Donohue - Message Framing Surrounding Oslo I

Message Framing Surrounding the Oslo I AccordsAuthor(s): William A. Donohue and Daniel DruckmanSource: The Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 53, No. 1 (Feb., 2009), pp. 119-145Published by: Sage Publications, Inc.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/27638656 .

Accessed: 08/06/2013 22:02

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

.

Sage Publications, Inc. is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The Journal ofConflict Resolution.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 69.48.155.2 on Sat, 8 Jun 2013 22:02:31 PMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=sage

http://www.jstor.org/stable/27638656?origin=JSTOR-pdf

http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp


Message Framing Surrounding the Oslo I Accords

William A. Donohue

Department of Communication

Michigan State University, East Lansing Daniel Druckman

Department of Public and International Affairs George Mason University and the University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia

The purpose of this study is to explore the relationship between the secret negotiations and the public rhetoric of Palestinian and Israeli leaders leading up to the Oslo I

Accords. To accomplish this goal, we coded public statements made by Israeli and

Palestinian leaders in the months preceding the accords and the events that unfolded

during the talks. We hypothesized that the Palestinian leaders, as nonstate actors,

would engage in outbidding by showing a more aggressive, backward-looking orienta

tion in public. Israeli leaders, as state actors, would engage in frontstage-backstage behavior and display a more balanced public rhetoric. The results showed that the

Palestinians focused on justice issues framed as mistrust and backward looking. This

public framing was associated with retreat in the private talks. In contrast, the Israelis

switched between positively and negatively framed rhetoric with forward-looking and

affiliative statements correlated with lack of progress and backward-looking and mis

trust rhetoric associated with progress in the talks.

Keywords: affiliation; backstage; backward looking; forward looking; frontstage;

message framing; Oslo I talks; outbidding; power; trust

The

Israeli-Palestinian conflict has swung between periods of escalation and de-escalation during the past two decades. A notable period of de-escalation

occurred in 1993 when the Oslo I Accords were signed. The extensive documenta tion of public speeches and interviews made by the leaders on both sides offers an

opportunity to better understand how their rhetoric set the stage for the secret talks. In previous attempts to explore this topic, Donohue and his colleagues (Donohue 1998; Donohue and Hoobler 2002) examined the relational messages that Israeli

Authors' Note: An earlier version of this article was presented at the annual meeting of the International

Association for Conflict Management, Montreal, 2006. It received the award for the best applied paper at the conference. Considerable gratitude goes to Carsten Tripscha for managing the coding process and

contributing to the reliability analyses. The data used in this article are available at http://jcr.sagepub

.com/supplemental and at http://www.msu.edu/^donohue/OSLODataset.doc.

Journal of Conflict Resolution

t|fcnber 1

]|il|-145 ?,JPublic|?ioiis

10.1?7/00?^|)83p443 ??ii|S|biii;.com

http:?^ine.s|g^)ub.com

119



120 Journal of Conflict Resolution

and Palestinian leaders displayed in various speeches and interviews that occurred

during the period of the secret Oslo I negotiations. These analyses found that Pales tinian rhetoric was characterized by greater reliance on power messages but that

as the parties moved closer to the public announcement of the agreement, the rheto

ric became more affiliative. This study extends the earlier analyses in several direc

tions and breaks new ground in the study of message framing. While the earlier analyses are useful in learning more about the rhetorical style

exhibited in the public presentations, they do not provide a full understanding of the link between the public discourse and the evolution of the private talks. Specifi cally, the studies did not address how the rhetoric is tied to weekly events that

emerged during the course of the negotiations. Furthermore, a more complete

understanding would focus both on the substantive and relational dimensions of the rhetorical messages (Watzlawick, Beavin, and Jackson 1967). In addition to power and affiliation, a critical indicator of relationships in negotiation is trust (Lewicki,

McAllister, and Bies 1998). To round out our understanding of these public com

ments, this key relational construct ought to be included in an assessment of how the rhetoric established a relational context for the talks. It is also important to include an understanding of the substantive direction of the public comments, such

as the extent to which the speakers were looking forward in working toward sustainable peace or backward toward reconciling justice issues (Zartman and

Kremenyuk 2005). In combination, these relational and substantive variables will

provide a more comprehensive understanding of how leaders chose to frame their

rhetoric for both internal and external audiences.

It is important to note that the purpose of this study is not to make claims about how the public rhetoric caused or drove the events at the secret bargaining table.

Rather, the goal is to explore how the public discourse set the stage for the private talks and is linked to their development. This specific regional conflict provides a

unique opportunity in this regard. The Oslo I process evolved with a nonstate actor and a state-actor engaging in private talks over several months to resolve an intract

able conflict. All during this secret process, leaders from both sides were prolific in their public statements about issues related to the conflict. Those statements can be

tracked to events that transpired during the secret talks. Because this conflict has

global ramifications, it has been the subject of numerous books and articles. This literature provides an opportunity to create data sets that allow us to explore several

interesting theoretical issues about how the parties use these various venues to

accomplish their political goals. This study proceeds in two directions. First, we provide a detailed analysis of

the public rhetoric displayed during the Oslo I period, focusing on how parties framed the substantive and relational issues. Second, we conduct a week-by-week

analysis of the public discourse in conjunction with the train of events that unfolded in the secret talks. We are particularly interested in the way that the lea ders' public comments and speeches set the stage for what subsequently transpired



Donohue, Druckman / Oslo I Accords 121

in the talks. As background for conducting these analyses, we begin by providing a brief overview of the Oslo I context. This section is followed by an elaboration of the

concepts that form the basis for several sets of hypotheses that will be evaluated.

Historical Context

The State of Israel was established on May 14, 1948, the day the British mandate over Palestine ended. The next day, the armies of Transjordan, Syria, Lebanon, and

Egypt invaded the newly proclaimed nation. They had superior numbers and fire

power, but after several months of fighting, the Israelis were in possession of vast

territories as well as part of the city of Jerusalem (Bickerton and Klausner 1998; Eisenstadt 1967; Gazit, 1998; Inbar 1998). After the conflict, the Israelis occupied more land than they would have under the UN partition plan. One million Arabs were

displaced into Egypt, Transjordan, and Syria. This community of refugees was the basis for the Palestinian resistance. They would ultimately transform into several groups,

including the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), Hamas, and Hezbollah

(Stoessinger 1998).

Subsequent wars between Israel and its neighbors in 1956, 1967, and 1973 left Israel with even more occupied territory, such as the Sinai, the West Bank, and the Golan Heights. These occupations deepened the rifts between Israelis and Arabs, even though the Sinai was eventually returned to Egypt. In 1988, the resentment felt by the Palestinians living in the occupied territories erupted into outright rebel lion. The Intifada, as the uprising was called, disrupted life in the West Bank and the Gaza strip as hundreds of thousands of Palestinians demanded an independent state. Negotiations came to an impasse when the Palestinians declared the PLO to be their only legitimate representative, and the Israeli government refused to

negotiate with any party regarded as members of a terrorist organization. The 1993 Oslo Accords were a breakthrough. Several representatives from Israel

and the PLO met secretly and informally in Norway over several months to discuss

potential solutions to the conflict. The Norwegians did not take an active role in the talks at first but acted as facilitators, providing a neutral setting for both parties. The leader of the Norwegian delegation was available for private conversations with

the delegates but did not initially attend the meetings. He took on a more active role as the parties viewed him increasingly as a trustworthy partner in the process. They also began to trust one another with increasing informal interactions. Eventually, the

relationship between the Israelis and the Palestinians became so secure that even the

introduction of a more aggressive, less compromising Israeli delegate and several acts

of violence in Israel and the occupied territories could not shake their resolve to find an acceptable solution. (Corbin [1994] provides a detailed account of the process.)

The talks in Oslo led to the creation of a Declaration of Principles, signed in

Washington in September 1993. It was designed to transfer power in the occupied




territories gradually to a newly formed Palestinian Authority (PA). It stipulated free elections in the West Bank and Gaza, withdrawal of Israeli troops, negotiations about the permanent status of the PA within two years, and final status negotiations within a five-year transition period (Naumkin and Zvyagelskaya 2005).

Outbidding and Frontstage-Backstage Communication

While these talks were taking place in secret and progressing on the issues, PLO and Israeli leaders gave public speeches and interviews about various topics asso

ciated with the conflict. Although the secret talks were not mentioned, these commu

nications provided the internationally visible context for the talks. The messages were broadcast largely over radio and TV and covered widely in the press.

