Grammar 2NC
2. Its 100 percent defense --- all of their arguments are indictments of a policy topic, not a reason that, once given that topic,
they should be able to debate in a different way. Because the topic is decidedly policy-oriented, this has to be a voting issue
Smith ‘03
(Ross, Debate Coach – Wake Forest U., “From Kritik to Performance and Back to Topicality”, Debaters
Research Guide, http://groups.wfu.edu/debate/MiscSites/DRGArticles/Crtique2003.htm)
Debate cannot be all things to all people any more than sculpture can. Some say we should not "silence voices" of those who want to do things differently, but
surely they do not mean that we should reward people no matter what they say or do. And if not, then we're right back where we started. Again, I am not
saying one should not be allowed to say or do anything in particular as long as it makes an argument that speaks to the focus (plan or resolution) of
the debate. Nor am I arguing we should only have policy resolutions. But as long as we do have policy resolutions, then the question of the debate is a policy
question. The question is interesting, controversial, and challenging. Those who do not engage it should lose to those who do.
Shively 2NC
Determining framework is a prior question ---- only once agreed-upon limits are established can the debate even begin
Ehninger ‘70
(Douglas, Professor of Speech – U Iowa, Speech Monographs, June, p. 108)
If two friends differ on whether they will gain greater satisfaction from dining at Restaurant A or Restaurant B, because the causes are simple and immediate, the
common end at which they aim-that of maximum enjoyment-will exhibit like qualities. When, on the other hand, as in a dispute concerning political persuasions or
social philosophies, the causes are broad and complex, the end aimed at may be remote or abstract. Always, however, some agreed upon end or goal must be
present to define and delimit the evaluative ground within which the interchange is to proceed. When such ground is lacking, argument itself, let alone
any hope of resolution or agreement, becomes impossible. The absence of a commonly accepted aim or value is what lies at the root of many of the breakdowns that
occur, for example, in negotiations between the Communist and Western nations, and what accounts for the well known futility of most disputes on matters of politics
or religion. When disputants hold different values their claims pass without touching, just as they pass when different subjects are being discussed. What
one party says simply is evaluatively irrelevant to the position of the other. An examination of the nature of ends or values need not concern us here.
Perhaps at bottom they are matters of feeling, of personal style or taste. The important point is that they lie on a deeper stratum than argument is capable of
penetrating; they are something which argument cannot shape or determine but which it must presuppose-something which any two disputants need
to assume and agree upon as a necessary condition of argumentative interchange.
Limits Good
And, some limits are always necessary; even if rules generally should be abolished, baseline agreements are key.
Shively ‘2K
(Ruth Lessl, Assistant Prof Political Science – Texas A&M U., Partisan Politics and Political Theory, p.
184)
The point here is that in arguing—and the point holds equally for other forms of contest—we assume that it is possible to educate or persuade one
another. We assume that it is possible to come to more mutual understandings of an issue and that the participants in an argument are open to this
possibility. Otherwise, there is no point to the exercise; we are simply talking at or past one another. At this point, the ambiguists might respond
that, even if there are such rules of argument, they do not apply to the more subversive or radical activities they have in mind. Subversion is, after all,
about questioning and undermining such seemingly “necessary” or universal rules of behavior. But, again, the response to the ambiguist must be that
the practice of questioning and undermining rules, like all other social practices, needs a certain order. The subversive needs rules to protect
subversion. And when we look more closely at the rules protective of subversion, we find that they are roughly the rules of argument discussed
above. In fact, the rules of argument are roughly the rules of democracy or civility: the delineation of boundaries necessary to protect speech and
action from violence, manipulation and other forms of tyranny. Earlier we asked how the ambiguists distinguish legitimate political behaviors,
like contest or resistance, from illegitimate behaviors, like cruelty and subjugation. We find a more complete answer here. The former are legitimate
because they have civil or rational persuasion as their end. That is, legitimate forms of contest and resistance seek to inform or convince others by
appeal to reasons rather than by force or manipulation. The idea is implicit in democracy because democracy implies a basic respect for selfdetermination: a respect for people’s rights to direct their own lives as much as possible by their own choices, to work and carry on relationships as
they see fit, to participate in community and politics according to decisions freely made by them rather than decisions forced on them, and so on.
