Program on Negotiation

Professor Robert Mnookin ’68, chairman of the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School, was honored by the International Academy of Mediators with a lifetime achievement award. The IAM Award is presented to a person who has made exceptional contributions throughout his or her career by personally advancing alternative dispute resolution and inspiring others to do so.

On Oct. 3, former United States Trade Representative Charlene Barshefsky came to Harvard Law School to share her experiences with students in the Advanced Negotiation Workshop taught by Clinical Professor Robert Bordone ’97 and Lecturer Rory Van Loo ’07.

It is the spring of 1997 and I am sitting in Pound 107 while Roger Fisher ’48, Williston Professor of Law, Emeritus, is telling a story about his serving as a weather reconnaissance pilot in World War II. As a teaching assistant for the Negotiation Workshop, I have heard the story at least a dozen times by now and feel my mind wandering. And yet, against my will, as the story reaches its crescendo and the combination punch line/negotiation lesson flows from Roger’s lips, I find myself involuntarily leaning forward and, a second later, helplessly bursting into laughter. The note I jot down to myself is: “All of life is about who tells better stories.”

Roger Fisher ‘48, a pioneer in the field of international law and negotiation and the co-founder of the Harvard Negotiation Project, died on August 25, 2012. A professor at Harvard Law School for more than four decades, Fisher established negotiation and conflict resolution as a single field deserving academic study and devoted his career to challenging students and colleagues alike to explore alternative methods of dispute resolution.

The winners of Harvard Law School’s 59th annual Williston Competition, Harvard’s annual contract negotiation and drafting competition for first-year law students, were announced on April 19.

Former Secretary of State James A. Baker III was at Harvard on March 29 to receive the Great Negotiator Award, the annual honor created by the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School to recognize individuals whose “lifetime achievements in the field of negotiation and dispute resolution have had a significant and lasting impact.”

Gene Sharp, an emeritus professor of political science at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth and founder of the Albert Einstein Institution, is widely credited as one of the principal initiators of the Arab Spring. His 1993 book, “From Dictatorship to Democracy,” which promotes the principle of nonviolent struggle, is created with inspiring the revolution in Egypt, as well as in other countries all over the world.  

The winners of Harvard Law School’s 58th annual Williston Competition, Harvard’s annual contract negotiation and drafting competition for first-year law students, were announced on April 18. 

Harvard Law School welcomed Kamla Persad-Bissessar, the Prime Minster of Trinidad and Tobago this month for a lecture on leadership and cooperation. Persad-Bissessar became the first female prime minister of the Caribbean nation in May, and was named one of the top 10 female world leaders by TIME Magazine in August.

On Monday, September 27, Harvard Law School’s Program on Negotiation will honor the former President of Finland, Martti Ahtisaari, with the 2010 Great Negotiator Award.

The day after Elaine Lin ’10 finishes taking the Bar Exam in California this summer, she’ll be on a plane to Belfast. Two days later, she’ll be working with dozens of young people who have lost loved ones to terrorism—from Israel, Palestine, Ireland, Spain, India, and the U.S.—in a camp where she will teach them skills for resolving conflict.

Sports agent Ronald M. Shapiro ’67 has a dream roster of clients that includes more baseball Hall of Famers than any other agent, including Cal Ripken Jr., Brooks Robinson, Eddie Murray, Kirby Puckett, and such future Hall of Fame probables as 2009 American League MVP Joey Mauer, for whom Shapiro recently negotiated a $184 million contract with the Minnesota Twins.

Negotiations between the White House and Congressional leaders of both parties have been undermined by mistakes that could have been avoided by using a better negotiation process, says Robert Bordone, Clinical Professor of Law and Director of the Harvard Negotiation and Mediation Clinical Program at Harvard Law School.

The Program on Negotiation has announced that Sean McDonnell ’09 has won the Roger Fisher and Frank E.A. Sander Prize for his paper “Fighting With Faith: The Role of Religion in Dealing With Modern Conflict.”

The following Q&A featuring Harvard Law School Professor Robert Mnookin ’68 was featured in the July 24, 2009, edition of the Boston Globe.

Christo and Jeanne-Claude—the artists whose notable projects include “The Gates” in New York City’s Central Park—received the Great Negotiator Award from HLS’s Program on Negotiation.

Last weekend, a team of students representing Harvard Law School took first place in The Negotiation Challenge in Leipzig, Germany. This year's Harvard Negotiators team was represented by Rene A. Pfromm LL.M. '08, Stefan Neata '08 and Jessica Price '08. Their win marks the second year in a row HLS has won the competition.

In Nepal, lawyers helped restore the rule of law. But not without paying a price.

A quarter-century after "Getting to Yes," Harvard's Program on Negotiation is refining the art and sharing it with the world.

Last spring, Erica Fox started the Harvard Negotiation Insight Initiative at HLS's Program on Negotiation to explore "what mindfulness and the great wisdom traditions have to teach us in the negotiation and dispute resolution field."