the benefits of private military firms

Concerning the March/April 2011 resolution, what are some of the tactical and strategic advantages of private military firms? In "Reconsidering Battlefield Contractors," from the Summer 2005 edition of Georgetown Journal of International Affairs, Doug Brooks and Jim Shevlin lay out some of the arguments in favor. The gist:

Private firms play an indispensable role in supporting peace and stability operations from Congo to Iraq, but sensationalization and misinformation of "battlespace contractors" has unfortunately skewed public perceptions and is having an adverse impact on policy formulation. Despite frequent claims that private firms are unprecedented, unregulated, inherently unethical and even a threat to American democracy, the private sector actually has a long history supporting U.S. military operations, is regulated by numerous domestic and international laws and statutes, plays a central role in operations critical to speedy state recovery, infrastructure reconstruction and humanitarian security, and is critical to implementing policies of democratic governments and the international community. The private sector provides policymakers, as well as those tasked to carry out the policies, with remarkably cost-effective and flexible tools, and criticisms of the industry too often have more to do with the politics behind the policies than with the performance of the companies engaged in their implementation.

Private military firms come in three main varieties:

1. Nonlethal Service Providers (NSPs)

NSPs provide logistics services, air transport, construction of military bases and refugee camps, and other specialized services such as water purification, unexploded ordinance disposal, and mobile hospitals. While NSPs face many of the same legal issues as the PSCs and PMCs when they operate in CPC regions, most concerns about NSPs focus on appropriate procurement policies, whether their services should be labeled "inherently" governmental, or whether the U.S. military is too reliant on them.

2. Private Security Companies (PSCs)

They provide armed protection for "nouns": people, places, and things. These include politicians, military leaders, buildings, organizations, convoys, etc.... While conceptually there is little difference between security guards in Iraq and in the United States, where private security outnumbers regular police three to one, PSCs in Iraq tend to have military backgrounds, be better armed, and offer a higher level of armed security capable of defending their "nouns" against attacks by heavily armed insurgents and bandits.

3. Private Military Companies (PMCs)

PMCs are firms used to alter the strategic shape of a conflict. PMCs generally work for states, international and regional organizations and provide military and police training, security sector reform, assistance in defense ministry design, and even advice on proper civil-military relations in a democracy. PMC employees are generally unarmed, though in Iraq some carry sidearms for self-defense.

Note that although Private Military Firms are involved in war zones and may tangentially be involved in combat operations, primarily their purpose is supportive and defensive.

According to Brooks and Shevlin, there are five main advantages to private military firms:
* surge capacity and speed - the ability to recruit and train personnel
* force multiplication - the ability to rapidly deploy personnel, equipment, and munitions
* specialized skills - most often in technology, security details, and training
* ease of use - the competitive market ensures that firms are highly responsive to their governmental "customers," and easily discarded if unsuccessful
* cost efficiency - on the whole, private military firms are cheaper than similarly equipped State actors

The article contains much more regarding the legal status of private firms, both in domestic and international law, too complex to summarize here. Overall, Brooks and Shevlin's analysis is well worth reading for LDers looking for affirmative arguments.

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

The NFL LD topic for March / April 2011 has been released:

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

The United States increasingly depends on private military firms to support its fighting forces around the world. However, that supporting role has become more of a solo act, as firms like Xe (formerly Blackwater) have moved beyond security details or logistics, into combat operations in everything but name--and with problematic results.

This raises several questions. Are private military firms effective, or even necessary? Are they legitimate--whether under U.S.law or under international law? Will their reach and influence continue to expand in a perpetual War on Terror, and, if so, what will be the costs? To whom are private military firms accountable? To whom are they loyal--especially when many of their employees or shareholders aren't U.S. citizens? Is this the "military industrial complex" Eisenhower warned about? Are we seeing the rise of shadowy corporate governance? Is "private security contractor" a mere euphemism for "mercenary?"

Expect security, justice, peace, international law, the social contract, Just War Theory, and corporatism to crop up in discussions. Also, expect huge criterial clash: the word "justified" isn't synonymous with "just."

Analysis and links, as always, are forthcoming--and, as always, your comments and questions are critical.

Added 2/2: A look at some definitions.

Added 2/3: Some initial Aff arguments mostly based on effectiveness considerations.

Added 2/13: More arguments and analysis for the Affirmative, based on military necessity.

Added 2/24: A formative list of value and criterion pairs.

Added 3/7: How postmodern developments change the nature of war.

it's not you, it's us: constitutionalizing secession

Second in a series of previews of potential 2010-2011 LD topics.

One third of first marriages end in divorce within the first ten years, yet fewer than 10% of couples will sign a prenuptial agreement. It would seem that young couples are irrationally optimistic. Or are they smart? Perhaps the act of signing a prenup bursts the romance bubble, creating a self-fulfilling prophecy--a marriage more likely to fail. (Looked for, but couldn't find, a statistic to support or refute this.)

When it comes to another of the potential LD resolutions for the 2010-2011 season, you can see that the basic concern is quite similar.

Resolved: The constitutions of democratic governments ought to include procedures for secession.

Would a constitutional procedure for secession empower separatist groups? Would it make violent secessions or rebellions less likely?

