Stock AC
[Since sanctions inflict massive human suffering for little or no result,] I affirm [that
“Economic sanctions ought not be used to achieve foreign policy objectives”].
Economist Thomas Pugel1 defines economic sanctions as “
Discriminatory
restrictions or
complete
bans on
economics exchange, designed to punish the target country or countries.” Thus, economic
sanctions are distinct from other punitive measures in that they aim to punish nations at large
rather than single persons and do so specifically by restricting trade.
[You prefer this interpretation:
First, Pugel is an expert in the field; he’s a professor at NYU with a PhD from Harvard
and more than 30 years’ experience. Expert usage determines both textual meaning of the topic
since words acquire meaning through use, and access to lit since it determines how the term is
used by other authors in the lit.
Second, my definition comes from a standard textbook on international economics, so it’s
intended to capture standard usage in the field rather than a working definition for purposes of a
paper or study.
Third, it provides reasonable limits on ground. I have to affirm the topic in general and
not just say one kind of sanctions are bad, but if sanctions are interpreted so broadly as to
include any punitive economic measure by a state, I can’t possibly make a case that all such
measures are bad in six minutes; further, exploding ground destroys predictability since it gives
the neg so many options for advocacy that I won’t know what we’re debating until the 1AR,
effectively stealing half my speech time. My definition limits us to a unified type of sanctions
1
Thomas Pugel (Ph.D. in Economics from Harvard University in 1978; Professor of Economics and International
Business at the Stern School of Business, New York University), International Economics (Hill-McGraw textbook),
12th edition, 2004, http://highered.mcgraw-hill.com/sites/0072487488/student_view0/glossary.html
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about which we can both make general arguments, so also don’t let him/her over-limit ground by
picking just one or a few sanctions to defend since this similarly destroys my ability to construct
AC advocacy.]
[The topic questions the use of sanctions in general without saying “all” or “some”.
Thus, the only reasonable interpretation of burdens requires us to debate the use of sanctions as
a general rule, i.e. to show that they ought or ought not be used in the majority of cases.
Arguments dealing with just one or a few uses of sanctions should be excluded in terms of (a)
reciprocity, since they force one debater to win all cases of the topic while the other only has to
win one, and (b) predictability since there are a plethora of cases debaters can choose to prep in
far greater depth than their opponents, making such debates lopsided and structurally unfair.]
From Merriam-Webster’s2, “ought” expresses obligation.
[This definition is most contextually appropriate, since we use “ought” to express
advisability or desirability only with respect to self-regarding actions, e.g. in Merriam-Webster’s
the case given for that use is “ought to take care of yourself”. In the topical context of
potentially thousands of lives saved or lost, it’s absurd to talk about acts as merely “desirable”.]
[“Not” just negates “ought”, meaning first, that the neg has a textual burden to prove
the converse of the topic, namely that sanctions ought be used; second, that moral neutrality is
aff ground, in that I have to show that sanctions are not obligatory but not that they’re morally
proscribed, meaning you presume aff in absence of clear neg offense; and third, that arguments
about the emptiness of normative language are grounds to affirm, in that they render all positive
moral assertions false and thus their negations true.]
http://m-w.com/dictionary/ought [“used to express obligation <ought to pay our debts>, advisability <ought to take
care of yourself>, natural expectation <ought to be here by now>, or logical consequence <the result ought to be
infinity>”]
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2
The qualifier “to achieve foreign policy objectives” limits the range of justifications for
sanctions we’re debating. Showing that sanctions are justified by deontic moral rules or by their
protective effect on domestic industries in the sanctioning country, for instance, wouldn’t negate
since it shows that sanctions ought be used for those reasons, but not to achieve foreign policy
objectives. [Letting the neg claim any desirable outcome or feature of a foreign policy as a
“foreign policy objective” clearly violates the textual meaning of the topic in that it makes the
qualifier vacuous, so that the topic might as well just have said “ought not be used”.]
I value morality, as implied by the term “ought”.
The standard is minimizing the imposition of suffering.
First, all moral theories presuppose the moral value of persons as grounds for demanding
that we treat them in some ways and not others. Further, since moral truths are neither observed
in the empirical world nor arrived at by pure deduction, they’re necessarily developed by persons
and societies to serve human interests and restrict harmful behavior. Failure to minimize
suffering is thus immoral since it fails to treat the interests and wellbeing of persons as morally
compelling grounds for action, negating the fundamental purpose of morals as guides to action.
Second, in addition to being a utilitarian bad, the imposition of suffering violates deontic,
rights-based standards of morality since imposing unnecessary suffering on others in the pursuit
of social goods treats them as expendable means to the pursuit of external ends in which they
may or may not share.
Third, empathy for the suffering of others and unwillingness to let unnecessary suffering
occur is the only psychological barrier against the worst moral atrocities like genocide. Basing
state action on a willingness to cause suffering to achieve policy goals allows such atrocities to
be justified whenever they putatively serve some pressing national interest.
