Aff Disclosure – Blake Round 4
1AC
Discrimination
Contention 1 is Discrimination –
The Supreme Court upholding the travel ban is an anomaly in regards
to precedent – it extends beyond the reach of plenary power,
enshrining a “national security exception” that always prioritizes
vacuous national security threats over violence inflicted upon
Muslims
Adam Cox et al 18, Robert A. Kindler Professor of Law at NYU School of Law,
Ryan Goodman, Co-Editor-in-Chief of Just Security, Anne and Joel Ehrenkranz
Professor of Law at New York University School of Law, former Special Counsel
to the General Counsel of the Department of Defense until 2016, and Cristina
Rodríguez, Leighton Homer Surbeck Professor of Law at Yale Law School,
Former Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Legal Counsel in the
U.S. Department of Justice until 2013, “The Radical Supreme Court Travel Ban
Opinion–But why it might not apply to other immigrants’ rights cases”,
https://www.justsecurity.org/58510/radical-supreme-court-travel-ban-opinion-butapply-immigrants-rights-cases/
New twist in “plenary power” doctrine The disquieting nature of the decision
is its novel standard for
evaluating the constitutionality of an immigration measure like the travel ban. The Court’s standard, in
essence, is that even when an unconstitutional motive for a policy exists (like anti-Muslim animus), if
there is also a plausible justification for the action, and the text of the order is neutral on its face, then the
policy is valid . Many commentators criticized this aspect of the decision for continuing the Court’s embrace of the
so-called “plenary power” doctrine, which purports to give enormous deference to the political branches’ immigration
policies. The Court’s approach, however, marks a departure from the past , not continuity with it.
To see this move, it is crucial to understand how the plenary power doctrine has been applied historically. In the past, the
Court has invoked the doctrine in upholding immigration policies that might have been upheld even outside of the
immigration context, due to the weak constitutional protections of the time. As one of us explained on Just Security when
the travel ban was first announced: [W]hat is too-often overlooked about [plenary power] cases is when they were
decided: each of them was decided during a constitutional era when such policies were often accepted as a matter of
domestic law as well. Chae Chan Ping was decided seven years before Plessy v. Ferguson, which upheld Jim Crow
segregation and birthed the infamous jurisprudential principle of “separate but equal.” Harisiades was decided in 1952, a
period when First Amendment protections were much more watered down—and when communist party members were
not infrequently criminally prosecuted. And Fiallo was handed down in the mid-1970s, during the nascent phase of the
Court’s sex equality jurisprudence, when a number of domestic laws that discriminated on the basis of sex were upheld by
the Supreme Court. … In short: The Supreme Court has never upheld an immigration policy that
openly discriminated on the basis of race or religion during a period of constitutional history when
such a policy would have been clearly unconstitutional in the domestic context. On Tuesday,
the Court appears to have done what we previously thought unthinkable : to hold that, even if
we know that an immigration policy was motivated by blatant official animus against a religion, the policy should be
sustained so long as the government proffers some rational national security basis for it. In a non-immigration context, a
policy that the President has defended with clear disdain for Muslims and Islam would almost certainly be subject to
exacting scrutiny, even if neutral on its face, because of the chief decision-maker’s discriminatory intent. Here, the Court
acknowledges (without adjudicating) that the plaintiffs allege that the “primary purpose” of the Executive Order was
religious animus. Yet the majority concludes that the policy is permissible because evidence can be mustered to show an
additional purpose related to national security. It’s almost as if Donald J. Trump and his litany of statements didn’t exist;
the President, instead, is an abstraction sitting atop an ordinary national security bureaucracy that scrutinizes the world for
real threats and adopts policies tailored to meet them. In articulating its standard of review, the Court essentially
admits that the policy could very well be based on unconstitutional grounds, but concludes
that this fact is irrelevant so long as a separate and additional non-illicit reason for the policy is available. The
Court will strike down immigration policies only if they “lackany purpose other than a ‘bare … desire to harm a politically
unpopular group.’” The Court will “uphold the policy so long as it can reasonably be understood to result from a
justification independent of unconstitutional grounds.” After laying out this weak standard of review, the Court goes on to
apply that review without even once referring back to the President’s discriminatory statements that it has already
recounted and that Justice Sotomayor powerfully assembles in her dissent. Compare this framework with the canon of
anti-discrimination constitutional cases. Normally, the existence of discriminatory intent is what moves the inquiry out of
rational basis review and triggers more heightened scrutiny of the decision-making process. The Court’s travel ban
opinion flips that analysis on its head. Once the Court identified a plausibly legitimate basis for the travel ban, that was the
end of the inquiry. Imagine the Court saying “because there is persuasive evidence that the felon disenfranchisement law
adopted by the Alabama constitutional convention in 1901 has a legitimate grounding in punishment and deterrence, quite
apart from any racial hostility, we must accept that justification.” Such a statement would be shocking. And we know that
the Court has held exactly the opposite , striking down Alabama’s 1901 felon disenfranchisement law
because it was motivated by racial animosity, just a few years after the Court had held that felon disenfranchisement
policies in general had both a legitimate basis and constitutional sanction. Yet that is what the Court’s doctrinal approach
in the travel ban decision would require.
The travel ban is a defining moment in history. It operates as a living
symbol that conflates Muslims with terrorism, encouraging private
violence
Khaled a Beydoun 18, law professor and the author of American Islamophobia:
Understanding the Roots and Rise of Fear, “The Korematsu moment for Muslim
Americans”, https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/korematsu-momentmuslim-americans-180628093048161.html
There have been definitive
moments in recent history that have vividly marked what it means to be
Muslim in the US today. These are moments when state action, in full candour and force, reveals that
the faith practised by at least 3.5 million Americans and 1.8 billion people globally is more of a national
security threat than a religion deserving of protection and respect . June 26 , 2018, will
forever stand as one of those moments . On that day, with a 5-to-4 vote the United States Supreme
Court issued its long-awaited ruling on President Donald Trump's so-called "travel ban", upholding the third rendition of his
executive order restricting entry of nationals from seven countries, five of them Muslim-majority. The majority decision,
authored by Chief Justice John Roberts, found that the order was non-discriminatory because religion (Islam) was not
explicitly mentioned in its text. Trump's incessant and virulent anti-Muslim rhetoric surrounding the order was ultimately
deemed immaterial. Stripping the Muslim ban of its context The Supreme Court has inferred religious discrimination (with
facially neutral policy) when the target is Christians. This was recently illustrated in the opinion in Masterpiece Cakeshop v
Colorado Civil Rights Commission. But less than a month later, the court pivoted from that position when the subjects of
religious hostility were Muslims, although the evidence of anti-Muslim animus coming from Trump was recurring and
robust, and established an intent to discriminate. Evidence
of religious animus the court's majority "failed"
to find in the text of the travel ban saturated the context that birthed it , lurid in the statements and
slurs of its executive benefactor and the structure of the order that preceded it. Just one week after his inauguration,
Trump signed an executive order restricting the entry of immigrants from seven countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia,
Sudan, Syria and Yemen. All of them are Muslim-majority countries. Sudan and Iraq subsequently removed from the list
and replaced by Venezuela and North Korea, but that doesn't change the fact that the executive order echoed Trump's
December 2015 proposal to ban Muslims. Apart from his vow to impose a Muslim ban, Trump also declared "Islam hates
us" on primetime television, re-tweeted anti-Muslim propaganda, and has repeatedly incited anti-Muslim sentiment
through his rhetoric and policies. Trump has never made an attempt to disavow or distance himself from his anti-Muslim
pronouncements. Yet the court deemed none of that relevant to the case they were ruling on. In his justification of the
decision, Chief Justice Roberts adopted a textual approach that stripped the facially neutral language of the executive
order from its virulently Islamophobic political context, in turn, leveraging textualism as a means to justify religious
discrimination at US borders - but also, within them. In her dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who voted against the
ruling, rightly argued: "Despite several opportunities to do so, President Trump has never disavowed any of his prior
invidious statements about Islam. Instead, he has continued to make remarks that a reasonable observer would view as
The Supreme
Court's ruling is a definitive moment for Muslims because it is far more than a
decision impacting immigration policy or the scope of executive authority. It has become not only
a symbolic declaration from the highest court of the land that justifies religious
an unrelenting attack on the Muslim religion." The court ruling as an affirmation of Islamophobia
discrimination on account of tenuous national security concerns, but also a decision affirming the
conflation of Muslim identity with "terror threat". As I have written elsewhere , "Dialectical
Islamophobia is the process by which structural Islamophobia shapes, reshapes, and endorses
views or attitudes about Islam and Muslims." In this sense, the court's decision ultimately
encourages private violence against Muslims (and perceived Muslims). The scope of parties
affected by the decision is more than Muslim immigrants travelling from the five Muslim-majority states, but also Muslim
citizens and residents living in the United States, who will be made more vulnerable to hate violence and intimidation from
Islamophobic elements emboldened by this Supreme Court ruling. The
ruling will permanently stand as a
living symbol , similar to the Dred Scott and Korematsu decisions holding black people to be property and
Japanese Americans to be subversive threats, respectively. It affirmed the fundamental tenet of
Islamophobia : that Islam is inherently violent, alien, and inassimilable, driven by the belief that
expressions of Muslim identity foreshadow terrorism. For those who still claim that "Islamophobia isn't real" or a form of
animus embellished by Muslims and their allies, this ruling from the highest court shows they were wrong. And for
Muslims, it will serve as a standing reminder that their religion will mark them, above all, as
national security pariahs - whether immigrants travelling from Africa or the Middle East, or US citizens living in
communities across the country.
Judicial deference on “national security” justifies atrocities – the plan
provides a balance that checks abuses without draining executive
flexibility
Ilya Somin 17, Professor of Law at George Mason University, author of "The
Grasping Hand: Kelo v. City of New London and the Limits of Eminent Domain"
and "Democracy and Political Ignorance: Why Smaller Government is Smarter”,
“The case against special judicial deference in immigration and national security
cases”, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokhconspiracy/wp/2017/10/22/the-case-against-special-judicial-deference-inimmigration-and-national-security-cases/?utm_term=.c4dda18ea383
One of the issues at stake in the ongoing litigation over President Trump’s travel ban executive orders is the extent to
which judges should give special deference to the president in cases involving immigration and national security. The
administration and its defenders argue for sweeping deference of a kind that would not be accorded in other constitutional
cases. Such claims are far from unique to Trump and the travel ban cases. But they are wrong nonetheless. Rejecting
special deference does not mean that all national security and immigration policies should be subject to a high level of
judicial scrutiny. Many need not be. it simply means such policies should not get a blanket exemption
from the kind of judicial review applied to similar policies in other fields. The usual rationale for judicial deference on
national security and immigration is that these issues pose great risks, and that the president and Congress have
specialized expertise on them that judges cannot hope to match. In an excellent recent article at the Lawfare website,
legal scholars Ganesh Sitaraman and Ingrid Wuerth critique such “national security exceptionalism” by pointing out that
national security policy isn’t really all that exceptional: By national security “exceptionalism,” we mean
arguments that all national security cases as a group should be subject to different analysis than cases not related to
national security. For example, courts and commentators sometimes reason that in all national security cases, courts
should defer to the executive branch because the courts lack expertise in the field of national security, or because national
security issues are uniquely important… Unfortunately, these justifications do not withstand logical scrutiny.
Take the importance of national security issues. It is true that national security is an important objective and that errors
could have serious consequences. But domestic
issues such as surveillance, data collection,
health care, property rights, and firearms are also of great—or sometimes even greater—
significance to the lives and well-being of millions of Americans, and errors could be significant in those arenas.
Yet courts routinely adjudicate those cases . What about the executive branch’s expertise in foreign
affairs and national security? It is true that courts don’t have as much depth in these areas, but courts also have less
expertise than bureaucrats in a wide variety of extremely complex issues that they routinely address ,
including antitrust, financial regulation, public utilities rate regulation, nuclear waste disposal,
and insurance markets. In our system of generalist judges, there is no reason to single out
“national security” decisions as categorically too technical or otherwise difficult to evaluate. While there might
be particular issues within the national security realm that warrant some deference based on the comparative expertise of
the executive branch vis-à-vis the judiciary, the broad category most certainly does not. Sitaraman and Wuerth are
absolutely right about national security exceptionalism. Even if we confine the analysis to risks to life, it is far from clear
that national security cases on average involve greater danger than many other categories. For example, vastly more
Americans die every year because of ordinary domestic crime and traffic accidents than because of
war or terrorist attacks by foreigners or immigrants. In 2016 alone, some 40,000 Americans died in traffic
accidents, far more than all US fatalities in the War on Terror and the Iraq war combined, and twelve times more than the
traffic safety and domestic law
enforcement involve a variety of technical issues on which the legislative and executive branches have
greater expertise than courts. Yet the courts regularly decide cases in these fields without granting
fatalities from all foreign-born terrorists since 1975. Like national security policy,
the government any special deference. For example, a landmark Supreme Court decision struck down a traffic safety law
that discriminated on the basis of sex, despite considerable evidence indicating that young male drivers created greater
risks than female ones of the same age. Special judicial deference in the national security field is also sometimes
defended on the grounds that national security policy relies on secret information that is inaccessible to the judiciary. But
this is far from universally true. As Sitaraman and Wuerth point out: Some national security decisions need to be shrouded
in secrecy, while others do not. Some might require great haste, others do not. At the same time, many ordinary
“domestic” issues require secrecy or haste, and yet the Supreme Court has never accepted blanket claims of deference to
the president for all domestic policymaking. Courts should accordingly afford the president greater discretion than normal
only when based on a specific justification—not on the general principle that all national security cases pose unique risks.
Indeed, a deferential posture toward the executive branch for the category of “national security” or “foreign
creates a dangerous incentive for the executive to claim that virtually every
policy is crucial to national security . Even in the comparatively rare instances when cases do turn on
secret information, courts have established procedures for considering such evidence “in
camera,” without revealing it to the public. Strikingly, the Trump administration has chosen not to avail itself of such
relations” cases
procedures in the travel ban litigation. They have agreed to confidentially reveal the government report supposedly
justifying the most recent travel ban order to one of the federal judges considering its legality, but have urged him not to
consider the report in making his decision. I suspect that is because the report does not really provide any good
justification for the order. What is true of national security policy is even more true for immigration policy. Here, there is
even less reason to believe that either the risks involved or the government’s special expertise are any greater than in a
the crime rate
of immigrants (including undocumented ones) is actually far lower than that of native-born
Americans . The risk that that any given American will be killed on US soil by an immigrant
terrorist is about 1 in 51 million per year, much lower than the risk of being killed by a lightning strike. If
vast range of domestic policy fields. True, some immigrants turn out to be criminals or terrorists. But
domestic crime control policy does not qualify for special judicial deference on grounds of risk and expertise, neither
should immigration policy. Similarly, immigration policy does not rely on secret information any more than policymaking in
a wide range of other areas. The tragic history of special judicial deference on national security and immigration casts
special deference led to such nowpersecution and intermment of
Japanese-Americans during World War II, and rulings permitting serious abuses of civil
liberties during World War I and the early Cold War. In the immigration field, judicial abdication helped empower the
government to enact cruel and racist policies , such as the Chinese Exclusion Act and
the exclusion of many Jewish refugees fleeing Nazism in the 1930s. By contrast, it is difficult to find
further doubt on the justification for this practice. In the national security field,
reviled rulings as the Supreme Court’s decisions upholding the
examples where special judicial deference on national security or immigration policy led to the upholding of important
special deference in these two fields
has been considerably eroded by Supreme Court decisions. For example, the Court showed very little
deference to the Bush administration in the various cases challenging the legality of detentions at Guantanamo, such
as Boumediene v. Bush (2008). Special deference in the immigration field is also in gradual
decline. The courts should repudiate the idea of special deference more fully. Repudiating a general doctrine of
judicial deference in immigration and national security policy does not mean that all government
policies in these fields would be subject aggressive judicial review . It only requires that
constitutional challenges to government policies in these two fields should get the same treatment as
those challenging policies on other issues. Policies that do not impinge on constitutional rights or
structural constraints on federal power should still be upheld with little or no difficulty . The appropriate
beneficial policies that would otherwise have been invalidated. In recent years,
level of judicial scrutiny should be determined not by whether the policy in question involves immigration or national
security, but by the degree to which it threatens constitutional limits on government power.
“National security” exceptionalism is so vague that it ensures
violence in other areas of law
Anne Gearan 18, White House reporter Education: Allegheny College, BA in
English and History, “For President Trump, ‘ national security’ can mean just
about anything ”, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/for-president-trumpnational-security-can-mean-just-about-anything/2018/08/22/e513b456-a61b11e8-a656-943eefab5daf_story.html?utm_term=.f17daaad9146
To hear President Trump tell it, America’s national security is facing threats from far beyond the usual list of enemies.