Thus, to say that rational persuasion is the end of political action is simply to acknowledge that, in democratic politics, this is the way we show
respect for others’ capacities for self-direction. In public debate, our goal is to persuade others with ideas that they recognize as true rather than by
trying to manipulate them or move them without their conscious, rational assent.
Eliminating rules transforms competitive debate into ‘cooperative conversation’ --- this approach privileges dominant voices,
locking in exclusion and political alienation
Tonn ‘05
(Mari Boor, Professor of Communication – University of Maryland, “Taking Conversation, Dialogue,
and Therapy Public”, Rhetoric & Public Affairs, Vol. 8, Issue 3, Fall)
Perhaps the most conspicuous effort at replacing public debate with therapeutic dialogue was President Clinton's Conversation on Race, launched in mid-1997. Controversial from its inception
for its ideological bent, the initiative met further widespread criticism for its encounter-group approaches to racial stratification and strife, critiques echoing previously articulated concerns- my
own among them6-that certain dangers lurk in employing private or social communication modes for public problem-solving.7 Since then, others have joined in
contesting the treating of public problems with narrative and psychological approaches, which-in the name of promoting civility, cooperation, personal
empowerment, and socially constructed or idiosyncratic truths-actually work to contain dissent, locate systemic social problems solely within individual
neurosis, and otherwise fortify hegemony.8 Particularly noteworthy is Michael Schudson's challenge to the utopian equating of "conversation" with the "soul of
democracy." Schudson points to pivotal differences in the goals and architecture of conversational and democratic deliberative processes. To him, political (or
democratic) conversation is a contradiction in terms. Political deliberation entails a clear instrumental purpose, ideally remaining ever mindful of its implications
beyond an individual case. Marked by disagreement-even pain-democratic deliberation contains transparent prescribed procedures governing participation
and decision making so as to protect the timid or otherwise weak. In such processes, written records chronicle the interactional journey toward
resolution, and in the case of writing law especially, provide accessible justification for decisions rendered. In sharp contrast, conversation is often
"small talk" exchanged among family, friends, or candidates for intimacy, unbridled by set agendas, and prone to egocentric rather than altruistic goals.
Subject only to unstated "rules" such as turn-taking and politeness, conversation tends to advantage the gregarious or articulate over the shy or slight of
tongue.9 The events of 9/11, the onset of war with Afghanistan and Iraq, and the subsequent failure to locate Iraqi weapons of mass destruction have
resuscitated some faith in debate, argument, warrant, and facts as crucial to the public sphere. Still, the romance with public conversation persists. As examples among
communication scholars, Karlyn Kohrs Campbell's 2001 Carroll C. Arnold Distinguished Lecture treated what she termed "the rhetoric of conversation" as a means to "manage controversy"
and empower non-dominant voices10; multiple essays in a 2002 special issue of Rhetoric & Public Affairs on deliberative democracy couch a deliberative democratic ideal in dialogic terms11;
and the 2005 Southern States Communication Convention featured family therapist Sallyann Roth, founding member and trainer of the Public Conversations Project, as keynote speaker.12
Representative of the dialogic turn in deliberative democracy scholarship is Gerard A. Hauser and Chantal Benoit-Barne's critique of the traditional procedural, reasoning model of public
problem solving: "A deliberative model of democracy . . . constru[es] democracy in terms of participation in the ongoing conversation about how we shall act and interact-our political
relations" and "Civil society redirects our attention to the language of social dialogue on which our understanding of political interests and possibility rests."13 And on the political front,
British Prime Minister Tony Blair-facing declining poll numbers and mounting criticism of his indifference to public opinion on issues ranging from the Iraq war to steep tuition hike
proposals-launched The Big Conversation on November 28, 2003. Trumpeted as "as way of enriching the Labour Party's policy making process by listening to the British public about their
priorities," the initiative includes an interactive government website and community meetings ostensibly designed to solicit citizens' voices on public issues.14 In their own way, each treatment
of public conversation positions it as a democratic good, a mode that heals divisions and carves out spaces wherein ordinary voices can be heard. In certain ways, Schudson's initial reluctance
to dismiss public conversation echoes my own early reservations, given the ideals of egalitarianism, empowerment, and mutual respect conversational advocates champion. Still, in the spirit of
the dialectic ostensibly underlying dialogic premises, this essay argues that various negative consequences can result from transporting conversational and therapeutic
paradigms into public problem solving. In what follows, I extend Schudson's critique of a conversational model for democracy in two ways: First, whereas
Schudson primarily offers a theoretical analysis, I interrogate public conversation as a praxis in a variety of venues, illustrating how public
"conversation" and "dialogue" have been coopted to silence rather than empower marginalized or dissenting voices. In practice, public conversation easily can
emulate what feminist political scientist Jo Freeman termed "the tyranny of structurelessness" in her classic 1970 critique of consciousness- raising groups
