Negotiation Power: How Humanitarian Frontliners Get Things Done with Hard Bargainers

Hard bargainers are known to dictate terms. Humanitarian frontliners confront them daily. Some state and nonstate counterparts, guided by military necessity, are deemed so overpowering that it seems impossible to negotiate humanitarian necessity with them. And yet, humanitarians leverage negotiations with quite an edge. They construct working relationships and creative solutions to get access and deliver humanitarian aid to those affected by conflict. Humanitarians shape a responsible approach that can enrich the understanding of negotiation power. Guided by humanitarian principles, they do not exercise a power over anyone but leverage a power of getting things done with counterparts, through relational, transactional, and process moves. The purpose of this article is both descriptive and prescriptive. On the one hand, it provides examples to document humanitarian negotiation practices of empowerment and to contribute to a general theory of negotiation power. On the other hand, the article provides some recommendations from negotiation theory to empower humanitarians. Indirectly, by analyzing and supporting the power of humanitarian frontliners, this article also aims at refining the reflection and action of every negotiator when confronted with tough bargainers.