The secret diplomacy at Oslo was motivated by failures in obtaining reconcilia tion through public diplomacy. Decades of mistrust on both sides have prevented the parties from making progress. Leaders on both sides can be trapped by their own public rhetoric. A continuing pattern of aggressive statements has made it dif ficult for them to offer concessions or to strive for integrative agreements even

when the timing is propitious. Resorting to a second track was seen to hold pro mise. A challenge to the leaders on both sides was how to manage the public rheto ric in this climate: specifically, how to prepare their various constituencies to

accept an agreement negotiated privately. We argue that the two parties?a state

and a nonstate actor?managed these communications differently. The public pre

sentations perform different functions for each of the groups. As the nonstate actor, the Palestinians may have focused their statements on the

task of outbidding. The process of outbidding typically involves nonstate actors'

using nonconciliatory discourse and deed (typically violent acts) to affirm their

martyrdom and resolve to constituent populations in a bid for support among com

peting factions. From a discourse perspective, Lilja (2008) demonstrates how the Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka use public rhetoric as outbidding by portraying the

government as the aggressor. Bloom (2004) describes how the various Palestinian factions claim responsibility for suicide attacks as outbidding for support. Thus,

outbidding, through both discourse and deed, is aggressive and nonconciliatory toward the opposing state actor as a means of demonstrating commitment and

resolve to the group's cause to ensure constituent support and to deflect the threat

from rival factions.

In contrast, outbidding is less likely to be used by a state actor, since its elected

leadership is relatively more secure. As a sovereign state, the Israeli rhetoric speaks to a much more diverse set of audiences. Internally, the Israeli audience is politi

cally diverse, ranging from extreme hawks to doves, from the secular to the reli

gious. Externally, key audiences include Western supporters, the PLO (in 1993), and, given the visibility of the conflict, many nations around the globe.




Perhaps the most effective way of capturing the nature of this diverse communi

cation process for a state actor is through Friedman's (1994) idea of alternative per forming stages. The frontstage refers to the need for actors to maintain their

respective roles while remaining visible to the audience. In the backstage, the

actors are able to relax, step away from their roles, and prepare for their frontstage

performance. In labor relations, Friedman suggests that integrad ve bargaining occurs largely backstage, in private meetings between leaders or in caucus sessions.

On the other hand, distributive bargaining is often reserved for the frontstage. This stance is taken to communicate resolve and commitment to various positions. It

plays to audiences with those expectations. Friedman's point is that the frontstage caters to constituencies, whereas the backstage plays to the pragmatics of resolving the conflict. A similar idea, proposed in earlier writings, is the boundary role con flict. (See Walton and McKersie [1965] for an application to labor negotiations and Druckman [1977] for an application to international negotiations.)

These competing frameworks of outbidding and frontstage-backstage communi

cation suggest two different communication styles. For the Palestinians, their need

for outbidding requires a more consistently aggressive and nonconciliatory rhetorical

strategy. For the Israelis, much more switching would be expected. On the frontstage,

they would be expected to alternate between highly aggressive, nonconciliatory, and collaborative rhetoric to accommodate their more varied audience requirements.

The outbidding and switching concepts can be understood also in terms of differ ences between state and nonstate actor structures.1 Each structure has a horizontal

and vertical dimension. The former dimension deals with the perils of leadership. The latter refers to relations with constituencies. Nonstate actors must confront fierce

competition from contenders. The relative popularity of emerging leaders often turns

on the perceived authenticity of their tough, unwavering rhetoric. That rhetoric is intended to appeal to a rather homogeneous hawkish constituency. State actors have

the advantage of relatively secure leadership, at least for their elected term in office.

They have more room to maneuver. Their popularity turns on their effectiveness in

appealing to divided constituents or voters. Thus, we would expect both tough and soft messages sent in their public speeches, and those messages are intended to

appeal to or provoke both substantive and relational issues.

To explore these ideas in the context of the Oslo I Accords, we analyzed a sample of public speeches and interviews conducted during the period before the signing of the Accords. As indicated above, we examine both the substantive or content and

relational dimensions of the communications (Watzlawick, Bevin, and Jackson

1967). From a substantive perspective, we ask about the way that speakers frame the

issues. Framing is defined in terms that are either backward- or forward-looking. The

former refers to restoring injustices perpetrated in the past; the latter deals with creat

ing the conditions for a peaceful future. From a relational perspective, we ask about

the way that speakers use language to communicate trust, affiliation, and power.

Each of these framing perspectives is discussed in turn.




Forward- and Backward-looking Negotiation

One way to understand the political rhetoric of negotiations is in terms of forward- and backward-looking statements (Zartman and Kremenyuk 2005).

Backward-looking statements focus on ending the violence, accounting for past

wrongs, and aiming for compromise outcomes that do not address the underlying sources of conflict. These statements emphasize the symptoms of conflict, often

implying that the other party is responsible for the problem and that a resolution

depends largely on their concessions. They reflect and reinforce a competitive (or distributive) bargaining process. In contrast, forward-looking statements are char

acterized by an attempt to address the underlying causes of the conflict by creating a new framework intended to build a more constructive future. They focus on simi

larities, the acknowledgement of mutual responsibility, and an awareness of the

underlying reasons for the conflict. The emphasis is on imagining a future in which

peaceful relationships are sustained.

A connection may be drawn between the forward-backward distinction and the

earlier distinction made between the distributive bargaining and problem-solving approaches to negotiation (Walton and McKersie 1965). These approaches are alter

native portrayals of negotiation processes. The former emphasizes positions, conces

sions, self-orientation, and relative gains and has been shown to depict the backward

looking process of negotiations intended to stop violence (for example, the ceasefire talks over Nagorno Karabakh analyzed by Druckman and Lyons [2005]). The latter is concerned more with interests and values, information exchange, and joint gains.

These features are characteristic of forward-looking talks intended to create the con

ditions for lasting peace (for example, the Mozambique peace process analyzed by Druckman and Lyons [2005]). They are thought also to coincide roughly with the difference between realist (or power politics) and liberal (or integrative solutions)

perspectives on international relations (Hopmann 1995). They bring into play the dimensions of power, affiliation, and trust in international affairs.

The secret discussions at Oslo in 1993 have been depicted as a problem-solving exercise. This appears to be evident from analyses of the process as it moved from

one phase to another (Corbin 1994; Donohue 1998). These talks are regarded as an

exemplar of the sort of unofficial diplomacy that produces agreements that would not have occurred in official channels. Propitious conditions included a period of

relatively relaxed tensions in the Middle East; secretive discussions along a second track of nongovernmental interventions, which gave diplomats a chance to brain

storm for possible solutions; and neutral, sensitive facilitation by an experienced third party from another region (Kelman 1996, 1997). Interestingly, the public dia

logue during this period gave no hint of the progress that was occurring behind the scenes. Speeches made and interviews given by Israeli and Palestinian politicians, as reported in the media, conveyed a familiar tone of invective and blame. Yet, on




closer inspection, the speeches may have offered some hope of reconciliation. A

question of interest is whether the public discourse during this period supported or contradicted the progress being made at Oslo. This question is addressed in the ana

lyses to follow. The public discourse also provides an opportunity to refine the construct. The

case study applications in Zartman and Kremenyuk (2005) suggest its usefulness for distinguishing between types of negotiation processes, particularly with regard to short-term and long-term solutions to ending violent conflicts. Less attention

was paid by the authors to defining or validating the construct's dimensions. A first

attempt is made in this study to specify these dimensions. One dimension consists of the causes of the conflict as imputed by the disputants: for example, the differ ence between taking responsibility and ending the violence. Another refers to the

process of managing the conflict: for example, the difference between visions of

the future and seeking justice for wrongdoing. A third dimension focuses on the

possible outcomes that would result from negotiation: for example, an emphasis on

joint or relative gains from a negotiation. The three dimensions are defined more

precisely in the section below on methods.