in the women's liberation movement,15 as well as the key traits Irving L. Janis ascribes to "groupthink."16 Thus, contrary to its promotion as a means to
neutralize hierarchy and exclusion in the public sphere, public conversation can and has accomplished the reverse. When such moves are rendered
transparent, public conversation and dialogue, I contend, risk increasing rather than diminishing political cynicism and alienation. [Continues…] This
widespread recognition that access to public deliberative processes and the ballot is a baseline of any genuine democracy points to the most curious irony of the conversation movement:
portions of its constituency. Numbering among the most fervid dialogic loyalists have been some feminists and multiculturalists who represent groups historically denied both the right to speak
in public and the ballot. Oddly, some feminists who championed the slogan "The Personal Is Political" to emphasize ways relational power can oppress tend to ignore similar dangers lurking in
the appropriation of conversation and dialogue in public deliberation. Yet the conversational model's emphasis on empowerment through intimacy can duplicate the power networks that
traditionally excluded females and nonwhites and gave rise to numerous, sometimes necessarily uncivil, demands for democratic inclusion. Formalized participation structures in
deliberative processes obviously cannot ensure the elimination of relational power blocs, but, as Freeman pointed out, the absence of formal rules leaves
relational power unchecked and potentially capricious. Moreover, the privileging of the self, personal experiences, and individual perspectives of reality intrinsic in the
conversational paradigm mirrors justifications once used by dominant groups who used their own lives, beliefs, and interests as templates for hegemonic social premises to oppress women, the
lower class, and people of color. Paradigms infused with the therapeutic language of emotional healing and coping likewise flirt with the type of psychological diagnoses once ascribed to
disaffected women. But as Betty Friedan's landmark 1963 The Feminist Mystique argued, the cure for female alienation was neither tranquilizers nor attitude adjustments fostered through
psychotherapy but, rather, unrestricted opportunities.102
The critical thinking benefits comparatively outweigh their reasons that switch-side debate is bad
Muir ‘93
(Star, Professor of Communication – George Mason U., “A Defense of the Ethics of Contemporary
Debate”, Philosophy & Rhetoric, Vol. 26, No. 4, p. 286-7)
A third point about isolation from the real world is that switch-side debate develops habits of the mind and instills a lifelong pattern of critical
assessment. Students who have debated both sides of a topic are better voters, Dell writes, because of "their habit of analyzing both sides before forming a
conclusion." O'Neill, Laycock and Scales, responding in part to Roosevelt's indictment, iterated the basic position in 1931: Skill in the use of facts and
inferences available may be gained on either side of a question without regard to convictions. Instruction and practice in debate should give young
men this skill. And where these matters are properly handled, stress is not laid on getting the speaker to think rightly in regard to the merits of either
side of these questions—but to think accurately on both sides. Reasons for not taking a position counter to one's beliefs (isolation from the "real world,"
sophistry) are largely outweighed by the benefit of such mental habits throughout an individual's life.
Debating both sides is the only way to create reflective thinking, a crucial pre-condition for critical decision-making
Muir ‘93
(Star, Professor of Communication – George Mason U., “A Defense of the Ethics of Contemporary
Debate”, Philosophy & Rhetoric, Vol. 26, No. 4, p. 289-90)
At an individual level, tolerance is related to moral identity via empathic and critical assessments of differing perspectives. Paul posits a strong
relationship between tolerance, empathy, and critical thought. Discussing the function of argument in everyday life, he observes that in order to
overcome natural tendencies to reason egocentrically and sociocentrically, individuals must gain the capacity to engage in self-reflective questioning,
to reason dialogically and dialectically. and to "reconstruct alien and opposing belief systems empathically."*- Our system of beliefs is. by definition,
irrational when we are incapable of abandoning a belief for rational reasons; that is, when we egocentrically associate our beliefs with our own
integrity. Paul describes an intimate relationship between private inferential habits, moral practices, and the nature of argumentation. Critical thought
and moral identity, he urges, must be predicated on discovering the insights of opposing views and the weaknesses of our own beliefs. Role playing, he reasons,
is a central element of any effort to gain such insight. Only an activity that requires the defense of both sides of an issue, moving beyond acknowledgement to
exploration and advocacy, can engender such powerful role playing. Redding explains that "debating both sides is a special instance of role-playing, where
debaters are forced to empathize on a constant basis with a position contrary to their own. This role playing, Baird agrees, is an exercise in reflective thinking,
an engagement in problem solving that exposes weaknesses and strengths, “Motivated by the knowledge that they may debate against their own case,
debaters constantly pose arguments and counter-arguments for discussion, erecting defenses and then challenging these defenses with a different tact." Such
conceptual flexibility, Paul argues, is essential for effective critical thinking, and in turn for the development of a reasoned moral identity.