Immigrants? Refugees? Transgender soldiers? All must be curtailed in the name of protecting the
Separating children from migrant parents detained at the border? A needed national
security step . Imported steel and aluminum? They “threaten to impair the national
security.” That new Mercedes-Benz? May also be a security risk, but he’ll decide later. Revoking security
clearances retained by former senior government officials who happen to be critics of the president? A needed
step to protect classified information from former officials whose television commentary the president deems
“unglued.” Propping up ailing coal and nuclear power plants ? “Essential to support the
Nation’s defense facilities.” “In times of war, in times of conflict, you can blow up those windmills. They fall down
country.
real quick,” Trump said Tuesday evening during a campaign rally in West Virginia. “You can blow up those pipelines. They
go like this, and you’re not going to fix them too fast. You could do a lot of things to those solar panels, but you know what
you can’t hurt? Coal. You can do whatever you want to coal.” [Trump preparing to use national security exemption to help
ailing coal, nuclear plants] The Trump administration is increasingly using
national security as the public or
legal justification for controversial policies and decisions by the president — even when there seems
to be little connection between the issue at hand and threats to the nation.
Defenses of the travel ban rely on precedential whitewashing
Robert S. Chang 18, Professor of Law and Executive Director, Fred T.
Korematsu Center for Law and Equality, Seattle University School of Law,
“Whitewashing Precedent: From the Chinese Exclusion Case to Korematsu to
the Muslim Travel Ban Cases”,
https://scholarlycommons.law.case.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4779&context
=caselrev
A proper appreciation
of the ways the Chinese Exclusion Case and Korematsu lie at the
heart of the defense of the Muslim travel ban is necessary to understand fully what is at
stake doctrinally . Once these cases are addressed openly, it increases the possibility that the legal
challenges will result in a course correction that 1) fixes the constitutional deformity known as the
plenary power doctrine and 2) ensures that courts will fulfill their constitutional role as a check to
executive power and not simply give the political branches a blank check whenever they invoke national security.
Stated differently, the hope is that the decision rendered by the Supreme Court does not reinstate the flawed
cases upholding
Asian exclusion in detail and explains how these cases might be described as embodying immigration
exceptionalism —a jurisprudence that exists outside of what we would expect in terms of constitutional
jurisprudence. Part II discusses the World War II cases that embody national security
exceptionalism . Part III details how the D epartment o f J ustice, in defending President Trump’s executive
orders, relies extensively on precedent that is based on the Chinese Exclusion Case and
Korematsu. This citation practice might be labeled a form of whitewashing . The Article concludes
jurisprudence behind the Chinese Exclusion Case and Korematsu. Part I of this Article discusses the
by arguing that the Court should not, sub rosa, reaffirm Korematsu and the Chinese Exclusion Case.
Whitewashing is a form of violence used to suppress colonized
groups
Franco Eugene Herminio Porras 17, Oddysey/Medium reporter, at College of
Charleston, “Why Whitewashing Is A Form Of Violence”,
https://www.theodysseyonline.com/whitewashing-form-violence
Why do we see so many articles in which the focus on whitewashing controversies is on how much money they lose or
the pitfalls of budgeting? We must know, in an America lead by the most obvious of racists, that representation in media
does not guarantee a future of racial reconciliation. Hollywood is not out to decolonize the collective imagination of its
customers; there is nothing beyond a motive for profit in their decisions to make the new Star Wars less white, or to make
We must rethink why we are
outraged at whitewashing . When we make folks who are not white a monolith, as we do when we lump
Chinese, Japanese and Korean cinema together when it comes to our discussions on "Ghost in the Shell" and
"Iron Fist," we are not merely misnaming or speaking over those people . Whitewashing is itself
a kind of violence borne from colonialism , a caricature of the "Other" created by the
white gaze in order to establish dominance and supremacy over colonized peoples .
LeFou gay in the live action adaptation of "Beauty and the Beast."
Therefore, when artists tell stories about white folks in stories that do not feature any sort of whiteness, their art serves the
goals and interests of empire: to relegate formerly and presently colonized people into the margins. What of the new
Yasuke film in the works -- the tale of the African samurai who served under Oda Nobunaga in Japan? Say the casting is
entirely correct, any white directorial pitfalls are avoided and market trends are in favor of the film's diversity. What if it
bombs the same as "Iron Fist" or "Ghost in the Shell?" There would be myriad reasons to answer trolls, of course, but the
premise of profit remains intact.
versa.
We must interrogate
how
whiteness informs the motive for profit and vice
Application of the shared stewardship model would result in the
courts striking down the Travel Ban on the grounds it exceeds the
power delegated to the executive by the INA
Peter Margulies 18, Professor of Law, Roger Williams University School of
Law; B.A., Colgate University; J.D., Columbia Law School, “BANS, BORDERS,
AND SOVEREIGNTY: JUDICIAL REVIEW OF IMMIGRATION LAW IN THE
TRUMP ADMINISTRATION”,
https://digitalcommons.law.msu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1198&context=lr
To offer a cohesive normative account that fills the gaps left by immigration case law and commentary,24 shared
stewardship relies on three factors to trigger heightened review: (1) degree of sovereign interest;25 (2) number and
intensity of collateral impacts; and (3) absence of intelligible limits. When courts find an attenuated sovereign interest,
substantial collateral impacts on U.S. persons or entities, and no intelligible limits, courts should apply a more searching
brand of review, requiring a tighter means-end fit between the challenged measure and its putative objectives. Often,
application of that more rigorous standard would result in invalidation of the measure at issue. Conversely, a looser
means-end fit would suffice when there is a significant sovereign interest supporting the measure, collateral impacts are
few or nonexistent, and limits on the measure are intelligible. In that event, courts would generally uphold the measure,
and let the political process adjudicate its fate. The three factors that drive the shared stewardship approach require
additional explanation. The sovereign interest of the United States inheres both in substantive admission and removal
criteria and the probability and gravity of foreign relations consequences. In a democracy, substantive criteria for both
admission and removal are at the heart of sovereignty.26 When Congress has provided a comprehensive framework,
courts owe that framework a measure of deference. Moreover, the executive branch’s initiatives should be largely
interstitial, filling gaps without undermining Congress’s overarching structure. The exercise of “predictive judgment”27 by
the Executive about the probability and gravity of adverse diplomatic or security consequences should elicit a measure of
judicial deference, particularly when those judgments concern events overseas. However, courts should not clothe all
immigration rules in crucial sovereign interests that may not fit the particular context the courts encounter. To demonstrate
that more robust review of means-end fit is appropriate, a challenger of an immigration measure should also address the
collateral impact of that measure. In the last forty years, that factor has been more salient in the Court’s consideration of
state measures affecting immigration than in analyzing the constitutionality of the INA itself. For example, during the past
term the Court, in Esquivel-Quintana v. Sessions,28 read the INA’s removal grounds to promote clarity regarding the
immigration consequences of criminal convictions, in part to promote fair and efficient plea bargaining in the criminal
justice system.29 Addressing state laws that seek to wrest the initiative in immigration enforcement from the federal
government, the Court has cautioned that such measures could have consequences for trade, investment, travel, and
diplomacy.30 Collateral
impacts have not figured as heavily in assessing the constitutionality of
federal immigration laws, in part because of the historical deference shown to Congress by the courts, which
often casts collateral impacts as by-products that Congress has duly considered and found not to be dispositive.31
However, on the rare occasions when the Court has invalidated federal immigration statutes, one can find gestures to
collateral consequences. In INS v. Chadha,32 the Court asserted that permitting a one-house legislative veto to overrule
executive decisions on immigration relief would encourage hasty, heedless, or malicious laws, undercutting the “due
deliberation” that Hamilton sought in the legislative process.33 In Sessions v. Morales-Santana,34 Justice Ginsburg
supported the Court’s invalidation of a gender-based statute on acquired citizenship by noting the overall “constraining
impact” of gender-based stereotypes on human aspirations.35 Shared
stewardship would promote closer
consideration of collateral impacts in assessing the scope of Congress’s delegation to the executive
branch and in constitutional review of immigration statutes, particularly when such statutes undermine long-standing
reliance interests. Courts should also consider whether the power exemplified by a challenged action or measure contains
a coherent limiting principle. The imposition of appropriate “external . . . [and] internal controls” that both enable and
constrain government is perhaps the central project of American constitutionalism.36 Case law on judicial deference to
Congress regarding immigration too often invokes the risks of imposing limits on Congress’s power.37 Here too, however,
there are glimmerings of a different approach in recent cases. In Zadvydas v. Davis,38 the Court cited the Constitution’s
abhorrence of indefinite detention in holding that the INA permitted only 180 days of detention for a former lawful
permanent resident (LPR) awaiting execution of a final order of removal because of criminal convictions.39 To best
vindicate the Framers’ vision and extend the wisdom of cases like Zadvydas, shared stewardship would elevate the
importance of intelligible limits in determining the level of means-end fit required.40 Shared
stewardship yields
fresh insights on current issues in immigration jurisprudence. A shared stewardship analysis
would find that the indefinite restrictions in President Trump’s EO-3 exceeded the power
delegated by Congress to the President . Congress’s demarcation in the INA of the United States’
sovereign interest hinged on the rejection of discriminatory national origin quotas and the prioritization of family
reunification.41 Here, EO-3’s indefinite restrictions contrast with the temporary pause in that measure’s predecessor, EO2. While EO-2’s brief pause to acquire more information42 did not undermine Congress’s comprehensive immigration
framework, EO-3’s indefinite ban on admission of nationals from designated countries clashes with the INA’s bar on
discrimination in the issuance of immigrant visas.43 Without adequate warrant from Congress, EO-3 installed a Middle
Eastern variation on the Asia-Pacific triangle quota system that Congress had strictly abjured in the landmark 1965
immigration amendments.44 Moreover, as an indefinite ban on entry of nationals of the listed countries, EO-3 lacks a
limiting principle. No independent review or neutral metric would stop this or any other Administration relying on a similar
unbridled
power poses a fundamental challenge to Congress’s comprehensive immigration
“plan .” Shared stewardship also provides fresh insight on consular “extreme vetting” of visa
theory from decreeing a de facto permanent ban on immigration from any country found wanting. That
applicants and retroactive application of removal grounds. Under the shared stewardship approach, the broad discretion
of consular officials becomes a source of concern, enabling the evisceration of Congress’s visa priorities. Basic
procedural fairness emerges as a valuable limit on the otherwise limitless discretion that consular
officials exercise. Those factors lead to a critique of the Court’s decision in Kerry v. Din45 as being unduly
deferential and point the way toward more searching review of the “extreme vetting”
that the Trump Administration has promoted. Shared stewardship also highlights the damage to the
substantive design of immigration law wrought by retroactive application of removal grounds.46
If substantive immigration law aims to shape the community in which we aspire to thrive, it should reflect abiding values,
including due regard for reliance interests. Retroactive application unduly discounts the importance of those reliance
interests. Moreover, the collateral impact of retroactive application compounds the “spirit of injustice”47 that Hamilton
identified with oppressive legislation. The spread of that toxic spirit deprives noncitizens of the stake they need to make
optimal contributions to U.S. society. The absence of intelligible limits on the harshness of retroactive application, which
can lead to the removal of longtime legal U.S. residents, further exacerbates the problem.
Shared stewardship is a critical, workable judicial standard
Peter Margulies 18, Professor of Law, Roger Williams University School of
Law; B.A., Colgate University; J.D., Columbia Law School, “BANS, BORDERS,
AND SOVEREIGNTY: JUDICIAL REVIEW OF IMMIGRATION LAW IN THE
TRUMP ADMINISTRATION”,
https://digitalcommons.law.msu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1198&context=lr
Shared stewardship seeks to fill the gap . To address whether heightened judicial review is appropriate,
shared stewardship considers three factors conjunctively: (1) degree of sovereign interest , (2)
number and intensity of collateral impacts , and (3) absence of intelligible limits .428
Each factor figures in the Framers’ thought and the Supreme Court’s case law, although the latter sometimes elevates the
perceived foreign policy aspects of a challenged measure and downplays concern with collateral impacts and intelligible
limits. Balanced attention to all three factors will lead to a clearer and more cohesive model of judicial review. In at least
two important areas—vetting of visa applicants by consular officials and retroactive application of removal grounds—
shared stewardship’s criteria lead to different results than current case law. Shared
stewardship would prohibit vexatious or unduly onerous requests for information from
consular officials to visa applicants and bar retroactive application of newly enacted removal provisions.
In reaching those different results, shared stewardship is more skeptical than current case law about the foreign affairs
implications of certain immigration decisions and more concerned with requiring a floor of fairness that will both discipline
the political branches and send a positive signal to the rest of the world. Shared stewardship would also view EO-3 as
inconsistent with the INA because of the absence of a limiting principle governing the EO’s indefinite restrictions. Shared
stewardship will not eliminate close cases in immigration law. Nor will it end debates about the degree of deference that
courts display. However, shared stewardship will ensure a judicial role in key areas where
that role has until now been muted. Moreover, shared stewardship will enlist the courts’ capacity for judgment without
unduly intruding on U.S. sovereign interests. Given immigration law’s importance for the near future under President
Trump and the longer term flourishing of the American experiment, achieving that balance is worth the effort.
Shared Stewardship’s analysis of “collateral impacts” reduces antiimmigrant violence broadly
Peter Margulies 18, Professor of Law, Roger Williams University School of
Law; B.A., Colgate University; J.D., Columbia Law School, “BANS, BORDERS,
AND SOVEREIGNTY: JUDICIAL REVIEW OF IMMIGRATION LAW IN THE
TRUMP ADMINISTRATION”,
https://digitalcommons.law.msu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1198&context=lr
Immigration decisions often affect other individuals, entities, and institutions beyond the parties to a case.158 Since
stewardship concerns itself with this broader range of stakeholders , collateral impacts should
be central. Moreover, collateral impacts can be intangible, encompassing harm to reliance
interests or the narrowing of perspectives caused by gender bias .159 The Supreme Court, as we have
already seen, has frequently cited potential collateral impacts in immigration cases. In Plyler v. Doe,160 the Court warned
that state laws prohibiting undocumented children from attending public schools would exacerbate the larger
crime and unemployment .161 Collateral impacts have also been key in socalled “ crimmigration ” cases, in which the Court has analyzed the interaction of the immigration and criminal
social problems of
justice systems.162 The Court has enhanced clarity on what criminal convictions trigger an LPR’s deportation. That
clarity vindicates reliance interests and minimizes the adverse effects that uncertainty would
trigger for the functioning of criminal justice.163
Plan
Thus, the plan: The United States federal government should, using a
shared stewardship model, implement a substantial reduction of its
restrictions on legal immigration created by Executive Order 13780
and all subsequent proclamations.
Framing
Contention 2 is Framing –
First, impact framing –
Default to probability – any other model of risk calculus collapses in
on itself
Kessler 08 (Oliver; April 2008; PhD in IR, professor of sociology at the University of Bielefeld, and professor of
history and theory of IR at the Faculty of Arts; Alternatives, Vol. 33, “From Insecurity to Uncertainty: Risk and the Paradox
of Security Politics” p. 211-232)
it is very difficult to "calculate" politically unacceptable
losses. If the risk of terrorism is defined in traditional terms by probability and potential loss, then the
focus on dramatic terror attacks leads to the marginalization of probabilities . The reason
is that even the highest degree of improbability becomes irrelevant as the measure
of loss goes to infinity.^o The mathematical calculation of the risk of terrorism thus tends to
overestimate and to dramatize the danger. This has consequences beyond the actual
risk assessment for the formulation and execution of "risk policies": If one factor of the risk
calculation approaches infinity (e.g., if a case of nuclear terrorism is envisaged), then there is no
balanced measure for antiterrorist efforts, and risk management as a rational endeavor
The problem of the second method is that
breaks down . Under the historical condition of bipolarity, the "ultimate" threat with nuclear weapons could be
balanced by a similar counterthreat, and new equilibria could be achieved, albeit on higher levels of nuclear overkill.
Under the new condition of uncertainty, no such rational balancing is possible since
knowledge about actors, their motives and capabilities, is largely absent. The second form of security
policy that emerges when the deterrence model collapses mirrors the "social probability" approach. It represents
a logic of catastrophe . In contrast to risk management framed in line with logical
probability theory, the logic of catastrophe does not attempt to provide means of
absorbing uncertainty. Rather, it takes uncertainty as constitutive for the logic itself;
uncertainty is a crucial precondition for catastrophes. In particular, catastrophes happen at once,
without a warning, but with major implications for the world polity. In this category, we find the impact of
meteorites. Mars attacks, the tsunami in South East Asia, and 9/11. To conceive of terrorism as
catastrophe has consequences for the formulation of an adequate security policy.
