The Honorable Joseph R. Biden Jr.

The Honorable Richard G. Lugar 
Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Re: Proposal to Establish Public Talks

 Dear Senators Biden and Lugar:

The Institute for Public Dialogue has designed a new international communication process, “Public Talks,” which constitutes a new approach to negotiations.  It could be briefly summarized as negotiating in public — the diplomatic option of last resort.

This new form of dialogue will provide a level worldwide communication playing field between two adversaries during times of crisis. As such, it offers no ideological advantage to the left or the right.  It is a public negotiating alternative that could be considered after all other talks have collapsed.

The central communications instrument of these Public Talks is a series of small, magazine-size "Challenge Documents" distributed on line and through a small number of both national and/or international print media.

The attendant publicity surrounding the development of the terms and parameters of Public Talks will take several months and be the subject of considerable scrutiny.  These collateral events will ultimately involve many world capitals and will create public expectations for this new form of international dialogue.  The objective of the organization developing the Public Talks structure would be widespread acceptance that this new communications platform treats two adversaries equally.

Proposing a public negotiating process will cause immediate skepticism that focuses on motive.  This legitimate concern could be summarized with a question:  Why would the more powerful of two adversaries engage in a public negotiating process when they have already rejected private talks?

Yet motive stands at the center of this proposal:

The fundamental motive for adversaries to engage in this process is not an idealistic notion of goodwill but rather recognition of the growing importance of public opinion.  Once Public Talks is established, subject to the defined terms, either side could unilaterally present its Challenge Document before a worldwide audience without any guarantee of a response in kind.  If that adversary rejected that challenge, they would risk international acceptance of the other side’s historical narrative of that conflict.  An adversary's motive to engage in this public dialogue would be to head off erosion of public support worldwide. 

Through its Challenge Document, each side will feature its interpretation of history.  This document would contain defined sections including questions to one's adversary, negotiating positions and other content inherent to international conflicts. Successive rounds of Public Talks would continue this defined exchange of views.

Every one or two weeks, one side would distribute a Challenge Document that will likely reverberate throughout the media.  If accepted, this dialogue would unfold over two or three months and will engage citizens, as never before, in the details of that conflict. 

Moreover, the many events surrounding the establishment of this universal process will make it that much harder for nations and societies to reject this challenge to negotiate in public.  Citizens everywhere will come to understand that a new communication media will create a window into the details of conflicts between societies as never before.  As citizens and journalists around the world see that Public Talks encourages a clash of views that will allow a greater public understanding of historical truth, rejecting this challenge will become increasingly difficult. 

Arguments in favor of secrecy implicitly advocate today’s status quo.  These critics will essentially argue that existing arrangements are effective at resolving conflicts around the world, thus a new form of international dialogue is unnecessary.  Yet how many citizens in the U.S. and elsewhere will see this as a credible argument? 

Another view will hold that advocates of Public Talks do not seek termination of secret talks.  Rather, when all other negotiations fail, including secret talks, our leaders should encourage Public Talks.

The purpose of this correspondence is to provide the Committee with an overview of this negotiating alternative.  Senate hearings are necessary to address a series of related issues including when Public Talks should and should not be used.

Another key decision concerns the organization chosen to develop the defined set of rules and terms that will create this level playing field.  Competing issues of legitimacy and function provide varying arguments for and against Congressional committees, the United Nations, the European Union, various established NGOs and other forums. 

For reasons of full disclosure, it is necessary for the Institute to define our larger plan to introduce Public Talks:

International stature and financial resources are the necessary organizational predicates for the establishment of Public Talks.  The first phase of this initiative will focus on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the House Committee on Foreign Affairs. If this U.S. initiative is ultimately rejected, our focus will turn to Europe where a series of proposals will be presented beginning with the European Union.  This strategy will continue nation by nation until Public Talks is established.

Immediately following this cover letter is a formal proposal to the Committee in five parts.  There is also a second set of documents containing third party comments on Public talks from both individuals and organizations.  Your time in reviewing this material is appreciated.

Sincerely,

John Connolly

John Connolly

Executive Director

One: Exposition

Public Talks will not replace private or back-channel negotiations, nor will it work in all situations.  It will be most effective in two-party negotiations, yet it is flexible enough for multilateral talks.  Once this level communication playing field is established as a formal negotiating alternative, the soft power of both U.S. diplomacy and world opinion will rise.  Concurrently, widespread acceptance of Public Talks as a universal platform will make it increasingly difficult for adversaries to reject participation.

Citizens worldwide will arrive at judgments about Public Talks in a very different way than traditional negotiations.  With the latter, the public forms a judgment based on the results reported in the media.  With the former, as the public becomes engaged in the central details of that conflict as never before, they will arrive at judgments based on the facts and history presented by the two sides. A judgment, perhaps unfavorable, could also be rendered upon those who refuse to engage in this dialogue. 