Power and Affiliation

An earlier conceptual scheme, devised by Donohue and Hoobler (2002), was used to capture the relational features of communication. It distinguishes between

messages that emphasize power and those that promote affiliation between dispu tants. Derived from Winter's (1993, 1994) work on motivational goals, these con structs were shown to capture the communication between Israeli and Palestinian

leaders in the period leading up to the Oslo I talks. An attempt was made to reflect the multidimensional aspects of both concepts. Power includes (1) strong, forceful

acts; (2) control, which consists of attempts to regulate or manage the other;

(3) attempts made to influence the other with direct or implied threats; (4) efforts to

impress the other with reputational tactics; (5) a strong positive or negative emo tional reaction; and (6) giving unsolicited advice or help. Affiliation consists of

(1) expressions of positive, friendly, or intimate feelings; (2) expressions of sadness or regret for lost opportunities to restore relations; (3) statements of companionship or camaraderie; and (4) nurturing statements or acts. These indicators were used as

codes for power or affiliation. Every public statement was judged for either power or affiliation, independent of the way previous statements were coded.

Trust

The construct of trust is included for two reasons. One is that we want to provide a more comprehensive understanding of the relational process. Trust has been




repeatedly shown to be central to any understanding of how relationships influence

negotiation outcomes (Burgoon and Hale 1987; W. Deutsch 1958). Another reason

is that trust is a key factor in the conduct of international relations (Hoffman 2002).

According to Hoffman, Karl Deutsch and colleagues (1957) identified trust as a

part of the cement on which peaceful relations are built. It has long been recog nized as a cornerstone of the peaceful resolution of interstate disputes. By including trust, we provide a more thorough and careful understanding of how relationships

are managed in the context of an outbidding or frontstage communication process.

Trust has been conceptualized frequently as risking vulnerability in situations

in which a person has little control over an outcome (Hoffman 2002; Lewicki,

McAllister, and Bies 1998). The key to a trusting relationship is a willingness to

take a chance on being exploited for the other's gain (Lewicki and Wiethoff 2000).

Among the factors thought to contribute to trust are (1) perceived similarity and

positive regard; (2) an interdependent relational structure in which the parties can

help or hurt one another; (3) the initiation of trusting behavior by the other party; and, in a bargaining context, (4) making concessions on key issues. When one or

more of these factors are present, the parties are more likely to risk vulnerability

and thereby strengthen a sense of trust (Lewicki and Litterer 1985). A distinction has been made between two types of trust, referred to as knowledge

and identity (Lewicki, McAllister, and Bies 1998). The former consists of a willing ness to share information that helps both (all) parties to predict the other's behavior

with some accuracy.2 The latter emphasizes the recognition of similar interests and

values and the acknowledgement of a shared identity. Identity-based trust carries

greater risks than knowledge-based trust in the sense of making each party more vul

nerable to the other's pretension of sincerity.3 The contrasting state of mistrust occurs

when parties are unwilling to risk vulnerability or to acknowledge their dependence on one another. Expressions of separation, denials of similarity, and an unwillingness

to offer or to reciprocate concessions are indicators of mistrust. In their study of

negotiations to end violent international conflicts, Irmer and Druckman (2007) found

that increasing levels of trust during the course of talks improved the prospects for

obtaining a comprehensive rather than a partial agreement?or no agreement at all.

Parties that made a transition from mistrust early in the talks to knowledge-based and

then identity-based trust achieved better outcomes than those who remained mistrust

ing or were willing only to evince a knowledge-based trust.

Each type of trust and mistrust covers a variety of statements. Typically, knowledge based trust is evident when a speaker declares, "I now understand where you are com

ing from," "Oh, that is what you mean," or "Let me then share with you my dilemma

on this matter." Identity-based trust surfaces when a speaker claims, "Yes, we share

those objectives," "Our hopes and desires are the same," or "I do not see much differ

ence in our aspirations and values." Mistrust is evident in statements such as "I simply

do not know where you are coming from," "I am baffled by the inconsistencies in your




statements," or "We simply have different views of the world." Coding reliabilities are

reported in the section on methods.

Hypotheses

We offer three sets of hypotheses, the first of which focuses on the construct

validity of the forward-backward construct and how it is connected to the relational dimensions of communication in the public messages. Since the forward-backward

concept has not been previously measured empirically, it is important to determine its scope as a construct. Thus, for validation reasons, the following descriptive

hypotheses are offered:

Hypothesis la: Backward-looking public rhetoric will focus more on causes than on either

outcomes or processes.

Hypothesis lb: Forward-looking public rhetoric will focus more frequently on outcomes

rather than on causes or processes.

The rationale for these hypothesized relationships is that rhetoric focused more on looking backward or on justice issues ought to be grounded in talk about who and what caused the conflict. Blame placing is often at the root of justice issues since remediation tends to take the shape of punishment or other forms of account

ability for the injustices. In contrast, forward-looking rhetoric should aim at build

ing peace or emphasizing a positive future. This future orientation focuses on

outcomes that seek to capture a more positive vision of a new reality rather than

causes or processes. Thus, backward-looking rhetoric is more likely to emphasize

causes, whereas forward-looking rhetoric is mostly about outcomes. If supported,

these hypotheses will contribute to the construct validity of the forward- and

backward-looking idea.

In addition to establishing the validity of the forward-backward construct, we are interested in determining whether issues framed from a forward-looking per

spective are also more likely to be affiliative and trust oriented. By definition, as

leaders look forward to creating an alternative future, they must exchange informa

tion or proposals about the future and be willing to take the risks implied by those

proposals. When they look backward, their substantive focus turns to redressing

grievances within a legacy of mistrust. Thus, we suggest relationships among the

substantive and relational features of communication between the Palestinian and

Israeli leaders during the period of the Oslo I talks. These relationships are sum

marized by the following hypothesis.

Hypothesis 1c: Forward-looking rhetoric from both parties will be correlated significantly with affiliation and both knowledge- and identity-based trust, whereas backward-focused

rhetoric will correlate significantly with power messages and mistrust.




Since forward-looking rhetoric is aimed at constructive problem solving, it

should exhibit more affiliative and trusting language to help promote that problem solving. In contrast, looking backward is intended to make the case for justice,

which is typically accompanied by references to reputation, compliance to rules

and laws, and emotional pleas. In their attempts to secure justice, parties are more

likely to resort to power references and expressions of mistrust. These communica

tions are intended to avoid expressing any willingness to be vulnerable to relation

ships. These hypothesized conceptual linkages form a forward-backward frame

that connects the content and relational aspects of communication.

The second set of descriptive hypotheses focuses on the issues of outbidding and switching with respect to the rhetorical strategies used by each set of leaders.

Recall that Donohue and Hoobler (2002) found that the rhetoric from the Palesti nian leaders featured a low level of affiliation and a high level of power statements, whereas the Israelis used more affiliation in their rhetoric. Extending this finding to

the current study, the first hypothesis in this set addresses the idea of outbidding from a forward-backward perspective and suggests that the Palestinians will use

a rhetorical strategy aimed primarily at showing resolve to supporters by displaying a backward-focused rhetorical frame combined with more mistrust and power

relational messages. Regarding Israeli leaders, their rhetoric should take on more of

a switching strategy to reflect a state-based, frontstage orientation that is both forward

and backward-looking as well as vacillating between trusting and mistrusting, power

and affiliation relational frames. This idea of a mixed set of messages that vacillate

between positive and negative is reflected in Hypothesis 2b. The two hypotheses are as follows:

Hypothesis 2a: Palestinian leaders will engage in outbidding by using more backward-looking content frames and more mistrust and power relational frames in their public rhetoric.

Hypothesis 2b: Israeli leaders will engage in more switching by displaying a balance

between forward- and backward-oriented content frames as well as between trust and

mistrust and power-affiliation relational frames in their public rhetoric.

To provide more background about these hypotheses, the tone of Palestinian rhetoric across this period is decidedly more reactionary. The speeches tend to focus on issues that were initiated by the Israelis. For example, in an interview in Arabic

given on the first of January, 1993, on Radio Monte Carlo (BBC Summary of World

Broadcasts), Arafat commented on the issue of Palestinian deportees by the Israelis and made the following statement: "I told him [UN Secretary General Butrus Ghali] what Rabin brazenly said after [UN envoy James] Jonah was sent. Rabin seemed as

though he was uninterested, unaffected and oblivious to the UN resolutions or their

implementation, or even to international legitimacy." Although this specific inter view was not part of the analysis of this article, it illustrates how Palestinian rhetoric tended to flow during this period. Comments were often reactions to perceived Israeli

injustices or other events that have relevance to the Palestinian plight.




