Developing Country Participation in Virtual Negotiations

More and more social interactions are moved online, and the diplomatic encounter is no different. While virtual meeting technology was already developed, the COVID-19 pandemic accelerated this shift. In the years since the pandemic, international organizations and foreign ministries are grappling with the question of whether, and which, diplomatic encounters can be moved efficiently to virtual platforms. Moving interactions online will reduce both the costs of diplomacy and reduce greenhouse gas emissions associated with diplomat travels. But it may also have secondary effects. In this paper we ask: How is developing country participation affected when multilateral negotiations are moved online? We first present a theoretical framework that outlines how a move from physical to virtual negotiations may impact developing countries' ability and willingness to participate. We then use a mixed-methods design that leverages the COVID-19-pandemic as a natural experiment. First, we conduct a quantitative analysis of developing country participation before, during, and after the COVID-19 pandemic using an interrupted time series model and data on state participation in a series of multilateral negotiations at the United Nations. To complement our quantitative analysis, we use interviews with negotiators from one of these fora to further understand this dynamic.