Since catastrophes hap-pen irrespectively of human activity or inactivity, no political
action could possibly prevent them. Of course, there are precautions that can be taken, but the framing
of terrorist attack as a catastrophe points to spatial and temporal characteristics that
are beyond "rationality." Thus, political decision makers are exempted from the
responsibility to provide security—as long as they at least try to preempt an attack. Interestingly enough,
9/11 was framed as catastrophe in various commissions dealing with the question of who was responsible and whether it
could have been prevented. This makes clear that under the condition of uncertainty, there are no objective criteria that
could serve as an anchor for measuring dangers and assessing the quality of political responses. For ex- ample, as much
as one might object to certain measures by the US administration, it is almost impossible to "measure" the success of
countermeasures. Of course, there might be a subjective assessment of specific shortcomings or failures, but there is no
"common" currency to evaluate them. As a consequence, the
framework of the security dilemma fails to
capture the basic uncertainties. Pushing the door open for the security paradox, the main problem of security
analysis then becomes the question how to integrate dangers in risk assessments and security policies about which
simply nothing is known. In the mid 1990s, a Rand study entitled "New Challenges for Defense Planning" addressed this
issue arguing that "most striking is the fact that we
do not even know who or what will constitute the most
serious future threat, "^i In order to cope with this challenge it would be essential, another Rand
researcher wrote, to break free from the "tyranny" of plausible scenario planning. The decisive step would be to
create "discontinuous scenarios ... in which there is no plausible audit trail or storyline
from current events"52 These nonstandard scenarios were later called "wild cards" and became important in the current
US strategic discourse. They justified the transformation from a threat-based toward a capability- based defense planning
strategy.53 The problem with this kind of risk assessment is, however, that even
the most absurd
scenarios can gain plausibility. By constructing a chain of potentialities ,
improbable events are linked and brought into the realm of the possible, if not even the
probable. "Although the likelihood of the scenario dwindles with each step, the residual
impression is one of plausibility. "54 This so-called Othello effect has been effective in the dawn of the recent
war in Iraq. The connection between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda that the US government tried
to prove was disputed from the very beginning. False evidence was again and again
presented and refuted, but this did not prevent the administration from presenting as the main
rationale for war the improbable yet possible connection between Iraq and the terrorist network and the
improbable yet possible proliferation of an improbable yet possible nuclear weapon into the hands of Bin Laden. As
Donald Rumsfeld famously said: " Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence ." This sentence
indicates that under the condition of genuine uncertainty, different evidence criteria prevail than in situations where
security problems can be assessed with relative certainty.
Reject 1% risk framing – it’s incoherent
David Meskill 9, professor at Colorado School of Mines and PhD from Harvard,
“The "One Percent Doctrine" and Environmental Faith”,
http://davidmeskill.blogspot.com/2009/12/one-percent-doctrine-andenvironmental.html
Tom Friedman's piece today in the Times on the environment (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/09/opinion/09friedman.html?_r=1) is one of the
flimsiest pieces by a major columnist that I can remember ever reading. He applies Cheney's "one percent doctrine" (which
is similar to the environmentalists' "precautionary principle") to the risk of environmental armageddon. But this
doctrine is both intellectually incoherent and practically irrelevant . It is intellectually incoherent
because it cannot be applied consistently in a world with many potential disaster
scenarios. In addition to the global-warming risk, there's also the asteroid-hittingthe-earth risk, the terrorists-with-nuclear-weapons risk (Cheney's original scenario), the superduper-pandemic risk, etc. Since each of these risks, on the "one percent
doctrine," would deserve all of our attention, we cannot address all of them
simultaneously. That is, even within the one-percent mentality, we'd have to
begin prioritizing, making choices and trade-offs. But why then should we only make these trade-offs between
responses to disaster scenarios? Why not also choose between them and other, much more cotidien, things
we value? Why treat the unlikely but cataclysmic event as somehow
fundamentally different, something that cannot be integrated into all the other calculations we make? And in fact, this is how
we behave all the time. We get into our cars in order to buy a cup of coffee, even
though there's some chance we will be killed on the way to the coffee shop. We
are constantly risking death, if slightly, in order to pursue the things we value.
Any creature that adopted the "precautionary principle" would sit at home - no, not even there, since
there is some chance the building might collapse. That creature would neither be able to act, nor not act, since it
would nowhere discover perfect safety . Friedman's approach reminds me somehow of Pascal's wager - quasi-religious faith
masquerading as rational deliberation (as Hans Albert has pointed out, Pascal's wager itself doesn't add up: there may be a God, in fact, but it may turn out that
He dislikes, and even damns, people who believe in him because they've calculated it's in their best interest to do so). As my friend James points out, it's striking
how descriptions of the environmental risk always describe the situation as if it were five to midnight. It must be near midnight, since otherwise there would be no
need to act. But it can never be five *past* midnight, since then acting would be pointless and we might as well party like it was 2099. Many religious movements for example the early Jesus movement - have exhibited precisely this combination of traits: the looming apocalypse, with the time (just barely) to take action.
Securitization is integral to a project of Western biopolitical control
and the acceleration of threats in the international sphere – reject
their fearmongering
Dillon 15 – [Michael, Emeritus Professor of Politics and International Relations
at Lancaster University, UK. “Biopolitics of Security: A Political Analytic of
Finitude”, pg. 210-213]//MM
*edited for ableist language
The societies of the North Atlantic basin have never been so secure. That security is a function of such a wide variety of security institutions
and practices it seems pointless to name them, for they penetrate into the very weft and warp of everyday life. Pointless to name them, but
not pointless to re-describe them by giving them a different name. They are in every respect baroque. Ordinarily addressed as a period and
or a style of art, an aesthetic, the baroque names, instead, a space of problematisation, and a mode of operationalisation. If factical finitude
is the condition of possibility for the baroque, as well as for modern politics, the baroque names factical finitude's condition of operability. No
more so, in fact, than in respect of die conditions of operability of modern politics of security. What is being secured is the securing of Life
whose very vital signs are now construed as generically dangerous to itself, or of the sovereign that is fated to fail the standards the
sovereign being, is the continuous suspension of any other expression of politics. It
is a suppression that works
through substitution , the substitution of repeated clichés, marvels and spectacles concerning the
'now', the 'future', 'potency', 'radical contingency' and survivability in a world whose very security
apparatuses have turned politically motivated killing into an industrial and
commercial processes integral to our civilization but capable also of threatening the
survivability of planetary life . At the beginning of the twenty-first century, these now seek their expression in tropes that
intensify security's baroque fixation with morbidity, mortality and modernity: complex adaptation and change, competitiveness, emergence,
catastrophic emergency, the event that saves, the event that threatens, and, above all, resilience - the capacity to endure by becoming
something else. To survive is to submit, through holocaust or social therapy, to self-annihilation as governmental necessity. We might
therefore envisage the baroque character of our politics of security as the attempt to unify these themes within synthetic narratives of
The past of security and war is forgotten by
continuous repetition in spectacle , simulation and practice. These are now organised through scopic
regime ; employing different orders of signification and representation as well as novel
technologies. To give our contemporary politics of security another name is, therefore, a deliberate device. It gives them another
competitiveness, identity, the enemy, or simply terror.
face. In rhetoric this maneuver is called prosopopoeia. Strictly speaking, prosopopoeia gives a face to that which does not have a face. Our
security politics are preoccupied, however, with presenting a face that will move the world, a face for the world to accept at face value.
Having a face is, therefore, not the issue here. The issue is what face. I have attempted to give our politics of security another face, one
capable of refracting its face of baroque display. Prosopopoeia is a difficult art. It does not seek to achieve closure or finality as some forms
of narrative, history and positivity do. It does not labour under the rule of verisimilar adequacy, and it does not suborn itself to policy or
governmental relevance. It seeks to represent not that which is absent, 'but that whose presence is so intense that we can only feel it and…
see it from a safe distance' (Godzich and Spadaccini, in Maravall 1986: xiii-xiv). Initially, the political programme of the baroque was the
formal answer of the monarchical-seigniorial segments of sixteenth-century Spanish society, to the assaults launched against the traditional
statist structure taking shape in early modern Spain (Godzich and Spadaccini, in Maravall 1986: xvii). One of its most distinguished
historians, José Antonio Maravall, defines the baroque, 'as a culture provoked by a cultural crisis of major proportions, one that was felt in
all of Europe, and perhaps most intensely in Spain, during the greater part of the seventeenth century' (Godzich and Spadaccini, in
Maravall 1986: xviii). Where, once, baroque politics included defence of the monarchy, the safeguard of honour as the raison d’état of
individual and social life, and the constant reaffirmation of love as a universal justification (Godzich and Spadaccini, in Maravall 1986: xix),
our baroque politics of security is a vast palimpsest of rules of truth and truths of rule, constantly reaffirming peace, rights and justice as
universal justifications for security and war. The baroque names its mode of operativity, rather than a period. I have extended this
description of it to the generic crisis induced by factical finitude and the changing baroque politics of security that helps distinguish the
states and societies of the North Atlantic basin at the beginning of the twenty-first century. As with the early baroque, so also with the
twenty-first century we are confronted with a political culture directed towards the multitude of anonymous and, therefore, potentially
disruptive individuals - homegrown 'terrorists', for example - no longer simply concentrated in the cities, but capable of circulating globally.
Its mode of operativity is distinguished by the effort that is spent on casting the
political subject as political spectator , whose voluntary servitude to indefinite
governance is secured through the spectacles of security, catastrophic
emergency and war , as much as through their everyday governmentalisation. Deleuze noted,
acutely, that, '[t]he essence of the baroque entails neither falling into nor emerging from illusion but rather realizing something in illusion
itself' (Deleuze 1992: 124). A fuller depiction of the neo-baroque character of contemporary security politics, therefore, requires further
studies. Among other things, these would have to revisit the problematization not only of spectacle and the virtual, but all modes of making
manifest politically and governmentally in which these are intimately involved as a matter of priority. But this has to wait, and for the
moment I can only add a coda to the present book, by gesturing towards how politics of security in the twenty-first century are distinguished
by the ways in which they exceed the katechontic security politics of the baroque sovereign that I introduced, through Reinhart Koselleck
and Carl Schmitt, in the first chapter of the book.
Politics of security remain katechontic , fated to
pursue the infinite deferral of the very finitude of which they are comprised, and from
which they also take their warrant to conduct the infinite securitisation of finite
things and processes of becoming finite . But this katechontic enterprise changes its character as we not only
move from addressing modern sovereign geopolitics to biopolitics, but also as we move from the baroque traits of the early modern era to
those of the neo-baroque of our own times. What
is additionally interesting is that, as the modern geopolitics
of the West has become a largely biopolitical enterprise, so also has the katechontic
task of restraint become acceleration of the very forces that the katechon was once
said to restrain - chaos, lawlessness and anarchy , since order now is commonly said to arise
from chaos. Katechontic politics of security at the beginning of the twenty-first century thus aim to become
the very anomic chaos originally stigmatized in the anarchy problematic of classical
international relations theory, which so extolled the necessity of the sovereign state, and of
statecraft, simultaneously also fostering the belief that there was no stagecraft to statecraft, in explicitly
katechontic terms. No longer simply committed to restraining the coming of the end, the katechontic enterprise of the biopolitics of security
of the twenty-first century is now much less committed to restraint than to acceleration, acceleration of the vital forces of being-in-formation
and becoming-dangerous that exceed finitude, thereby offering the prospect of securely commanding it. This, then, is less a matter of
resisting the end, than cultivating the vitality whose power is not presence, but the power to make present. Contra Schmitt, this is a less a
matter of the trompe l'oeil of ‘the miracle', a baroque trope if ever there was one, than of the novel powers of artifice and illusion realised
through digital powers of the sign. As Deleuze observed, it is, of course, not the illusion that counts but what is realised through illusion. As
one, now infamous, aide to George W Bush blankly put it. 'We are an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while
you're studying that reality - judiciously, if you will - we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how
things will sort out. We're history's actors ... and you, all of you will be left to study what we do' (quoted in Egginton 2010: 1). Except, of
course, as Benedetto Croce Ion~ ago observed, in the epigraph that heads this book, they do not, in fact, know what they do. It is not as if
this were not, however, an all too familiar world -a madness *chaos that occurs in the full light of day.
Second, no existential risks –
A confluence of factors makes great power war obsolete – nuclear
deterrence, interdependence, democracy and international norms –
assign minimal risk to neg impacts
Fettweis 17 (Christopher J, *Associate Professor of Political Science at Tulane
University, Ph.D. from the University of Maryland, College Park, “Unipolarity,
Hegemony, and the New Peace,” Security Studies 26:3, 423-451)//cmr
Competing Explanations The publication of Pinker’s The Better Angels of Our Nature in 2011 brought the New Peace into
popular consciousness to some degree, but general recognition remains rather low. The data might suggest that the world
is much safer, but Americans know better: a 2009 poll found that nearly 60 percent of the public—and fully half of the
membership of the elite Council on Foreign Relations—actually considered the world more dangerous than it was during
the Cold War.20 Among academic and policy experts, however, the phenomenon is well known, if controversial, and a
debate over potential explanations has been raging for some time. A number of major and minor factors have been
help account for the New Peace . First, nuclear weapons came into
existence about the same time that the great powers stopped fighting one another, which a
number of scholars suggest is no coincidence.21 Faith in the pacifying effect of nuclear weapons led a
cited over the years that might
few prominent realists to suggest that an efficient way to spread stability would be to encourage controlled proliferation to
non-nuclear states.22 This idea found little purchase. Instead, proliferation momentum slowed considerably after the end
of the Cold War: the
world has the same number of nuclear states in 2016 that it did in 1991
Perhaps that number is sufficient to
generate widespread fear of generalized war and overall systemic stability . Second,
modern integrated markets contain powerful incentives for peace . While economic
considerations are not the only ones that states must weigh when war looms, to the extent that they affect
decisions, in this postmercantilist age they do so in a uniformly pacific direction. In the 1970s, neoliberal
institutionalists argued that modern levels of economic interdependence provide strong incentives for
states to resolve disputes peacefully.23 It is almost always in the interest of states today, if
they are rational and self-interested, to cooperate rather than run the risk of ruining their
economies, and those of their main trading partners, with war. The globalization of production, as
(eight), having lost one (South Africa) and gained another (North Korea).
Stephen G. Brooks has argued, is a powerful force for stability among those countries that benefit from the actions of
multinational corporations.24 Furthermore, today’s
highly mobile investment dollars flee instability,
providing strong incentives for states to settle both external and internal disputes
peacefully. As Secretary of State Colin Powell once told a Ugandan audience, “money is a coward.”25 Overall,
globalization has been accompanied by an evolution in the way national wealth is accumulated. The major industrial
powers, and perhaps many of their less developed neighbors, seem to have reached the rather
revolutionary conclusion that territory is not directly related to national power and
prestige.26 Third, the new peace has risen alongside the number of democracies in the world. While
the widely tested and debated democratic peace theory is not universally accepted in the field, the hundreds of books and
articles that have been written on the subject over the past thirty years have been sufficient to convince many that
democracies rarely fight one another.27 Since most of today’s great powers practice some form of
democracy, perhaps it should be unsurprising that conflict has been absent in the global north.
Fourth, a number of scholars have suggested that regimes, law, and institutions shape state behavior,
and can serve to inhibit aggression.28 Some major theorists of the New Peace, including both Andrew Mack and
Joshua S. Goldstein, give UN peacekeeping primary credit for the decline in warfare.29 At the very least, there is
convincing evidence that wars do not recur with the same frequency as in the past, a
phenomenon for which the UN can certainly take a degree of credit. These potential
explanations suffer from the same general weakness: stability exists where the influence of their independent variable is
weak or absent. There are no nuclear states in Central or South America, for example, but those regions have been
virtually free of interstate war for many decades. The relative decline of civil wars and ethnic conflict around the globe
since the end of the Cold War also is not a product of nuclear deterrence. The democratic peace theory might help explain
why there have been no intra-West wars, but it cannot account for the pacific trends among and within nondemocratic
states. Africa and other areas of the Global South are also experiencing historically low levels of armed conflict, which
suggests that economic growth and interdependence might not be the sole determinants of peaceful choices by
leaders.30 With many of these potential explanations, there is another problem: the direction of causality is not clear. It is
just as plausible to suggest that peace preceded, and then abetted, the rise of the other factors.31 Democracy and
economic growth might be the results of stability, rather than the other way around. The rise in peacekeeping has only
been possible because of increased great power cooperation. These phenomena may well be related, but just not in the
way that their proponents suggest. A number of other explanations have been proposed. Pinker discussed a series of
“rights revolutions,” especially including those of children and women that, in addition to several other factors, may well
have contributed to the decline of war.32 Others have suggested that demographics may be playing a decisive role, either
the most prominent
explanation for the decline of war integrates all of the above , suggesting that they
contribute to a change in the way people view conflict itself. Together these factors may have
combined to alter the way people think about warfare, removing the romance and glory
and replacing it with revulsion and dishonor. Ideas, when widely held, can become
norms that shape and limit state behavior.34 There is yet another potential explanation, one that is far
through aging populations or declining birthrates in the Global North.33 Finally, perhaps
more common in the policy community than in scholarship. The possibility that the United States is essentially responsible
for the New Peace, either through its military power or the institutional order it created, is the subject of the rest of this
paper.
