ABSTRACT
All British diplomats, it is said, are given three rules to follow: never lie, never tell the whole truth, and never miss a chance to go to the bathroom. That advice might also be given to those involved in an endeavor requiring the same interpersonal skills and sensitivities as diplomacy–mediation. And in none of the new fields to which mediation has come in recent years is the need for such talent greater than in environmental affairs. Like the diplomat, the environmental mediator often works with disputes that have divided communities or regions for a decade or longer. A leading environmental mediator, in a frank discussion of his field, said recently: "Mediation takes power and the only basis for mediating disputes is fear–fear that something worse will happen" if there is no mediation. Change the word mediation to diplomacy and you might have had a diplomat speaking.
