The Kashmir Dispute: Prospects for Conflict Resolution

Abstract

In a recently published book that reflects very thoughtfully on the preconditions for reaching international agreement in regional disputes, the scholar-diplomat Richard N. Haass maintains that much of what presently constitutes mainstream writing on negotiation is focused either on the negotiating process, where the emphasis is on technique, style and approach, or on conflict resolution, where emphasis is on the promotion of formulas aimed at eliminating the grounds for disagreement. Too little attention, he suggests, is given to the larger geopolitical context, where much of the reason for the success or failure of negotiations is actually to be found.2 Most of the time, according to Haass, eliminating the sources of conflict simply isn’t possible; hence, diplomacy that focuses on rooting them out is very likely to be frustrated. Better, he says, that peacemakers focus on the more modest objectives of conflict management than for their efforts to perish on the field of conflict resolution.KeywordsPrime MinisterConflict ResolutionNational SecuritySecurity CouncilSecurity Council ResolutionThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.