“Level II” Negotiation Strategies: Advance Your Interests by Helping to Solve Their Internal Problems

Many negotiators have constituencies that must formally or informally approve an agreement. Traditionally, it is the responsibility of each negotiator to manage the internal conflicts and constituencies on his or her own side. Far less familiar are the many valuable ways that one side can meet its own interests by helping the other side with its “internal,” “behind the table,” or “Level II” constituency challenges. Moving from theory to practice and from simple to complex, the present paper builds on a moderately theoretical treatment of this challenge previously proposed. It illustrates several classes of practical measures that negotiators can use to advance their own interests by focusing on the other side’s Level II negotiations. Beyond tailoring the terms of the deal for this purpose (e.g., with “compensation provisions”), one side can help the other, and vice versa, via a number of devices, alone or in concert.