Camp David Accords: A Case Study in International Negotiation

Introduction to International Negotiation and Camp David

There are several tools of statecraft, which can be classified as economic, military, or political in nature. Negotiations, international laws, alliances, and public diplomacy are the main instruments of politics used by statesmen to resolve issues and problems at both the national and international levels.

Negotiation takes place when two or more parties use diplomatic means, rather than military force, to settle a problem, issue, or conflict they share. Negotiations should not be confused with reconciliation or compromise — in which one party wins and the other loses — but are instead a bargaining process conducted by both parties in order to achieve economic and territorial gains.¹

This paper examines the famous case of international negotiation known as the Camp David Accords, which was the end result of a thirteen-day series of talks that culminated in September 1978. These negotiations were mediated by the United States to resolve issues between Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin. This case is considered one of the longest-lasting and most effective negotiated agreements between Israel and any Arab country. There were many important factors and interests on both sides — Egypt and Israel — that brought these two incompatible players together to forge an agreement and a stable peace on behalf of their nations.

There have been several debates regarding the interests of both nations and their roles in this process. The Camp David Accords case offers lessons in diplomacy and illustrates how the different instruments of power — financial, economic, informational, and diplomatic — are used by nations in the bargaining process to achieve their desired goals.

This paper discusses in detail the role played by Egypt, the strategies it used in the bargaining process, and its interests in reaching an agreement. The final section also evaluates how successful Egypt was in achieving its goals.

Thesis: The Camp David Accords negotiations among Sadat, Carter, and Begin demonstrate impressive use of the instruments of power and offer rich lessons in diplomacy.

Egypt's Opening Move: Sadat's Visit to Jerusalem

Before proceeding, it is important to identify the four basic issues at stake at Camp David:²

1) To sign a peace treaty and normalize relations between Egypt and Israel.
2) To remove Israeli military troops from the Sinai Peninsula.
3) To address the future of the West Bank and Gaza.
4) To establish a statement of principles — including Israeli withdrawal from occupied territories and the granting of self-determination rights to the Palestinians.

The steps taken by Egyptian President Sadat may look surprising at first glance, but a closer examination reveals that they were the best moves available to him and that he chose a near-perfect strategy for resolving the issues.

The first step taken by President Anwar Sadat was traveling to Jerusalem. By doing so, he officially recognized Israel — something no other Arab state had done. He was well aware that many Egyptians would oppose this move, but given its symbolic and historic value, diplomatic engagement with Israel was one of the most powerful cards Sadat held at the time. His trip was a gamble; he himself was not certain whether extending this bargaining leverage would produce good results.

The question then arises: if he was uncertain whether his move would be effective, why did he take it? The answer is that he was worried about the prospect of another Geneva Conference. The first Geneva Conference, held in 1973, had failed because the parties could not reach a mutual agreement. Sadat did not want a repeat of that experience, in part because he had no interest in dealing with the Soviets, and also because he feared that reconvening Geneva would prevent Egypt from regaining control of the Sinai Peninsula, which Israel had seized in the 1967 war.³

Sadat recognized that Egypt's standing in the Arab world was eroding. He therefore focused on reasserting his leadership role and crafted this strategy to maintain good relations with the United States while working with Israel — thereby also extricating Egypt from the Geneva process.

Sadat also understood that the Arab world would not readily accept his cooperation with Israel. He therefore framed his trip as a dramatic peace initiative rather than a quiet diplomatic overture. He knew that people respond more powerfully to symbolic gestures than to secret deals; with this psychological insight in mind, he made a high-visibility trip to Jerusalem, branding it a peace mission and attempting to minimize the anticipated negative reaction from the Arab world.⁴

The Negotiation Strategy and Diplomatic Interests

His gamble worked. His passionate speech before the Israeli Knesset played a significant role in presenting Israelis with a new reality. Begin was pressured to seize this new opportunity and move toward peace.

Sadat received a mixed response at home: some Egyptians expressed support for this new direction while others did not. Regardless, Sadat's visit to Jerusalem achieved its primary goal — creating an atmosphere in which Begin could respond with concessions of his own.

Sadat was able to pursue this dominant strategy because it happened to align with both Egypt's domestic and international interests. Egypt's economy had deteriorated badly during the 1970s owing to the heavy burden of defense expenditures.

Sadat wanted to recover from these losses, and he recognized that doing so required two things: first, Egypt needed high levels of investment from its oil-rich neighbors; second, Egypt needed to reduce its military spending. He could only cut the defense budget if he was assured that Israel no longer posed a threat. He therefore agreed to the peace treaty, under which Israel would withdraw its troops from the Sinai Peninsula. He also understood that none of this was achievable without the active involvement of the United States;⁵ he therefore worked to maintain good relations with Washington as well as with Israel in order to reach his targets.

With these considerations in mind, Sadat crafted a diplomatic strategy designed to satisfy both the Americans and the Arabs. Satisfying the Americans was relatively straightforward — he could do so by highlighting Israeli intransigence to U.S. officials. Satisfying the Arabs was far more difficult, given that he had already recognized Israel and sparked a backlash. To recover his standing, he needed Israel to withdraw from all occupied territories, so that he could demonstrate his commitment to Palestinian autonomy. These two objectives became his bottom-line demands at Camp David.

Conclusion

Stein, Janis Gross. "The Political Economy of Security Agreements." In Double-Edged Diplomacy, edited by Peter B. Evans, Harold K. Jacobson, and Robert D. Putnam. Berkeley: California UP, 1993, pp. 77–103.

Telhami, Shibley. "The Camp David Accords." Pew Case Studies in International Affairs. Washington, DC: Institute for the Study of Diplomacy, 1992.

Telhami, Shibley. "Evaluating Bargaining Performance: The Case of Camp David." Political Science Quarterly 107, no. 4 (1992–93): 629–53.

Touval, Saadia. The Peace Brokers. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 1982, p. 288.