Consider the many examples of stalled or failed negotiations: Iran-U.S./European allies, Israeli-Palestinian, India-Pakistan, Ethiopia-Eritrea, Sri Lanka-Tamil Separatists, Serbian-Kosovar/Albania, Turkey-Kurds, Spain-Basque Separatists and the Russia-U.S. suspended nuclear pact.  

The act of listing possible examples of where Public Talks can be applied will generate immediate concerns.  Will the U.S. be compelled to engage in unwanted negotiations with say Iran or Israel with the Palestinians or other allies with their despised adversaries.  Yet Senate and House hearings can shape conditions under which this process unfolds to assure that egregious use of this process by say Al Qaeda will not take place. 

While some will view Public Talks through the prism of whatever single issue is of greatest personal concern, step back and take a long-term view of this process in the context of U.S. interests. Public Talks is a universal process that will focus world attention in a way that will tend to cause adversaries to want to be seen as reasonable.  Thus, as Public Talks unfolds, this phenomenon will tend to cause each to take incremental steps towards the other side’s positions. 

Even in situations where no response in kind is expected, such as the crises in Darfur and Burma, Public Talks could be an effective tool to bring about consensus for sanctions against the recalcitrant party in a more powerful way than today because the public within many other nations will see the same arguments and historical narrative – at the same moment in time. 

This format may tempt some parties to obfuscate, manipulate and outright lie.  If so, their credibility would be damaged by a more forthright adversary. This direct clash of opinions exposes ideas to competitive examinations so that only the more credible arguments would emerge as the basis for compromise.

Public Talks depends less on personal trust between leaders than private talks. At the culmination of the process, the final signed agreement delivered into the hands of citizens on both sides will increase confidence that the terms will not be reinterpreted in divergent ways.

Shortly after 9/11, a Pew Research poll indicated that 73 percent of Americans favored hearing both sides of issues, even if it meant hearing directly from enemies. Nevertheless, some will oppose this balanced and even handed approach.  Yet those who call for the spread of democracy while opposing a greater public understanding of conflicts will be creating an edifice of unsustainable hypocrisy.

Although not an exact parallel, the closest precedent for Public Talks is the back and forth communication process of the Federalist and Anti-Federalist Papers of 1787 and 1788 where James Madison, Alexander Hamilton and John Jay helped to bring forth the Constitution of the United States.

Two: Objections

(These and other anticipated objections, none of which hold up to scrutiny, are addressed in considerably more detail on our Web site).

Public Talks conflict with the secrecy that advocates of realpolitik insist on.  Secret talks will always have a role, but Public Talks presents an alternative to failed negotiations. Leaders have frequently reinterpreted agreements in order to sell them to their constituencies, thereby sowing the seeds of a future conflict.  Many traditional negotiations including Versailles, Potsdam, and Yalta, led to agreements that participants later reinterpreted in vastly different ways, causing the agreement to be disavowed.  The failure of contemporary secret talks in Madrid, Dayton and Oslo, points towards the need for an alternative negotiating model.  Moreover, some political leaders will sweep this secrecy objection aside with simple logic:  Public Talks only becomes an option after all secret talks have collapsed. It provides the U.S. with an additional tool, often at times of crisis, when existing procedures have failed.

Encouraging public opinion to dictate U.S. foreign policy is a bad idea. This false claim envisions leaders abdicating leadership.  Public Talks will not compel leaders to act as the public wishes and there will undoubtedly be times when a U.S. leader explains that he or she will go against the grain as a matter of principle or policy.  Simply speaking, advancing the historical truth behind both sides of a given conflict will not force resolution, but rather, it will inject a small measure of balance in what is often an overwhelming public relations victory for the strong over the weak

Typically, the U.S. will primarily be involved in Public Talks as a witness to a dialogue between other nations and societies.  When the U.S. chooses to engage in Public Talks, leaders will be able to explain their positions clearly and emphatically.

Isn’t this just one more form of propaganda?  When and where have we seen propaganda in the form of a level communication playing field between two adversaries?  The strong and the weak will have the same platform to put forth their views on an equal basis.  A rational analysis of Public Talks will conclude that it is very much the opposite of propaganda.

This proposal is divorced from reality because governments don't care about advertisements or messages, only interests and power.  This ignores the growing importance of public opinion in the calculus of political leaders worldwide.  The rise of democracy and the increased access to information is advancing this phenomenon.  There are many manifestations of this from the White House's desire to "get in front" of a political issue, to the government stage-managing media events for its leaders, to diminishing public support leading to electoral defeat.

