LD Nov/Dec 2017 - Development Assistance - Introduction

Resolved: Wealthy nations have an obligation to provide development assistance to other nations.

Introduction

In our state, the varsity season kicks off in November and runs into March. Luckily, the November-December topic usually serves as a good introduction to Lincoln-Douglas debate since we don't start early enough to debate the so-called novice topic which thus far, has not changed since its inception. For the most part, the NSDA has chosen pretty good topics for November which allow us to begin with well-balanced debates which are not overly complex. This is potentially a good topic with which to kick off the 2017-18 season.

We have seen similar topics in the recent past, for example:

2011 Nov/Dec.

Resolved: Individuals have a moral obligation to assist people in need.

2014 Mar/Apr

Resolved: Placing political conditions on humanitarian aid to foreign countries is unjust.

Anyone who has the slightest awareness of world affairs will know there is a great disparity between the nations in terms of their wealth and development. A few nations, such as the United States are very well developed and continue to amass great amounts of wealth. On the other hand, there are many nations throughout the world which are among the poorest on earth. There are nations in which food security is not assured, clean drinking water is scarce, personal security is at risk, and general living conditions result in the premature (yet preventable) deaths of millions each year. This resolution asks debaters to affirm that wealthy nations have an obligation to help these poorer nations attain a higher level of development. I think that conceptually, this resolution is clear enough. It is kind of like saying, the richer countries have a duty to help the poorer countries. However, we must note, the resolution is NOT saying wealthy nations should provide humanitarian aid such as food, water, medicine and shelter. It says, development assistance, so we need to clarify what is meant by development assistance. I think most debaters have a pretty good idea already about development. We can look to an area of empty land and as roads are cut through, utilities installed, buildings are erected we understand the area has progressed from undeveloped to developed. The area attains qualities which make it conducive for human thriving.

Bright-lines and Thresholds

Debaters often talk about bright-lines. Basically a "bright-line" is an imaginary line of demarcation between what is topical and what is not topical. In this case, the affirmative side of the debate will claim wealthy nations have a duty to do something. Clearly, any affirmative case which states non-wealthy nations have a duty would be considered non-topical. So the questions is, what is the bright-line between wealthy and non-wealthy? Where do we draw the line between nations which have a duty to provide assistance and those that do not, and where do we draw the line between those which require assistance and those that do not? The bright-lines, then are a kind of threshold between those who have the duty and those who do not; those who qualify for assistance and those who do not.

I do believe, this topic is perfectly debatable without any need to draw very specific lines of demarcation. For example, there is probably no need to define a wealthy nation as one which has a gross domestic product (GDP) which exceeds a certain dollar amount. But I do think, debaters need to think about and prepare themselves to deal with questions about how "wealthy nations" is defined, and who are the "other nations" specified in the resolution. This may be especially important for those debaters who take a more pragmatic approach to their cases (as discussed below). So having said this, let's look at the definitions.

Definitions

Wealthy nations

We can start off by breaking this into two words. Merriam Webster defines wealthy as "having wealth: very affluent" and "wealth" as "abundance of valuable material possessions or resources". It further defines "nation" as "a community of people composed of one or more nationalities and possessing a more or less defined territory and government". We could think of a nation as an independent country with its own government. It is not easy to find a specific definition for "wealthy nations" which provides the kind of clear threshold discussed above. In fact, the World Bank suggests, the determination of "wealth" for nations involves factors outside of GDP.

Wealth Accounting supplements macroeconomic indicators, such as Gross Domestic Product (GDP), by measuring the comprehensive wealth of a country. While changes in GDP tell us if growth is occurring, changes in wealth (i.e., saving rate) tell us if growth is sustainable-that is, whether it is long-term. So, just as private companies are assessed by looking at both income and balance sheets, countries need to start accounting for wealth and not just income.
For the past 15 years, the World Bank’s Environment and Natural Resources Global Practice has implemented a program to systematically measure comprehensive wealth, to include natural resources, human, and social capital, along with physical capital. This work program provides indicators that measure the sustainability of a country’s growth path: some indicators are published annually, such as Adjusted Net Saving (ANS) and adjusted Net National Income (aNNI), while the comprehensive wealth accounts were published in 2011. Related annual indicators also include natural resource rents, which underlie the wealth accounting data.

have an obligation

According to Merriam Webster, an obligation is "something (such as a formal contract, a promise, or the demands of conscience or custom) that obligates one to a course of action" and "to obligate" means "to bind legally or morally".

to provide

For this definition, I again look to the Merriam Webster dictionary for the transitive verb, "to provide", which states, "to supply or make available (something wanted or needed)"

development assistance

Since we are dealing with terminology related to nations, I have selected a definition provided by the "The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)", which defines 'official development assistance (ODA)' as:

The DAC defines ODA as “those flows to countries and territories on the DAC List of ODA Recipients and to multilateral institutions which are:
i.  provided by official agencies, including state and local governments, or by their executive agencies; and
ii.  each transaction of which:

a)  is administered with the promotion of the economic development and welfare of developing countries as its main objective; and
b)  is concessional in character and conveys a grant element of at least 25 per cent (calculated at a rate of discount of 10 per cent).”

other nations

The 'other nations' in the resolution would be those deemed eligible to receive development funds. As with the difficulty in defining wealthy nations, the bright-line for deciding who is eligible for development aid is nebulous. However, I will again refer to the OECD to provide some clarity.

The DAC List of ODA Recipients shows all countries and territories eligible to receive official development assistance (ODA). These consist of all low and middle income countries based on gross national income (GNI) per capita as published by the World Bank, with the exception of G8 members, EU members, and countries with a firm date for entry into the EU. The list also includes all of the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) as defined by the United Nations (UN).

The Major Frameworks

Having attempted to provide some modicum of definition to the resolution we can now look at several approaches to this topic which I will explore more deeply when I present the Affirmative position in a later post. In Lincoln Douglas and other forms of debate we refer to the case framework. The framework is the underlying mechanism established by the debater for the judge to evaluate the winner or loser. Typically this amounts to arguing the side which best adheres to certain defined criteria should be the one preferred by the judge. In Lincoln Douglas debate, Affirmative will typically claim some change or action must be taken in order to preserve or defend some over-arching value or principle (such as justice, equality, liberty, etc.). The case then provides the judge with a means for measuring how well the case protects the threatened value. This value goal and its associated measuring guideline is the framework.

This topic can lend itself to two principle kinds of frameworks. One approach is pragmatic. The debater can look at dollars and cents, life expectancies, infant mortality rates, GDPs and other measurable criteria and create a kind of cost-benefit comparison which the judge can use to determine a winner. A second approach is more philosophical. For example, a debater may argue that individuals and by extension nations have a moral obligation to assist the needy and so the judge should prefer the side which best adheres to certain standards of moral or right behavior in meeting the goal of preserving an over-arching value. It is also possible to create a case which incorporates elements of pragmatism and philosophy but these can be more complex to argue.

For more on this topic, past topics or other information about how to develop a Lincoln Douglas case, select the Lincoln-Douglas page tab at the top of this post.