Middle East expert Professor William B. Quandt has given two seminars in Oslo, invited by the International Peace Research Institute, Oslo (PRIO) and the University of Oslo. Both seminars attracted audiences of close to 200. 

The first seminar focused on ‘What Has Worked?’, the second on ‘What Has Not Worked?’. Both seminars were chaired by Hilde Henriksen Waage, Associate Professor (UiO) and Senior Researcher (PRIO).

US Policy Toward the Arab–Israeli Conflict: What Has Worked?
Monday 6 March 2006, 14:15–16:00 at PRIO, Hausmanns gate 7, Oslo

This seminar focused on the three ‘success cases’:
• Kissinger and the disengagement agreements
• Carter and Camp David I
• Baker and Madrid

Among the key ingredients of success were deep presidential involvement and an active role by a US secretary of state closely identified with the president. There was a close-knit support team, realistic goals, a strong definition of the US interests at stake and considerable attention to detail.

 US Policy Toward the Arab–Israeli Conflict: What Has Not Worked?
Tuesday 7 March 2006, 14:15–16:00 at the University of Oslo, Blindern: Auditorium 3 in ‘Helga Engs hus’

This second seminar followed up on the first and looked at the ‘failures’: 
• The Reagan Plan and follow-on Shultz initiatives
• Clinton
• Bush II 

Common elements here include uneven or non-existent presidential leadership, lack of clarity about how US-led mediation could serve US national interests, mixed signals to the local parties, a poor sense of timing and excessive sensitivity to domestic political considerations.

William B. Quandt is Professor of Politics at the University of Virginia, where he teaches courses on the Middle East and US Foreign Policy. His research specialization is US policies toward the Arab–Israeli conflict. He has also served on the US National Security Council in the 1970s and was actively engaged in the negotiations that led to the Camp David Accords and the Egyptian–Israeli Peace Treaty.

Publications by William B. Quandt include:
Peace Process: American Diplomacy and the Arab–Israeli Conflict Since 1967 (3rd edn, Brookings, 2005);  Between Ballots and Bullets: Algeria's Transition from Authoritarianism (Brookings, 1998); 
The United States and Egypt: An Essay on Policy for the 1990s (Brookings, 1990);
Camp David: Peacemaking and Politics (Brookings, 1986);
Saudi Arabia in the 1980s: Foreign Policy, Security, and Oil (Brookings, 1981);
Decade of Decisions: American Foreign Policy Toward the Arab–Israeli Conflict, 1967–1976 (University of California Press, 1977); and
Revolution and Political Leadership: Algeria, 1954–1968 (MIT Press, 1969).
He also edited The Middle East: Ten Years After Camp David (Brookings, 1988).