Though it isn't often debated in this country--a bloody Civil War, for most, ended the discussion--secession, like a prenuptial agreement, is a great way to examine the nature and purpose of political marriage. It highlights a problem of particulars: certainly we can use the social contract to justify a government's legitimacy. But why this government, over these people, in this location?

A host of other questions surround this resolution, including, but not limited to...

• What is the purpose of a constitution?
• What makes a government legitimate?
• What makes a nation a nation?
• What is "self-determination?" Who gets it?

The SEP has a decent summary of debate regarding the question. Cass Sunstein is the political scientist most associated with opposition to constitutionalized secession, arguing that it undermines democracy as splinter groups use the threat of secession to increase their bargaining power.

Against Sunstein, Jason Sorens, in the introduction to Secession and Democracy, argues that

...governments that have explicitly ruled out military suppression
of democratic secession have suffered far less ethnic rebellion than governments that have declared their eternal indivisibility. On the basis of this evidence, I infer that a constitutional right of secession would substantially decrease ethnic violence around the world without significantly increasing the risks of actual state breakup in most countries. A constitutional right of secession would instead result in widespread devolution of power, allowing minorities to obtain rights of self-government in the areas most important to them.

Wikipedia's quality entry on secession is a nice starting point. Also of interest: its list of countries with limited recognition, and list of "micronations," many of which are tongue-in-cheek. The "Volokh Conspiracy" law blog had a flurry of posts on the topic a little while back; see here and here and here and here and here and here and here.

sanctions, trade, and private actors

Regarding the Jan/Feb economic sanctions resolution, some affirmatives argue that economic sanctions are immoral because they interfere with free trade, punishing not only citizens in sanctioned nations, but entrepreneurs and corporations in the nations levying the sanctions.

At first glance, the argument seems compelling--but how significant is the impact? In "Economic Sanctions: Public Goals and Private Compensation," found in the Fall 2003 issue of the Chicago Journal of International Law, Gary Hufbauer and Barbara Oegg analyze the economic effects of sanctions.

First, the impacts on trade are relatively small:

Over the past decade, the emergence of new senders such as the European Union and the United Nations, coupled with an expanding list of foreign policy goals, has lead [sic] to a proliferation of new sanctions initiatives. Despite these developments, the total amount of trade disrupted by sanctions remains relatively small. Our estimates indicate that US trade loss due to extensive sanctions ranged from 0.7 percent to 1.8 percent of total US merchandise trade. Lost EU trade is probably much smaller. Similarly, average annual costs of economic sanctions to the target countries seldom exceed 3 percent of GDP. Compared to the tremendous expansion of international trade and capital flows in the last decade, the costs of sanctions in terms of national income or bilateral trade flows seem minor.

However, investment impacts are considerably larger; according to Hufbauer and Oegg's calculations, sanctions affect "as much as 10 percent of world [Foreign Direct Investment]," and that this, on average, would decrease target countries' GDP by a "substantial" 6%.

If the economic impacts are mixed, what might represent another approach for the affirmative? First, consider the wording of the resolution--"... to achieve foreign policy objectives," which in most readings applies exclusively to governments. The affirmative might argue that private actors are a more appropriate agent of action--that individuals and corporations, through grassroots direct action, nonviolent revolution, and litigation, can go after rights violators and rogue regimes.

Hufbauer and Oegg note the Free Burma Coalition, which

...claims that it successfully pressured companies such as Eddie Bauer, Columbia Sportswear, Apple Computer, Motorola, Heineken, Eastman Kodak, Amoco, and Pepsi, among others, to withdraw their businesses from Burma. Some 39 major US retailers have also announced their decisions to cut off all business ties with Burma. Grassroots divestment campaigns are not solely a US phenomenon. Under pressure from the Burma Campaign UK, eight UK investment funds launched an initiative highlighting the unique problems for foreign investors in Burma including the threat of international boycotts, corruption, and the loss of shareholder confidence.

Hufbauer and Oegg also foresee a future in which private litigation, enabled by legislation such as the FSIA and the Alien Tort Statute, and by courts with growing international reach, put a much larger crimp in the economic style of state sponsors of terrorism.

I'm not sure it's worth building a whole case around, but at least it offers a potential block to Negatives arguing that no realistic peaceful alternatives exist.

the sanctions dilemma

Regarding the 2010 Jan/Feb resolution, the U.S.'s potential response to the ongoing crisis in Iran is a perfect contemporary example of the sanctions dilemma.

U.S. and allied officials have been in discussions for months about how to impose economic penalties on Tehran to discourage it from continuing with a uranium enrichment program that the West believes is aimed at developing a nuclear bomb.

But as the Iranian government's crackdown has taken a growing toll on the opposition movement, officials are increasingly concerned that broad sanctions harming ordinary citizens would appear harsh to the outside world and would risk alienating parts of the population with which the West seeks to establish common cause.

The discussions are now aimed at making the sanctions "as narrow as they can be," said a senior State Department official who declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of the talks.

This points to a potential Negative line of argument against Affirmatives who base their advocacy on the harms of broad sanctions. (In fact, much of the literature against sanctions assumes broadly-imposed penalties--a fact that might be quite important to raise in CX.) How I've seen it done:

1. The Aff's harms are based on wide-ranging, broad sanctions.
2. 21st century sanctions, however, are targeted and narrow.
3. Thus the primary reason to deny the use of sanctions is obsolete.

