation in the 1970s. In the 1990s the contact clearly depended on him as an individual from the outset and this gave him increased leverage, particularly because he had agreed to act again as intermediary at the express request of the British government[10]. In addition, Duddys attitude had changed in the intervening period. In 1975 there was a particular intensity and urgency to his efforts to prevent the renewal of violence. The talks had collapsed in 1976 despite all his efforts and in the 1990s he appears to have been much more sanguine about the possibility of breakdown. After the British pulled out of a planned meeting with Republican representatives in 1993, creating a crisis in relations between the two parties, Duddy (codenamed June) spoke on the phone with MI5 agent Robert McLarnon (Fred). As Duddy recalled it in a narrative that he dictated a few days later:
June thanked Fred and reminded him that the damage caused by this adventure would be very great [. . .] Fred said that it was remarkable how cool June had remained and June responded that it wasnt all that difcult as she had seen it all before (Duddy Papers, POL 35/266).

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In addition, the intermediary, receiving information from the Republican side that strongly indicated that the IRA were seeking to end their campaign through a negotiated compromise, was impatient with the British government. There was a personal dimension to this impatience. Duddy had watched a succession of British representatives become involved in these contacts and then continue to promotions in their careers, apparently unaffected by the failure of the efforts. He expressed this impatience to MaClarnon, the new representative in 1991:
[. . .] I had got to the point with Robert [McLarnon], I had experienced with Michael [Oatley] coming and going, R.[11] coming and going, Donald [Middleton] coming and going and really it was getting to a point where I was saying really I have had enough of this. More of letting my disaffection be known rather than Im out the door (personal interview with Niall ODochartaigh, 26 and 27/11/09).

Once again, tentative expressions of disaffection and frustration, that I have had enough of this were used in preference to direct threats of termination that would have raised the stakes excessively. This dissatisfaction with the extent of British government movement formed the backdrop to a clear and explicit threat of

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termination successfully deployed by the intermediary in spring 1993. The British had agreed to a formal face-to-face meeting with Republican representatives for the rst time since the contacts of 1975/6. The British representative then called to say that they were pulling out of the meeting because of recent IRA attacks. Duddy applied intense pressure on him to come to the meeting:
There was real biting confrontation [. . .] There was three to four, ve hours possibly of telephone calls in which I was very bluntly saying to Robert [McLarnon], this is it, it has taken a big effort for me to get Kelly and McGuinness[12], it has taken a big effort for them to come. If you dont come now dont come back next week, you are really blowing it. I deeply pressurised him and I also added that I wouldnt be around next week if they came to do this (personal interview with Niall ODochartaigh, 26-27/11/09).

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The British representative eventually agreed to attend and the meeting went ahead. He was not ofcially authorised to do so (Duddy papers, POL 35/307). In this case the threat of termination had produced a clear and direct outcome. Crucial to this was the fact that the intermediary looked on the current phase of contact as the continuation of a long effort and was more condent in his power and more prepared to wield it. He was also aware from his experience in the 1970s that termination did not preclude future renewal of contact at a time when the chances of success might be higher. 4. Discussion Examination of the termination threats by the intermediary in the Northern Ireland conict yields some important insights for the theory of the exit option. We will elaborate on the insights from the empirical analysis here. A central purpose of mediation is to increase the chances of a successful agreement by reducing uncertainty about the intentions of the other side through the exchange of information. But, as Richmond notes, disputants may be guided by objectives unrelated to nding a compromise solution (Richmond, 1998). They may even be involved in negotiation with the express intention of buying time while they prepare to return to violence. In these circumstances the information aspect of mediation is valuable in allowing them to prepare more effectively for a return to conict. The information exchange facilitated by a mediator thus has a value to the parties that is independent of the desire of the two sides to reach a negotiated settlement. The empirical analysis has shown that the belligerent parties valued the intermediary not only because of his role in pursuing an agreement but also as a source of information. They chose to engage in the mediation process not only because they wished to explore the possibilities for a negotiated settlement of the conict but also because they could get information. In particular, they sought information that could not be generated through public channels. Moreover, the fact that the parties sought information from the intermediary also had implications for how the mediation process unfolded. The intermediary and the primary parties engaged in a bargaining over information. There was a process of trading asymmetries of information between the intermediary, on the one hand, and the parties, on the other. From this point-of-view, there was a constant struggle and tension between the informational and the more classical problem-solving aspects of the communication. The more information the intermediary accumulated, the more his inuence and leverage increased. Yet that also transformed his role from facilitator of the process to a bargaining party. The analysis also reveals that the intermediary, because he possessed the value of being a unique information channel for the parties, was able to create momentum and