In contrast, the Israelis seemed to focus more on switching. They might have

reacted to Palestinian issues, but they also acknowledged progress in dealing with those issues in their rhetoric. For example, consider these excerpts from an Indepen dence Day address given in April 1995 by Prime Minister Rabin (BBC Summary of

World Broadcasts): "We demand and expect that the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) do its duty in Gaza and Jericho?whether through reaching an agreement with these organizations that would prevent them from using Gaza and Jericho for the pre

paration of attacks inside or outside the territories, or through carrying out arrests

and trials. We have seen signs that things are starting there, but it is still not enough." Notice that the first sentence expresses mistrust by demanding that the PNA do its enforcement duty in Gaza and Jericho, but in the second sentence, Rabin acknowl

edges progress in their behavior, which expresses some level of knowledge-based trust. Perhaps the Israelis are engaging in more frontstage diplomacy in trying to balance the tone of their rhetoric.

The third set of hypotheses deals with the relationship between the public rheto ric and the events chronicled by Corbin (1994) in her book about the Oslo I talks. Recall that our focus in this article is the manner in which the public rhetoric sets the stage for the private talks. There were about a dozen face-to-face meetings between the parties as they attempted to craft the Accords, as well as countless

phone exchanges and mediations. These meetings were matched, on a weekly

basis, with the rhetoric sample from Palestinian and Israeli leaders, which made it

possible to explore the lag between the public discourse and the progress or lack of

progress (retreat) in the private talks. Based on the concepts of outbidding and

switching used to describe the styles of the Palestinians and Israelis, respectively, the following hypotheses are suggested:

Hypothesis 3a: Israeli increases in forward-looking, affiliation-oriented, and trust rhetoric

will be correlated significantly with a subsequent lack of progress (retreat) in the private

talks, whereas increases in backward-looking, power-oriented, and mistrust rhetoric will

be correlated significantly with progress in the private talks.

Hypothesis 3b: Palestinian increases in backward-looking, power-oriented, and mistrust

rhetoric will be correlated significantly with a subsequent lack of progress (retreat) in the

private talks.

The Israeli hypothesis proposes that the frontstage-backstage distinction will

govern the relationship between their public rhetorical stance and subsequent activ

ities in the private talks. That is, they are more likely than the Palestinians to switch between the frontstage and backstage orientation. Being tough publicly provides the license to be conciliatory in the private talks. Thus, we hypothesize that positive rhetoric correlates with progress in the talks. Being conciliatory in public allows them to be tough at the bargaining table when needed. Thus, we hypothesize that

negative rhetoric correlates with retreat. This pattern may be typical of a state actor.

The Palestinian pattern is more focused on the nonstate actor outbidding process.




Based on prior analyses, the Palestinians did not lace their rhetoric with much affiliation talk; power talk was the norm. Thus, they are more likely to talk tough in

public while also exhibiting tough talk at the bargaining table.

Methods

To address the hypotheses, two sources of information were used. One consisted

of a subset of the documents collected for earlier research (Donohue and Hoobler

2002). These consist of statements made by official representatives in interviews and

newspaper editorials. The statements were coded for power and affiliation, forward

and backward-looking statements, and trust. The coding procedures are discussed

next in conjunction with the variables that were coded. Another source consisted of

an events chronology compiled originally by Corbin (1994). These events were used to code progress in the secret talks and are discussed in that section below.

Coding the Public Statements

There are a total of forty articles, twenty from Palestinian and twenty from Israeli sources. The time frame of the documents ranges from the beginning of Jan

uary 1993 to July 1993, the month in which secret negotiations ended and two months before the agreement was signed in Washington. All the documents were retrieved from the British Broadcasting Corporation Web site and were presented in English. Thus, no translations were needed. The list of speakers and the time frames associated with the documents are shown in Table 1.

It should be noted that there are many redundant speakers. For example, Arafat and

Ashwari documents were used frequently for the Palestinians, whereas Rabin and Peres documents were common among the Israelis (see Table 1). This redundancy sug

gests that these speakers were significantly involved in framing the issues and relation

ships away from the bargaining table by dominating the public media during this

period. It should also be noted that one of the speakers in the data set, Yossi Beilin, was instrumental in starting the Oslo I process but did not participate directly in the talks (Pruitt, Bercovitch, and Zartman 1997). Although not chosen randomly, the

speakers represent different political and ideological orientations. None of them partici pated directly in the talks. The goal was to sample broadly to provide a representative frame of the rhetoric surrounding the evolution of the Oslo I Accords.

Power and Affiliation Coding

Each thought unit in each speech or interview was scored for power and affilia tion motives as discussed above. A thought unit is an independent clause that may also be paired with a dependent clause in a sentence. If a thought unit contained

multiple power or affiliation references, only the first one was counted. This




Table 1

Speeches and Interviews by Group

Palestinian Documents Israeli Documents

(1)01-12-93

(2)01-13-93

(3)01-19-93

(4)02-10-93

(5)02-18-93

(6) 02-26-93

(7)03-10-93

(8)03-14-93

(9)03-22-93

(10)03-31-93

(11)04-09-93

(12)04-21-93

(13)04-29-93

(14)05-11-93

(15)05-22-93

(16)05-23-93

(17)06-12-93

(18)06-15-93

(19)06-30-93

(20)07-16-93

Arafat

Arafat

Sharif

Arafat

al-Qudwah Ashrawi

Urayqat Sharif

Arafat

Arafat

Arafat

Ashrawi

Ashrawi

Arafat

al-Sa'ih

Arafat

Sha'th

Arafat

Ashrawi

Sharif

(1)01-06-93

(2)01-15-93

(3)01-21-93

(4)02-03-93

(5) 02-04-93

(6)02-11-93

(7) 03-09-93

(8)03-15-93

(9) 03-30-93

(10)04-08-93

(11)04-13-93

(12)04-22-93

(13)05-06-93

(14)05-14-93

(15)05-23-93

(16)06-10-93

(17)06-19-93

(18)06-22-93

(19)07-04-93

(20) 07-08-93

Beilin

Peres

Rabin

Yaacobi

Shoval

Rubinstein

Beilin

Rabin

Rabin

Rabin

Beilin

Rabin

Gal

Peres

Beilin

Rubinstein

Peres

Rubinstein

Peres

Sarid

happened only one time, since thought units were more commonly just short sen

tences. All of the scoring for the public documents was conducted by two graduate students in the Department of Communication at Michigan State University. The coders were experienced at analyzing text in negotiation and mediation contexts.

They were trained by the authors. Following a review of the coding system and

guidelines, they coded a sample of two speeches not included in this analysis to ensure reliability. Independent coding of each transcript followed an evaluation of

reliability. The students' progress was checked to prevent slippage in coding appli cation. The total for each motive was summed and divided by the number of

thought units in the document. This calculation yielded a ratio of power and affilia tion messages, controlling for the size of the document. The mean level of intensity for power was .27, and the mean level of intensity for affiliation was .10. Cohen's

(1960) kappa for interrater reliability between two independent coders across the two categories in the coding scheme was .89.

Forward-Backward Coding

The coding scheme is shown in the appendix. It is divided into causes, processes, and outcomes and includes a neutral code. Every thought unit (using the same




process as in the prior analysis) in each document was coded for forward-backward

orientation and causes, processes, or outcomes. To determine the number of forward

and backward-looking perspectives that appeared in a given document, the percen

tage of each coding category in relation to the number of total thought units in the document was calculated. Dividing by the total number of thought-units controls for the length of the document. To determine the amount of forward- and backward-look

ing orientations that were presented, the data were collapsed across the three categories

of each orientation. The coding procedure for this analysis was identical to the process used for the power-affiliation analysis. Once again, the coders were experienced gradu ate students working with the first author. These coders were trained, and to ensure

reliability, they were given sample transcripts to code that were not used in the analy

sis. Then, they were allowed to code independently. The coding of each transcript was

checked when returned. Cohen's (1960) kappa for interrater reliability between two

independent coders across the seven categories in the coding scheme was .92.

Trust Coding

To determine trust, each thought unit was coded to determine the levels of mis

trust, knowledge-based and identification-based trust following the definitions pro vided above. Each thought unit was coded as one of these three forms of trust or

mistrust or for neutrality, which indicates that there was no evidence of trust or

mistrust in the statement. Once the codes were applied, a percentage of each type

of trust was calculated by dividing each form by the number of thought units in the

transcript to control for transcript length. In this analysis, there were no instances

of multiple codes within a given thought unit. Once again, the thought units were

typically short since talk is structured differently than writing, which typically con

tains many complex sentences. Following the same procedure for the prior analy

sis, the coders were experienced graduate students working with the senior author.