The problem, though, is that narrow sanctions have a much lower chance of success (and, it could be argued, less valuable as a deterrent), not only because they are narrower, but because of a critical lack of information. Going back to the Iran example:

Ray Takeyh, who was an administration advisor on Iran earlier this year, agreed that it was now desirable to make the sanctions as "discriminating and selective as possible."

But Takeyh said that doing so would be difficult because the world has so little information on the inner workings of the Iranian economy that it is difficult to calculate the social effects of any economic sanction.

Targeting "surgically... may just not be possible," he said. "And if it isn't, you might want to rethink how you do it and whether you want to do it at all."

This is not an in principle objection, however; is there another line of attack?

One way is to argue that since the resolution doesn't specify "targeted" sanctions, that the Negative must defend broad sanctions as well, or otherwise they're "conditionally negating," adding words to the resolution and ignoring the general principle. After all, nothing limits the use of broad sanctions in the Neg world--especially if they're seen as a moral (or less immoral) alternative to war. (Usually it's the Aff who's accused of "conditional affirmation"--but this is one of those "ought not" resolutions where the Neg is really affirming the morality of sanctions.)

Another line of argument for the Neg is the "toolbox" argument: that the Affirmative would remove critical tools, including targeted sanctions, from the government's disposal. This would lead to a second dilemma, this time for the Affirmative: without the carrot and stick of economic sanctions, the government is left with a feather of noneconomic sanctions and the bloody spike of war.

alternatives to economic sanctions

Concerning the January/February LD resolution, since the affirmative is charged with claiming that economic sanctions ought not be used, if economic sanctions, then what?

War and other military tactics are, of course, available, but costly. Their advantages: they can be effective in stopping tyrants, and, at least in the modern era, they are normally aimed at military targets, whereas sanctions can be intended to harm civilians. (But see "smart sanctions" for the rebuttal to the latter point.) Their disadvantages: civilians will still suffer or perish; failure is riskier; war is much more costly; the risk of a widening conflict is greater. (I'm sure there are other arguments, too.)

How about non-economic sanctions? Robert P. O'Quinn of the Heritage Foundation details some of the options:

In contrast to economic sanctions, which are intended to penalize a target country financially, non-economic sanctions are aimed at denying legitimacy or prestige. Although the following list is not exhaustive, non-economic sanctions include:

* Canceling ministerial and summit meetings with a target country;

* Denying a target country's government officials visas to enter the sender country;

* Withdrawing a sender country's ambassador or otherwise downgrading diplomatic and military contacts with a target country;

* Blocking a target country from joining international organizations;

* Opposing a target country's bid to host highly visible international events, such as the Olympics;

* Withholding foreign aid; and

* Instructing a sender country's directors to vote against new loans to a target country at the World Bank or other international financial institutions.

Arguably, the last two have an economic impact and thus the Negative might try to claim them as economic sanctions.

The rest of O'Quinn's article is well worth a read; he defines terms important to the debate, deconstructs the oft-cited South Africa example, and points out arguments against sanctions' constitutionality. The only weakness of the article is its date: at a decade old, the arguments might be the same, but the evidence has changed, in utility, scope, and relevance.

value and criterion pairs for the economic sanctions resolution

A work in progress. Suggest your own in the comments.

Remember that this is one of those "affirming a negation" resolutions: Economic sanctions ought not be used to achieve foreign policy objectives.

Trending Affirmative

V: Justice
C: Rawls' Difference Principle (or the Veil of Ignorance?)
Sanctions punish the worst-off by limiting economic growth or keeping critical goods out of the hands of those who need them most.

V: Justice
C: Protecting Innocents (variations on a theme of Just War theory) or Deontology
The gist of the argument: innocents are punished by sanctions; for various reasons, this is wrong. In Kantian ethics, persons are never to be used as a mere means to an end. Arguments can also be made based on retribution or proportionality; innocents should not suffer for the sake of their country's leaders, since they are not due punishment.

V: Prosperity or Societal Welfare or...
C: Capitalism / Free Market
Sanctions interfere with the free market. This stunts overall economic and technological development, increases conflict, reduces the pacifying power of globalization, etc.

Trending Negative

V: National Security
C: Pragmatism or Realism or somesuch
I heard the "toolbox" metaphor employed a few times this weekend: we have to keep all the necessary tools at our disposal. Declaring that we ought not use sanctions limits our options to, essentially, inaction (which is immoral), diplomacy (which is weak), or war (which is often far too costly).

V: National Security or International Stability
C: Preserving Hegemony

V: Peace or Life
C: Preventing Proliferation
Sanctions can keep weapons, especially nuclear weapons, out of the hands of dictators. Even if they're not 100% effective, they are less costly--and less likely to cause spectacular "blowback"--than war.

V: Governmental Legitimacy
C: Social Contract
States are beholden only to their own citizens. There may be practical reasons for avoiding sanctions, but no inherently moral duty for the state to forgo them.


Could Go Either Way

V: Societal Welfare (or Morality or Life)
C: Consequentialism (or Utilitarianism, Act or Rule)
I've already seen arguments on both sides: that sanctions are ineffective and thus waste precious time, energy, and resources; that they benefit organized crime; that they strengthen tyrants; that they hurt average citizens, leading to other ills. On the other hand, I've seen Negs argue for "targeted" or "smart" sanctions; the claim is that they're more effective and don't punish the wrong people. I've also seen it argued that sanctions are more effective at the "threat stage" (and therefore must be used from time to time to keep their deterrent effect). Some are arguing (as per above) that, when faced with intractable opposition, the basic choice is between sanctions or war, and the costs of war are too high. In short, if you choose consequentialism as a criterion, prepare for a potentially back-and-forth round full of twists and "turns."