get procedural concessions during the process by putting this channel at risk by termination. The credibility of this threat was enhanced by two mechanisms. First, as predicted by the theory, by putting his own role (and the information that owed from it) at stake, he could make the parties back down from intransigent positions. Second, the empirical analysis reveals that the intermediary could utilize the costs incurred by himself as a way of increasing the credibility of the exit-option threat. When he could show the parties that his personal commitment and costs were unsustainable, it lent credibility to his threats of termination. Paradoxically, conditions that worsened the situation for the intermediary actually increased his leverage as a mediator, by enhancing the credibility of the exit-option. Another important insight, that may deserve further exploration, is the relationship between the onset and the termination. The ability to utilise the exit option was signicantly increased when the intermediary was acting on the request of one of the parties, as happened in the 1990s in this case. When parties had asked for the intermediary, they were also more vulnerable to threats of his withdrawal. Hence, mediation by request from the parties, rather than initiated by outside interventions, may therefore have greater potential for effective deployment of the termination threat. Our empirical analysis also yields insights that were not predicted by our theoretical framework. One important observation in this regard is that threats of termination will also be used when continued negotiations on the existing pattern threaten to damage the intermediary in a variety of other ways. Thus, a mediator may terminate negotiation in order to protect the integrity of their role, a measure which in some cases may also be necessary to safeguard their life. A mediator who urges one side to stay in negotiations when it is clear to the mediator that the other side seeks only to gain tactical advantage and has no intention of reaching a negotiated settlement, runs the danger of becoming an instrument of the latter. In this case the role of mediator is undermined and termination is necessary in order for the intermediary to avoid becoming an accomplice in the deception of one party to talks. We conclude from this that mediators must be prepared to threaten termination and to accept that they might trigger a renewal of violence if their role is not to be compromised. In discussing threats of termination, it is important to note that there is a continuum between pressure for compromise, warnings of breakdown, and threats of termination with sometimes fuzzy boundaries between each of these. Deadlines can play a fruitful role in negotiation processes since they facilitate agreement, lower expectations, call bluffs, and produce nal proposals (Zartman and Berman, 1982). The refusal by an intermediary to relate a message, for example, or a statement by an intermediary that a particular stance or decision or position is certain to provoke the other side to renew violence are forms of pressure aimed at altering and shaping responses through an implicit threat of termination. Zartman has argued that such threats can succeed when there is a mutually hurting stalemate and neither party wishes to return to violence. But there are two difculties with this argument. If the structural pressures for negotiation implicit in the concept of stalemate are very strong, parties might actually be quite sanguine about the withdrawal of a particular mediator on the basis that they can simply be replaced. Threats of termination might have less force in these situations than in others. Secondly, we might infer from Zartmans analysis that parties that do not perceive the situation as a mutually hurting stalemate or that wish to return to conict might be impervious to threats of termination but we argue that this is not the case. A mutually hurting stalemate is not a necessary condition for the successful exertion of power

