The author discussed the main reasons for writing the book and provided an overview of the main themes. Davy was prompted to write the book on the Helsinki negotiating process, which he had covered as a journalist, because of many misunderstandings and misconceptions surrounding the process on the positions of the parties during the negotiations and its place within the Cold War framework. He outlines in the book a rather complex process of negotiation amongst the West European countries themselves, between West Europeans and the Americans, and between the Western countries and the Soviet Union. He further includes also the role of the non-aligned countries such as Austria, Ireland, and Yugoslavia.
During the presentation, Davy underscored the role of the nine members of the European Community, which became “the driving force” to include human rights as a principle in international relations. He contrasted this position to that of Kissinger, who maintained that human rights did not have a place in international relations and favoured Détante as the most effective path to stabilize superpower relations and avoid nuclear war. Despite Kissinger’s position, the United States State Department was rather sympathetic and supportive of the European position, whose aim was to encourage the long-term liberalisation of the Warsaw Pact regimes. Conversely, the Soviet position was to achieve a declaration that the frontiers of Europe were immutable and establish the principle of non-interference. Davy concluded by underscoring the role of the Helsinki Final Act in establishing mechanisms for mutual verification and the establishment of a normative framework that would contribute to the end of the Cold War, and the subsequent contributions of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) – the successor of the CSCE – in promoting democracy and human rights despite setbacks and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.Hebel praised the book for its precision and details on a complex negotiating process that has been difficult “to get right”. Therefore the book makes a profound contribution to the scholarship on the Helsinki process not only because it weaves together the political context with the inter-personal relations of the diplomats, but it does so by dismantling a number of myths surrounding the Helsinki process. A key misconception highlighted by Hebel is that the Final Act was a code of conduct for East-West relations. He was adamant in arguing that for the Western negotiators themselves it was important that the Final Act not be perceived as such, because there were also neutral countries involved in the negotiation process and the process sought to provide a framework for the assembly of sovereign states, which included Soviet satellites but boosted their sovereignty through their participation as equals – at least nominally. He further argued that there is an under-appreciation of the contribution of West European states in the historiography, when in fact 90 percent of the Final Act was pre-negotiated by West Europeans partly because Kissinger had been hostile to the CSCE and had not given clear instructions to the US delegation in the negotiations. Hebel added at the end that despite Davy’s argument that the Soviet efforts to fulfil their objectives were successfully frustrated by the West, the Soviet propaganda successes before, during, and after the negotiating process had been understated in the book.
Aunesluoma praised the book’s myth-busting effects and its balance of details on the negotiation process with the political context to clearly understand the process as a whole. He discussed briefly the position of the Western critics of the Helsinki process, which was seen by them as legitimizing the Soviet position by confirming the post-1945 order without gaining anything in return, and contrasted it with the main argument of the book – namely that peaceful engagement with the Soviet Union gradually eroded Soviet power in Eastern Europe during the 1970s/1980s. According to Aunesluoma, despite the view of some scholars that the CSCE had either been irrelevant or counterproductive for the demise of the Soviet Union, he agreed with the main argument of the book that the Final Act provided a framework through which civil society in Eastern Europe were engaged in exposing human rights violations and challenge the country’s leaders. The effect of the normative framework on human rights was effective also in producing politicians with liberalising tendencies in Russia according to him.
The question and answer session explored further the importance of the proper implementation of “soft” security aspects of the Final Act as part of the confidence building measures between East and West, the work of civil society in exposing human rights violations discussed in the follow-up conferences, and importance of including clauses upholding self-determination and countering Soviet attempts to prevent border changes.
by Alban Dafa (ESC Research Assistant)
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