V: Peace
C: Pacifism or Isolationism

calculating the true costs of economic sanctions

An extremely useful article for both sides of the economic sanctions resolution is "A Prologamena [sic] to Thinking About Economic Sanctions and Free Trade," by David Baldwin, found in the Fall 2003 edition of the Chicago Journal of International Law.

Baldwin's primary aim is to clear away the fallacies that have cluttered up the debate over sanctions. After discussing the inherently political nature of sanctions, he considers their cost.

The logic of choice applies to situations in which policymakers must choose how to allocate scarce resources among competing ends. In such situations policymakers must consider the opportunity costs of their actions. In such situations, choosing a low-cost policy alternative with a low probability of success may not be foolish at all if the likely cost-effectiveness of other policy alternatives is even less attractive. Making that choice may be the rational thing to do. For example, military force may have the highest probability of success with respect to getting a country to change its human rights policy or stop exporting arms. Military force, however, is likely to be more expensive than economic sanctions. In such a situation, it may be rational to choose the less effective and less costly alternative of economic sanctions rather than the more effective but more costly alternative of military force. Herbert Simon explains it as follows:

An administrative choice is incorrectly posed, then, when it is posed as a choice between possibility A, with low costs and small results, and possibility B, with high costs and large results. For A should be substituted a third possibility C, which would include A plus the alternative activities made possible by the cost difference between A and B.

This opens up a potential Negative strategy for cross-examination. Ask, "Is military force justifiable?" If the Aff says "Yes," then you can argue that the cost of sanctions is much less than that of war--and that the other goods that can be instantiated by not engaging militarily, Simon's "C" scenario above, far outweigh the benefits of that engagement--even if the sanctions ultimately fail. (If the Aff says "no," then press hard to determine what sorts of interventions--if any--are justified in response to state aggression or wholesale rights abuses, if sanctions are also off the table.)

And, as Baldwin argues, those who claim that sanctions fail often commit any of three fallacies in thinking. The first is that sanctions must be evaluated against a single objective: for instance, whether Castro is still in power. (As Baldwin notes, this was not one of the four original stated objectives of the sanctions.) The second is the fallacy that sanctions can't be successful in degrees--that it's an all-or-nothing measure of success or failure. Baldwin calls this the "fallacy of misplaced dichotomies." The third and final fallacy is the idea that symbolic actions are functionless. As Baldwin writes,

Symbolic behavior is not unique to economic sanctions. James N. Rosenau contends that foreign policy "involves a degree of manipulation of symbols that is unmatched in any other political situation." And Robert Jervis reminds us that "[a] desired image... can often be of greater use than a significant increment of military or economic power. An undesired image can involve costs for which almost no amount of the usual kinds of power can compensate and can be a handicap almost impossible to overcome."

Economic sanctions are sometimes viewed as so useless and counterproductive that they can be worse than "doing nothing." Even putting aside the rather tricky question of what it means for a nation state to "do nothing," this is misleading. As a practical matter, "doing nothing" means doing what one would have done if the event provoking consideration of sanctions had not occurred. In other words, it means carrying on "business as usual." And countries that carry on business as usual when confronted by aggression (Iraq's invasion of Kuwait), racism (apartheid in South Africa), nuclear proliferation (India and Pakistan), or other violations of international norms are likely to acquire an image as being indifferent to such behavior. If they take action to avoid the acquisition of such an image, they are not necessarily behaving in a frivolous or expressive manner.

Combine this with the evidence that economic sanctions are more effective as a deterrent, and the Negative has a multi-pronged justification for their use.

Iraq and the "terrible price" of sanctions

When a rogue nation is making life miserable for the international community, what can be done? Diplomatic talk is cheap--but you get what you pay for. War is costly, and only sometimes efficacious. Economic sanctions are a potential compromise, a way to pressure a nation into changes, or to at least keep it from wreaking havoc, without the commitment and cost of conflict.

But is it the right thing to do? Or does it end up punishing the wrong people? A recent example of the perils of sanctions--one that's already fully played out--is that of the U.S-led approach to Iraq. In an article published in the New York Times in 2003, David Rieff explores both sides of the sanctions debate.

American officials may quarrel with the numbers, but there is little doubt that at least several hundred thousand children who could reasonably have been expected to live died before their fifth birthdays. The damage, according to those who fought against sanctions, was terrible, medieval. It was, in the literal sense, unconscionable, since those who died had not themselves developed weapons of mass destruction or invaded Kuwait. Rather, they were the cannon fodder for Hussein's war and the victims of his repression.

Madeleine Albright was widely excoriated in 1996 for telling a television interviewer who asked her about the deaths of Iraqi children caused by sanctions, "This is a very hard choice, but the price, we think the price is worth it."

She says now that she regrets the comment -- "It was a genuinely stupid thing to say" -- and in a recent interview seemed still to be struggling with the moral and strategic questions that underlie the sanctions debate. For Albright, the comprehensive regime of sanctions imposed on Iraq represented at best a tragic choice between unhappy alternatives -- a search for the lesser evil.

