Friends of Negotiation Journal – current and former editors, advisory board members, frequent authors and reviewers, and Program on Negotiation stalwarts who were there at its founding – gathered last week at Harvard to celebrate the journal’s 25th year and 100th issue.
The event was hosted by journal editor Michael Wheeler and PON executive committee chair Robert Mnookin.
Several guests, including Deborah Kolb, who shared editing duties with Wheeler from 1995 to 2000, shared their memories of the founding of the journal with a particular emphasis on the role of the journal’s founding editor, the late Jeffrey Z. Rubin. Kolb described Rubin as a multi-faceted, prodigiously talented scholar who believed that “anybody could write about almost anything.” It was his adventurous, multi-disciplinary spirit that gave birth to the journal in 1984 and his guided it since, said Kolb and others.
Larry Susskind, another PON founder who helped Rubin give birth to the journal, described its critical function as a forum where theory and practice inform each other, while Mnookin described the journal as integral to PON’s research and teaching missions. Mnookin also paid special tribute to Wheeler, presenting him with a commemorative cover of the journal and citing his creative leadership of the journal for fourteen years.
Special guests at the event included Bill Breslin, who was thanked profusely for his pivotal role as the journal’s managing editor for twenty years, and Carol Rubin, who shared memories of her late husband, Jeff.