vIACM 2021 Proceedings »
Lessons learnt from “Climate Club”, a negotiation simulation of multilateral diplomacy and politics
Abstract: How can the insights of the IACM community be used to train diplomats and policymakers for effectively mitigating climate change? Partnering with an intergovernmental organization, we have sought to develop a simulation that transfers many of our community’s research findings from social science to practice. The outcome is “Climate Club”, a six-party simulation that allows negotiators to sharpen their integrative negotiation skills in a simplified but realistic conference scenario. In late 2020, we have conducted three test-runs of the simulation. The lessons that we have learnt so far concern, e.g., the pros and cons of allowing for a mainly quantitative evaluation of negotiation performances. We have concluded that while a quantifiable outcome may motivate competition-oriented negotiators, it may poorly represent the multi-facetted nature of diplomatic and political negotiations. Our lessons learnt also concern the intersection of leadership training and negotiation success, the pro and cons of using fictitious parties in real-words scenarios, and the different functions that instructors can have during a simulation.
Keywords: negotiation teaching, political conflict, climate, diplomacy