“What do UN mediators actually do in conflicts like the one in Syria?”. This is the question that Fadi Nicholas Nassar seeks to answer in UN Mediators, his important analysis of three United Nations (UN) mediators in Syria: Kofi Annan (February 2012–August 2012), Lakhdar Brahimi (August 2012–May 2014), and Staffan de Mistura (July 2014–October 2018). Whereas existing research has emphasized contextual factors (e.g., the “ripeness” of the conflict for settlement or the strength of rebel groups) and individual-level variables (e.g., the dominant mediation style of the mediator) for explaining mediation success or failure, this book offers an in-depth understanding of why mediators design mediation the way they do. Specifically, this book generates case-specific insights and more general hypotheses regarding why mediators (1) prioritize the interests of local stakeholders to the conflict over the interests of regional players or major powers, (2), engage in a small number rather than many public mediation initiatives, and (3) get stakeholders to agree with positions that do not align with their initial interests.

To do so, the book combines process-tracing of key steps in the mediation process in Syria with “first-level analysis” assessing patterns of perceptions and evaluations of the three mediators in the 20