The public will not be interested in a Challenge Document when they have access to enormous quantities of information from many media outlets.  Predicting what interests the public is not a simple matter.  People everywhere, recognizing the life and death nature of these communiqués, may find Public Talks enormously compelling. The Challenge Document would be the centerpiece of a worldwide communication process that the public would be anticipating in advance of it becoming available.  Millions would see these competing historical narratives, with the leaders of the adversarial party aware that the entire world would be focusing on that same conflict. 

Nations could censor Public Talks by simply preventing the distribution of a Challenge Document.  Yes, in areas under their control. However, attempts to block this process internally may backfire, as the rest of the world would pay close attention to any banned information.  Suppressed documents such as Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago became more powerful because they were banned and thus endowed with heroic status.

Negotiations could not really take place through documents designed for the public.  Unlike private talks that often begin with small confidence-building agreements, Public Talks would most likely start with the large issues that fundamentally separate adversaries. The contrasting historical narratives surrounding such conflicts are easily understood and if agreement is reached, lesser issues could be negotiated in later stages or indeed privately.  Moreover, a formal web site could feature relevant details.

Three:  Why Congressional Hearings?

Why ask for Congressional hearings on Public Talks?

The subject matter of our proposals to the two international Congressional committees is entirely within the purview of their constitutional responsibilities.  What is new and without precedent is that we are asking these leaders to envision a large-scale communication process that does not now exist. At the same time, we are proposing that these committees should play a central role in the development of a series of rules and terms that will create a level communication platform that becomes a new form of international dialogue.  Thus, these hearings could lead to a new public negotiating process - an option after all other forms of traditional talks have failed.  Congressional efforts to bring forth Public Talks will strengthen our nation’s position as a strong advocate of freedom.

What will cause these hearings to take place?

Senate and House recognition that Public Talks addresses motive from three very different, yet important perspectives will provide a compelling case for these hearings:

The first motive is why a group would initiate a Public Talks challenge. There is abundant evidence that many groups need to influence both American and world attention to bring about change in their circumstances.  These many groups seek a dialogue with their adversary even after all other avenues have been foreclosed.  They will be highly motivated to try this new process that brings their view of history before the world public.  Consider the many full page ads that have run in the New York Times from groups seeking changes as just one example among many of failed negotiations that we see all around us.

The second motive is why would the more powerful entity ever respond to this challenge.  To many observers, this is the strongest argument in favor of Public Talks.  If one envisions the less powerful entity distributing its version of history worldwide, followed up by interviews, political events and other media efforts, the more powerful entity has a difficult decision to make.  If they don’t challenge the other side’s version of history in kind and rely on their supporters to make their case through the worldwide media, they run a great risk:  Their adversary’s version of history may gain ascendancy.  Citizens everywhere will ask: Well if this other version of history is not true, show us your side in the same form where we can weigh the two sides on an equal basis. Thus, a refusal to engage in a Public Talks challenge could begin an erosion of international support.

The third is why Americans will be motivated to support Public Talks.  The U.S. public’s interest may go far beyond the point made in the Roll Call op-ed piece, “Shortly after the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, a Pew Research poll found that 73 percent of Americans favored hearing both sides of issues, even if it meant hearing directly from enemies.” 

The American public, less ideological than its leaders, wants solutions. They see turmoil throughout the world and they see how this affects them in many direct and indirect ways.  Given the practical nature of the American public, their expected reaction to Public Talks will be:  “Let’s try it.  Let’s see if it works.” They will become powerful drivers of this process as future polls will ask:  “Do you support Public Talks after secret talks fail?”    

How does the Institute see the request for hearings unfold?

Normal procedural steps will be followed in the way that any government request winds its way in obscurity through channels.  Yet once one leader and then another envisions where this simple request for hearings lead there will come a moment in time when everything changes.  There has never been an idea disseminated widely through the media in precisely the way that Public Talks will enter the public consciousness. 

And once American citizens begin to see the intrinsic nature of this new form of international dialogue that respects and honors the principles of true democracy, they will insist on formalizing the process of Public Talks.  And they will support the leaders who make this happen.

Given that the presidential candidates have contrasting views of negotiations, how does the introduction of Public Talks affect the race?

There is nothing inherently partisan about creating a new form of negotiations.  Yet analyzing their contrasting comments on negotiations highlights how Public Talks represents a process in between the extremes of sitting down and talking to refusing to talk entirely.  The sitting down part of secret talks instills stature upon whomever you are negotiating with.  Moreover, the very act of secret talks often brings up charges by opponents that you are engaged in “appeasement.” 

Public Talks is a more distant process with no handshake or the need for personal trust that often bedevils negotiators.  While we have always assumed that some measure of secret talks will take place in the background during most prominent Public Talks, this more open process allows for a detailed exposition of the precise negotiating trade-offs, which has the potential to neutralize the appeasement criticism.   In short summary, Public Talks offers no advantage to either side of the presidential campaign.   