They were trained, and to ensure reliability, they were given sample transcripts to

code that were not used in the analysis. Then they were allowed to code indepen

dently. The coding of each transcript was checked when returned. Cohen's (1960)

kappa for interrater reliability between two independent coders across the four cate

gories in the coding scheme was .82.

Coding Progress in the Talks

To relate the public rhetoric to progress in the talks, a matrix was constructed

consisting of the thirty-two weeks between January 3, 1993, and August 8, 1993. These weeks overlap the period for the public documents. The data in the matrix consisted of the scores for each public rhetoric variable (Palestinian and Israeli) for each of the forty documents for the period in which they were delivered. The amount of progress in the talks was coded by entering the starting dates for each of




twelve meetings beginning with the January 21, 1993 start of the talks to the final set of meetings that began on August 14, 1993. In addition to the dozen face-to face meetings, it was determined that six additional periods ought to be entered in the analysis. These included the pivotal periods of shuttle diplomacy by the Norwe

gians between Palestinian and Israeli participants as described by Corbin (1994). Thus, there were a total of eighteen weeks of coded progress for the talks. A brief

summary of each event is shown in Table 2. Although these events are not tran

scripts of statements made by the Oslo participants, they are the best account avail

able of what happened in the talks. Each of the eighteen periods was coded in terms of progress toward agreement,

retreat from agreement, and neutral on progress or retreat. For example, the first

meeting at Borregaard near Oslo on January 21, 1993, was coded as progress since

there is significant evidence that the parties developed their interpersonal relation

ships in addition to sharing information about their substantive goals. A later exam

ple of progress was observed on July 25, 1993, when the parties developed the Declaration of Principles (DOP) after an apparent crisis in which the talks teetered on failure, resulting in a key turning point. In contrast, the third meeting, which

began on March 20, 1993, was coded as a retreat since the PLO demanded more official Israeli participation before talks could proceed. Another example of retreat was Meeting 9 on July 10, 1993, in which the talks ended grimly after a stalemate about language in the DOP. The authors of the article coded the eighteen weeks

independently and achieved Cohen's (1960) kappa reliability of .94.4

Results

To evaluate Hypotheses la and lb on the validity of the forward- and backward

looking construct, a series of paired-samples i-tests was conducted that compares the

means of the ratios in the subcategories. The means associated with each pair of vari

ables are shown in Table 3. These means indicate that backward-looking cause state

ments were by far the most common, and forward-looking outcome rhetoric was the

least common. Table 4 presents the comparisons. Regarding Hypothesis la, pairs 3 and 4 reveal that backward-cause rhetoric was much more commonly displayed than either outcome or process statements, confirming the hypothesis. For Hypothesis lb,

pairs 1 and 2 reveal that forward-outcome rhetoric is significantly less likely than either forward-cause or process rhetoric, disconfirming Hypothesis lb. Thus, the data show a clear emphasis on backward-cause statements, which were used significantly

more often than any other nonneutral statement. This focus on backward-looking cause statements and a lack of emphasis on forward-looking outcome statements sug

gests that much of the rhetoric focused on accusing and blaming the other party, with little emphasis on a new vision.




Table 2

Sequence of Events Leading to the Oslo I Agreement

February 28, 1992 Larsen meets informally with chief PLO negotiator, Abu Ala.

May 1992 Larsen meets an Israeli diplomat, Yossi Beilin.

September 12, 1992 Beilin introduces Larsen to Yair Hirschfeld at state dinner. Larsen gets to

know Hirschfeld.

December 4, 1992 Larsen facilitates an informal lunch meeting with Hirschfeld and Abu Ala

in London.

December 18, 1992 Larsen meets Arafat with Abu Ala in Tunis.

January 21, 1993 Meeting 1: Borregaard. Larsen facilitates meeting with Abu Ala, Maher

El Kurd, and Hassan Asfour from the PLO and Hirschfeld and

Ron Pundak from Israel in Borregaard, Norway. Late January/early Larsen acts as phone intermediary, interpreting comments for both Tunis

February 1993 and Jerusalem.

February 11,1993 Meeting 2: Borregaard. Meeting ends with the creation of the Sarpsborg Document, the Declaration of Principles (DOP) that was proposed in the first

meeting. March 2, 1993 Palestinian youths from Gaza run amok in the streets of Tel Aviv and kill two

Israelis while wounding eight others; Gaza strip is sealed off and violence

continues through the middle of March. Clinton is preoccupied with the

lack of progress in the Washington talks going on simultaneously. March 20, 1993 Meeting 3: Borregaard. The talks hit a snag. The PLO demands more

official Israeli participation. Mid-March through Larsen goes to Tel Aviv to talk with Beilin about making the talks official.

early April 1993

April 27, 1993 Palestinian delegation returns to formal talks in Washington after

a four-month absence.

April 30, 1993 Meeting 4: Holmenkollen Park. Group continues to work on the DOP with

Palestinian insistence that both sides sign the DOP.

May 5-6, 1993 At a formal Oslo conference unrelated to the secret talks, Larsen talks with

Abu Ala.

May 8, 1993 Meeting 5: Norwegian Government's Guest House, Oslo. Abu Ala

threatens to leave if Israel does not upgrade the talks to an official level.

May 21, 1993 Meeting 6: Holmenkollen, Oslo. At another location, Uri Savir, an Israeli

diplomat, enters the talks.

Late May/early Larsen mediates heavy phone traffic. Hoist and Juul, on official visit

June 1993 to Israel, meet with Peres about Oslo.

June 13, 1993 Meeting 7: Holmenkollen, Oslo. Joel Singer, a trusted Rabin negotiator, enters the talks.

July 3, 1993 Meeting 8: Gressheim. Singer brings a new DOP written with help from

the Americans.

July 10, 1993 Meeting 9: Halversbole. A new DOP is proposed by the PLO with 23

new elements.

July 11-21, 1993 Norwegian Shuttle Diplomacy. Larsen and a Norwegian delegation meet with

Arafat and Abu Ala in Tunis (July 11); Larsen and Juul meet with Peres,

Savir, Hirschfeld, and Pundak in Jerusalem (July 14); Larsen and Juul return

to Tunis to deliver Peres' letter to Hoist, which he shares with Arafat

(July 19); Hoist sends another letter to Peres concerning talks with Arafat

(July 21); Juul and Larsen meet with Pundak in Paris on the way back

to Norway.

(continued)




Table 2 (continued)

July 25, 1993

August 7, 1993

August 14, 1993

August 17, 1993

August 20, 1993

September 3-10, 1993

September 13, 1993

Meeting 10: Halversbole. A key framework is developed out of 8 points from the DOP, and mutual recognition.

Larsen and Juul arrange "nonmeeting" in Paris; Israelis send Hirschfeld, PLO sends Abu Ala.

Meeting 11: Borregaard Mansion. Agreement is made subject to approval, but Abu Ala is unable to obtain telephone consent from Abbas.

Telephone negotiations from Stockholm: Peres, Hoist, Singer, and Gil, in Stockholm on official business, negotiate on the telephone with Arafat,

Rabbo, Abu Ala, Asfour, and Abbas in Tunis; Rabin in Tel Aviv; and Savir in Jerusalem.

Final meeting in Oslo Plaza Hotel: DOP is initialed in a secret ceremony. Mutual Recognition Negotiations: Peres and Hoist meet in Paris and

negotiate mutual recognition terms for two days with Arafat over the

telephone (September 3). Hoist, in Oslo, negotiates with Arafat through Mubarak and Rabbo (September 5). Meeting held in Paris between

Israelis, Palestinians, and Norwegians (September 6-7). Arafat writes

letter to Israel concerning mutual recognition (September 9). Rabin writes

letter recognizing PLO. United States resumes dialogue with the PLO

(September 10).

Signing ceremony held on White House lawn.

Note: PLO = Palestinian Liberation Organization; DOP = Declaration of Principles.

