Negotiating with terrorists and the tactical question

Abstract

Governments involved in internal conflicts are constantly faced with the question of whether and when to negotiate with the rebels whom they termed terrorists.1 Often the rebels seek negotiations, if only to set the terms of takeover,2 but negotiations legitimize their movement and acknowledge its status as spokesman for a part of the government's population, as well as rewarding it for its violence against civilians and government forces. But governments frequently, if not inevitably, evolve in their views of the rebels as a negotiating partner. A quick count indicates that 21 of the 26 cases of negotiation in civil wars between 1900 and 1989 (including negotiated surrender and unstable negotiations) were instances where governments negotiated with former terrorists (Stedman, 1991, 6-7). The interesting subject of inquiry, then, is the reasoning behind a government's decision to negotiate with its terrorists and the impact of that decision (i.e., the effectiveness of that reasoning) on them. © 2010 State University of New York All rights reserved.