Emmanuel Levinas, ethics, and LD

This post is inspired by Max, who wrote an LD case for the March/April humanitarian aid resolution based on the work of Emmanuel Levinas. Thanks for the idea, Max.

I'll quote from two useful sources in my discussion: Adriaan Peperzak's To the Other: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Emmanuel Levinas, which is available in its entirety online, and Benjamin Yost's "Responsibility and Revision: A Levinasian Argument for the Abolition of Capital Punishment." Any misrepresentation of their work--or of Levinas--is entirely my own. (Debaters who lack the hours to peruse Peperzak's exegesis will find use in Bettina Bergo's capably brief summary of Levinas's life and work.)



Why Levinas?
For debaters who are tired of the same old Utilitarianism vs. Deontology arguments, Levinas' approach offers a way out. It is profoundly humanistic, and critical of all-encompassing formulas or categorical imperatives. Although Levinas' prose (translated from French) can be intimidating, his core idea is understandable with a little effort.

The Core Idea: Responsibility
A human's first encounter with another human--the Other--shocks us out of our unreflective egoism, an egoism that other ethicists confuse with selfhood. According to Levinas, it is not until we recognize the existence of the Other--and their infinite claims to our attention, resources, and time--that we develop a sense of responsibility to them, and understand our own nature. As their needs are infinite, our responsibility to them must be infinite; and, as Yost explains,

...responsibility is asymmetric--meaning that the other has no responsibility to me--and radically singular--my responsibilities are mine and cannot be passed of to, or shared by, anyone else.

Or, as Peperzak puts it,

[a just] being does not concentrate on its own happiness or even on the sublime form in which this happiness can present itself within the framework of a belief in human immortality or soul... [since] it has turned from egoistical injustice in order to dedicate itself to the service of the Other.

Levinas' critical project is aimed straight at Kantian and contractualist defininitions of justice as reciprocity between free agents. Yost again:

This is because Levinas puts responsibility where Kant, and the liberal tradition more generally, would put freedom--to be human is to be responsible, and the other’s needs constitute the fundamental value. Being responsible for others is about transcending the drive toward self-preservation and self-enhancement.... As a result, our responsibilities for others cannot be determined by, nor limited by, the responsibilities others bear for us. Duties are not cut from the cloth of reciprocity. This view is in sharp distinction to liberal justice.

Limitations...
Levinas' position, square in the critical camp, makes using his ideas a challenge for LDers, as on the one hand, it places justice and ethics at the first priority, but on the other hand, makes no specific normative claims. As Peperzak explains,

[Levinas'] ethical terminology... does not point the way to a system of commands and prohibitions. It describes the situation of responsibility that precedes every ethics--a relation that "constitutes" me even before I can ask: "How should I conduct myself?" or "What should I do?" As an adequate description of the subject, insofar as it escapes the order of Being, ethical language is pre- or meta-ontological. As characteristic of a situation that precedes freedom, it is also pre- or meta-ethical.

Levinas rankles against the systematizing impulse of most ethical theorizers, framing such an impulse as a sort of abdication of moral responsibility. Back to Yost:

Now, if responsibility is singular and asymmetric, it is non-generalizable, and cannot be used to deduce moral norms that bind anyone other than oneself. Indeed, to convert singular demands into generalized norms will turn out to be, in some sense, a betrayal of responsibility. In doing so, one shirks one’s responsibilities by passing them off to others.... Levinas cannot, therefore,address the basic concern of mainstream normative ethics, which is to establish a catalogue of moral duties. Instead, Levinas encourages vigorous criticism of these catalogues, on the grounds that they justify limits on our responsibilities.

... And How to Overcome Them
That doesn't preclude what Yost calls "Levinasian" arguments in favor of universal human rights (or, in Yost's own view, against specific policies such as the death penalty). Justice itself is a universal principle, as Peperzak explains:

The simultaneity of many others distances me from the infinity of my responsibility. The contradiction caused by an infinite claim that is multiplied can only be overcome by the opening up of a dimension in which all others are served, respected, and treated justly: the dimension of universal justice. The infinite "principle" of transcendence... necessitates its own universalization and therewith a certain limitation. This is the "origin" of justice as the concern for a universally just order. This justice demands comparison (of unique and incomparable others), coexistence (of those whose "truth" can only "appear" in a face-to-face), gathering, equality (of the differents), administration, politics (which necessarily includes totalization), and so on.

Or, as our house's resident ten-year-old Keira summarizes, "There was a dimension where he went into a dimension, and then found the face-to-face of justiceness."

Can we go farther, and link this "justiceness" to the lived reality of political justice? Peperzak says that Levinas says yes.

The infinite obligation now becomes the duty of justice. I must be just in the distribution of my attention and devotion. I must compare and calculate, correct and order, treat others as equals and conduct myself as a judge.... The ethical relation of the One-for-the-Other obligates us to the rational organization of society, in which justice is exercised and violence is suppressed.

Yost adds,

Those who argue that Levinas’ philosophy has political implications include (Burggraeve 2002), (Caygill 2002), (Critchley 1992), (Critchley 2007), (Perpich 2008). Critchley and Perpich defend very general implications. Caygill and Burggraeve derive more concrete ones, especially with respect to the extension and protection of human rights.

The full cites:

Burggraeve 2002. "The Wisdom of Love in the Service of Love : Emmanuel Levinas on Justice, Peace, and Human Rights. "
Caygill 2002. Levinas and the Political.
Critchley 1992. The Ethics of Deconstruction : Derrida and Levinas.
Critchley 2007. Infinitely Demanding: Ethics of Commitment, Politics of Resistance.
Perpich 2008. The Ethics of Emmanuel Levinas.

I haven't read them, but you're welcome and encouraged to.

And, for extra credit, compare and contrast Levinas' idea of responsibility with Sarte's "anguish."

value / criterion pairs for the humanitarian aid resolution

This post consists of value and criterion pairs for the March-April 2014 LD humanitarian aid resolution, which states:

Placing political conditions on humanitarian aid to foreign countries is unjust.

These ideas are intended to kickstart your own thinking. Feel free to adapt them for your own purposes. I can't claim they'll win you any rounds, but if they do, be sure to give me 80% of the credit, more or less.

Also, this is a work in progress, so feel free to suggest additions in the comments.


Trending Affirmative

Value: Justice (defined morally)
Criterion: Preserving human dignity.
Humans are worthy of fundamental respect and have inherent worth. Regardless of role or station, we have a moral obligation to preserve human dignity. Political conditions have the potential to deny aid to those who need it most, use humans as bargaining chips and human suffering as leverage, and, if based on partisan bickering, are a moral obscenity and an affront to human dignity.


V: Justice
C: Protecting Human Rights
If protecting human rights is essential to justice (or morality), and if PPCoHA leads to the loss of human rights (as thousands or even millions suffer and die when aid is denied), then PPCoHA is unjust.


V: Justice
C: International Law / International Human Rights Norms
Since the resolution does not specify a particular society, we can't be 100% certain which rights must be protected. Best, then, to look to the prevailing standards of international law--the rights that people across societies, cultures, and even times have agreed are essential. Is this criterion open to attack? Certainly. But it also presents a clear, highly defensible set of rights.


V: Justice
C: Deontology, especially the 2nd Formulation of Kant's Categorical Imperative
Kant argues that as humans are autonomous moral agents, it is wrong to use them as mere means to an end. Political conditions do this by treating suffering and dying humans as bargaining chips for a nation's purposes.


V: Justice
C: Retribution
In this view, withholding aid for political reasons is a punishment. If this is a correct reading of the situation, it violates a fundamental principle of retributive justice. Innocents should not suffer for the sake of their country's leaders, since they are not due punishment.


V: Justice
C: Rawls's "Law of Peoples"
Rawls's "Law of Peoples" is an attempt to apply his contractual reasoning to international relations. The seventh and eighth rules are most salient: "Peoples are to honor human rights," and "Peoples have a duty to assist other peoples living under unfavorable conditions that prevent their having a just or decent political and social regime."