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[Actors, whether persons or states, only have full control of their actions and not those of
others, so while all suffering is bad, we’re more morally culpable for suffering that we impose
directly than for suffering imposed by others that we might have prevented. Further, where
preventing the imposition of suffering by another would require the imposition of similar
suffering on other innocent people, we default to moral suasion of the other actor and attempts
to mitigate the effects of their actions since this offers the only chance to actually reduce
suffering to a minimum, e.g. we wouldn’t choose to bomb a country and kill nine innocent people
to stop the execution of ten political prisoners. Thus, absent major quantitative disparities, the
impacts of our own imposition of suffering outweigh those of impositions by other which we
might conceivably have prevented.]
I contend that economic sanctions impose massive suffering on target countries with little
chance of relieving ongoing suffering. First, sanctions have overwhelming human cost. Choi et al
in ’093: “Economic sanctions create social disruption and material deprivation, including
dramatic declines in resources
during 10 years of UN
more than doubled
imposed economic
that are essential for health,
such as drugs, vaccines, food, water, and energy.
sanctions on Iraq
(from 56 to 131 per 1000 live births).
in the 1990s,
mortality among Iraqi children under 5
In Cuba, with the loss of Soviet trading partners in the
population level measures of health declined and then worsened with the tightening of economic sanctions by the US.
For example,
Union
years old
early 19
90s
,
[s]hortages in drugs resulted in a 48% increase in
mortality from tuberculosis and a 77% increase in mortality from pneumonia and influenza.
Similarly,
North Korea’s economy plummeted under the combined effects of economic sanctions and the
fall of the Soviet Union. Its economic and public health systems further buckled with successive
3
Sanghyuk Shin (fellow, Korea Policy Institute), Ricky Choi (clinical instructor, Department of Pediatrics,
University of California, San Francisco), Thomas Novotny (professor and codirector, San Diego State University),
“Economic sanctions towards North Korea: A violation of the right to health and a call to action”, BMJ (externally
peer-reviewed medical journal), 9 October 2009,
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/bmj.b4069?ijkey=emwIQ7OfIO5mzeL&keytype=ref
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years of floods and droughts, leading to widespread malnutrition and up to one million excess
deaths in the 90s. Although many US trade sanctions
19
sanctions
that are
of the
against North Korea
were lifted during the 90s, the
19
currently in place continue to handicap North Korea’s attempt to recover from the
ongoing public health crisis.”
Second, the suffering imposed by sanctions is not justified by any corresponding relief of
suffering, since sanctions are rarely if ever effective in producing real policy change. Robert
Pape4 writes: “The
deductive
case that we should expect sanctions to be effective in future
more
the
is also flawed, because it
relies on the expectation that economic punishment can overwhelm a state's commitment to
pursue important policy goals. Most modern states, however, resist external pressure. Pervasive
nationalism often makes states and societies willing to endure considerable punishment rather
than abandon what are seen as the interests of the nation, making even weak or disorganized
states unwilling to bend to the demands of foreigners. In addition, states that have modern
administrative capabilities can usually mitigate the economic damage of sanctions through
substitution and other techniques. Finally, even when such capabilities are lacking and ruling
elites are unpopular, they can still protect themselves and their supporters by shifting the
often
economic burden of sanctions onto opponents or disenfranchised groups.”
This is empirically confirmed. Marc Bossuyt5 writes: “There is a no small debate around
the
interpretation of
success [or] failure of sanctions regimes, but even the most optimistic point to only
es and
s
about a third of all sanctions having even “partial” success, while others
looking at the data
have come up
Robert A. Pape (professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago), “Why Economic Sanctions Do Not
Work”, International Security, Vol. 22, No. 2 (Autumn, 1997), pp. 90-136, http://www.jstor.org/stable/2539368
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Marc Bossuyt (Ph.D in Law from the University of Ghent, Certificate of International Relations at Johns Hopkins
University in Bologna; professor emeritus of international law at the University of Antwerp; member of the
Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague, judge at the Belgian Constitutional Court), “Review Of Further
Developments In Fields With Which The Sub Commission Has Been Or May Be Concerned: The adverse
consequences of economic sanctions on the enjoyment of human rights”, prepared for the UN Commission on
Human Rights, Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights,” 21 June 2000,
http://www.unhchr.ch/Huridocda/Huridoca.nsf/0/c56876817262a5b2c125695e0050656e?Opendocument
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with a 5 per cent success rate, and a dismal 2 per cent
success
rate for sanctions against ‘authoritarian
regimes’. In addition, it has been noted that financial sanctions alone have a greater success than
trade sanctions or combined trade and financial sanctions.”
