Focal Points in Negotiation by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9783030279011
Publisher: Springer International Publishing

4 Classifying Arms Control Solutions

Arms control agreements and negotiating positions contain plenty of numbers, designations of various types of borders and other easily formalized parameters. How many of them meet the criteria of focal points? Do focal point solutions in arms control break down into distinct types? From the focal point perspective, three types of solutions embodied in arms control agreements are identified here. Solutions may have no connection with focal points whatsoever (1); represent a salient point that “competes” with an alternative salient point (2); or rely on an “isolated” focal point with no clear salient alternative in sight (3).

Outcomes of the first type of arms control negotiations are not based on any focal point. The majority of negotiated arms control solutions represent this type of outcome. Such solutions are reached without reliance on any symmetry or appealing number. In many cases, numbers in arms control negotiations are chosen in a consensual manner without the need to attract negotiating parties to a position they would otherwise consider suboptimal based on their interests. In such situations, the appeal of the number may be present, but is not necessary to override or alter anyone’s initial negotiating position. Only a small share of numbers in arms control agreements conform to the definition of a focal point.

For example, the round numbers used extensively in the New START (2010) and Conventional Forces in Europe (1990) treaties were not needed as tools to draw the positions of the sides closer to one another; agreement on these numbers came relatively easy for the negotiating parties before having to address more controversial issues. According to senior negotiators involved in the most recent round of strategic arms control talks between the US and Russia, the ceilings for deployed nuclear warheads to be enshrined in the New START Treaty of 2010 were in fact not difficult to agree upon. Neither side considered it a major concession to commit to a maximum of 1550 deployed warheads and 800 deployed and non-deployed carriers.11

In a similar vein, the Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) Treaty signed in 1990 and the preceding negotiations on “mutual and balanced force reductions” in Europe involved dozens of numbers, most of which, according to the existing accounts of CFE negotiations, were in no way focal or salient.

In arms control negotiations, in general, numbers often generate less contention than, for example, the terms according to which the sides will be monitoring and verifying implementation of the negotiated agreement. In these and many other cases, the round numbers’ “focal promise”, which can be defined as the power of attraction, was either unnecessary or weak.

Arms control solutions of the second type rely on what I call a non-equilibrium focal point. This is a focal point in whose vicinity is another salient point, meaning that a shift from one to the other can occur relatively easily and oftentimes unexpectedly. One example of non-equilibrium focal points are counter-value and counter-force targeting principles in nuclear strategy. Each principle has an underlying coherent logic that can be adopted by the mutually deterring sides.

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