Table 3 Means on Forward-Backward Categories

Ratios Mean Std. Deviation

Neutral

Forward cause

Forward process Forward outcome

Backward cause

Backward process Backward outcome

Valid N (listwise)

.47

.09

.10

.04

.17

.07

.05

.185

.080

.094

.049

.135

.091

.064

Note: Each variable is a ratio of the number of statements in the category divided by the number of docu

ments (40).

A principal-components exploratory factor analysis with a Varimax rotation was

calculated to evaluate Hypothesis lc. Table 5 shows the correlation matrix among the variables?forward-looking or backward-looking, power or affiliation, and trust

or mistrust. Table 6 shows the results from the factor analysis of the correlation matrix. The analysis reveals a two-factor solution. Mistrust, backward-looking, and

power-focused rhetoric constituted the first factor, which accounted for 36 percent




Table 4

Paired-samples i-tests

Pairs /-value df Sig. (2-tailed)

Pair 1 Forward cause-forward outcome 3.52 39

Pair 2 Forward process-forward outcome 4.29 39

Pair 3 Backward cause-backward process 3.94 39

Pair 4 Backward cause-backward outcome 5.03 39

<.01

<.001

<.001

<.001

Table 5 Correlations among the Variables

Ratios Mistrust Knowledge Identity Forward Backward Power Affiliation

Mistrust

Knowledge

Identity Forward

Backward

Power

Affiliation

-.29*

-.15

-.58*

.48*

.47*

-.37*

.20

.43*

-.14

-.28*

.70*

.45*

-.32*

-.33*

.10

-.45*

-.45*

.47*

.66*

-.19 .34*

*Significant (one-tailed, p < .05).

Table 6 Rotated Factor Loadings for the Variables

Variables Factor 1 Factor 2

Mistrust

Knowledge

Identity Forward

Backward

Power

Affiliation

62

10

59

65

86

79

15

-.37

.89

.04

.50

-.01

-.21

.90

Note: Extraction method: principal component analysis. Rotation method: Varimax with Kaiser normali

zation rotation converged in three iterations.

of the total variance. The second factor consisted of knowledge trust, forward

looking, and affiliation-oriented rhetoric. This factor accounted for 29 percent of the total variance. Thus, Hypothesis lc was confirmed.

To assess Hypothesis 2a, which examines Palestinian outbidding, paired-samples i-tests were used to examine the ratio of Palestinian forward-looking to backward

looking, trust to mistrust, and power to affiliation statements. The results indicated




that the Palestinians used significantly more backward-looking than forward-looking rhetoric (total forward: M=A4,SD = .03; total backward: M = .36, SD = .04). This

relationship was found to be significant (t= ?3.56, df? 39, p < .002). In addition, the Palestinians used more mistrust than identity rhetoric (total mistrust: M =.16, SD = . 10; total identity: M ? .01, SD = .02). This relationship was found to be signif icant (t = 6.537, df= 19, p < .0001). The Palestinians also used more mistrust than

knowledge trust (total mistrust: M = .16, SD= .1; total knowledge: M? .07, SD= .10,

t = 2.06, df? 19, p < .017). Finally, the Palestinians used more power than affiliation

messages (total power: M = .25, SD = .18; total affiliation: M = .05, SD = .18), and the result was significant (t

= 3.9, df= 19, p < .001). Thus, the Palestinians made consider

ably more backward-looking than forward-looking statements, more mistrust than

knowledge or identity-based trust statements, and more power language in their

speeches, providing support for the outbidding process predicted in Hypothesis 2a. Further support for this outbidding hypothesis is found in comparing content and

relational messages between the two groups. The Palestinians used more backward

statements than the Israelis (i = ?2.14, df? 38, p < .04), while the Israelis used

more forward statements than the Palestinians (t = 4.09, df? 38, p < .001). In addi

tion, the Palestinians displayed more mistrust than the Israelis (t= ?2.46, d/=38, p < .02), while the Israelis used more identity trust than the Palestinians (i = 2.70,

df= 38, p < .01). However, both groups used about the same amount of knowledge

trust, which resulted in a nonsignificant finding (t = 1.25, df = 38, p < .219). Regard ing the other relational variable, the Palestinians displayed about twice as many power messages as the Israelis (M

= .24 vs. M = . 16), yet the means approach signif

icance (t = ?1.8, df= 38, p < .08), and both groups used about the same amount of

affiliation in their speeches (M = .06 vs. M = .05), again resulting in a nonsignificant difference. The Palestinians engaged in more backward-looking, power-oriented, and

mistrust rhetoric, supporting an outbidding process.

To assess Hypothesis 2b, which explores Israeli switching, paired-sample s ?-tests

were used to examine the ratio of Israeli forward-looking to backward-looking con

tent frames and trust-to-mistrust, power-to-affiliation relational statements. The

results indicated that the Israeli speakers used more forward-looking than backward

looking rhetoric in their speeches (total forward: M= .32, SD= .15; total backward: M? .23, SD ? .17). The difference is in the predicted direction but does not reach statistical significance (t= 1.57, df? 39, p < .133). In addition, Israeli speakers used

more mistrust than identity rhetoric in their speeches (total mistrust: M = .09, SD = .07; total identity: M = .04, SD = .05). The difference was significant (t = 2.56,

df= 19, p < .019). Also, the Israelis used more power than affiliation rhetoric (total power: M= .16, SD = .11; total affiliation: M= .05, SD= .04). The difference was

significant (t = 3.60, df? 19, p < .002). However, the Israeli speakers used about the same amounts of mistrust and knowledge-based trust statements, which yielded a

nonsignificant difference (total mistrust: M =.09, SD =.07; total knowledge: M= .10, SD= .06, t = -.28, df= 19, p < .78). Thus, the Israelis displayed a more



13 8 Journal of Conflict Resolution

balanced approach to their rhetoric than the Palestinians since they used somewhat more forward-looking than backward-looking content framing, and they used about

the same amount of knowledge-based trust as mistrust relational framing. This pat tern supports the switching hypothesis.

The third set of hypotheses was evaluated with lagged correlations. Each of the substantive and relational variables was correlated with progress that occurred in the

talks during the following week.5 Significant lagged correlations with progress were obtained for Israeli affiliation (-.50), forward-looking statements (-.48), and mistrust

(.52). More affiliation and forward-looking statements were correlated with retreat

during the next week. However, partial correlations showed that the relationship between forward-looking statements and progress was accounted for by mistrust.

(The correlation between mistrust and forward looking was -.53; the correlation

between affiliation and mistrust was -.28.) Thus, more progress occurred in the next

week when more mistrusting statements were made by the Israelis in the previous

week; less progress occurred when more affiliation statements were made. Palesti

nian backward-looking statements correlated strongly with retreat in the talks during the next week (-.75). The correlation held when Palestinian mistrust (-.85), forward

looking (-.75), and affiliation (-.77) were controlled. It remained strong as well when Israeli mistrust (-.76), backward looking (-.75), and affiliation (-.74) were partialed out of correlation between Palestinian backward-looking statements and progress.

A principal-components factor analysis with a Varimax rotation was also per

formed. The factor loadings are shown in Table 7. Three factors were extracted,

accounting for 29 percent, 26 percent, and 19 percent of the variation, respectively. The first factor captures Israeli public rhetoric. Forward-looking and affiliation rhetoric load negatively on this factor. The mistrust and backward-looking vari

ables have positive loadings. These variables were shown to correlate with progress

in the talks. This factor describes switching behavior on the part of the Israeli lea ders. It confirms Hypothesis 3a.

The second factor captures the connection between Palestinian public rhetoric and

progress in the talks. Backward-looking and mistrust public statements show a strong

positive loading, while progress loads negatively. These variables were shown to cor

relate with a lack of progress in the talks. This factor describes outbidding behavior

by Palestinian leaders. It confirms Hypothesis 3b on both substantive and relational statements. Palestinian forward-looking public statements and progress in the talks load on the third factor. However, these variables are not correlated.

Discussion

The goal of this article was to break some new ground in understanding the relation

ship between public rhetoric and private talks in the context of the Oslo I peacemaking process. To accomplish this goal, we evaluated a series of hypotheses aimed at better




Table 7 Rotated Factor Loadings for Public Rhetoric and Progress at Oslo I

Variables Factor 1 Factor 2 Factor 3

Israeli forward-looking ?.79 ?.33 .18

Israeli affiliation -.72 .10 -.08

Israeli backward-looking .67 .05 .37

Israeli mistrust .65 .46 .11

Palestinian forward-looking .27 ?.46 .68

Palestinian backward-looking ?.34 .80 .43

Palestinian mistrust .07 .77 ?.48

Progress .34 -.51 -.69

understanding the content and relational messages displayed in the public rhetoric as well as how they are linked to progress in the private talks. Specifically, the results for

Hypotheses la and lb indicate a significant emphasis in public on backward-looking rhetoric when both sides continued to promote justice issues with less emphasis on

peace.