As Albright put it to me, "I wish people understood that these are not black and white choices; the choices are really hard." Sanctions like the ones that were imposed on Iraq, she said, "are a blunt instrument. That's their tragedy. What was so terrible for me was that I did see the faces of the people who were suffering -- even if I thought then and think now that the sufferings of the Iraqi people were Saddam's doing, not ours. There's a terrible price you pay. A terrible price."

The whole article is worth reading, especially if you're an LD debater interested in the Jan / Feb sanctions resolution.

the Siracusa Principles and compulsory immunization

For debaters creating a rights-based Negative for the immunization resolution, the UN's human rights jurisprudence is worth a serious look. In their study titled "Detention and the Evolving Threat of Tuberculosis: Evidence, Ethics, and Law," found in The Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics, 2007, Coker et al. note that the Siracusa Principles of the UN's Commission on Human Rights, published in 1984, offer a criterion for determining whether individual rights can be restricted in a public health emergency.

Summing up the Principles, the authors write,

The first of the principles is the notion of whether any proposed restriction on liberty is a legitimate objective of general concern... Is the restriction provided for and carried out in accordance with the law? Many democratic countries have legal structures in which coercive public health interventions are sanctioned.... A second principle questions whether available alternatives that are less intrusive and restrictive have been tried.... Another principle addresses the arbitrary, unreasonable or discriminatory manner in which a sanction might be imposed.

When we look to the Principles themselves, we can see specific language regarding public health as a justification for limiting individual rights:

Public health may be invoked as a ground for limiting certain rights in order to allow a State to take measures dealing with a serious threat to the health of the population or individual members of the population. These measures must be specifically aimed at preventing disease or injury or providing care for the sick and injured.

The question is, which "certain rights?" Or, more to the point, which rights cannot be infringed--or, in legal terms, are "nonderogable?"

No State party shall, even in time of emergency threatening the life of the nation, derogate from the Covenant's guarantees of the right to life; freedom from torture, cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, and from medical or scientific experimentation without free consent; freedom from slavery or involuntary servitude; the right not to be imprisoned for contractual debt; the right not to be convicted or sentenced to a heavier penalty by virtue of retroactive criminal legislation; the right to recognition as a person before the law; and freedom of thought, conscience and religion.These rights are not derogable under any conditions even for the asserted purpose of preserving the life of the nation.

The rights concerned are detailed in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. And note that last sentence, which is about as strong a statement in favor of the Neg as you are likely to see in international law.

the tensions inherent in public health law

The November/December resolution throws light on a growing area of legal interest: public health. In "Mapping the Scope and Opportunities for Public Health Law in Liberal Democracies," found in The Journal of Law, Medicine, and Ethics, Winter 2007, Roger Magnusson, a law professor at the University of Sydney, notes (among other things) the tensions in contemporary public health law.

The first, as always, is the tension between proper government action and individual rights:

Lawrence Gostin points out that the protection of the public's health is necessarily a public function that should also be regarded as a duty of government. Discharge of that duty carries "intrinsic and instrumental value for individuals, communities, and entire nations." At the same time, public health law is that body of law which - in a liberal democracy - keeps the state on a short leash, and there is considerable resistance to lengthening it. At the same time, in one of many contradictions in American law, Nan Hunter argues that this is precisely what is occurring as public health and national security have moved closer together to meet the threat of bioterrorism and pandemic influenza.

The "national security" angle is one that affirmatives should explore. The resolution doesn't specify who would be receiving compulsory immunizations; the Negative, presumably, would have to defend the right of medical workers and soldiers (among others) to refuse immunization, even in a crisis.

However, an important Negative consideration is the tension between wider and narrower conceptions of just what constitutes "public health concerns"--and the propensity for the debate to expand into the international arena.

The health and human rights movement provides a further example of public health law expanding to embrace, in this case, global human rights norms and laws, exploring the potential for the promotion or neglect of global norms to enhance or harm the health of populations. The usual criticisms of these approaches is that they turn "life, the universe and everything" into a subdivision of health. In Mark Rothstein's words, "just because war, crime, hunger, poverty, illiteracy, homelessness and human rights abuses interfere with the health of individuals and population does not mean that eliminating these conditions is part of the mission of public health."

The effect of such a broad definition is not only to increase government overreach, but to insulate the government from criticism, since "public health" is a powerful way to frame policies that might otherwise be seen as the normal risks of everyday life, accepted in a free society. Furthermore, globalization puts the drafting and enacting of such policies out of the reach of citizens within any given nation. Thus, from a social contract perspective, a widening "public health" definition is doubly a menace to individual rights and governmental legitimacy.

Resolved: It is just for highly indebted poor countries to repudiate their debt.

First in a series of previews of the potential LD resolutions for 2009-2010.

One of the potential LD resolutions for 2009-2010 offers a good balance of ethics, history, and international relations.

Resolved: It is just for highly indebted poor countries to repudiate their debt.

What counts as a "highly indebted poor country?"* As the World Bank explains, an HIPC must face an

...unsustainable debt situation after the full application of the traditional debt relief mechanisms (such as the application of Naples terms under the Paris Club agreement). A country's debt level is considered unsustainable if debt-to-export levels are above a fixed ratio of 150 percent; or, where countries have very open economies where the exclusive reliance on external indicators may not adequately reflect the fiscal burden of external debt the debt-to-government revenues are above of 250 percent [sic].

