1NC
1NC DA
Obama’s using capital to persuade Congress to avoid sanctions but
opponents are nearing a veto-proof majority
Riechmann, 12-29—Deb, AP writer, “Obama doesn't rule out opening US embassy in
Iran; Congress planning January vote on sanctions,” MN Star Tribune,
http://www.startribune.com/politics/national/286993011.html --BR
While President Barack Obama hasn't ruled out the possibility of reopening a U.S. Embassy
in Iran, Republicans say the Senate will vote within weeks on a bill to impose more
sanctions on Tehran over its nuclear program. Obama was asked in an NPR interview
broadcast on Monday whether he could envision opening an embassy there during his final
two years in office. "I never say never," Obama said, adding that U.S. ties with Tehran must
be restored in steps. Washington and its partners are hoping to clinch a deal with Iran by
July that would set long-term limits on Iran's enrichment of uranium and other activity that
could produce material for use in nuclear weapons. Iran says its program is solely for
energy production and medical research purposes. It has agreed to some restrictions in
exchange for billions of dollars in relief from U.S. economic sanctions. On a visit to Israel on
Saturday, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said the new Republican-controlled Senate will vote
on an Iran sanctions bill in January. He said the bipartisan sanction legislation says: "If Iran
walks away from the table, sanctions will be re-imposed. If Iran cheats regarding any deal
that we enter to the Iranians, sanctions will be re-imposed." Graham also is sponsoring
legislation that would require any deal with Iran to be approved by Congress before
sanctions could be lifted. Standing alongside Graham, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu called Iran a "dangerous regime" that should be prevented from having nuclear
weapons. "I believe that what is required are more sanctions, and stronger sanctions,"
Netanyahu said. The Obama administration has been telling members of Congress that it
has won significant concessions from Iran for recently extending nuclear talks, including
promises by the Islamic republic to allow snap inspections of its facilities and to neutralize
much of its remaining uranium stockpile. Administration officials have been presenting the
Iranian concessions to lawmakers in the hopes of convincing them to support the
extension and hold off on new economic sanctions that could derail the diplomatic effort.
Obama has threatened to veto any new sanctions legislation while American diplomats
continue their push for an accord that would set multiyear limits on Iran's nuclear progress
in exchange for an easing of the international sanctions that have crippled the Iranian
economy. Senate hawks are still trying to build a veto-proof majority of 67 votes with
Republicans set to assume the majority next month. Sen. Mark Kirk, R-Ill., told Fox News
Sunday that Senate Republicans might have enough backing from Democrats to pass vetoproof legislation that would impose more sanctions on Iran. "The good thing about those
votes, they will be really bipartisan votes," he said. "I have 17 Democrats with me. . We
have a shot at even getting to a veto-proof majority in the Senate."
The plan’s a political landmine and a waste of political capital
Sullivan, 12—Andrew, one of the most widely syndicated columnists in the USA, “The
Silent Stoner President, Ctd,” The Dish, http://dish.andrewsullivan.com/2012/11/27/thesilent-stoner-president-ctd/ -- BR
That old footage you showed of Obama speaking in favor of decriminalization in 2004 reminded me of one
of the weirdest Obama videos I've ever seen. It's from the summer of 2007 when he was running
for president and in it someone on a rope line in New Hampshire asked what his stance was regarding
medical marijuana. You can tell right away from Obama's body language that he really
doesn't want to answer this question, presumably because he thinks it's a political
landmine. Then the oddest thing happens, and I had to watch it a few times to make sure
that I was seeing what I thought I was seeing. You can see Reggie Love in the background
apparently listening to an earpiece, which I'm assuming must be radioed directly to
somebody like Gibbs or Axelrod or some other adviser. Reggie hears something in the
earpiece and suddenly has to get Obama's attention in the middle of this guy's question and
not-so-smoothly transfers the ear piece to Obama, who then pauses, and after a few beats
apparently parrots back the stock answer coming to him in his ear. Obama's response was that
the Feds cracking down on state medical marijuana operations wouldn't be a worthwhile use of federal resources.
it was one of those rare times where
you see the politically calculated side rather than the casual authenticity that usually comes
across in him, and the sense I got was that whatever Obama's actual position on marijuana
is, he's not about to let that be the issue that he wastes political capital on. That's not going
But never mind the answer, which didn't seem like his own. To me,
to be the issue that prevents him from becoming president and fixing everything else that he cares more about.
As a big Obama supporter back in the summer of '07, I wouldn't have dared point out this video before Obama won
the Democratic primaries, the election in 2008, or the recent reelection, but now that we're on the other side of all
three, I couldn't help but pass along the footage. Above is some footage closer to the real Obama.
Obama’s capital is do or die—failure triggers war
Winsor, 14 (Ben, “A Coalition Is Working Furiously Behind The Scenes To Support
Obama's Iran Talks,” Oct 2, http://www.businessinsider.com/rag-tag-iran-coalition-backingdiplomacy-2014-10)
Since November 2013, the Obama administration has engaged with Iran in tense, drawnout nuclear negotiations which optimists hope could bring an end to decades of hostility and
mistrust. Throughout it all, Congress has threatened to play the spoiler, with a tough
sanctions bill passing the House and looming in the Senate which would almost certainly
scuttle the fragile talks over the Iranian nuclear program. Now, as the deadline for the end
of the talks approaches, a coalition of legislators, advocacy groups, and White House
officials are working to hold Congress back from the brink of thwarting what they see
as a historic window of opportunity. They're fighting against legislators and
conservative groups like The Heritage Foundation and The Free Enterprise Institute who
are pushing for the US to take a hawkish stance. Legislators, led by Minnesota
Congressman Keith Ellison, have been maneuvering quietly behind the scenes in Congress
to keep the talks alive. At the same time, officials from the White House have been
leaning heavily on Senate Democrats to refrain from bringing a sanctions bill to
the floor. On the outside, a diverse range of pro-diplomacy groups, led by organisations
like the National Iranian American Council (NIAC) and the liberal Jewish organization J
Street, have found a common cause and rallied together to lobby for restraint. Even the
Quakers are energized. “This is a do-or-die moment, either we succeed, or we go in a much
more negative direction,” said NIAC co-founder Trita Parsi at the group’s annual conference
last weekend. Parsi sees the negotiations as a historic moment during a narrow window
of opportunity. Presidents on both sides have sunk significant time and energy
into the talks and Parsi believes the current leadership in both countries is more likely to
make a deal than those who came before — or might come after. “The next president,
whatever political party they’re in, is not going to spend precious political capital
battling Congress… [Obama] is the guy,” Parsi said. Supporters fear that failure of the
talks could trigger increased sanctions, the rise of hardliners in Iran, and relations
spiraling toward military confrontation.
Veto threats are only credible if Obama has capital
Lee, 5—Andrew Lee (Professor of Political Science at Claremont McKenna College) 05
“Invest or Spend? Political Capital and Statements of Administration Policy in the First Term
of the George W. Bush Presidency”, Georgia Political Science Association, Conference
Proceedings
With these words, the Framers created veto power, a central feature of our legislative
process. The veto, traditionally an executive prerogative designed as a defensive check on
Congress, has become an offensive tool for the president’s legislative agenda. In addition to
blocking disfavored legislation, the president may threaten to veto favored legislation to
compel Congress to change provisions within legislation. Congressional leaders take a veto
threat very seriously. How does Congress gauge the credibility of a veto threat? Legislators
would gauge the “political capital” of the president to determine the credibility of
the threat. According to political journalist Tod Lindberg (2004), political capital is a “form
of persuasive authority stemming from a position of political strength” (A21). Political
capital can be measured by favorability and job approval polling numbers because they
signify support for the president’s actions and agenda. For example, President Bush’s
leadership after the September 11th terrorist attacks increased his favorability and job
approval polling, and thus his political capital. He subsequently was able to launch a war
with Afghanistan and Iraq. In such cases, the president’s high political capital would
make a veto more credible. Congress must also reckon whether the president will think
an issue is worth spending political capital on. As Richard S. Conley and Amie Kreppel
(1999) write, “Whenever the President . . . act[s] to change the voting behavior of a
Member, political capital is expended. It would not be logical to expend that capital in what
was known ahead of time to be a losing battle” (2).
Goes nuclear—tons of different actors and scenarios for extinction
Avery, 13 -- Associate Professor, University of Copenhagen (11/6/2013, John Scales
Avery, “An Attack On Iran Could Escalate Into Global Nuclear War,”
http://www.countercurrents.org/avery061113.htm)
Despite the willingness of Iran's new President, Hassan Rouhani to make all reasonable
concessions to US demands, Israeli pressure groups in Washington continue to demand an
attack on Iran. But such an attack might escalate into a global nuclear war, with
catastrophic consequences. As we approach the 100th anniversary World War I, we should
remember that this colossal disaster escalated uncontrollably from what was intended to be
a minor conflict. There is a danger that an attack on Iran would escalate into a largescale war in the Middle East, entirely destabilizing a region that is already deep in
problems. The unstable government of Pakistan might be overthrown, and the revolutionary
Pakistani government might enter the war on the side of Iran, thus introducing nuclear
weapons into the conflict. Russia and China, firm allies of Iran, might also be drawn into
a general war in the Middle East. Since much of the world's oil comes from the region, such
a war would certainly cause the price of oil to reach unheard-of heights, with catastrophic
effects on the global economy. In the dangerous situation that could potentially result
from an attack on Iran, there is a risk that nuclear weapons would be used, either
intentionally, or by accident or miscalculation. Recent research has shown that besides
making large areas of the world uninhabitable through long-lasting radioactive
contamination, a nuclear war would damage global agriculture to such a extent that a
global famine of previously unknown proportions would result. Thus, nuclear war is the
ultimate ecological catastrophe. It could destroy human civilization and much of the
biosphere. To risk such a war would be an unforgivable offense against the lives and future
of all the peoples of the world, US citizens included.
1NC K
Legalizing marijuana is a tactic of neoliberal governmentality that places
the onus on individuals to govern themselves while the government sits
back and makes sure that they’re doing it right – this increases state
control through regulatory mechanisms while minimizing its perception
O’Brien 2013 - University of Wisconsin-Whitewater (February 25, Patrick, “Medical
Marijuana and Social Control: Escaping Criminalization and Embracing Medicalization”
Deviant Behavior, 34: 423–443, Taylor & Francis)
A latent outcome of this legal-medical system has been its adaptation to the new
criminologies evidenced in late modern society (Garland 1996, 2001). The medicalization of
cannabis has defined deviance down significantly (Moynihan 1993) and effectively reduced
the demands placed on the State’s criminal justice agencies. At the same time, the State
has increasingly embedded social controls into the fabric of society, rather than
inserting them from above in the form of sovereign command (Garland 2001). Medical
dispensary owners, cultivators, investors, and employees, along with local politicians and
affiliated business owners, have remained bound to State laws and policies, but have also
been expected to proctor themselves while government powers watch at a distance for
a breakdown in control. The State has conceded that it is unable to manage the illicit
marijuana market alone and has redirected its control efforts away from the sole authority
of the police, the courts, and the prisons. The dispensary industry has provided the State a
situation in which it governs, but does not coercively control marijuana and its users.
Instead, the State manages the drug through the actors involved in the legal-medical
industry, and has effectively mandated them as active partners in sustaining and enforcing
the formal and informal controls of the dispensary system. The State controls at an
ostensibly distant fashion, but it has not resigned its power. On the contrary, it has
retained its traditional command over the police and the prisons while expanding
its efficiency and capacity to control marijuana and its users. This new reality in
crime control has stratified itself across all facets of society, including its structural, cultural,
and interactional dimensions. At the structural level, the legal-medical model has reduced
the strain of a substantial segment of society by institutionalizing acceptable and lawful
means of accessing marijuana, effectively shifting this population into an ecological
position where they can be watched and controlled. The groups once involved in the
illicit market have become visible, and the laws that govern the use, distribution, and
production of cannabis have actually become enforceable by the State. Marijuana users
have become patients, requiring a physician’s recommendation to con sume the drug
lawfully. The State has mandated what medical conditions warrant a registry card,
monitoring people through licensing applications, doctors’ files, government paperwork, and
the medical marijuana registry. Dispensary owners have been required to grow 70%of their
own product, to provide live 24-hour surveillance camera feeds of their cultivation and
distribution warehouses, and to subject themselves to periodic inspection. Dispensary
owners and employees have been fingerprinted and undergone extensive background
checks, and marijuana businesses only operate in State zoned locations. By amassing
knowledge about the social organization of the marijuana industry and its users, the
government has engaged in monitoring, aggregating, and transmitting such information to
law enforcement and the public. At the cultural level, the legal-medical system has provided
a greater degree of social order, stability, and integration by relocating marijuana users into
the fold of conventional norms and values. Cultural cohesion and conformity have been
fostered through legitimate business opera tions that cater to conventional lifestyles and
work hours, that quell concerns over safety and lawfulness, and reduce the alienation of a
subculture of users. The State has effectively aligned a once criminal population of people
with dominant ideals of normality (Goffman 1983) and dismantled a framework of deviant
organization (Best and Luckenbill 1982) with distinct ideol ogies and norms concerning
marijuana sales and use. The government has incorporated the norms and values of
conventional society into the processes of distributing and using cannabis, and now assists
in controlling marijuana through the cultural transmission (Shaw and McKay 1972) of rituals
and sanctions now aligned with the normative social order. Both of these macro- and mesolevel shifts have augmented State control of marijuana and its users at an interactional
level. These structural and cultural changes have directly influenced micro-level processes
and mediated people’s differential associations and social learning processes (Akers 2000;
Sutherland 1949; Sutherland and Cressey 1955) as users have been increasingly socialized
into a conventional drug lifestyle. Marijuana users in the dispensary sys tem have decreased
their contacts with deviant others and increased their contacts with legitimate associations
by purchasing lawfully from licensed distributors. Dispensary owners have come to interact
with banks, contractors, real estate firms, tax specialists, and lawyers because they exist in
legitimate occupational associations and lawful community relations. This legal-medical
model has allowed the State to further monitor interactional processes through receipts,
taxes, and video surveillance. This continuous supervision has led to growing
discipline and normal ization. The State has prescribed conforming modes of
conduct upon marijuana users with new found power (Foucault 1975). Zoning laws
have mandated where transactions occur, distribution laws have defined how much can be
purchased, and monitored business hours have controlled the time sales occur. The State
has also strengthened individual bonds to society (Hirschi 1969) as a medical license
protects users’ conventional investments (i.e., education, career, and family) and caters to
their time-consuming activities as they have decided the time, speed, and location of their
purchases. Finally, State medicalization of marijuana has prompted people to endorse
society’s rules as progressively more politically and morally correct, since users are
typically critical of cannabis prohibition. This legal-medical system has also
accommodated the ideals of neoliberalism. Through the adaptive strategy of
responsibilization (Garland 2001), the penalization strategies (i.e., control mechanisms)
regulating marijuana have become increasingly privatized, operating through civil
society. For example, although the State has demanded 24-hour video surveillance over
dispensary operations, it has also required these businesses to regulate their own marijuana
production and distribution, monitor their own employees and financial accounts, and direct
their own branding and promotional campaigns. Furthermore, by defining deviance down,
marijuana has become legally sold through privately owned dispensaries. In neoliberal
fashion, marijuana has been deregulated for capital gain.
Biopower and neoliberalism combine to create a unique form of
necropolitics that drives endless extermination in the name of maintaining
the strength of the market
Banerjee 2006 - University of South Australia (Subhabrata Bobby, “Live and Let Die:
Colonial Sovereignties and the Death Worlds of Necrocapitalism,” Borderlands, Volume 5
No. 1, http://www.borderlands.net.au/vol5no1_2006/banerjee_live.htm)
10. Agamben shows how sovereign power operates in the production of bare life in a variety
of contexts: concentration camps, 'human guinea pigs' used by Nazi doctors, current
debates on euthanasia, debates on human rights and refugee rights. A sovereign decision to
apply a state of exception invokes a power to decide the value of life, which would allow a
life to be killed without the charge of homicide. The killings of mentally and physically
handicapped people during the Nazi regime was justified as ending a 'life devoid of value', a
life 'unworthy to be lived'. Sovereignty thus becomes a decision on the value of life, 'a
power to decide the point at which life ceases to be politically relevant' (Agamben, 1998:
142). Life is no more sovereign as enshrined in the declaration of 'human' rights but
becomes instead a political decision, an exercise of biopower (Foucault, 1980). In the
context of the 'war on terror' operating in a neoliberal economy, the exercise of biopower
results in the creation of a type of sovereignty that has profound implications for those
whose livelihoods depend on the war on terror as well as those whose lives become
constituted as 'bare life' in the economy of the war on terror. 11. However, it is not enough
to situate sovereignty and biopower in the context of a neoliberal economy especially in the
case of the war on terror. In a neoliberal economy, the colony represents a greater potential
for profit especially as it is this space that, as Mbembe (2003: 14) suggests, represents a
permanent state of exception where sovereignty is the exercise of power outside the
law, where 'peace was more likely to take on the face of a war without end' and
where violence could operate in the name of civilization. But these forms of
necropolitical power, as Mbembe reads it in the context of the occupation of Palestine,
literally create 'death worlds, new and unique forms of social existence in which
vast populations are subjected to conditions of life conferring upon them the
status of theliving dead ' (Mbembe, 2003: 40). The state of endless war is precisely the
space where profits accrue whether it is through the extraction of resources or the use of
privatized militias or through contracts for reconstruction. Sovereignty over death worlds
results in the application of necropower either literally as the right to kill or the right to
'civilize', a supposedly 'benevolent' form of power that requires the destruction of a
culture in order to 'save the people from themselves' (Mbembe, 2003:22). This attempt to
save the people from themselves has, of course, been the rhetoric used by the U.S.
government in the war on terror and the war in Iraq. 12. Situating necropolitics in the
context of economy, Montag (2005: 11) argues that if necropolitics is interested in the
production of death or subjugating life to the power of death then it is possible to speak of a
necroeconomics - a space of 'letting die or exposing to death'. Montag explores the relation
of the market to life and death in his reading of Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations and Theory
of Moral Sentiments. In Montag's reading of Smith, it is 'the dread of death, the great
poison to the happiness...which while it afflicts and mortifies the individual, guards and
protects the society' (cited in Montag, 2005: 12). If social life was driven solely by
unrestrained self-interest then the fear of punishment or death through juridical systems
kept the pursuit of excessive self-interest in check, otherwise people would simply rob,
injure and kill for material wealth. Thus, for Smith the universality of life is contingent on
the particularity of death, the production of life on the production of death where the
intersection of the political and the economic makes it necessary to exercise the right to kill.
The market then, as a 'concrete form of the universal' becomes the 'very form of
universality as life' and requires at certain moments to 'let die'. Or as Montag theorizes it,
Death establishes the conditions of life; death as by an invisible hand restores the market to
what it must be to support life. The allowing of death of the particular is necessary to the
production of life of the universal. The market reduces and rations life; it not only allows
death, it demands death be allowed by the sovereign power, as well as by those who
suffer it. In other words, it demands and required the latter allow themselves to die. Thus
alongside the figure of homo sacer, the one who may be killed with impunity, is another
figure, one whose death is no doubt less spectacular than the first and is the object of no
memorial or commemoration: he who with impunity may be allowed to die, slowly or
quickly, in the name of the rationality and equilibrium of the market (Montag, 2005: 15).
Montag, therefore, theorizes a necroeconomics where the state becomes the legitimate
purveyor of violence: in this scenario, the state can compel by force by 'those who
refuse to allow themselves to die' (Montag, 2005: 15). However, Montag's concept of
necroeconomics appears to universalize conditions of poverty through the logic of the
market. My concern however, is the creation of death worlds in colonial contexts through
the collusion between states and corporations. 13. If states and corporations work in
tandem with each other in colonial contexts, creating states of exception and exercising
necropower to profit from the death worlds that they establish, then necroeconomics fails to
consider the specificities of colonial capitalist practices. In this sense, I would argue that
necrocapitalism emerges from the intersection of necropolitics and necroeconomics, as
practices of accumulation in colonial contexts by specific economic actors - multinational
corporations for example - that involve dispossession, death, torture, suicide, slavery,
destruction of livelihoods and the general management of violence. It is a new form of
imperialism, an imperialism that has learned to 'manage things better'. Colonial
sovereignty can be established even in metropolitan sites where necrocapitalism may
operate in states of exception: refugee detention centres in Australia are examples of these
states of exception (Perera, 2002). However, in the colonies (either 'post' or 'neo'), entire
regions in the Middle East or Africa may be designated as states of exception.
The alternative is to refuse to imagine legality – only the formation of
autonomous geographies can challenge biopolitical neoliberalism
Pickerill and Chatterton 2006 - Leicester University AND Leeds University (Jenny and
Paul, “Notes towards autonomous geographies: creation, resistance and self-management
as survival tactics” Progress in Human Geography30, 6 (2006) pp. 730–746)
In essence, autonomy is a coming together of theory and practice, or praxis. Hence, it is not
solely an intellectual tool nor a guide for living; it is a means and an end. Autonomous
geographies represent the deed and the word, based around ongoing examples and
experiments. Autonomous spaces are not spaces of deference to higher organizational
levels such as non-governmental organizations, political representatives or trade union
officials. They are based around a belief that the process is as important as the
outcome of resistance, that the journey is an end in itself. As the Zapatistas say: ‘we
don’t know how long we have to walk this path or if we will ever arrive, but at least it is the
path we have chosen to take’. Autonomous geographies are based around a belief in
prefigurative politics (summed up by the phrase ‘be the change you want to see’), that
change is possible through an accumulation of small changes, providing much-needed
hope against a feeling of powerlessness. Part of this is the belief in ‘doing it yourself ’ (see
McKay, 1998) or creating workable alternatives outside the state. Many examples
have flourished embracing ecological direct action, free parties and the rave scene,
squatting and social centres, and opensource software and independent media (Wall, 1999;
Seel et al., 2000; Plows, 2002; Chatterton and Hollands, 2003; Pickerill, 2003a; 2006).
Resources are creatively reused, skills shared, and popular or participatory education
techniques deployed, aiming to develop a critical consciousness, political and media literacy
and clear ethical judgements (Freire, 1979). In the terrain opened up by the failure of statebased and ‘actually existing socialism’, autonomy allows a rethinking of the idea of
revolution – not about seizing the state’s power but, as Holloway (2002) argues, ‘changing
the world without taking power’ (Vaneigem, 1979). Autonomy does not mean an
absence of structure or order, but the rejection of a government that demands
obedience (Castoriadis, 1991). Examples of postcapitalist ways of living are already part of
the present (Gibson-Graham, 1996). The documentation of the ‘future in the present’ has
been a hallmark of work by anarchist, libertarian and radical scholars from Peter Kropotkin
(1972) to Colin Ward (1989) and Murray Bookchin (1996). Their work looks for tendencies
that counter competition and conflict, providing alternative paths. Some of these disappear,
others survive, but the challenge remains to find them, encourage people to articulate,
expand and connect them. Autonomous projects face the accusation that, even if they do
improve participants’ quality of living, they fail to have a transformative impact on the
broader locality and even less on the global capitalist system (DeFilippis, 2004).
Consequently, in talking of local resistance, Peck and Tickell (2002) suggest that ‘the defeat
(or failure) of local neoliberalisms – even strategically important ones – will not be enough
to topple what we are still perhaps justified in calling “the system”’ (p. 401). However,
commentators make the mistake of looking for signs of emerging organizational
coherence, political leaders and a common programme that bids for state power, when
the rules of engagement have changed. A plurality of voices is reframing the debate,
changing the nature and boundaries of what is taken as common sense and creating
workable solutions to erode the workings of market-based economies in a host of, as yet,
unknown ways. Rebecca Solnit’s writings on hope remind us that, while our actions’ effects
are difficult to calculate, ‘causes and effects assume history marches forward, but history
is not an army. It is a crab scuttling sideways, a drip of soft water wearing away stone’
(Solnit, 2004: 4).
Regulation disrupts autonomous geographies by inserting neoliberal
governmentality and undermining revolutionary potential
Vanolo 2014 – lecturer at Turin (Alberto, with Alessandro Coppola, “Copenhagen
Normalising autonomous spaces: Ongoing transformations in Christiania,” Urban Studies 1–
17)
One of the key research questions is how the agreement will actually regulate the space of
autonomy creating – out of the inherited tradition of self-regulation and self-management –
a set of ‘differential rights’ belonging to the residents of Christiania. While in the past these
rights were loosely defined and activated in the largely undetermined sphere of selfmanagement and self-regulation of the Free Town, in the context of a relationship with the
state that had successive relatively ‘peaceful’ and ‘conflictual’ phases, after the agreement
these rights are going to be increasingly embedded in the formalised reality of the
Foundation and of its contractualised relationship with the state achieved with the 2012
agreement. In the frame of this emerging ‘differential citizenship’ that can be understood as
a locally rooted ‘micro-citizenship’ (Centner, 2012), residents of Christiania will be included
in a now formalised system of double taxation based on the legal recognition of the
existence of a collective property regime insisting on a significant portion of the city and
administered by a special private body that is the Christiania Foundation. More broadly, this
process has led to the creation of a new fully formalised governance scale based on the
contractualisation of the relationships between the Free Town, the City of Copenhagen and
the Danish state, in a way that seems to be overall coherent with wider processes of
geographical re-scaling operated in the neoliberal scenario in the last decades. How this new
scale will be enacted and operated on the ground will depend on many different factors.
From this point of view, it is crucial to understand how the mechanics of informal consensus
democracy, that the community claims it wants to preserve in its traditional form, will
interact with the workings of the new governance scale. As we have seen, this
contractualised governance scale will be most likely conflictual, turbulent and contested
across different important realms in which the Free Town has full autonomy until the 2012
agreement. In the three realms examined – access to housing, regulation of the built
environment and childcare – it is possible to imagine a range of potential outcomes
consequent to the agreement. For example, in the case of the regulation of access to
housing, it is possible to hypothesise a range of outcomes going from the defacto
preservation of the highly localist and informal selection process currently in the hands of
local areas’ committees, to the implementation of a new system introducing more
formalised and standardised rules and procedures. Similarly, in the cases of planning
regulation and childcare, the actual organisation shall be challenged and hybridised, to
different degrees, in the context of intensifying normalisation forces. It needs to be noted
how, across the three realms, narratives underlying the risk of ‘normalisation’ mobilise
desires of ‘separation’ and fears of integration: for example, the disdain of regulations that
could bring people who do not make a choice to live in Christiania to actually live in the
community or that could fully include some services – like the kindergarten – in national
systems therefore opening them also to users from outside (a point that is not necessarily
related to the agreement). More generally, voices in the community express a desire to
escape from standardised and highly regulated welfare state systems, that could limit the
collective and individual autonomy that characterise the Free Town (cf. Bøggild, 2011).