With Hypothesis lc, we sought to explore the relationship between the content and relationship dimensions of the rhetoric. The data revealed that a rhetorical focus on past justice themes was typically combined with relational messages of

power and mistrust. The justice frame appears to crowd out sentiments of trust and

affiliation. Similarly, forward-looking rhetoric is typically combined with senti ments of affiliation and trust; peace talk is more relationally constructive. These

political leaders adopted a justice or peace frame and rounded that out with consis tent relational messages. Trust and affiliation seem to follow from an emphasis on

peace; mistrust and power are associated with justice. This finding builds on and extends the Zartman and Kremenyuk (2005) concept by adding relational features to their substantive distinction.

The goal of the second set of hypotheses was to test the concepts of outbidding and frontstage-backstage rhetorical framing. The results from Hypotheses 2a and 2b supported the different styles of each group, with the Palestinians' engaging in more outbidding and the Israelis' displaying more switching. Specifically, the results for Hypothesis 2a found that the Palestinians focused almost exclusively on backward-looking and mistrust rhetoric. Hypothesis 2b demonstrated that the Israelis generally balanced their forward- and backward-looking public rhetoric

with a bias toward forward-looking messages. They also used more mistrust than

identity rhetoric, but they used about the same amount of mistrust and knowledge based trust rhetoric, again demonstrating balance typical of a switching style.

Overall, the Israelis used more forward-looking and identity trust messages than

the Palestinians but about the same amount of knowledge-based trust, and the




Palestinians displayed significantly more backward-looking and mistrust state ments than the Israelis. Again, as a nonstate actor, the Palestinians were searching for support among fellow Arabs to show toughness; as the state actor, Israel was

searching for support among other diverse states and internal political factions by switching between forward and backward substantive messages and trust and mis

trust relational messages.

The results for the third set of hypotheses present perhaps the most interesting findings in the article. They provide more compelling support for the switching and

outbidding constructs. Specifically, Hypothesis 3a posited that peace rhetoric from the Israelis would be correlated with retreat in the private talks and that justice rhetoric would be associated with progress in the private talks. In contrast, Hypoth esis 3b posited that Palestinian justice rhetoric would be associated with retreat in the private talks. The results revealed that more mistrust statements were associated

with progress in the talks for the Israelis, and more affiliation statements were cor

related with retreat in the next week, both of which support the switching idea for the Israelis. For the Palestinians, looking backward was associated with lack of progress in the talks which supported, the outbidding hypothesis. The results of the partial cor relations boil down to mistrust and affiliation for the Israelis and backward-looking statements for the Palestinians. These results support the two hypotheses. The factor

analysis further confirms the links between the public rhetorical strategies and pro gress in the talks.

These results can be understood in terms of events that occurred in the period the speeches were given. The need for outbidding during the Oslo I period by the Palestinians may have reflected the Intifada that had continued uninterrupted for five years. While at war, the Palestinians needed to outbid to sustain support and morale internally. The Intifada was a tool that gave them power at the negotiating table. While the Intifada was going on, the Palestinians had to be taken seriously and were able to make demands. Perhaps it was in the best interests of Palestinian leaders to appear aggressively anti-Israeli and fan the flames of rebellion with their

speeches. To appear conciliatory toward Israel would undermine the efforts and

sacrifices of those participating in the Intifada.

Many Israeli constituencies demanded that the government take a hard line in

dealing with the Palestinians. They viewed their government's primary responsibility as protecting their security. Other constituencies were more willing to negotiate and

make concessions to achieve peace. Thus, Israeli politicians needed to be responsive to both these points of view expressed by their citizens, which prompted more

switching. (For a discussion of the constraining effects of public opinion on the deci sions made by political representatives and negotiators, see Druckman [2003].)

Since this study is the first to compare the process of outbidding and frontstage backstage behavior within the same context, it would be useful to reflect on what we have learned about these concepts. First, the results appears to strengthen the con

struct validity of the ideas. The nonstate actor is more consistently nonconciliatory,




and the state actor is more balanced. These results even hold during what might have been the most productive period of peace between Palestinians and Israelis. Further

more, there is consistency in outbidding in public and in private for the Palestinians, and there is more inconsistency for Israelis across both venues. For the Israelis, when

they are publicly conciliatory, they follow this up by being privately tough and vice versa. These findings provide empirical confirmation for the frontstage-backstage and outbidding dynamics. Both are at play. The findings also encourage expanding the empirical domain for evaluating these concepts, contributing to refinements in

the theories.

A second important observation is that outbidding appears fairly robust. Even in the face of more conciliatory talk by the state actors, the nonstate actors maintained

their consistency until the very end. In other words, outbidding may be immune from

external rhetoric by the state actor. Any public venue is a chance to bid for more sup

port for the nonstate cause. It is important for state actors to realize that the nonstate

actors are not likely to alter their public stance in relation to "overtures."

A third observation concerns the idea of different structures introduced earlier. The findings are consistent with structural explanations for rhetorical and bargain

ing strategies. Outbidding by nonstate actors would seem to protect them from con

tenders eager to claim the mantle of leadership. This strategy would also seem to

appeal to constituents suspicious of their state neighbors. Switching on both the substantive and relational framing of messages by state actors would seem to sus

tain their mandate through the next election cycle. Thus, the strategies reflect the

horizontal and vertical challenges posed by their respective political structures. Those structures may well constrain actors from seeking solutions to intractable

conflicts. However, the explanatory power of this structural interpretation of the

findings awaits the results of analyses on other cases of asymmetrical conflicts.

Probing more deeply into the parties' motivations, we might ask about what they were trying to do with their public statements. Are the speakers trying to shape public opinion about Oslo and/or influence the actual negotiations? Our outbidding and frontstage-backstage arguments suggest that each speaker is appealing to a

particular configuration of constituencies as well as trying to influence the recep

tion for an agreement or for concessions made at Oslo. The correlations that we

obtained between the public rhetoric and progress in the talks may suggest that they were also influencing the actual negotiations. Further insight into this issue would come from efforts to conduct systematic interviews with the key actors.

Another next step within this context is to expand the analysis. It would be use

ful to analyze statements made during the time period immediately after the announcement of the Oslo I Accords. A relevant question is whether the frames shifted toward more forward-looking statements. Of special interest would be an examination of the rhetoric surrounding major benchmarks such as the Hebron

Massacre, Rabin's assassination, and key peace accords such as Oslo II and Camp




David. A transformation of the conflict into a more cordial relationship, which is

expected to occur as a result of successful forward-looking negotiation (Zartman and Kremenyuk 2005), would be reflected in a shift of the rhetoric. A change in the direction of a more backward-looking orientation, on the other hand, would signal that the Oslo Accords failed to achieve their goal. It would indicate that the rela

tionship between the parties had deteriorated to a point at which mutually satisfy ing solutions were even harder to find.

It would also be useful to probe the external-internal relationship further. Our results contribute to an earlier body of work on these issues in arms-control contexts.

That work explored the way that both external (including domestic) events and the international atmosphere influenced progress in negotiation (e.g., Hopmann and

Smith 1977; also see Druckman and Hopmann [1989] for a review of the studies on this issue). At times, negotiating behavior reflected outside developments: deteriora tion in relations between the countries represented in the talks led to impasses. At other times, negotiators reacted to the outside developments: increasing cooperation, as during the period of detente, prompted increased competition (or exploitation) by one or another party in the talks. These earlier findings resemble, in some ways, the

outbidding and switching hypotheses evaluated in this study. These hypotheses may also be viewed as a refinement of the earlier concepts. Both sets of ideas orient our

theoretical work in the direction of contingencies: under which conditions and in what contexts do actors outbid (reflect) or switch (react). Expanding the contexts for research would enable us to explore the contingencies in some detail. More gener

ally, additional case analyses would contribute further to our understanding of com

munication frames.