(The Paris Club's website offers an alternative summary and history of the program.) "Repudiating" debt means refusing to pay it off; in the larger sense, the term includes a wider connotation of a failure to recognize the rightness or truth of a situation.

3 a: to refuse to accept ; especially : to reject as unauthorized or as having no binding force b: to reject as untrue or unjust 4: to refuse to acknowledge or pay

Thus, the resolution requires the affirmative to argue that refusing to pay off one's international creditors is, in fact, just.

Why?

There are several larger strategies the affirmative could adopt. One could be to argue that the international monetary system, either because of present or past injustices, has made victims out of HIPCs, and uses debt as a weapon to conform developing nations to multinational, corporate desires. (Consider this the "international predatory lending" argument.) This route is explored on websites like Odious Debts, for example. Another general strategy could be to justify debt repudiation on pragmatic grounds: for the country concerned, it eliminates the primary barrier to development at a comparatively minor cost to creditors. From any individual nation's perspective, its social contract is with its own citizens, who would gladly shake off the burden. (On a further note, when freed of the debt, the country is more likely to engage in constructive commerce with its neighbors, leading to net gains on all sides.) Another interesting strategy might be to take a position inspired by the late great libertarian Murray Rothbard, who, in arguing for the U.S.'s repudiation of its own national debt, provides grounds for HIPCs to repudiate their own:

It is precisely the drying up of future public credit that constitutes one of the main arguments for repudiation, for it means beneficially drying up a major channel for the wasteful destruction of the savings of the public. What we want is abundant savings and investment in private enterprises, and a lean, austere, low-budget, minimal government. The people and the economy can only wax fat and prosperous when their government is starved and puny.

What arguments for repudiation are you considering? And what's an appropriate response for the Negative? Get your summer LD fix in the comments.




*Note that the official designation is "Heavily Indebted Poor Country."

"We will find the truth. We will fully investigate."

[via Ed Brayton]

interesting cases for the ICC resolution

What are some of the most interesting cases you've encountered while debating the Jan/Feb international criminal court resolution? List 'em in the comments.

Here are some I've seen...

The Violence Against Women Aff
Since women are the largest single oppressed group, we have a moral imperative and priority to right the wrongs committed against women by joining the ICC.

The IACHR Aff
This case focuses on the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. The reasoning is essentially similar to that of standard ICC cases. One potential advantage is that its jurisdiction is solely over member states; one potential disadvantage is that its scope is narrower, restricted to the Western hemisphere, so it may lack the strength and legitimacy of the ICC. (Here's the Convention that established the IACHR; articles 61ff cover the Court's jurisdiction.)

The Hegemony Aff
To preserve its strategic superiority, the U.S. ought to submit to the jurisdiction of the ICC. It's best to cooperate internationally rather than to try to maintain hegemony alone. (I've seen the Aff try to argue that the ICC wouldn't prosecute an American citizen anyway, since it wouldn't want to risk having the U.S. pull up its stakes and leave camp, but that would seem to make the phrase "submit to the jurisdiction" utterly meaningless.)

The Habermas Neg
Since discourse precedes the establishment of moral universals, and "submitting" means that true discourse is not achieved, the U.S. cannot submit to the jurisdiction of an ICC.

a lack of political will

Suppose it turns out that, legally speaking, acts sanctioned by the Bush administration at Guantanamo constitute torture. Actually, you don't really have to suppose:

In her interview, Crawford acknowledges that it was "the combination of the interrogation techniques, their duration and the impact on Qahtani's health that led to her conclusion. 'The techniques they used were all authorized, but the manner in which they applied them was overly aggressive and too persistent. … This was not any one particular act; this was just a combination of things that had a medical impact on him. … It was that medical impact that pushed me over the edge' to call it torture." What Crawford has done here is astounding. She has repudiated the formalistic (and perennially shifting) definitions of torture as whatever-it-is-we-don't-do. She has admitted that there is a medical and legal definition for torture and also that we have crossed the line into it.

What then?

The answer to that question takes you to a very different place when the act is torture, as Crawford says it is. Under the 1984 Torture Convention, its 146 state parties (including the United States) are under an obligation to "ensure that all acts of torture are offences under its criminal law." These states must take any person alleged to have committed torture (or been complicit or participated in an act of torture) who is present in their territories into custody. The convention allows no exceptions, as Sen. Pinochet discovered in 1998. The state party to the Torture Convention must then submit the case to its competent authorities for prosecution or extradition for prosecution in another country.

The former chief judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces and general counsel for the Department of the Army has spoken. Her clear words have been picked up around the world. And that takes the prospects of accountability and criminal investigation onto another level. For the Obama administration, the door to the do-nothing option is now closed. That is why today may come to be seen as the turning point.

All LDers should be watching this situation closely, since it puts a sharp edge on the debate over the current resolution. It's entirely conceivable that a former president and high-ranking officials, never mind the soldiers, doctors, and citizen contractors who participated, could be prosecuted under international law. They won't, of course, since the U.S. will never allow it. And Barack Obama isn't going to press the case.

