Welcome to a special issue — in name and fact — of Negotiation Journal. It celebrates and documents the enduring impact of A Behavioral Theory of Labor Negotiations, first published fifty years ago. Richard Walton and Robert McKersie's book has profoundly influenced the theory, practice, and teaching of negotiation ever since.
Last October, the Program on Negotiation (PON) floated the idea of marking the occasion and saluting Dick and Bob's contribution with some sort of event. (I use their familiar names here — as do others throughout this issue — as they are close friends of many of us.) Everybody was enthusiastic. A splendid dinner clearly was in order. We would feature a speaker who could testify to the breadth of Dick and Bob's vision and the depth of their analysis. We might coax our honorees to share some reflections, and the rest of us could personally express our appreciation.
It turns out that grateful minds think alike. We learned that Joel Cutcher‐Gershenfeld and Thomas Kochan already had something in the works for the annual gathering of the Labor and Employment Relations Association (LERA). By happy coincidence, it would be meeting in Boston at the beginning of this year. We at PON didn't feel preempted in the least. Rather, in the spirit of Dick and Bob's integrative model, we recognized a great opportunity to build on the LERA symposium and host a larger symposium, involving more people who could survey A Behavioral Theory's continuing influence in realms far beyond labor relations. The PON conference, in turn, would generate articles and commentary for this journal, so that insights could be shared with a much wider audience, over a much longer time. That collection is now before you.
Joel and Tom generously agreed to this three‐step plan. Both of them have been full partners in organizing the PON conference. Working with them has been a pleasure. We quickly encountered two problems, however. The first was working on a tight schedule. We planned the gathering to take place on March 5, and Dick and Bob had locked the date onto their calendars. But that left us little time to spread the word. Many people who would have loved to participate had commitments that they just couldn't unwind. The substantial roster of participants that you see in the table of contents would be even larger had there been more lead time.
The second problem was a different sort of time constraint. It soon became clear that the event would be much more than a cheerful dinner party. Participants wanted to join us in thanking Dick and Bob, of course, but also had much to say about how the concepts in A Behavioral Theory have evolved over the decades, and how they inform where negotiation theory and practice may be headed. In short, we saw an opportunity to use this seminal book as a platform to both reflect on a full half century of thinking in our field and to chart a course for future work. Our challenge was to pull all this off in the limited time that had been scheduled for the event — a single afternoon and evening.
My teacher (and later colleague) Howard Raiffa was given to say, “If you don't have a choice, you don't have a problem.” The territory that Dick and Bob had charted was so wide and the list of people who deserved the opportunity to speak was so long, the standard academic format of delivering papers was out of the question. By necessity we lit upon the idea of mini TED talks, giving lead presenters a spare nine minutes (half the normal TED allotment) to present one or two key ideas or challenging questions on their assigned topic. Other panelists were allotted a mere three minutes each to add whatever they wished on the theme. They weren't obliged to comment on the leads' remarks — in fact, they were encouraged to offer complementary perspectives. Next we opened up the conversation to the more than eighty people who had come on short notice. At the mid‐point and at the end, Dick and Bob deservedly were given the last word. A high‐energy, deeply engaging afternoon was the result.
We broke the program into two parts: theory and practice. The boundaries between the two were appropriately loose. Within each half, three sessions reflected central themes in the book. This special issue of Negotiation Journal follows the same structure, with the addition of some other elements. Starting with the theory side, we first covered
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enduring dualities: integrative/distributive, creating/claiming; forcing/fostering;
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new frontiers: pushing the boundaries of attitudinal structuring; and
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intra‐organizational bargaining in postindustrial organizations.
Then for the second part, addressing practice, we turned to fifty‐year perspectives on
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negotiation and conflict in the workplace;
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facilitating and training in the community; and
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negotiation pedagogy.
(Interested readers can view the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J‐3AGXMtick and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hq3fVNRITZE.)
What appears in these pages is not a transcript of what took place, however. This spring, after the event, speakers refined and developed their short talks. Some pooled their efforts in coauthored pieces that follow, while others worked on their own.
We have also included some important new material here. Joel and Tom lead off the issue with an overview of the central themes of Dick and Bob's remarkable book. They track how its ideas have informed the thinking of negotiation specialists across many disciplines and fields. Their article sets the stage for the contributions that follow. The questions up for serious inquiry include the following:
Do the terms “integrative” and “distributive” still describe the best framework for our field?
Is “attitudinal structuring” in negotiations still an expanding domain for negotiation research?
Could there be better ways to think about internal negotiations within an organization?
Are the domains of the workplace and the community changing in ways that require expanding the scope of negotiation theory?
Can our courses be truly transformative, so that our students have the poise, judgment, and interpersonal skills to negotiate effectively?
We've added other important items following the event. One is the late Richard Peterson's review of the book Strategic Negotiations: A Theory of Change in Labor‐Management Relations, which Dick and Bob coauthored (with Joel) twenty years after A Behavioral Theory appeared. Because we're chronicling how other scholars have advanced concepts in that book over the years, it is fitting that we also note that Dick and Bob did so themselves. We are grateful to Professor Peterson's family and Industrial Relations, the journal in which the review originally appeared, for permitting us to republish an assessment of this important work.
Another addition is a reflection by Werner Sengenberger, former Director of the Employment Strategy Department of the International Labor Organization and a doctoral student under Bob McKersie. He nicely connects the labor aspects of the theory with broader concerns in society.