Trending Negative

V: Justice
C: Social Contract
The resolution uses the phrase "is unjust," which can (should?) be defined in moral terms. The moral obligations of the State are based on its contractual duties and limits. The contract (in most classic formulations) requires no positive obligations toward the citizens of other countries. (There may be negative duties--to not violate the human rights of foreigners--but humanitarian aid is not a moral obligation for states.

A potential "turn" exists if the social contract is linked to consequentialist reasoning (i.e., the State has to act in a way that benefits its citizens or keeps them secure). If unfettered humanitarian aid improves the donor nation's security, it might have a moral obligation to avoid political conditions.


V: Prudence (defined as carefully weighing political options; see Morgenthau)
C: Political realism
The idea here is that nations act in their best interests, independent of overarching moral considerations, charting a careful course in a chaotic, Hobbesian world. Justice isn't a proper description of international relations, so the resolution is a category error, analogous to claiming that numbers are too heavy, or colors are too fearful. (Be aware that some judges hate political realism. I mean really, really hate it.) Realism can also be turned, potentially, in the way the Social Contract argument can be turned, if realism is discussed in terms of its consequentialist impacts, rather than in its inherent approach.



Could Go Either Way

V: Justice
C: Consequentialism (or Utilitarianism, Act or Rule)
Any case predicated on a body count, a dollar figure, or any other quantifiable metric of success is essentially consequentialist. If justice is defined morally, and the State looks to consequentialism as a way to decide whether its actions are moral, then consequentialism can work as a criterion for justice. However, this seems like a weaker link (as it makes justice into a matter of majority rules). Also, any affirmative would have to beware of potential turns.

does humanitarian aid forestall political solutions?

As someone who watched Phil Hartman kill it on Saturday Night Live in the early 90s, I'm old.

Hartman's second-to-note Bill Clinton impersonation is on full display in the classic skit in which the rotund politician interrupts his mid-morning jog to meet, greet, and eat with regular folks at a local McDonald's. As Clinton finds a way to sample nearly everyone's meal, he discourses on various policies, including a memorable analogy for why an international military force would be necessary to secure humanitarian aid in Somalia.

Also, I'm old.

The serious point, which I'm winding toward, is that humanitarian aid isn't delivered in a vacuum. By changing the cost of inaction, aid can potentially forestall political solutions. This point is argued by Tamer Qarmout and Daniel Beland in "The Politics of International Aid to the Gaza Strip," found in The Journal of Palestine Studies, Summer 2012.

Within the context of the Israeli occupation, international aid to the [Palestinian Authority] has allowed Israel to sustain its occupation without bearing the expenses of providing for the basic humanitarian needs of the people under occupation. In this environment, donors play an integral and direct role in the conflict by alleviating any sense of urgency to end the occupation.

Even if you're inclined to balk at the loaded terms in their analysis (I don't intend to wade into a debate about the legitimacy of Israeli and Palestinian territorial disputes), the analysis raises the troubling prospect that aid perpetuates a problematic status quo.

Mark E. Manyin makes a similar argument in "Assessing U.S. Assistance to North Korea," from Asian Review's Fall 2003 issue.

From a humanitarian perspective, sending food to North Korea arguably diverts limited supplies of food aid from other needy, and more accountable, countries. Furthermore, as discussed above, the volume and consistency of international aid has allowed the North Korean government to institutionalize emergency food assistance as part of its annual budget needed to feed its people and remain in power. Therefore, although international food aid has saved thousands of lives, it also has indirectly subsidized Kim Jong Il's regime and allowed the government to avoid making much-needed economic reforms.

The age of the evidence--11 years and counting--only bolsters the claim that continuing aid has potentially contributed to the perpetuation of Jong Il's repressive dynasty.

Berhanu Nega and Geoffrey Schneider, in "International Financial Institutions and Democracy in Africa: The Case for Political Conditionality and Economic Unconditionality," found in The Journal of Economic Issues, June 2011, note that

..there is evidence that foreign aid is used by dictatorships for political purposes and that humanitarian aid is frequently denied to families that are considered opponents of the regime (Human Rights Watch 2010), which argues for the denial of all forms of aid to the worst-behaving dictatorships. Properly structured aid programs may be able to exert pro-democracy pressure while preserving aid for the poor, but this may not always be possible.

The upshot is that, in a consequentialist framework, the equation isn't simply aid saves lives, therefore aid good. Political conditions, long term, may be necessary to prevent suffering.

defining "political conditions" in the humanitarian aid resolution

An important way to divide up ground between the Affirmative and Negative in the humanitarian aid resolution...

Resolved: Placing political conditions on humanitarian aid to foreign countries is unjust.

... is to fairly define "political conditions."

"Conditions" seems easy enough--to get this consequence, do this--but "political" is another story.

Look at some dictionary definitions of the word:

1. of, pertaining to, or concerned with politics: political writers.
2. of, pertaining to, or connected with a political party: a political campaign.
3. exercising or seeking power in the governmental or public affairs of a state, municipality, etc.: a political machine; a political boss.
4. of, pertaining to, or involving the state or its government: a political offense.
5. having a definite policy or system of government: a political community.

The first definition links circularly to the noun "politics," so we'll ignore it. The second is slanted toward the Affirmative, as it would make political conditions into a partisan affair, which would be difficult to justify. The third and fourth are quite broad, and also arguably the most contextual. The fifth is the most specific, which will relate well to operational definitions described later.

Under the broadest definitions, what counts as a political condition--and what doesn't? Pace Atmar, should we distinguish security conditions (your government must ensure basic aid worker safety) and capacity-building / development conditions (your government must invest in critical infrastructure projects) from human / civil rights conditions (your government must enact feminist reforms)?

Perhaps a way out is to investigate the topic literature. Tamer Qarmout and Daniel Beland, in "The Politics of International Aid to the Gaza Strip," found in The Journal of Palestine Studies, Summer 2012, p. 34, have a fairly concise operational definition:

Political conditionality usually links donor aid to the recipient's implementing programs in such areas as democratization and good governance.

More specific, to be sure, but also slanted toward the Negative, as it presumes generally beneficial aims. Still, even as it stands, it provides a clearer value comparison than just "saving lives vs. indeterminate government action."

We can get even more specific, though. The Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation's definition of political conditions tied to development aid is extensive (and typical):

The main criteria which are applied in a specific situation and to the behavior of other countries are failure to make efforts to achieve good governance, e.g. the deliberate and consistent blocking of reform-oriented measures; serious violations of human rights, in particular grave discrimination of minorities; the interruption or revoking of democratization processes; serious infringements against peace and security (war, warmongering, state terror); reluctance to accept the right of return of nationals (refugees).

It's important to note, though, that in Swiss practice, humanitarian aid is entirely exempt from these conditions. (That doesn't change the definition of the conditions themselves, of course.) Whether that's warranted, of course, is the whole question of the debate.

I'll be on the lookout for other definitions, and if you've found something useful, share it in the comments.

the agent of action in the humanitarian aid resolution

The March/April LD humanitarian aid resolution invites a careful parsing.

Resolved: Placing political conditions on humanitarian aid to foreign countries is unjust.

One of the primary questions: who or what is the agent of action in the resolution? In other words, who or what would be described as "unjust" when placing political conditions on humanitarian aid?

The question matters for several reasons, which will be outlined below amid various agent options.

The agent is an indeterminate government or nation-state.
I place this reading first, as I think it's the preferred interpretation, given the general-principle nature of LD, and the fact that states are the entities most likely to impose political conditions on humanitarian aid, whether mediated via sanctions regimes, or through direct aid dispersal. Furthermore, the aid is directed "to foreign countries," which is a clean semantic fit with the idea of state-to-state bargaining.

What defines justice vis a vis the State? For the Affirmative, the answer may lie in Kantian respect for persons, Rawlsian calculations of fairness, consequentialist cost-benefit analyses, or, if the resolution is situated more in the "real world," norms such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, or international legal frameworks such as the Geneva Conventions.

The Negative has Rawlsian and consequentialist options as well, but I'd go for a contractual argument, based on the word "foreign." Nations have no obligations to give aid to foreign citizens, in the classic social contract stance. Thus, it may be sad or heartless or mean, but it's not unjust to set political conditions. In fact, given the state's obligation to the welfare of its own citizens, such conditions might be preferable or even required.