These claims of self-determination and self-management, associated with the portraying of
Christiania as a ‘community of choice’, somehow recall narratives mobilised in the commoninterest developments repertoire, coming to represent a refusal of universalistic stateregulated and funded welfare systems and a desire of separation and secession through the
creation of ‘homogeneous’ environments. Even if the cultural content is peculiar – a radical,
alternative, anarchist culture – the logic is similar. From this point of view, it is key to
understand how values and goals of autonomy are being reframed in the context of this
rising contractualised governance scale promoted by the agreement and in which the Free
Town is now embedded. Autonomy is no more the insurgent practice of a complete and
often conflictual separation from the state – that had already been partially negotiated in
previous but less far-reaching agreements with the state – but rather a ‘regulated’ practice,
where autonomy is negotiated on a contractual basis: the search for the preservation of
some degree of associated and individual sovereignty on local matters needs to be
continuously negotiated within the Free Town and between the Free Town and the statist
institutional realm. This reframing of ‘autonomy’ as a practice and as a goal suggests the
subsumption of Christiania to the neoliberal governmentality characterising various
‘separatist’ spatial formations as CIDs and special interest districts, leading us to the
inclusion of the Free Town in the turbulent geography of spaces and practices of exception
generated in the context of wide processes of neo-liberal rescaling. From this point of view,
the agreement represents a government technology that is consistent with a wide range of
urban governance tools ‘defining special rules and procedures for specific urban governance
situations’ (Baptista, 2013: 39) and of ‘new formal or informal institutional arrangements
that engage in the act of governing outside and beyond the state’ (Swyngedouw, 2005:
1991).
1NC CP
The United States should propose amendments to all necessary
international drug control treaties to allow the legalization of marijuana.
The United States should reverse all laws that legalize marijuana. The
United States should halt all efforts to legalize marijuana while
international drug control treaties prohibit the legalization of marijuana.
The United States should cease and prohibit the determination of federal
agency employment eligibility based on marihuana use, abuse, presence,
possession, sale, manufacture, transport, cultivation, or treatment. The
Drug Enforcement Agency should reschedule marihuana into Schedule V of
the CSA. The United States should
The amendment passes and results in eventual legalization—inter se
agreements avoid consensus issues
Don 14
[2014, Allison Don is a University of Minnesota Law School, J.D. candidate 2015, “Lighten
Up: Amending the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs” 23 Minn. J. Int'l L. 213, Hein
Online]
In light of the newly passed legislation within the United States concerning recreational
marijuana and proposed legislation in the international community, the best means of
aligning the Single Convention with evolving norms is to amend the treaty. n153
Amendments allow for formal changes to be made to a treaty while maintaining the treaty's
existence. n154 This allows for adjustment as "parties' understanding of the issue" n155
change or circumstances surrounding the issue change without requiring the drafting of a
new treaty or termination of an existing one. By amending the Single Convention to allow
for the recreational use of marijuana, the United States and other countries considering
such legislation would be able to continue the legislative process without any
international obligations impeding the progression towards marijuana legalization.
Article 47 within the Single Convention provides instructions for amending the treaty,
stating that "any party may propose an amendment to this Convention." n156 In order to
make such a proposal, the amendment itself and the reasons behind the amendment must
be transferred to the Secretary-General of the United Nations in writing who will then
disseminate the proposed amendment to the other parties of the treaty and the
Commission. At this point, the Commission has the power to decide if a conference should
be held to discuss the proposal or if the parties should simply be asked if they are willing to
accept. n157 If there is no objection within 18 months, the amendment becomes fully
adopted; if there is an objection, the Commission may then choose to hold a conference to
review the proposal. n158 With 153 current parties to the Single Convention, arriving at a
consensus may prove difficult. This does not preclude the option to amend as "amendments
require agreement between treaty parties, but not necessarily between all parties." Once an
[*237] amendment has been proposed and adopted, parties are free to decide if they will
become a party to the amendment. n159 Those who opt not to join the amendment remain
bound by the treaty's original obligations. n160 By proposing an amendment that would
permit the use of marijuana for recreational purposes, those countries who wish to
pursue such legislation would be permitted to do so and those countries who remain
in opposition would be able to remain parties to the original treaty preventing the use of
recreational marijuana. n161
C. Support for Legalization Within the United States from a Policy Standpoint The need for amendment is evident as
numerous countries move towards marijuana legalization. n162 Within the United States, a movement towards federal legalization is desirable for numerous reasons. Particularly,
legalization would increase tax revenues, lower drug use rates while also lowering the rate of international violence. 1. Marijuana is Costing Taxpayers Money The United States has one
of the busiest criminal justice systems in the world, resulting in and estimated 12.2 million arrests in 2012 alone. n163 Of these arrests, 1,552,432 were for drug abuse violations with
almost half for marijuana related crimes. n164 The money spent, on a national level, for this level of [*238] enforcement of marijuana laws alone is up to $ 7.7 billion a year. n165 The
excessive spending for the enforcement of marijuana prohibition is not only costing taxpayers, but it's also taking away from potential tax revenue. "If it were taxed similarly to alcohol
and tobacco, marijuana would provide $ 6.2 billion in additional revenue each year ... ." n166 The potential for generated revenue, coupled with savings gained by no longer having the
necessity for strict enforcement of marijuana prohibition could potentially amount to an "annual budget increase of nearly $ 14 billion." n167 In order to identify where some of these
saving would be coming from, it's important to take a closer look at spending within the federal prison system. There are well over 200,000 inmates incarcerated at the federal level;
51% of those inmates' most serious charge is a drug offense. n168 Depending on the level of security they're housed in, each inmate costs the federal government between $ 21,000
and $ 33,000 a year. This kind of expenditure led to the Obama administration having ""to request $ 6.9 billion for the Bureau of Prisons in fiscal [year] 2013.'" n169 The expensive
reality doesn't stop there, "federal prison costs are expected to rise to 30 percent of the Department of Justice's budget by 2020." n170 The potential savings to not only taxpayers but
also to the [*239] criminal justice system by essentially eliminating the prohibition on marijuana n171 can be better illustrated through comparisons to the Netherlands, where
marijuana has been decriminalized since the 1970s. For instance, in 2009, the United States incarcerated 743 people for every 100,000. In 2010, the Netherlands incarcerated 94
people for every 100,000. n172 While prison populations fluctuate from year to year and are impacted by numerous factors n173, the stark difference in incarceration rates between the
Netherlands and the United States is hard to ignore. On the expense side of things, the Netherlands spends approximately $ 307 per capita on their criminal justice system while the
United States spends approximately $ 552. n174 By adopting federal legislation similar to that of Washington and Colorado, the federal government would be lightening the current load
on the prison system while simultaneously generating revenue. 2. The Status of Marijuana as an Illegal Substance Has No Deterrent Effect Proponents of maintaining marijuana as an
illegal substance claim that social stigmas associated with breaking the law will prevent individuals from experimenting with and using marijuana. n175 However, there is no empirical
evidence to [*240] support this claim. Recent figures show that in the United States, despite marijuana legislation, high school aged children who view smoking marijuana as risky
behavior has steadily declined since the early 90's. n176 Although marijuana laws have been in effect for over 70 years, there is further evidence of increasing acceptance of the
substance with fifty-eight percent of the population believing marijuana should be legal. n177 Marijuana usage among the population as a whole also shows that marijuana laws have no
deterrent effect within the United States. In 2012, 7.6 million people over the age of 12 reported using marijuana 20 or more days a month, up from 4.8 million in 2002. n178 There
has also been a rise in the number of individuals who use marijuana 300 or more days a year from 3.1 million in 2002 to 5.4 million in 2012. n179 These figures continue to rise despite
an increase in marijuana enforcement. Between 1996 and 2006, there were nine million arrests for marijuana violations. Despite these arrests and their alleged deterrent effect, 25
million people used marijuana in 2007. n180 Growing public acceptance of marijuana in the United States is evident beyond the realm of private use. In 1987, Judge Douglas Ginsburg
was nominated for a seat on the United States Supreme Court by then President Ronald Reagan. Nine days after his nomination, Judge Ginsburg withdrew his name after receiving
backlash for his prior marijuana use. n181 Four years later, then President George H. W. Bush nominated Judge Clarence Thomas. When it became public that Judge Thomas had
previously smoked marijuana, President Bush stated that it was not an issue that warranted [*241] disqualification. n182 Shortly after, Senator Bill Clinton admitted to marijuana
experimentation and was later elected as the successor to George H. W. Bush as President of the United States. n183 Public acceptance of marijuana in the United States has become
so widespread that for the last 16 years the public has chosen as its President an admitted prior marijuana user. n184 3. Legalization May Decrease Overall Drug Use There is a great
deal of speculation as to the effects marijuana legalization would have, but the best indication is to look to the Netherlands where marijuana has been decriminalized since 1976. n185
Following the adoption of decriminalization, marijuana use in the Netherlands actually declined and has since stabilized with no tangible increase or decrease in use. n186 More
importantly, by providing an alternative means of obtaining marijuana, the Netherlands has successfully isolated casual marijuana users to the "coffee shops' found throughout the
country ""where it is as absurd to ask for hard drugs as it is at an average butcher's [shop] to ask for a zebra-steak." n187 By preventing exposure to drug dealers [*242] peddling
"hard drugs,' n188 decriminalization successfully decreased the demand for harder drugs, particularly heroin, because users were no longer being introduced to "hard drugs' by the
dealers they previously had to associate with in order to purchase marijuana. n189 4. U.S. Legalization Would Reduce Violence on an International Level The black market for marijuana
in the United States has led to the formation of drug cartels in Mexico. The cartels smuggle marijuana into the United States and the proceeds from the sale are then smuggled back
into Mexico where they account for over sixty percent of the cartels overall revenue. n190 Without any legal avenues for settling disputes among rival cartels, they are ultimately pitted
against each other in a violent fight for control over territory, smuggling routes and cities along the border between the United States and Mexico. n191 The resulting violence has
caused approximately "60,000 drug-related murders since ... 2006." n192 In 2011, Mexico's former President, Vicente Fox, explained that ""the drug consumer in the U.S. yields billions
of dollars, money that goes back to Mexico to bribe police and money that buys guns ... . So when you question yourselves about what is going on in Mexico, it depends very much on
what happens in this nation.'" n193 By not forcing marijuana producers underground, the United States could substantially alleviate the violence in Mexico. n194 [*243] CONCLUSION
. The United States
signaled a potential shift in its perspective by publicly condoning the new legislation.
The United States is not alone; the international community has shown an increased
approval, and in some instances outright support, of recreational marijuana. This
growing international support warrants an amendment to the Single Convention in order to
allow states to legislate recreational marijuana as they see fit without the constraints of
international obligations. Amending the Single Convention would allow the United
States to pursue federal legislation similar to that of Colorado and Washington. By
legalizing marijuana on the federal level, the United States would see positive gains both
domestically and internationally. The United States would stand to gain significant revenue
while simultaneously decreasing its prison population and international violence. Such
potentially significant ramifications warrant an amendment to the Single Convention in order
to permit states to weigh these benefits in their own territories without being held
hostage by an international treaty that's no longer in line with popular opinion.
Colorado and Washington took a leap of faith in approving the use of marijuana for recreational purposes despite conflicting federal law
The counterplan solves the case but avoids the disads – rescheduling
ensures that legalization happens down the line after treaty amendment
and creates domestic and international momentum
Sullum 14, Senior editor at Reason magazine (Jacob, 2/10, Why Reschedule Marijuana?,
reason.com/archives/2014/02/10/why-reschedule-marijuana)
In light of President Obama's recent observation that marijuana is safer than alcohol, CNN's Jake Tapper wondered
if he was open to reconsidering marijuana's status as a Schedule I drug. When Tapper asked him that in an
interview that aired last week, Obama derailed the conversation by denying that the executive branch has the
the CSA gives the attorney general the
authority to move drugs between schedules. The attorney general has delegated that
authority to the DEA (a division of the Justice Department), which is why that agency has been the recipient
power to reclassify marijuana. That clearly is not true, since
of petitions urging it to put marijuana in a less restrictive category. Because Obama incorrectly insisted that
rescheduling marijuana would require an act of Congress, he never addressed the merits of doing it
administratively. From the perspective of people who believe marijuana should be legalized for medical or general
use, the advantages of such a move are not as substantial as you might think. But neither are they, as UCLA drug
Moving marijuana to a less restrictive legal
category would have some significant practical effects, perhaps the most important of
which would be to advance a more honest discussion of marijuana's hazards and
benefits. As Kleiman points out, removing marijuana from Schedule I would not automatically
make it legal for medical use, since any cannabis product still would have to be approved by the Food and Drug
policy expert Mark Kleiman claims, "identically zero."
Administration (FDA). "For a doctor to prescribe it," notes Aaron Houston, a Marijuana Majority board member and
WeedMaps lobbyist, "there would have to be an FDA-approved formulation of it." Since marijuana itself cannot be
patented, a pharmaceutical company would not have much incentive to go through the arduous, time-consuming,
and expensive process required to gain FDA approval. Furthermore, drug regulators tend to look askance at herbal
medicine, preferring isolated chemicals. "They're never going to approve a whole-plant organic product," says Dan
Riffle, director of federal policies at the Marijuana Policy Project. Rick Doblin, executive director of the
Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies, which for years has been trying to jump through the hoops
required to get marijuana approved as a medicine, disagrees. "FDA,
like most regulatory agencies, wants
to expand the areas it regulates," he says. "FDA does want to regulate botanical drugs and
would be willing to approve whole-plant organic products if Phase 3 studies demonstrate safety and
efficacy." In any case, rescheduling marijuana might make it easier to conduct research on the
plant's medical utility, which could lead to cannabis-derived medications that would pass
muster with the FDA. "The biggest obstacle, at least historically, to doing research on
marijuana to prove its medical benefit is that it's in Schedule I," Riffle says. "So you had that
Catch-22, where marijuana is a Schedule I drug because there's no evidence, and there's no
evidence because marijuana is a Schedule I drug." Harvard psychiatrist Lester Grinspoon, co-author of
Marihuana: The Forbidden Medicine and a leading expert on cannabis, agrees that marijuana's Schedule I
status has impeded research. "Since 1970," he says, "it has been the major reason why the
kinds of large double-blind studies which have been the basis for FDA approval of medicines
since the mid-1960s have been impossible to pursue in this country." Dale Gieringer, who runs the
California chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, notes that " there are very
burdensome registration requirements and regulations regarding Schedule I substances."
Although "most of them also apply to Schedule II," he says, they do not apply to substances in
Schedules III through V, which are deemed to have progressively lower potential for abuse.
There are other research obstacles, unique to marijuana. In 1999, responding to the legalization of
medical marijuana in California, the Clinton administration imposed an additional layer of review
on research involving cannabis, requiring approval by the Public Health Service as well as
the FDA, the DEA, and the relevant institutional review board. And even after they get all
the other necessary approvals, researchers have to obtain marijuana from the National
Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), which has a monopoly on the legal supply—something that is not
true of other Schedule I drugs. NIDA, an agency whose mission focuses on marijuana's hazards, has not been keen
these requirements is a necessary
would be harder to defend if marijuana were
reclassified, which would mean acknowledging that it has medical value and can be used
safely. Rescheduling marijuana would not affect the legal status of state-licensed cannabusinesses in states such
to assist research aimed at measuring its benefits. Although neither of
consequence of marijuana's Schedule I status, they
as Colorado and Washington, which would still be criminal enterprises in the eyes of the federal government. But
rescheduling could remove one of the major financial challenges
facing state-legal marijuana suppliers: Section 280E of the Internal Revenue Code
prohibits the deduction of business expenses related to "trafficking in controlled
substances," but only for drugs on Schedule I or II. If marijuana were moved to, say,
Schedule III, that prohibition would no longer apply. Schedule III, which is supposed to be for
Gieringer notes that
medically useful drugs that can be taken safely and have a lower abuse potential than drugs on Schedules I and II,
arguably is appropriate for marijuana because that is where the DEA put Marinol (a.k.a. dronabinol), a synthetic
version of THC, marijuana's main active ingredient. The DEA also has said naturally occurring THC used in generic
versions of Marinol belongs on Schedule III. But depending on how you define abuse potential, marijuana could go
on a lower schedule. "When you look at the Schedule IV drugs," says SUNY at Albany psychologist Mitch
Earleywine, author of Understanding Marijuana, "you've got the opiate Tramadol, the stimulant Modafinil, lethal
sedatives like phenobarbital and chloral hydrate, and the 'date rape' drug rohypnol. Surely cannabis is safer than
these." Grinspoon believes "none of the schedules is truly appropriate for marijuana." But if it he had to pick, he
says, "based on a realistic appraisal of the drug, I would put it in Schedule V." That category, which includes
codeine and opium preparations, is for prescription drugs with the lowest abuse potential. Rick Doblin notes that
the DEA could move cannabis to a lower schedule only if it changed its definition of "currently accepted medical
use," which demands the sort of large-scale, multi-site, double-blind studies that the FDA requires to approve a
new drug. "Assuming that marijuana has been approved as a prescription medicine by the FDA," Doblin says,
"Schedule II seems too high, since Marinol is in Schedule III. Due to its actual abuse potential, marijuana for
medical use should be in Schedule V." Alex Kreit, a professor at Thomas Jefferson School of Law in San Diego who
the CSA leaves undefined phrases on which scheduling hinges. The
DEA therefore "has enjoyed incredibly broad discretion to interpret and define 'potential for
abuse' and other scheduling criteria," Kreit writes on the Marijuana Law, Policy & Reform blog. Just as it could
studies drug policy, notes that
adopt a less demanding definition of "accepted medical use," the DEA could take a narrower view of "abuse," which
it equates with any nonmedical use. By that standard, marijuana, by far the most popular illegal drug, does indeed
have a high potential for abuse. But that judgment seems peculiar if abuse is defined as problematic use, in which
case potential for abuse might be measured by the percentage of users who become addicted or suffer serious
harm. In truth, as Lester Grinspoon observes, marijuana does not fit any of the schedules very well. It is not the
sort of medicine the FDA is used to approving. But it clearly can be used safely, as Obama conceded when he noted
that it is less dangerous than alcohol. Back in 1988, when he urged the DEA to reschedule marijuana,
Administrative Law Judge Francis Young called it "one of the safest therapeutically active substances known to
man." And while marijuana surely can be abused (what can't?), its potential for abuse seems lower than that of
many pharmaceuticals, not to mention alcohol and tobacco, which the CSA specifically excludes from its schedules.
In light of these inconsistencies, could the DEA take marijuana off of the CSA's schedules altogether? Probably not.
"I think it is very unlikely that the attorney general could remove marijuana from the schedules entirely," Kreit
the CSA gives the attorney general the power to "remove a drug or other substance entirely from
says that "if control is required by United States obligations under
international treaties, conventions, or protocols in effect on October 27, 1970, the Attorney General
shall issue an order controlling such drug under the schedule he deems most appropriate."
says. Although
the schedules," it also
Since the 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs requires its signatories (which include the United States) to
treaty
obligations seems to bar the DEA from descheduling, as opposed to rescheduling,
marijuana. Cannabis "requires a lot of control" under the Single Convention, notes Eric Sterling, president of the
criminalize production, possession, and distribution of cannabis for nonmedical purposes, this reference to
Criminal Justice Policy Foundation, who helped write federal drug legislation in the 1980s as counsel to the House
Judiciary Committee. "Cannabis is supposed to be controlled like opium and opiates." Then again, Kreit notes,
other CSA provisions "seem to contemplate situations where the U.S. does not accept international scheduling
determinations." Riffle, who is also a lawyer, sums it up this way: "I could make some arguments in a court that
[the reference to drug treaties] doesn't bind the executive, but I'd probably lose." The consequences of
administratively descheduling marijuana are difficult to tease out, given that some provisions of federal law refer to
marijuana specifically, while others talk about "controlled substances" or drugs on certain schedules. Aaron
Houston notes one salutary result of descheduling marijuana: Its consumers would no longer be barred from
owning firearms under the Gun Control Act of 1968, which purports to carve out an exception to the Second
Amendment for "unlawful user[s] of…any controlled substance." Even if the CSA permitted the Obama
even moving
marijuana down one level, from Schedule I to Schedule II, could have an important
impact on the drug policy debate. For one thing, it would free the Office of National Drug
Control Policy (ONDCP), which is required by law to oppose the legalization of any Schedule
I substance, to talk about the hazards of marijuana a little more honestly. Such freedom is
desperately needed, to judge by the effort required to extract the concession that marijuana is safer than
administration to deschedule marijuana, such a step would be politically inconceivable. But
alcohol from ONDCP Deputy Director Michael Botticelli at a congressional hearing this week. "You have Obama
saying that marijuana is less harmful than alcohol, that it's important for Colorado and Washington to move
forward," says Riffle, "but nonetheless you have the ONDCP saying, 'We remain steadfastly opposed to
If it weren't a Schedule I drug, they wouldn't have to say that. The ONDCP would be
free to take a new position on legalization or put out more honest statements about the
harms associated with marijuana." Rescheduling marijuana also might affect the level of
legalization.'
cannabis candor at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), which is barred
from using any of its funds to promote the legalization of Schedule I substances. Riffle
thinks lifting that restriction might even make NIDA, which is part of HHS, more willing to
let researchers use its marijuana. Beyond such statutory implications, acknowledging that
marijuana is more beneficial and less hazardous than the government has been saying all
these years is apt to influence the conversation about how to handle this much-maligned
plant. When the president conceded, in an interview with The New Yorker, that alcohol is more
dangerous than marijuana, it set off weeks of high-profile discussion about whether pot
prohibition is sensible or fair. If he followed up on that observation by asking whether
marijuana meets the criteria for Schedule I, it would call further attention to the
arbitrary distinctions drawn by our drug laws. The resulting discussion could help
pave the way for more ambitious moves, such as legislation lifting the federal ban
on marijuana in the 20 states that have legalized it for medical or recreational use. Bill Piper, director of
national affairs at the Drug Policy Alliance, says rescheduling is not his top priority, but it would be "a
significant victory for commonsense drug policy," because it "would acknowledge the weight
of scientific evidence and popular support for medical marijuana, and it could boost state
legislative efforts." Sterling thinks that acknowledgment could help people who get into legal
trouble for growing medical marijuana. "Moving marijuana to any other schedule would be a
recognition by the government that it has medical value," he says, which "makes a difference
in terms of what can be said to a jury." Gieringer agrees. "Rescheduling would send a
powerful message around the U.S. that marijuana does have medical uses," he says, "even in
states like Alabama that don't allow it. This would help put to rest the common argument of cops and DAs
that marijuana isn't medicine." Regardless of the practical consequences, there is something to be said for telling
the truth. "When Obama took office," Riffle notes, "he said that decisions in his administration would be guided by
science, not by politics and ideology. It's very clear that marijuana's continued classification as a Schedule I drug
Since Congress banned marijuana in 1937, says Houston, "we have seen
extremely cynical efforts to overblow the danger of marijuana and to demonize it. A move
to reschedule or unschedule would be the first time since 1937 that our government started to roll back
some of that reefer madness."
violates that mandate."
1NC DA
Obama’s current claim to flexibility in the treaty works in the short term,
but reversing legalization measures now is key to make the US position
sustainable—full legalization establishes a dangerous precedent of
unilateral flexibility
Walsh 14
[10/17/14, John Walsh is a scholars at the Brookings Institute, “The Brookings Institution
International Impacts Of the U.S. Trend Towards Legal “ Marijuana,
http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/events/2014/10/17%20international%20impacts%20m
arijuana/20141017_legal_marijuana_transcript.pdf]
there’s kind of a legal debate at the margins about exactly what that might mean for
the United States, which has conditionally tolerated the creation in Washington state and
Colorado of regulated markets for legal marijuana. And there are essentially two claims. One is
that there is policy flexibility baked into these treaties; that the United States can say, as it did
through the so-called Cole memo issued by the deputy attorney general, that the United States can pick
and choose its enforcement priorities, and provided that those don't get offended, it
can sort of stay its hand and see what happens with marijuana . There’s also a broader policy claim,
Now, it is true that
namely that the treaties have brought objectives ensuring access to critical medicine, for example, and that the
The idea is, in so
many words, is that those objectives are essentially consistent or not inconsistent with a
conditional toleration for marijuana. Now, the United States has paired those arguments with
kind of a longterm vision, and that vision is that the treaties shouldn’t be changed . They are
treaties give a lot of discretion to states’ parties as to figure out to achieve those objectives.
good as they are. And that all the international communities should sort of come together in a discussion and agree
on a way to live within them while accommodating changing drug policy, chiefly that regarding marijuana. The core
of this is to say that these are living documents that need to be re-interpreted from time to time, but the world
looks fundamentally different, and we should all just figure out that there’s space in it that we can all
accommodate, and I think that’s essentially what the Assistant Secretary was saying there in remarks that John
That’s the U.S. position in a nutshell ; what its upsides and downsides point to? In the
short-term, this probably makes some pragmatic sense. There weren’t a lot of good options
alluded to.
for the United States. There had been a call in some quarters to bring a lawsuit founded on pre-emption, the
doctrine that federal statutes trump contrary to state statutes, but that wasn’t a sure fire winner. It was also not
politically or economically a very smart idea to just send a trove of DEA and FBI guys into Washington and
Colorado and just shut the whole thing down. So, there’s kind of a least bad alternative, difficult choice matrix kind
There’s also the prospect that
marijuana legalization may not work. It may go badly. It may stop and the trajectory
may be reversed, and if that happens, the U.S. position is going to look pretty astute
in the rear view mirror that by pausing, seeing what was going to happen and then
waiting for the thing to play out, well, it didn’t require any big adjustments to their
international positions or any big adjustments to the international treaties, either. The
downside though, is that it might work. Marijuana legalization might go forward , and it might go forward
smartly. In that event, it’s going to be -- there’s already tension between U.S. position and the treaties, and I
think that’s safe to say. But that tension will only grow more acute, and the legal arguments
get less and less persuasive the more marijuana legalization proceeds intelligently and if
that trajectory holds. That is why in a piece that John and I have written, we think that treaty reform should
be on the table and not off the table, presumptively, because if the United States can claim policy
flexibility in the treaties for so long as it needs to, then its treaty partners are
entitled to no less. And I certainly don't mean to be alarmist by saying this, but that holds true not
really in the drug kind of treaty setting, but also in other multi lateral regimes where
of in play there that really does explain what the U.S. was up to.
the United States has pretty powerful interests in securing compliance. I think most
people would agree, we do not want Vladimir Putin in the business of claiming unilateral
flexibility with nuclear weapons or something, even though again, that’s sort of a -- that’s an example
I use just to illustrate the point. I don't mean to be alarmist by it. But that is the U.S. view and my appraisal of it,
in so many words. I want to stop there because I don't want to take up too much time. I’ll pass it on to Martin.
