5 reasons why Brexit negotiations proved so painful
Nobody said it was going to be easy! The Brexit negotiations came to a climax on December 31st 2020, with both parties crawling over the finish line. EU and UK negotiators locked horns over issues ranging from free movement of labour, sovereignty, fishing rights and Irish border controls to name but a few, yet a deal that both parties were reasonably happy with, took a long time to achieve.
Without being a fly on the wall observing the complex issues going on behind closed doors, we won’t ever truly understand the dynamics of those negotiations and what the "real" issues were preventing the two parties resolving their differences.
Nevertheless, there were some fundamental questions to be asked surrounding the inability of the EU and the UK to come to a mutually acceptable deal. And by this, I don't mean simply compromising, but rather why the negotiators failed to understand and implement some founding principles of negotiation by building a robust strategic plan for the future.
Before we get into the nitty-gritty, we may want to put some assumptions in place surrounding the negotiations. Firstly, that both parties felt that striking a good deal was the way forward and the best solution for a successful future relationship. Secondly, that both parties had a best alternative (BATNA), which in this case may have been the contingencies built in to a potential no-deal outcome. It may not have been an ideal BATNA, but it could have been better than a poorly negotiated agreement where both parties left dissatisfied. In other words, was no deal better than a poor deal?
So, let's jump straight in with 5 reasons why the Brexit negotiations went so badly.
Time pressure - despite the fact that the UK and the EU had plenty of time to resolve the key issues on the table, it still came down to the wire. Deadlines shifted to buy more time, but you have to question the dangers of self-imposed time pressure which forced the negotiations down one path or another. Of course, we can't set unlimited timescales for negotiations because nothing would ever get agreed, but both parties should have spent their time more wisely addressing problem areas and sticking points and understanding the scope of this deal.
Negotiating positions rather than interests. One could dedicate a whole book to this subject, as it's the foundation of principled collaborative negotiations. In essence, a positional negotiation is about what each party wants. For example, the UK wants protected fishing rights, the EU doesn't think this is right or fair. It therefore becomes a sticking point as neither party can enter the metaphorical bargaining zone. Now, add to this all the other contentious terms, and we had an increasingly challenging negotiation to navigate. During positional negotiations, both parties can feel they're in a win/lose situation where they have to concede or compromise. Interest based negotiations on the other hand focus on the why behind the what. In other words, if I can truly understand why your position is so important to you, then we can look for creative solutions together. So, how could we make the fishing issues work for both parties? Easier said than done as we need to overcome such factors as historical disputes, egos, attitudes towards fairness and of course political biases.
The dynamics of the negotiating teams. In my view, this is main contributing factor to the breakdown in communication during the whole Brexit process. One team consisted of chief negotiators representing the interest of one nation, whilst the other has the interests of 28 countries to consider. So, it would be fair to say that Michel Barnier had his work cut out on this one, with all the pressures to keep each nation happy. In reality, this was not feasible nor realistic as the more powerful nations' interests dominated the agenda. The resulting persona of the EU team therefore becomes that of a negotiator who is accountable to a higher authority - the 28 member nations. Firstly, it allows this party to put national pride and emotions to one side and focus on matters of principle. Secondly, it can approach the negotiation from a position of power knowing it has the political peer pressure from around Europe. Thirdly, it can reference existing "rules" of engagement towards the black sheep who wants to leave the family. If the UK wants to leave, they have to follow EU rules. These factors contributed to the perceived balance of power between each party and not surprisingly, resulted in a more adversarial, positional based negotiation.
Failure to separate the people from the problem. You may have already sensed from my earlier points that the role of the human ego was going to feature further in this article. It is the one certainty in any negotiation - the irrationality of human beings when under pressure. You may have the best team in place, the best process prepared, know your demands and understand the other party's requirements, but when you throw powerful, ego driven personalities into the mix, that's when the shenanigans begins. Our natural desire not to be outdone by the other party can dent the ego so much that we unbelievably, focus so much on winning that we ignore the quality of the deal. In practice, the frightening implication for Brexit negotiations is that both parties could have ended up sacrificing a potentially acceptable deal in favour of getting their own way in a no-deal situation. Strange but true.
Putting politics before real-life practical solutions. At the risk of being controversial, let's throw an argument into the mix that questions the UK's stance on fishing rights - one of the key stumbling blocks in the Brexit negotiations. An objective outsider would classify this particular negotiation term as a political agenda item rather than an economic one. The reality of the situation is that this apparent matter of principle - having control of our own waters, clouded the bigger picture in many people's opinions. So, the UK negotiators had a dilemma of asking themselves whether the greater economic landscape benefits should suffer for the sake of this political agenda item, even if it meant upsetting an industry and denting the national ego.
Will we ever know what type of deal both parties really got? Only time will tell, but hopefully the UK and EU will have learnt some important lessons about how not to negotiate.
James Thomas
james@serenpartnership.co.uk