Another Negative strategy is to blow up the notion of State obligations, taking a Morgenthau-esque "realist" position. In the anarchic international system, the State has to act to safeguard its own interests. Political conditions aren't "unjust" because justice isn't applicable to the State. Prudence is the only path. (This is a similar "category error" approach taken in Randian kritik-esque arguments about the fallacy of "collective nouns.")


The agent is the government of the United States.
This is a common way LDers attempt to parametricize the resolution: by arguing that since we live in America and take part in the American educational system and can easily place ourselves in an American-oriented policymaking stance. I wouldn't go this route, but your mileage may vary.


The agent is an indeterminate nonprofit / nongovernmental organization (NGO).
NGOs certainly have the ability to impose political conditions on their aid, but in my initial survey of the literature, it seems that they are the least likely to. For good reason: due to their principled neutrality, groups such as Doctors Without Borders oppose any and all political conditions. This reading of the resolution is likely to trend Affirmative.


The agent is an individual actor within a government agency or NGO.
Do obligations to corporate aims trump individual morality, or must individuals act justly regardless of their office, status, or context?


The agent is an individual actor without any particular corporate obligations--a philanthropist.
I see this as the least likely reading of the resolution, as it's the least likely aid scenario.


In sum, I see state-based analysis as the most fruitful for both sides, although I'm willing to be persuaded otherwise if you have better ideas. At any rate, the definition of justice--and the proper application of the term to various agents--seems to be the matter of most concern in this debate. Is justice essentially moral, political, or legal? (Or some combination of the above?) Good luck finding the answer, and good luck in your rounds.

Resolved: Placing political conditions on humanitarian aid to foreign countries is unjust.

The National Speech and Debate Association (formerly the National Forensic League) has released the March-April 2014 Lincoln-Douglas debate topic.

Resolved: Placing political conditions on humanitarian aid to foreign countries is unjust.

There's a lot to consider, from the meaning of "political conditions" (are we talking about free elections, regime change, partisan bickering, or all of the above?) to the standard for justice. The word "foreign" invites analysis of international and domestic legal frameworks for aid, but without a specified agent of action, should we focus on US aid efforts, throw the EU in the mix, consider the UN the focus, or debate abstract principles? Is there a difference in the interests of state actors and private agencies?

Of course, you can expect much of the debate to boil down to frameworks. For instance, my immediate inclination is to take a Kantian stance, arguing that using humanitarian aid as political leverage treats suffering citizens of other countries as mere means to an end. Consequentialism may point us in entirely different directions, though, especially since humanitarian aid has been diverted by bad actors, fueled corruption and state capture, and isn't necessarily effective in the long run.

A few countries and regions that spring to mind include North Korea, the Sahel, the Central African Republic, Syria, Afghanistan, Palestine, Haiti, and Myanmar. Agencies include USAid, ECHO (the world's largest donor, according to their website), UNICEF, Doctors Without Borders, and more. Many more.

These are just a few thoughts at the onset. Watch this space in the coming weeks for links, analysis, and value and criterion pairs, and, as always, feel free to pose ideas and questions in the comments.

Updates
1. I take a closer look at potential agents of action in the resolution, and their strategic implications.

2. How should "political conditions" be defined in the resolution?

3. Does humanitarian aid forestall political solutions?

4. A list of value / criterion pairs to get you started, if that's your thing.

5. Two external links you might find useful: Stanford's article on International Distributive Justice, and IEP's on Global Ethics and on Moral Egalitarianism (potentially useful for the Aff).

6. Levinas seems useful for this resolution. Who is Levinas, you ask?

7. I go into a little more depth about political realism.

how to parametricize an LD resolution

One of the hot buzzwords cropping up in debates about the "environmental protection versus resource extraction" resolution is the matter of parametricization.

If your browser red-squiggly-underlines the word, like mine does, it's just as confused about parametricization as you are. And, even if you know what it means, you may not know the way to make parametricization fit within a traditional LD round.

Definition
Parametricization is fairly straightforward. A debater, usually the Aff, wants to limit the ground of the debate--how much she has to defend or advance--so she changes the parameters. For instance, rather than argue a general principle that the environment should be prioritized, the Aff specifies a particular country or issue--Niger's uranium extraction, for instance, or just uranium mining in general--and then talks about the benefits of affirming in that instance. This is often a straight-up plan; if not, it's a quasi-plan, discussed in terms of Util impacts and/or solvency.

The word comes out of Policy Debate theory, as LPNelson explains:

Parametric analysis when applied to debate makes the resolution a parameter for the debate and is what allows the affirmative team to choose one example of reform/change (thus creating the plan-focused debate we’re all familiar with) within the bounds of the resolution.

Contrast this with the traditional view of LD:

Resolution centered debate, however, is what you will see if you participate in things like Lincoln-Douglas or Public Forum debate. This is where instead of having plan-focused debate, ALL of the argumentation in the round is about whether or not the resolution as a whole should be affirmed or negated – meaning that all examples in the round need to be typical of the resolution in its entirety (which is why occasionally you’ll hear LDers accusing each other of “parametricizing” the resolution).

More on this problem later.

Justification
In progressive LD, many debaters will run parametricized cases without any additional warranting; however, in a traditional tournament, this is likely to meet with resistance. Some debaters use fairness as a warrant, claiming that the vastness of the topic literature makes it impossible to run a "general principle" case, while others claim that parametricizing is about the educational value of debating things as a policymaker, especially given the real-world context of the resolution. (This tactic seems less apt when the resolution is written more abstractly, such as, say, "Resolved: the spirit of the law ought to take precedence over the letter of the law," which isn't inherently specific to any nation, agent of action, or other context.)

Problems
This is where things get a little dicey for the parametricizer. Unless LD rids itself of the "general principle" language and the explicit prohibition of plans (the NSDA, formerly the NFL, says they're a no-no), then a parametricized case is dependent on judges who ignore or flout the rules.

Furthermore, a parametricized Aff won't clash with a general-principle Neg, a situation I saw develop several times in January. Beefing up mangroves for the potential solvency benefits offers little inherent defense against, say, a rights-based Neg talking about minerals, fish, and timber. This leads to three (or more)-pronged Neg attacks in the 1NR: a topicality theory shell, followed by a disad, followed by an alternate framework and case structure. Good luck defending all that in the 1AR.

A Proposed Solution
I think it's fair to parametricize within the traditional context of Lincoln-Douglas as long as the resolution can still be affirmed as a general principle, avoiding unnecessary topicality debates.

One is to consider the range, scope, and magnitude of impacts. For instance, in the environment vs. resource extraction resolution, it's empirically verified that among developing nations, China, India, Brazil, and Russia own a relatively large share of carbon emissions, due to their growing industrial output and larger populations. Secondly, the impact of carbon emissions is huge and potentially catastrophic. Thus, a Util-based argument focused largely on these four nations has enough of a potentially large impact to justify affirmation as a general principle, in a way that, in contrast, ending uranium mining in Niger can't--at least, not without tenuous link chains and the tactical disadvantages described above.

Another strategy is to include an argument for why a particular scenario is typical of a wider pattern, making the parametricization more of a "focal point." For instance, given the example of Niger above, it'd be easy for the Aff to spend a paragraph rhetorically linking the situation to a wider context, given that Niger isn't the only developing nation (or even the only African developing nation) to have problems with foreign corporations extracting critical resources. This strategy precludes Neg responses of "cherry-picking" or "hasty generalizations," as it functions more as a "case study." The weakness is, once again, the potential lack of clash against a more general Neg.

In sum, not all parameters are created equal, and there seems to be fair ways to carve up ground within the traditional rules, ethos, and style of Lincoln-Douglas debate.

Bonus Question
I recently heard a debater say, theoretically justifying her parametricization case, that 50% of the developing nations / environmental topic literature is about...

a. Brazil
b. China
c. Russia
d. India

Wrong. Uganda.

do the rules of LD actually matter?

This post is aimed at my Washington state colleagues, but you're welcome to read it, too. It's about something I first considered three years ago, when invited to Washington state's premier progressive debate tournament. Since then, the past has become the present, and the present keeps scrolling down to the future.

