The sale of a unique object in an open market

Conclusion

My purpose in this article is not to probe the sorts of deals most likely to be made by the wealthy—though the examples chosen are obviously from a restricted class of deals. Neither am I attempting to “show up” principled negotiation as a general rule. Most of the examples used in this article are so clearly atypical that a general system of negotiating could not be impeached solely by reference to them.

Rather, my goal here is to show that the negotiator ought to be sensitive to those elements of a deal that may not be subject to principled valuation, as well as to those that are. It is also to begin to delineate the legitimate place of will in a negotiating system generally founded on externally verifiable claims to fairness.