ABSTRACT
Environmental negotiations combine elements of science and engineering, politics and government, public health and public sensibilities, and economic theory and marketplace reality. It is the multi-disciplinary nature of environmental negotiations that make them especially difficult for those who would like to play the game. Environmental activists can describe how better sewage treatment upstream greatly improves environmental quality downstream. Environmental activists understand ecology and public sensibilities, and some environmental engineering, but they frequently do not know about politics or how business works. The people in a given neighborhood know better than anyone how a project will affect their local community, but they often need the help of engineers, of politicians, of businesspeople, and of environmental activists in order to understand the larger issues outside of their local neighborhood. Every successful environmental negotiator has the ability to work with people and with information outside of his field of specialization.