Where are we now?

We're at the point, when responding to a resolutional analysis based on interpretations of the NFL's Competition Events Guide--parallel burdens, burden of clash, burden of resolutionality, fairly banal, but necessary in these random times--a judge writes on the ballot, "I don't care about the LD rule book."

Now, I'm guessing this judge was oversimplifying for the sake of clarity, and wasn't advocating total adjudicative anarchy. The LD rule book, after all, is why we have prescribed times, and I haven't heard of any judges allowing Aff or Neg filibusters.

But... then... why not? If debate is about "fairness," defined nebulously and warranted empirically, and ultimately up to the interpretation of a judge with a 4000-word paradigm (no offense, Matt Z, just giving an example), and if the time skew is real, why not call for any given judge to throw out the standard times as a micropolitical solution?

The fact is, in varsity LD in these parts, the rules are becoming obsolete. (At least, until debate hipsters make the old school cool again.) At worst, they are unknown; at best, unenforced. Consider some of the rules for Washington State LD. For instance, when was the last time you heard a debater give a proper source citation?

b. The first time a particular piece of evidence or source is used, the speaker must give the author, publication, date of publication, and pages. Once the source/author is used in the round, then the citation may be shortened to author, page, and year.

Or did you know that...

Lincoln-Douglas debating encourages the development of a direct and communicative delivery style. Emphasis is placed upon the issues involved rather than strategy in developing the case. The statement of the topic is a RESOLUTION OF VALUE rather than of policy. This results in emphasizing logic, theory, and philosophy while eliminating "plan" arguments.

At the Puget Sound invitational, I was mildly surprised to hear a debater run "plans required" theory, which is about as opposite to their elimination as you can get. Never mind "tradition" or "ethos;" any time a Washington State judge votes for an LD plan, an angel gets its wings clipped.

Oh, and spreading? The WSFA isn't going to have it:

Because of the time limits, a wealth of evidence cannot be used, but research by good background reading is necessary.

No brightline, I know, but a principle that is as trendy as parachute pants.

My point isn't to defend the utility or justice of these particular rules, but to point out that they are actually rules.

That is, if we're going to enforce them.

We have two choices: we take the rules seriously and educate judges who don't know them or don't care about them, or we change the rules to fit the evolving event. As a coach concerned with educating his students and preparing them for success in LD, I'll adapt to either scenario. But both require change and commitment. We can't accept the status quo.

We have to care about the rule book.

a closer look at the LD time skew

What follows is an analysis of particular empirical evidence for the fabled "time skew" in Lincoln-Douglas debate.



The Context
I've heard several theory shells that rely heavily on time skew arguments, all sharing the same warrants. For the uninitiated, "time skew" is the idea that in LD, the Negative has an unfair time advantage in the 1NR--7 minutes to run all sorts of attacks, disads, theory shells, meta-ethics, a prioris, interpretive dances, killer bee swarms, whatever--that the Aff simply can't respond to in the 4 minute spittlefest known as the 1AR. Compound this with the 6 minute 2NR, and the measly 3-minute 2AR in response, and the modern LDer feels significantly cramped while affirming.

Often, the "fairness" portion of the shell's standard appeals to an empirical fact: at the Tournament of Champions in LD, the Negative has won over 50% of the ballots.

This, of course, raises all sorts of questions.

* Is this a historical trend, or the result from one tournament?
* If one, what was the resolution? Would its own presumptions and associated judge biases cause the skewed results?
* If it's an identifiable trend at the TOC, what is the root cause?
* Do judges have a contrarian bias that favors the Neg? (Good luck answering this one in a mere blog post.)
* What if it's abusive tactics that actually create the problem?

These questions, of course, presume that the statistic is true. Is it?

To find out, I crunched the numbers myself, because I'm the fact-checking sort.


Methodology
I used the 2011-2013 LD results, based on the first six rounds, presuming that this would provide an even number of Aff-Neg opportunities for each individual debater, with the exception of 2011, which had 8 rounds for each. I counted each by hand, double-checked, and then ran the results through a spreadsheet. I eliminated two 2013 ballots, as they were both forfeits, one on each side, which doesn't significantly alter the results or the conclusions. Of course, I didn't count byes.


Results
Out of 772 preliminary round ballots in the past 3 years of competition, 345 went for the Aff, or 44.7%. Negs took 427 ballots, or 55.4%.

Before we declare the skew to be real, we have to account for the margin of error. For a sample of this size, at a 99% confidence interval (i.e., only 1 in 100 results could be explained by pure chance), we would expect an error margin of +/- 4.57%.

Thus, the lowest "expected value" for the Aff is 368 ballots, or 47.7% of the total, while the highest is 404, or 52.3%. Any result within this range isn't far enough away to be anything but intriguing.

But the actual total, 345, is well below the range. Even being optimistic, the Aff has won only 94% of the times they "should have" won, while, at worst, they've won only 85% of the times they "should have" won at the TOC. (Consider also that the skew would be stronger in the 2012-13 tournaments, which went 7 rounds in prelims, as roughly half of the debaters had one extra round on the Neg.)


Interpretation
The time skew is statistically significant. The numbers indicate that at the TOC, the Neg picks up at anywhere from 1 to 3 extra ballots per round.

What causes the skew, though? The simplistic answer is the seeming structural disadvantage of the 1AR, described above. But this is a bit like saying, "Honda Civics built in the mid-1990s spend more time in the shop than other similar makes from that era, and are thus defective," when an equally plausible explanation is that that Honda Civics are preferred wheels for crazy drivers who YOLO their way through life / the Interstate Highway System.

In other words, the TOC's emphasis on progressive, spread-based tactics has potentially created the skew, whereas it may not be a problem in a more traditional form of LD.

We might be on firmer ground if we compared results to NFL tournament preliminary rounds to draw firmer conclusions. (Maybe that'll be the subject of a future post.)


Takeaways
First, never uncritically accept a statistic, even one as potentially intuitive as this one.

Second, if the timeskew is inherent--or, as TOC tactics are now mainstream in many regions, will eventually become ubiquitous, which at that point may as well mean it's inherent--then I propose a solution: 6 3 7 3 5 6 2. Give the Aff an extra minute to work with in the 1AR, and turn the 2AR into a voters-only speech. I think it's elegant, workable, and fair. (I typically have a high opinion of my own ideas.) I'd love to hear of a tournament trying it, and getting enough data to draw meaningful conclusions.

Third, if you're running a theory shell using the TOC data, here's an easy citation.

ANDERSON: "In the past three years, over 55% of TOC elimination-round LD ballots went to the Neg, a statistically significant advantage."

Fourth, if you're running against a similar theory shell, and wish to debate the point, here's another easy citation.

ANDERSON: "It is possible, and even likely, that spread tactics themselves are the root cause of the skew, which may not exist in more traditional LD clashes."

Hint: don't run this if you're the one who started the ruckus by spreading.

Meanwhile, I'll be speeding down the freeway in my tricked-out Civic. Or in the shop getting it fixed.

#YOLO?

thoughts about animal rights

The first post about the animal rights resolution has sparked a lot of great questions. Rather than try to answer them in the comments, I'll tackle them here, all at once, and see what other thoughts I can add.

First, a reader writes,

[If] we were to affirm, would major corporations such as McDonalds and Burger King be in violation of these rights, and if they were, would they be shut down by the government, costing thousands of people their jobs and adding to the country's unemployment rate?

This is one of the most critical points in this resolution: it doesn't define the nature or scope of animal rights. For all we know, animals could only have negative rights of a fairly limited extent, such as the right not to suffer cruel and unusual treatment. (It may seem morally strange to allow a person to kill and eat something, provided it doesn't suffer while alive, but that's just one of the morally strange things about trying to blend carnivorous and animal rights.)

So, unless animal rights include a "right not to be killed," we simply can't answer the question.

Next, reader nesh asks, "Didn't we as humans create this system of justice that the resolution speaks of?"

That's a great question that won't find an easy answer. In this view, rights are socially constructed. They're invented by humans, for humans--but this also makes rights a matter of human whim, changing with times and cultures. This gets tricky quickly, leading to cultural / moral relativism, and slippery grounds for disapproving of moral horrors like murder or rape.