Appendix

Forward/Backward Coding Categories

A. Causes?Theory/Frame for the Conflict

Forward

1. Acknowledge responsibility, recognize role in conflict

2. Awareness of reasons or sources of conflict

Backward

3. Focus on ending the conflict

4. Blaming: other side, past injustices, recognizing impasse




B. Processes or Methods for Managing the Conflict

Forward

1. Express affiliation, focus on commonalities

2. Visions of the future discussed

Backward

3. Accountability/promise of justice 4. Evade the presence of underlying issues

C. Outcomes or Proposed Outcomes

Forward

1. Joint gains/mutual cooperation, proposed outcomes

2. Proposals about forming a new relationship

Backward

3. Ceasefire proposals 4. Relative gains?claiming

Neutral. Any sentence that does not fit into any of its above categories.

Notes

1. Thanks to Jannie Lilja for suggesting this idea.

2. Another kind of trust suggested by Lewicki, McAllister, and Bies (1998) is referred to as calculus based. This form of trust shares the prediction feature of knowledge-based trust but not the information

sharing feature. For our purposes, there is no need to separate these two features. As a result, we code only

knowledge-based trust.

3. A similar idea is goodwill-based trust. This focuses on perceptions about the other's benevolence and integrity and thus contributes to judgments of sincerity (Das and Teng 2001; Lewicki and Wiethoff

2000). We consider these features to be part of identity-based trust.

4. The meetings were also coded for whether they dealt primarily with substance, relations, or both.

Independent coding by the authors produced high reliability. However, the frequency distribution of these categories was asymmetric: ten sessions were coded as substantive, three as relational, four as

mixed, and one as neutral. The small amount of variation between these categories precluded statistical

analyses of relationships with the other variables.

5. This set of hypotheses specifies lagged relationships between the public rhetoric and progress in the secret talks. None of the contemporaneous (nonlagged) correlations were significant; nor were the

lagged correlations computed in the opposite direction?from the secret talks to the public statements

made during the next week?significant.




References

Bickerton, Ian, and Caria L. Klausner. 1998. A concise history of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Bloom, Mia M. 2004. Palestinian suicide bombing: Public support, market share and outbidding. Political Science Quarterly 119: 61-88.

Burgoon, Judee K., and Jerold L. Hale. 1987. Validation and measurement of the fundamental themes of

relational communication. Communication Monographs 54 (1): 19-41.

Cohen, Jacob. 1960. A coefficient of agreement for nominal scales. Educational and Psychological Mea

surement 20 (1): 37-46.

Corbin, Jane. 1994. Gaza first: The secret Norway channel to peace between Israel and the PLO.

London: Bloomsbury. Das, T. K., and Bing-Sheng Teng. 2001. Trust, control, and risk in strategic alliances: An integrated

framework. Organization Studies 22 (2): 251-83.

Deutsch, Karl W., Sidney A. Burrell, and Robert A. Kann. 1957. Political community and the North

Atlantic area: International organization in the light of historical experience. Princeton, NJ: Princeton

University Press.

Deutsch, Morton. 1958. Trust and suspicion. Journal of Conflict Resolution 2 (4): 265-79.

Donohue, William A. 1998. Managing equivocality and relational paradox in the Oslo peace negotia tions. Journal of Language and Social Psychology 17 (1): 72-96.

Donohue, William A., and Gregory D. Hoobler. 2002. Relational ripeness in the Oslo I and Oslo II negotia tions. In Media and conflict: Framing issues, making policy, shaping opinions, ed. Eytan Gilboa, 65-88.

Ardsley, NY: Transnational.

Druckman, Daniel. 1977. Boundary role conflict: Negotiation as dual responsiveness. Journal of Conflict Resolution 21: 639-62.

-. 2003. Puzzles in search of researchers: Processes, identities, and suw??ons.International

Journal of Conflict Management 14 (1): 3-22.

Druckman, Daniel, and P. Terrence Hopmann. 1989. Behavioral aspects of negotiations on mutual secur

ity. In Behavior, society, and nuclear war, vol. 1, ed. Philip Tetlock, Jo Husbands, Robert Jervis, Paul Stern, and Charles Tilly, 104-25. New York: Oxford University Press.

Druckman, Daniel, and Terrence Lyons. 2005. Negotiation processes and postsettlement relationships:

Comparing Negorno Karabakh with Mozambique. In Peace versus justice: Negotiating forward-and

backward-looking outcomes, ed. I. William Zartman and Victor Kremenyuk, 265-86. Lanham, MD:

Rowman & Littlefield.

Eisenstadt, Shmuel N. 1967. Israeli identity: Problems in the development of the collective identity of an

ideological society. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 370 (1): 116-23.

Friedman, Raymond A. 1994. Front stage, backstage: The dramatic structure of labor negotiations.

Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Gazit, Shlomo. 1998. Israel and the Palestinians: Fifty years of wars and turning points. Annals of the

American Academy of Political and Social Science 555 (1): 82-96.

Hoffman, Aaron M. 2002. A conceptualization of trust in international relations. European Journal of International Relations 8 (3): 375-401.

Hopmann, P. Terrence. 1995. Two paradigms of negotiation: Bargaining and problem-solving. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 542 (1): 24-47.

Hopmann, P. Terrence, and Theresa C. Smith. 1977. An application of a Richardson process model:

Soviet-American interactions in the test-ban negotiations, 1962-1963. Journal of Conflict Resolution

21:701-26.

Inbar, Efraim. 1998. Israeli national security, 1973-96. Annals of the American Academy of Political

and Social Science 555 (1): 62-81.




Irmer, Cynthia G., and Daniel Druckman. 2007. Process and context in international negotiation. In N?gociation et Transformations du Monde, ed. Christophe Dupont, 117-35. Paris: Publibook.

Kelman, Herbert C. 1996. The interactive problem-solving approach. In Managing global chaos, ?d. Chester A. Crocker, Fen Osier Hampton, and Pamela A. All, 501-19. Washington, DC: United

States Institute of Peace Press. -. 1997. Social-psychological dimensions of international conflict. In Peacemaking in interna

tional conflict, ed. I. William Zartman and J. Lewis Rasmussen, 191-237. Washington, DC: United

States Institute of Peace Press.

Lewicki, Roy J., and Joseph A. Litterer. 1985. Negotiation. Homewood, IL: Irwin.

Lewicki, Roy J., Daniel J. McAllister, and Robert J. Bies. 1998. Trust and distrust: New relationships and realities. Academy of Management Review 23 (3): 438-58.

Lewicki, Roy J., and Carolyn Wiethoff. 2000. Trust, trust development, and trust repair. In The hand

book of conflict resolution: Theory and practice, ed. Morton Deutsch and Peter Coleman, 86-107.

San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Lilja, Janni. 2008. Managing outbidding to get to the negotiation table and succeed? Non-state parties in

Sri Lanka, Aceh, and Senegal. Paper prepared for the conference External Efforts to Promote Nego

tiating in Identity Conflicts. International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, Laxenburg, Austria.

Naumkin, Vitaly V., and Irina D. Zvyagelskaya. 2005. The Israeli-Palestinian peace processes. In Peace

versus justice: Negotiating forward and backward looking outcomes, ed. I. William Zartman and

Victor Kremenyuk, 113-40. Lanham MD: Rowman & Littlefield.

Pruitt, Dean G., Jacob Bercovitch, and I. William Zartman. 1997. A brief history of the Oslo talks. Inter

national Negotiation 2 (2): 177-82.

Stoessinger, John G. 1998. Why nations go to war. New York: St. Martin's.

Walton, Richard E., and Robert B. McKersie. 1965. A behavioral theory of labor negotiations: An analy sis of a social interaction system. New York: McGraw-Hill.

Watzlawick, Paul, Janet H. Beavin, and Don D. Jackson. 1967. Pragmatics of human communication:

A study of interactional patterns, pathologies, and paradoxes. New York: Norton.

Winter, David G. 1993. Power, affiliation, and war: Three tests of a motivational model. Journal of Per

sonality and Social Psychology 65 (3): 532-45. -. 1994. Manual for scoring "motive imagery,, in running text. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan,

Department of Psychology. Zartman, I. William, and Victor Kremenyuk. 2005. Peace versus justice: Negotiating forward and backward

looking outcomes. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.



Donohue - Message Framing Surrounding Oslo I

Documents

Transcript of Donohue - Message Framing Surrounding Oslo I