The plan violates drug treaties creates a precedent for a pick and choose
approach to international law which spills over across all treaty areas
Hasse 13
[10/14/13, Heather Hasse is a New York consultant for International Drug Policy Consortium
and the Harm Reduction Coalition, “The 2016 Drugs UNGASS: What does it mean for drug
reform?”
http://drogasenmovimiento.files.wordpress.com/2014/01/13-10-14-the-2016-drugsungass-e28093what-does-it-mean-for-drug-reform_.pdf]
But why? With all of the progress made in reform around the world lately, many – especially
in the US – are asking if the UN is even relevant to domestic drug reform at this point. With
the recent marijuana laws passed in Colorado and Washington and the proposed legislation
in Uruguay – not to mention decriminalization measures enacted in Portugal and a growing
number of other countries – reform seems inevitable. At some point, the argument goes,
the UN system will simply be overtaken by “real world” reform on the ground. Why
even bother with advocacy at the UN? This is not an easy question to answer; however, I
truly believe that to be effective, reform efforts must be made at every level – locally,
nationally, and globally. It may be true that reform efforts in the US and around the world
have made significant progress in the last 10 years. But there is still a long way to go –
marijuana is still not completely legal anywhere in the world (despite state laws to the
contrary, marijuana still remains illegal under federal law throughout the US), and many
human rights abuses continue to be carried out against drug users throughout the
world in the name of drug control. Meanwhile, the international drug control treaties – the
1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs and its progeny – remain in place and, in fact,
enjoy nearly universal adherence by 184 member states. That so many countries
comply – at least technically, if not in “spirit” – with the international drug treaty system,
shows just how highly the international community regards the system. As well it
should – the UN system is invaluable and even vital in many areas, including climate
change, HIV/AIDS reduction, and, most recently, the Syrian chemical weapons crisis (and
don’t forget that the international drug treaty system also governs the flow of licit
medication). While it is not unheard of for a country to disregard a treaty, a system in which
countries pick and choose which treaty provisions suit them and ignore the rest is, shall we
say, less than ideal. But beyond the idea of simple respect for international law, there are
practical aspects of reform to consider. The drug problem is a global one, involving not only
consuming countries but producing and transit countries as well. Without global
cooperation, any changes will at best be limited (marijuana reform in Washington and
Colorado hardly affects the issue of human rights abuses in Singapore or the limitations on
harm reduction measures in Russia). At worst, reform efforts enacted ad hoc around the
world could be contradictory and incompatible - as might be the result if, for example,
Colombia and the US opted for a regulated market without the cooperation of Costa Rica or
Honduras, both transit countries. Finally, no matter what you think about the treaties
and the UN drug control system, or how significant you believe them to be in the
grand scheme of things, they are here for the time being, and are necessary to any
discussion about drug reform.
Marijuana is a stress test for the broader treaty regime—the plan’s
unilateral legalization ahead of any treaty reforms destroys I-Law which is
key to prevent a host of existential risks—ISIS, Ukraine, warming and
terrorism
Bennett and Walsh 14
[10/15/14, Wells Bennett & John Walsh are scholars at the Brookings Institute, Marijuana
Legalization is an Opportunity to Modernize International Drug Treaties,
http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/research/files/reports/2014/10/15%20marijuana%20le
galization%20modernize%20drug%20treaties%20bennett%20walsh/cepmmjlegalizationv4.
pdf]
In making the case for the United States to proactively open the door to future change in
the drug treaties, we have emphasized, so far, the negative value of avoiding conflict and
instability. We would be remiss not to end on an equally important positive note. The
political changes and incentives in play in the marijuana-policy debate open a real
opportunity to demonstrate and improve the adaptability of the international legal
system—a system on which the United States relies more and more. No treaty can survive
the collapse of a political consensus supporting it. And no treaty system can endure if it
cannot cope with changing political conditions. Sustainability in international law depends
not only on commitment but also on resilience and adaptability. At this writing, one or
two more U.S. states may be about to adopt a version of marijuana legalization. If states
continue to legalize, and if the federal government continues to allow their reforms to
proceed, the short run for treaty reform may come quite soon. This is why we refer to
the challenge of marijuana legalization as a “stress test” for the adaptability of
international law. Should legalization prove politically popular or socially successful, it will
spread to more states and nations; should it spread, then one way or another both domestic
and international politics will find ways to accommodate it—either by adapting formal legal
commitments or by cutting new, informal channels around those commitments. The
latter would weaken international law; the former would strengthen it. Marijuanarelated reform to the drug treaties offers, in several respects, good odds of achieving
constructive adaptation. Reform need not entail any wholesale reconsideration of
international drug policy, nor need any brand new treaty be negotiated. Modest
incrementalism can do the job. In the United States, moreover, a growing political
constituency, embracing members of both political parties, favors reform, so the issue is
less partisan than many. Persuading the Senate to make more room for U.S.
experimentation by revising an existing treaty is a lighter lift than persuading it to
undertake entirely new treaty obligations. And, if the United States plays its cards right
(with, as we have suggested, suitably narrow and hedged legal changes), we believe a
consensus abroad for modest change could become within reach. In any case, broaching the
subject relatively early on—by ruling treaty change in, now, as a possibility, instead of
ruling it out as a non-starter—may itself open the door to a new international conversation
about modernizing and adapting drug treaties. In other words, marijuana offers as good
a chance as we are likely to see of setting a precedent for creative, consensual,
and gradual adaptation of a well-established international treaty structure. The
international legal system, however suspicious of it many Americans may be, has always
mattered and has never mattered more than now. For example, the campaign against ISIS
and the Ukraine crisis underscore all too dramatically the continuing importance of
multilateral security commitments. If anything, international law’s remit is growing as
environmental, social, economic, and security problems transcend national
borders. From global warming to sanctions on Iran and Russia to the campaign against
terrorism and military intervention in a host of theaters, the United States and its allies
increasingly rely on international agreements and commitments to legitimize and
amplify joint action against common threats. Of course, marijuana and the
international narcotics treaties are only one small piece of that puzzle. But they are a
highly visible piece, and they offer a real opportunity to demonstrate adaptation
through international legal channels, rather than around them. Laying groundwork
for manageably incremental changes—by beginning conversations with treaty partners and
other constituencies about where flexibility might lie—would reaffirm American
commitment to constructive adaptation, and to building consensus. Conversely,
pushing the outer boundaries of the drug treaties’ flexibility could weaken the
international order and damage American interests. To put the point another way:
Marijuana policy reform is a stress test that the United States and the
international order should, and realistically can, pass.
Effective international law facilitates global coordination over public
goods---solves multiple existential threats
Gregory Shaffer 12, Melvin C. Steen Professor of Law, and Affiliated Professor in the
Department of Political Science, University of Minnesota, “International Law and Global
Public Goods in a Legal Pluralist World,” Eur J Int Law (2012) 23 (3): 669-693,
http://ejil.oxfordjournals.org/content/23/3/669.full
Power fragments and states holding nuclear weapons
destabilize, risking nuclear proliferation and
terrorist use. Climate change intensifies
while states
dither
Fisheries
deplete, deserts expand, and aquifers diminish
¶ Increased
transnational interdependence recasts domestic issues into global ones
We face imminent financial collapse with scant collective will to address it.
eventual
that are the main contributors
and politicians with veto power trivialize repeated scientific findings as ‘the greatest hoax ever perpetrated’.1
. International law scholarship, in the meantime, takes a turn towards celebrating pluralism without
sufficiently accounting for institutional variation to address different contexts. Those writing on global public goods challenges, at the same time, tend to come from disciplines other than law.2
. To give one mundane example, until 1997,
corporate insolvency law in Indonesia was considered a purely local matter. But with the onset of the Asian financial crisis, the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, and Asian Development Bank rethought domestic corporate
examples include
public health, and civil conflict
insolvency law as a global issue in light of the risks of financial contagion, threatening a global public good, financial stability.3 Other
the impact on state sovereign debt crises), pest control,
domestic banking regulation, tax avoidance (given
. In response, states create new international institutions and existing international
institutions expand their mandates. The UN Security Council has expanded its mandate for overseeing international peace and security to authorize ‘humanitarian intervention’, and the World Health Organization has done so to
address public health in response to the SARS epidemic and similar threats.4 States and state institutions sometimes create international club-like institutions with limited membership, such as the Financial Action Task Force and
the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, with the express aim of affecting behaviour in non-members, such as over money laundering and bank capital requirements.5 ¶ So what is international law’s role in the production of
global public goods? Where are greater international legal constraints and international institutions needed, and where should international law retain slack? International law both is required to produce global public goods and can
potentially impede dynamic processes that are needed to address global public goods challenges. This article provides a framework for addressing these issues in light of variation in the properties of global public goods (section 3),
their distributive implications (section 4), and alternative institutional choices for confronting them, as reflected in different theoretical visions for global governance advanced within international law scholarship (section 5). But first
we address the rise of the legal pluralist vision (section 1) and the tensions between it and the concept of global public goods (section 2).¶ 1 The Rise of the Legal Pluralist Vision¶ Legal pluralism seems a bit of a fad in
international law scholarship today, just as dialectical federalism may be a bit of a fad in the United States, and constitut ional pluralism in the European Union.6 Legal pluralism is a construct, a way of understanding and envisaging
the world, both positively (the way the world is) and normatively (the way it should be). The challenge with the legal pluralist construct is how it takes account of the global public goods challenges confronting us. ¶ What has led to
the rise of this academic construct, its proliferation, its catching on, its enticement of our imaginations? In part, the concept resonates with our experience of multiple overlapping orders in tension with each other, with no clear
centre. In part, the concept provides a normative vision of restructuring plural orders into pluralist ones – that is, re-envisaging them from fragmented, closed, sovereign legal orders into an open, interacting, interlinked,
interdependent, multi-level structure of legal ordering. In part, it particularly resonates with those writing in Europe, reflecting the European experience with supranational law. The European experience, encompassing both
economic regulation and human rights protection, is viewed as an experimental model and ‘laboratory’ for the ordering of a global legal pluralism, one which provides order without centralized hierarchy, hegemony, or the
abandonment of public law principles to transnational market forces.7 ¶ Yet the turn to a pluralist vision also has something to do with our disenchantments, our disenchantment with international law, the limits of the European
experiment where a constitutional order exists but has been formally rejected by its citizens, and the failure of progressive politics in the US at the national level, spurring a strategic retreat out of political necessity to bottom up
progressive initiatives from small municipal activist havens like Berkeley, California, and Madison, Wisconsin. There are good reasons for such disenchantment within the US, with the populist lure of the Tea Party’s destructive
rhetoric of any sense of collective purpose, its members cheering at Republican debates at the prospect of Americans dying because they do not have health insurance. There are good reasons for this disenchantment in Europe with
little sense of solidarity in facing a crisis threatening the Euro, the Union itself, and the world, with the biggest sovereign defaults in history, ones that would dwarf earlier defaults in South America and Asia. It is a crisis which – to
play with Hobbes’ famous phrase – could be nasty and brutish, but not short. And there are good reasons for such disenchantment globally, with the cynicism of the Bush administration’s despising of international law in invading
Iraq, its trivializing of torture, and its ordering the freeze of individual assets through Security Council resolutions with no concern for due process. International law failed to constrain power when power chose to belittle and ignore
it, and it served to legitimize power when power deigned to deploy it. ¶ The concept of pluralism certainly captures much going on in the world better than its occasional foil, the concept of constitutionalism.8 There is rarely any
central hierarchy in international law. And even where there is a glimpse of a shadow of hierarchy, such as decisions by the UN Security Council or of the WTO Appellate Body, there always follows the challenge of implementation.
International law depends on national systems and private actors to implement its dictates, and it has little authority to ensure that they do so. ¶ We have a fragmented plurality of legal orders spatially in at least three senses.9
First, as international functional organizations proliferate, we have a plurality at the international level – constituting a horizontal plurality. Different semi-autonomous international institutions address common issue areas in
different ways. At times actors may strategically create overlap among international institutions to reorient international legal norms when they are unable to trigger such change within an existing institution. The tensions between
the rules of the WTO and the Convention on Biodiversity and its Biosafety Protocol are a salient example.10 Institutions with overlapping mandates may also compete for leadership on a legal issue, as the World Bank, International
Monetary Fund, and Asian Development Bank did during the Asian financial crisis.11 ¶ Secondly, we have a plurality of legal orders between levels of governance – constituting a vertical plurality. Since considerable power remains
at the nation state level, whether for producing detailed law, implementing it, or enforcing it, international law must inter act with national law to be effective. In practice, domestic law and institutions will always remain critical parts
of a recursive process of resistance, adoption, and adaptation of international legal norms, which in turn can reshape those international norms.¶ Thirdly, in an economically interdependent world, private actors develop non-public
legal orders at the state and international levels. They are sometimes encouraged by public actors that may later codify these private legal norms, or enforce them judicially, or collaborate through forming ‘public–private
partnerships’. We thus also have a plurality of public and private legal orders.12 ¶ The concept of legal pluralism does not signify disorder – per the international relations trope of anarchy. Legal pluralism, with its account of
interacting legal orders, takes the idea of international law seriously. Otherwise, there is nothing with which national legal systems can interact, except with each other or with private legal ordering. The normative vision of legal
pluralism rather aims to foster transnational and global legal order out of the plural; it aims to structure out of the many one, but with the one constituted by the interactions of the many.13¶ 2 Legal Pluralism and the Challenge of
Global Public Goods¶ Despite the appeal of the legal pluralist vision, one realizes in reading thought-provoking authors on legal pluralism, such as Mireille Delmas-Marty and Nico Krisch, that though they compellingly support their
arguments with examples and case studies, their case studies do not focus on the challenges of global public goods. They do not, one might conjecture, because there is a tension between the operation of legal pluralism and the
production of global public goods where processes of pluralist interaction will provide too little too late. ¶ What do we mean by a global public good? In economic theory, a public good, in contrast to a private good, is one that is
non-excludable (no one can be excluded from the good’s consumption) and non-rivalrous (the good’s consumption does not reduce its availability to others).14 Clean air, for example, is a public good because it is not depleted by
our breathing it, and it cannot be appropriated by a few. The term ‘good’ refers to a product, and not a normative attribute. A public good thus can be positive (such as knowledge), or negative, a good that we wish to curtail so that
our aim is to produce its absence (such as terrorism).¶ Those promoting international cooperation often broaden the definition of a public good classically used in economic theory, which was statist in its initial focus, to encompass
a larger number of issues for global action. On the one hand, the two-fold ‘publicness’ of a good in practice often lies along a continuum, so that goods may combine public and private attributes, complicating the assessment of how
to generate them.15 On the other hand, one reason policy-makers arguably have developed a broader definition of global public goods is to enhance the scope for global governance projects and thus legitimize their pursuit.16 The
concept of global public goods, for example, was originated under a project sponsored by the UN Development Programme which seeks funding for projects. Inge Kaul and her collaborators, leading that project, use a relaxed
definition of public good as ‘goods with benefits that extend to all countries, people, and generations’,17 while noting that the concept of public good is a social construction.18 Such expanded definitions, however, risk making the
concept of global public goods so malleable that it becomes abused, leading to scepticism and cynicism regarding its relevance.19 As we will see in section 3, we rather need to differentiate among different types of public goods in
order meaningfully to address the role of international law and organizations in their production. ¶ The major challenge for the production of many (but not all) global public goods, as well as those public goods that are
transnational (but not global) in scope,20 and thus the challenge of celebrating legal pluralism, is collective action and free riding. Nation states and other actors will not invest in global public goods if their independent action will
have no impact, or if they can free ride on the investment of others. To produce global public goods often requires a sense of collective purpose based on mutual interests and understandings. To arrive at that collective purpose, we
need (for economists) an alignment of incentives, and (for sociologists) socialization processes that lead to a common identity (such as national citizens). We are then more likely to cooperate and create institutions that invest in
producing public goods. The creation of nation states with general taxing powers and a monopoly of the legitimate use of force facilitated the production of national public goods. The development of the theory of public goods
correspondingly has been statist on account of the existence of centralized decision-making in nation states which produce them.21¶ The most salient challenge internationally is that we lack legitimate, centralized institutions with
general taxing and regulatory powers. We thus have traditionally depended on cooperation between nation states involving decentralized forms of implementation and enforcement to advance collective goals. International law
facilitates this cooperation through creating international institutions and common norms and rules, thereby reducing transaction, monitoring, and enforcement costs and building shared understandings.22 States created the UN
and its Security Council to help to ensure the global public good of international peace and security. They created the World Health Organization to protect public health from the spread of infectious diseases, the UN Framework
Convention on Climate Change to address climate stabilization, the World Trade Organization to address trade liberalization and help to manage inter-state trade conflicts so that they do not escalate into 1930s beggar-thyneighbour policies, the Financial Action Task Force to address money laundering of illicit funds, and the International Monetary Fund to stabilize currency and sovereign debt crises. The concerns addressed by these institutions can
be viewed in global public goods terms. Yet none of these institutions has a general taxing power to address them. All of them depend on negotiations between states over the amount of ‘contributions’.¶ 3 The Need to Differentiate
between Global Public Goods¶ In order to assess the place and role of international law and institutions to promote and govern the production of global public goods, we need to differentiate among the range of public goods
challenges faced, as opposed to speaking of global public goods and international law in the abstract. Global public goods come in different varieties, calling for different institutional responses, sometimes involving greater
centralization through international law and institutions, and sometimes not. There is no one size fits all, no one optimal institutional structure. For the production of many global public goods, legal pluralism, in which different legal
orders interact with each other, works fine. There may be little need for international law, at least in its hard (mandatory) law variety, much less centralized international institutions. ¶ Since global public goods do not come in one
variety, international law plays a variable role in their production. As Scott Barrett conceptualizes in his book Why Cooperate?: The Incentive to Supply Global Public Goods,23 some global public goods raise collective action
problems and others do not. Barrett, following other economists, classifies global public goods into three varieties: single best efforts goods, weakest links goods, and aggregate efforts goods.24 An example of a single best efforts
public good, on the cover of his book, is the crashing of a giant asteroid into the earth. All countries are affected by this prospect. Scientists do not know when one will hit and what size it will be, but they find that small ones hit the
earth about once a month, and estimate that potentially catastrophic ones that could devastate an area the size of Manhattan every 250 years, and one that could cause the extinction of most life forms every 65 million years.25
For this global public good, the US has the incentive to finance research and implement technology to detect and deter such happenings. No international treaty is required for it to do so. Other countries may free ride on the US’s
research, or may engage in complementary research, but that will not deter the US from investing. ¶ Similarly, countries, companies, and even individual researchers have incentives to invest in basic science on their own which can
benefit the world. Joseph Salk’s development of the polio vaccine in the US was a gift to the world, as he did not patent the polio vaccine.26 Such a good can be produced by private initiatives (such as those of pharmaceutical
companies and of the Gates Foundation), purely national ones (such as those of the National Institutes of Health), or international collaborative ones (such as the UNICEF/UNDP/World Bank/WHO Special Programme in Tropical
Diseases).27¶ Is there no required role for international law in these cases? Even in the asteroid case, Barrett notes the potential negative externalities of other countries relying on the US. The US may have the incentive to invest
in producing the global public good, but in a way that could create a new risk. If an asteroid bears toward the earth, and if the existing technology is such that the asteroid could only be slightly deflected so that it would crash into a
different part of the earth, who should make the decision regarding its deflection? Even if it were to be deflected into the ocean, the location of its impact would raise differential risks for countries of a tsunami.28 ¶ Similarly,
geoengineering increasingly looks like an important policy option for climate stabilization
, given
the world’s inability to reduce carbon emissions. It thus can be viewed as a global public good, at least to avoid abrupt and catastrophic climate change.29 Since engineering the climate may be relatively cheap, it could be a single
Yet
geoengineering may benefit some countries and harm others.
Climate engineering constitutes a huge experiment that poses unforeseeable, differential
risks
If different
countries engage in climate engineering, their plural efforts will interact, potentially
undercutting each other. Coordination over climate change thus raises governance
challenges
there is a role for international law and
international institutions in coordinating decisions
¶
Eliminating infectious diseases and curtailing
w
m d
are weakest link
public goods
best efforts global public good.
like climate change itself,
for countries in light of uncertainties. A wealthy country may decide to invest in geoengineering to assist its own climate situation, but in the process have negative externalities on others.
. Who should decide whether and how the climate should be engineered? Once again,
even though only one or a few wealthy countries invest in geoengineering on their own.
the proliferation of
eapons of
ass
estruction
. A wealthy country can invest in preventing an infectious disease within its borders through financing the vaccination of its population each year. The US does so, for example, with polio vaccines. Yet
it would be much more cost effective to eradicate polio, as the world did for smallpox in the 1970s. The benefit-cost ratio for smallpox eradication is thought to be 159:1, if all costs are included, and 483:1, if only international
funds for financing eradication efforts in developing countries are considered.30 That is a remarkable rate of return. Investing in polio eradication could provide another global public good. Yet, in order to eradicate polio, poor and
World Health Organization, an international institution created
under the auspices of the UN
leads the eradication
efforts
failed states, such as Somalia, are the weakest links.¶ The
and inheriting the mandate of an earlier institution created pursuant to the League of Nations,
. The WHO includes distinct voting rules for its regulations on infectious diseases, which facilitate collective action for collective purposes. The general rule of international law of treaties is an ‘opt in’ rule. A state is
not bound unless it consents. Under Articles 21 and 22 of the WHO constitution, however, a majority decision is binding on matters involving ‘procedures designed to prevent the international spread of disease’, unless a state opts
out. The WHO created new International Health Regulations in 2005 pursuant to these provisions, which require states to build institutional capacity toward containing communicable diseases, collaborate with each other, and
maintain clear points of contact.31 In parallel, the regulations expand the legal authority of the WHO’s Director-General to intervene in response to communicable disease outbreaks, including through a system for convening
experts and declaring a public health emergency of international concern. As has been shown experimentally and statistically, opt-out rules generate much broader participation than do opt-in rules.32 No WHO member, in fact,
Keeping weapons of mass destruction out of terrorist hands is
another weakest link global public good
opted out of the 2005 International Health Regulations.33¶
. We do not know where or when such weapons will be used, but the fallout of their use will have global repercussions, whether for
life and health, civil rights, or the global economy. Countries thus have the incentive to keep these weapons out of terrorist hands, but the result will depend on the weakest links. The weakest links today are Pakistan, Russia, and
North Korea. New weakest links may emerge, as more states invest in nuclear technology to gain advantage or parity with their rivals. States in 1968 signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which was extended
indefinitely in 1995,34 and the Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material in 1987, amended in 2005.35 In addition, the UN Security Council passed Resolution 1540 in 2004 which enjoins all states to take measures
to prevent nuclear weapons materials from being obtained by non-state actors having ‘terrorist purposes’.36 The non-proliferation regime, however, has been under some risk of unravelling, as the Bush administration created a
special regime for India and reconsidered the US’s first strike options and weapons development plans.37 ¶ The severest global public goods challenge today is what Barrett calls an aggregate efforts public good – that is, where the
global public good can only be produced through the aggregate efforts of multiple countries. The world appears to have been startlingly successful in addressing the depletion of the ozone layer, starting with a framework
convention, then turning to hard law obligations that were progressively enhanced, and then using soft law mechanisms to facilitate compliance, even when formally hard law sanctions were available.38 The Montreal Protocol on
Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer created a variety of sticks and carrots to realign incent ives, including potential trade sanctions and a Multilateral Fund for Implementation for developing countries. In contrast, the world
has been completely unsuccessful in addressing climate change mitigation, which is a much more complex and difficult issue that is more susceptible to free riding, undermining collective action. Human-induced climate change is
happening and it is not clear what, if anything, effectively will be done to reduce emissions. ¶ These different public goods entail different problem types. That of weakest link public goods involves a holdout problem, whether the
holdout is an unwilling one, such as North Korea over nuclear weapons, or an unable one, such as Somalia regarding polio erad ication. That of aggregate efforts public goods involves a free rider/collective action problem, resulting
in underinvestment in providing a solution. And that of best shot public goods involves a positive externalities problem because the investor does not fully capture the benefits. It is easier to fund best shot public goods, even if the
result is overinvestment from the perspective of global efficiency. A technological alternative to chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) for refrigerants, propellants, and solvents (a best shot problem) appears to have resolved ozone layer
depletion by facilitating the phase-out of CFCs (an aggregate efforts problem). Similarly, climate engineering (a best shot problem) has become a default solution for addressing climate change because of the difficulty of agreeing to
emissions reductions (an aggregate efforts problem).¶ There is a varying role for international law and international institutions in producing these different global public goods. For best shot global public goods, an international
institution is not needed to develop them. Private foundations could provide some of these goods, such as through prizes for the development of new drugs to combat tropical diseases. Yet where decisions over implementation can
have negative externalities, international legal obligations and institutions that constrain unilateral action can better ensure fairness and manage conflicts, and possibly produce public goods more efficiently, as in the case of
asteroid deflection and climate engineering. For aggregate efforts public goods, in comparison, there is a greater need for centralized institutions to produce them, leading to a relinquishment of some national sovereignty. The
opening quotation from Nordhaus reflects his frustration with the global collective failure to address climate change. In contrast, with weakest link public goods, the challenge sometimes lies in building state sovereignty. The
challenge for disease eradication, for example, is with ‘failed states’ that lack functional governing institutions. In other weakest-link situations involving states unwilling to cooperate, such as that of nuclear proliferation, there is
greater need for an international institution such as the UN Security Council, combined with financial transfers to secure nuclear materials. Otherwise, pressure for unilateral action will increase. ¶ In sum, international law and
organizations play varying roles in the production and governance of global public goods. Table 1 summarizes the relationship of different types of global public goods with international law and organizations in a legal pluralist
world.¶ 4 The Challenge of Distributive Conflict and the Production of Global Public Goods ¶ International law, like all law, has distributive consequences, posing particular challenges for governing the production of global public
goods. These distributive issues cannot be elided, although they often are in legal scholarship. At least three distributive issues arise in decisions over the provision of global public goods: the specific terms of cooperation for
producing a global public good; choices among producing different global public goods in a world of limited resources; and the potential of actual conflict in the pursuit of different public goods which can act at cross-purposes to
each other.¶ It is striking that many of the international legal scholars who incorporate ra tional international relations theory to explain international cooperation have drawn on the familiar Prisoner’s Dilemma (PD) situation from
game theory.40 The Prisoner’s Dilemma game, however, elides distributive issues. In the classic PD model, states are assumed to have a defined set of preferences and a common interest in reaching a cooperative outcome, and
the primary impediment to be overcome is the fear that other states will cheat on their agreements. In PD models, mechanisms for the monitoring of state behaviour and the sanctioning of states that violate the terms of the
agreement can be created to address these concerns. International law thus comes to the rescue to facilitate mutually beneficial outcomes. Since concerns over cheating, shirking, and slacking inhibit the production of global public
goods through international cooperation, the PD model may seem appropriate. ¶ However, the Prisoner’s Dilemma game ignores another important obstacle to successful cooperation, namely conflicts among states with different
interests over the distribution of the costs and benefits of cooperation.41 When states cooperate in international politics, they do not simply choose between ‘cooperation’ and ‘defection’, the binary choices available in PD games.
