Blake Debate Get Your War On – Aff Edition
Postseason 2010
I affirm
The standard is net benefits
/Gary Woller, June 1997 (BYU Prof.), “An Overview by Gary Woller”, A Forum on the Role of Environmental Ethics, pg. 10/
Appeals to a priori moral principles, such as environmental preservation, also often fail to acknowledge that public policies inevitably entail trade-offs among competing values. Thus since policymakers cannot justify inherent value conflicts to the public in any philosophical sense, and since public only general guidance to ethical dilemmas in public affairs and do not themselves suggest appropriate public policies, and at worst, they create a regimen of regulatory unreasonableness while failing to adequately address the problem or actually making it worse. For example, a moral obligation to preserve the environment by no means implies the best way, or any way for that matter, to do so, just as there is no a priori reason to believe that any policy that claims to preserve the environment will actually do so. Any number of policies might work, and others, although seemingly consistent with the moral principle, will fail utterly. That deontological principles are an inadequate basis for environmental policy is evident in the rather significant irony that most forms of deontologically based environmental laws and regulations tend to be implemented in a very utilitarian manner by street-level enforcement officials. Moreover, ignoring the relevant costs and benefits of environmental policy and their attendant incentive structures can, as alluded to above, actually work at cross purposes to environmental preservation. (There exists an extensive literature on this aspect of regulatory enforcement and the often perverse out- comes of regulatory policy. See, for example, Ackerman, 1981; Bartrip and Fenn, 1983; Hawkins, 1983, 1984; Hawkins and Thomas, 1984.) Even the most die-hard preservationist/deontologist would, I believe, be troubled by this outcome. The above points are perhaps best expressed by Richard Flathman, The number of values typically involved in public policy decisions, the broad categories which must be employed and above all, the scope and complexity of the consequences to be anticipated militate against reasoning so conclusively that they generate an imperative to institute a specific policy. It is seldom the case that only one policy will meet the criteria of the public interest (1958, p. 12). It therefore follows that in a democracy, policymakers have an ethical duty to establish a plausible link between policy alternatives and the problems they address, and the public must be reasonably assured that a policy will actually do something about an existing problem; this requires the means-end language and methodology of utilitarian ethics. Good intentions, lofty rhetoric, and moral piety are an insufficient, though perhaps at times a necessary, basis for public policy in a democracy
Contention 1: A Post Sanctions World
_____ Sanctions are one of three foreign policy tools
/Jesse Helms 1999 (fmr US Senator R – NC; Chair of the Foreign Relations Cmte) “What Sanctions Epidemic”? Foreign Affairs Vol 78 No 1, pg. Online/
Jefferson is right. There are, indeed, three tools in foreign policy: diplomacy, sanctions, and war. Take away sanctions and how can the United States deal with terrorists, proliferators, and genocidal dictators? Our options would be empty talk or sending in the marines. Without sanctions, the United States would be virtually powerless to influence events absent war. Sanctions may not be perfect and they are not always the answer, but they are often the only weapon. Unilateral sanctions, in fact, are the linchpin of our nonproliferation policy. According to a recently declassified analysis by the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, "the history of U.S.-China relations shows that China has made specific nonproliferation commitments only under the threat or imposition of sanctions." Short of war, sanctions are the main leverage the United States has over China
Text: The United States federal government should remove all current and proposed economic sanctions to achieve foreign policy objectives
Contention 2: Constructive Engagement
- It Solves
_____ Positive engagement via diplomacy is key to peace
/Philippe Le Billon and Eric Nichols 2007 (Associate Professor at the University of British Columbia with the Department of Geography and the Liu Institute for Global Issues) "Ending 'Resource Wars': Revenue Sharing, Economic Sanction, or Military Intervention?" International Peacekeeping Vol 13 No 5, pg. 613-632
Positive incentives can address the linkages between resources and wars. Rather than seeking to curtail revenue access to belligerents, revenue can be made accessible to ‘former’ belligerents. Sharing resource revenues, in other words, can ‘buy peace’. This type of positive incentive encompasses a broad range of options. Resources constitute divisible goods, especially in terms of revenues and to a lesser degree in terms of ownership (especially if considering state sovereignty), and are thus amenable to self-enforcing sharing agreements. Divisibility can be arranged according to territorial, organizational, or commercial criteria. A first option is to simply leave the armed group in – at least partial – control of the territory and resources it is holding, for example as part of a local autonomy or secession agreement or even as part of a sanction regime, as in the case of the oil-for-food program in Iraq. A second option is to offer the armed group new resource concessions, the control of resource businesses, or lucrative government positions overseeing resource sectors. A third option is to establish a broad sharing agreement for resources through fiscal legislation. In this regard, any conflict settlement could be considered as involving a sharing of resource revenues as long as opposing parties are allowed to have an input into governing. However, in this analysis we consider only the cases in which natural resources constituted a major financial stake in the conflict and in which agreements had an important resource dimension (although not always incorporated into formal documents, see below). These agreements can take place at various levels, concerning an entire rebel movement as part of a comprehensive peace agreement, or only regional units as part of a local ceasefire or defection process.