Counter-forcing solves escalatory conflict
Woody Mueller 9, Woody Hayes Chair of National Security Studies, Professor
of Political Science at Ohio State University, Cato Senior Fellow, and award
winning author, “Atomic Obsession: Nuclear Alarmism from Hiroshima to AlQaeda”, Google Books, p. 8
To begin to approach a condition that can credibly justify applying such extreme
characterizations as societal annihilation, a full-out attack with hundreds, probably thousands, of
thermonuclear bombs would be required. Even in such extreme cases, the area actually
devastated by the bombs' blast and thermal pulse effective would be limited : 2,000 1-MT
explosions with a destructive radius of 5 miles each would directly demolish less than 5
percent of the territory of the United States, for example. Obviously, if major population centers were targeted, this sort of attack
could inflict massive casualties. Back in cold war days, when such devastating events sometimes seemed uncomfortably likely, a number of
studies were conducted to estimate the consequences of massive
thermonuclear attacks. One of the most prominent of these considered several
probabilities. The most likely scenario--one that could be perhaps considered at least to begin to approach the rational-was a "counterforce" strike in which well over 1,000 thermonuclear weapons would be targeted
at America's ballistic missile silos, strategic airfields, and nuclear submarine bases in an effort to
destroy the country’s strategic ability to retaliate. Since the attack would not directly target
population centers
, most of the ensuing deaths would be from radioactive fallout, and the study estimates that from 2 to 20 million, depending
mostly on wind, weather, and sheltering, would perish during the first month.15 That sort of damage, which would kill less than 10 percent of the population, might
or might not be enough to trigger words like “annihilation.”
No environment impacts
Goklany 15 (Indur, PhD from Michigan State, Assistant Director of Programs,
Science and Technology Policy at the DOI, represented the United States at the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and during the negotiations
that led to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change,
“CARBON DIOXIDE: The good news”, The Global Warming Policy Foundation,
GWPF Report 18)
[figures omitted]
The impacts of global warming are generally estimated using chains of linked computer
models
. Each chain begins with a climate model, which itself is driven by a set of socioeconomic scenarios based on assumptions for population, economic development and technological change over the entire period of the
analysis (often 50– 100 years or more). The climate model is followed by various biophysical, economic and other downstream models to estimate changes in different as pects of human 23 activity or welfare, for example agriculture, forestry,
The uncertain outputs of each upstream model serve as the inputs of the
subsequent downstream model with the uncertainties cascading down the chain so that
the individual streams of uncertainty combine into a regular torrent.
health or biodiversity.
,
For example, to estimate the impacts on agriculture and
food security, the outputs of the climate model are fed into various crop models to estimate yields, which then are linked to economic models to estimate supply and demand for the various crops. Supply and demand are then reconciled via
national, regional and global scale trade models.142 Notably, despite the cascade of uncertainties,
provided an objective estimate
to date no climate change impact assessment
has
of the cumulative uncertainty, starting with the socioeconomic scenarios through to the impact estimate. The ranges of uncertainty presented in the IPCC
impact reports are generally based on the uncertainties only from using different climate scenarios. But these are much narrower than the true uncertainties that would have been estimated had the full cascade of uncertainties been considered.
Models have not been validated One reason that doom-laden predictions about human wellbeing have failed is that orthodox climate scientists have neglected to apply the scientific method: specifically they have not checked their hypotheses
and biases embodied in their models against empirical reality. As we have seen, simple reality checks show that environmental and human wellbeing is not currently deteriorating. Validation of these models using such reality checks would have
limited their divergence from reality, and also reduce the uncertainties that are inevitably compounded as one progresses down the chain of models. Climate models overstate global warming Firstly, the global climate has not been warming as
rapidly as projected in the IPCC assessment reports. Figure 5 compares observed global surface temperature data from 1986 through 2012 versus modelled results. It confirms that models have been running hotter than reality. But these are the
projections that governments have relied on to justify global warming policies, including subsidies for biofuels and renewable energy while increasin g the overall cost of energy to the general consumer – costs that disproportionately burden those
models have
overestimated warming.
Model performance was even worse for the more recent 15-year period
of 1998–2012. Here the average modelled trend was 0.21±0.03◦C per decade,
quadruple the observed trend of 0.05±0.08◦C.
that are poorer. A comparison of performance of 117 simulations using 37 models versus empirical data from the HadCRUT4 surface temperature data set indicates that the vast majority of the simulations/
143 The models indicated that the average global temperature would increase by 0.30±0.02◦Cper decade during the period from 1993 to 2012 but empirical data show an
increase of only 0.14±0.06◦C per decade.144
Considering the confidence interval, the observed trend is indistinguishable from no trend at all; that is,
warming has, for practical purposes, halted. Even the IPCC acknowledges the existence of this ‘hiatus’.145 Moreover, the HadCRUT4 temperature database indicates that the global warming rat e declined from 0.11◦C per decade from 1951–
2012 to 0.04◦C per decade from 1998–2012.146 This is despite the fact that, per the IPCC, the anthropogenic greenhouse gas forcing for 2010 (2.25 W/m2) exceeded what was used in the models for 2010 (1.78–1.84 W/m2) by around 25%.147
Some have argued that satellite temperature data should be preferred over surface datasets. In fact, satellite coverage is more comprehensive and more representative of the Earth’s surface than is achievable using surface stations, even if the
latter were to number in the thousands. A recent review paper notes that satellites can provide ‘unparalleled global- and fine-scale spatial coverage’ presumably because of ‘more frequent and repetitive coverage over a larger area than other
observation means’.148 In addition, surface measurements are influenced by the measuring stations’ microenvironments, which will vary not only from station to station at any given time, but also over time at the very same station, as vegetation
and man-made structures in their vicinity spring up, evolve and change.149 Satellite temperature data indicates that the globe has been warming at the rate of 0.12–0.14◦C per decade since 1979;150 by contrast, the IPCC assessments over the
last 25 years have been projecting a warming trend of 0.2–0.4◦C per decade.151,152 The 25 differences between modelled trends and those from satellites and weather balloons are shown in Figures 6 and 7.153 Nevertheless, based on these
chains of unvalidated computer models, orthodox thinkers on climate change claim that global warming will, among other things , lower food production, increase hunger, cause more extreme weather, increase disease, and threaten water
supplies. The cumulative impact will, they claim, diminish living standards and threaten species, and if carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases are not curbed soon, pose an existential threat to humanity and the rest of nature. Some claim it
global
life expectancy increased
Nostalgia for a 350
may already be too late.154 The group 350.org, for instance, agitates for reducing atmospheric carbon dioxide levels, currently at 400 ppm, to 350 ppm, a level the earth last experienced in 1988.155 But since then,
GDP
has increased
mortality declined
and the poverty headcount has dropped
ppm world seems
downright perverse
per capita
60%, infant
5.5 years,
has
48%,
has
by
from 43% to 17% despite a population increase of 40%.
somewhat misplaced, if not
.156,157 Climate models don’t do local well It is not clear what logical process was used to arrive at these
allegations. It may stem from the fact that orthodox thinkers on climate, in the grip of confirmation bias, are unable or unwilling to acknowledge that, unless a climate or weather event is truly unprecedented then the default assumption – the ‘null
hypothesis’ in scientific parlance – should be that it is part of normal climate variability rather than manmade global warming. Some have used the results of modelling exercises that purport to assess the future impacts, usually in the latter part of
this century, and then ‘interpolated’ these results back to the present day.158,159,160 The first step in such an exercise relies on climate models to project the future climate. But we have seen that these models have failed the realit y test with
respect to globally averaged surface temperature over the past two decades or more. To compound matters, the performanc e of climate models relative to reality worsens as one attempts to project surface temperatures at smaller geographical
More importantly, the wellbeing of human beings and the rest of
nature is probably more sensitive to changes in precipitation than to temperature, and
precipitation is highly variable from spot to spot. But climate models perform even
worse for precipitation than they do for temperature, regardless of the geographic
scale
scales. 27 Climate models don’t do precipitation well
. In fact, for several areas many models are unable to reliably hindcast past precipitation, let alone forecast the future.161,162 Notsurprisingly, precipitation projections using different models often contradict each other. For
example, a recent study of annual precipitation changes in California using 25 model projections indicates that ‘12 projections show drier annual conditions by the 20 60s and 13 show wetter.’163 Thus impact assessments that use as their
starting point the outputs of these climate models cannot and should not be relied upon to develop policies, although they may have scientific diagnostic value for improving our understanding of climate mechanisms and processes. Adaptation
methodology is flawed Failure to properly account for adaptation Even if climate models represented reality perfectly and were able to foretell the future climate, impact assessments would still be suspect. This is because most global warming
impact
assessments assume little or no
endogenous (or autonomous)
adaptation
. For example, the vast majority of studies of global warming impacts on water
resources do not incorporate any allowance for adaptive measures that might be taken to reduce those impacts, despite the fact that steps of this nature have been taken since time immemorial.164,165 For instance, the world’s oldest
functioning dam, at Lake Homs in Syria, dates back to 1319 BC,166 and qanats, underground canals to convey water for human settlements and irrigation, were built in Persia as long ago as the first millennium BC.167 Similarly, of the many
studies used by the IPCC to estimate future impacts on crop yields, 63% did not consider improvements in the agricultural sector’s adaptive capacity.168 Moreover, specific adaptive measures used in many global warming impact studies are
suitable adaptation measures are
numerous and
cheap
these options are even more affordable
ability to adapt has
improved markedly just in the past few decades or so
increases in
crop yields, access to safer water, and life expectancy
reductions in
poverty and mortality from
diseases and
weather events
based on surveys of available technologies from the 1990s. However, today
both more
er.169 And because we are wealthier,
.170 Consequently, our
.171 As proof, consider the previously noted global
example,
, for
on one hand, and
vector-borne
extreme
on the other. These examples suggest that
neglecting adaptive capacity and technological change can, over the course of several decades, lead to estimates of impacts t hat are too pessimistic by an order of magnitude or more.172 28 Another factor that is ignored in impacts
assessments is the tremendous increase in our interconnectedness due to the internet, e-mail, text messages, and cell phones. As a result, the dissemination of knowledge is today far faster and wider than what was possible two or three
connectivity alone has considerably enhanced humanity’s adaptive
capacity Also ignored is
technologies
precision farming the growing ability
to monitor plant growth, nutrient deficiencies and the environmental conditions
decades ago. This increase in
.173
the array of
that are collectively called ‘
’:
at finer scales, combined
with techniques that use GPS and drones to more precisely deliver nutrients and water to crops. Today these technologies can be afforded by wealthy farmers in rich countries. Over time, they should, like all other technologies, also diffuse
around the world as their costs drop and as rising incomes make them more affordable. Such techniques should reduce agricultu re’s demand for water. Because agriculture is responsible for about 70% of global water consumption, this ought to
A 20% increase in global agricultural water-use efficiency
should, for example, translate into a global increase of 39% in water available for
nonagricultural use.
free up water for other human uses and substantially reduce water stress.174
Third, pragmatism –
Autonomous experiments are aspirational and ignoring the state
causes worse fill-in
King ‘16 (has been active in campaigning for refugee rights and against border
controls for over a decade, has taught at the University of Nottingham and
worked as a caseworker with the British Refugee Council, Natasha, No Borders:
The Politics of Immigration Control and Resistance pg 39-42, dml)
But to
what extent are these experiments in autonomy ever entirely autonomous? In
response to Richard Day’s book on the newest social movements, Richard Thompson argues that it’s unrealistic
to talk about creating wholly autonomous social structures because ‘[t]he second
they’re consequential is the second they’ll be noticed [by the state]. At that point, it
becomes impossible to break the cycle of antagonism by will alone. They will come
after us’ (Thompson n.d., emphasis added). In other words, experiments in autonomy are rarely (if
ever) entirely free from a relation to the state, or from state antagonism, and we are rarely
able to ignore that antagonism. We may antagonize the state, but we are forced
also to respond to the state, as a form of self-defence. This has happened time and
time again, from the steady illegalization of squatting in Europe, and the tightening
of laws around private property, to the infiltration by the CIA of the Black Panther
movement, to the struggle between the Zapatistas and the Mexican state . We see this
in the struggle for the freedom of movement when, continuing with the examples above, the EU employs Frontex special
missions on the Turkish/Greek borders, or when the living spaces of people without papers are raided or destroyed.
Whether people have been forced to, or they have seen it as the best strategy, the
history of struggles for liberation has been one that included demands on the state.
Often this has taken the form of engagement in a politics of rights and/or
recognition . From the movement of the Sans Papiers in France, to ‘a Day without Migrants’ in the USA; from
campaigns that fight against the detention and deportation of people without papers, to
struggles against police violence, resistance through forms of visible collective action
have been central to struggles against the border. In most cases such struggles
have made demands on the state, particularly through seeking recognition as a
group, and through making claims to rights . But to what extent are demands for rights and/or
recognition part of a no borders politics? Demands for rights and recognition have played a big part in the struggle for the
the politics of citizenship. Rights
claims, for example, have been seen as essentially reinforcing the role of the state as the
benefactor and grantor of rights, and reinforcing the notion that rights represent
entitlements applicable to those who fit certain descriptions of being a human (cf. Arendt
1973 [1951]; Barbagallo and Beuret 2008; Bojadžijev and Karakayali 2010; Elam 1994). From this perspective,
freedom of movement. Yet there has been a long history of criticism over
demands for rights and representation amount to disputes over the allocation of equality and therefore can only ever
achieve a redistribution of that equality, rather than undermining the idea that equality is somehow qualified in the first
place. As Imogen Tyler says, ‘[c]itizenship
is a famously exclusionary concept, and its
exclusionary force is there by design. The exclusions of citizenship are immanent to
its logic, and not at all accidental. Citizenship is meant to produce successful and
unsuccessful subjects. Citizenship, in other words, is “designed to fail”’ (Tyler, quoted in
Nyers 2015: 31). Similar variations of this critique have appeared in the autonomy of migration debate.
Representation can also be thought of as a bordering technology that seeks to pacify
and discipline expressions of autonomy (or attempts at escape) (Papadopoulos et al. 2008). In
other words, the politics of citizenship is problematic because it only ever brings
people into the state . ‘Of course migrants become stronger when they become visible by obtaining rights, but
the demands of migrants and the dynamics of migration cannot be exhausted in the quest for visibility and rights’ (ibid.:
219). I
have a lot of sympathy with these arguments , and because of them am extremely suspicious of
a politics of citizenship. But when it comes to actual practices of struggle against the border,
a resolute stand against such strategies seems naïve, and insulting to those who
have taken part. Migrant-led struggles have often been claims for rights, and ultimately
I don’t want to dismiss such practices because they are philosophically
problematic . In fact, sometimes to appeal to rights or recognition is the only available
strategy in situations of extreme vulnerability, where people’s options are highly
limited. Recognizing that we are in relations of power right now means also
recognizing that our situation is imperfect and that we have to struggle in our
(imperfect) reality. Youssef, a long-time activist for the freedom of movement in Greece, himself of North African
descent, talked about the need for pragmatism in tactics; that sometimes we must engage with the
state in order to bring about greater freedoms now . ‘Today, in Creta, in Chania, they will catch five
people. How can I take them from the jail? I have something in the police station, OK. I have to talk with them today. OK?