Even if rights are human constructs, does it follow that animals are excluded from rights-talk? Not necessarily. There may be a good reason--a utilitarian or pragmatic reason--to extend rights to animals so that all humans benefit. More on this later.

A less constructivist approach is to argue that rights exist independent of human thought, but are discovered by rational actors, much as mathematical concepts exist on their own plane, waiting to be plucked out by mathematicians. Humans might disagree on the nature of rights, but they can't merely construct them. Animal rights could exist in a like manner, waiting for the first John Locke of the dolphins to squeak out a treatise. Even if such an event never occurs, however, a creature that can articulate animal rights--a human being--already exists, and can potentially assign those rights to animals.

An anonymous reader writes,

I do not like anything on the aff side... people will say that there are animals with "near human intelligence" and like arguments. This is not a good argument on several levels... First, that only occurs in certain cases. Not a true reason to affirm, and secondly if they were so smart they would protect their own rights

Giving animals rights for inherent reasons--they're intelligent, they can suffer, they're cute and fuzzy--is only one approach. Another is utilitarian, as I mentioned above: when we assign rights to animals, we protect their welfare, which not only improves their lives (and the environment), but may make us more moral as human beings. To wit, a person who treats animals with respect is more likely to treat humans with respect. (The opposite may be true as well; stereotypically, it's the psychopathic serial killer who's cruel to animals at a young age.)

Furthermore, an ethicist like Peter Singer will argue that the same reasons we defend the rights of defenseless, pre-rational human babies can be extended to the defense of non-rational animals.

As a different anonymous reader writes later on,

As for the justice approach, you're gonna have to be specific about the definition of justice, or what justice really is and what it applies to. Is justice a human-only concept? If we talk about justice and its benefits, is it utility for humans only? and if it is or isn't, why?

Amen and amen.

I'm running out of time at the moment, so I'll stop there for now. More questions, and concomitant answers, coming soon.

Resolved: Justice requires the recognition of animal rights.

The September / October 2011 Lincoln-Douglas debate topic has been released:

Resolved: Justice requires the recognition of animal rights.

It's a fairly straightforward sentence with a lot of deep philosophical implications, and is a great way to start the season.

To get started, here's a thought-experiment.

An alien spaceship descends on your hometown, bug-eyed spindly-legged creatures emerging from its bowels. "Great," you think. "This is gonna be great." You've always wondered whether there was intelligent life elsewhere in the universe--and here it is, practically knocking down your door.

Actually, it is knocking down your door, and vaporizing your furniture, and corralling you and your family into cages, until you're whisked off to some distant galaxy, ostensibly to serve as entertainment for Emperor Garthron of Planet X.

You try to reason with your captors. Their eyes are blank with apathy, however; they cannot hear, nor can they understand your rudimentary bleating. They ignore your gestures and are unfazed by your scribblings. Your actions are meaningless to them, beyond the detached interest of idle alien curiosity.

How would you convince one of these aliens that their behavior is unjust, and that they've violated your rights?

Or would you even bother to try?

Clearly, your rights exist regardless of your ability to articulate them to an outsider. But what if the situation were reversed, a la District 9? Would intelligent aliens have rights?

Or, more to the point, what if animals find themselves in the same position regarding their human neighbors?

How wide is the circuit of our moral concern? Should it include organisms of different species?

Why do we care about animals?
Suppose you feel anger or sadness about recent reports about whales' susceptibility to industrial toxins. Your sentiments could arise from many sources: appreciation of the whales' beauty and power and intelligence; pity for their helplessness; respect for their unique place in nature, or for divine mandates for environmental stewardship. You could also take a different tack, highlighting their instrumental value--for instance, their essential role in the oceanic ecosystem, or their utility as a food source.

The last makes the problem particularly acute. It's tough to concede rights to something you might grill on the barbecue. Here the culturally arbitrary nature of our attachments becomes evident: some folks dress up their dogs in funny clothes, while other folks eat them. (And if dogs have a right not to suffer, why not whales?)

How do we define "animal?"
Dictionary.com (based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary) gives us at least three workable definitions.

1.any member of the kingdom Animalia, comprising multicellular organisms that have a well-defined shape and usually limited growth, can move voluntarily, actively acquire food and digest it internally, and have sensory and nervous systems that allow them to respond rapidly to stimuli: some classification schemes also include protozoa and certain other single-celled eukaryotes that have motility and animallike nutritional modes.

This scientific definition would set up an interesting affirmative:

All humans have rights.
All humans are animals.
Therefore, some animals have rights.
Thus, we affirm the resolution.

The second and third definition are much narrower:

2. any such living thing other than a human being.
3. a mammal, as opposed to a fish, bird, etc.

The former sets up a distinction between human rights and animal rights, which is the traditional manner of thinking about such things. The latter is even more restrictive, making it so the affirmative would have to defend rights for whales and grizzlies and gibbons, but not for lobsters, snakes, or chickens. (Serious efforts to grant rights to apes and to cetaceans already exist.)

Which animals would have rights?
The definition chosen points to a potential answer; other arguments might revolve around distinctions based on sentience or intelligence.

Which rights would these animals have?
Hard to say. In Spain, for instance, non-human apes have rights of life and freedom from suffering.

Where do rights come from?
If they come from God, we may have to turn to some kind of scripture to answer the question.
If they're inherent, we have to figure out whether they're inherent in animals.
If they're social constructions, we have to decide whether our society admits nonhumans.
If they're contractual, we have to wonder whether non-signatories are covered by the contract.
If they're legal constructs, we have to determine whether the law assigning rights to animals is wise.
If they're a matter of utility, we need to know whether a life with animal rights increases utility.

Recommended Reading
The SEP's entry on the moral status of animals.
Lawrence Hinman's list of relevant links and resources.

As always, your ideas and questions are critical. Fire away in the comments.

Note: this is a slightly modified repost of the topic preview from last year, since, following custom, the Sept/Oct topic is the least popular top choice from the 2010-2011 list.

LD topics for 2011-2012

Whitman U's Jim Hanson sends along word that the NFL has released its slate of potential topics for 2011-12:

1. Resolved: The United States ought to extend to non-citizens accused of terrorism the same constitutional due process protections it grants to citizens.

2. Resolved: It is morally permissible for victims to use deadly force as a deliberate response to repeated domestic violence.

3. Resolved: In the United States, possession of handguns ought not be an individual right.

4. Resolved: The use of eminent domain for private economic development is just.

5. Resolved: Estate taxes are just.

6. Resolved: A government has the obligation to lessen the economic gap between its rich and poor citizens.

7. Resolved: A just society ought to prioritize environmental concerns over the production of energy.

8. Resolved: In the United States, law enforcement ought to be required to have probable cause to search data an individual has stored on remote servers.

9. Resolved: Targeted killing is a morally permissible foreign policy tool.

10. Resolved: Individuals have a moral obligation to assist people in need.

The "targeted killing" resolution is my initial favorite, not only because of its timeliness, but because it's focused without seeming too specific. (#8, for instance, seems too narrow for my tastes.)

What's your favorite?

defining "national interest"

Recently, a reader noted,

I am having a lot of trouble defining "national interest". I feel like definitions are going to be extremely important for this resolution.

I agree that it's difficult to precisely define "national interest"--and that a good definition is critical for the universal human rights resolution.

Here's my brief attempt to un-muddy the waters.

National interest is usually defined in terms of the actions or policies that advance a nation's economic, cultural, or political standing. In the introduction to Michael Roskin's incisive analysis of the phrase, Col. John Mountcastle offers a decent summary:

The "national interest" is a composite declaration derived from those values that a nation prizes most--liberty, freedom, security. Interests are usually expressed in terms of physical survival, economic prosperity, and political sovereignty. The list invariably expands, and is ultimately shaped by subjective preferences and political debate. As an object of political debate, the concept of national interest serves to propose, justify, or denounce policies.

