Negotiation Engineering: A Quantitative Problem-Solving Approach to Negotiation

Abstract

Negotiations are complex problems whose solutions require special, practical methods. We introduce a problem-solving approach to negotiation inspired by the established solution-oriented discipline of engineering, which we call Negotiation Engineering. The key elements of this approach are the reduction of problems to their basic structures and the application of heuristic methods to problem solving. We argue that the use of mathematical language in negotiations enables an increased logical accuracy in negotiation analysis and allows the use of a variety of existing helpful mathematical tools to achieve a negotiation agreement. We demonstrate the practicability and usefulness of this approach in four case studies in the area of international diplomacy in which Negotiation Engineering was applied to achieve negotiation solutions.

Keywords: Negotiation Engineering, problem solving, heuristic method, mathematical language