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Public Dispute Resolution Environmental Mediation Joint Fact Finding Facility Siting Credo Public Entrepreneurship Mutual Gains Approach to Negotiation Interactive Representation The Mediation of Land Use Disputes Management of Sustainable Development Using Simulations As a Teaching Tool Global Environmental Treaty-making: Parallel Informal Negotiation Joint Training As a Dispute Resolution Tool
Professor Susskind’s primary contributions to the fields of urban and environmental planning, negotiation and dispute resolution, and mutlilateral treaty negotiation are highlighted below. He is the originator of twelve key ideas that have shaped theory and practice in the United States and elsewhere around the world.
Traditional approaches to resolving public disputes produce results that are not as fair, efficient, stable, or wise as they could be. This is true in almost every democratic society. By supplementing representative democracy with new forms of stakeholder involvement -- facilitated by trained mediators -- better results can be achieved at the local, state, and national levels. This suggests new roles for planners, a new profession of public dispute mediation, and ways of strengthening mature democracies. Links
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| Environmental Mediation |
Environmental conflicts can often be resolved through mediated face-to-face negotiation. Environmental mediating raises a host of ethical issues. This is particularly true in the rule-making or regulatory context. Links
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| Joint Fact Finding |
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| Facility Siting Credo |
The “decide-announce-defend” approach to siting regionally necessary but locally noxious facilities no longer works. Only an approach that follows the steps outlined in the Facility Siting Credo is likely to overcome claims of environmental injustice and political unfairness. Links |
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| Public Entrepreneurship |
New “greener” technologies will be needed to shift to more sustainable development patterns throughout the world. The diffusion of these technologies will not be easy because communities (rather than individual corporate or public leaders) will have to decide simultaneously to try them and ensure that they work. New public entrepreneurship networks (with public and private sector actors playing very different roles) will have to be created and maintained to ensure the implementation of these “greener” technologies. Links
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| Mutual Gains Approach to Negotiation |
So-called “win-win” approaches to negotiation have gained in popularity over the past two decades. There is actually no way, however, for everyone to get everything they want in most negotiations. So, building consensus in a way that ensures that all stakeholders exceed “their next best option if there is no agreement” is the key. Building on the work of Fisher and Ury at the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School, Susskind has spelled out how to make a mutual gains approach to negotiation work, especially in multi-party contexts of all kinds. Links
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| Interactive Representation |
Most parliaments and legislatures are comprised of representatives elected on a district basis (by majority rule). As with the United States Congress, this heightens party politics, leads to enormous instability in policy priorities, and usually ensures that “good policy is not good politics.” A new system of Interactive Representation that shifts away from geography and toward shared interests as the basis for elections and emphasizes proportionality rather than majority rule would produce far better policy. Links
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| The Mediation of Land Use Disputes |
Most land use and growth management conflicts (particularly at the state and local levels) can be mediated as long as the right kind of “homework” is done beforehand and certain modifications in traditional institutional arrangements are worked out. Links
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| Management of Sustainable Development |
Sustainable development (i.e. patterns of growth and resource consumption that leave “good” options open to future generations) is an elusive goal. Only by treating the goals and methods of sustainable development as “negotiable” can they be achieved. Balancing economic, ecological, cultural and political objectives requires institutional capacity building and more effective management strategies, particularly in the developing world. Links |
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| Using Simulations As a Teaching Tool |
Too much teaching and training is purely didactic. At every level – from grade school through the most advanced professional training – simulations can and should be used to supplement traditional educational techniques. Simulations (unlike unstructured role plays or case studies) put learners in carefully structured situations that build in real-life constraints. Simultaneous debriefing of multiple groups using the same simulations generate powerful lessons. Links
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| Global Environmental Treaty-making: Parallel Informal Negotiation |
The global environmental treaty-making system is flawed. While hundreds of multilateral accords have been adopted, implementation (as with the Climate Change convention) has been difficult. A new approach to generating transboundary agreements -- called Parallel Informal Negotiation-- ensures much more than lowest common denominator agreements and increases the chances of effective implementation. Links
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| Joint Training As a Dispute Resolution Tool |
As a prelude to negotiation, it is often helpful to bring together the parties for a period of joint training. By introducing the actual parties to the mutual gains approach to negotiation (and ensuring that their constituencies also understand what is involved), it is possible to minimize the adversary nature of contract and other kinds of negotiations. Links
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