9 Sep 2014
WTI hosts first Global Negotiation Conference
The inaugural Global Negotiation Conference took place on 3-5 September 2014 at the World Trade Institute. Twelve teams took part in a series of presentations on negotiation and climate change as well as a negotiation simulation modelled on the talks taking place to adopt a new international treaty to tackle climate change.
Students in attendance represented the universities of Aarhus (Denmark), Bayreuth (Germany), Bucharest (Romania), Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (Russia), Sussex (United Kingdom), and the Swiss universities of Bern, Zürich, Lausanne and the ETH Zürich as well as the École Polytechnique Féderale de Lausanne.
The students came from a range of academic disciplines including law, political science, the natural sciences, philosophy and economics. This diversity in backgrounds provided a stimulating and interesting mix of people, with different perspectives and approaches to the task at hand and ideas on negotiation in general, according to the organisers.
"The teams all performed exceptionally in the simulation and after over six hours of negotiation eventually achieved an agreement," said Jack Williams of the conference team.
The teams that were deemed to be the most influential and constructive in reaching an agreement, by both their peers and the judges in attendance, were those from the EU and Russia. The Russian team was finally crowned the most constructive team of the year.