Amazon’s 2018 search for a second headquar ters became one of the most competitive economic development negotiations i n North American history\, attracting 238 bids from cities across the Unite d States\, Canada\, and Mexico. In a surprise move\, Amazon selected two lo cations—Long Island City in New York City and National Landing in Virginia. Despite pursuing the same target deal with similar stakeholders\, the outc omes diverged sharply: New York City’s selection ultimately failed\, while Virginia’s succeeded.
In this webinar\, Jim Sebenius and Alex Green p resent a rare\, side-by-side case study of these illustrative negotiations\ , featured in a recently published article in Negotiation Journal. They hig hlight the differences in how each region considered the tangible and intan gible interests of their counterparts\, approached the need for political a nd genuine stakeholder engagement\, and decided whether or not to employ a “Decide-Announce-Defend Approach.” Sebenius and Green emphasize the lesser- known National Landing negotiation and its implications for negotiators.
CATEGORIES:Lecture LOCATION:Zoom GEO:40.712728;-74.006015 ORGANIZER;CN="Kenneth D. Russell":MAILTO:kerussell@law.harvard.edu URL;VALUE=URI:https://hls.harvard.edu/events/pon-live-a-tale-of-two-cities- amazon-hq2-negotiations-in-new-york-and-virginia/ ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://hls.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/A-Tale-of-Two-Cities.png END:VEVENT BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:America/New_York BEGIN:STANDARD TZOFFSETFROM:-0400 TZOFFSETTO:-0500 DTSTART:20251102T060000 TZNAME:EST END:STANDARD END:VTIMEZONE END:VCALENDAR