Third, sanctions lead to an increase in the suffering imposed by target regimes on their
citizens by letting those regimes strengthen both their economic and political positions. Bossuyt
2 writes: “Under sanctions, the middle class is eliminated, the poor get poorer, and the rich get
richer as they take control of smuggling and the black market. The Government
benefit
economically
from sanctions
, owing to
[given] this monopoly on illegal trade.
and elite
can actually
as
As many commentators have pointed out, in the long run,
democratic participation, independent institutions and the middle class are weakened, and as
social disruption leaves the population less able to resist the Government, the possibility of
democracy shrinks.
In sum, the civilian suffering that is believed to be the effective factor in comprehensive economic sanctions renders those sanctions ineffectual, even reinforcing the Government and its policies. The Secretary-General recognized
this, writing in his Millennium Report: ‘When robust and comprehensive economic sanctions are directed against authoritarian regimes, a different problem is encountered. Then it is usually the people who suffer, not the political elites whose behaviour triggered the sanctions in the first
place. Indeed,
those in power
, perversely, often
[also] benefit from sanctions
such
by their ability to control and profit from black market activity, and
by exploiting
them as a pretext for eliminating domestic sources of political opposition.’”
Fourth, even when sanctions successfully target regime leaders, this only incents further
repression to quash any potential threats to the power of the ruling elite. Wood in ’066: “
The first element of the
theory constructed herein is that
[S]anctions contribute to state
target leaders.
In short, I argue that
-sponsored
repression by constraining the resource flows of
[A]s sanctions reduce the ability of incumbents to provide resources to
supporters, the likelihood of defections increase. In order to
incumbents
in turn
augment their level of repression.
deter defections and
maintain stability,
target
This effect is significantly influenced however by the political institutions of the target state. Political structures influence the probability that a
state is the target of a sanctions event, as well as their duration. They likewise affect the ability of incumbents to use repression as a strategy to compel cooperation from a civilian population. Finally, institutions determine incumbents’ ability to allocate resources and redistribute costs.
Incumbent survival is in large part a function of the ability to maintain a flow of resources to core supporters. Failing to maintain the flow of goods to the winning coalition threatens the stability of the regime because the incumbent must credibly promise more to her winning coalition tha n
can any potential challenger. Costly sanctions make the credible promise of continued resources more difficult, which helps explain why costlier sanctions are more likely to destabilize target regimes. As the pool of available resources diminishes, sanctioned leaders must choose between
conforming to the preferences of the sender and redistributing resources in a manner that protects supporters. If incumbents concede, the flow of resources presumably returns to normal and they can more easily reaffirm the stability of the regime. Often, however, targeted leaders – already
the most recalcitrant regimes – refuse concessions and instead opt to redistribute available resources in the hope of weathering sanctions and waiting out their adversaries. Such [R]edistributions result[s] in net losses for some members of the winning coalition (as well as those excluded from
Wood, Reed M. “‘A hand upon the throat of the nation’: Economic sanctions and state repression, 1976-2001.”
International Studies Quarterly, vol. 52, 2006.
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the coalition), thereby reducing their loyalty to the incumbent.
Falling loyalty
degrades the stability of the regime and
raises the incentives for incumbents to use
coercion to prevent defections.” Increased repression also negatively impacts regime opponents.
Woods 2 futhers: “If sanctions increase
the[ir] power
of opposition groups
opposition mobilization or increase
support for the opposition, they augment
relative to the incumbent regime.
Changes in the balance of power influence the strategies of the incumbent, and
[A]s the power
of the two groups reaches parity, the likelihood of violence increases accordingly. Consequently,
an upswing in support for the opposition
– such that its power increases relative to the incumbent regime –
is expected to result in higher
levels of repression as it raises the threat perception of the regime.” This and the cost-shifting
argument from Pape both mean that the better sanctions target leaders, the worse the impact on
citizens, so I turn back any offense s/he claims from regime coercion to a degree proportional to
the strength of his/her link.
Lastly, while some individual uses of sanctions might manage to prevent suffering
without producing comparatively more in the target country, this can never be an adequate basis
for the imposition of sanctions since every effective use of sanctions by good actors sets
precedent for future uses by bad actors or in cases where they’re likely to do more harm than
good. Further, human behavior is never fully predictable, meaning that any positive response to
sanctions on the part of state actors can never be reliably predicted before the fact, so even if
sanctions have worked a few times in the past, their only predictable outcome in any given future
case is the direct imposition of suffering. [Finally, any imposition of sanctions assumes that the
moral judgment of one state is more reliable than that of another. But this can never be assumed
since the existence of conflict implies that both actors think they’re in the right, and letting
conflict be resolved through sanctions just defaults to the judgment and ideology of the more
economically powerful state, which isn’t any more prima facie reliable than that of the less
powerful state.]
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[Thus, sanctions directly inflict suffering on innocents for the sake of marginal, unlikely,
and purely speculative returns, so I affirm [and now stand open for cross-examination].]
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