Switch-side debate develops a unique educational flexibility --- arguing both sides allows students to see the interconnection
between varied subjects
Muir ‘93
(Star, Professor of Communication – George Mason U., “A Defense of the Ethics of Contemporary
Debate”, Philosophy & Rhetoric, Vol. 26, No. 4, p. 282-5)
The debate over moral education and values clarification parallels in many ways the controversy over switch-side debate. Where values clarification recognizes no
one set of values, debate forces a questioning and exploration of both sides of an issue. Where cognitive-development emphasizes the use of role playing in the
inception of moral judgment, debate requires an empathy for alternative points of view. Where discussion provides an opportunity for expressions of personal feelings, debate fosters an
analytic and explicit approach to value assessment. Freelev describes the activity this way: Educational debate provides an opportunity for students to consider the significant problems in the
context of a multivalued orientation. They learn to look at a problem from many points of view. As debaters analyze the potential affirmative cases and the potential negative cases, including
the possibility of negative counterplans, thev being to realize the complexity of most contemporary problems and to appreciate the worth of a multivalucd orientation; as they debate both
sides of a proposition under consideration, they learn not only that most problems of contemporary affairs have more than one side but also that even
one side of a proposition embodies a considerable range of values. The comparison between moral education and debate is useful because it contextualizes the process of
moral development within an educational setting. Several objections have been raised about the practice of moral education, and these objections have direct relevance to the issue of switchside debate. A view of debate as a form of moral education can be developed by addressing questions of efficacy, isolation from the real world. and of relativism. The first issue is one of
effectiveness: Do clarification activities achieve the espoused goals? Social coercion and peer pressure, for example, still occur in the group setting, leaving the individual choice of values an
indoctrination of sorts. Likewise, the focus of clarification exercises is arguably less analytic than expressive, less critical than embroyonic. The expression of individual preferences may be
guided by simple reaction rather than by rational criteria. These problems arc minimized in the debate setting, especially where advocacy is not aligned with personal belief. Such advocacy
requires explicit analysis of values and the decision criteria for evaluating them. In contemporarv debate, confronted with a case they believe in, debaters assigned to the negative side have
several options: present a morass of arguments to see what arguments "stick," concede the problem and offer a "counterplan"a s a better way of solving the problem, or attack the value
structure of the affirmative and be more effective in defending a particular hierarchy of values. While the first option is certainly exercised with some frequency, the second and third
motivations arc also often used and are of critical importance in the development of cognitive skills associated with moral judgment. For example, in attacking a case that restricts police
powers and upholds a personal right to privacy, debaters might question the reasoning of scholars and justices in raising privacy rights to such significant heights (analyzing Griswold v.