They rather choose among specific terms of cooperation, which raise distributive issues.42 Different states and constituencies within them can have competing preferences for different international rules and standards. States, and
especially powerful states, thus jockey to employ different forms of international law in a world of fragmented institutions in an effort to influence the development, meaning, and impact of international law.43 ¶ Secondly, different
states and private actors benefit from the production of some global public goods more than others. Since resources are limited, they face opportunity costs when they make choices regarding the production of public goods. They
must determine not only which public goods to fund, but also how much to fund each of them.44 Distributive concerns arise in choice and budgeting decisions, given states’ and private actors’ conflicting views.¶ Thirdly, the pursuit
of different public goods can conflict in a more direct sense. One public good may interfere with the pursuit of another. For example, choices over the generation of at least four public goods arise in the debate over the interaction of
public health, pharmaceutical patent protection, human rights, and trade policy: knowledge-generation, liberalized trade, public health, and the right to life and human dignity.45 Knowledge has public-good attributes since once
knowledge enters the public domain it is no longer excludable and our consumption does not diminish its availability.46 The central issue is how to generate knowledge that facilitates new inventions and understandings most
effectively and equitably. International trade law similarly has public good attributes, since all countries benefit not only from the wider variety of products made available at lower prices that trade liberalization facilitates, but also
because they benefit from rules constraining mutually harmful beggar-thy-neighbour policies.47 Public health constitutes a third implicated public good since we all benefit from the global eradication of diseases and we do not
diminish that good when we benefit from it.48 The right to life and human dignity can be viewed as yet another affected public good to the extent that it affects our moral sensibilities.49 ¶ The production of these public goods,
however, can conflict, complicating global decision-making over the terms of international law. The recognition and enforcement of patent rights under the WTO Agreement on Trade -Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights
(TRIPs Agreement) and other conventions can generate incentives for the production of knowledge and new drugs for the protection of human life. But the protection of pharmaceutical patent rights also can diminish the benefits of
liberalized trade by reducing the consumption possibilities of citizens, interfere with the provision of public health policies in containing diseases, and raise human rights concerns, as the AIDS epidemic illustrates. Moreover,
mandatory vaccination policies to protect public health raise human rights concerns, especially from a libertarian perspective, and in particular given uncertainty regarding the consequences of vaccination s.¶ In sum, choices over
global governance policies involve different values, priorities, and perspectives, considerable uncertainty, and rival public goods. As a result, although the definition of a single global public good is one that is non-rivalrous, global
public goods are collectively rivalrous because choices must be made among them, including in funding their production. Decisions over producing global public goods thus raise the question of alternative institutional choices in light
of trade-offs.¶ 5 Alternative Institutional Choices for the Production of Global Public Goods: Global Constitutional, Administrative Law, and Legal Pluralist Approaches¶ For the efficient production of pure private goods we rely on
(imperfect) preference revelation through the market. For the efficient production of pure public goods we rely on (imperfect) preference revelation through democratic voting. The conventional (although not sole) solution is thus to
rely on the state for the production of public goods.50 State decisions, in turn, are constrained by constitutionally provided checks and balances involving different state institutions, including democratically elected legislatures and
courts which exercise judicial review of legislative and executive decisions. For the production of global public goods, the institutional analogues are international organizations. Since centralizing decision-making within them raises
serious legitimacy concerns, institutional choice poses the ultimate question for the production of global public goods. ¶ Although economists and law and economic scholars tend to address the production of global public goods in
terms of substantive effectiveness, and thus start with an assumption of what is to be measured, we first need agreement over the goal. Priorities and goals are determined through institutional processes. Where choices among
institutions affect opportunities to participate, institutional analysis is needed to focus on the relative biases of participation in alternative decision-making processes that may define priorities and goals. ¶ Problems of biased
participation beset all institutional alternatives on account of informational and resource asymmetries and divergent incentives to participate because of varying per capita stakes in outcomes. A major challenge in relying on national
institutions is that they make decisions which affect outsiders who are not represented before them. In the case of many global public goods, moreover, reliance on national decision-making raises collective action problems and free
rider concerns which undercut each nation’s ability to attain its goals. International institutions can help to overcome collective action problems, as well as to reduce bias in participation in national decision-making. However, the
major challenge with international institutions is their remoteness from affected constituencies and local contexts, raising legitimacy concerns when decision-making has distributive implications.¶ A key issue from a public policy
perspective is thus the assessment of the relative merits of institutional processes, and different combinations of them, in terms of the relatively unbiased participation of affected parties compared with other (non-idealized)
institutional alternatives.51 That is, who decides regarding the production of global public goods? Or, put differently, which institutional process, among alternative political, market, and judicial processes at the national, local,
regional, and international levels, should be granted how much authority to decide on the appropriate balancing of different goals in light of their distributive implications? These institutional choices affect how different interests,
directly and indirectly, are taken into account. Such an approach is decidedly pragmatist. It recognizes that there is no single best approach to producing global public goods, but rather alternative approaches that involve trade-offs
which vary in light of particular global public goods problems, and from which we can learn through practice. ¶ In current international law scholarship, three analytic frameworks compete for addressing the challenges of global
governance, and thus implicitly of the production of global public goods: constitutionalism, global administrative law, and legal pluralism. These frameworks are sometimes put forward as alternatives that better address global
governance challenges; yet, for our purposes, they are better viewed as complements that apply differentially to the types of global public goods we have discussed. These frameworks each have attributes and deficiencies that
make them more suitable frameworks for some issues compared to others. ¶ A The Global Constitutional Approach¶ Global constitutionalism is one of legal pluralism’s chief rivals as a contemporary vision for organizing,
constraining, and legitimizing international law.52 The constitutional vision of international law comes in different varieties, but, relative to the pluralist vision, one of its major attributes is its framing international law and
international institutions in constitutional terms that involves centralized international institutions,53 often involving some form of majoritarian or supra-majoritarian decision-making. The global constitutional vision is suitable, in
particular, for addressing the production of aggregate efforts global public goods. Centralized institutions operating under international law help to align national incentives and to overcome free rider problems facing the production
if climate change stabilization is to occur, centralized rules and
institutions to oversee their application will be required, as
in the case of the
protection of the ozone layer
of aggregate efforts global public goods.¶ For example,
occurred successfully
. Under the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer, amendments to emissions limits can be made by a two-thirds vote of the parties
representing at least half of the total consumption of the parties of controlled ozone-depleting substances, if there is no consensus.54 Analogous voting arrangements will need to be developed for the international regulation of
For global public goods challenges that pose imminent threats,
existing institutions
will need to be reformed
Issues such as asteroid collisions and climate change
pose international security risks Centralized institutions
have
become important for coordinating the monitoring of dangerous diseases and declaring
international public health emergencies
¶
Centralized institutions
can
help to keep national decision-makers accountable
in decision-making over
geo-engineering and asteroid deflection for national defence.¶
climate change mitigation that take account of those most implicated. ¶
UN
, and in particular the UN Security Council,
and updated. The issue of UN reform was considered in the 1990s and
2000s, but remains needed to reflect today’s global context.55
considered within a reformed Security Council where they
could even be
.
and regulations
, as we saw under the WHO’s 2005 International Health Regulation.
global public goods raises distributive concerns that centralized governance can help to address.
Finally, as we have seen, even the production of best shot
, operating under a constitutional frame of checks and balances,
. We have seen these issues raised
As globalization and technological advance increase the need for centralized
international decision-making, a constitutional frame will become of growing importance for critically scrutinizing and checking these institutions’ exercise of power. Nonetheless, although the global constitutional vision has certain
attributes regarding the governance of centralized institutions needed to provide global public goods, these institutions face major legitimacy challenges. The production by national institutions of public goods is beset by trade-offs,
ranging from bureaucratic inefficiencies to political corruption. A vastly greater challenge at the global level is the lack of democratic processes that reveal preferences, reflecting the lack of a global demos.56 To the extent that we
rely on states to represent citizens’ interests, moreover, many states are not democratic.57 States vary considerably in terms of population, so that decision-making arguably should take into account differences in the size of states
(as opposed to generally relying on consensus voting at the international level). Since international institutions are so distant from citizens that it is difficult to conceive of democratic global institutions, we will need to re-conceive or
otherwise adapt our concept of democratic checks and balances to the international level,58 and rely on other forms of accountability mechanisms. Curiously, the existing literature on global constitutionalism has been largely silent
on the issue of global public goods.59¶ B The Global Legal Pluralist Approach ¶ Although the concept of global public goods poses challenges for the legal pluralist vision and its focus on decentralized processes, this approach
remains extremely relevant. Among legal pluralism’s virtues is that pluralism accounts better for divergences in community values, priorities, and perspectives in light of the distributive consequences at stake in the production of
global public goods. Enumerating and deliberating over these distributive issues highlights the need for pluralism to contest centralized policies. ¶ The legal pluralist vision calls to the forefront the importance of ongoing interaction
with state institutions in order for global-public-goods governance to be accountable and effective. From an accountability perspective, the pluralist approach provides a needed check on centralized decision-making at the global
level, such as for the production of aggregate efforts public goods. From the perspective of effectiveness, international law is more likely to be implemented if it engages and takes account of state perceptions and concerns through
pluralist interaction.¶ Legal pluralists focus on the potential pathologies of centralized institutions and the role of pluralism in checking these pathologies. Krisch shows how, in our current socio-political context, the interaction of
pluralist legal orders can produce superior ordering to a constitutionalism that is based on hierarchic, centralized decision-making, since mutual accommodation that can result from pluralist interaction will be grounded in greater
legitimacy.60 Krisch illustrates, for example, how the UN Security Council reassessed and revised its procedures regarding the freezing of individuals’ assets in the ‘war on terror’ in light of due process concerns, only after states
and other actors challenged and resisted implementation of its resolutions.61 ¶ Delmas-Marty demonstrates how pluralism can also lead to a unification of legal norms based on a ‘hybrid’ melding of different ‘ensembles’ of law,
rather than on hegemony.62 Such a pluralist hybrid is more legitimate, in that it takes into account, and borrows from, different national legal systems. Because it is more legitimate, it is more likely to be implemented in practice
by states.¶ Ultimately, international law depends on national implementation. Concerns over implementation are particularly salient regarding weakest link public goods. If an infectious disease is to be eradicated, for example, then
capacity must be built in a weakest link state. Otherwise, centralized decision-making will be ineffective. Weakest link global public goods highlight the need for pluralist interaction with states having meaningful capacity to engage
with policies, such as disease eradication. Take, for example, the distribution of antiretroviral drugs to combat the AIDS crisis. Their effective use for constraining the epidemic’s ravages are enhanced where developing countries
have the capacity to provide meaningful input to tailor policies and to carry out such tailored programmes effectively. ¶ C The Global Administrative Law Approach ¶ The global administrative law approach helps to address the
deficiencies of the global constitutional vision through providing other accountability mechanisms, derived from national administrative law, which can be used to check centralized international decision-making.63 As national
governments grew during the twentieth century in response to the growing complexity of national public goods challenges, legislatures delegated increasing powers to agencies. States correspondingly developed administrative law
accountability mechanisms to apply to agencies, given that legislatures were unable to oversee them sufficiently. International institutions can be viewed analogously to national government agencies, in that both involve a
delegation of power to an unelected body.¶ The accountability mechanisms highlighted by the global administrative law pro ject are pragmatically useful for governing the production of global public goods. They include
transparency and access to information; engagement with civil society and with national parliaments; monitoring, inspection, reporting, and notice and comment procedures; reason-giving requirements; substantive standards, such
as proportionality, that must be met; and judicial review.64 These accountability mechanisms can be developed through international treaties, such as under the Aarhus Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in
Decision-Making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters,65 and through national and international judicial decisions. Decision-making within international institutions must be overseen, in particular, through private groups
placing pressure on public representatives. Making international decision-making more transparent facilitates such processes. ¶ To give one example of the usefulness of the global administrative law framework in the context of
global public health, the WHO is increasingly engaging in public–private partnerships for innovative drug development because of the challenges of obtaining sufficient public financing.66 These partnerships raise conflicts-of-interest
concerns that a global administrative law model can help to address through transparency and other administrative law mechanisms.¶ The global administrative law model also offers the advantage of being applicable to national
decision-making over the production of global public goods, thus providing checks on decentralization under a legal pluralist model. A s we have seen, the deployment of best shot global public goods, such as technologies for
asteroid deflection and climate engineering, may not require an international institution. Yet, the externalities involved in their deployment by states calls for accountability checks. Such national decision-making can be subject to
due process requirements and to monitoring and review before international administrative bodies and courts. The WTO Shrimp–Turtle case provides an excellent example. The US exercised unilateral action to help preserve an
endangered species on the high seas (a global public good). Its efforts, however, had significant implications for developing countries and their traders. The WTO Appellate Body successfully pressed the US to change its
administrative law procedures better to assure due process review of the situations and concerns of these countries and their traders.67¶ Nonetheless, despite its many attributes, the global administrative law approach is rather
technocratic and thus lacks ambition regarding larger scale questions of governance requiring political decision-making for the production of global public goods.¶ Each of these three leading analytic frameworks for assessing law’s
role in global governance focuses in a different way on the issues of accountability and legitimacy. Their relative attributes can be assessed in relation to different global public goods. For the production of aggregate efforts public
goods where more centralization is needed, the legal pluralist vision is particularly insufficient. The global constitutional ist perspective, which legal pluralists have criticized, offers a complementary frame for building and critically
scrutinizing centralized international institutions to which important secondary rule-making powers are delegated in light of imminent global public goods challenges, such as over international security and climate change. The
global administrative law project has been particularly important in providing practical tools drawn from domestic administrative law for enhancing the accountability of decision-making in the production of global public goods,
whether at the international or at the national level. The case of best shot public goods, for example, illustrates concerns regarding decision-making at the national level. Finally, the challenges of weakest link public goods highlight
the need for ongoing interaction between centralized entities and nation states if international law and policy are to be implemented effectively. Each approach, in short, has attributes and deficiencies, involving trade-offs and
potential complementarities. They should be viewed in comparative institutional analytic terms in relation to different global public goods challenges. Table 2 summarizes our discussion.68¶ Although these analytic approaches are
sometimes advanced as alternatives, they play important complementary roles for enhancing the legitimacy of the international institutions that we need to produce different types of global public goods.¶ 6 International Law as
Facilitator of, and Potential Constraint on, the Production of Global Public Goods ¶ Law (in general) and international law (in particular) can be viewed as a public good in providing for order and stability.69 Law (in general) and
international law
can be viewed as an intermediate public good that facilitates the
production of final substantive public goods – such as the avoidance of ozone depletion,
the provision of a stable climate through mitigation and geoengineering, financial stability,
(in particular) also
and peace between nations. International law and institutions
overcome collective
action and free rider problems. They facilitate interaction that can produce shared
understandings and common purposes. And they
manage the frictions between pluralist
legal orders that govern different public goods
¶
70
help to
help to
. In this way, international law helps to provide for public order.
However, international law, in its prescriptive
and proscriptive forms, can also constrain the production of global public goods. It may do so by creating positive or negative obligations that interfere with their production. Some contend, for example, that the positive obligations
under the WTO TRIPs Agreement and other international intellectual property conventions reduce the supply of knowledge and constrain the protection of public health.71 Others contend that the negative obligations provided in
other WTO agreements could constrain needed national action on climate change, such as through carbon taxes, an emissions-trading system, or a product ‘life cycle’ labelling regime.72 To the extent that decisions under the
Convention on Biodiversity limit research on geoengineering, they too are suspect.73 ¶ Unilateral action is problematic because it can be self-serving and fail to take account of the values and perspectives of affected others. Yet
unilateral action may also be an important part of a broader transnational process leading to the production of a global public good over time. In a world of interacting legal orders, certain actors will have to act, sometimes
unilaterally, to catalyse international and global action. These actors most likely will exercise some form of power, such as market power wielded by the US and EU. To advance climate change policies globally, the US or EU may
need to take unilateral action by creating its own internal system and then imposing some form of a border tax adjustment or penalty applied to applicable imports and cross-border services from countries that do not have a
remediation system of comparable effectiveness.74 In a world without centralization and hierarchy, there will often be a need for unilateral action to spur the production of global public goods by inciting reactions and interactions
which lead to the emergence of international law and international institutions to govern conflicts and maintain order. In practice, unilateralism may help to produce a global public good where common action fails, especially in light
of opt-in rules under international treaties. Although international law can help to produce global public goods, it also can get in the way of their production.¶ The possibility of unilateral action is not available to all, and the results
often reflect biases. For example, John Yoo has written of global security as a public good which is not provided by global institutions in order to justify US intervention in Iraq and other unilateral policies.75 The example of Iraq
makes clear the need for some form of international constraint on unilateral action so that a nation must justify its acts and take into account their impact on others. The WTO provides such a possibility in the area of regulation. It
creates constraints and has a mandatory dispute settlement system to hear legal complaints, backed by sanctions. Its dispute settlement system can press a country to negotiate in good faith with third countries and create internal
administrative law mechanisms in which non-citizens’ interests are heard. These constraints are less binding in other areas, such as international security, as represented by the US invasion of Iraq, NATO’s intervention in Kosovo,
and US missile and drone attacks in the territories of other states. ¶ In sum, international law represents an important ‘constraint on the unilateral definition of a global public good’.76 The stringency of this constraint, however,
should vary in light of the objective at stake, the effectiveness of a multilateral alternative, and the possibility that the national measure can take better account of its implications on outsiders in an unbiased manner. There are thus
compelling reasons to refocus attention from public international law to processes of transnational legal ordering in which international law is one element in a broader interactive process.¶ 7 Conclusion¶
Globalization pressures transform issues that formerly were national in scope into global
ones. With globalization, national decision-making increasingly has externalities on
outsiders, and it is increasingly insufficient to attain national goals. International law and
institutions thus rise in importance
. Choices over the terms of international law, however, have distributive consequences, and the choice among global public goods and their
funding involves rivalry. As a result, the key normative question becomes a comparative institutional one: that is, under what conditions are more or less centralization and hierarchy preferable? While the choice among alternatives
may be complicated at the national level, the choice becomes much more so at the international level where problems of numbers and complexity multiply.¶ The global public goods framework helps us to see both the attributes
and limits of a legal pluralist approach toward international law and institutions. Legal pluralism’s starting assumption is about the need for communities to have a voice in shaping their own destinies. It thus distrusts order imposed
by hierarchical, centralized institutional authority. The starting assumption for the production of many global public goods, in contrast, is the need for collective action to cooperate for common benefits. These starting points create
a tension. There are risks of too much comfort with the legal pluralist framework as an organizing concept for the production of global public goods. But there are parallel risks with legitimizing centralized international decisionmaking without global democratic checks. Comparative institutional analysis is thus required which is tailored to the particular challenges raised by the production of different global public goods.
International law will play a critical role by facilitating the creation, maintenance,
oversight, and constraint of centralized international institutions, and the monitoring and
review of national institutions, in relation to decision-making implicating the production of
global public goods
in different contexts. Given the varying contexts of different global public goods, there is no single best, universalist approach. Rather, a pragmatic approach is required in relation to
different types of public goods and real world institutional limits. These strategies must include greater international centralization (for which constitutional principles are needed), multi-level institutional interaction (highlighting the
key role of pluralism), and hybrids that include public–private partnerships (for which administrative law principles are required).
1NC Cartels
Mexico is stable now
Bates 14 (Theunis, "A Mexican drug cartel's rise to dominance," The Week, January 25,
theweek.com/article/index/255503/a-mexican-drug-cartels-rise-to-dominance)
The Mexican crime syndicate is the world's most powerful drug trafficking organization, and
the biggest supplier of illegal narcotics in the U.S. About half of the estimated $65 billion worth of cocaine,
heroin, and other illegal drugs that American users buy each year enters the U.S. via Mexico. Sinaloa — which is named after its
home state in western Mexico — controls more than half of that cross-border trade, from which
it earns at least $3 billion a year. U.S. law--enforcement officials say the group has a
presence in all major American cities, and a near monopoly on the wholesale distribution of heroin and cocaine in
Chicago. The city's Crime Commission has branded Sinaloa's elusive leader, Joaquín Guzmán, also known as El Chapo (or Shorty),
Public Enemy No. 1 — a title last held by Al Capone.
"What Al Capone was to beer and whiskey," said
commission member Arthur Bilek, " Guzmán is to narcotics."¶ How did the cartel get started?¶ Mexican smugglers
have long trafficked homegrown heroin and marijuana to the U.S. But in the 1980s, Mexico also became the primary route for
Colombian cocaine bound for the U.S. At the time, U.S. law enforcement was cracking down on the Colombian drug producers'
attempts to ship the lucrative drug into Florida by boats and planes. So the Colombians hired Mexico's Guadalajara cartel to
smuggle drugs across the border, and paid them in cocaine, which allowed the Mexicans to build their own drug networks in the
U.S. Before long, the Mexicans were the senior partners in the relationship. When Guadalajara's leader was arrested in 1989, the
group's remaining capos, including a young Guzmán, divided up its trafficking routes, creating the Sinaloa, Juárez, and Tijuana
cartels. These gangs soon became locked in a series of turf wars that have killed more than 60,000 people. But throughout the
bloodshed, El Chapo's organization has continued to grow.¶ Why has Sinaloa succeeded?¶ The 5-foot-6 Guzmán may be a grade
school dropout, but he's also "a logistical genius," said Jack Riley, the head of the Drug Enforcement Administration's Chicago
division. He's trafficked cocaine from Colombia to Mexico in small private planes, in the luggage of airline passengers, and on the
cartel's own 747s. Sinaloa has also moved cocaine on custom-built $1 million submarines. El Chapo, 56, has shown similar
ingenuity moving drugs from Mexico to the U.S. He's built scores of tunnels under the border, some of which are air-conditioned
and boast half-mile-long trolley lines. He's sent drugs through U.S. checkpoints in hidden car compartments, in cans of jalapeños,
and in the bellies of frozen shark carcasses. Once in the U.S., the drugs are ferried to warehouses in Chicago — which Guzmán has
called his "home port" — before being divided up and distributed across the nation.¶ Why Chicago?¶ It's the transportation hub of
America. The city is located within a day's drive of 70 percent of the nation's population, and is crisscrossed by major interstate
highways and railway lines. Chicago is also a huge drug market in its own right. Some 86 percent of people arrested in Cook County
in 2012 tested positive for at least one illegal narcotic — the highest percentage of any big U.S. city. With his monopoly in the city,
Guzmán doubled wholesale heroin prices, thus cutting profit margins for street dealers. That fueled greater competition for turf and
exacerbated Chicago's epidemic of gang violence. "It used to be honor among thieves," said Harold Ward, a former gang member
turned anti-violence campaigner. "Now, it's by any means necessary."¶ How violent is the cartel?¶ Sinaloa can be exceedingly
brutal — it left 14 severed heads in iceboxes outside a mayor's office in the northern Mexican city of Nuevo Laredo in 2012. But
compared with other cartel leaders, El Chapo is a practical businessman who prefers "bribe over bullet." He invests millions in
corrupting police and government officials in Mexico rather than intimidating them with violence. "There is a level-headedness
about [Sinaloa's] leadership that the other groups lack," said Malcolm Beith, author of a book on Guzmán titled The Last Narco.
A
2010 National Public Radio investigation of Mexican arrest records noted that Sinaloa had
suffered notably fewer arrests than other cartels. U.S. court documents also show that top Sinaloa
officials regularly met with DEA agents between 2006 and 2012 and fed them intelligence
about rival cartels, helping law enforcement crush their competitors. U.S. and Mexican officials
Some observers claim that this fact has led both Mexican and U.S. authorities to go easy on Sinaloa.¶ Is that allegation true?¶
have denied showing any favoritism toward Sinaloa, and the DEA has arrested several high-ranking cartel members in recent years,
including Jesús Vicente Zambada Niebla, the son of the organization's No. 2 leader, Ismael Zambada. In a rare 2010 interview,
the senior Zambada said that such arrests had no effect on the cartel , and that its drugs
would keep flowing north even if El Chapo were brought down . "When it comes to the capos, jailed, dead,
or extradited," he said, "their replacements are ready."
Legalization causes cartels to compete over new revenue streams
Vanda Felbab-Brown, a senior fellow with the Center for 21st Century Security and
Intelligence in the Foreign Policy program at Brookings. She is an expert on international
and internal conflicts and nontraditional security threats, including insurgency, organized
crime, urban violence and illicit economies, “Law Enforcement Actions in Urban Spaces
Governed by Violent Non-State Entities: Lessons from Latin America,” September ‘11
Often, criminal groups function as security providers (suboptimal as they are), regulating
and punishing theft, robberies, extortions, rapes and murders and dispensing their rules and
punishments for transgressions. The removal of the criminal gangs often results in a rise of
street crime that can become a critical nuisance to the community and discredit the
presence of the State and its law enforcement. That has in fact been the case in both
Medellín in the post-Don Berna order as well as in the pacified favelas of Rio.14 Especially in
areas where police have been trained as light counterinsurgency forces (in Latin America,
unlike South Asia, this is more often a problem in rural areas rather than in urban spaces)
they may be undertrained, under-resourced, and not focused on addressing street crime.
Even community-policing forces may have little capacity to undertake criminal
investigations that lead to meaningful prosecution, yet police units specialized in criminal
investigations may continue to be too far away and have limited access to a pacified urban
space to conduct investigations that reduce street crime. Providing training to community
police forces for tackling at least some street crime and streamlining and facilitating the
presence of specialized criminal investigation units, such as homicide squads and
prosecutors, are of critical importance for improving public safety for the community and for
anchoring State presence in the pacified areas. Under some circumstances, law enforcement
actions against the governing criminal entity may give rise to intense turf warfare among
other criminal groups over the spoils of the criminal market. After Don Berna was extradited
to the United States, for example, many criminal gangs in and around Medellín, including
two large ones led by Sebastian and Valenciano, began fighting each other over smuggling
routes, local drug distribution, prostitution enterprises, and protection rackets. The turf war
triggered extensive violence, including homicide rates in over 100per 100,000 in the late
2000s and on par with those before the FARC was defeated in the city, and Don Berna
established his “narco-peace”.15 Similarly in Mexico, law enforcement actions against
established DTOs triggered intense violence among splinter groups and new gangs, such
as in the Mexican state of Michoacán where interdiction operations against La Familia
Michoacana have given rise to Los Templarios. That criminal gang has since been battling
with Los Zetas, another of Mexican DTOs originating as splinter group, over control of
criminal markets in the state. Such turf wars can compromise the physical and
economic security of local communities far more than even the previous criminal
order. In some circumstances, an urban area to which State presence has been extended
may even suffer a peace deficit. Along with or instead of the hoped-for peace dividend of
legal businesses moving into the urban space and providing legal jobs and income, the new
areas may be attractive as a source of new land to be taken over by nefarious land
developers. Such demands for land in the newly “pacified” urban areas may generate new
forced land displacement, instead of benevolent gentrification. In rural spaces, the cause
of such new illegal displacement may be the presence of profitable resources, such as gold,
coal, and others, or the agricultural potential of the land, such as for African oil palm
plantations. In urban spaces, housing development and real estate speculation may well
drive such illegal displacement. Competition over State resources inserted to “pacified”
areas, such as for socio-economic development, may generate new temptations of illegal
behavior. Militias or new criminal groups seeking to set up new protection rackets and usurp
the inserted State resources may well emerge. Many urban spaces in Colombia suffer from
such old-new criminality today, as they have historically. Local community forces, even
while effective at keeping the old criminals out, may not have the capacity to prevent such
nefarious activities cloaked as legal development. At the same time, criminal units
specializing in white-collar organized crime and asset expropriation are often located in the
city center of a State capital far away from the “pacified” slums and may be paying little
attention to such phenomena in the newly-liberated spaces. Moreover, since such land
takeover and asset expropriation may well be linked to legal and politically-powerful
developers, municipal authorities may lack the motivation to pay close attention to such
criminal developments in the “pacified” urban areas. Yet without diligent and concerted law
enforcement actions against such new crime, the benefits of the complex and costly State
interventions in the marginalized urban areas may be altogether lost. Instead of
addressing the causes of illegal economies and violent organized crime by strengthening
effective and accountable State presence, the State intervention may ultimately only alter
the manifestation of illegality and displace existing problems to other areas. Not
only criminality and criminal gangs, but also the marginalized residents of the urban
shantytowns themselves may merely be forced out to other slums.