But tomorrow I can fuck him. He’s not my friend. He’s not my comrade. OK. We are talking today. Tomorrow we are
fucking’ (interview, Youssef). His statement reflects how many practices that refuse the border often come out of
necessity. In other words they’re rarely part of some intentional or ‘noble’ act to become a rights-bearer, say, and more
A no borders politics
seeks to go beyond claims to representation and rights that ultimately stand to
reinforce the state. But claims to representation and rights can sometimes do this
too . Building on Foucault’s idea that power can be both positive and empowering or negative
and dominating , Biddy Martin and Chandra Mohanty suggest that fighting oppression involves seeing
power in a way that refuses totalizing visions of it and can therefore account for the
possibility of resistance, as in creating something new, within existing power relations (Martin and
Mohanty 2003: 104). Suggesting that representation only ever brings people into power
therefore means rejecting a vast range of moments when the oppressed have voiced
their refusal to be reduced to non-beings outside of politics (Sharma 2009: 475). In other
often pragmatic decisions based on the need to alleviate immediate situations of oppression.
words, resistance is not only or always a reaction to the constraining effects of dominating power, but can also express
From the Black Panthers to the Sans Papiers,
demands for representation, when carried out by minority groups for themselves, can challenge the
role of dominant power over that group and create new, emancipated
subjectivities (Goldberg 1996; Malik 1996). Depending on who it is that acts, then, in some cases
demands for recognition/rights can be a radical and transformative political act (Nyers
power as something positive and liberating.
2015. See also Butler and Spivak 2007; Isin 2008; Nyers and Rygiel 2012). As Nandita Sharma suggests, in response to
Papadopoulos et al.’s book Escape Routes, we must recognise that making life and fashioning our subjectivities are
intimately intertwined and making ‘new social bodies’ … is not the same as bringing people back into power through
identity politics (or identity policing). It is important to recognise that there are significant qualitative differences between
subjectivities. There are those that Papadopoulos et al. rightly discuss as bringing us directly back into power – and which
account for most of the subjectivities that people hold today (‘race’, ‘nation’, ‘heterosexual’, ‘homosexual’, ‘native’ and so
on) – but there are also those that are born of practices of escape. (Sharma 2009: 473, emphasis in original)
Debating the intricacies of immigration policy is key to combat
misinformation, creating informed activists
Daftary 18 (Ashley-Marie Hanna Daftary is a Ph.D. in Social Work, University of
Denver. February 28, 2018 “Confronting Immigration Myths with the Reality: A
Necessary Perspective for Culturally Grounded Social Work Practice,” Published
by Smith College Studies in Social Work, University of Nevada, Reno, Vol. 88,
No. 2, p. 96-98, Accessed through Taylor and Francis Online)
The immigration debate today is filled with misinformation and fear-inducing tactics.
This misinformation colors the perspective of many individuals and communities, promoting a culture of xenophobia and fear of anyone who is foreign-born or
assumed to be foreign-born (including most people of color) (Huber, Lopez, Malagon, Velez, & Solorzano, 2008). This is especially concerning as social workers
find themselves working with immigrant families at increasing rates (Engstrom & Okamura, 2007). Although immigrant groups that have been targeted by fearinducing propaganda have changed over time, the dehumanizing propaganda surrounding immigration to the United States has remained fairly consistent.
Immigrants have been frequently depicted as strange, alien, and vulgar creatures that threaten the dominant (white, male, elite) culture (Hanna & Ortega, 2016;
Ortega, Hanna, & Haffajee, 2014; Park, 2006; Park & Kemp, 2006). Most recently, President Donald Trump has not only characterized Mexican immigrants as
drug smugglers and rapists but also discussed building a wall between the United States and Mexico with the implication that the United States needs to be
protected from Mexican invaders (Fang, 2015; Trump, 2015). This rhetoric and imagery have constructed the contemporary understanding of immigrants and
immigration (Chavez, 2008) and enabled Trump to have the necessary political and public support to move forward with his plan to tighten immigration policies and
practices, expand the internal and border policing of immigrants, and increase the militarization of the southern border, including his initiative to build a bigger wall
to protect the United States. The following section reframes the often unchallenged narrative that immigration in the United States is a problem (Chomsky, 2007). It
addresses and debunks four common immigration myths and the associated truths. These four myths are: (1) The United States is being overrun by immigrants
(Chavez, 2008; Khakoo, 2003; Park & Kemp, 2006). (2) Immigrants do not integrate into U.S. society (Chavez, 2008; Chomsky, 2007; Cole, 1994; Foner, 2001;
Khakoo, 2003; Passel & Fix, 1994). (3) Immigrants are a fiscal and/or economic burden to the United States (Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1996;
Accessing historically accurate
and researched data about immigrants and immigration is a necessary step for social workers who aim to
address and confront the bias and misinformation that pervade U.S. society. In addition, a more realistic representation of immigrants can
help move direct service practitioners from a community deficits framework to a strengths-based and
empowerment perspective. This opens the space for social workers to provide more culturally responsive services, including
intervention and advocacy with the immigrant community. Furthermore, increased understanding of current myths and the
associated truths surrounding immigration can help social workers engage in well-informed, balanced dialogue with
Massey, 2005). (4) Immigrants are criminals and more prone to criminal activity (Chavez, 2008; Rumbaut, 2008).
other service providers, community members and leaders about immigrants and immigration in the United States. To do this, social worker practitioners must first
identify misinformation. Next, they should address the misinformation referring to reliable research and scholarship as needed. Directly confronting misinformation
providing correct information to political officials, lawmakers, and voters can strengthen the likelihood that
decisions made by lawmakers and political officials at local, state, and federal levels will be better informed in order to
support the public well-being .
and
policies, practices, and
Our model of citizenship is formulated on a rejection of
assimilationist logics, instead focusing on granting group-specific
rights forged through political demands for social justice that
remedies historical wrongs
Rachel Busbridge 18, Lecturer in Sociology at the Australian Catholic
University, Melbourne, “Multicultural Politics of Recognition and Postcolonial
Citizenship Rethinking the Nation”, https://www.routledge.com/MulticulturalPolitics-of-Recognition-and-Postcolonial-CitizenshipRethinking/Busbridge/p/book/9781138659728
As a response to the ways in which globalisation and increasing transnational migration have diversified contemporary polities,
multicultural citizenship is concerned with integrating cultural minorities into the fabric of
political community as a means to foster commitment to democratic ideals of equality, autonomy and
inclusion (Fernandez, 2008). It is thus framed by more substantive notions of citizenship as full membership in
a political community, as opposed to merely a legal status conferring of certain rights and duties. Whereas T.H. Marshall’s
(1963) account of substantive citizenship, wherein civil and political rights are supplemented by social welfare rights, was driven by the aim
of levelling class differences to extend basic individual rights, multicultural
citizenship adds cultural rights into the
cultural minorities have rights to
‘symbolic presence and visibility’, ‘ dignifying representation’ and to the ‘ propagation of
identity and maintenance of lifestyles’ (Pakulski, 1997: 80), multicultural citizenship is entangled with the gradual
political shift away from policies of assimilation in favour of a more nuanced approach to social cohesion. Rather than
forcing all citizens into a one-size-fits-all model , multicultural citizenship is grounded in the
presumption that the granting of group-specific rights, which may include national and
Indigenous minorities (Kymlicka, 1995) but most typically relates to the ethnic, cultural and religious
diversity produced by immigration , is integral to fostering a sense of commonality
amongst citizens and a sense of substantive belonging for minority groups . Multiculturalists have lauded
mix as an important element of political membership. In acknowledging that
the social and political significance of cultural diversity from a variety of perspectives. These range from the com- munitarian assumption
that cultures are valuable because they provide the rich context in which choices are made meaningful and viable (Kymlicka, 1995) to the
argument that cultural
diversity is a social good in itself because it creates opportunities for
encounters across difference and thus gives us opportunities to discover more about ourselves and about others (Parekh,
2000). Conceptions of multicultural citizenship have a transformative dimension , insofar as they
seek to ‘transform the way dominant majorities have treated minorities within their boundaries, as well
as the way minority groups have conceived of their claims’ (Ivison, 2010: 12). My understanding of postcolonial
citizenship takes much from the idea of multicultural citizenship , particularly with regard to the
significance of trans- forming majority/minority relations. Yet, it is significant that multicultural citizenship has been challenged for failing to
deliver on its aspiration for social cohesion and better integration of cultural minorities (Fernandez, 2008). Instead of promoting a richer
sense of belonging through the differentiated application of rights, the charge is that multicultural citizenship has served to overemphasise
difference, in effect fragmenting social groups and undercutting the common identity and shared public culture substantive citi- zenship
requires. Furthermore, it has been argued that, contrary to trans- forming relationships between cultural minorities and majorities,
multicultural citizenship has merely served to ‘freeze’ cultural differences and their respective positions in social relations of power.
Something like this cri- tique is common in the debate between ‘interculturalism’ and ‘multi- culturalism’ which has come to the fore in recent
years. Ted Cantle defines the concept of interculturalism as being: about the creation of a culture of openness which effectively challenges
the identity politics and entrenchment of separate communities, based upon any notion of ‘otherness’. But, it is also a dynamic process in
which there will be some tensions and conflicts, as a necessary part of societal change in which people are able to positively envision ideas
for multicultural and multifaith societies and where diversity and globalisation are recognised as permanent features of society, to be
embraced, rather than feared. (2012: 143–4) The interculturalist concern is thus that, in seeking to accommodate differ- ence,
multiculturalism has ended up preserving it at the expense of inter- cultural communication, dialogue and a ‘synthesis’ of diversity into a
robust and cohesive whole (Meer and Modood, 2012). It is beyond the scope of this chapter to engage the interculturalism/ multiculturalism
debate in any further detail, suffice to say that interculturalism remains for the most part more a rhetorical and political challenge to
multiculturalism than a developed political theory (Kymlicka, 2012). Interculturalism no doubt resonates far more than multiculturalism in
certain contexts – most notably northern Europe – and thus does important work in garnering social support for cultural diversity (Taylor,
2012). None- theless, many of its claims about the ghettoisation produced by policies of multiculturalism and the supposed incapacity of
multiculturalist theory to engage questions of integration and societal cohesion are, to put it quite simply, wrong (see Kymlicka, 2007; Meer
and Modood, 2012). And it is in this con- text that I think postcolonial citizenship can serve as a useful supplement to multicultural
citizenship. As I have sought to lay it out, postcolonial
citizenship is a means to engage the social dynamics and
political impetus underlying multicultural struggles for recognition , which cannot be
understood without reference to the wider political culture within which they take place. Recognition is indeed a powerful
framework with which to engage multicultural politics , precisely because it foregrounds their
relational aspects (see Chapter 3). But as I have aimed to show, this relationality is, to a powerful extent, located within a common space of
political community; indeed, the necessary connections between misrecognition as a source of conflict and recognition as a political remedy
mean that questions of political community and claims to difference are effectively inextricable from each other. It is thus not necessarily the
case that multicultural citizenship cannot account for a ‘culture
of openness’ as Cantle suggests, but more that this must
be seen as an achievement of political action and political struggle as opposed to simply an ethical
commitment to envision diversity as a positive aspect of contemporary societies. Furthermore, post-colonial citizenship
stresses that the creation of such a common culture in which there is space for difference is not a consensual process,
but rather forged through demands for social justice and thus entails asking difficult questions about the
identity and culture of a given political community. In claiming recognition, minorities variously demand social
engagement with past injustices , racism and prejudice, exclusionary narratives, histories of empire and present neoimperial realities; in short, uncomfortable truths about political culture that need reckoning with if we are to live
together as a genuinely multicultural community. As such, they seek alternative visions of political community not
founded on exploitation, oppression and discrimina- tion, but rather on freedom, inclusiveness, democracy and justice (Gilroy,
2008: 663). It would be remiss to imagine that all minority struggles for recognition necessarily promote democratic ideals. This is
something that liberal feminists have cautioned us against, even as many of their presump- tions regarding minority and majority cultures
we must certainly avoid romanticising
minority political claims as inherently emancipatory . Nevertheless, it is critical that we see
multicultural politics of recognition as essential to the development of democratic public
cultures in general, where the politicisation of cultural difference in social justice struggles unavoidably compels questions about who
have been critiqued (see Chapter 5). From a postcolonial perspective,
‘we’ are and where ‘our’ limits may lie.
Opinions are malleable – new information regarding immigrants can
substantially alter individuals’ beliefs
Giovanni Facchini et al 16, University of Nottingham, University of Milan,
CEPR, CESifo, GEP and IZA Yotam Margalit Tel Aviv University “Countering
Public Opposition to Immigration: The Impact of Information Campaigns”,
https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/161043/1/dp10420.pdf
In this paper we have studied whether exposing citizens to information about the potential positive role of immigration in addressing
domestic social and economic problems can alter their views on immigration. Focusing on the case of Japan, a country with a
comparatively small foreign population and known for a widespread public skepticism toward immigration, we carried out the first largescale experimental study of the impact of information treatments on reducing opposition to immigration. Our study delivers several results of
lead to a sizable increase in support
leads also to a
change — albeit a smaller one — in a quasi-behavioral measure of active engagement in the form of signing onto a
note. First, we find that exposure to
positive information
can
for allowing more immigrants into the country, including the expansion of visas for temporary migrants. Second, it
petition to parliament in support of a more immigration-friendly policy. Third, we find that the effects persist after 10-12 days, a striking result
many
people have little exposure to, and knowledge about, the potential benefits of a more open
immigration policy. As our analysis indicate, providing people with even fairly rudimentary
information about these potential benefits, particularly if this information is new, can lead to substantial shifts
in views . As the public conversation is often dominated by anti-immigration voices, the paucity of politicians or organizations that
publicly advocate for a more open immigration policy may mean that information about the potential benefits
of immigration is not receiving substantial airing in the public discussion.20 The fact that information
given the relatively unobtrusive nature of the experimental intervention. The results provide support to the conjecture that
treatments of the type we administered produce such sizable effects, many of which last beyond the immediate term, suggests that
campaigns informing the broad public about certain positive impacts of immigration are potentially a
powerful tool for countering widespread public hostility toward immigration.
2AC
T - Visas
1st – travel ban applies to green card applications
Ahmad 17 (Hassan, immigration lawyer of 15 years, “This is how an immigrant
can enter Trump's America,” 10-9, http://thehill.com/opinion/immigration/354613this-is-how-an-immigrant-can-enter-trumps-america, CMR)
Trump's third
try to ban Muslims works like this: The affected countries are Chad, Iran, Libya, North Korea, Somalia, Syria, Venezuela, and Yemen. Each country has their
own restrictions — but no new immigrant visas (green cards) for any of these countries
except Venezuela . For other nonimmigrant visas, it varies. Nationals from affected countries who are in the U.S. already, have a valid visa
On Oct. 18, the new travel ban — aka “Muslim Ban 3.0” — will be fully effective (unless recently-filed court challenges are successful.)
already, have a green card, have granted asylee status, are admitted refugees, or fall into other narrow exceptions are not affected by the new ban. Thousands of
people will be affected by this ban if it is allowed to proceed. (I am very concerned it will be ultimately successful.) But make no mistake: This is still a ban guided
by hate and alternative facts.
