Iran: Cultural Values, Self images and Negotiation Behavior

Communication and NegotiationPre-Negotiations and Operational IntelligenceIranian negotiators have been known to make extensive use of back channels andpre-negotiations. Obviously such behavior has a mundane domestic reason: to free theregime of the need to explain its behavior to the Iranian public. In many cases,however, these channels seem to have been no more than a mechanism for gatheringoperational intelligence prior to the actual negotiations, for sounding out the rival’sweaknesses and positions, and to identify disagreements within the rival's teams. In afew cases it was revealed that the Iranian side made extensive simulations, includingallocating tasks to the more responsive or conciliatory team member as opposed to thehard-liner.Here, the Iranian pre-conceptions of the West frequently come into play. The morethe West is perceived as a “high BATNA” rival (Best Alternative to a NegotiatedAgreement - like the Iranians themselves), and willing to walk away (to the militaryoption if need be), the greater will be the Iranian tendency to expedite thenegotiations.What's on the Table?True to the code of the bazaar, the prices of merchandise proposed at the outset ofnegotiations has very little to do with the real price that the Iranian believes he canget. The difference is usually expressed in terms of hundreds of percents (when theprice is in money), and in unacceptable political demands when the price isdiplomatic.A more interesting phenomenon is the willingness to enter into detailednegotiations over issues that the Iranian side knows it could not deliver even if itsdemands were to be met. 138 Some sources claim that this is a negotiating ploy, meantto wear out the adversary with “virtual” negotiations and to learn his weaknessesbefore raising real issues. Others claim that this is just a reflection of the “bazaarinstinct” and the “love of the game,” a demonstration of rhetorical, emotional, andintellectual virtuosity in negotiation that raises the status of the Iranian in the eyes ofhis colleagues and subordinates, and hence serves a social end, separate from the realgoal of the negotiations.According to one source, the virtual negotiations often spring from other issueswith no apparent reason, with the Iranian side going off on a tangent. The new andunexpected issue comes as a non sequitur, but becomes the focal point of the talks.The non-Iranian side finds itself compelled to negotiate back to the original issue, andthen finds that it has paid for the return to status quo ante. A former Western officialpointed out that at the start of negotiations he was “led to believe that [the Iraniannegotiators] are rational, reasonable, understanding, and able to adjust on the basis offacts that are revealed to them in the course of the give and take.” He claims,however, that this turned out to be no more than verbal dexterity serving as a mask tohide a reluctance to change positions. He discovered that at the end of the negotiations138 Sources who were privy to sensitive negotiations over hostages/POWs testified that even when therewas reliable information that the Iranian team did not have the authority to make decisions, or theycould not deliver, they held talks as if they could.39