Strategic Moral Diplomacy: Mandela, Qaddafi, and the Lockerbie Negotiations

Understanding and mitigating the consequences of clashing moral perceptions should be a primary goal of diplomacy and foreign policy analysis. Personal interviews and primary documents about the Lockerbie negotiations are used to illustrate the dangerous collision of different moral claims in the international arena, the mistakes made by the United States and United Kingdom in handling this aspect of the negotiations, and South African President Nelson Mandela's use of strategic moral diplomacy to resolve the stalemate between Libya, the United States, and the United Kingdom. Mandela's strategy in these negotiations is an example of how an intelligent and pragmatic moral position, rather than the conventional image of an enemy as evil, can produce the desired strategic results—in this case, Colonel Qaddafi's handover of the two Libyan citizens accused of the Lockerbie bombing.