Sales · The decoy of the exceptional warranty, The practitioner Roger Dawson, in Secrets of Power Negotiating, describes the red herring as a bogus demand intended to be withdrawn in exchange for a concession. The typical pattern he documents: a seller of industrial equipment places at the centre of the contract a warranty extended to ten years, disproportionate and seemingly costly, on which the buyer concentrates their objections. After several rounds, the seller relinquishes it "exceptionally", asking in return to hold their list price. The buyer, having secured the abandonment of a warranty they judged absurd, signs off on a price they would have fiercely contested had they identified it as the real issue. Dawson explicitly classes this manoeuvre among the unfair gambits to be recognised so as not to fall for them.
Politics · The divisive clause that masks the budget, A recurring device of parliamentary life, analysed by specialists in unfair tactics (see the Harvard Program on Negotiation's overview of dirty tricks), consists of writing into a text a deliberately divisive provision that polarises public and media debate. While the opposition and the press exhaust themselves on this point, a technical clause, often budgetary or fiscal, makes its way through with little attention. At the close of the debate, the divisive provision is withdrawn "after dialogue", a gesture presented as a democratic concession, while the clause genuinely sought is adopted. The decoy has fulfilled its function: to concentrate the attention capital where it did not matter, so as to free the real issue from critical scrutiny.
Diplomacy · The battle of the flags at Panmunjom, The armistice talks of the Korean War (1951-1953) offer a famous illustration of diversion over symbolic issues. As the chronicles of the time report (notably Time magazine), a genuine "battle of the flags" played out over several weeks: each side sought to have its own standard stand higher on the negotiating table. It was eventually agreed to use miniature flags of strictly equal size, whereupon the North Korean delegation added a spike to the top of theirs to gain an inch or two. These protocol squabbles, like the disputes over the shape and size of the table, absorbed a considerable amount of time and served as a field of manoeuvre, illustrating how peripheral issues can be instrumentalised to wear down the counterpart and shift the balance of power on the substantive points (the demarcation line, the exchange of prisoners).
Legal · The secondary claim blown out of proportion, In the settlement negotiation preceding a civil trial, a practice documented in settlement manuals consists of overloading the claim with secondary heads of loss, inflated moral damages, contestable interest, ancillary items, in order to focus the opposing party and its insurers on these fronts. After a battle of expert reports over these items, the claimant abandons them "to facilitate an agreement", obtaining in return that the principal head of compensation, the item genuinely targeted, is recorded without hard bargaining. Practitioners of alternative dispute resolution recommend responding through the separation of items and an independent valuation of each head, so as not to trade the abandonment of ancillaries for acceptance of the principal.
Business · The phantom exclusivity of a framework agreement, During the negotiation of a framework agreement between a large group and a strategic supplier, the procurement department puts front and centre a demand for worldwide exclusivity that it knows to be unacceptable to the supplier, when its real objective is to obtain an annual downward price-review clause. The legal teams on both sides spend weeks on exclusivity. As the financial year-end approaches, the buyer relinquishes it "in a spirit of partnership" and extracts the review clause, presented as a modest quid pro quo. This pattern illustrates the mechanism of adding issues studied by Malhotra and Bazerman: multiplying negotiation points creates bargaining "currencies", some of which serve only to be sacrificed.
Everyday life · The family home in an inheritance, In the division of an estate, a representative scenario, with no words attributed to real persons, sees an heir insistently claim the family home laden with memories, provoking the emotional opposition of the siblings. Their true objective lies elsewhere: the distribution of the financial portfolio. After letting the conflict crystallise around the house, they "give it up to preserve harmony", a gesture applauded by all, and immediately obtain the most advantageous liquid share. This case illustrates the power of the red herring on emotional ground: the emotional charge of the decoy amplifies the illusion of sacrifice and lowers vigilance over the real monetary value, which only a neutral valuation of each lot can restore.