Just last weekend, Obama signaled in a television interview that he was not inclined to launch sweeping new criminal investigations of detainee treatment and interrogations that took place under the Bush administration. "My instinct is for us to focus on how do we make sure that moving forward we are doing the right thing," Obama told ABC's George Stephanopoulos. "That doesn't mean that if somebody has blatantly broken the law, that they are above the law. But my orientation's going to be to move forward."

What then?

Update: Eric Posner (U. Chicago) lists five reasons Eric Holder, the incoming Attorney General, is unlikely to prosecute torture charges.

LD mailbag: retribution and the ICC

Regarding the current resolution, a reader writes:

I'm really struggling with this topic, but I think I have an idea for a case. However, I'm afraid that I'm misunderstanding the topic or this idea isn't addressing it in the entirety that it needs to. The resolution has been reading to me that the question for the affirmative to answer is whether or not the US should (I'm defining ought as "moral rightness") submit itss citizens to the jurisdiction of an ICC. My idea is to have a value of cosmopolitan justice and criterion of retribution with the premise that justice is the highest value of any society, making it the highest value of the world/global society, and that the way for justice to be best achieved in this situation is for retribution to be fulfilled because retribution will give the just due to those who have harmed. My question is about the retribution part; I'm afraid I'm simplifying the debate too much because I'm seeing all of these other arguments that are much more complex. I see many other arguments about how submitting will support human rights, but is it wrong to interpret the topic as a response to injustice? Obviously, if there is a need for a court, then it's after the fact; the time for preserving rights is past, and now all that can be done is to punish those who have harmed. I interpret the debate to be that the US should submit if more justice will be achieved by doing so; one of the biggest benefits of an ICC is that there is an opportunity for retribution that wouldn't exist without it. The rest of my points are set up to prove that more justice is achieved for both US citizens and the rest of the world by submitting, so do you think that this could work? Or, like I said earlier, am I missing the point of the debate?

I think there's much to work with here.

1. Philosophically speaking, retributivism is perhaps the strongest justification of punishment, it a moral duty, and thus fulfilling the burden of "ought" in the resolution. Utilitarian theories (often based on deterrence) are a harder sell, since they require an empirical confirmation that the Court actually deters crime, and can be shown, absent side constraints, to justify horrific punishments to maximize deterrent value.

2. I don't think your doubts about retributivism are due to its weaknesses, but rather due to a misconception of the strength of rights-based affirmatives. It's much easier to show a duty to right a wrong than to show a positive obligation to prevent a wrong, especially in a world where national sovereignty is still alive and well and realpolitik holds sway.

3. One way retributivism might flow to the Neg is to argue that the ICC (and international jurisprudence, generally) prohibit the use of the death penalty. The worst atrocity crimes, including murder, merit at most life in prison without parole. If we have a moral duty to punish proportionally--almost always a key tenet of retributivist theory--and if mass murder requires the death penalty, then the U.S. should not submit to the jurisdiction of a court that will fail to carry out justice. (Even from a utilitarian standpoint, it could be argued that the ICC's inability to sentence criminals to death reduces its deterrent value to nil.) For a retributivist defense of the death penalty, start with Kant.

4. Varieties of retributivism (and the title of an anti-death-penalty retributivist piece.)

5. More on the different justifications for punishment, from the SEP.

Your thoughts and questions, as always, are appreciated.

the United States' obligation to further human rights around the globe

Regarding the current LD resolution, any affirmative looking for an actual part of U.S. law obligating the United States to set the observance of human rights as a positive goal of its foreign policy should turn to Ch. 22, US Code.

Sec. 2304. Human rights and security assistance

(a) Observance of human rights as principal goal of foreign policy; implementation requirements

(1) The United States shall, in accordance with its international obligations as set forth in the Charter of the United Nations and in keeping with the constitutional heritage and traditions of the United States, promote and encourage increased respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms throughout the world without distinction as to race, sex, language, or religion. Accordingly, a principal goal of the foreign policy of the United States shall be to promote the increased observance of internationally recognized human rights by all countries....

(3) In furtherance of paragraphs (1) and (2), the President is directed to formulate and conduct international security assistance programs of the United States in a manner which will promote and advance human rights and avoid identification of the United States, through such programs, with governments which deny to their people internationally recognized human rights and fundamental freedoms, in violation of international law or in contravention of the policy of the United States as expressed in this section or otherwise.

The chapter is one of the few places in United States law includes the phrase "crimes against humanity," commanding the Secretary of State to report on any potential aid recipients' participation in such crimes, among other things.

some strategic considerations for the ICC resolution

Here are some things I've been mentally batting around over the last couple weeks: some strategic moves for the Affirmative and Negative concerning the Jan / Feb international criminal court resolution.

Take 'em with a hefty dose of salt, and suggest your own in the comments.

If I were writing an Aff case, my first choice would have to be whether to go with the real ICC, or something like it. I've presented reasons for the former; however, the latter avoids some of the potential problems with the real ICC, described immediately below.

Thus, it's probably wise to have two Neg cases: one versus the "real ICC" aff, and one against the hypothetical. The real ICC can be attacked in many ways: loopholes, Security Council chicanery, lack of enforcement, lack of jury trials, etc. A hypothetical ICC presents even larger problems: a slippery slope to global tyranny, slippery conceptions of "crimes against humanity," uncertainty about jurisdiction or enforcement.