Roskin himself begins,

The student new to international relations is often at first intoxicated by the concept of "national interest." It seems crisp, clear, objective: what's good for the nation as a whole in international affairs. (What's good for the nation as a whole in domestic affairs is the public interest.) National interest lies at the very heart of the military and diplomatic professions and leads to the formulation of a national strategy and of the calculation of the power necessary to support that strategy. Upon reflection, however, one realizes how hard it is to turn concepts of national interest into working strategy.

The boundary between international and domestic concerns can be fuzzy, since the two are often (or always?) intertwined. Also, it's possible that national interest-seeking is a zero sum game--that one nation's interest rises only as another's falls, or, in other words, we have to define a nation's interest relative to other nations' interests.

Roskin traces the history of the phrase from Machiavelli to Morgenthau and beyond, summing them up in the overall concept that a nation's sole interest (from a practical and empirical perspective) is in preserving its own power. Roskin also notes the difference between vital and secondary interests, which could be important to clarify the debate.

For the LDer interested in this resolution, Roskin's essay is quite useful. Check it out.

Resolved: When forced to choose, a just government ought to prioritize universal human rights over its national interest.

The NFL has released the topic for the 2011 national tournament:

Resolved: When forced to choose, a just government ought to prioritize universal human rights over its national interest.

It's classic LD, a clash between cosmopolitanism and sovereignty, and among competing visions of the social contract. It's timeless--and, thanks to recent American involvement in Libyan strife, perfectly timely.

I wrote about this resolution in my summer preview of my favorite topics; it was number three on my list. It reminds me of the UN vs. sovereignty resolution from a few years ago, and will include some of the same basic arguments.

I've reposted some of my initial thoughts, have added more, and will continue to add more material as demand arises.

First, some key questions:

What is a "just government?" What is the nature of its social contract? And which contractarian gets it right? If the world is a Hobbsean "war of all against all," the argument is quite different than if the ideal of justice is Rawlsian egalitarianism.

I'd imagine that many Affs would have a value of justice aligned with a criterion of "protecting rights." But the Neg has to ask in Cross-Ex, immediately: where do rights come from? What defines or limits them? If "universal human rights" includes, for instance, trade or labor rights, must nations abandon protectionist trade schemes, or, conversely, stop trading with nations that allow sweatshops--even if it means a loss of economic security?

Why have nations at all? Why not have a universal government? Wouldn't that be the best way to protect universal human rights? Would affirming the resolution lead to a super-state?

Who or what defines "national interest?" Who is the "agent of action" in the resolution? The people? Government agents? Can we make any assumptions about the nature of the government in the debate?

What situations might lead to an forced choice between universal human rights and a nation's interest? (Some might include, but are not limited to, war, torturing terror suspects, immigration / refugee crises, trade agreements, dealing with dictatorships / oppressive societies.)

If a nation's citizens know that its government is going to prioritize universal human rights, will they remain loyal in a time of crisis? What are the upsides of nationalism?

What obligations follow from prioritizing universal human rights?

Do universal human rights exist? Can the Aff, for the sake of clarity, presume that they do--otherwise there's no forced choice?

Links, Analysis, etc.
1. Which human rights? A post from the vault noting the fractious origins of the United Nations' approach to human rights law.
2. Speaking of, The Universal Declaration of Human Rights
3. The SEP's article on human rights is, as typical, excellent.
4. How should we define "national interest?"

Resolved: The United States has a moral obligation to promote just governance in developing nations

With North Africa and the Middle East exploding in conflict, now's a perfect time for the NCFL's LD resolution for the May championship.

Resolved: The United States has a moral obligation to promote just governance in developing nations.

At a reader's prompting, here are some initial thoughts.

First, generally, why might just governance in developing nations be important? Lots of potential reasons, each of which would require some research for warranting:

* It's just / the right thing to do, which is reason enough
* Improves lives / protects rights of citizens of those developing nations
* Reduces conflict / promotes international stability
* Economic security for nations and their trading partners
* Just governance probably better protects the environment
* Reduces the growing pains of globalization

Still, we're not yet to the level of a moral obligation; not all good things are obligatory. We have some hurdles to clear:

1. The Affirmative has to warrant the notion that nations have moral obligations.
Such obligations could arise from several places: the social contract, universal moral schemes (utilitarianism, Kantianism), or legal frameworks (the Constitution, treaties, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, international law). They may be corporate (the U.S. as a government has the obligation) or aggregate (the U.S.'s government agents as a collection of independent moral actors have the obligation).

The choice of moral framework will be critical to establishing the level of the obligation as well. Even from a purely pragmatic or instrumental perspective--that the U.S.'s only moral obligation is to its own needs--if, empirically, promoting just governance is critical to the U.S.'s own security, then we vote Aff.

2. "Just governance" has to be clearly, compellingly defined
Here's where a broader contractarian perspective offers a coherent framework without demanding particulars (What kind of governmental structures? What sort of democratic institutions, if any? What kinds of civil rights?). Delving into specifics potentially makes the Aff an uphill battle. However, it's not impossible to narrow the focus to something like international legal norms, which offer a widely agreed-upon set of "best practices" for just governance.

3. What does it mean to "promote" just governance? Does mere cheerleading suffice?
On the Neg, I'd use a "fork" strategy:
a. If the obligation is mere cheerleading, it's not morally significant, and therefore no obligation.
b. If the obligation requires economic or military action, it's too costly, and therefore no obligation.
c. If the obligation is something else--diplomatic efforts? winning a war of ideas?--it's ineffectual and pointless and wasteful, and therefore no obligation.

4. Is it ever to the U.S.'s advantage to allow--or even promote--unjust governance in developing nations?
It sounds like a question a terrible person would ask, but then, political philosophers are terrible people. We can't presume that just governance provides automatic benefits for surrounding or affiliated nations, never mind the citizens of the developing nation, unless we construe "just" so broadly as to include beneficial outcomes by definition.

In fact, for the U.S. to maintain economic and military hegemony, perhaps it's best to let developing nations remain mired in dictatorships or muddle their own way through. As the Egyptian non-intervention and the Libyan intervention shows, getting involved isn't automatically the best option. More cynically, if developing nations gain power through just governance, they may threaten the long-term interests of the United States.

At any rate, there are no easy, knock-down arguments for either side, although it seems that the Negative, by sheer number of hurdles, has the advantage in this debate.

If you have any questions or would like any further analysis, let me know in the comments. I don't usually cover the NCFL, so I won't blog extensively on this resolution without your prompting.

the irrational creepiness of a private military firm

The other day, while attempting to answer a reader's debate question about the use of PMFs in South Korea, I came across the website of Xeros Services.

Xeros supplies men and materiel for war-making, and offers "cross-structural value," "risk mitigation," and "a nuanced approach." Take away the images of surface-to-air missiles and armored personnel carriers, and you might think you're being sold a 401K.  (Take away the website, and you can't even be sure the company is real: they're barely mentioned on the Web, outside of some duplicated Wikipedia entries.)

PMFs are criticized for making conflict too convenient, and it's hard to argue when faced with a sales pitch like this:

"Our 24-7-365 guarantee means we can help you react quickly and decisively to any unexpected developments, no matter the scale. For a small premium you can have complete peace of mind - and we'll handle the paperwork."

Do you want an army at your disposal? Log in with your password, charge your corporate credit card, and a platoon will be delivered to your door.

It's conflict outsourcing, and it's more than a little creepy.

LD mailbag: 1AR tactics and analytical warrants

Now that the postseason is winding down, it's time to focus primarily on general LD questions. The first concerns tactics in the first Affirmative rebuttal (1AR). A reader writes:

On the negative, all the reading I've done suggests limiting a case to 1-2 contentions. Some of my opponents, though, have negative cases with 3 contentions, 3-4 subpoints apiece. I understand the idea of prioritizing arguments when I'm aff, but when I don't address all of the subpoints explicitly in the 1AR, flow judges extend the individual subpoints and often vote on these "dropped" arguments. One thing I've tried is grouping subpoints under a main idea (e.g. group his contention 1 subpoints because they all pertain to how PMFs aren't accountable), but this is often too general a response. How can I avoid this dilemma in the 1AR?

There are a few ways to handle this.

1. If you know you have a flow judge who can handle speed, go faster and hit every subpoint, even if only with a blippy argument. This may be better than the phantom "drops."