We also in this issue include a column by Edward Miles and Jeff Schatten entitled “From the Research Lab to the Office: Making Negotiation Research More Accessible to Negotiators.” They ask how negotiation research can be made more externally valid and contextually specific in ways that will enhance the impact of research on practice. Although this contribution is not technically part of the Walton and McKersie celebration, it serendipitously touches on ideas raised throughout the special issue.
Alas, there is one item from the PON symposium that we cannot deliver to you, whether you are devouring this journal in print or online. The choice of dessert at the celebratory dinner following the event was inspired: freshly baked, unsliced pies were brought to each table. Guests had to work out for themselves how to divide the treat. (Buckets of ice cream were also provided for those inclined to expand the offering.)
Until digital printers are engineered to deliver fresh‐baked pie, that description of the meal will have to suffice. But we can provide a taste of the warmth and gratitude expressed throughout the symposium, thanks to the tribute that Harvard Business School Dean Nitin Nohria gave at the end of the program. Bob McKersie was on Nitin's doctoral committee at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Dick Walton was a colleague and mentor when Nitin later joined the Harvard Business School faculty. Nitin saluted them both for their profound contribution to the ways in which we understand negotiation in its fullest sense. He also commended their generous spirits, their keen intellects, and the lofty examples that they have set for the rest of us teachers and scholars. We echo that admiration. We hope that this special issue will enable others to learn from and expand on the work of these two giants in our field.
I will add a personal note, as well. Working on this issue and on the PON symposium earlier this year has been a joy. For me it has also been a matter of coming full circle. I first read A Behavioral Theory in the early 1970s when I had the good luck of being a student in Jim White's negotiation seminar. His course, as well as Dick and Bob's book, launched my career in negotiation.
Among other things my vocation has included serving as editor of Negotiation Journal for the past twenty years. I stepped into this role (along with Debbie Kolb, as coeditor) under terrible circumstances — the loss of our dear friend and colleague, Jeff Rubin, who died in a hiking accident. Jeff was Negotiation Journal's founding editor, as well as the second executive director of the Program on Negotiation. In these pages, I have tried to be a steward of his legacy, in particular his commitment to cross‐disciplinary work that bridges theory and practice.
As editor I have had a privileged vantage point for watching the field of negotiation grow and flourish. I have also had the pleasure of collaborating with and learning from colleagues near and far. After two decades in this role, this will be my final editor's note. I am stepping down with the publication of this issue. Joel Cutcher‐Gershenfeld, who has worked so tirelessly on this special issue, has been named as the new editor, beginning with the January issue, and I have happily agreed to pitch in during the transition.
Acknowledging the long list of people who have helped me — and the journal — would require another special issue. I do, however, want to thank immediate members of the Program on Negotiation family, starting with Bob Mnookin, the chair of PON's executive committee, and Susan Hackley, the program's managing director, for their steadfast support of the journal. Of the many other PON colleagues who have written for us, Debbie Kolb, Jes Salacuse, Jim Sebenius, and Larry Susskind deserve particular thanks for the quality (and quantity) of their contributions. I am also grateful for the work and counsel of our associate editors: Bob Bordone, Dan Druckman, Melissa Manwaring, and Carrie Menkel‐Meadow. In addition to recruiting authors and reviewers, they have provided sage advice on trends both in our field and in publishing more generally.
The entire enterprise of peer‐reviewed scholarship is also dependent on the sometimes seemingly thankless work of hundreds of peer reviewers who not only ensure the rigor and quality of the articles we publish but also play a critical role in the development of authors' careers. Many of these reviewers serve on our editorial advisory board, but many others do not. I thank them all.
Saving the most important names for last, I thank Bill Breslin, managing editor emeritus, who most ably served in his role as long as I have been in mine. Bill helped Jeff Rubin to found the journal. He is one of our most devoted readers and remains a treasured friend. Second, I bow deeply to Nancy Waters, who has been at the helm since 2004, which means she has overseen the publication of forty‐four issues.
Just think about the process involved in turning a single promising draft into a finished article, and all the transactions required between just one author and Nancy — and Bill before her — as editor. Multiply that effort by ten and then by ten again, and you are nowhere near the number of phone calls, e‐mails, and revisions required to get this quarterly out on time. So, Nancy, thank you for helping to keep this good ship afloat and on course.
Finally, I thank our readers, as eclectic a group as is Negotiation Journal itself: a community of researchers, alternative dispute practitioners, public officials, managers, teachers, and students. I hope that whatever article or question first drew you to this publication prompted you to read something else that you happened upon, seemingly beyond your specialty. And I hope further that the experience gave you a fresh perspective on your own work, whether scholarly or applied. Sparking such insights is our mission, pure and simple.
At this very moment others are puzzling over questions about negotiation, reconsidering old notions, toying with new ones. I'm imagining an experimentalist who is designing a study that could turn familiar assumptions upside down. Or it could be a daring mediator about to try a new approach in a seemingly intractable dispute. A young teacher somewhere is preparing to pilot an ingenious new exercise. And someone else, leafing through an old book, could be on the verge of drawing still more wisdom from it. (A Behavioral Theory, perhaps?)
Many such musings will effervesce, of course. The researcher might get distracted by another project. The mediator's initiative may fail. But some nascent ideas will blossom — just as the planned dinner to celebrate Dick Walton and Bob McKersie's book became a symposium and that gathering, in turn, spawned this special issue of Negotiation Journal. Knowing that so many others share my fascination with negotiation is exhilarating. Looking ahead to future issues of the journal, I am eager to see the many ways this unique publication will continue to advance theory‐building and best practices in our important field.