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through a threat of termination. Regardless of their attitude to the negotiations and the importance they attach to a successful outcome, parties must remain oriented to a possible future relationship with the intermediary after the breakdown/failure of negotiations. A mediator can play a signicant role in allocating blame simply by choosing the timing and thus the political context for breakdown. The desire to maintain working relationships with the intermediary is thus crucial to understanding the leverage a mediator can exert. 5. Conclusion This study set out to explore the dynamics surrounding the exit-option in international mediation. We conclude that the exit-option is an important tactical resource that an international intermediary can use in order to improve the prospects for progress in negotiations. It is used at some crucial stages of international negotiation by intermediaries in a way that cannot be explained by previous theory. Empirically, this paper has shown that an anonymous mediator without signicant independent resources and operating in secrecy can credibly and successfully deploy the threat of termination regardless of whether a mutually hurting stalemate exists and despite the fact that they are unable to authoritatively allocate blame in front of an important audience. Crucial to this is the informational value of the mediator to the parties. Trade in informational asymmetries is one of the most important processes in international mediation, and this also has implications for when the exit-option can be used. When such trading is deemed as useful by the parties, the intermediary also has a base for making effective threats of terminations, since the ending of mediation efforts would be costly for the parties involved. This adds insights to the dynamics of the mediation process from a bargaining perspective. The informational basis of the mediator helps to explain the conditions under which the mediator can credibly threaten to disengage from mediation processes, in order to build pressure on the parties to move forward towards peace. Given that successful trading between the parties generates information that accumulates to the mediator, this source of leverage over the parties would be expected to grow over time. As a consequence the mediator can become an increasingly signicant party in the negotiation process. Our ndings indicate that mediators who are involved in their role over an extended period and who accumulate information that increases their value to the parties involved, are in a stronger position than others to exert inuence on the parties to move them towards settlement. This has implications for both mediators and parties to a dispute. It might be valuable for mediators to think in a more calculated way about these two aspects of their role: the duration of their involvement and the informational aspect of their role, because these aspects can signicantly increase their capacity to inuence parties to move towards settlement. It is important for parties to conict to be aware that the informational role of a mediator, particularly where that has developed over a long period of time, creates a certain capacity for the mediator to act as a third party and to exert inuence, even where that mediator does not have the capacity to cast blame or to withhold resources. This study suggests some important avenues for further exploration. First, being a study of a single case, albeit a crucial one, there is an obvious need for comparative approaches when it comes to termination dynamics. Second, there is a need for a more integrated analysis of the entry and exit dynamics this study shows that how the intermediary came in also affected the possibility of utilising the exit-option. Third, the

so-called role-bargain (Princen, 1992), where the intermediary shifts role over time is an important theme for further research. We have seen in this study that the trading of asymmetries in information gave the intermediary more leverage over time and shifted his strategies and tactical possibilities. How such bargaining over roles plays out is an important area for further exploration.
Notes 1. In line with previous research, such as Princen (1992), we do not draw a sharp line between the terms intermediary and mediator and throughout this study we use the concepts interchangeably. 2. POL35, The Brendan Duddy papers at the Archives, James Hardiman Library, National University of Ireland, Galway. 3. Details of interviews by Niall ODochartaigh: Brendan Duddy, Derry, 11-13 May, 27-29 July, air OBra daigh, former President of Provisional 13-16 October, and 26-27 November 2009; Ru in, Roscommon, 2 December 2009 (interview conducted through the medium of Irish); Sinn Fe unattributable interview with former British ofcial, 7 October 2008 air OBra daigh Papers at the Archives, James Hardiman Library, National 4. POL 28, The Ru University of Ireland, Galway 5. In 1970 the IRA split into two competing organisations. The Ofcial IRA espoused Marxist ideology and hostility to traditional nationalism. It wound down its activity from 1972 onwards and ceased to be a signicant force by the mid 1970s. The Provisional IRA emerged as the key republican paramilitary organisation, despite the existence of other smaller groups. 6. Mediation is considered here as an approach that can be aimed at either conict management or conict resolution (for a discussion about the difference, see Wolff, 2006, p. 134). 7. Irish National Liberation Army, a Marxist Republican paramilitary group that emerged from the Ofcial IRA and was highly active from the mid 1970s until the late 1980s. 8. British representative in contact with the IRA in the mid-1970s, Oatley was involved in this channel again in 1980/1981 and in the early 1990s. 9. According to Duddy the British agreed to transfer Stagg but subsequently retreated from this agreement. Stagg too died on hunger strike. 10. As described in the 2008 BBC television documentary, The Secret Peacemaker. 11. British representative in 1975. in elected representatives who were reputed to also be senior IRA leaders. 12. Senior Sinn Fe

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