2. Effective grouping may depend on which way you're addressing your opponent's argument. Are you actually taking down the whole argument at once, logically speaking, or just claiming that you are because you think it's necessary?

For instance, consider an opponent who argues:

C1: Private Military Firms (PMFs) are necessary for military operations
a) Speed
b) Flexibility
c) Staffing
d) Superior Resources

If you group and try to argue that PMFs aren't necessary because we could always institute a draft, in a way you've taken out the whole contention, but you haven't really addressed its logic. A draft defeats warrant (c), but doesn't compete with (a), (b), or (d). So your opponent could legitimately argue that you've dropped 3 out of 4 warrants, and her point still stands.

If you group and try to argue that PMFs are both morally abhorrent and that overstretch is good because it limits US military foreign adventuring, now you have two reasons to dismiss the entirety of the contention without even addressing its warrants--first, that moral considerations trump practical considerations, and secondly, a retort or "turn" that actually provides you with offense.

3. The problem with drops is asymmetric, since you lack the time in the 1AR to dismiss your drops as irrelevant or insignificant (if you're taking the "bigger picture" approach), yet your opponent has time to extend and impact those drops. So, if you're in front of a flow judge, you might try this: at the end of your 1AR, say something to effect of, "In her next speech the Neg is going to point out that I've dropped several inconsequential subpoints. In my closing, I'll crystallize the round and explain exactly why those drops don't matter." In that way, you've prepared the judge for your approach.

It may be risky, but it's better than leaving the drops for the judge to deal with in the absence of any direction from you--and with plenty of prompting by your opponent!

Let's move on to a couple of questions about evidence.

My second question is regarding the justifications behind a source. I've found that judges in my state often respond much better to studies/statistics over analysis from a professor/expert, but I know that expert analysis is definitely valuable. How do I respond to claims that "just because a professor says it, it isn't true"? Do I just need to better understand my evidence, or is there some argument I can make to save my analytical warrants?

Your opponent may be correct about the potential dubiousness of expert opinion--but if a professor's expertise and analysis are dubious, what about the analysis of a high school student? Ad hominem is a nonstarter. Instead, argue that your opponent hasn't actually addressed the logic of the analysis, which stands or falls on its own. (Decry the "ad hominem" attack and call it out as a fallacy if necessary.) And besides, the so's-your-old-man to the statistical card is "Figures lie and liars figure." Evidence battles, unless there are good reasons to doubt the evidence, are pretty boring and obnoxious to most judges.

I have one more question for you after going over some recent flows. One of my opponents spewed a lot of evidence at me in one of my debates, but they didn't actually READ said evidence...they paraphrased in 1-2 sentences and provided a brief citation at the end. Call I call them out on that, or is that allowed?

This is a gray, foggy area. Academics do this all the time--and it's quite likely that the cards being cited by debaters in rounds are actually footnoted paraphrases themselves! But without a direct source, we have to hold it in faith that our opponent isn't cherry-picking, card-stacking, context-ripping, or improperly summarizing. That's quite a leap, and it's fair in cross-ex to ask for a direct citation for any "evidence" that sounds too good to be true. But only for evidence that sounds unreasonable or dubious. Otherwise you'll sound like a nit-picker, which is the cardinal sin of evidence-challenging.

When writing your own case, use direct quotations whenever feasible.

If your opponent is doing something genuinely abusive, and you're sure you can convince the judge on this point, then make it a voting issue.

Debaters are encouraged to submit their examples, tactics, or questions regarding the above scenarios.

utilizing force in the postmodern world

The March / April LD resolution asks us to consider the use of PMFs to pursue U.S. military objectives abroad. How does the changing face of war impact this debate?

Traditional war, Rupert Smith argues in The Utility of Force, is obsolete. In its place arise two distinct and yet related phenomena: the extended police action and state-building project known as the War on Terror, and perpetual peacekeeping and conflict management. These phenomena, which Smith calls "War amongst the people," demand new strategies, in which the ends are obscure or distant. As Smith writes,

The ends for which we fight are changing from the hard objectives that decide a political outcome to those of establishing conditions in which the outcome may be decided.... We fight so as to preserve the force rather than risking all to gain the objective.

This idea of force-preservation is central to every development in the postmodern military landscape.

1. The military must evolve.
As Defense Secretary, following in the footsteps of Donald Rumsfeld, Robert Gates has pushed the U.S. military toward greater flexibility and mobility. Fred Kaplan summarizes:

The Army needs to shift from a garrison peacetime force that's preparing for a possible head-on armored clash against a foe of comparable strength to a mobile force that's fighting actual "asymmetric" wars against rogue states and insurgents. The Air Force needs to pull back from its traditional obsession with high-tech air-to-air combat and focus more on joint operations—surveillance, precise air strikes, cargo transport, and rapid rescue—that help the troops on the ground. The Navy needs to focus less on aircraft carriers and more on vessels that can maneuver in coastal waters.

Now that Gates' tenure is ending, it'll be interesting to see whether this momentum keeps building. Necessity would seem to demand it.


2. So long, Social Contract.
In the absence of industrial war, and with Gates' quick-strike model of military supremacy, notions of a draft are no longer with us. The U.S. military is a professional force, and with that, it's only natural that Americans let the professionals handle it. To put it in other words, when security is the project, we're happy to subcontract.


3. Objectives subject to change.
A year ago, would anyone have predicted that the U.S. would consider military involvement in a Libyan civil war? Of course not. Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran, and North Korea would have been the "obvious" concerns, with a rising China and perpetually dysfunctional Russia seen as long-term threats. The situation on the ground changes far too rapidly in a postmodern world.


4. Speed is power, and power corrupts.
Eric Wilson's "Speed / pure war / power crime," found in Crime, Law, and Social Change, 2009, is an interesting read for anyone considering a critical perspective. Following Paul Virilio's analysis in Pure War, Wilson argues that the increasing speed of conflict isn't a side effect, but a desired outcome of the postmodern corporation.

Speed reduces transparency by means of an 'optical disappearance,' which so hinders detection that the crime is effectively re-constituted a 'non-event;' that is, invisible....

By favouring the high-velocity corporations that respond with near-instantaneity to fast moving 'market forces,' 'private' structures displace traditional public institutions that are temporally encumbered by low-velocity traditional political deliberation and public accountability; nowhere is this more transparent than with the military procurement process. Pure War is identical with the systemic criminogenic environment, or 'corruption,' the covert privatization of government functions,' that is the conflation of the domestic political economy with speed. Power Crime is an emergent property of the political hegemony of speed. The question now becomes whether pure war can, in itself, affect a fundamental reconfiguration of national and trans-national juridical space.

Corruption doesn't just threaten the function of the State; when the virtual supersedes the actual, the State vanishes.

value and criterion pairs for the Private Military Firms resolution

The Private Military Firms resolution presents plenty of framework options for the Aff and Neg.

Resolved: The United States is justified in using private military firms abroad to pursue its military objectives.

The following list of Value and Criterion pairs is neither conclusive nor comprehensive. Rather, it's a set of suggestions to spark your thinking. Feel free to share your bright ideas, constructive criticism, and questions in the comments.

A work in progress.


Trending Affirmative

V: National Security
C: Pragmatism / Bolstering defense forces
We ought to value national security because the resolution concerns whether PMFs can reasonably or legitimately be used to attain military objectives. Hence the oft-used "toolbox" metaphor: to maintain security, we have to keep all the necessary tools at our disposal. Limiting our options could be expensive, counterproductive, or disastrous to our military efforts. This position will likely clash with advocacies based on freedom or human rights, since valuing security as paramount tends toward oppression.


V: National Security and/or International Stability
C: Preserving Hegemony
If PMFs help the U.S. maintain military superiority and economic clout--and thus the global balance of power via American hegemony--then they're warranted. The hegemony argument suffers from a couple pitfalls: first, it may not be true (in a multipolar world full of dangerous nonstate actors and nontraditional, asymmetrical conflict, can the U.S. even stake claim to be a hegemon?), and second, even if it's true, whether hegemony is good is another matter entirely--racism, ethnocentrism, or patriarchy, anyone? Benevolence is often solely in the eye of the benefactor.