Legalizing causes a net increase in cartel violence – shift to other revenue streams
that affect more citizens
Corcoran 13 (Patrick, MA Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, "Mexico's shifting
criminal landscape: changes in gang operation and structure during the past century," InSightCrime.org
http://download.springer.com/static/pdf/700/art%253A10.1007%252Fs12117-013-91908.pdf?auth66=1407004616_6fa114f7864b91ac4d7579906bea212c&ext=.pdf 3/1/13)
The changing nature of Mexico’s trafficking industry offers policy-makers a handful of suggestions and cautionary
notes. One is that the security challenge is no longer limited to the drug trade. As noted above, many of the
newer gangs increasingly rely on revenues from alternative activities rather than
the drug trade. The most notable of these are extortion and kidnapping. These crimes
are qualitatively different from the rest because, by design, they prey on successful, lawabiding citizens. For all but the unluckiest Mexicans, avoiding the ill effects of the
drug trade is simply a matter of not becoming a drug trafficker. However, running
a thriving legitimate business today makes one a target for extortion and
kidnapping, which is to say, these crimes punish the very ingredients of a prosperous
society . This indicates that two of the solutions most frequently offered—demand reduction and
legalization—would not be sufficient to address Mexico’s current problems. In the
long run, driving down the total amount of money available to criminal groups would almost
certainly reduce their threat, but such a transition would not happen overnight. The estimated 500,000
Mexicans who currently make their living off of the drug trade, many of them violent actors, would seek to replace
the income. 139 Because the most logical substitutes for drug trafficking are other
illicit activities— such as extortion, kidnapping and bank-robbery—that often have a greater
impact on civilians, suddenly reducing demand or legalizing drugs may even have
a short-term perverse effect of increasing the chaos .
Legalization is the only scenario for violence to spread – the aff can only
lead to net more violence
Charles D. “Cully” Stimson 10 is a Senior Legal Fellow in the Center for Legal & Judicial Studies at The Heritage Foundation.
Before joining The Heritage Foundation, he served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense; as a local, state, federal, and military
prosecutor; and as a defense attorney and law professor. “Legalizing Marijuana: Why Citizens Should Just Say No” Legal
Memorandum #56 on Legal Issues September 13, 2010. http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2010/09/legalizing-marijuanawhy-citizens-should-just-say-no ac 6-18
Violent, brutal, and ruthless, Mexican DTOs will work to maintain their black-market profits at the expense of
American citizens’ safety. Every week, there are news articles cataloguing the murders, kidnappings, robberies, and other thuggish
brutality employed by Mexican drug gangs along the border .
It is nonsensical to argue that these gangs will
simply give up producing marijuana when it is legalized; indeed, their profits might soar,
depending on the actual tax in California and the economics of the interstate trade. While such
profits might not be possible if marijuana was legalized at the national level and these gangs were undercut by mass production,
that is unlikely ever to happen. Nor does anyone really believe that the gangs will subject themselves to state and local regulation,
including taxation. And since the California ballot does nothing to eliminate the black market for marijuana—quite the opposite, in
fact—legalizing
marijuana will only incentivize Mexican DTOs to grow more marijuana to
feed the demand and exploit the black market. Furthermore, should California legalize
marijuana, other entrepreneurs will inevitably attempt to enter the marketplace and game
the system. In doing so, they will compete with Mexican DTOs and other criminal
organizations. Inevitably, violence will follow, and unlike now, that violence will not be
confined to the border as large-scale growers seek to protect their turf—turf that
will necessarily include anywhere they grow, harvest, process, or sell marijuana. While this
may sound far-fetched, Californians in Alameda County are already experiencing the reality
of cartel-run marijuana farms on sometimes stolen land,[54] protected by “guys [who] are
pretty heavily armed and willing to protect their merchandise.”[55] It is not uncommon for
drugs with large illegal markets to be controlled by cartels despite attempts to roll them into
the normal medical control scheme. For instance, cocaine has a medical purpose and can be
prescribed by doctors as Erythroxylum coca, yet its true production and distribution are controlled
by drug cartels and organized crime.[56] As competition from growers and dispensaries
authorized by the RCTCA cuts further into the Mexican DTOs’ business, Californians will face
a real possibility of bloodshed on their own soil as the cartels’ profit-protection measures
turn from defensive to offensive. Thus, marijuana legalization will increase crime, drug use,
and social dislocation across the state of California—the exact opposite of what pro-legalization advocates promise.
There’s no correlation between hegemony and stability
Fettweis, PoliSci Prof @ Tulane, ’10
[Christopher J. Fettweis, Assistant Professor of Political Science at Tulane University, “Threat
and Anxiety in US Foreign Policy,” Survival, 52:2, 59-82, March 25th 2010,
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00396331003764603]
One potential explanation for the growth of global peace can be dismissed
fairly quickly: US actions do not seem to have contributed much. The limited
evidence suggests that there is little reason to believe in the stabilising
power of the US hegemon, and that there is no relation between the relative
level of American activism and international stability. During the 1990s, the
United States cut back on its defence spending fairly substantially. By 1998, the
United States was spending $100 billion less on defence in real terms than it had in 1990, a 25% reduction.29 To
internationalists, defence hawks and other believers in hegemonic stability, this
irresponsible ‘peace dividend’ endangered both national and global security.
‘No serious analyst of American military capabilities’, argued neo-conservatives William Kristol and Robert Kagan in
1996, ‘doubts that the defense budget has been cut much too far to meet America’s responsibilities to itself and to
And yet the verdict from the 1990s is fairly plain: the world grew
more peaceful while the United States cut its forces. No state seemed to
believe that its security was endangered by a less-capable US military, or at
least none took any action that would suggest such a belief. No militaries
were enhanced to address power vacuums; no security dilemmas drove
insecurity or arms races; no regional balancing occurred once the stabilising
presence of the US military was diminished. The rest of the world acted as if
the threat of international war was not a pressing concern, despite the
reduction in US military capabilities. Most of all, the United States was no less
safe. The incidence and magnitude of global conflict declined while the United
States cut its military spending under President Bill Clinton, and kept declining as
the George W. Bush administration ramped the spending back up. Complex
world peace’.30
statistical analysis is unnecessary to reach the conclusion that world peace
and US military expenditure are unrelated.
Mexico not key to heg --- energy reform now key since we have domestic
supplies
Joe Barnes 11, the Bonner Means Baker Fellow, James A. Baker III Institute for Public
Policy, Rice University, 4/29/11, “Oil and U.S.-Mexico Bilateral Relations,”
http://www.bakerinstitute.org/publications/EF-pub-BarnesBilateral-04292011.pdf
The U.S.-Mexico relationship has traditionally
ranked rather low as a U.S. policy priority . All recent incoming U.S.
presidents offer rhetorical tribute to the centrality of U.S.-Mexico ties. All find themselves
consumed by other foreign policy issues. President Obama is a case
in point. He met Mexican president Felipe Calderon before his inauguration. He visited Mexico in April 2009; Calderon visited the
United States the next month. They have continued to meet; they keep in regular contact. But there is little doubt that
the
Obama administration's foreign policy focus is
elsewhere. The ongoing economic downturn has put
cooperation with other major economies at the
very top of the Obama administration's agenda. U.S.
combat forces are engaged in Iraq and Afghanistan. The United States is conducting
military missions in Yemen and Pakistan. Washington is
leading an international effort to halt Iran from developing nuclear
weapons. The Obama administration has launched yet another round of Israeli-Palestinian talks. Popular unrest has swept much of
the Arab world, toppling dictatorships and creating huge uncertainty in the region and in the United States. And, as this paper goes
the United States has intervened in Libya's nascent civil war on behalf of
opponents of the Gaddafi regime. From Washington's perspective, U.S.Mexico relations simply lack the urgency of these
and many other issues.
to print,
No collapse
Neil Couch 12, Brigadier in the British Army, July 2012, “’Mexico in Danger of Rapid
Collapse’: Reality or Exaggeration?”
http://www.da.mod.uk/colleges/rcds/publications/seaford-house-papers/2012-seafordhouse-papers/SHP-2012-Couch.pdf/view
A ‘collapsed’ state, however, as postulated in the Pentagon JOE paper, suggests
‘a total vacuum of authority’, the state having become a ‘mere geographical expression’.16
Such an extreme hypothesis of Mexico disappearing
like those earlier European states seems
implausible for a country that currently has the
world’s 14th largest economy and higher predicted
growth than either the UK, Germany or the USA;
that has no external threat from aggressive neighbours, which was the ‘one
constant’ in the European experience according to Tilly; and does not suffer the
‘disharmony between communities’ that Rotberg says is a feature
common amongst failed states.17,18¶ A review of the literature does not reveal why the JOE paper might have
Crime and
corruption tend to be described not as causes but
as symptoms demonstrating failure. For example, a study for Defense Research and Development
suggested criminal gangs and drug cartels as direct causes leading to state collapse.
Canada attempting to build a predictive model for proximates of state failure barely mentions either.19 One of the
in failed states, ‘corruption
flourishes’ and ‘gangs and criminal syndicates
assume control of the streets’, but again as effect
rather than trigger.20 The Fund for Peace Failed States
Index, does not use either of them as a ‘headline’
indicator, though both are used as contributory factors. This absence may reflect an assessment that
numerous states suffer high levels of organised
crime and corruption and nevertheless do not fail.
Mandel describes the corruption and extreme violence of the Chinese Triads, Italian
Mafia, Japanese Yakuza and the Russian Mob that, in some cases, has continued for
centuries.21 Yet none of these countries were singled
out as potential collapsed or failed states in the
Pentagon’s paper. Indeed, thousands of Americans were
killed in gang warfare during Prohibition and many people ‘knew
principal scholars on the subject, Rotberg, says that
¶
or at least suspected that politicians, judges, lawyers, bankers and business concerns collected many millions of
dollars from frauds, bribes and various forms of extortion’.22
Organised crime and
corruption were the norm in the political, business, and judicial systems and police
forces ran their own ‘rackets’ rather than enforcing the law.23 Neither the violence
nor the corruption led to state failure.
1NC FBI
No cyber threats – exaggeration
Guo 12, IT and legal consultant with a JD from University of Miami
(Tony, "Shaping Preventive Policy in “Cyber War” and Cyber Security: A Pragmatic
Approach" Cyber Security and Information Systems Information Analysis Center, Vol 1 Num
1, October 2012, https://www.thecsiac.com/journal_article/shaping-preventive-policy“cyber-war”-and-cyber-security-pragmatic-approach#.UhP31JLvuSo)
“Cyber war” today exists only in the hypothetical, and its disastrous impacts are often
exaggerated. For instance, the Estonia incident is a commonly cited example by proponents
of “cyber war,” where a number of Estonian government websites were temporarily disabled
by angry Russian citizens. A crude distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack was used to
temporarily keep users from viewing government websites. To borrow an analogy, the
attack was akin to sending an army of robots to board a bus, filling the bus so that regular
riders could not get on. A website would fix this the same way a bus company would, by
identifying the difference between robots and humans, and preventing the robots from
getting on. A following MSNBC article dressed up the Estonia incident and asked the
question, could a cyber skirmish lead the U.S. to actual war? Imagine this scenario: Estonia,
a NATO member, is cut off from the Internet by cyber attackers who besiege the country’s
bandwidth with a devastating denial of service attack. Then, the nation’s power grid is
attacked, threatening economic disruption and even causing loss of life as emergency
services are overwhelmed . . . outside researchers determine the attack is being sponsored
by a foreign government and being directed from a military base. Desperate and outgunned
in tech resources, Estonia invokes Article 5 of the NATO Treaty -- an attack against one
member nation is an attack against all. The article claimed that “half of this fictional
scenario occurred in 2007.” In reality, a lot less than half of it occurred, most Estonian sites
immediately cut off access to international traffic soon after the increased bandwidth
consumption, and botnet IP addresses were soon filtered out. Most of the attackers could
not be traced, but one man was later arrested and fined £830 for an attack which blocked
the website of the Prime Minister’s Reform Party. “Cyber war” has been a source of
confusion due to the ubiquitous application of the terminology, inclusive of cyber crimes and
cyber espionage. Cyber warfare comes with many faulty premises, for instance, proponents
argue that it might allow terrorists to successfully attack a much larger target and do
disproportionate damage. However, the reality is that any sufficiently effective attack will
invite disproportionate retaliation. For instance, one nation may be able to make the claim
that any number of nations is harboring “cyber terrorists” and invoke the right of
preemptory self-defense. However, “cyber war” as it exists today is not kinetic warfare and
should not be confused with traditional notions of war. “Cyber war” is about how to prevent
or respond to a DDoS attack, and how to secure systems and information. Short of “reengineering the Internet,” one could simply maintain government networks and critical
infrastructure on closed-networks using proprietary software or protocols. If an organization
has all its systems on a closed circuit, the only threats left are its users. Recent data
suggests that problems of attribution may not be the major issue, but having reasonable
security is. For instance, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security recently ran a test in
2011 where staff secretly dropped USB drives and CDs in the parking lots of government
buildings and private contractors. Of those who picked up the media, an overwhelming 60%
plugged them into office computers to see what they contained. If the drive or CD had an
official logo, 90% were installed. “The test showed something computer security experts
have long known: Humans are the weak link in the fight to secure networks against
sophisticated hackers.” Moving forward, legislation and international treaties should focus on
the immediate concern regarding cyber security, not on hypothetical accounts of “war.”
Addressing security is practical--attacks are less likely to succeed on secured systems and
networks with diligent operators, especially given that the majority of breaches today are as
a result of system failures and employee negligence.
No war - no motives or capability
Zetter 13, senior reporter at Wired
(Kim, “Spy Chief Says Little Danger of Cyber ‘Pearl Harbor’ in Next Two Years” March 12,
2013, http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2013/03/no-cyber-pearl-harbor/)
Contrary to much of the fear-mongering that has been spreading through the nation’s
capital on cybersecurity matters lately, the director of national intelligence bucked that
trend on Tuesday when he told a senate committee that there was little chance of a major
cyberattack against critical infrastructure in the next two years. DNI James Clapper was a
singular voice of reason when he told the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence that lack
of skills on the part of most attackers and the ability to override attacks on critical
infrastructure with manual controls would make such attacks unfeasible in the near future.
He also said that nation states that might have the skills to pull off such an attack lack the
motive at this point. “We judge that there is a remote chance of a major cyber attack
against U.S. critical infrastructure systems during the next two years that would result in
long-term, wide-scale disruption of services, such as a regional power outage,” Clapper said
in his statement to the committee. “The level of technical expertise and operational
sophistication required for such an attack — including the ability to create physical damage
or overcome mitigation factors like manual overrides — will be out of reach for most actors
during this time frame. Advanced cyber actors — such as Russia and China — are unlikely to
launch such a devastating attack against the United States outside of a military conflict or
crisis that they believe threatens their vital interests.” Clapper’s words come in the wake of
increased rhetoric in Washington over a recent report that Chinese hackers, presumed to be
supported by that nation’s military and Communist Party apparatus, have been responsible
for unprecedented cyberespionage attacks that have resulted in millions of dollars of
intellectual property being lost. That report, published by computer security firm Mandiant,
suggested that Chinese spies were also targeting critical infrastructure systems with the
possible intention of causing sabotage.
Doesn’t solve— Missile defense ineffective now
Jeff Hecht 10, science and technology writer who has covered the laser industry for more
than 30 years and has been a contributing editor to Laser Focus World, "Is there any way to
defend against a ballistic missile?" May 29, New Scientist, Vol. 206, Issue 2762, EBSCOhost
An analysis of tests of the missile defence system favoured by the US government suggests it is
ineffective - it joins a long list of flawed technology¶ IS THERE any way to stop a ballistic missile? It's a question
raised by a report criticising the US government's missile interceptor plan for Europe.¶ Ted Postol of the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology and George Lewis of Cornell University analysed publicly released videos of
tests of the Standard Missile 3 (SM-3), which the US plans to deploy on ships in the Black Sea. The SM-3 is a
surface-to-air missile with extra power and sensors. Though its low weight gives it the flexibility to be launched at
only one or two of the 10 tests destroyed a warhead. The analysis was
published in the May issue of Arms Control Today.¶ Blocking a ballistic missile is far from easy: it's like
hitting a bullet with a bullet. Such missiles coast through space before re-entering the atmosphere up to
sea, the researchers reckon
thousands of kilometres from their launch site.¶ A missile is most vulnerable while its rocket is firing during launch,
Bush administration ploughed billions into the
Airborne Laser to target missiles during launch, but it fell short of the required range and
was abandoned last year.¶ President Barack Obama cancelled two other Bush-era interceptors.
because it is easier for sensors to target. The George W.
When the Kinetic Energy Interceptor's mission was broadened from hitting launches to warheads in space, it
became too large to use. The Multiple Kill Vehicle, designed to destroy both decoys and warheads, became too
heavy. "Cutting those programs was to some extent a no-brainer," says David Wright of the Union of Concerned
US missile defence now deployed is a network of ground-based interceptors in Alaska
and California targeting missiles mid-flight. That technology was to be expanded to a system based in
Poland, but Obama nixed the idea to focus on ship-based defence, which also aims to target missiles midScientists.¶ The only
flight. It cost less and fared better in early tests.
No chinese aggression
Desker, ’08
[Barry Desker, Former Singapore Ambassador, Dean of the S Rajaratnam
School of International Studies, “Why War is Unlikely in Asia: Facing the
Challenge from China,” June 4th 2008, IISS Jubilee Forum Tokyo]
On the other hand, the rise of China does not automatically mean that conflict is more
likely. First, the emergence of a more assertive China does not mean a more
aggressive China. Beijing appears content to press its claims peacefully (if forcefully),
through existing avenues and institutions of international relations. Second, when we look
more closely at the Chinese military buildup, we find that there may be less than some
might have us believe, and that the Chinese war machine is not quite as threatening – as
some might argue. Instead of Washington perspectives shaping Asia-Pacific affairs, the rise
of China is likely to see a new paradigm in international affairs – the “Beijing Consensus” –
founded on the leadership role of the authoritarian party state, a technocratic approach to
governance, the significance of social rights and obligations, a reassertion of the principles
of national sovereignty and non-interference, coupled with support for freer markets and
stronger regional and international institutions. The emphasis is on good governance. Japan
fits easily in this paradigm. Just as Western dominance in the past century led to Western
ideas shaping international institutions and global values, Asian leaders and Asian thinkers
will increasingly participate in and shape the global discourse, whether it is on the role of
international institutions, the rules governing international trade or the doctrines which
under-gird responses to humanitarian crises. An emerging Beijing Consensus is not
premised on the rise of the „East‟ and decline of the West‟, as sometimes seemed to be the
sub-text of the earlier Asian values debate. I do not share the triumphalism of my friends
Kishore Mahbubani and Tommy Koh. However, like the Asian values debate, this new
debate reflects alternative philosophical traditions. The issue is the appropriate balance
between the rights of the individual and those of the state. This debate will highlight the
shared identity and shared values between China and the states in the region. I do not
agree with those in the US who argue that Sino-US competition will result in “intense
security competition with considerable potential for war” in which most of China’s
neighbours “will join with the United States to contain China’s power.”1 These shared values
are likely to reduce the risk of conflict and result in regional pressure for an accommodation
with China and the adoption of policies of engagement with China, rather than confrontation
with an emerging China. China is increasingly economically inter-dependent, part of a
network of over-lapping cooperative regional institutions. In Asia, the focus is on economic
growth and facilitating China’s integration into regional and global affairs. An interesting
feature is that in China’s interactions with states in the region, China is beginning to be
interested in issues of proper governance, the development of domestic institutions and the
strengthening of regional institutional mechanisms. Chinese policy is not unchanging, even
on the issue of sovereignty. For example, there has been an evolution in Chinese thinking
on the question of freedom of passage through the Straits of Malacca and Singapore. While
China supported the claims of the littoral states to sovereign control over the Straits when
the Law of the Sea Convention was concluded in 1982, China’s increasing dependence on
imported oil shipped through the Straits has led to a shift in favour of burden-sharing, the
recognition of the rights of user states and the need for cooperation between littoral states
and user states. Engagement as part of global and regional institutions has resulted in
revisions to China’s earlier advocacy of strict non-intervention and non-interference. Recent
Chinese support for global initiatives in peace-keeping, disaster relief, counter-terrorism,
nuclear non-proliferation and anti-drug trafficking, its lack of resort to the use of its veto as
a permanent member of the UN Security Council and its active role within the World Trade
Organisation participation in global institutions can be influential in shaping perceptions of a
rising China. 3 Beijing has greatly lowered the tone and rhetoric of its strategic
competition with the United States, actions which have gone a long way toward
reassuring the countries of Southeast Asia of China’s sincerity in pursuing a nonconfrontational foreign and security strategy. Beijing’s approach is significant as most
Southeast Asian states prefer not to have to choose between alignment with the US and
alignment with China and have adopted hedging strategies in their relationships with the
two powers. Beijing now adopts a more subtle approach towards the United States: not
directly challenging US leadership in Asia, partnering with Washington where the two
countries have shared interests, and, above all, promoting multilateral security processes
that, in turn, constrain US power, influence and hegemony in the Asia-Pacific. The People’s
Liberation Army (PLA) is certainly in the midst of perhaps the most ambitious upgrading of
its combat capabilities since the early 1960s, and it is adding both quantitatively and
qualitatively to its arsenal of military equipment. Its current national defence doctrine is
centered on the ability to fight “Limited Local Wars”. PLA operations emphasize preemption,
surprise, and shock value, given that the earliest stages of conflict may be crucial to the
outcome of a war. The PLA has increasingly pursued the acquisition of weapons for
asymmetric warfare. The PLA mimics the United States in terms of the ambition and scope
of its transformational efforts – and therefore challenges the U.S. military at its own game.
Nevertheless, we should note that China, despite a “deliberate and focused course of
military modernization,” is still at least two decades behind the United States in terms of
defence capabilities and technology. There is very little evidence that the Chinese military is
engaged in an RMA-like overhaul of its organizational or institutional structures. While the
Chinese military is certainly acquiring new and better equipment, its RMA-related activities
are embryonic and equipment upgrades by themselves do not constitute an RMA. China’s
current military buildup is still more indicative of a process of evolutionary, steady-state,
and sustaining – rather than disruptive or revolutionary – innovation and change.
1NC Banking
No evidence that increased money going through Hawala funds LeT – their
ev only says that they use it too
Alt cause to laundering – online gambling
Banks 12, Senior Lecturer in Criminology, Department of Law, Criminology and
Community Justice, Sheffield Hallam University, Sheffield, UK, Dr James Banks Online
Gambling and Crime: A Sure Bet?,
http://shura.shu.ac.uk/6903/1/Banks_online_gambling.pdf
3.3 Money Laundering It has been suggested by some (Mills 2001) that the potential for criminals to
launder their ill-gotten gains through remote gambling sites is the greatest threat
posed by the virtual gambling industry.
Laundered funds can be the end product of successful criminal
enterprise, but can also be employed to
fund organised crime, terrorism , smuggling and
counterfeiting , and this has led to significant attention from law enforcement agencies and their
governments (Government Accountability Office 2002; RSeconsulting 2006). Yet whilst it is estimated that between
US$300 billion and US$500 billion are laundered annually (Magliveras 1992; Barbot 1995; Sultzer 1995), the
degree to which online gambling sites facilitate such activities is unclear. It is possible that the low limits on
gambling, coupled with the close monitoring and recording of electronic financial transactions, effectively limit the
opportunity for money laundering. Conversely,
the high speed , high volume and international
reach of online gambling operators and their clientele, alongside the anonymity
afforded by the internet and encrypted payment processes , can make it difficult to
trace payments. Moreover, gambling sites are frequently located in areas with weak
or non-existent supervisory regimes , which may make them particularly
susceptible to money laundering There are three principal ways in which gambling sites can
theoretically be used to launder money: First, illegal funds may be transferred to a source inside the gambling
organisation by gambling until all money is lost; second, illegal funds may be transferred from a casino insider to a
gambler through the use of rigged games; third, casino gambling software may be programmed to respond to a
specific password or sign-in command by removing a percentage of the money deposited and recording it as a
gambling loss. Alternatively, legitimate gambling sites may be used by money launderers who operate a legitimate
account under a false name. Individuals may ‘clean’ their illicit funds by wagering a small amount before
withdrawing the remaining money or transferring it to an offshore account. Betting exchanges have also provided
significant opportunity for the laundering of money, as all sides of an event may be bet on. Irrespective of the
As
‘traditional’ laundering requires the movement of illicit funds through financial
outcome and minus only the house ‘vigorish’, visible and declarable profits and losses can be generated.
institutions that are highly regulated, avoiding built-in detection processes is
extremely challenging for the criminal entrepreneur. Yet the instantaneous and
anonymous nature of the internet, augmented by the rapid development of both ebanking and the
online gambling industry, has revolutionised the money laundering
process and provided significant opportunity for launderers to deposit, cleanse
and withdraw money, all at the click of a button. With no traditional financial
institutions in place to alert authorities to potential criminal activity, ill gotten gains
can be easily filtered into the stream of international commerce. So whilst the
magnitude of this problem is, to date, unknown, the potential for money laundering is
significant, given the laissez-faire approach to regulation in many of the jurisdictions in
which online gambling occurs (Williams and Wood 2007).
Multiple alt causes to U.S. cred decline in their ev – street and white collar
crime
No evidence that U.S. laundering crackdown actually does anything
US-India cooperation solves LeT attacks
Iqbal, 10-2-’14 (Anwar, “US, India vow to dismantle LeT, Al Qaeda” The Dawn,
http://www.dawn.com/news/1135624)
the United States and India
vowed to work together to dismantle Al Qaeda, Lashkar-e-Taiba and their affiliates. The statement also
urged Pakistan to bring the perpetrators of the November 2008 terrorist attack in Mumbai to justice. The two
countries committed themselves to making “joint and concerted efforts to disrupt all
financial and tactical support” to “Lashkar-e-Taiba, Jaish-e-Mohammad, the D-Company, the Haqqanis” and Al Qaeda.