Four:  Further Details

1.  Democracy:  Democracy is strengthened when citizens understand the central details of disputes between nations and societies.  The emergence of Public Talks will result in a growing series of Challenge Documents, representing different conflicts around the globe.  This collective series of documents will become a historical reference that will allow both present day citizens and future generations to look back at these conflicts in a very precise way that may allow some measure of wisdom and understanding to be applied to conflicts of that day.   

As prime ministers, presidents, secretaries of state and foreign secretaries see both their own citizens and people around the world becoming very much engaged in the step-by-step process of Public Talks, their calls for each side to make incremental steps towards the other will become more specific and thus more powerful.  All of this will deepen the interest in democracy across the globe.

2.  Transparency:  U.S. policy on trade has consistently called for transparency and a level playing field for all commercial transactions.  On a philosophical level, Public Talks seeks to apply these same principles in a way that brings foreign policy into alignment with the clear needs and norms of the 21^st century. 

While some traditionalists may insist that secret deals must continue, there are two answers to such a critic.  The first is yes, by all means, have secret talks but if this ends in failure, consider Public Talks.  The second is that if you reach an agreement and publicly announce those terms without acknowledging the secret elements, you are engaging in a deception that history has shown will set the set the stage for rejection once the full story is revealed in the future.

The world is changing before our eyes, with the spread of democracy becoming one of the defining characteristics of our age.  Public Talks simply creates a physical process that allows for increased transparency for the crucial details of conflicts between societies.    

3.  Two Case Studies: Burma and Zimbabwe:  The turmoil that has unfolded in both Burma and Zimbabwe represents examples of how Public Talks could play a role in the type of crisis where a brutal regime controls all media in a given country. 

The last thing any totalitarian regime wants is world attention.  Hence, they cut off access to the Internet, ban foreign journalists, and suppress media attention as much as possible.

Once Public Talks becomes a widely accepted and established process, opposition leaders under a repressive regime would have a new means to challenge that government.  But they would also have something far greater: They would have the ability to speak directly to the world public in a message of their own choosing.  This could commence before the crisis at hand reached the level of violence in the streets.  And that ability would continue regardless of whether or not that regime ever responded in kind.

Public Talks would allow leaders of the society being oppressed to issue a dramatic call for nearby nations to stand with them.  This message would go above the heads of the leaders of these nearby countries and directly to those citizens.  They could ask for specific sanctions and other measures in a way that would be difficult to ignore with the world public watching. 

Would Public Talks work all the time?  No.  Sometimes the opposition to the government will not be able to speak with one voice, while still other problems may occur.  Yet this new diplomatic mechanism may greatly magnify the voice of some societies at a critical time in their history and that may be just enough to make a decisive difference. 

4.  Challenge Documents:  This new media, constituting unfiltered news directly from leaders, would be full color, multifaceted messages that would feature content unlike any we have seen before.   (See “A New Media” on the Institute’s Web site)  The multiple sections of this new media would be different for various rounds of this process. (See “Terms”) 

Challenge Documents are nothing like common “white papers.” This process would be designed to allow leaders to make their case in a powerful and dramatic way using modern visual tools combined with rhetoric chosen by the people most affected by that crisis.

A central element of our information age today, details of conflicts between societies, is interpreted by journalists and disseminated to the public through various media.  This new media, the Challenge Document, will allow the public to directly experience the central details of disputes between societies for themselves. 

5.  War and Peace:  Is the threat real and the rationale for war entirely legitimate?  If so, make that case by challenging that adversary to negotiate in public, which may very well be responded to in kind.   If the case is based on truth, this clash of views will allow potential allies to side with you quicker than with drawn out news stories through the media because it will also be clear to those other citizens.  Only the most inattentive observer of Public Talks would see the inherent characteristics of this process as some form of pacifism. 

Five: Conclusion

Public Talks will focus world attention on the compromises and trade-offs required for agreement. Successive rounds of Public Talks would be accompanied by international news reports, polls from inside and outside the affected regions and calls from world leaders—all of which would add political and personal pressure on the negotiating parties.  In this way, public opinion could become a powerful force in moving parties to agreement.

Amidst the “battle of ideas” taking shape today, U.S. support for Public Talks will show the world community that Americans are interested in not just symptoms of international conflicts, but also in underlying causes. An America that does not fear open discussion is more likely to see its principles embraced around the world.

Once Public Talks enters the national conversation, polls will begin to ask a question that will be repeated in countries around the world.  It is a simple question that will shake dictators and authoritarians to their core, embolden democracy advocates worldwide and present American leaders with a choice:  Will you support Public Talks after private talks fail?