Connecticut and other landmark cases), offer alternative value structures (social order, drug control), and defend the criteria through which such choices are made (utilitarian vs. deontological
premises). Even within the context of a "see what sticks" paradigm, these arguments require debaters to assess and evaluate value structures opposite of their own personal feelings about their
right to privacy. Social coercion, or peer pressure lo adopt certain value structures, is minimized in such a context because of competitive pressures. Adopting a value just because everyone else
does may be the surest way of losing a debate. A second objection to debate as values clarification, consonant with Ehninger's concerns about gamesmanship, is the separation of the
educational process from the real world. A significant concern here is how such learning about morality will be used in the rest of a student's life. Some critics question whether moral school
knowledge "may be quite separate from living moral experience in a similar way as proficiency in speaking one's native language generally appears quite separate from the knowledge of
formal grammar imparted by school." Edelstein discusses two forms of segmentation: division between realms of school knowledge (e.g., history separated from science) and between school
and living experience (institutional learning separate from everyday life). Ehninger's point, that debate becomes a pastime, and that application of these skills to solving real problems is
diminished if it is viewed as a game, is largely a reflection on institutional segmentation. The melding of different areas of knowledge, however. is a particular benefit of debate, as it addresses
to is considerable importance in a real world setting. Recent college and high school topics include energy policy, prison reform, care for the elderly, trade
policy, homelessness. and the right to privacy. These topics are notable because they exceed the knowledge boundaries of particular school subjects,
they reach into issues of everyday life, and they are broad enough to force student to address a variety of value appeals. The explosion of "squirrels," or small
and specific cases. in the 1960s and 1970s has had the effect of opening up each topic to many different case approaches. National topics are no longer of the one-case variety (as in 1955's "the
U.S. should recognize Rcd China"). On the privacy topic, for example, cases include search and seizure issues, abortion, sexual privacy, tradeoffs with the first amendment, birth control,
information privacy, pornography, and obscenity. The multiplicitv of issues pavs special dividends for debaters required to defend both sides of many issues because the value criteria change
from round to round and evolve over the year. The development of flexibility in coping with the intertwining of' issues is an essential component in the
interconnection of knowledge, and is a major rationale for switch-side debate.
Cede the Political 2NC
isolated debate inevitably creates natural impulses and training for activism --- their framework destroys effective politics by
forcing debaters to prematurely turn outward
Coverstone ‘95
(Alan, Debate Coach – Montgomery Bell Academy, “An Inward Glance: A Response To Mitchell’s
Outward Activist Turn ”,
http://groups.wfu.edu/debate/MiscSites/DRGArticles/Coverstone1995China.htm)
Debate teaches individual decision-making for the information age. No other academic activity available today teaches people more about information gathering,
assessment, selection, and delivery. Most importantly, debate teaches individuals how to make and defend their own decisions. Debate is the only academic
activity that moves at the speed of the information age. Time is required for individuals to achieve escape velocity. Academic debate holds tremendous
value as a space for training. Mitchell's reflections are necessarily more accurate in his own situation. Over a decade of debate has well positioned him
to participate actively and directly in the political process. Yet the skills he has did not develop overnight. Proper training requires time. While there is a
tremendous variation in the amount of training required for effective navigation of the public sphere, the relative isolation of academic debate is one of its
virtues. Instead of turning students of debate immediately outward, we should be encouraging more to enter the oasis. A thirsty public, drunk on the product of
anyone who claims a decision, needs to drink from the pool of decision-making skills. Teaching these skills is our virtue. Second, Mitchell's argument
underestimates the risks associated with an outward turn. Individuals trained in the art and practice of debate are, indeed, well suited to the task of entering the
political world. At some unspecified point in one's training, the same motivation and focus that has consumed Mitchell will also consume most of us. At that point,
political action becomes a proper endeavor. However, all of the members of the academic debate community will not reach that point together. A political
outward turn threatens to corrupt the oasis in two ways. It makes our oasis a target, and it threatens to politicize the training process. As long as debate appears to
be focused inwardly, political elites will not feel threatened. Yet one of Mitchell's primary concerns is recognition of our oasis in the political world. In this
world we face well trained information managers. Sensing a threat from "debate," they will begin to infiltrate our space. Ready made information will
increase and debaters will eat it up. Not yet able to truly discern the relative values of information, young debaters will eventually be influenced
dramatically by the infiltration of political elites. Retaining our present anonymity in political life offers a better hope for reinvigorating political discourse. As
perhaps the only truly non-partisan space in American political society, academic debate holds the last real possibility for training active political participants.