In a joint statement issued on the conclusion of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s four-day visit,
D-Company is a term coined by the Indian media for a criminal group controlled by an Indian crime boss, Dawood Ibrahim. Delhi claims Mr Ibrahim lives
Obama and Prime Minister Modi also expressed “deep concern
over the continued threat posed by terrorism,” and underlined the need for “continued comprehensive global
efforts to combat and defeat terrorism.” On Wednesday, the US Treasury Department slapped
sanctions on two Pakistan-based terrorist organisations — LeT and Harakat ul-Mujahidin (HuM) — and froze the assets of
their leaders. The announcement claimed that the assets were used for providing financial support to LeT, which is accused of carrying out the
in Pakistan. Islamabad denies. In their joint statement, US President Barack
Mumbai terror attacks. The Treasury notification described HuM as “a terrorist group that operates throughout India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan, and
maintains terrorist training camps in eastern Afghanistan.” According to the notification, in 2005, HuM attacks in Kashmir killed at least 15 people, and in
the Treasury
Department has designated 27 individuals and three entities associated with LeT .
2007, an unspecified number of Indian troops were also killed in a firefight with HuM militants in the area. To date,
Pakistan has cut off cooperation with LeT
Haidar, 1-5-’15 (Suhasini, “Pak. has reined in LeT: U.S.” The Hindu,
http://www.thehindu.com/news/international/south-asia/pak-has-reined-in-letus/article6754118.ece)
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry will visit Pakistan this month, shortly after certifying the Pakistan
government’s “action against” Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM). The authorisation is likely to spark outrage in
India. Mr. Kerry is due to visit the Vibrant Gujarat summit, which begins in Gandhinagar on January 11, ahead of President Barack Obama’s visit on
January 24. Mr. Kerry will lead the Strategic Dialogue in Islamabad later in January, the Pakistan Foreign Ministry announced this week. Despite the fact
that both the LeT and JeM have resurfaced visibly in the past year in Pakistan and the founders of both, Hafiz Saeed and Masood Azhar, have held public
the U.S. Secretary of State has signed off on a certification that the Pakistan
government has “prevented al-Qaeda, the Taliban and associated terror groups such as Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-eMohammad from operating in the territory of Pakistan” for the year. Civilian aid The certificate is a condition for the
rallies in Pakistan in 2014,
U.S. to disburse funds under the Kerry-Lugar Bill for civilian aid to Pakistan that was co-authored by Mr. Kerry in 2009. This year’s grant of $532 million
to Pakistan will be disbursed shortly, as the Congress gave its nod to President Obama, the U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan Richard Olson disclosed.
According to official agency APP, Mr. Olson met Pakistan’s Finance Minister Ishaq Dar to finalise the agenda for Mr. Kerry’s upcoming visit . Significantly,
the Kerry-Lugar Bill lapsed in September 2014, but only about half of the $7.5 billion outlay has been disbursed so far. According to Section 203 of the
Bill, which is formally called the Enhanced Partnership with Pakistan Act (S.1707), there are limitations on clearing the annual $1.5 billion assistance to
Pakistan based on actions in the “preceding financial year.” The authorisation required is that the Pakistan government and military have “ceased
and carrying out
attacks against its neighbours, while dismantling their bases in Muridke, FATA and Quetta.
support” to extremist and terror groups, that they have “prevented” groups like the LeT and JeM from operating in Pakistan,
LeT can’t steal nukes or attack
Hashmi 12 (Muhammad Jawad, M.Phil in Defence and Strategic Studies. author of
“Nuclear Terrorism in Pakistan: Myth of Reality?”, “Threats Of Nuclear Sabotage Against
Pakistan – Analysis”, 1/30, http://www.eurasiareview.com/30012012-threats-of-nuclearsabotage-against-pakistan-analysis/)
It is acknowledged secret that Pakistan
has a robust command control system with its weapons kept
unassembled and dispersed at different places with multilayered security arrangements. As a
result potential terrorists would have to toil a lot to obtain access to those weapons. These are
extremely complex challenges and next to impossible for the terrorists to cross all the
thresholds and layers of security undetected. Thus, the strict security arrangements around nuclear facilities and lack of
nuclear knowledge may hinder terrorists to steal fissile material and attempt to manufacture a workable nuclear weapon. In a more plausible
scenario it could be that terrorists
purpose, terrorists
may assemble an RDD (radiological dispersal devices) or dirty bombs.1 For the said
would need fissile material and a lot of technical know-how to fabricate such
device.
No indo-pak war or escalation
Enders 2 (Jan 30, David, Michigan Daily, “Experts say nuclear war still unlikely,” http://www.michigandaily.com/content/experts-say-nuclearwar-still-unlikely)
* Ashutosh Varshney – Professor of Political Science and South Asia expert at the
University of Michigan
* Paul Huth – Professor of International Conflict and Security Affairs at the
University of Maryland
* Kenneth Lieberthal – Professor of Political Science at the University of Michigan.
Former special assistant to President Clinton at the National Security Council
Varshney becomes animated when asked about the likelihood of nuclear
war between India and Pakistan.¶ "Odds are close to zero," Varshney said forcefully,
standing up to pace a little bit in his office. "The assumption that India and Pakistan cannot manage their
nuclear arsenals as well as the U.S.S.R. and U.S. or Russia and China concedes less to
the intellect of leaders in both India and Pakistan than would be warranted."¶ The worlds two
youngest nuclear powers first tested weapons in 1998, sparking fear of subcontinental nuclear war a fear Varshney finds ridiculous.¶ "The decision
makers are aware of what nuclear weapons are, even if the masses are not," he said.¶
"Watching the evening news, CNN, I think they have vastly overstated the threat of nuclear war," political
science Prof. Paul Huth said.¶ Varshney added that there are numerous factors working against
the possibility of nuclear war.¶ "India is committed to a no-first-strike policy," Varshney said.
"It is virtually impossible for Pakistan to go for a first strike, because the retaliation
would be gravely dangerous."¶ Political science Prof. Kenneth Lieberthal, a former special assistant to President Clinton at the
National Security Council, agreed. "Usually a country that is in the position that Pakistan is in would not shift to a level that
would ensure their total destruction," Lieberthal said, making note of India"s considerably larger nuclear arsenal.¶
"American intervention is another reason not to expect nuclear war," Varshney said.
"If anything has happened since September 11, it is that the command control system has
strengthened. The trigger is in very safe hands."
University political science Prof. Ashutosh
2NC
CP
Conditionality Good 2NC
First our offense1- Critical thinking- Reacting to multiple attacks increases aff ability to
evaluate their best arguments and collapsing down teaches the neg to
make strategic, reactive decisions- that’s key to decisionmaking skills
2- Negative flexibility- The aff gets to parametricize the rez by picking one
example- its an inherent advantage because they know way more about
their one aff than the neg who has to be prepared for every aff- the only
check is to advance multiple cps
Now our defense1- Not “infinitely” regressive- time limits and quality of argument create a
limit. Our interp is: _______________________________________
2- Ground- Aff can always make “aff key” args and addons- it’s offense
against any and all CPs
3- Strat and time skew are inev- The alternative to multiple advocacies is
more T and Das- those require just as many answers and create strategic
double binds too
4- CPs aren’t uniquely complex and perms check the advantages of neg
fiat- a SKFTA CP is way less threatening than a SKFTA DA because you can
perm it
5- To vote aff you have to believe the debate is irreparably damaged by
conditionality- it might make debate hard but not impossible
6- Don’t be fooled by “reciprocity”- the aff’s job is to pick the question of
debate and the neg’s is to find a way to disprove it- that’s why stability is
important for the aff and flexibility is key for the neg
2NC Say Yes
The CP results in an amended treaty—there’s a global surge in support for
an alternative to cannabis prohibition that the CP capitalizes on—that’s
Don
Framing issues—
a. Threshold low—none of their evidence assumes inter se agreements—
amendments can be passed between parties where only the parties that
want to legalize marijuana sign on to the amended version of the treaty—
this is enabled by the single convention and means only one country has to
approve the amendment before the US can legalize without violating the
treaty—that’s Don
Full consensus isn’t necessary for an amendment
Jelsma 14
[10/17/14, Martin Jelsma is the Director, Drugs and Democracy Program Transnational
Institute, “The Brookings Institution International Impacts Of the U.S. Trend Towards Legal
“ Marijuana,
http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/events/2014/10/17%20international%20impacts%20m
arijuana/20141017_legal_marijuana_transcript.pdf]
there are also options for adaptation in the regime that do not require a full
consensus of all the parties. Now, the WHO review is already one example, because if the WHO
would recommend a de-scheduling of cannabis, it is -- a decision like that is taken by a
simple majority, not consensus. There is also the possibility of countries individually or in group to
And secondly,
withdraw from the treaties and re-adhere with certain reservations. That’s a path that Bolivia has taken in the case
And there is the possibility also, that a group of countries can sign an
inter se agreement, where they you know, agree among themselves that the treaty
is applied in a different way, while they still maintain their full obligations to all the treaty
parties that are not part of the inter se agreement.
of in (Inaudible).
b. US influence—US support for prohibition is what sustains an oppositional
bloc—US influence the other way ensures amendment passage
Kumah-Abiwu 14
[Felix Kumah-Abiwu is a Professor of Africana Studies @ Eastern Illinois UniversityDr. Felix
Kumah-Abiwu received his PhD in Political Science (International Relations,
Comparative/African Politics and Public Policy) from West Virginia University. He also
studied at Ohio University and the Legon Center for International Affairs and Diplomacy,
University of Ghana, “The Quest for Global Narcotics Policy Change: Does the United States
Matter?” International Journal of Public Administration, 37: (2014) pg. 53–64]
the US has a strong influence in many issue
areas, including narcotics within the global system. Bullington (2004, p. 690) captures this assumption
by noting that: The United States had been the prime mover of this early anti-drug legislation,
relying on diplomatic pressure and arm twisting to forge a shaky consensus among
nations that were generally much less convinced of the need for international controls. This
US NARCOTICS POLICY TOOLS OF INFLUENCE Clearly,
American triumph signaled the beginning of nearly a century during which America literally dominated the direction
of drug control and drug policy in the international arena. For Levine (2003, p. 148),
the global narcotics
regime has been sustained for many years because the “US has used the UN as the
international agency to create, spread, and supervise world-wide prohibition.” In a
similar argument, Bewley-Taylor (1999a) observes that the US employs key policy tools of influence in
its effort to globalize the prohibition approach to narcotics control. As previously noted, this article
argues that the US to some extent shapes the global narcotics policy through four major policy tools of influence.
the US employs diplomacy (bilateral and multilateral)
as a key policy tool of influence in shaping the global narcotics regime (Bullington, 2004; Levine,
2003). For Bewley-Taylor (1999a), the US employs its diplomatic strength within the UN to
pressure other countries in supporting its preferred prohibition approach to narcotics
control. In fact, Bewley-Taylor’s (1999a) classic example is worth reiterating in support of my argument.
Table 3 provides a summary of the policy tools. First,
According to him, an independent research on the usefulness of drugs (legal and non-legal) was conducted
between 1992 and 1994 by the World Health Organization (WHO) and Program on Substance Abuse (PSA) in
conjunction with the UN Interregional Crime and Justice Research Institute (UNICRI). Surprisingly, the findings of
the study show greater health problems associated with the use of legal drugs than with occasional use of some
narcotic drugs Fearing that the findings might undermine the existing prohibition approach, the UN was pressured
by the US to issue a disclaimer on the report (Bewley-Taylor, 1999a, p. 169; Kumah-Abiwu, 2012). In fact, one of
The US plays very dominant
role and has provided an enormous amount of funding to UN anti-drug efforts. At one point
the experts interviewed for this study shares a similar view by indicating that:
when the World Health Organization (WHO) was planning to issue a report on the lack of dangerousness of
cannabis, the US pressured the WHO to kill the report . . . . At another point when the Liberal government of
Canada under Prime Minister Chretien proposed to decriminalize marijuana, the Bush Administration’s drug czar,
John Walters, threatened trade retaliation against Canada regarding timber, fish, and other issues. (An official
interviewed at the Criminal Justice Policy Foundation. Also see Kumah-Abiwu, 2012) In the words of another policy
Latin American lawmakers, for instance, have moved intellectually and also policy wise
toward decriminalization in recent years, but have feared going far because of their
northern neighbor. In recent years, the US has also pressured Canada and the UK from
moving ahead with radical policy changes that would shift away from criminalization. The US
expert:
fears that a radical drug policy change would compromise the UN conventions. (An official interviewed at the Drug
Derivative control is another policy tool of influence at
the disposal of the US. One of the ways the US employs this policy tool is to link nonnarcotic issues with narcotic ones at the UN. Explaining the policy, Bewley-Taylor (1999b, p. 151)
observes that: By tying the acquiescence of other nations in the Commission on Narcotic Drugs
to American economic aid and political support in other areas , the US was able to dominate
the decision-making process and play a central role in the instigation and design of
anti-narcotics legislation. The third policy instrument is the certification policy. The policy
Policy Alliance. Also see Kumah-Abiwu, 2012)
mandates every US president to present a yearly report to Congress on the status of drug-producing countries. Any
country, especially in the Andean region, that falls within the decertified category could face serious sanctions from
These sanctions
range from the withdrawal of US foreign aid, which may or not be directly linked to counternarcotics policy issues (Bouley, 2001; Falcon, 1996). The US could also employ its influence to
prevent loans from multilateral development agencies to the so-called countries that fall
within the decertified category (Spencer, 1998). The final policy tool of influence is the financial
leverage of the US on many UN agencies, including the UNODC. Essentially, the US is one of the
top financial contributors to the operations of many agencies within the UN system (Bewleythe US (Bewley-Taylor, 1999a; Chepesiuk, 1999, p. 34; Hinojosa, 2007; Kumah-Abiwu, 2012).
Taylor, 1999a). The Better World Campaign (BWC) notes that the financial contribution of the US to major UN
activities in 2011 alone was substantial as compared to others. For instance, the US contributed about $1.884
billion toward peacekeeping operations, $516 million for UN regular budgets, and $354 million (Kumah-Abiwu,
2012) toward other agencies including the UNODC (Bruun, Lynn, & Ingemar, 1975; BWC, 2012). Another
interesting example that supports US dominance over the UNODC is worth mentioning as well. According to
Bewley-Taylor (2005, p. 429), the former Executive Director of the UNODC, Mr. Antonio Costa, met with Mr. Robert
Charles, head of the US Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL) in 2004 to discuss the
Fearing a possible threat to its
preferred prohibition approach, the head of the US Narcotics Bureau threatened to
possibility of a public health approach to global narcotics control.
drastically reduce the US financial support to the UNODC , unless Mr. Costa withdraws support of the
UNODC for any public health approach to global narcotics control. Mindful of a drastic cut in funding from
the US, the head of the UNODC was said to have succumbed to the US demands (BewleyTaylor, 2005, p. 429; Kumah-Abiwu, 2012). This case provides another good example of how
the US continues to employ its policy tools of influence in shaping the global
narcotics regime (Andreas & Nadelmann, 2006; Bullington, 2004). Pg. 59-60
2NC Rescheduling
Solve every advantage – rescheduling shifts DEA focus and also allows
banking
Rescheduling results in federal and state marijuana legalization which
means that even if there are solvency deficits to rescheduling on its own
the counterplan still solves 100% of the case because it results in the aff
but in a way that avoids the net benefits.
Rescheduling will lead to legalization for three reasons:
1) Honest communication – Government agencies like the Office of
National Drug Control Policy are unable to speak freely about the minimal
harms of marijuana and the potential benefits because they are required
by law to oppose legalization of any Schedule I substance. Acknowledging
that the panic over marijuana is overblown will significantly affect the
conversation by drawing attention to unfair drug laws. This will “pave the
way” for legalization at both the federal and state level. That’s all in our
1NC Sullum evidence
2) Research – Rescheduling marijuana allows new research that
contradicts the official narrative – pro legalization forces will effectively
capitalize
Murray 14, Senior Fellow at Hudson Institute (David, Hard to Study: The Difficulty in
Measuring Marijuana’s Value, www.hudson.org/research/10604-hard-to-study-the-difficultyin-measuring-marijuana-s-value)
Second, if marijuana were placed in Schedule II, the increased access might abet agendadriven research and publications by advocacy organizations that conduct “science by press
release.” Those seeking to sway public opinion in favor of marijuana’s supposed benefits
would likely capitalize on the opportunity, generating careless studies that would not withstand
rigorous scientific review but would suffice to create positive headlines, softening up public
opinion in favor of legalization.
3) States – rescheduling would increase support for legalization even in
hard sell states like Alabama, that’s in our 1NC Sullum evidence.
Increased state legalization leads to federal legalization
Somin 14, Professor of Law at George Mason University School of Law, (Ilya, 29,
Prospects for marijuana legalization in 2014, www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokhconspiracy/wp/2014/02/09/prospects-for-marijuana-legalization-in-2014/)
Not all of these laws are likely to pass. But if a large number do, it could greatly accelerate the trend
towards marijuana legalization. This is especially true if legalization hits large states such as
California, where a legalization ballot initiative narrowly failed in 2010; public opinion in both California and the
nation as a whole has become more favorable to legalization since then. Even many conservatives have begun to
rethink the War on Drugs. Even if numerous states legalize marijuana, the drug will still be illegal under federal
law. In its badly misguided decision in Gonzales v. Raich (2005), the Supreme Court ruled that Congress’ power to
regulate interstate commerce allows it to ban the possession of marijuana even in cases where the marijuana in
Obama administration has
taken a very equivocal position on the question of whether federal prosecutions for marijuana
distributors will continue in states that legalize marijuana under their own laws. However, widespread
legalization at the state level will put pressure on the federal government to
repeal the federal ban. Even if it does not, federal law enforcement resources are
extremely limited, and it will be difficult or impossible for the feds to enforce a marijuana
ban without state cooperation. If marijuana legalization does sweep the nation over the next
few years, perhaps it will also lead more people to reconsider the War on Drugs as a whole .
question has never crossed state lines or been sold in an market anywhere. The
2NC AT Perm: CP
The permutation severs certainty—The CP only legalizes if the international
drug control treaty is successfully amended – should in the aff’s plan
means they can’t be conditional
Nieto 09 (Judge Henry, Appellate Judge Colorado Court of Appeals, 8-20-2009 People v.
Munoz, 240 P.3d 311 (Colo. Ct. App. 2009), http://www.scribd.com/doc/19076662/Peoplev-Munoz)
“Should” is “used . . . to express duty, obligation, propriety, or expediency.” Webster’s Third New
International Dictionary 2104 (2002).Courts interpreting the word in various contexts have drawn
conflicting conclusions, although the weight of authority appears to favor interpreting
“should” in an imperative, obligatory sense. A number of courts, confronted with the question of whether
using the word “should” in jury instructions conforms with the Fifth and Sixth Amendment protections governing
the reasonable doubt standard, have upheld instructions using the word. In the courts of other states in which a
defendant has argued that the word “should” in the reasonable doubt instruction does not sufficiently inform the
jury that it is bound to find the defendant not guilty if insufficient proof is submitted at trial, the courts have
squarely rejected the argument. They reasoned that the word “conveys a sense of duty and obligation and could
not be misunderstood by a jury.” See State v. McCloud, 891 P.2d 324, 335 (Kan. 1995);se e also Tyson v. State,
457 S.E.2d 690, 691-92 (Ga. Ct. App. 1995) (finding argument that “should” is directional but not instructional to
be without merit); Commonwealth v. Hammond, 504 A.2d 940, 941-42 (Pa. Super. Ct. 1986). Notably, courts
interpreting the word “should” in other types of jury instructions have also found that the word conveys to the jury
a sense of duty or obligation and not discretion. In Little v. State, 554 S.W.2d 312, 324 (Ark. 1977), the Arkansas
Supreme Court interpreted the word “should” in an instruction on circumstantial evidence as synonymous with the
word “must” and rejected the defendant’s argument that the jury may have been misled by the court’s use of the
word in the instruction. Similarly, the Missouri Supreme Court rejected a defendant’s argument that the court erred
by not using the word “should” in an instruction on witness credibility which used the word “must” because the two
words have the same meaning. State v. Rack, 318 S.W.2d 211, 215 (Mo. 1958). In applying a child support
statute,
the Arizona Court of Appeals concluded that a legislature’s or commission’s use of the word
a
statute stating that child support expenditures “should” be allocated for the purpose of parents’ federal
tax exemption to be mandatory
“should” is meant to convey duty or obligation.McNutt v. McNutt, 49 P.3d 300, 306 (Ariz. Ct. App. 2002) (finding
Severs immediacy—The treaty amendment process takes several months at
a minimum – should means they have to be immediate—anything else is a
legal disaster
Summers ‘94
(Justice for the Oklahoma Supreme Court, 11-8-94, Pat Kelsee, Appellee, v. Dollarsaver
Food Warehouse of Durant, Appellant, Appeal from the District Court of Bryan County, The
Supreme Court of Oklahoma, Case Number 81862, 1994 OK 123, 885 P.2d 1353)
4 The legal question to be resolved by the court is whether the word "should"13 13 "Should" not only is
used as a "present indicative" synonymous with ought but also is the past tense of "shall" with various shades of
meaning not always easy to analyze. See 57 C.J. Shall § 9, Judgments § 121 (1932). O. JESPERSEN, GROWTH
AND STRUCTURE OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE (1984); St. Louis & S.F.R. Co. v. Brown, 45 Okl. 143, 144 P. 1075,
Certain contexts
mandate a construction of the term "should" as more than merely indicating preference or
desirability. Brown, supra at 1080-81 (jury instructions stating that jurors "should" reduce the amount of
1080-81 (1914). For a more detailed explanation, see the Partridge quotation infra note 15.
damages in proportion to the amount of contributory negligence of the plaintiff was held to imply an obligation and
to be more than advisory); Carrigan v. California Horse Racing Board, 60 Wash. App. 79, 802 P.2d 813 (1990)
(one of the Rules of Appellate Procedure requiring that a party "should devote a section of the brief to the request
for the fee or expenses" was interpreted to mean that a party is under an obligation to include the requested
segment); State v. Rack, 318 S.W.2d 211, 215 (Mo. 1958) ("should" would mean the same as "shall" or "must"
when used in an instruction to the jury which tells the triers they "should disregard false testimony"). in the May
connotes futurity or may be deemed a ruling in praesenti.14 14 In praesenti means literally
"at the present time." BLACK'S LAW DICTIONARY 792 (6th Ed. 1990). In legal parlance the phrase
denotes that which in law is presently or immediately effective, as opposed to something that
will or would become effective in the future [in futurol]. See Van Wyck v. Knevals, 106 U.S. 360, 365, 1
18 order
S.Ct. 336, 337, 27 L.Ed. 201 (1882). The answer to this query is not to be divined from rules of grammar;15
15
modern English usage appears supportive of my conclusion that ". . . what the practice
amounts to is this: the past subjunctive should is not only used in all persons, but it is employed as,
virtually, a present indicative synonymous with ought ." E. PARTRIDGE, USAGE AND ABUSAGE, p. 376
Nonetheless,
(1963). it must be governed by the age-old practice culture of legal professionals and its immemorial language
usage. To determine if the omission (from the critical May 18 entry) of the turgid phrase, "and the same hereby
is", (1) makes it an in futuro ruling - i.e., an expression of what the judge will or would do at a later stage - or (2)
constitutes an in in praesenti resolution of a disputed law issue, the trial judge's intent must be garnered from the
four corners of the entire record.16 16 Frazier v. Bryan Memorial Hosp. Authority, Okl., 775 P.2d 281, 285
(1989); Elliot v. City of Guthrie. Okl., 725 P.2d 861, 863 (1986); Mayhue v. Mayhue, Okl., 706 P.2d 890, 893 n. 6
(1985). 5 Nisi prius orders should be so construed as to give effect to every words and every part of the text, with
a view to carrying out the evident intent of the judge's direction.17 17 Russell v. Freeman, 202 Okl. 417, 214
P.2d 439, 441-42 (1950); Gade v. Loffler, 171 Okl. 313, 42 P.2d 815, 818 (1935); McNeal v. Baker, 135 Okl. 159,
274 P. 655, 656 (1929); Foreman v. Riley, 88 Okl. 75, 211 P. 495, 496 (1923). The order's language ought not to
be considered abstractly. The actual meaning intended by the document's signatory should be derived from the
context in which the phrase to be interpreted is used.18 18 Brawn, supra note 13, 144 P. at 1080-81; ManhattanDickman Construction Co. v. Shawler, 113 Ariz. 549, 555, 558 P.2d 894, 900 (1976); Rack, supra. note 13, 318
S.W.2d at 215. When applied to the May 18 memorial, these told canons impel my conclusion that the judge
doubtless intended his ruling as an in praesenti resolution of Dollarsaver's quest for judgment n.o.v. Approval of all
counsel plainly appears on the face of the critical May 18 entry which is [885 P.2d 1358] signed by the judge.19
19 See supra note 1 for the pertinent terms and form of the May 18 memorial. True minutes20 20 Minutes are
nothing more than abbreviated memoranda of what takes place in a courtroom. Mansell v. City of Lawton, Okl.,
877 P.2d 1120, 1123 (1994); Hinshaw v. State, 147 Ind. 334, 47 N.E. 157, 171 (1897); State v. Larkin, 11 Nev.
314, 321 (1876); Gregory v. Frothingham, 1 Nev. 253, 260 (1865). Although the judge is authorized to draft
mnemonic aids for posting on the court's appearance docket, it is ordinarily the deputy clerk, present in the
courtroom, who acts as the minutes' scrivener. of a court neither call for nor bear the approval of the parties'
To reject out of hand the view that in this context "should" is
impliedly followed by the customary, "and the same hereby is", makes the court once again revert
to medieval notions of ritualistic formalism now so thoroughly condemned in national
jurisprudence and long abandoned by the statutory policy of this State. IV CONCLUSION Nisi prius
counsel nor the judge's signature.
judgments and orders should be construed in a manner which gives effect and meaning to the complete substance
When a judge-signed direction is capable of two interpretations, one of which
would make it a valid part of the record proper and the other would render it a meaningless
exercise in futility, the adoption of the former interpretation is this court's due. A rule - that on
direct appeal views as fatal to the order's efficacy the mere omission from the journal entry of a
long and customarily implied phrase, i.e., "and the same hereby is" - is soon likely to drift into
the body of principles which govern the facial validity of judgments. This development would
make judicial acts acutely vulnerable to collateral attack for the most trivial of reasons and
tend to undermine the stability of titles or other adjudicated rights. It is obvious the trial
of the memorial.
judge intended his May 18 memorial to be an in praesenti order overruling Dollarsaver's motion for judgment
n.o.v. It is hence that memorial, and not the later June 2 entry, which triggered appeal time in this case. Because
the petition. in error was not filed within 30 days of May 18, the appeal is untimely. I would hence sustain the
appellee's motion to dismiss.21 21 Because the court's pronouncement does not give this case the prospectivity
protection which might be affordable by Manning v. State ex rel. Dept. of Public Safety, Okl., 876 P.2d 667 (1994),
my writing does not consider Manning's impact, if any, on this appeal's dismissibility.
