Game theory, however, deals only with the way in which ultrasmart, all knowing people should behave in competitive situations, and has little to say to Mr. X as he confronts the morass of his problem.

Disputants often fare poorly when they each act greedily and deceptively.

There is no shortage of disputes.

the mediation of internal conflicts can be resolved by linkages with other problems.

The need is not for the creation of new analytical techniques specially designed for the negotiation process, but rather for the creative use of analytical thinking that exploits existing techniques.

The best practical advice then is: try to maximize your expected payoff, which is the sum of all payoffs multiplied by probabilities.

We act like a zero-sum society, when in reality there is a lot of non zero-sum fat to be skimmed off to everyone's mutual advantage.

It is always amazing to see how wide a spectrum of results can be obtained from replicating an identical negotiation with different principal actors it makes no difference whether there subjects are inexperienced or whether they are senior executives and young presidents of business firms. That is an important lesson to be learned here.

The party that negotiates in haste is often at a disadvantage.