Restrictions govern quantity, type, and terms of admission
Posner, 6 - Kirkland and Ellis Professor of Law, University of Chicago Law
School (Eric Posner & Adam B. Cox, "The Second-Order Structure of
Immigration Law" ( John M. Olin Program in Law and Economics
Working Paper No. 314, 2006)
https://chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1571&context=l
aw_and_economics italics in original
A central goal of immigration policy for all states is, at a very high level of abstraction, to expand the polity by
admitting desirable people.13 Nonetheless, states have different attitudes about which potential immigrants are desirable under
various circumstances. These differences lead states’ first-order policy preferences to diverge along three main
dimensions: with respect to the quantity of immigrants, the type of immigrants, and the terms of admission.14¶
Quantity. States can choose a range of numerical restrictions. At one extreme, a state permits no immigration;
at the other extreme, a state permits unlimited immigration.15 Nearly all states choose intermediate points, but there is still a great deal of
variation. Prior to the twentieth century, the United States had no formal numerical limits; beginning in 1921, the United States imposed an
immigration ceiling of 350,000 on the Eastern Hemisphere.16 Over time, that ceiling ranged from 150,000 (in 1927) to 700,000 (in 1990)
and since 1965 has covered the entire globe.17 Because of exceptions to the ceilings, actual immigration has been somewhat higher; for
example, in 2004 legal immigration exceeded 946,000.18 By comparison, legal immigration in the same year was 202,300 in Germany,
175,200 in France, 88,300 in Japan, 235,800 in Canada, and 266,500 in the United Kingdom.19 ¶ Quantity restrictions can take various
forms. As noted above, the U.S. federal government placed few formal restrictions on immigration prior to the 1870s.20 During this period,
the government often took steps to increase the size of the immigrant flow.21 Even after the federal government began to place statutory
limits on the types of immigrants who could enter, it did not place numerical restrictions on the overall size of the immigrant flow. The first
statutory limits on the annual flow of immigrants were not adopted until shortly after World War I.22 These initially temporary limits were
codified in the national origins quota system a few years later, but even these quota laws applied only to the Eastern Hemisphere.23 Only
in the last forty years has the
United States established relatively rigid global numerical restrictions on the
annual number of immigrants the country will admit.24¶ Type. States also regulate the type of
person who may immigrate. Some states use a point system that favors applicants with desired characteristics.25 These
typically include the ability to speak the native language, work skills, educational achievement, and propensity to obey the law. For
example, Canada awards points to applicants who are highly educated; who speak English and French proficiently; who have work
experience; who are between twenty-one and forty-nine years old; who have arranged for employment in Canada; and (under the category
of “adaptability”) who have an educated spouse or partner, have had prior work experience in Canada, or have a family relation in
Canada.26 The United States places more weight on family relationship, though it too favors immigrants who have desired work skills.27
Before it imposed numerical restrictions, the United States did not have such elaborate
and specific criteria for type, but it would be a mistake to think that the type of immigrant is a new concern. The Alien and
Sedition Acts passed by the first Congress permitted the deportation of disloyal or subversive aliens,28 and many states in the postfounding era had laws that permitted the expulsion (from state territory) of public charges and criminals.29 Starting in 1875, Congress
passed laws designed to exclude noncitizens on the basis of race (initially Chinese, then covering noncitizens from most of East and South
Asia) and later on the basis of national origin (disfavoring, for example, southern Europeans).30 Today, the United States treats a criminal
record as an important indication that a person is of an undesired type.31¶ Terms
of admission. States also differ in
the status that they confer on those permitted to immigrate. At one extreme, a state may confer full
citizenship on an immigrant; at the other extreme, a state may permanently deny an immigrant the legal incidents of citizenship. For
example, while the United States places substantial constraints on the numbers and types of immigrants it admits, today it places relatively
few conditions on their terms of admission. Most noncitizens admitted to lawful permanent residence in the United States have a relatively
easy path to citizenship.32 They must live in the country for five years before becoming eligible to naturalize, but this is nearly the only
meaningful condition they must satisfy.33 Many other states have been less welcoming. In Germany, for example, a guest worker system
under which resident workers (and their children) were ineligible for citizenship was the norm for much of the twentieth century.34
Moreover, the naturalization requirements have not always been so easy to satisfy in the United States. Until 1952, the United States
restricted naturalization on the basis of race, which had the effect of permanently depriving some immigrants of access to full membership
in the political community.35¶ We should be clear that we
describe here only the immigrant admission system
in the United States, not the system used to admit nonimmigrants. Nonimmigrants are
those noncitizens admitted for a temporary period, such as tourists or employees who receive temporary
authorization to work in the country.36 Immigrants, by contrast, are admitted to permanent residence in the
country—residence that is not contingent on retaining employment, learning English, and so forth—and are on a path to eventual
citizenship. (For that reason admitted immigrants are typically referred to as “lawful permanent residents”). We focus on the structure of the
immigrant system, because our interest here is in the system that the state uses to select those in the immigrant pool whom it considers
desirable to add to the country’s population and eventually to the citizenry.37 As we explain below, however, a state might choose to use a
temporary immigration system—such as a guest worker program—as a screening mechanism for potential permanent immigrants.38¶
This highlights one last important point about first-order preferences—a point that foreshadows the following discussion on secondorder design. Though restrictions concerning immigrant numbers, types, and terms of admission
often reflect a state’s first-order preferences, they need not always do so. Because such restrictions are closely
interrelated, a restriction along one dimension can be used as an instrument to advance a different first-order preference. Restrictions on
terms of admission are, as we note above, one example of this. Numerical restrictions offer another example: they can reflect a first-order
preference, but can also be used as a second-order mechanism to control the types of immigrants (and vice versa). The national origins
quota system that Congress enacted in 1924 was designed to do just this: the quota law’s formula was intended to constrict the flow of
immigrants from southern and eastern Europe, whom Congress saw as racially inferior to their western and northern European
counterparts.39
Legal immigration includes temporary migrants
Wasem, 12 - Specialist in Immigration Policy for the Congressional Research
Service (Ruth, “Overview of Immigration Issues in the 112th Congress “ 1/12,
CRS Report for Congress, https://fas.org/sgp/crs/homesec/R41704.pdf
The scope of legal immigration includes permanent admissions (e.g., employment-based,
familybased immigrants) and temporary admissions (e.g., guest workers, foreign students). There are some
foreign nationals admitted temporarily in a conditional status who may be on a path to permanent residence. The
challenge inherent in reforming the system of legal immigration is balancing the hopes of employers to increase the
supply of legally present foreign workers, the longings of families to re-unite and live together, and a widely shared wish
among the various stakeholders to improve the policies governing legal immigration into the country.
The executive can impose immigration restrictions – prefer ev from
the CFR
CFR no date, Code of Federal Regulations “8 U.S. Code § 1182 - Inadmissible
aliens”, https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/8/1182
(f) Suspension of entry or imposition of restrictions by President
Whenever the President finds that the entry of any aliens or of any class of aliens into the United
States would be detrimental to the interests of the United States, he may by proclamation, and for such period
as he shall deem necessary, suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or nonimmigrants, or
impose on the entry of aliens any restrictions he may deem to be appropriate . Whenever the
Attorney General finds that a commercial airline has failed to comply with regulations of the Attorney General relating to
requirements of airlines for the detection of fraudulent documents used by passengers traveling to the United States
(including the training of personnel in such detection), the Attorney General may suspend the entry of some or all aliens
transported to the United States by such airline.
3rd – no offense – the temporary-permanent distinction has been
eroded
Meissner, et al, 07 --- former Commissioner of the Immigration and
Naturalization Service and Senior Fellow at Migration Policy Institute (Summer
2017, DORIS MEISSNER, DEBORAH W. MEYERS, DEMETRIOS G.
PAPADEMETRIOU & MICHAEL FIX, The Georgetown Journal of Law & Public
Policy, “SYMPOSIUM: REFORMING U.S. IMMIGRATION POLICY: Immigration
and America's Future: A New Chapter,” 5 Geo. J.L. & Pub. Pol'y 473, Lexis-Nexis
Scholastic, JMP)
B. Temporary Immigration A core principle of the immigration system, codified in the 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act, has been
separating nonimmigrant (temporary) and permanent visas, with temporary visa intended not to lead to permanent immigration. n48 Yet
through incremental changes in law and practice, many
temporary visas are now temporary in name
only . Nonimmigrant (temporary) immigration programs have increasingly been used as a step to permanent immigration. n49
Temporary workers and visa categories are meeting standing, ongoing labor market needs and employer preferences. In response, there
has been explosive growth in the categories and numbers of temporary immigration programs, creating a patchwork system of visas
tailored to specific types of workers or entrants. As a result, illegal immigration is meeting the nation's low-skill demands, and
temporary visa programs in the legal immigration system are meeting the
demands for mostly high-skilled immigration. n50 The scale of the various agricultural, non-agricultural, and
high-skilled visa programs that admit temporary workers and their dependents is at an historic high. The number of H and L temporary
visas issued more than tripled from 136,000 in FY 1992 to about 440,000 in FY 2005. n51 Demand for H-1B visas, the primary path for
high-skilled workers, is so high that the annual cap has typically been met before the fiscal year even begins. n52 The roughly 550,000
temporary work visas for employment in FY 2004 outnumbered by nearly four-fold the cap on employment-based admissions in the current
permanent [*484] immigration system. n53
CP “Immigrant” PIC
Critical discourse analysis is flawed – and its analysis is insufficient
and wrong
Michael Stubbs 97, Professor of English Linguistics at the University of Trier,
Germany, since 1990. He was previously Professor of English in Education,
Institute of Education, University of London (1985-90) and Lecturer in Linguistics,
University of Nottingham, UK (1974-85), “WHORF'S CHILDREN: CRITICAL
COMMENTS ON CRITICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS (CDA)”, British Association
for Applied Linguistics, 1997, https://www.unitrier.de/fileadmin/fb2/ANG/Linguistik/Stubbs/stubbs-1997-whorfs-children.pdf
Introduction
A model of language which has evolved very fast in the 1990s is an approach to
textual commentary known as critical discourse analysis (CDA). In a period of
only a few years, it has become very influential, and has been the subject of
many papers, including plenaries, at both BAAL and AILA. Although, in this
paper, I make several criticisms of CDA, I hope my comments will be taken in
a positive spirit. Many of the observations made in CDA seem to me to be
correct. I think, however, that the analyses could be strengthened by comparative
and quantitative methods, and that the logic of the position could be better
argued.
Definition
It is because CDA raises important social issues, that it is worthwhile trying to
strengthen its analyses. CDA argues that there are relations between language,
power and ideology, and between how the world is represented in texts and how
people think about the world. The following definitions cover several essential
points:
"Critical Discourse Analysts [...] feel that it is [...] part of their professional role to
investigate, reveal and clarify how power and discriminatory value are inscribed
in and mediated through the linguistic system: Critical Discourse Analysis is
essentially political in intent." (Caldas-Coulthard and Coulthard 1996: xi.)
"Critical linguistics [...] formulated an analysis of public discourse, an analysis
designed to get at the ideology coded implicitly behind the overt propositions [...]
Critical linguistics insists that all representation is mediated, moulded by the
value systems that are ingrained in the medium [...] The proponents [...] are
concerned to use linguistic analysis to expose misrepresentation [...] the critical
linguist is crucially concerned with the relativity of representation." (Fowler 1996:
3, 4, 10.)
Key concepts include: representation, mediation, implicit or hidden
meanings, and the explicitly political aim of analysing power and inequality, not
just to interpret the world but to change the world. In addition to this critique
of ideology, important themes are the relation between changes in discourse and
wider sociocultural change, and the claim that language has acquired new
functions in the late-modern world (Fairclough 1992). However, the two themes
are closely connected, since they both concern relations between ways of talking
and ways of thinking, and I will here treat them together.
I will take as representative two books which have the phrase "critical discourse
analysis" in the title (Fairclough 1995a, Caldas-Coulthard & Coulthard 1996) and
four other books by Fairclough (1989, 1992, 1995a, b). Also relevant is work by
Fowler (1991a), Hodge and Kress (1988, 1993), Kress (1990), and Meinhof &
Richardson (1994). Caldas-Coulthard & Coulthard (1996: xi) regard "the leading
names in the field" to be Fairclough, Fowler, Kress, van Dijk, van Leeuven, and
Wodak.
Criticisms
CDA aims to provide social criticism which is based on firm linguistic
evidence: both politically committed and grounded in "systematic and detailed
textual analysis" (Fairclough 1995a: 187). However I will question the extent to
which CDA meets "standards of careful, rigorous and systematic analysis"
(Fairclough & Wodak 1997: 259). I will mostly formulate my criticisms as a series
of questions, since I think that some of them can be answered. However, the
paper is not entirely optimistic, and I will argue that CDA is unavoidably circular
in certain respects.
Some sharp criticisms have been around for a long time, but remain
unanswered. A repeated criticism is that the textual interpretations of critical
linguists are politically rather than linguistically motivated, and that analysts
find what they expect to find, whether absences or presences. Sharrock and
Anderson (1981) are ironic with reference to critical linguists such as Kress and
Fowler:
"[O]ne of the stock techniques employed by Kress and his colleagues is to look in
the wrong place for something, then complain that they can't find it, and suggest
that it is being concealed from them."
Amongst many criticisms, Widdowson (1995a, b, 1996) also criticizes CDA for a
political agenda which is not clearly grounded in linguistic analysis, and he
is severe in his overall characterizations of Fairclough (1992):
"[...] essentially sociological or socio-political rather than linguistic [...] an
impressive display of apparent scholarship [...] profligate with terms whose
conceptual significance is uncertain [...] interpretation in support of belief takes
precedence over analysis in support of theory [...] perhaps conviction counts for
more than cogency." (1995b.)
Perhaps particularly significant are criticisms by Fowler (1996: 8, 12), one of the
originators of critical linguistics:
"[M]ajor problems remain with critical linguistics [...] [D]emonstrations [tend] to
be fragmentary, exemplificatory, and they usually take too much for
granted in the way of method and of context. [...] [N]owadays it seems that
anything can count as discourse analysis [...] [T]here is a danger [of]
competing and uncontrolled methodologies drawn from a scatter of different
models in the social sciences."
These quotations express several fundamental criticisms: that CDA's methods of
data collection and text analysis are inexplicit, that the data are often restricted
to text fragments, and that it is conceptually circular, in so far as its own
interpretations of texts are as historically bound as anyone else's, and that it is a
disguised form of political correctness.
K - Mills
Weigh consequences first—moral absolutism reproduces evil
Isaac 2 — Jeffrey C. Isaac, James H. Rudy Professor of Political Science and
Director of the Center for the Study of Democracy and Public Life at Indiana
University-Bloomington, 2002 (“Ends, Means, and Politics,” Dissent, Volume 49,
Issue 2, Spring, Available Online to Subscribing Institutions via EBSCOhost, p.
35-36)
an unyielding concern with moral
goodness undercuts political responsibility . The concern may be morally laudable, reflecting a kind of personal integrity, but it
As writers such as Niccolo Machiavelli, Max Weber, Reinhold Niebuhr, and Hannah Arendt have taught,
suffers from three fatal flaws: (1) It fails to see that the purity of one’s intention does not ensure the achievement of what one intends. Abjuring violence or refusing to make common cause with
morally compromised parties may seem like the right thing; but if such tactics entail impotence, then it is hard to view them as serving any moral good beyond the clean conscience of their
supporters; (2) it fails to see that in a world of real violence and injustice,
moral purity is not simply a form of powerlessness; it is
often a form of complicity in injustice . [end page 35] This is why, from the standpoint of politics—as opposed to religion—pacifism is always a
potentially immoral stand. In categorically repudiating violence, it refuses in principle to oppose certain violent injustices with any effect; and (3) it fails to see that
politics is as much about unintended consequences as it is about intentions; it is
the effects of action, rather than the motives of action, that is most
significant . Just as the alignment with “good” may engender impotence, it is often
the pursuit of “good” that generates evil . This is the lesson of communism in the twentieth century: it is not enough that one’s
goals be sincere or idealistic; it is equally important, always, to ask about the effects of pursuing these goals and to judge these effects in pragmatic and historically contextualized ways.
Moral absolutism inhibits this judgment . It alienates those who are not true
believers. It promotes arrogance . And it undermines political effectiveness .
A plan that demands the state remove itself is a challenge to the state
Newman 10
(Saul, Reader in Political Theory at Goldsmiths, U of London, Theory & Event
Volume 13, Issue 2)
the notion of demand: making certain demands
on the state – say for higher wages, equal rights for excluded groups, to not go to war, or an end to draconian policing –
is one of the basic strategies of social movements and radical groups. Making such demands does
not necessarily mean working within the state or reaffirming its legitimacy. On the
contrary, demands are made from a position outside the political order , and they often exceed
the question of the implementation of this or that specific measure. They implicitly call into question the legitimacy and
even the sovereignty of the state by highlighting fundamental inconsistencies between, for
instance, a formal constitutional order which guarantees certain rights and equalities, and
state practices which in reality violate and deny them.
There are two aspects that I would like to address here. Firstly,
The aff’s hunt for a new world comes at the expense of changing this
one --- that cedes control to the colonizer and reinforces binaries that
justified colonialism in the first place. Recognizing the multi-faceted
nature of this world allows solidarity to enact a concretely
cosmopolitan politics.
Gary WILDER 16, Associate Professor of Anthropology at The Graduate Center
of the City University of New York [“Here/Hear Now Aimé Césaire!” The South
Atlantic Quarterly, Vol. 115, No. 3, July 2016, p. 585-604, Accessed Online
through Emory Libraries]
These key terms illuminate crucial aspects of what made Césaire a distinctive thinker whose critical voice may continue to
resonate for us today. But in order to attend to Césaire as he did his predecessors—as a contemporary— we should
recognize how his intellectual orientation and insights
brush against the grain of many current
theoretical tendencies. In both critical theory and postcolonial studies, the standard
operation is to unmask purportedly universal categories as socially constructed, culturally
particular, and implicated in practices, systems, and logics of domination. These are indispensable
critical moves. But this approach often devolves into a hunt for traces of universalism or
humanism , whether in textual artifacts or political projects, in order to reveal the regressive or
oppressive essence of the object. This “aha” moment thus becomes the punch line of
the discussion rather than the starting point for analysis. Such fears of complicity
with power do not only belie a longing for intellectual and political purity. They also make
it difficult to think dialectically, to identify aspects of given arrangements that may point
beyond their actually existing forms .