The CP results in a different legalization regime—drug reform means that
our drug policy is integrated and synchronized internationally—the plan
has to include action exclusive to the US otherwise it severs
a) Definition - In is “used to indicate limitation” according to
dictionary.com
Dictionary.com
(used to indicate limitation or qualification, as of situation, condition, relation, manner, action, etc.): to speak in a
whisper; to be similar in appearance.
b) Grammar – Use of the prepositional phrase “In the United States” in a
resolution indicates exclusivity
Cioffi 14 (mrcioffi.weebly.com/uploads/2/2/3/8/22382440/20142015_1_sep_sports_subsidies.pdf)
What is the significance of the prepositional phrase “in the United States” in the resolution?
This phrase makes it clear that we are discussing the role of sports subsidies in
this country – not the role of such subsidies in Europe or elsewhere.
The counterplan demonstrates a critical opportunity cost to the plan so err
negative on competition questions. Unilateral legalization is harmful, their
interpretation of competition allows the aff to dodge debates in the
literature about the function of legalization in diplomacy. The depth of
literature on this subject proves they undermine education and takes out
their predictability and aff ground arguments. Other counterplans they say
we justify are just different ways of doing the plan but our counterplan is a
distinct policy that says the plan is undesirable
Reich 13, Professor of Global Affairs and Political Science (Simon, The Paradox of
Unilateralism: Institutionalizing Failure in U.S.-Mexican Drug Strategies, NORTEAMÉRICA,
Año 8, número 2, julio-diciembre)
Much of the debate about drug policy, as we have characterized it, concerns conceptions of the
definition of sovereignty, the exercise of power, and the institutional context in which power
is exercised. Elsewhere, we address in depth the theoretical weaknesses of realism in explaining this relationship
(Reich and Aspinwall, 2013). In brief, one perspective believes that weak states are only able to prevail against
stronger states if they have access to counterbalancing alliances or something highly valued by the larger state
that they can use as leverage (Wohlforth, 1999; Baker Fox, 1959; Rothstein, 1982: 159-160). Mexico, however, is
not a member of any global or regional organization that can dilute U.S. interference, nor can it effectively align
with regional or global partners in a way that counterbalances U.S. America’s material advantages (Sanchez, 2003:
58; Vital, 1967). Others have claimed that weak states may prevail when favored by geography or greater resolve
(Bjol, 1968). But drugs are a key security issue for the U.S., with easy access to its neighbor from where the
problem “originates.” Of central importance to us here is a key realist concept, that of sovereignty. In his book on
that subject, Stephen Krasner discusses alternative uses of the term: The term sovereignty has been used in four
different ways –international legal sovereignty, Westphalian sovereignty, domestic sovereignty, and
interdependence sovereignty. International legal sovereignty refers to the practices associated with mutual
Westphalian
sovereignty refers to political organization based on the exclusion of external actors from
authority structures within a given territory. Domestic sovereignty refers to the formal
organization of political authority within the state and the ability of public authorities to
exercise effective control within the orders of their own polity. Finally, interdependence
sovereignty refers to the ability of public authorities to regulate the flow of information,
ideas, goods, people, pollutants, or capital across the borders of their state. (1999: 4) We adopt
Krasner’s variety of definitions for two reasons. First, we aim to improve our understanding of
recognition, usually between territorial entities that have formal juridical independence.
the relationship between the exercise of power and the way in which that influences
authority, legitimacy, and control. Utilizing these concepts in dynamic rather than static
terms may make the definitional distinctions more operationally useful. Second, we seek to
apply these concepts to the issue of U.S.- Mexican drug policies in the hope that they
provide a heuristic framework that may help address a current and ongoing economic and
security problem for the United States. We depict these varied conceptions of sovereignty in Figure 1. In
this figure, we suggest that sovereignty can be disaggregated along two dimensions. Krasner’s ideal-types can be
distinguished between its operational and its principled dimensions. Sovereignty has an instrumental, pragmatic
purpose, because it enables states to establish and exert authority and control, to regulate and establish norms
and rules. But states also invoke sovereignty as a principle, because that is how they establish themselves as
Our
distinction is between a unilateral (or imposed) and a negotiated
(cooperative or integrative) dimension. In this regard, states may act without the
cooperation or recognition of other states in solving problems or establishing the principle of
autonomous existence. Equally, they may work bilaterally or multilaterally when solving
problems or establishing their sovereign right to exist (through the mechanism of mutual recognition).
Krasner’s Westphalian sovereignty and domestic sovereignty both imply unilateral
decision-making processes. In contrast, interdependent and international legal forms of
sovereignty imply a negotiated exercise of power, requiring the cooperation of other
states.
entities. They seek recognition and recognize others by invoking or employing the concept of sovereignty.
second
2NC Treaties NB
The counterplan doesn’t link – international law allows rescheduling
Nelson 14, Reporter at U.S. News & World Report (Steven, 1/31, Obama Confused About
Power to Reschedule Pot, Advocates Say,
www.usnews.com/news/articles/2014/01/31/obama-confused-about-power-to-reschedulepot-advocates-say)
The 1970 Controlled Substances Act, which created five tiers of restricted drugs, says the attorney general may
"remove any drug or other substance from the schedules if he finds that the drug or other substance does not
If a substance is banned by international treaties
– as marijuana is – the law grants the attorney general the power to place it "under the
schedule he deems most appropriate." Rep. Earl Blumenauer, D-Ore., tells U.S. News it's "very clear"
that the law "actually permits reclassification administratively." I don't dispute that Congress could
meet the requirements for inclusion in any schedule."
and should make the change, but it's also something the administration could do in a matter of days and I hope
they will consider it," says Blumenauer, who is currently circulating a letter among colleagues asking Obama to do
so. Eight members of Congress have signed the letter so far.
Legalization that follows on after the counterplan doesn’t link because the
counterplan creates an obligation for the US to seek reform of international
drug treaties
Gettman 06, Director of Communications at NORML - PHD Public Policy at George Mason
(Jon, Rescheduling and International Treaties, www.drugscience.org/LAW/LAW_TRE.html)
Rescheduling and International Treaties After discussing U.S. obligations to respond to scientific data
reported by the U.N. as to the danger presented by a drug or substance, the Controlled Substances Act
reserves for the United States the right to have the international legal status of a drug or
substance reviewed and amended. Nothing in the amendments made by the Psychotropic Substances
Act of 1978 or the regulations or orders promulgated there under shall be construed to preclude requests by the
Secretary of Health and Human Services or the Attorney General through the Secretary of State, pursuant to
article 2 or other applicable provisions of the Convention, for review of scheduling decisions under such
Convention, based on new or additional information. 21 USC 811(d) (5) Why would the Secretary of Health and
Human Services or the Attorney General make such a request? Most likely because they have discovered
information, by way of the official administrative process, that scientific knowledge about a drug or substance has
changed.
If under U.S. law a substance's status must be changed, then the U.S. is
bound by the same law to seek a change in the substance's status under
international treaties.
Case
Cartels
Mexico not key to heg --- energy reform now key since we have domestic
supplies
Joe Barnes 11, the Bonner Means Baker Fellow, James A. Baker III Institute for Public
Policy, Rice University, 4/29/11, “Oil and U.S.-Mexico Bilateral Relations,”
http://www.bakerinstitute.org/publications/EF-pub-BarnesBilateral-04292011.pdf
The U.S.-Mexico relationship has traditionally
ranked rather low as a U.S. policy priority . All recent incoming U.S.
presidents offer rhetorical tribute to the centrality of U.S.-Mexico ties. All find themselves
consumed by other foreign policy issues. President Obama is a case
in point. He met Mexican president Felipe Calderon before his inauguration. He visited Mexico in April 2009; Calderon visited the
United States the next month. They have continued to meet; they keep in regular contact. But there is little doubt that
the
Obama administration's foreign policy focus is
elsewhere. The ongoing economic downturn has put
cooperation with other major economies at the
very top of the Obama administration's agenda. U.S.
combat forces are engaged in Iraq and Afghanistan. The United States is conducting
military missions in Yemen and Pakistan. Washington is
leading an international effort to halt Iran from developing nuclear
weapons. The Obama administration has launched yet another round of Israeli-Palestinian talks. Popular unrest has swept much of
the Arab world, toppling dictatorships and creating huge uncertainty in the region and in the United States. And, as this paper goes
the United States has intervened in Libya's nascent civil war on behalf of
opponents of the Gaddafi regime. From Washington's perspective, U.S.Mexico relations simply lack the urgency of these
and many other issues.
to print,
There’s no correlation between hegemony and stability
Fettweis, PoliSci Prof @ Tulane, ’10
[Christopher J. Fettweis, Assistant Professor of Political Science at Tulane University, “Threat
and Anxiety in US Foreign Policy,” Survival, 52:2, 59-82, March 25th 2010,
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00396331003764603]
One potential explanation for the growth of global peace can be dismissed
fairly quickly: US actions do not seem to have contributed much. The limited
evidence suggests that there is little reason to believe in the stabilising
power of the US hegemon, and that there is no relation between the relative
level of American activism and international stability. During the 1990s, the
United States cut back on its defence spending fairly substantially. By 1998, the
To
believers in hegemonic stability, this
irresponsible ‘peace dividend’ endangered both national and global security.
United States was spending $100 billion less on defence in real terms than it had in 1990, a 25% reduction.29
internationalists, defence hawks and other
‘No serious analyst of American military capabilities’, argued neo-conservatives William Kristol and Robert Kagan in
1996, ‘doubts that the defense budget has been cut much too far to meet America’s responsibilities to itself and to
And yet the verdict from the 1990s is fairly plain: the world grew
more peaceful while the United States cut its forces. No state seemed to
believe that its security was endangered by a less-capable US military, or at
least none took any action that would suggest such a belief. No militaries
were enhanced to address power vacuums; no security dilemmas drove
insecurity or arms races; no regional balancing occurred once the stabilising
presence of the US military was diminished. The rest of the world acted as if
the threat of international war was not a pressing concern, despite the
reduction in US military capabilities. Most of all, the United States was no less
safe. The incidence and magnitude of global conflict declined while the United
States cut its military spending under President Bill Clinton, and kept declining as
the George W. Bush administration ramped the spending back up. Complex
statistical analysis is unnecessary to reach the conclusion that world peace
and US military expenditure are unrelated.
world peace’.30
Legalizing causes a net increase in cartel violence – shift to
other revenue streams that affect more citizens
Corcoran 13 (Patrick, MA Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, "Mexico's shifting
criminal landscape: changes in gang operation and structure during the past century," InSightCrime.org
http://download.springer.com/static/pdf/700/art%253A10.1007%252Fs12117-013-91908.pdf?auth66=1407004616_6fa114f7864b91ac4d7579906bea212c&ext=.pdf 3/1/13)
The changing nature of Mexico’s trafficking industry offers policy-makers a handful of suggestions and cautionary
notes. One is that the security challenge is no longer limited to the drug trade. As noted above, many of the
newer gangs increasingly rely on revenues from alternative activities rather than
the drug trade. The most notable of these are extortion and kidnapping. These crimes
are qualitatively different from the rest because, by design, they prey on successful, lawabiding citizens. For all but the unluckiest Mexicans, avoiding the ill effects of the
drug trade is simply a matter of not becoming a drug trafficker. However, running
a thriving legitimate business today makes one a target for extortion and
kidnapping, which is to say, these crimes punish the very ingredients of a prosperous
society . This indicates that two of the solutions most frequently offered—demand reduction and
legalization—would not be sufficient to address Mexico’s current problems. In the
long run, driving down the total amount of money available to criminal groups would almost
certainly reduce their threat, but such a transition would not happen overnight. The estimated 500,000
Mexicans who currently make their living off of the drug trade, many of them violent actors, would seek to replace
Because the most logical substitutes for drug trafficking are other
illicit activities— such as extortion, kidnapping and bank-robbery—that often have a greater
impact on civilians, suddenly reducing demand or legalizing drugs may even have
the income. 139
a short-term perverse effect of increasing the chaos .
Banking
LeT can’t steal nukes or attack
Hashmi 12 (Muhammad Jawad, M.Phil in Defence and Strategic Studies. author of
“Nuclear Terrorism in Pakistan: Myth of Reality?”, “Threats Of Nuclear Sabotage Against
Pakistan – Analysis”, 1/30, http://www.eurasiareview.com/30012012-threats-of-nuclearsabotage-against-pakistan-analysis/)
It is acknowledged secret that Pakistan
has a robust command control system with its weapons kept
unassembled and dispersed at different places with multilayered security arrangements. As a
result potential terrorists would have to toil a lot to obtain access to those weapons. These are
extremely complex challenges and next to impossible for the terrorists to cross all the
thresholds and layers of security undetected. Thus, the strict security arrangements around nuclear facilities and lack of
nuclear knowledge may hinder terrorists to steal fissile material and attempt to manufacture a workable nuclear weapon. In a more plausible
scenario it could be that terrorists
may assemble an RDD (radiological dispersal devices) or dirty bombs.1 For the said
purpose, terrorists would need fissile material and a lot of technical know-how to fabricate such
device.
No indo-pak war or escalation
Enders 2 (Jan 30, David, Michigan Daily, “Experts say nuclear war still unlikely,” http://www.michigandaily.com/content/experts-say-nuclearwar-still-unlikely)
* Ashutosh Varshney – Professor of Political Science and South Asia expert at the
University of Michigan
* Paul Huth – Professor of International Conflict and Security Affairs at the
University of Maryland
* Kenneth Lieberthal – Professor of Political Science at the University of Michigan.
Former special assistant to President Clinton at the National Security Council
Varshney becomes animated when asked about the likelihood of nuclear
war between India and Pakistan.¶ "Odds are close to zero," Varshney said forcefully,
standing up to pace a little bit in his office. "The assumption that India and Pakistan cannot manage their
nuclear arsenals as well as the U.S.S.R. and U.S. or Russia and China concedes less to
the intellect of leaders in both India and Pakistan than would be warranted."¶ The worlds two
youngest nuclear powers first tested weapons in 1998, sparking fear of subcontinental nuclear war a fear Varshney finds ridiculous.¶ " The decision
makers are aware of what nuclear weapons are, even if the masses are not," he said.¶
"Watching the evening news, CNN, I think they have vastly overstated the threat of nuclear war," political
science Prof. Paul Huth said.¶ Varshney added that there are numerous factors working against
the possibility of nuclear war.¶ "India is committed to a no-first-strike policy," Varshney said.
"It is virtually impossible for Pakistan to go for a first strike, because the retaliation
would be gravely dangerous."¶ Political science Prof. Kenneth Lieberthal, a former special assistant to President Clinton at the
National Security Council, agreed. "Usually a country that is in the position that Pakistan is in would not shift to a level that
would ensure their total destruction," Lieberthal said, making note of India"s considerably larger nuclear arsenal.¶
"American intervention is another reason not to expect nuclear war," Varshney said.
"If anything has happened since September 11, it is that the command control system has
strengthened. The trigger is in very safe hands."
University political science Prof. Ashutosh
1NR
O/V
Treaty system outweighs—failed, rapid proliferation, terrorism, global
climate change, dangerous geoengineering warfare, asteroids and ozone
depletion create the conditions for a short term extinction—international
law is key to manage public goods and prevent these from escalating—
that’s Schaffer
Prefer our impact—system instability constantly creates the risk of new
crises that we can’t anticipate—international law is key insurance against
burgeoning threats
It’s a controlling and magnifying impact—all threats are more likely and
more dangerous absent international cooperation—treaty system contains
the worst of their impacts through constant cooperation
I-law solves nuclear Indo-Pak war
Evan and Boyle 2 (William Evan, professor emeritus of sociology and management at
the University of Pennsylvania, and Francis Boyle, professor of law at the University of
Illinois, 6/4/2002, Kashmir: Invoking International Law to Avoid Nuclear War in Kashmir, p.
http://www.counterpunch.org/boyle0604.html)
The military confrontation between India and Pakistan, two nuclear-armed neighbors, has
the world in a state of jitters. With each country mobilizing its forces--together totaling
about a million troops along their 1800 mile border--there is a high probability that the
current face-off may lead to the outbreak of yet another war between these two countries.
Although such a war--if it eventuates--is likely to involve a conventional exchange of
weapons as happened in the 1947, 1965, and 1972 wars, there is reason to fear that it
could escalate into a nuclear war. If such a catastrophe were to occur, American intelligence estimates that
about 12 million people would be killed and 7 million would be injured. What has been the response of the
international community to this crisis? President Bush has urged President Musharraf of Pakistan and Prime Minister
Vajpayee of India to exercise restraint and stop cross-border attacks. President Jacques Chirac, President Vladimir
Putin and other European officials have echoed similar sentiments. In the meantime, Mr. Vajpayee accuses
Pakistan of waging a 20-year campaign of terrorism to dislodge India from the predominantly Muslim state of
Kashmir. He also rejects Pakistan's repeated requests for dialogue or negotiation. And the U.N. Secretary-General
Kofi Annan reiterates his requests to General Musharraf to crack down on Islamic militants penetrating the Line of
Control separating the Pakistani sector of Kashmir from the Indian sector. Forty-three years ago the U.N. put forth
a potentially reasonable solution to the conflict by conducting a plebiscite on the status of Kashmir--whether it
should remain part of India, or become part of Pakistan. These two options could be supplemented by (1)outright
far India
has dismissed the idea of holding such a plebiscite. Clearly missing from all responses so far
to the looming nuclear crisis is an argument for using international law to resolve the IndiaPakistan conflict over Kashmir. This striking omission underscores, on the one hand, the widespread
independence for Kashmir; or (2) shared sovereignty between India and Pakistan over Kashmir. Thus
commitment to power politics and the use of war as a means of resolving international disputes and, on the other
hand, a fundamental distrust of international law to resolve international conflicts. As it happens, both India and
Pakistan are parties to the 1899 Hague Convention for the Pacific Settlement of International Disputes. The United
It establishes a
procedure for special mediation. The states in conflict would each choose a power to which
they would respectively entrust the mission of entering into direct communication with the
power chosen by the other side for the purpose of preventing the rupture of pacific
relations. For the period of this mandate, which could not exceed thirty days, unless
otherwise agreed, the states in conflict would cease all direct communication on the subject
States is also a party to this 1899 Convention. Article 8 is the brainchild of the United States.
of the dispute, leaving it exclusively to the mediating powers. In case of a definite rupture
of pacific relations, the mediating powers were charged with the joint task of taking
advantage of any opportunity for peace. The threat of nuclear war between India and
Pakistan directly affects the vital national security interests of the United States: The
nuclear fallout would poison America and its people as well as the peoples of other countries. So the U.S.
government, joined by others, must formally and publicly invoke Hague Article 8 against both India and Pakistan,
and demand the required 30-day cooling-off period so that this special mediation procedure could take place. The
U.S. government joined by others must also invoke the requirement of Article 33(1) of the United Nations Charter
providing that the two parties to the dispute over Kashmir "shall first of all, seek a solution by negotiation, inquiry,
mediation, conciliation, arbitration, judicial settlement, resort to regional agencies or arrangements, or other
peaceful means of their own choice." U.N. Charter Article 33 expressly by name requires the pursuit of the
"mediation" procedure set forth in Hague Article 8, including the mandatory 30-day cooling off period. Time is of
the essence when it comes to invoking Hague Article 8 and averting a nuclear war!
2NC Heg T/
International law key to US leadership
Sadat, Professor Law Washington University in St Louis, ‘5 (Leila Nadya, Wash. U. Global
Stud. L. Rev. 329, p. lexis)
America's preoccupation with foreign affairs
also
derives from its superpower status. While
representing only about five percent of the world's population, the U.S. economy dwarfs the economies of other [*330] nations, whether measured by
GDP, purchasing power, trade, industrial output, or stock market capitalization. 3 The United States is the world's largest consumer of energy, 4 and
Americans, by some estimates, consume twenty-five percent of the world's oil resources. 5 This economic dominance has led to military predominance,
and the emergence of the United States as the world's only superpower. Nearly fifteen years after the end of the Cold War, the other eighteen NATO
countries combined spend less than half of what the U.S. spends on military defense. 6 The 9/11 Commission Report notes that the U.S. Defense
The United States military is engaged in operations across
the globe, with more than 140,000 soldiers in Iraq 8 and an additional 20,000 in Afghanistan. 9 As a society, we have become more aware than
Department budget is greater than Russia's GDP. 7
ever of our increased stature in the world and the fact that, whether we like it or not, our upcoming Presidential election is being closely followed by
observers all over the planet - becoming, as one British journalist recently remarked, the first "world election," but one in which only five percent of the
world will vote. 10 At Washington University School of Law, we have taken cognizance of the globalization revolution by expanding our curriculum,
admitting foreign students in record numbers, and sending our own students abroad. But our society, in general, has been relatively slow to think about
. International law and international justice have become neglected elements of the
U.S. foreign policy equation, as [*331] the focus has shifted away from the exercise of diplomacy to the projection of power. Even the
globalization in legal terms
9/11 Commission Report, which exhorts the United States to adopt a preventive strategy toward terrorism that is as much, or more, political than military
in nature, 11 barely mentions the need for international legal consensus-building and enforcement as means of constraining the spread of international
The United States has increasingly turned its back on the role that international law
may play in helping to stabilize an often chaotic and violent world. Paradoxically, this trend appears to be
terrorism.
peaking just at the moment when, outside U.S. borders, international law and lawmaking have risen to unprecedented prominence. I would like to
international law should be elevated from its current status as an occasional tool or
convenient rhetorical device of U.S. foreign policy to a chief element both in international
relations and United States diplomacy. Put another way, the United States needs to take its
commitment to the rule of law to the global stage, thereby playing to American strengths,
enhancing American legitimacy and moral authority, and perpetuating the leadership role
that the United States has historically exercised in the conduct of international affairs. As the
hegemon presiding over - and benefiting the most from - the global economy, the United States has both a vital
interest in maintaining the stability of that system and a responsibility to ensure that the system is fair. While military
force will surely continue to play a central role in the conduct of foreign affairs, coercion without legal authority lacks
legitimacy and breeds resentment. As lawyers and as citizens, we understand the deep and abiding importance of law and legal
institutions domestically - and it is virtually impossible to conceive of a just, peaceful, and stable
international order without seeing a place for the rule of law within that order.
suggest that
2NC AT I-Law Fails
Treaties work –
---norm development, decrease incentives for defection, provide
mechanisms for capacity-building and technical assistance
Findlay 6 – PhD, Director, Canadian Centre for Treaty Compliance, Associate Professor,
Norman Paterson School of International Affairs (NPSIA)
(Trevor, “Presentation to Canadian Institute of International Affairs (CIIA),” Scholar)
So the general question arises: when treaties work, why do they work? The short answer
is because they embody a norm, an aspiration, a settlement that is valued by all of the
parties. The treaty has been well constructed to reflect these elements, the states that
become party are happy with the outcome and there are no incentives to defect from the
agreement. The best example of this phenomenon that I can think of is the Ottawa
Landmine Convention. It embodies the special mix of aspirations of all those who inspired it,
notably the International Campaign to Ban Landmines and states parties such as Canada,
Belgium and Norway. It is geared to deal not just with disarmament, but with humanitarian
and quasi-development issues such as demining. Its focus on capacity- building and
technical assistance has given it a constituency among developing countries that other
disarmament agreements favoured by the first world lack. This has not insulated it entirely
from violations―Uganda almost certainly has done so―but it has surrounded the treaty with
a hugely supportive cacoon of states and civil society in genuine partnership.¶ Another
reason why treaties work is that their goals are simply expressed, or at least readily
identifiable, and their achievements are measurable. An effective monitoring and verification
system can be of enormous help here, providing confidence to all states parties that there
are no free-riders and that non-compliance will not threaten them.¶ One of the most
successful environmental treaties of our time is the Montreal Protocol which seeks to close
the hole in the ozone layer caused by the release of chloroflurocarbons (CFCs) into the
atmosphere. The ban on CFCs was relatively simple to envisage, it could be technically
monitored with relative ease, developed and¶ 2¶ developing countries were subject to the
same requirements and there would be clear evidence that the treaty was working if the
ozone hole started to close. It is.
---even absent legal enforcement, violations risk institutional capital –
makes compliance likely
Simmons 10 – Professor of International Affairs @ Harvard
(Beth, “Treaty Compliance and Violation,” Annu. Rev. Polit. Sci., vol. 13)
Most treaties do not of course have strong external enforcement mechanisms. In that case,
why are treaties especially useful tools for cred- ible commitment making? Some scholars
in- sist that there is something about a legal com- mitment that inherently raises ex post
costs. For example, Guzman (2002, p. 65) writes that treaties “represent the complete
pledge of a na- tion’s reputational capital” (see also Schachter 1991). This special quality of
treaties may be due to the fact that they are embedded in a broader system of socially
constructed inter- state rule making, normatively linked by the principle of pacta sunt
servanda—the idea that agreements of a legally obligatory nature must be observed.
Violating a legal agreement, in this view, provides information on both the govern- ment’s
attitude toward the contents of the treaty (the specific rule) and the government’s respect
for law itself (the broader set of principles in which the rule is embedded). Note, however, ¶
that for these reputational mechanisms to work, there must be widespread social agreement
that law creates more serious obligations than other kinds of agreements, a point stressed
by constructivist scholars. Arguably, treaties also allow a more complete reputational
commitment because of their capacity for clarity. Precision reduces the plausible
deniability of violation by narrowing the range of reason- able interpretation. In Morrow’s
(2007) ratio- nalist interpretation of the laws of war, the relative precision of treaty
arrangements sup- ports reciprocity between warring states by clar- ifying prescribed and
proscribed behaviors and limiting the permitted range of response to vi- olation. For these
reasons, violating a treaty is often asserted to have more serious reputational consequences
than reneging on a political com- mitment, ceteris paribus.
