MSC- IR: Diplomacy

Chapter: 3 Around-the-Table Negotiations Assignment no. 4 REG NO: 1443-112020

SUBMITTED BY: Abida

SUBMITTED TO: Dr.Abdul Basit

Q1. Write a note on Homans theorem ? George Caspar Homans (1910-1989) was born in the prosperous Back Bay district of Boston, Massachusetts. On his mothers side, he was sixth generation in the lineage of that distinguished family, the Adamses of American statesmanship and literature, which includes John Adams, second president of the United States. Entering Harvard University in 1928 to read English, Homans was to spend the rest of his academic career there. He became a junior fellow in sociology in 1934; was invited to become a professor of sociology in 1939; and, with a gap of four years serving in the naval reserve, he remained a faculty member until he retired in 1970. In The Human Group (1950) George C. Homans made a major contribution to the deepening of small group theory and research and through this to growing sophistication of practice with the field of social group work. He also explored the activities of individuals in his influential work Social Behaviour (1961; 1974). The development there of social exchange theory proved to be influential with several, later theories including rational-choice theory drawing upon it. Homans served as the 54th President of the American Sociological Association and was a member of the National Academy of Sciences.

Homans theorem Homans theorem is a deal in which one party trades something which it values highly but which it knows it is going to have to surrender anyway, irrespective of whether or not it gets a quid pro quo from the other side.in principle, both parties can do this as well. The trick here, of course, is to make sure that the other side does not share the same information. This is where liberal democracies are at a severe disadvantage compared to authoritarian regime. According to the sociologist George Homans, asserts that in a negotiation, The more the items at stake can be divided into goods valued more by one party than they cost to the other and goods valued more by the other party than they cost to the first, the greater the chances of successful outcomes. In other words it is not likely to be difficult for a negotiation to be successfully concluded between a meat-loving weight-watcher embarrassed by a gift of chocolates and a sweettoothed vegetarian with a joint of beef won in a raffle. Example:In seeking to trade to US freeze in the deployment of Anti Ballistic missiles (ABMs) in return for Soviet limitations on offensive nuclear forces, Kissinger was seriously hampered by the obvious determination of congress to kill off the ABM programme anyway (Kissinger,1979,pp. 194-210, 534-51).Nor did it help him in his negotiations with the north Vietnamese in Paris that, under even more Fierce Congressional pressure, his major trump card-US military power in south Vietnam-was slipping remorselessly from his grasp with every fresh public announcement of further troop withdrawals .when the other party knows that history is on its side, it has little incentive to pay for concessions Whichever strategy for making and seeking concessions, or whichever combination of them, is adopted will depend on circumstances and the established style of the negotiators. In the last regard, there are significant

variations between different national cultures. Where the negotiators come from different cultural traditions, this can naturally cause problems (Cohen 1977).

There remains however the issue of the general attitude to strike in negotiations, whether, that is, the negotiators should be accommodating or tough. Each has obvious advantage and disadvantages and since the circumstances of different negotiations vary so enormously generalization in this area is a risky business.

Summary:Negotiation is thus generally a lengthy and laborious process; proceeding through prenegotiation and a formula to the details phase. In each stage there is a risk of breakdown, though this probable most acute in the first and last-in the first not least because the exit costs are low, while in the last stage even if both parties in a bilateral negotiation, or a majority of parties in a multilateral negotiation, are serious about making them a success.