Skip to Main Content
HBS Home
  • About
  • Academic Programs
  • Alumni
  • Faculty & Research
  • Baker Library
  • Giving
  • Harvard Business Review
  • Initiatives
  • News
  • Recruit
  • Map / Directions
Faculty & Research
  • Faculty
  • Research
  • Featured Topics
  • Academic Units
  • …→
  • Harvard Business School→
  • Faculty & Research→
Publications
Publications
  • 2018
  • Book

Kissinger the Negotiator: Lessons from Dealmaking at the Highest Level

By: James K. Sebenius, R. Nicholas Burns and Robert H. Mnookin (with a forward by Henry A. Kissinger)
  • Format:Print
ShareBar

Abstract

As professors and practitioners with careers devoted to negotiation, we are often asked “Who are the world’s best negotiators? What makes them effective?” Inevitably Henry Kissinger’s name comes up as an elite, if controversial, negotiator from whom we can learn a great deal. At a time of rancorous divisions in American society, he helped to forge pathbreaking Asian, Soviet, and Middle Eastern agreements. These include the opening to China after decades of mutual hostility with the United States; détente and the first nuclear arms control treaty with the Soviets at the height of the Cold War; the Paris peace treaty with the North Vietnamese after years of bitter conflict; as well as Egyptian and Syrian disengagement accords with Israel following their 1973 war. Along with diverse political leaders, diplomats, and business executives, every U.S. President since John F. Kennedy—including President-elect Donald Trump in 2016—has sought Kissinger’s counsel. His geopolitical insights into foreign policy, statecraft, and world order have been widely discussed. Yet surprisingly, until this book, his impressive achievements as a negotiator have escaped systematic analysis. While specific cases have been examined in depth, no serious cross-cutting study of Kissinger’s overall approach has extracted its lessons for today’s negotiators. We have extensively interviewed Henry Kissinger about his most difficult negotiations. We studied his writings and those of many others who have analyzed these episodes. This has provided this book with valuable answers to several questions: How did he do these deals? What strategies and tactics worked and what failed? Why and under what conditions? What ethical challenges does this approach present? Is there an underlying logic and method to his approach that, well beyond the diplomacy of the 1970s, offers practical guidance for meeting today’s negotiation challenges—from diplomacy to business, finance, and law? Though Henry Kissinger is a controversial figure who played key roles in policies still marked by contention, our purpose in this book is neither to judge the man nor to set the historical record straight. Rather, by plumbing a career of extraordinary effectiveness, we have sought to learn as much as possible, extracting useful insights into the art and science of negotiation from Kissinger’s dealmaking at the highest level.

Keywords

History; Negotiation Process; Negotiation Tactics; Personal Development and Career; Negotiation Style; United States

Citation

Sebenius, James K., R. Nicholas Burns, and Robert H. Mnookin (with a forward by Henry A. Kissinger). Kissinger the Negotiator: Lessons from Dealmaking at the Highest Level. New York: HarperCollins, 2018.
  • Find it at Harvard
  • Purchase

About The Author

James K. Sebenius

Negotiation, Organizations & Markets
→More Publications

More from the Authors

    • 2023
    • Faculty Research

    Christiana Figueres and the Collaborative Approach to Negotiating Climate Action

    By: James K. Sebenius, Laurence A. Green, Hannah Riley-Bowles, Lara SanPietro and Mina Subramanian
    • March 2023
    • Faculty Research

    Aleksander Ceferin and the European Super League

    By: Thomas Graeber, Nour Kteily, James K. Sebenius and Matthew (Matt) Higgins
    • January 11, 2023
    • ForeignAffairs.com

    Russia and Ukraine Are Not Ready for Talks: But They Might Get There If Ukraine Keeps Winning

    By: James K. Sebenius and Michael Singh
More from the Authors
  • Christiana Figueres and the Collaborative Approach to Negotiating Climate Action By: James K. Sebenius, Laurence A. Green, Hannah Riley-Bowles, Lara SanPietro and Mina Subramanian
  • Aleksander Ceferin and the European Super League By: Thomas Graeber, Nour Kteily, James K. Sebenius and Matthew (Matt) Higgins
  • Russia and Ukraine Are Not Ready for Talks: But They Might Get There If Ukraine Keeps Winning By: James K. Sebenius and Michael Singh
ǁ
Campus Map
Harvard Business School
Soldiers Field
Boston, MA 02163
→Map & Directions
→More Contact Information
  • Make a Gift
  • Site Map
  • Jobs
  • Harvard University
  • Trademarks
  • Policies
  • Accessibility
  • Digital Accessibility
Copyright © President & Fellows of Harvard College