And, This is empirically verified
/VOA News 2008 “Economic Rewards Obtain Better Results than Sanctions, Some Experts Say” pg. Onlin /
Policymakers often view economic sanctions as an attractive middle option between doing nothing, or intervening directly to change an intractable government's behavior. But sometimes providing the 'carrot' of economic rewards, rather than the 'stick' of economic sanctions, can be more effective in persuading a government to change its policies. VOA's Bill Rodgers takes a look at some alternatives to sanctions. Declaring war is usually the last resort for policymakers pressing a government to change its practices. That is why they often turn to sanctions to pressure a country's leaders, as is the case currently with Iran, where the United States and other western nations want Tehran to abandon its nuclear ambitions. But Ted Galen Carpenter of the CATO Institute in Washington says sanctions often do not work. "The historical record of sanctions, whether unilateral or ad hoc or multilateral, show that they rarely work," Carpenter said. "They fail more often than they succeed, and they especially don't work very often when they're trying to get the target regime to give up on a high-priority policy." But what can sometimes work is the offer of economic incentives or rewards. The United States slapped sanctions on Pakistan after it carried out a nuclear test in 1998. The sanctions were aimed at stopping a nuclear arms race on the Indian subcontinent. Pakistanis resented the sanctions and found ways to circumvent them. Retired Pakistani Major General Jamshed Ayaz Khan heads the Institute of Regional Studies in Islamabad. "I was in the Defense Production Division when you had these sanctions," he said. "They have an effect, but not an immediate effect, because there is always somebody there to sell the things. But we did manage to survive and survive pretty well." Washington lifted the sanctions after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States, in hopes of enlisting Pakistan's help in the war on terrorism. Military and economic aid flowed in, and Pakistan began to cooperate in hunting down extremists. Sanctions expert Gary Hufbauer at the Peterson Institute for International Economics says the new policy better served U.S. interests. "Pakistan has done a lot, maybe not as much as we've wanted, but it has done a lot in this battle against al-Qaida and the problems going on in Afghanistan," Huftbauer said. "And, if you consider the alternative, which is that we had a hostile Pakistan even today, with this instability, things are so much better than they would have been, if we'd had a hostile Pakistan." Libya is an example where the prospect of lifted international sanctions and resumed commercial ties helped change government behavior. International sanctions were imposed on Libya when it became clear it was responsible for the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103, which killed 270 people, and other terrorist attacks. Washington strengthened those sanctions in 1996. But Libya eventually agreed to make restitution payments to the relatives of the victims killed in the Pan Am bombing and other attacks. And, in 2003, Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi also agreed to to end his weapons of mass destruction program. Libya's ambassador to Washington Ali Aujali says the WMD program no longer made sense in the face of the prospect of having sanctions lifted. "This was a priority of the Libyan government, to get rid of these sanctions," he said. "Not only because that in daily life we felt it, but because also of the political complications and... I think both sides realize that we've been able to achieve nothing in 25 years of hostile relations, but we've been able to achieve a lot in three or four years of our new relations."
