Which side are you on?

Andrew Kydd is an assistant professor of government at Harvard University who has developed an interesting theory about mediation. As Kydd writes in the introduction to a working paper, “Mediators are often thought to be more effective if they are unbiased, or have no preferences over the issue in dispute. … For a mediator to be effective, however, the parties must believe that the mediator is telling the truth, especially if the mediator counsels one side not to make a large demand because their opponent has high resolve and will fight. An unbiased mediator who is simply interested in minimizing the probability of war will have a strong incentive to make such statements even if they are not true, hence the parties will not find the mediator credible.”