V: Prudence (defined as carefully weighing political options; see Morgenthau)
C: Political realism
The idea here is that the US must act in its best interests, which are independent of overarching moral considerations. Rather, the U.S.'s goal is to preserve its own power, charting a careful course in a chaotic, Hobbesian world. Realists generally denounce grand state-building / democracy-spreading schemes, however, so there may be a "turn" available: that realism demands a massive scaling-back of American military activity abroad.


V: Justice or Governmental Legitimacy
C: Constitutionalism
The Constitution not only provides a justification for national defense, but seems to permit the use of Private Military Firms. So far, I have yet to see a compelling analysis that PMFs are unconstitutional; if you've found one, pass along word.


V: Societal Welfare or National Security
C: Capitalism / Free Market
PMFs, like any other business, provide jobs to hardworking Americans (and foreign nationals). Further, PMFs are constrained by market forces, which keeps them from acting too recklessly or abominably (lest they lose clients). If you're debating in a progressive region and run this type of argument, expect to face the "Cap K."


Trending Negative

V: Peace
C: Reducing "Warism," Preventing Future Conflict; Pacifism; Isolationism
Duane Cady describes warism as "the uncritical presumption that war is morally justifiable, even morally required." PMFs incentivize conflict, since they have a financial stake in providing security or goods in war zones. When the war ends, PMFs have to move on to the next opportunity. Eisenhower's warning about the "military-industrial complex" anticipated this sort of perpetual conflict machine.


V: Justice or Morality or Governmental Legitimacy
C: Social Contract
The resolution uses the phrase "is justified," which may be defined in moral terms. The moral obligation of the State is based on its contractual duties and limits--and its monopoly on the legitimate use of force. Subcontracting this to PMFs is a dangerous policy, since PMFs are accountable to stakeholders who may not even be U.S. citizens or have the U.S.'s best interests in mind. In contrast, the U.S.'s citizen-soldiers have strong commitments to the U.S's military objectives; it's the focus of their recruitment, their training, their everyday life, and the entire command structure.


V: Justice or Morality
C: Just War Theory
If PMFs don't meet the criteria of jus in bello, we negate.


V: Freedom
C: Reducing the power of the state and/or corporations
The seemingly ever-expanding influence of corporations and states on individuals--and of corporations on states--means that we risk becoming a paternalistic plutocracy that defends its own interests in the guise of national security. Globalization, corporate welfare, financial bailouts... and PMFs, all in an unholy alliance.


V: Justice or Morality or Human Dignity
C: Protecting Human Rights
Thesis: If protecting human rights is essential to justice (or morality), and if PMFs (especially security firms) violate rights with impunity, then we must negate.



Could Go Either Way

V: Societal Welfare (or Morality or Life or National Security)
C: Consequentialism (or Utilitarianism, Act or Rule)
Any case predicated on a body count, a dollar figure, or any other quantifiable metric of success is essentially consequentialist (and perhaps utilitarian). Not that there's anything wrong with that.

the necessity of private military firms

Why might the U.S. be justified in employing Private Military Firms (PMFs) to attain its overseas military objectives? In "Contractors: The New Element of Military Force Structure," found in the Autumn 2008 edition of Parameters (a publication of the U.S. Army War College), Mark Cancian outlines the ways in which PMFs have become not only useful, but entirely necessary.

1. Reconstruction
Cancian dispels the myth that PMFs are mostly mercenaries; in fact, the vast majority of military contractors are unarmed support personnel involved in diverse tasks. The largest group of contractors--nearly half--are involved in reconstruction efforts, with manifold benefits. Not only does it keep troops focused on military missions, but it establishes long-term stability in the occupied territory.

Work removes the bored and unemployed from the streets. Men who might otherwise join the insurgency for ideological or economic reasons now have a stake in maintaining stability. A job also has significance in traditional societies such as Iraq and Afghanistan, a fact that is sometimes difficult for westerners to appreciate. A job means that a man can get married and leave his family's home. Traditionally in these societies, unmarried children do not move out and get apartments on their own. This transition to independent living makes a young man an adult, thereby giving him a stake in the stability of his neighborhood or town.

2. Logistics
The military's own functioning depends heavily on PMFs for logistical support.

Most of the US personnel involved in these functions are blue-collar technicians (truck drivers, electricians, maintenance specialists), the people who keep materiel flowing and bases running. They are unarmed and often highly skilled in their areas of expertise, frequently more so than their counterparts in the military who are often much younger and, in effect, apprentices in their trades. Traditionally, military personnel performed these functions, but the high cost and relative scarcity of experienced uniformed personnel in the all-volunteer force made use of contractors an attractive option. Why use military personnel for a job that a civilian is willing, able, and often better qualified to perform?

For an example, Cancian focuses on food service, an area in which private firms outshine and have largely replaced their military counterparts.

3. Interpretation
Communication makes private support an absolute necessity.

Conflicts overseas, especially counterinsurgencies, require a large number of interpreters so US forces at every level can communicate with the local populace. Although the military is expanding its number of linguists, large-scale operations require thousands of interpreters. The military will never have enough personnel skilled in any particular language (except Spanish) to cover more than a small proportion of its total requirements. Contractors will always provide the bulk of this capability.

4. Security Details and Bodyguards
Admittedly the most problematic PMFs, armed security details and bodyguards draw the most attention, despite their relative smaller scale. Regarding the former,

About three-fourths of these security contractors protect fixed facilities inside major bases and never venture outside the wire.... The main function of these security guards consists of screening personnel entering facilities by checking identity cards. The majority of this group has never fired a shot in anger. They are more akin to the security guards one sees in the United States guarding banks or shopping malls.

Bodyguards, on the other hand, have ignited the most controversy, due to their involvement in violence. Yet according to Cancian, they represent fewer than 1% of all PMF personnel. A lack of coordination with and oversight by military forces, and what Cancian calls the "bodyguard mindset," in which the bodyguard will engage in disproportionate force in order to protect the client at all costs, combined to precipitate the infamous Blackwater incident in 2007. Since then, Cancian argues, necessary changes have been made.

The Department of Defense (DOD) and the State Department finally issued new guidelines that brought contractors under military control, required State Department security officials to accompany every convoy, installed video cameras in contractor vehicles, and clarified the rules on the use of force.

The full impacts of these changes remain to be seen, but it's an exaggeration to argue that PMFs are rogue elements operating entirely outside the control of the government.

5. The Future
The evolution of conflict, which I'll discuss further in a future post, demands an expanding military.

The Army is currently expanding from 482,400 to 547,400 soldiers. This expansion could have reduced dependence on contractors by channeling all the additional personnel into support units. But it has not. Although some of this additional manpower is being integrated into support units, the majority is going to combat units. The purpose is clear-reduce stress on personnel by increasing the number of units in the rotation base. Army leaders have repeatedly cited the need to lengthen the time units spend in the continental United States. In all their testimony related to expanding the force Army leaders have never expressed a desire to reduce dependence on contractors.

The Army is developing a strategy based on a future of "persistent conflict" where every combat unit, active and reserve, deploys on a regular basis. Indeed, the Army's planned force structure does not make strategic sense without the implicit expectation of continuous deployments. As a result, the Army will continue to depend on contractors in support of deployed forces.

6. The Absence of a Realistic Alternative
What of those who would advocate replacing PMFs with military personnel? Cancian dismisses this as impractical, bordering on impossible:

Replacing the 113,000 contractors in the security and logistics arenas (excluding interpreters and all those in reconstruction) would require a minimum of 250,000 additional military personnel, and when the rotation base and training pipeline are considered the number quickly swells to more than 400,000 as a high-end estimate. With the Army struggling to meet the more modest target of its current expansion, an increase of 65,000 active-duty soldiers, such a large expansion would appear impossible without reconstituting the draft. Since a draft is opposed by the military leadership, politicians, and the American people as a whole, reinstituting conscription is infeasible, whatever its attraction for op-ed writers.

Cancian's article, which goes into much more depth regarding the legal status of military contractors, is well worth reading in full, especially for Affirmatives building the case for PMFs.