- Its net beneficial
_____ Economic freedom is key to reducing tyranny
/Daniel T. Griswold January 4, 2004 (Associate Director, Center for Trade Policy Studies, Cato Institute) “Trading Tyranny for Freedom: How Open Markets Till the Soil for Democracy,” CATO TRADE POLICY ANALYSIS No 26, pg 2-3/
Economic freedom and trade provide a counterweight to governmental power. A free market diffuses economic decision making among millions of producers and consumers rather than leaving it in the hands of a few centralized government actors who could, and often do, use that power to suppress or marginalize political opposition. Milton Friedman, the Nobel-prize-winning economist, noted the connection between economic and political freedom in his 1962 book, Capitalism and Freedom: Viewed as a means to the end of political freedom, economic arrangements are important because of their effect on the concentration or dispersion of power. The kind of economic organization that provides economic freedom directly, namely competitive capitalism, also pro- motes political freedom because it separates economic power from political power and in this way enables the one to offset the other. This dispersion of economic control, in turn, creates space for nongovernmental organizations and private-sector alternatives to political leadership—in short, civil society. A thriving private economy creates sources of funding for non-state institutions, which in turn can provide ideas, influence, and leadership outside the existing government. A more pluralistic social and political culture greatly enhances the prospects for a more pluralistic and representative political system. Private- sector corporations, both domestic and foreign-owned, create an alternate source of wealth, influence, and leadership. Theologian and social thinker Michael Novak identified this as the “Wedge Theory,” in which capitalist practices “bring contact with the ideas and practices of the free societies, generate the economic growth that gives political confidence to a rising middle class, and raise up successful business leaders who come to represent a political alternative to military or party leaders. In short, capitalist firms wedge a democratic camel’s nose under the authoritarian tent.”4 Just as important, economic freedom and openness encourage democracy indirectly by The faster growth and greater wealth that accompany trade promote democracy by creating an economically independent and politically aware middle class. A sizeable or dominant middle class means that more citizens can afford to be educated and take an interest in public affairs. As citizens acquire assets and establish businesses and careers in the private sector, they prefer the continuity and evolutionary reform of a democratic system to the sharp turns and occasional revolutions of more authoritarian systems. People who are allowed to successfully manage their daily economic lives in a relatively free market come to expect and demand more freedom in the political and social realms.
And, Tyranny is the biggest source of human rights abuses
/Cherif Bassiouni 1996 (Distinguished research law prof emeritus at Depaul Univ) “Searching for Peace and Achieving Justice: The Need for Accountability” Law and Contemporary Problems, Vol. 59, No. 4, pg. Jstor/
Since World War II, the number of conflicts of an international character declined as did their harmful impact, in comparison to other types of conflicts whose harmful consequences increased. Indeed, the occurrence of conflicts of a non-international character and purely internal conflicts has dramatically increased in number, intensity, and victimization. In addition, tyrannical regimes produced systematic and large scale-victimization far exceeding quantitatively and qualitatively the harmful results generated by all other types of conflicts. Conflicts of a non-international character, purely internal conflicts, and tyrannical regime victimization have occurred all over the world. That victimization has included genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes, along with, inter alia, extra-judicial executions, torture, and arbitrary arrest and detention, all of which constitute serious violations of fundamental human rights protected by international human rights law.3 During the course of the twentieth century it is estimated that conflicts of a non-international character, internal conflicts, and tyrannical regime victimization have resulted in more than 170 million deaths. This is compared with an estimated 33 million military casualties.5 It is estimated that since World War II, more than 250 conflicts of a non-international character, internal conflicts, and tyrannical regime victimization have occurred. These situations have resulted in an estimated 86 million casualties.
Contention 3: War