Title: When David negotiates with Goliath: Negotiations among enemies and the power politics of multilateralism
Speaker: Kai Hebel (Leiden University)
Date: 19 October 2026
Time: 12:30
Venue: A-130 Seminar Room
Abstract: ‘Superpowers’, ‘great powers’, ‘middle powers’, ‘small powers’, etc. – both academic discourse and everyday parlance about international relations classify states according to how much power they supposedly possess. However, this influential view of power- as-possession frequently clashes with the reality of international negotiations in which nominally weak actors ‘punch above their weight’. This talk examines how and why power dynamics shift in the practice of multilateral negotiations. To empirically substantiate its points, the talk will use the contested negotiations of the Conference on Security and Cooperation (CSCE) as a case study. On 1 August 1975, after painstaking negotiations, the CSCE led thirty-five leaders, hailing from all European states, the Soviet Union, the United States, and Canada to sign a momentous agreement: the Helsinki Final Act. The product of three years of arduous multilateral bargaining, this landmark document was celebrated by some as nothing less than a substitute peace treaty concluding the Second World War and hailed by others as a charter of ‘peaceful co-existence’ for the divided continent. In contrast, critics derided the Final Act precisely for these reasons, charging signatories with appeasement and the legitimisation of an immoral status quo. 50 years later, the Final Act is widely seen as a masterpiece of modern diplomacy and a textbook
example of successful negotiations between enemies with contemporary relevance. It is no surprise, therefore, that politicians and pundits are presently calling for replicating the Helsinki process in conflict-prone regions around the world. For example, Saudi Arabia has recently floated the idea of a Helsinki process in its neighbourhood and Abdullah Gül, the former president of Turkey, has called for a ‘Final Act for the Middle East’. Especially at a time when multilateralism is under attack and international conflicts are on the rise, these proposals deserve to be taken seriously.
Bio:
Dr. Kai Hebel (DPhil, Oxon) is Assistant Professor of International Relations at Leiden University. His research interests include diplomacy, international security, Cold War history, and transatlantic relations. A graduate of UC Berkeley, the Sorbonne, and Oxford University, he held visiting research fellowships at LSE, the Foreign Ministry of the Republic of China, and National Taiwan University in Taipei. His monograph, Britain, Détente, and the Helsinki CSCE: ‘Fathers of the Final Act’ has been called a ‘superbly researched analysis of an important turning point in European history ‘ (Timothy Garton
Ash), a ‘major masterpiece’ (Richard Davy), and ‘a model of integrating diplomatic history with international relations theory’ (Aryo Makko).