It's also extremely important to clearly define "crimes against humanity." If you haven't already done so, read this article. (Wikipedia, believe it or not, also has a decent summary.) I don't think the Neg should waste any time trying to minimize the badness of most crimes against humanity; as I mention above, it's more about their potential for prosecutorial abuse, either through slippery definitions or politically-motivated charges.

Many, if not most, Aff arguments I've seen involve the importance of protecting all human rights. It's a moral issue; after all, the resolution says "ought."
If I were running the Neg, I'd immediately place two burdens on the Affirmative:

1. To prove that nations have moral obligations. If they can't do this, we can't affirm, since "ought" is moral.
2. To prove that the U.S. has obligations beyond the immediate good of its own citizens.

In other words, why does any one nation have a duty to humanity as a whole? Don't let Affirmatives merely assert that since something is really, really bad, the US has an obligation to fight against it, etc. They have to warrant this.

A Negative styled after hardline Political Realism would be a perfect way to take Burden #1 above. A Negative based on sovereignty (framed by the Lockean social contract) would be perfect to go with #2.

Another thing no Neg should let the Aff presume is the efficacy of the ICC, real or hypothetical. Aff's running the "real ICC," and Negs facing it, should consider Jack Goldsmith's "The Self-Defeating International Criminal Court," found in the Winter 2003 edition of the University of Chicago Law Review. Not only is the ICC ineffective, Goldsmith argues, but it threatens the effectiveness of current rights protection. A sampling:

The most salient class of human rights violators during the past century has been oppressive leaders who abuse their own people within national borders. Under the traveling dictator exception, the ICC does not touch this class of offenders, even if they travel abroad. Unless oppressive regimes ratify the ICC (something few are expected to do), the ICC simply fails to address the most serious human rights abuses.

The only way to overcome the exception is through Security Council action, which means that "such a referral remains subject to the permanent member politics that so worried ICC supporters." Furthermore, the ICC lacks the resources to extricate a tyrant.

defining "submit" in the international criminal court resolution

Several readers have asked how "submit" should be defined in the current LD resolution. Here are some thoughts on the subject.

1. Affirmatives especially should look for definitions that involve "yielding to the authority of." For example, from dictionary.com:

to give over or yield to the power or authority of another

or, perhaps

to defer to another's judgment, opinion, decision, etc.

Either of these avoids the negative connotations that involve "surrender."

2. Really, though, the best definition might involve providing an example of the entire phrase, "submit to the jurisdiction of." In layperson's terms, this means that the United States would grant the international court the authority to prosecute its citizens. What if a U.S. general were brought to trial, say, for arresting and detaining inmates held at Guantanamo who were later released without punishment? If the international court found the general guilty, even though he had not been prosecuted under U.S. law, affirming the resolution would mean deferring to the court's judgment, for good or ill. (There are many other crimes considered "crimes against humanity;" this article is extremely helpful.)

3. As always, your thoughts, comments, and questions are appreciated.

LD mailbag: consequentialism and the international criminal court resolution

Regarding the Jan/Feb LD resolution, a reader writes,

I was wondering if you could help me with my Aff case.

VP: (Morality?)
VC: (Consequentialism?)
Resolution should be looked at from both a global and US standpoint, should be adopted because it furthers the interests of both.

C1: Signing ICC would further US interests
a) Helps with war on Terror
b) Even if the US does not sign ICC, nations can still bring on cases against US.
c) Helps further US image as Human Rights leader

C2: Signing ICC would help further global interests
a) Helps efficiently prosecute crimes against humanity and bring Justice
b) Helps further international law and global cooperation etc.

This is a very policy-like impacts based case, and I'm having problems figuring out my Value Premise and Value Criterion from it. I've seen people debate LD without a Value or Criterion (and win!), but I'd rather not go that route. The problem with morality as a value is that my case is more arguing that signing the ICC better achieves the interests of both parties, not necessarily that those interests are more moral per se. The consequentialism seems to be a good criterion, but then again, I'm sure there must be something that better links to the resolution and my case. Could you please help me? Thanks!

First, make sure you organize your initial analysis as you do your contentions, since they establish the general warrant for your VC/VP.

Second, a value criterion of consequentialism (or, perhaps to be more specific, universal consequentialism) works best with an ends-based value premise such as societal welfare (or human welfare / global welfare). It's even echoed in the language of the contentions--substitute "welfare" for "interests," and it becomes quite obvious what the VP should be.

There's the potential in the case's construction that either contention could stand or fall on its own. This is good, in the sense that either might be sufficient to affirm, but bad in the sense that it seems to tease apart U.S. and global interests. (It also prompts the question, Why should the U.S. care about global interests?) There needs to be strong rhetoric--perhaps in a third contention--that shows that the U.S.'s interests not only merge with the world's, but that, because of the impact of globalization, they depend on the world's interests. And vice versa.

It's also a nice preemptive move against anyone running a realist case that tries to minimize "morality" as a decision rule for governments.

Lastly, regarding the second contention in particular, the ICC has been viewed as toothless because it has no enforcement authority, which also decreases its deterrent value (which is of great importance in a consequentialist framework). The U.S.'s participation in the process would set the stage for U.S. enforcement of ICC rulings as well.

Readers are, of course, encouraged to offer their own suggestions or questions in the comments.