On September 20th, Harvard Law School awarded the prestigious annual Great Negotiator Award to Nobel Peace Prize Winner Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos, on behalf of the Program on Negotiation. This award recognizes those whose lifetime achievements in the field of negotiation and dispute resolution have had a significant and lasting impact. Santos is also a graduate of the Harvard Kennedy School.
Both his Nobel Peace Prize and the Great Negotiator Award “recognize his work to end his country’s 52-year civil war and forge a comprehensive peace agreement between the Colombian government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). The conflict in Colombia has claimed more than 220,000 lives and displaced more than 6 million people,” writes Harvard Law Today.
“While at Harvard, he studied negotiation with Harvard Law professor Roger Fisher, co-founder of the Program on Negotiation and the Harvard Negotiation Project. This time, however, it was Santos who was the professor, guiding Harvard faculty and students through the intricacies of the six-year negotiation. Some of the tactics were traditional negotiation strategies. Others were implemented for the first time, such as making living victims central to the negotiation process during an armed conflict and placing a special focus on women.”
Santos says, “I was convinced this war had to end at the negotiating table, otherwise it could last 20, 30, or 40 more years.”
To read the full article on Harvard Law today, click here: Santos receives 2017 Great Negotiator Award at HLS.
