Negotiating human rights in peace processes : the lessons of South Africa, Northern Ireland and the Palestinian-Israeli situations

Abstract

Focusing on self-determination, past human rights violations and future human rights guarantees, this is a comparative study of the impact of the "process" of negotiating "peace" in the South African, Northern Ireland and Palestinian-Israeli situations. This study uses negotiation theory to identify key factors that influence a negotiation process and its outcome. This examination helps clarify the role of principle in general, and international human rights and humanitarian law in particular, in a negotiation process. Examination of each of the three areas identified above proceeds by first reviewing contemporary law and practise, before moving to an analysis of the role of key factors identified by negotiation theory in relation to the processes in question. This work demonstrates a relationship between the negotiation process in each situation and its outcome. The picture that emerges is that of peace negotiations in which the greater the processes' adherence to principle expressed in international law, the greater the likelihood of their success.