2NC AT Drones
This distinction matters—outright violations of treaties have been limited,
but put us on the brink—only magnifies the link
Koplow 13
[Winter 2013, David Koplow is a Professor of Law and Director of the Center for Applied
Legal Studies at Georgetown University Law Center. He was Special Counsel for Arms
Control to the General Counsel, U.S. Department of Defense, Washington, DC, from 2009 to
2011, “Indisputable Violations: What Happens When the United States Unambiguously
Breaches a Treaty?,” http://www.fletcherforum.org/wpcontent/uploads/2013/02/Koplow_37-1.pdf, The Fletcher Forum of World Affairs 37(1)]
Why does it matter that the United States
violates treaties, and occasionally does so without a shred of legal cover? Perhaps that is the
IMPLICATIONS OF THE REPEATED VIOLATIONS So what?
realpolitik privilege of the global hegemon: to be able to sustain hypocrisy, asserting that its unique international
responsibilities and its “exceptional” position in the world enable the United States explicitly to welch on its debts,
there
is a cost when the world’s strongest state behaves this way. One potential danger is that
other countries may mimic this disregard for legal commitments and justify their own
cavalier attitudes toward international law by citing U.S. precedents . Reciprocity and
mutuality are fundamental tenets of international practice; it is foolhardy to suppose
that other parties will inde"nitely continue with treaty compliance if they feel that the United
States is taking advantage of them by unilateral avoidance of shared legal obligations . So far,
there has not been significant erosion of the treaties discussed in the three
examples. The United States and Russia will fall years short of compliance with the CWC destruction
obligations, but other parties, with the notable exception of Iran, have reacted with aplomb,
comfortable with the two giants’ unequivocal commitment to eventual compliance. Likewise,
the VCCR is not unraveling, even if other states lament the asymmetry in consular access to
detained foreigners. And while many states pay their UN dues late and build up substantial
arrearages, that recalcitrance seems to stem more from penury than from a deliberate
choice to follow the U.S. lead. But that persistent touting undermines the treaties—
and by extension, it jeopardizes the entire fabric of international law. Chronic
noncompliance— especially ostentatious, unexcused, unjustified noncompliance— also
sullies the nation’s reputation and degrades U.S. diplomats’ ability to drive other states to
better conform with their obligations under the full array of treaties and other international
law commitments from trade to human rights to the Law of the Sea. The United States
depends upon the international legal structure more than anyone else : Americans have the
biggest interest in promoting a stable, robust, reliable system for international exchange . It
fudge on its obligations, and adopt a “do as we say, not as we do” approach with other countries. However,
is shortsighted and self-defeating to publicly and unblushingly undercut the system that offers the United States so
It is especially damaging when, following an indisputable violation, the
United States acknowledges its default, participates in an international dispute
resolution procedure, and apologizes—but then continues to violate the treaty. The
many benefits.
CWC implementation bodies, the International Court of Justice, and even the UN General Assembly and Security
Council are unable to effectively do much to sanction or penalize the mighty United States, but it is still terrible for
U.S. interests to disregard those mechanisms.
Not a violation
Carafano 13
[08/26/13, James Jay Carafano, “Say What You Want About Drones—They're Perfectly Legal”,
http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2013/08/say-what-you-want-about-drones-theyre-perfectlylegal/278740/]
I hate Obama's drone war--but, under the law, he has a perfect right to fight one. Armed
drones in war may be new, but their use introduces no new ethical or legal issues. In the Western
world, the laws of war are built on the foundation of the Just War tradition . The principles for
employing force are fairly simple and realistic. The use of force has to be under a competent
sovereign authority. And it has to be proportional --that is, the level of force used must be appropriate
to the military mission, with appropriate care taken to avoid harming innocents. Those rules apply regardless of the
As I said, nothing new here. Our laws
and treaty obligations place a legal framework around the principles of the Just War
tradition. At times, the United States has modified these legal instruments to account for the unusual destructive
weaponry involved, be it hand grenades, nukes... or armed drones.
power of certain weapons -- their ability to inflict intentional and unnecessary cruelty or to pose an indiscriminate
threat to innocents. For example, the U.S. helped pen conventions on poison gas and biological weapons, as well as
Drones, however, present none of these
issues. There is nothing novel or unusual about the destructive potential of a drone
strike. Pretty much every weapon in the U.S. arsenal may be used in war, provided the
users (1) have the legal authority to use them, (2) aim them at that legitimate targets, and
(3) use them according to the rules of engagement laid out by their commanders. All those
bases are covered when it comes to drones. Congress has given the commander-inchief an Authorization to Use Military Force--AUMF in Washington-speak--and that's all the legal
treaties to help stem the proliferation of nuclear weapons.
authority he needs. And, as Mark Bowden's article in this month's The Atlantic illustrates well, the administration
has plenty of rules for running armed drone operations. Here is the brutal reality of war: It always requires
targeting enemies with lethal force. It is an operational necessity. And it is legal. The problem some people have
with killer drones in combat has little to do with the technology of flying weapons. As my colleague at Heritage,
Cully Stimson testified before Congress, "Much criticism of drone warfare is actually criticism of broader policies,
such as the application of the law of armed conflict to the present conflict, geographical limitations on such conflict,
and targeting decisions. Whether a strike is carried out by a drone or an airplane (with the pilot in the vehicle
itself) has little or no bearing on these broader policy issues." Turning drone strikes into a battle of legal briefs is
more an act "lawfare" than warfare--an attempt to hamstring U.S. military operations by clothing complaints in
legal-sounding arguments. Amnesty International declared in its 2012 report that U.S. operations do not "recognize
the applicability of international human rights law," an assertion the report conclusively fails to document.
Christof Heyns, the UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial killings and summary or arbitrary
executions, stated at a conference in Geneva that some U.S. operations might constitute
"war crimes." Though he has been on the job for many months, he has yet to prove that
allegation. To recapitulate: President Obama has the right to drone on as long as the authority of the AUMF
remains in force and as long as he operates within that authority (or operates under some other legal authorization
for the use force).
Even if overall compliance is low—this issue is key to give US credibility in
enforcing treaties and preventing excessive flexibility—the aff dooms the
system
Bennett 14
[10/16/14, Wells C. Bennett is a Fellow in National Security Law at the Brookings
Institution; interviewed by Jonathan Rauch, Senior Fellow in Governance Studies at
Brookings, “Marijuana Legalization Poses a Dilemma for International Drug Treaties,”
http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/fixgov/posts/2014/10/16-marijuana-enforcementmodernize-international-drug-treaties-rauch]
Why should we care about avoiding a collision between international
commitments and domestic policies? Countries technically violate treaties all the
time, don’t they? The United States has a unique role in the world. It can summon
powers that no other nation can summon, but it confronts risks that no other nation
confronts. If you accept that premise, then the United States has a unique interest in
securing reciprocal compliance from its treaty partners. It gets harder and harder to
call out our partners for excessive flexibility within the drug treaty structures—or for
that matter within other multilateral commitments—after we have claimed a lot of
flexibility for ourselves.
2NC UQ—AT International Defections
All defections now are soft and within treaty latitude—reputational costs
mean they won’t become hard violations
Jelsma 14
[2014, Martin Jelsma is the co-coordinator of the TNI's Drugs & Democracy Programme with
Tom Blickman, “The Rise and Decline of Cannabis Prohibition the History of cannabis in the
UN drug control system and options for reform: Treaty reform options,”
http://www.tni.org/files/download/rise_and_decline_ch4.pdf]
The existing flexibility or room for manoeuvre in the treaty regime has allowed a variety of
cannabis policy practices and reforms to deviate from a repressive zero-tolerance drug law
enforcement approach, the legality of which is reviewed in detail in the third chapter. Nonenforcement of drug laws in the case of cannabis, rooted in social acceptance or long history
of traditional use, is the reality in quite a few countries. Even though the 1961 Convention
obliged traditional, including religious, use of cannabis to be phased out within 25 years
(with the exception of bhang as mentioned above), the widespread persistence of religious
uses in Hindu, Sufi and Rastafarian ceremonies and traditions led to lenient law enforcement
practices in a number of Indian states, Pakistan, the Middle East, Northern Africa and
Jamaica. Depending whether the legal system allows for discretionary powers, in several
countries more formalised schemes of non-enforcement have been established by providing
guidelines for the police, the prosecution and/or the judiciary. In other countries cannabis
consumption and possession for personal use are de jure no longer a criminal offence. Many
varieties of such decriminalization schemes exist, in terms of distinguishing possession or
cultivation for personal use from the intent to trade; and whether or not to apply
administrative sanctions. Since the treaty requirements do not differentiate between
possession and cultivation for personal use, first in Spain and more recently in some other
countries, “cannabis social clubs” have started to engage in collective cultivation for
personal use. The inclusion of cannabis and its compounds in the strictest schedules of the
conventions was a rejection of its usefulness for therapeutic purposes and an effort to limit
its use exclusively to research purposes, for which only very small amounts would be
required. Today, however, many countries have rejected this position as scientifically
untenable and have established legal regimes recognising the medicinal properties of
cannabis. All these policy practices were interpreted by the implementing countries as
respecting the confines of treaty latitude. Most have a solid legal basis, others employ
a certain legal creativity, not always acknowledged by the INCB. And sometimes schemes
perfectly justifiable in principle have been applied with a “pragmatic” dose of hypocrisy. The
strictures of the conventions and the near impossibility to amend them have impelled some
countries to stretching their inbuilt flexibility and escape clauses to questionable limits.
Examples are the legal contradictions around the backdoor of the Dutch coffeeshops; the
expansion of medical marijuana schemes in some U.S. states into recreational use; and the
establishment of large-scale commercial cannabis social clubs in Spain. Indeed, while a
fundamental change in cannabis policy is increasingly viewed as a legitimate option to
consider in various parts of the world, the reputational (and possibly economic) costs of
treaty breach are likely to deter most states from moving beyond some form of soft
defection.
The US is key—our compliance dictates broader treaty enforcement
Bennett 14
[10/16/14, Wells C. Bennett is a Fellow in National Security Law at the Brookings
Institution; interviewed by Jonathan Rauch, Senior Fellow in Governance Studies at
Brookings, “Marijuana Legalization Poses a Dilemma for International Drug Treaties,”
http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/fixgov/posts/2014/10/16-marijuana-enforcementmodernize-international-drug-treaties-rauch]
Why should we care about avoiding a collision between international
commitments and domestic policies? Countries technically violate treaties all the
time, don’t they? The United States has a unique role in the world. It can summon
powers that no other nation can summon, but it confronts risks that no other nation
confronts. If you accept that premise, then the United States has a unique interest in
securing reciprocal compliance from its treaty partners. It gets harder and harder to
call out our partners for excessive flexibility within the drug treaty structures—or for
that matter within other multilateral commitments—after we have claimed a lot of
flexibility for ourselves.
2NC UQ—AT US States
States not bound by treaties
Humphreys 13 – prof @ stanford
(Keith, “Can the United Nations Block U.S. Marijuana Legalization?” 11/15,
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/keith-humphreys/can-the-united-nationsbl_b_3977683.html)
1. Is the U.S. currently in violation of the UN treaties it signed agreeing to make marijuana illegal? No.
The U.S. federal government is a signatory to the treaty, but the States of Washington and
Colorado are not. Countries with federated systems of government like the U.S. and Germany can only make
international commitments regarding their national-level policies. Constitutionally, U.S. states are simply not
Hence, the U.S. made no such commitment on
behalf of the 50 states in signing the UN drug control treaties.¶ Some UN officials believe that the
required to make marijuana illegal as it is in federal law.
spirit of the international treaties requires the U.S. federal government to attempt to override state-level marijuana
in terms of the letter of the treaties, Attorney General Holder's refusal to challenge
Washington and Colorado's marijuana policies is within bounds.
legalization. But
2NC Link—O/V
That outweighs—the plan’s pick and choose approach violates “pacta sunt
servanda” which is the most fundamental principle of international law
Lopez 14
(German, “How much of the war on drugs is tied to international treaties?”
http://www.vox.com/cards/war-on-drugs-marijuana-cocaine-heroin-meth/war-on-drugsinternational-treaties)
There is a lot of disagreement among drug policy experts, enforcers, and reformers about the stringency of the
treaties. Several sections of the conventions allow countries some flexibility so they don't violate their
own constitutional protections. The US, for example, has never enforced penalties on inciting illicit drug use on the
any move toward legalization
of use, possession, and sales is in violation of international treaties. Under this argument, Colorado,
basis that it would violate rights to freedom of speech.¶ Many argue that
Washington, and Uruguay are technically in violation of the treaties because they legalized marijuana for personal
possession and sales.¶ Others say that countries have a lot of flexibility due to the constitutional exemptions in the
conventions. Countries could claim, for instance, that their protections for right to privacy and health allow them to
legalize drugs despite the conventions. When it comes to individual states in the US, the federal government can
America's federalist system allows states some flexibility as long as the federal
government keeps drugs illegal .¶ "It's pretty clear that the war on drugs was waged for political reasons
also argue that
and some countries have used the treaties as an excuse to pursue draconian policies," said Kasia MalinowskaSempruch, director of the Open Society Global Drug Policy Program. "Nevertheless, we've seen a number of
countries drop criminal penalties for minor possession of all drugs. We've seen others put drugs into a
pharmaceutical model, including the prescription of heroin to people with serious addictions. This seems completely
possible within the treaties."¶ Even if a country decided to dismantle prohibition and violate the treaties, it's unclear
how the international community would respond. If the US, for example, ended prohibition, there's little other
countries could do to interfere; there's no international drug court, and sanctions would be very unlikely for a
country as powerful as America.¶ Still, Martin Jelsma, an international drug policy expert at the Transnational
ignoring or pulling out of the international drug conventions could
seriously damage America's standing around the world. "Pacta sunt servanda
('agreements must be kept') is the most fundamental principle of international law
and it would be very undermining if countries start to take an 'a-la-carte' approach
to treaties they have signed; they cannot simply comply with some provisions and
ignore others without losing the moral authority to ask other countries to oblige to
other treaties," Jelsma wrote in an email. "So our preference is to acknowledge legal tensions with the
Institute, argued that
treaties and try to resolve them."¶ To resolve such issues, many critics of the war on drugs hope to reform
international drug laws in 2016 during the next General Assembly Special Session on drugs.¶ "There is tension with
the tax-and-regulate approach to marijuana in some jurisdictions," Malinowska-Sempruch said. "But it's all part of
a process and that's why we hope the UN debate in 2016 is as open as possible, so that we can settle some of
these questions and, if necessary, modernize the system."
That outweighs any link turn and any alt causes—claiming excess flexibility
undermines the US’s unique role in enforcing the treaty system
Bennett 14 [10/16/14, Wells C. Bennett is a Fellow in National Security Law at the
Brookings Institution; interviewed by Jonathan Rauch, Senior Fellow in Governance Studies
at Brookings, “Marijuana Legalization Poses a Dilemma for International Drug Treaties,”
http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/fixgov/posts/2014/10/16-marijuana-enforcementmodernize-international-drug-treaties-rauch]
Why should we care about avoiding a collision between international
commitments and domestic policies? Countries technically violate treaties all the
time, don’t they? The United States has a unique role in the world. It can summon
powers that no other nation can summon, but it confronts risks that no other nation
confronts. If you accept that premise, then the United States has a unique interest in
securing reciprocal compliance from its treaty partners. It gets harder and harder to
call out our partners for excessive flexibility within the drug treaty structures—or for
that matter within other multilateral commitments—after we have claimed a lot of
flexibility for ourselves.
2NC Link—AT LT/Aff Causes Reform
Unilateral action fails at resulting in treaty reform
Rolles 9 [2009, Stephen Rolles is a Senior Policy Analyst for Transform Drug Policy
Foundatio, “After the War on Drugs: Blueprint for Regulation”,
http://www.tdpf.org.uk/resources/publications/after-war-drugs-blueprint-regulation]
Given the near impossibility for substantial or meaningful reform to be achieved by
unilateral action, using the established administrative routes outlined in the various
articles of the drug treaties and related UN legal structures, the most credible and likely way
that the current treaty restrictions on exploring legal regulatory models for certain
substances will be loosened is clearly through some form of collective action, by a
coalition of reform minded states. This coalition would likely consist predominantly of an EU
bloc (presumably minus Sweden), a South and Central American bloc, possibly along with
New Zealand, Australia, Canada, and various others.
Unilateral legalization makes treaty reform impossible—singular reform
efforts generate opposition and prevent a unified amendment consensus
from forming
Jelsma 14 [2014, Martin Jelsma is the co-coordinator of the TNI's Drugs & Democracy
Programme with Tom Blickman, “The Rise and Decline of Cannabis Prohibition the History of
cannabis in the UN drug control system and options for reform: Treaty reform options,”
http://www.tni.org/files/download/rise_and_decline_ch4.pdf]
System-wide coherence group - With a growing awareness of the complex and cross-cutting
nature of drug policy has come an appreciation of the systemic tensions that exist between
the international drug control regime and other areas of the UN’s activities. Consequently,
concern for UN system-wide coherence may be sufficient to lead to the formation of an LMG
on the issue. Such an approach would be complementary not only to the spirit of the
broader UN ‘Delivering as One’ agenda,39 but also the more recent ‘One-UN’ approach
championed by the UNODC in relation to its work on transnational organized crime and drug
trafficking.40 Such a group might work to resolve tensions relating to a range of
issues including human rights, access to essential medicines, and HIV/AIDS. Mindful of
these concerns, this group would probably work to clarify further the place of harm
reduction relative to the treaty framework (i.e. in hard law) and could use the IS-26 as a
foundation. A System-wide coherence group could draw on a wide array of international
treaties and customary international law to place the drug conventions in legal context. The
bedrock of such discussion could, indeed, be the Charter of the United Nations, with the
LMG aiming to reconcile the drug control regime with the overarching aims of the UN –
peace and security, development and human rights.41 While there is a degree of overlap
within these potential groups, the route for treaty revision (denunciation, modification or
amendment) taken by them, or indeed by other revisionist LMGs, is likely to be driven by
a combination of group issue and group composition. This reality throws up an almost
infinite and most definitely daunting array of possible options. For example, a cannabis
regulation group might in one scenario use a different approach to that of a systemwide coherence group. While of course hypothetical, the likelihood that the former
would be relatively modest in size and generate considerable opposition suggests
that it would pursue a route to adjust the group members’ individual relationship
with the Single Convention rather than a more universally impactful revision of the
entire treaty via modification or amendment. Consequently, the route currently being
pursued by Bolivia in respect to coca, that is to say denunciation with re-accession and a
reservation, might be a promising, if potentially problematic, one to follow.42 Conversely, a
system-wide coherence group aiming to recalibrate and reconcile the regime to mesh with
other parts of the UN system on the issue of human rights, may, for example, generate
enough support to pursue an amendment to the treaty. Indeed, the human rights
issue may be one that could encourage coalescence and limit opposition.
The CP solves their link turns, but not the other way around—all of their
evidence describes the need for the US to pressure countries away from a
prohibitionist model, not for immediate unilateral legalization—the CP’s
amendment proposal does that, but the plan goes too far
Bennett and Walsh 14 [10/15/14, Wells Bennett & John Walsh are scholars at the
Brookings Institute, Marijuana Legalization is an Opportunity to Modernize International
Drug Treaties,
http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/research/files/reports/2014/10/15%20marijuana%20le
galization%20modernize%20drug%20treaties%20bennett%20walsh/cepmmjlegalizationv4.
pdf)
But there is another precedent to consider, too. Decades before Bolivia’s 2009 amendment
bid, there was another campaign to revise the 1961 Single Convention—one led by the
United States in the early 1970s and that culminated in a conference involving 97 parties
agreeing upon the 1972 Amending Protocol. To be sure, the drug treaties are not easy to
amend. But the United States played a central role in amending them before; it could
do the same once again. Such a revision would bring some needed coherence to the current
policy, and in that respect it might be a relatively easier sell. It is difficult to understand why
the United States (and, presumably, all other parties) should be entitled to the “flexibility”
needed to enact “different national strategies” vis-à-vis marijuana, notwithstanding
contrary treaty language; but at the same time should stoutly resist any attempts to rework the treaties so as to bring parties’ international obligations better into line with their
shifting domestic policies and practices. Said differently, if flexible, unilateral reinterpretation doesn’t offend the “integrity” of the treaties in principle then amendment—a
process established in the treaties themselves—should not offend it either, especially when
a proposed amendment would only codify the status quo, and not undercut the United
States’ current drug policy priorities. This raises a related point: the United States has
unique leverage. Exit or the credible threat of exit, for example, has brought about key
changes in other multilateral treaties, including those establishing international
organizations.47 To be clear: we do not mean to draw any broad analogies between
those situations and this one, or to recommend threatening exit as even a
tentative negotiating strategy. But it would be wrong to downplay the importance, to
other drug treaty signatories, of the United States’ continued law enforcement and other
drug treaty-based cooperation worldwide. Those signatories have a strong interest in
keeping the United States within the drug treaties, and happily so. All of that stands to help
the United States in building the international consensus needed to pass an amendment
along the lines set forth above.
The plan doesn’t cause denunciation or treaty withdrawal or reacession—
the aff’s immediate and unilateral legalization means it results in action
that violates a treaty before any change in our status to that treaty can be
made—treaty withdrawal is a legal procedure that takes time and before
that finishes completely the US is considered under legal obligation to the
treaty—even if the US does withdraw it still decks our cred
Don 14 [2014, Allison Don is a University of Minnesota Law School, J.D. candidate 2015,
“Lighten Up: Amending the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs” 23 Minn. J. Int'l L. 213,
Hein Online]
Another option is to withdraw from the Single Convention altogether, thus leaving the treaty intact
but removing any legal obligations formed on behalf of the United States. n146 The [*235] process of
withdraw, referred to as denunciation in the Single Convention , simply calls for a
written statement to the Secretary-General of the United Nations. n147 The
withdrawing party will then be relieved of all obligations no later than six months following
receipt of the statement by the Secretary-General. n148 Withdraw, or denunciation, is always an
option but does not "affect any right, obligation or legal situation of the parties
created through the execution of the treaty prior to its termination." n149 Thus, the
United States would remain responsible for the current breach emanating from Washington and Colorado despite a
Withdraw also carries with it certain negative consequences,
such as international isolation, trade sanctions, removal of financial assistance and a
damaged reputation. n151 By recently withdrawing from, or failing to ratify, at least 10 treaties, the United
States has already "cast doubt on its commitment to multilateral cooperation." n152 As withdraw is not a
feasible means to circumvent accountability for the current violation, the potential
ramifications of withdraw from the Single Convention outweigh any benefits.
potential decision to withdraw. n150
Treaty withdrawal is the least defensible—destroys the treaty
Jelsma 14 [2014, Martin Jelsma is the co-coordinator of the TNI's Drugs & Democracy
Programme with Tom Blickman, “The Rise and Decline of Cannabis Prohibition the History of
cannabis in the UN drug control system and options for reform: Treaty reform options,”
http://www.tni.org/files/download/rise_and_decline_ch4.pdf]
The Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties provides that historical “error” and
“fundamental change of circumstances” (rebus sic stantibus, literally “things thus standing”)
can be grounds for invalidating a state’s consent to a treaty.34 According to Leinwand, “[I]f
the fundamental situation underlying treaty provisions becomes so changed that continued
performance of the treaty will not fulfil the objective that was originally intended, the
performance of those obligations may be excused.” In an early attempt to legally
accommodate cannabis reforms beyond the treaty latitude, he argued in 1971 for the
applicability of those clauses to justify “selective denunciation” from the cannabis provisions
under the 1961 Single Convention. The inclusion of cannabis, he wrote, “was a mistake,
based on the erroneous scientific and medical information generally available to the
delegates when the treaty was drafted”.35 The highly politicized and scientifically dubious
history of how cannabis ended up in the 1961 treaty would definitely support Leinwand’s
conclusion. The use of the rebus sic stantibus doctrine and the option of “selective
denunciation”, however, are rarities in international law. The Beckley Foundation’s Global
Cannabis Commission report, therefore, concluded in 2008 that “taking this path might
be less legally defensible than denunciation and reaccession with reservations”,
which would have the same end result.36 Withdrawing from the UN drug control
conventions completely is likely to trigger even stronger condemnations than seen in
the case of Bolivia, and may have serious political, economic and reputational
repercussions.37 For countries receiving development aid or benefitting from preferential
trade agreements, sanctions from the U.S. and the European Union would probably be
unavoidable. Adherence to all three drug control conventions has been made an explicit
condition in several other agreements, not only in the sphere of trade and development but
it is also a sine qua non for accession to the European Union, for example. Very few
countries would be able to confront such pressures alone. Also, most countries now
struggling to abide by all its strictures and considering options for change want to keep
significant parts of the international drug-control regime intact, not least its control system
for production, trade and availability of drugs for medicinal purposes.
The single convention prohibits new reservations after initial ratification—
reacceeding to the treaty would still violate
Don 14 [2014, Allison Don is a University of Minnesota Law School, J.D. candidate 2015,
“Lighten Up: Amending the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs” 23 Minn. J. Int'l L. 213,
Hein Online]
When becoming party to a treaty, there exists an option to make "a unilateral statement ...
whereby it purports to exclude or modify the legal effect of certain provisions of the treaty
in their application to that state." n141 This option is known as a reservation which allows a
state to "fine-tune or adjust the way in which a multilateral treaty will apply to it." n142 In
relation to the Single Convention, at least three countries entered into reservations stating
that the use of marijuana would be permitted within their territories for non-medical or
scientific purposes; the United States was not one of them. n143 Initial logic would hold
that the United States could simply enter into a reservation now permitting the use of
marijuana for recreational purposes. However, the Single Convention expressly prohibits
the statement of reservations following initial accession to the treaty, stating that
reservations may be made "at the time of signature, ratification or accession." n144 By not
stating a reservation pertaining to marijuana at the time of accession, the United States was
barred from doing so in the future. n145 Thus, a reservation permitting the use of
recreational marijuana is not a feasible means of avoiding the obligations under
the Single Convention.
Reacession trades off with long term reforms and undermines the treaty
system
Jelsma 14 [2014, Martin Jelsma is the co-coordinator of the TNI's Drugs & Democracy
Programme with Tom Blickman, “The Rise and Decline of Cannabis Prohibition the History of
cannabis in the UN drug control system and options for reform: Treaty reform options,”
http://www.tni.org/files/download/rise_and_decline_ch4.pdf]
A downside to this approach, besides the already mentioned risk of creating precedents for
weakening other UN treaty regimes, is that it applies only to the reserving nation and that
unilateral escape mechanisms could reduce pressure on the treaty system to
undergo a multilateral and more fundamental process of reform and
modernization. It is in effect a one-off fix for an individual state and could not be
applied regularly. Nonetheless, the procedure is worthy of consideration under specific
circumstances, especially after other avenues for creating more flexibility on a particular
topic have been explored and failed.
2NR
US and marijuana key on this issue and outweighs their drones and other
countries thumper
Bennett 14
[10/16/14, Wells C. Bennett is a Fellow in National Security Law at the Brookings
Institution; interviewed by Jonathan Rauch, Senior Fellow in Governance Studies at
Brookings, “Marijuana Legalization Poses a Dilemma for International Drug Treaties,”
http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/fixgov/posts/2014/10/16-marijuana-enforcementmodernize-international-drug-treaties-rauch]
Why should we care about avoiding a collision between international
commitments and domestic policies? Countries technically violate treaties all the
time, don’t they? The United States has a unique role in the world. It can summon
powers that no other nation can summon, but it confronts risks that no other nation
confronts. If you accept that premise, then the United States has a unique interest in
securing reciprocal compliance from its treaty partners. It gets harder and harder to
call out our partners for excessive flexibility within the drug treaty structures—or for
that matter within other multilateral commitments—after we have claimed a lot of
flexibility for ourselves.