The current insistence on negative critique also makes scholars reluctant to identify
desirable alternatives and specify the kind of world they might want to create. But what
do we concede if we are unable or unwilling to risk affirming more just, more human,
ways of being to which we can say “yes”? It is not easy for radical thinkers to reconcile a
nonprescriptive orientation to a radically open future with the imperative to envision
more desirable arrangements (Coronil 2011). But ignoring or deferring the challenge does
not make it disappear. Following anticolonial thinkers like Césaire, especially those
located within the black Atlantic critical tradition, may remind us not to forfeit
categories such as freedom, justice, democracy, solidarity, and humanity to the
dominant actors who have instrumentalized and degraded them .
Given this dilemma, the attention paid to Vivek Chibber’s recent polemic against subaltern studies is not surprising. Such
attention, however, seems to be less about the merits of his universalist Marxism than about a sense of some of the
limitations and impasses into which certain currents of postcolonial thinking have led (Chibber 2013).7 Partha Chatterjee
himself has recently written, “The task, as it now stands, cannot . . . be taken forward within the framework of the concepts
and methods mobilized in Subaltern Studies . . . what is needed are new projects” (2012a: 44). He suggests that such
projects should probably focus on “cultural history” and “popular culture” with a renewed focus on visual materials and
embodied practices rather than written texts and on ethnography rather than intellectual history. Moreover, he links this
invitation to study “the ethnographic, the practical, the everyday and the local” to a focus on subnational “regional
formations” and “minority cultures” and languages whose specificities, he observes, had not been sufficiently engaged by
earlier subaltern studies research on “India,” “Pakistan,” or “Bangladesh” (47–49). Valuable as such studies would surely
be, it is not clear how a renewed focus on locality, with place-based assumptions about territory, consciousness, and
categories, could do the kind of critical work necessary to grasp the deep shifts in political logics, structures, and practices
that characterize the world-historical present. On the contrary, such approaches risk reproducing precisely the culturalist
and territorialist assumptions about political identification and affiliation that need to be rethought in light of contemporary
conditions.8
Chatterjee’s surprising emphasis
on local ethnography seems consistent with one trend in
postcolonial thinking that risks reviving the types of civilizational thinking, and associated
assumptions about origins and authenticity, that it had earlier set out to dismantle
(Chakrabarty 2007; Mah- mood 2005; Mignolo 2011). Consider the important ways that Talal Asad has invited us to
rethink liberal assumptions about “tradition,” with respect to liberal and nonliberal forms of life. In dialogue with Ludwig
Wittgenstein and Alasdair MacIntyre, Asad (1986) has developed a powerful critique of liberal secularism—and the
secularist logic that subtends many modern liberal states—from the standpoint of embodied and discursive traditions. On
the one hand, he reminds us that “Islamic tradition” is neither singular nor unchanging; it is a structured and dynamic
despite liberalism’s claims to posttraditional neutrality, it too constitutes a particular tradition (albeit one that defines itself in opposition
space for reasoned argument. On the other hand, he reminds us that
to inherited, embodied, and practice-oriented forms of tradition-based reasoning).
Asad’s genealogical insights have rightly informed recent critiques of Western liberal ideologies, states, and
politics especially regarding their arrogant, condescending, and violent responses to tradition-rooted practices and
unintentionally, have also led
scholars to establish dubious chains of equivalence between modernity, the West, and
liberalism. Such operations seem to disregard Asad’s important invitation to understand
traditions as capacious, heterogeneous, and dynamic spaces of inquiry, disputation, and
practitioners, whether outside or inside the West. But his interventions, however
revision, not simply as a set of rigid behavioral scripts, unchanging cultural formulas, or
dogmatic ideological precepts. This reduction of political modernity to a onedimensional liberalism obscures , for example, the many currents of progressive
antiliberalism within the tradition of modern Western political thought. It fails to recognize
the significant number of non-European colonial intellectuals engaged in anti-imperial
struggles who were active participants in such “traditions within traditions.” It also
disregards the contradictions within and redeemable fragments of even liberal political
thinking, fragments that, if realized, might point far beyond, and possibly explode,
liberalism itself .
To reify modern or Western politics into a static and stereotypical liberalism is to risk
practicing an unfortunate form of “Occidentalism” that would reinforce archaic civilizational
assumptions about incommensurable and unrelated worlds (and worldviews) and
disregard the actual history and open possibilities for practices of cross-cultural
solidarity whereby anti-imperial actors outside Europe could enter into dialogue or affiliate
with, or even discover ways that they are already situated within, counterhegemonic
“Western” political traditions. Critics have rightly mobilized singularity, incommensurability, or untranslatability
against liberal attempts to discover an abstract humanity and thereby discount situated and embodied forms of life. But
the question is whether we treat incommensurability or untranslatability as an epistemological or political limit or as an
always imperfect starting point for practices of dialogue, coordination, affiliation, reciprocity, solidarity. For isn’t the
impossibility of full transparency or undifferentiated unity simply the unavoidable condition within which all communication,
sociality, and politics must be attempted?9
My point is not to congratulate dissident currents within the West, let alone to recuperate liberalism. It is
rather to approach radical and emancipatory politics from a place of not-alreadyknowing, of not presuming to know a priori which aspects of a tradition are irredeemable,
which traditions may become allies or habitations, what the boundaries of (thoroughly plastic) traditions
must be. This nondogmatic and experimental orientation to politics, traditions, and
concepts is one of the most precious and timely gifts that Césaire may offer to us now. He
practiced a concrete cosmopolitan relationship to modern traditions of philosophy,
aesthetics, and politics, one that was highly developed by the robust tradition of black Atlantic criticism within which
he was firmly rooted along with predecessors (e.g., Toussaint and W. E. B. DuBois), contemporaries (e.g., C. L. R.
James, James Baldwin, Suzanne Césaire, Senghor), and descendants (e.g., Fanon, Edouard Glissant, Stuart Hall, Paul
Gilroy, Achille Mbembe, David Scott).
Understandable concerns about totalizing explanation and Eurocentric evaluation have
led a generation of scholars to insist on the incommensurable alterity of non-European
forms of thought. But perhaps we should be concerned less exclusively with unmasking
universalisms as covert European particularism than with also challenging the
assumption that the universal is European property. I read Césaire not in order to provincialize
European concepts but to deprovincialize Antillean thinking. Césaire’s critical reworkings
remind us that the supposedly European categories of political modernity properly
belong as much to the African and Caribbean actors who coproduced them as to
the inhabitants of continental Europe. Similarly, African and Caribbean thinkers, no less
than their continental counterparts, produced abstract and general propositions about
“humanity,” “history,” and “the world.” In contrast to invocations of multiple modernities,
Césaire never granted to Europe possession of a modernity or universality or humanity
that was always already translocal and fundamentally Caribbean. He never treated
self-determination, emancipation, freedom, equality, or justice as essentially European
and foreign. Césaire’s intellectual and political interventions radically challenged reductive territorialist approaches to
social thought. He refused to concede that “France” was an ethnic or continental entity, that Martinique was not in some
real way internal to “French” society and politics, or that he was situated outside of modern critical traditions. Thus his
ongoing and unapologetic engagements with Hegel, Marx, Proudhon, Nietzsche, Lautréamont, Rimbaud, Mallarmé,
Bergson, Freud, Breton, Frobenius, and Lenin, alongside his many African, Antillean, and African American interlocutors.
The sonic blurring between “here” and “hear” in the title of this essay is meant to signal not only the contemporaneity of
Césaire’s thought for us here now but the imperative that we open ourselves to his presence and recognize his actuality
across the epochal divide by hearing what he actually said. This gesture builds on Walter Benjamin’s insight that every
now is a “now of recognizability” whereby “what has been comes together in a flash with the now to form a constellation”
through which past epochs become newly legible (1999: 462). I also follow Césaire himself, who engaged in dialogue with
predecessors as if they were contemporaries and who addressed future interlocutors directly as if they were already
present. Like Benjamin, Césaire
practiced a form of radical remembrance that connected
outmoded pasts to charged presents. This attention to vital histories was bound up
with a poetic politics that identified transformative possibilities dwelling within existing
arrangements and a proleptic politics that anticipated seemingly impossible futures by trying to enact them
concretely in the here and now. But Césaire can only speak to us now if we listen rather than presume to know what
someone like him in his situation must have, or should have, been saying.
Until very recently, scholarship on his work has been overdetermined by methodological nationalism (that puzzles over his
refusal to pursue state sovereignty), identitarian culturalism (that debates how adequately Césaire expressed Antillean
lived experience and whether or not he was an essentialist), and a disciplinary division of labor (that too often splits his
poetry, criticism, and politics into separate domains). Generally, Cold War scholarship was shaped by a need to evaluate
him in relation to canonical anticolonial nationalists and fit him into a narrative of decolonization-as-nationalindependence. This has made it difficult to recognize the epochal character, world-making ambition, and global sensibility
of his political reflections.
Faced with the promise of decolonization, Césaire conjugated concrete acts with political
imagination in ways that displaced conventional oppositions between aesthetics and politics, realism and utopia,
pragmatism and principle. Such efforts were animated by what I have been calling radical literalism and utopian realism
and which he called inflection and poetic knowledge. He regarded freedom as a problem whose institutional solution was
not self-evident and could only be situational. His interventions demonstrated the nonnecessary relationship between
colonial emancipation, popular sovereignty, and self-determination, on the one hand, and territorial state sovereignty and
He pursued cosmopolitan aims concretely through transcultural
practices and by attempting to invent new political forms through which to ground plural
and postnational democratic arrangements.
national liberation, on the other.
We should recognize that Césaire formulated a critique not of Western civilization from the standpoint of African or
Antillean culture but of modern Western racism, imperialism, and capitalism from the standpoint of Antillean and African
historical situations and experiences. More generally, it was a critique of an alienated and alienating modernity from the
Césaire
recognized residues of, and resources for, more just, human, and integrated ways of
living together within Antillean, African, and European texts, traditions, forms, histories,
and conditions. In his view, Antilleans—as culturally particular actors, imperial subjects,
New World denizens, moderns, and humans—were their rightful heirs. He was
concerned less with defining culturally authentic concepts, spaces, and arrangements for
Antilleans (apart from Europe or uncontaminated by modernity) than with overcoming imperialism, in
solidarity with other struggling peoples, in order to establish less alienated forms of
human life globally.
Remembering Césaire’s insistence that modern currents of radicalism were shared
legacies and common property may help us to rethink inherited assumptions about
the relation between territory, ethnicity, consciousness, and interest (Buck-Morss 2009, 2010).
They invite us to deterritorialize social thought and to decolonize intellectual history. This
is a matter not of valorizing non-European forms of knowledge, as important as such a move
certainly is, but of questioning the presumptive boundaries of “Europe” itself—by
recognizing the larger scales on which modern social thought was forged and of
appreciating that colonial societies produced self-reflexive thinkers concerned with largescale processes and future prospects. We can thereby recognize Césaire as a situated
postwar thinker of the postwar world, one of whose primary aims was to place into
question the very categories “France,” “Europe,” and “the West” by way of an immanent
critique of late imperial politics. He envisioned postnational arrangements through which
humanity could attempt to overcome the alienating antinomies that had impoverished the
quality of life in overseas colonies and European metropoles. His situated humanism
and concrete cosmopolitanism should thus be placed in a constellation of modern
standpoint of embodied and poetic ways of being, knowing, and relating (to self, others, and world). Above all,
emancipatory thinking oriented toward worldwide human freedom that included
antiracist, anti-imperial, internationalist, and socialist thinkers from a range of traditions:
black Atlantic, First Internationalist, global anarchist, Western Marxist, Marxist humanist,
Third Worldist.
Césaire believed that the future of humanity depended in some sense on its recovering a
lost poetic relation to “the throbbing newness of the world.” Why not regard Césaire’s
“humanism made to the measure of the world” as a starting point for our critical thinking
about the contemporary situation and the kind of world we would like to create. Césaire, like
Toussaint before him, addressed future interlocutors directly. At the same time, his thinking about future possibilities was
refracted through dialogue with predecessors like Toussaint. This is how I understand what one of his heirs, Glissant,
means by “a prophetic vision of the past” based on “the identification of a painful notion of time and its full projection
forward into the future” (1989: 64; see also Glissant 2005: 15, 16). Césaire once wrote of Schoelcher, the socialist
republican architect of the 1848 abolition of slavery in France, that it would be “useless to commemorate him if we had not
decided to imitate his politics” (1948a: 28). In this spirit I hope that the recent resurgence of interest in
Césaire is not only treated as an occasion to honor his memory but is seized as an opportunity to hear
his transgenerational address. We can thus think with Césaire about the relation between
existing theoretical frameworks, the world we are confronting, and urgent political
desires— especially with regard to the history of empire and the role of colonial
intellectuals as modern thinkers of global processes.
A positive orientation towards history and the ideals of radical
humanist freedom are key to global liberationist struggles. Only this
can avert every major existential crisis of our times.
Karenga 6—Professor and Chair Department of Africa Studies at Cal State
University and a major figure in the Black Power movement [Maulana,
Philosophy in the African Tradition of Resistance: Issues or Human Freedom and
Human Flourishing in Not Only The Master’s Tools, p. 242-5]
Surely, we
are at a moment of history fraught with new and old fOnTIS of anxiety, alienation,
and antagonism; deepening poverty in the midst of increasing wealth; proposals and
practices of ethnic cleansing and genocide; pandemic diseases; increased plunder; pollution and
depletion of the environment; constant conflicts, large and small; and worldthreatening delusions on the part of a superpower aspiring to a return to empire, with spurious
claims of the right to preemptive aggression, to openly attack and overthrow nonfavored and
fragile governments openly, and to seize the lands and resources of vulnerable peoples
and establish "democracy" through military dictatorship abroad, all the while suppressing
political dissent at home (Chang 2002; Cole et at. 2002). These anxieties are undergirded by racist
and religious chauvinism , by the self-righteous and veiled references of these rulers to themselves as a kind
of terrible and terrorizing hand of God, appointed to rid the world of evil (Ahmad 2002; Arnin 2001; Blum1995). At the
same time, in
this context of turmoil and terror and the use and threatened use of
catastrophic weapons, there is the irrational and arrogant expectation that the
oppressed will acquiesce, abandon resistance, and accept the disruptive and
devastating consequences of globalization, along with the global hegemony it implies (Martin
and Schumann 1997). There is great alarm among the white-supremicist rulers of these globalizing nations, given the
metical resistance rising up against them, even as globalization’s
technological, organizational, and
economic capacity continues to expand (Barber 1996; Karenga 2002e, 2003a; Lusane 1997). There is
great alarm when people who should "know" when they are defeated ridicule the assessment, refuse to be
defeated or dispirited, and, on the contrary, intensify and diversify their struggles
(Zepezauer 2002).
Certainly the battlefields of Palestine,
other continuing
Venezuela, long suffering Haiti, and Chiapas, Mexico, along with
emancipatory struggles everywhere, reaffirm the indomitable
character of the human spirit and the durability and adaptive vitality of a people
determined to be free, regardless of the odds and assessments against them. Indeed, they
remind us that the motive force of history is struggle, informed by the ongoing quest for
freedom, justice, power of the masses, and peace in the world. Despite "end of history"
claims and single-super- power resolve and resolutions, these struggles continue. For still the oppressed want
freedom, the wronged and injured want justice, the people want power over their destiny and daily lives, and the world
wants peace. And all over the world-especially in this U.S. citadel of aging capitalism with its archaic
dreams of empire-clarity in the analysis of issues, and in the critical determination of tasks and prospects, requires
the deep and disciplined reflection characteristic of the personal and social practice we call
philosophy.
But this sense of added urgency for effective intervention is
prompted not only by the critical
juncture at which we stand but also by an awareness of our long history of resistance
as a people, because in our collective strivings and social struggles we seek a new
future for our people, our descendants, and the world. Joined also to these conditions and considerations is the
compelling character of our self-understanding as a people, as a moral vanguard in this country and the world. For we
have launched, fought, and won with our allies struggles that not only have expanded
the realm of freedom in this country and the world but also have served as an ongoing inspiration
and a model of liberation struggles for other marginalized and oppressed peoples and
groups throughout the world. Indeed, they have borrowed from and built on our moral vocabulary and moral vision,
sung our songs of freedom, and held up our struggle for liberation as a model to emulate. Now, self-understanding
and self-assertion are dialectically linked. In other words, how we understand ourselves in the
world determines how we assert ourselves in the world. Thus, an expansive concept of
ourselves as Africans-continental and diasporan-and as Africana philosophers forms an
essential component of our sense of mission and the urgency with which we approach it.