Nowhere else are people allowed, let alone encouraged, to test all manner of political ideas. This is the process through which debaters learn what they believe and
why they believe it. In many ways this natural evolution is made possible by the isolation of the debate community. An example should help illustrate this idea. Like
many young debaters, I learned a great deal about socialism early on. This was not crammed down my throat. Rather, I learned about the issue in the free flow of
information that is debate. The intrigue of this, and other outmoded political arguments, was in its relative unfamiliarity. Reading socialist literature avidly, I was ready
to take on the world. Yet I only had one side of the story. I was an easy mark for the present political powers. Nevertheless, I decided to fight City Hall. I had received a
parking ticket which I felt was unfairly issued. Unable to convince the parking department to see it my way, I went straight to the top. I wrote the Mayor a letter. In this
letter, I accused the city of exploitation of its citizens for the purpose of capital accumulation. I presented a strong Marxist critique of parking meters in my town. The
mayor's reply was simple and straightforward. He called me a communist. He said I was being silly and should pay the ticket. I was completely embarrassed by the
entire exchange. I thought I was ready to start the revolution. In reality, I wasn't even ready to speak to the Mayor. I did learn from the experience, but I did not learn
what Gordon might have hoped. I learned to stop reading useless material and to keep my opinions to myself. Do we really want to force students into that type of
situation? I wrote the mayor on my own. Debaters will experiment with political activism on their own. This is all part of the natural impulse for activism which
debate inspires. Yet, in the absence of such individual motivation, an outward turn threatens to short circuit the learning process. Debate should capitalize
on its isolation. We can teach our students to examine all sides of an issue and reach individual conclusions before we force them into political
exchanges. To prematurely turn debaters out threatens to undo the positive potential of involvement in debate.
Role-playing is uniquely empowering --- this imagination is critical to understand how the government reaches decisions,
how to hold it accountable and determine how we should act
Rawls ‘99
(John, Professor Emeritus – Harvard University, The Law of Peoples, p. 54-7)
Developing the Law of Peoples within a liberal conception of justice, we work out the ideals and principles of the foreign policy of a reasonably just liberal people. I distinguish between the
public reason of liberal peoples and the public reason of the Society of Peoples. The first is the public reason of equal citizens of domestic society debating the constitutional essentials and
matters of basic justice concerning their own government; the second is the public reason of free and equal liberal peoples debating their mutual relations as peoples. The Law of Peoples with
its political concepts and principles, ideals and criteria, is the content of this latter public reason. Although these two public reasons do not have the same content, the role of public reason
among free and equal peoples is analogous to its role in a constitutional democratic regime among free and equal citizens. Political liberalism proposes that, in a constitutional democratic
regime, comprehensive doctrines of truth or of right are to be replaced in public reason by an idea of the politically reasonable addressed to citizens as citizens. Here note the parallel: public
reason is invoked by members of the Society of Peoples, and its principles are addressed to peoples as peoples. They are not expressed in terms of comprehensive doctrines of truth or of right,
which may hold sway in this or that society, but in terms that can be shared by different peoples. 6.2. Ideal of Public Reason. Distinct from the idea of public reason is the ideal of public
reason. In domestic society this ideal is realized, or satisfied, whenever judges, legislators, chief executives, and other government officials, as well as candidates for public
office, act from and follow the idea of public reason and explain to other citizens their reasons for supporting fundamental political questions in terms of the political
conception of justice that they regard as the most reasonable. In this way they fulfill what I shall call their duty of civility to one another and to other citizens. Hence whether judges, legislators,
and chief executives act from and follow public reason is continually shown in their speech and conduct. How is the ideal of public reason realized by citizens who are not government
officials? In a representative government, citizens vote for representatives-chief executives, legislators, and the like-not for particular laws (except at a state or local level where they may vote
directly on referenda questions, which are not usually fundamental questions). To answer this question, we say that, ideally, citizens are to think of themselves as if they were
legislators and ask themselves what statutes, supported by what reasons satisfying the criterion of reciprocity, they would think it most reasonable to enact.7l When
firm and widespread, the disposition of citizens to view themselves as ideal legislators, and to repudiate government officials and candidates for public office
who violate public reason, forms part of the political and social basis of liberal democracy and is vital for its enduring strength and vigor. Thus in
domestic society citizens fulfill their duty of civility and support the idea of public reason, while doing what they can to hold government officials to it.
This duty, like other political rights and duties, is an intrinsically moral duty. I emphasize that it is not a legal duty, for in that case it would be incompatible with freedom of speech.