It is important to note that I have conceived and written this chapter within the framework of Kausaida philosophy
(Karenga 1978, 1980, 1997) Kawaida is a philosophic initiative that was
forged in the crucible of
ideological and practical struggles around issues of freedom, justice, equalitys, selfdetermination, conullunal power, self-defense, pan~African- ism, coalition and alliance,
Black Studies, intellectual emancipation, and cultural recovery and reconstlouction. It
continued to develop in the midst of these ongoing struggies within the life of the mind and stmggles iottbtn the life of the
people, as well as within the context of the conditions of the world. Kawaida is defined as an ongoing synthesis of the best
It characterizes culture as a unique,
instructive and valuable way of being human in the world-as a foundation and framework
for self-understanding and self-assertion.
As a philosophy of culture and struggle, Kawaida maintains that our intellectual and social practice as
Nricana activist scholars must be undergirded and informed by ongoing efforts to (1) ground our- selves in our own
culture; (2) constantly recover, reconstruct, .and bring forth from our culture the best of what
it means to be African and human in the fullest sense ; (3) speak this special cultural truth to the
of xAfrican thought and practice in constant exchange tuttb tl3e 'U)()ltd.
world and (4) use our culture to constantly make our own unique contribution to the reconception and reconstruction of
this country, and to the forward flow of human history.
The alternative’s lack of hyper-specific demands means it will
inevitably be coopted by corporations, losing its radical potential
JULIANNE TVETEN 18, writes about the tech industry, labor, and culture,
“Living in a Pepsi Ad World”,
https://newrepublic.com/article/147748/commodified-protest-movements-trumpera
In a commercial for Google’s smart-home subsidiary Nest, a teenage boy, dressed for prom night, prepares to board a
limousine. Before he leaves, a paternal voice off camera gently commands the boy to treat his date with respect,
reminding him that he is entitled to nothing. That voice, it’s soon revealed, belongs not to the girl’s father, but to the boy’s:
It emanates from a curved, black audio device mounted in place of a doorbell as the father tele-parents from work via the
Nest app. A text overlay appears, reading, “It starts at home.” The ad, which occupied a coveted Academy Awards slot, is
an obvious nod to the #MeToo movement—a concept surely familiar to the Oscar-viewing public in the wake of
Hollywood’s recent sexual-assault reckoning. At first glance, there’s nothing remarkable about the commercial; it uses
such standard marketing techniques as demographic targeting and imparts a general air of corporate goodwill. Yet
commodification of
protest , particularly in the era of Trump . This issue reached a fever pitch a year ago, when an infamous
beneath its putative message of male responsibility lies a more insidious phenomenon: The
Pepsi commercial starring Kendall Jenner distilled the iconography of protests against police brutality into a collage of
meaningless signs, dance moves, and amicable cops. Though it was an egregious example of corporate appropriation,
the repercussions were mild and fleeting: Pepsi removed the ad, apologized, and moved on. Meanwhile, companies like
Nest have continued to glom on to mainstream social movements, simply in more subtle forms. Since, roughly, Trump’s
inauguration, private enterprise has tapped into an American furor gone mainstream, leveraging marches into
marketplaces. In 2017, New York magazine’s style vertical, The Cut, informed readers which scarves and leggings from
Uniqlo, Amazon, and American Apparel they should tote at the Women’s March. Smaller companies, too, used it as an
advertising platform: The CEO of cosmetics firm Glossier carried a sign to the same march proclaiming “We’re in it
together” under the company’s signature “G,” and health-tech startup Tia offered free poster templates for download, its
playful serif logo nestled in the corner. (The page appears to have been deactivated.) Cell carrier CREDO Mobile adopted
the same tactic, branding intact, for last month’s March For Our Lives to protest gun violence. If protesters are a market, it
should come as no surprise that signs and posters designed for them aren’t just canvases for ads; they’re also for sale.
Princeton Architectural Press, for instance, has published a series of ready-made signs: Posters for Change, a collection
of 50 removable posters running the gamut of causes of the #Resistance, from the abstract “Stay woke” to the more
concrete, if nonspecific, “Fund the Arts.” The book exhorts prospective marchers to “Tear, Paste, Protest”—that is, after
they fork over the requisite $25. Media outlets reinforce this process of commercialization. Like clockwork, the likes of
BuzzFeed, The Washington Post, The Guardian, and Slate comb
the crowds at the Women’s March, March For
demonstrations, compiling the signs they deem the wittiest and pithiest of the bunch.
Here, the protest sign transitions from an expression of conviction to something far more
marketable —clickbait—plus bragging rights for whichever clever marcher happened to make the cut. This predated
Our Lives, and other mass
Trump: In 2011, New York consulted with a Madison Avenue ad executive to “grade” signs from the Occupy Wall Street
movement on their “brand-building” potential. As the Occupy report card suggests, the monetization of resistance didn’t
begin with the ascendancy of Trump. Genevieve LeBaron and Peter Dauvergne examined how corporations like
ExxonMobil and WalMart co-opt and neuter dissent in 2014’s Protest Inc.: The Corporatization of Activism, starting with
the year 2008, when the financial crisis awoke even the world’s wealthiest countries to their own precarity. In 2011,
journalist Allison Kilkenny lamented the corporatization of Occupy Wall Street, citing such youth-capturing wangles as an
MTV music award for “Most Memorable #OWS Performance” and the possibility of Occupy Wall Street-themed
installments of MTV’s reality franchises The Real World and True Life. Yet it’s worth considering the effect of the Trump
presidency on this trend. Trump’s victory rattled a segment of the American population that, thanks to its own social and
financial capital, had been complacent under the eight years of the Obama administration. As many have noted, Trump
didn’t introduce America’s ugliness—its militarism, its feeble social-welfare programs, its rampant privatization of public
goods, its latent and overt bigotries, to name a few—he merely amplified it. However, those with the wherewithal to think
otherwise—that “America Is Already Great,” as the Democrats suggested in 2016—treated the current presidency as an
affront on American values, a departure from Who We Are. The members of this demographic—largely middle-class,
white, self-described liberals—are, on the whole, new to protest. Historically, they’ve been shielded from America’s worst
policies; after the election, however, they were thrust out of their institution-trusting comfort zone, forced to acknowledge
the ills that, as subtext under Obama, became text under Trump. Previously unaccustomed to taking it to the streets, this
group had suddenly arrived with pun-laden signs in tow. Accordingly, the Women’s March of 2017 generated record
Protest had, again, entered the mainstream , its new
core attendees equipped with money to burn —a fact of which “conscious” corporations became
all too aware . Relatedly, most mass movements, while aiming to counteract some of the horrors of the
Trump administration, have been content to couch their messaging in broad, fuzzy terms . They lack
numbers, peppered with celebrities and food trucks.
many of the demands that lie at the heart of activist politics on the left, which are both granular in their specifics and
sweeping in their call for holistic, systemic change. This is evident in criticism of the Women’s March for its racial
exclusion; of the post-Weinstein #MeToo movement for its scant attention to class; and of the March For Our Lives for
In an absence of specific , structural
demands —even if that absence is unconscious— corporations can more easily claim
silencing the voices of Marjory Stoneman Douglas’s black students.
critiques and
causes as their own. If, say, economic injustice isn’t clearly among the chief grievances of the Women’s March, it’s far
easier for companies to shoehorn themselves in —to, as Pepsi so nebulously put it, “join the
conversation.” These companies can then masquerade as champions of social justice, proclaiming a half-baked message
of equality with no financial loss and plenty to gain. It’s difficult to make prescriptions about acts of protest, especially in
such fraught times. What shouldn’t be up for debate, though, is that effective, inclusive
social movements are
compromised when they become vehicles for corporate exploitation. The next time a protester at one of America’s
post-2016 marches sees a business logo on a sign, an article prompting them to buy leggings, or a #woke commercial, it
just might behoove them to ask what, and who, it’s all for.
Modern movements inevitably fail – only moving towards the political
can succeed in shifting who holds power
Micah White 16, one of the leaders of the Occupy movement, author of The End
of Protest: A New Playbook for Revolution, “Protests won't stop Trump. We need
a movement that transforms into a party”,
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/nov/14/protests-donald-trumpdemocracy-party
The astonishing triumph of Donald Trump can be traced to the bitter defeat of Occupy Wall Street, a pro-democracy movement that
transcended left and right, sparking unrest in hundreds of cities and rural towns in 2011. Occupy’s consensus-based encampments
demanded that President Obama get money out of politics. Instead, we got mercilessly smashed by his progressive administration. Now
the dark irony of history is bashing back. Trump – an uber-wealthy, partially self-financed candidate who promises to “drain the swamp” –
was elected president just one week before the fifth anniversary of Mayor Bloomberg’s eviction of the Zuccotti Park encampment.
President-elect Trump, a charismatic strongman with an autocratic temperament, is not what millions of Occupiers were dreaming of when
we took to the streets against the monied corruption of our democracy. Now, as the nation experiences a disturbing rise of hate crimes
against the groups singled out by Trump during his campaign, protests descending into riots are rocking our cities. These visceral protests
will undoubtedly continue into 2017. Celebrated progressive Kshama Sawant, a socialist councilwoman in Seattle, has already called on
people to disrupt Trump’s inauguration in January. At the same time, despite the excitement of seeing militants marching in the cities, leftist
activist networks are buzzing with the painful realization that
contemporary protest is broken . The dominant tactic
of getting people into the streets, rallying behind a single demand and raising awareness about an injustice simply
does not result in the desired social change . Nominally democratic governments tolerate protest because elected
representatives no longer feel compelled to heed protest . The end of protest is not the absence of
protest. The end of protest is the proliferation of ineffective protests that are more like a ritualized performance
of children than a mature, revolutionary challenge to the status quo. Activists who rush into the streets tomorrow and repeat
yesterday’s tired tactics will not bring an end to Trump nor will they transfer sovereign power to the
people. There are only two ways to achieve sovereignty in this world. Activists can win elections or win
wars . There is no third option. Protest can play an important role in winning elections or winning wars but protest alone is insufficient.
Just think of the three years many activists spent on Black Lives Matter versus the 18 months it took Trump to sweep into power. It is
magical thinking, and a dangerously misguided strategy , for activists to continue to act as if the masses in the
streets can attain a sovereignty over their governments through a collective manifestation of the people’s general will. This may have been
true in the past, but is not true today. What is to be done now? American activists must move from detached indignation to revolutionary
engagement. They must use the techniques that create social movements to dominate elections . The path
forward is revealed in the rallying cry of the people in the streets: “Not My President!” This protest slogan is eerily similar to the one used by
Spain’s 15-M Movement of indignados who set up anti-establishment general assemblies in May of 2011 and chanted “No Nos
Representan!” (“You Don’t Represent Us!”) during their election. Their assemblies inspired the birth of Occupy. But when the refusal of the
indignados to participate in the election resulted in a shocking victory for Spain’s right wing, the movement’s activists and supporters quickly
internalized an important lesson that Americans must now embrace. Realizing that new forms of social protest are better equipped to win
elections than disrupt elections, many of the indignados transformed themselves into Podemos, a hybrid movement-party that is now
winning elections and taking power. A similar story can be told of the Pirate party in Iceland, or the 5 Star Movement in Italy or the panEuropean Diem25. Focus on the form, not the content, of these hybrid movement-parties: their organizing style is the future of global
protest. Concretely speaking, activists must reorient all efforts around capturing sovereignty. That means looking for places where
sovereignty is lightly held and rarely contested, like rural communities. Or targeting sovereign positions of power that are not typically seen
Protests will remain ineffective as long
as there is no movement- party capable of governing locally and nationally.
as powerful, such as soil and water district boards or port commissions.
DA - HT
No deal – Republicans flip for the plan
KATE IRBY, McClatchy, “Vulnerable Republicans ready to work with Democrats
if immigration votes fail”, June 20th 2018,
https://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/politicsgovernment/congress/article213523074.html
Republicans facing difficult re-election fights need to show constituents they're sensitive
to the plight of Dreamers as well as families who have crossed the border seeking asylum, which is included in the
compromise bill. So if that bill is defeated, they're open to joining Democrats to force new votes on
immigration. Reps. Jeff Denham, R-California, and Carlos Curbelo, R-Florida, who have led the Republicans' immigration reform
effort, told McClatchy all options were open if the compromise bill failed, including forcing
a vote without leadership approval . The compromise includes a path to citizenship for
Dreamers, those who came to the country illegally as children. "The Dreamers have stepped up, and done what their government asked
them to do, so I'm not going to take no for an answer," Denham said. "If the Speaker can't find a way to get 218 votes, then I'm going to find
a way to work with Democrats and get a solution." Such
a move, which would have to involve as few as 25
House Republicans and all 193 Democrats to be effective, would be a clear rebuke of House
GOP leaders as well as President Donald Trump .
No deal – ever
Dara Lind 17, Vox reporter covering immigration, “Democrats are taking a hard
line on immigration — from the left”, Oct 18th 2017, https://www.vox.com/policyand-politics/2017/10/18/16458164/democrats-daca-border-security-schumerpelosi
Democrats are not here to compromise on immigration. Don’t be fooled by the muchtrumpeted “deal” that President Donald Trump reportedly struck with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and House Minority Leader
Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) to address the status of the 690,000 immigrants who will soon begin to lose their deportation protections as the Deferred Action
for Childhood Arrivals program winds down. That deal is all but dead, if it ever lived to begin with . It’s been
replaced by a hardline White House wish list — and by Democrats’ calls for Congress to pass a “clean DREAM Act” that would legalize DACA recipients
without increasing immigration enforcement in return. The thing is, about 10 years ago, many Democrats — including, notably, Schumer — would have
championed many of the Trump administration’s enforcement proposals, from increased local cooperation with immigration enforcement to a physical barrier on
the US/Mexico border, even if they weren’t part of a deal to legalize unauthorized immigrants. And they’d certainly accept them, happily, alongside legalization. So
why do they oppose them now? Democrats have come to defer to organized immigration activists in a way they didn’t 10 years ago, or even during the early years
of the Obama administration. Thanks in part to a change of strategy by major labor unions, whose success in organizing immigrant-heavy professions like the
the Democratic base has wholly
embraced the idea of comprehensive immigration reform. As a result, the party has
moved substantially to the left on the issue of immigration enforcement. For
Democrats, it’s been a simple calculus . Democrats’ attempts at “tough love” centrism
didn’t win them any credit across the aisle , while an increasingly empowered
immigrant-rights movement started calling them to task for the adverse consequences of
enforcement policies. Democrats learned to ignore the critics on the right they couldn’t please, and embrace the critics on the left who they could.
hospitality industry rather than relying on its traditional manufacturing base, this important component of
No deal – Republicans make additional demands
Erin Durkin, NY Daily News, “Dems offer to accept border wall in exchange for
DACA deal — but GOP won’t budge “, Jan 21st 2018,
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/gop-rejects-daca-deal-dems-offerborder-wall-article-1.3769776
Democrats said Sunday they're now willing to accept President Trump's controversial border wall in exchange for
protecting young immigrants from deportation — but Republicans said no deal . The immigration fight has
triggered a government shutdown now in its second day, after Senate Democrats refused to vote for a spending bill
without a deal for the immigrants known as Dreamers. President Trump and Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer
made a deal at a White House meeting Friday where Schumer agreed to funding for the border wall — but two
hours later, the White House reneged , Democrats say. Besides the wall, Republicans are
demanding that any deal include an end to chain migration and a visa lottery program.
"Chuck Schumer made what I considered to be a bold and important concession and said, yes, we'll go forward with the
wall as long as we do this in a responsible fashion," Sen. Dick
Durbin (D-Ill.), the number two Senate Democrat,
said Sunday on ABC's "This Week." "The President embraced it," he said. "Two hours later, a call from the White House
says the deal is off. We're not going to stand by this at all. How can you negotiate with
the President under those circumstances , where he agrees face-to-face to move forward with a
certain path and then within two hours calls back and pulls the plug?"
If dems concede it’ll be to insignificant wall funding
Phillip Bump, “Schumer offered Trump something Democrats hate for
something Republicans broadly like”, Washington Post, 1/20/2018,
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/politics/wp/2018/01/20/schumer-offeredtrump-something-democrats-hate-to-get-something-republicans-broadlylike/?utm_term=.d4efc532abe9
What’s more, what
Schumer offered was apparently not the full cost of covering the entire
border along the wall . In a news conference on Saturday, White House budget director Mick
Mulvaney disparaged Schumer for claiming to have agreed to funding the wall — he
actually agreed to only the $1.6 billion the administration asked for in 2017 .