Independently turns the case --- deliberative democracy is a crucial means to solve oppression
Kapoor ‘02
(Ilan, Faculty of Environmental Studies – York U., Alternatives, Oct/Dec, p. 29)
Both Mouffe and Habermas put forth a democratic politics that is nonprescriptive but critical. These are important qualities for Third World politics, given the West's
history of foisting ideologies and development plans on Third World societies; and given the centralized and sometimes autocratic decision making of state bureaucracies in many of these
countries. Mouffe's democratic politics is open-ended and antiauthoritarian. As mentioned earlier, for her, democracy is by definition pluralist,
decentered and decentralized. It makes politics incumbent on as wide a participation as possible. It is thus inimical to, and critical of, any
Westernizing/ universalizing narratives or top-down and totalizing state policies. Arturo Escobar's views epitomize this Mouffean critique, applying it to Third World
issues. Partly inspired by her work, and relying on many of the same poststructuralist sources that her work draws upon (e.g., Foucault, Derrida), Escobar carries out an antiessentialist critique
of the "discourse of development., (30) He argues that such a discourse, framed in a way that champions Western priorities and interests and excludes non-Western ones, furthers Western
dominance over the Third World. Development is deployed, for example, to mean Western economic and technological development, thereby making "progress" in the Third World dependent
on the import of Western knowhow and technology. Development, for Escobar, far from aiding people, ends up disciplining them and subjugating them to the dictates of Western or
Westernized elites. In a Mouffean vein, he upholds popular/new social movements as a way to counter this authoritarian type of discourse and politics (more on this point later). Like
Mouffe's, Habermas's democratic vision is open-ended. His proceduralism means that deliberative democracy refrains from limiting the public
agenda or imposing upon it blueprints-be they external, Western ones or programs sponsored by Third World states. Power is thus decentralized. In
fact, he is critical of the "liberal" view of society centered on the state--a state that promotes market economics and embodies the "ethical
community." His democratic theory envisions a "decentered society"--one in which the political system has no center. (31) As noted earlier, for
Habermas, deliberative politics happens in the formal electoral bodies and thestate bureaucracy, but also in the multiple formal and informal
networks of the public sphere. Privileging none, he entrusts all social sectors to make up the public agenda dialogically.
And, effective civic engagement is key to prevent right-wing fill in; causes extinction.
Boggs 97 (Carl Boggs, The great retreat: Decline of the public sphere in late twentieth-century America National University, Los Angeles Theory and Society 26:
741-780
The decline of the public sphere in late twentieth-century America poses a series of great dilemmas and
challenges. Many ideological currents scrutinized here - localism, metaphysics, spontaneism, postmodernism, Deep Ecology - intersect with and reinforce each other. While these currents have deep origins in popular movements
of the 1960s and 1970s, they remain very much alive in the 1990s. Despite their different outlooks and trajectories, they all share one thing in
common: a depoliticized expression of struggles to combat and over- come alienation. The false sense of
empowerment that comes with such mesmerizing impulses is accompanied by a loss of public engagement,
an erosion of citizenship and a depleted capacity of individuals in large groups to work for social change. As this
ideological quagmire worsens, urgent problems that are destroying the fabric of American society will go
unsolved - perhaps even unrecognized - only to fester more ominously into the future. And such problems (ecological crisis, poverty,
urban decay, spread of infectious diseases, technological displacement of workers) cannot be understood outside the larger
social and global context of internationalized markets, finance, and communications. Paradoxically, the widespread retreat from politics, often
inspired by localist sentiment, comes at a time when agendas that ignore or side- step these global realities
will, more than ever, be reduced to impotence. In his commentary on the state of citizenship today, Wolin refers to the
increasing sublimation and dilution of politics, as larger numbers of people turn away from public concerns
toward private ones. By diluting the life of common involvements, we negate the very idea of politics as a
source of public ideals and visions.74 In the meantime, the fate of the world hangs in the balance. The unyielding
truth is that, even as the ethos of anti-politics becomes more compelling and even fashionable in the United States, it
is the vagaries of political power that will continue to decide the fate of human societies. This last point demands
further elaboration. The shrinkage of politics hardly means that corporate colonization will be less of a reality, that
social hierarchies will somehow disappear, or that gigantic state and military structures will lose their hold
over people's lives. Far from it: the space abdicated by a broad citizenry, well-informed and ready to
participate at many levels, can in fact be filled by authoritarian and reactionary elites - an already familiar
dynamic in many lesser- developed countries. The fragmentation and chaos of a Hobbesian world, not very far
removed from the rampant individualism, social Darwinism, and civic violence that have been so much a part of the American landscape, could be the
prelude to a powerful Leviathan designed to impose order in the face of disunity and atomized retreat. In this
way the eclipse of politics might set the stage for a reassertion of politics in more virulent guise - or it might help further rationalize the existing power structure.
In either case, the state would likely become what Hobbes anticipated: the embodiment of those universal,
collective interests that had vanished from civil society.