Instigator / Pro
4
1641
rating
63
debates
65.08%
won
Topic
#2333
TOURNAMENT R(2): Speedrace vs MisterChris
Status
Finished
The debate is finished. The distribution of the voting points and the winner are presented below.
Winner & statistics
Better arguments
0
3
Better sources
2
2
Better legibility
1
1
Better conduct
1
1
After 1 vote and with 3 points ahead, the winner is...
MisterChris
Judges
whiteflame
27 debates /
202 votes
Voted
Tags
Parameters
- Publication date
- Last updated date
- Type
- Standard
- Number of rounds
- 4
- Time for argument
- Three days
- Max argument characters
- 30,000
- Voting period
- One week
- Point system
- Multiple criterions
- Voting system
- Judges
Contender / Con
7
1762
rating
45
debates
88.89%
won
Description
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1bhNN3TEx1wJmf_Tq2yevvEvAhyIFOmKJYkBN_DLumOA/edit
Round 1
Pro
#1
Topic:
On Balance, Economic Globalization Benefits Worldwide Poverty Reduction.
Definition(s) and Scope:
On balance: "after considering the impacts of both sides of a question"Economic Globalization: “the increasing interdependence of world economies."
Poverty: "The state of being so financially poor that one's needs are not fully met."
Benefits the reduction of world poverty: "Decreases the amount of people in poverty worldwide"
Therefore,
if I manage to prove that economic globalization decreases the amount of people
in poverty worldwide and that the positives of it do not outweigh the negatives,
then I have won the debate.
The
scope of this debate is to look at the present in the entire world.
BoP:
The burden of proof is shared between Pro and Con. This means that I must prove that economic globalization is beneficial to the reduction of worldwide poverty, and that the positives associated with economic globalization outweigh the negatives. My opponent must prove that economic globalization is not beneficial to the reduction of worldwide poverty and/or that the negatives associated with economic globalization outweigh the positives. It is not enough to only respond to the other's arguments; both sides are responsible for providing evidence for their position.
Debate Structure:
R1: Pro Constructive and
Con Constructive/Rebuttal
R2-R3: Fluid Attack/Defense
R4: Fluid Attack/Defense & Conclusion
Rules:
1. No new arguments made in the final round
2. No trolling
3. You must follow the debate structure
4. No plagiarism
5. Must follow debate definitions
If the ruleset is broken,
the penalty will be the loss of a conduct point. By accepting the debate, the
contender accepts the rules and the penalty.
My opponent should make sure to accept/contend the definitions, scope, and BoP in his opening round.
Arguments:
Contention 1: Empirical Evidence that Economic Globalization
has Reduced Worldwide Poverty
There are many studies showing that globalization has reduced
poverty worldwide.
On Balance, Economic Globalization Benefits Worldwide Poverty Reduction.
Definition(s) and Scope:
On balance: "after considering the impacts of both sides of a question"Economic Globalization: “the increasing interdependence of world economies."
Poverty: "The state of being so financially poor that one's needs are not fully met."
Benefits the reduction of world poverty: "Decreases the amount of people in poverty worldwide"
BoP:
The burden of proof is shared between Pro and Con. This means that I must prove that economic globalization is beneficial to the reduction of worldwide poverty, and that the positives associated with economic globalization outweigh the negatives. My opponent must prove that economic globalization is not beneficial to the reduction of worldwide poverty and/or that the negatives associated with economic globalization outweigh the positives. It is not enough to only respond to the other's arguments; both sides are responsible for providing evidence for their position.
Also, it is not my job to outline the negatives
of economic globalization, and likewise, it is not my opponent's job to outline
the positives of economic globalization. We only need to respond to the
negatives/positives outlined by each other. If my opponent does not outline any
negatives and I outline positives, I de facto win. If I provide no positives
and he provides negatives, he de facto wins.
Debate Structure:
R2-R3: Fluid Attack/Defense
R4: Fluid Attack/Defense & Conclusion
1. No new arguments made in the final round
2. No trolling
3. You must follow the debate structure
4. No plagiarism
5. Must follow debate definitions
My opponent should make sure to accept/contend the definitions, scope, and BoP in his opening round.
Arguments:
“By combining the recent country survey data of household consumption with latest figures on private consumption growth, Brookings Institution researchers Laurence Chandy and Geoffrey Gertz generated poverty estimates to the present day. They conclude that the world –even stubborn Sub-Saharan Africa–is in the midst of rapid poverty reduction; they credit economic growth and widespread development brought by globalization. “ [1]
Their study found that “between 2005 and 2010, the total number of poor people around the world fell by nearly half a billion, from over 1.3 billion in 2005 to under 900 million in 2010. Poverty reduction of this magnitude is unparalleled in history: never before have so many people been lifted out of poverty over such a brief period of time.” [2]
Not only is poverty falling at massive rates, but the
experts witnessing this trend specifically credit economic globalization for
it.
“The global poverty rate, which stood at 25 percent in 2005, is ticking downwards at one to two percentage points a year, lifting around 70 million people –the population of Turkey or Thailand –out of destitution annually.“ [1]
As the world has become more interdependent
economically, the poverty has consistently dropped annually.
Contention 2:The Countries With The Fastest Reducing Poverty Are the Most Globalized
Contention 2:The Countries With The Fastest Reducing Poverty Are the Most Globalized
“The poor countries that display the greatest success today are those that are engaging with the global economy, allowing market prices to balance supply and demand and to allocate scarce resources, and pursuing sensible and strategic economic policies to spur investment, trade and job creation. It’s this potent combination that sets the current period apart from a history of insipid growth and intractable poverty.” [1]
This shows that more globalization directly leads to less poverty.
Contention 3: Even When Other Variables Are Controlled For, Poverty Still Decreases
“To gain knowledge about potential mediators in the globalization-poverty relationship we add a number of control variables to the baseline regression: The average level of education in the population over 15 years old, the share of the population residing in urban areas, and the government final consumption expenditure as a share of GDP and inflation… including all the above control variables in the same specification changes little except for small reductions in the size of the globalization coefficients suggesting that there is something else in the globalization process benefiting the poor.” [3]
So even when we control for other variables
in this process, we still see that economic globalization overwhelmingly reduces
poverty worldwide.
Conclusion:
Because of the factors so discussed,
economic globalization does indeed benefit worldwide poverty reduction.
Sources:
1. http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/content/little-notice-globalization-reduced-poverty
2. https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/01_global_poverty_chandy_execsumm.pdf
3. https://sci-hub.tw/10.1016/j.worlddev.2014.04.007
Conclusion:
2. https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/01_global_poverty_chandy_execsumm.pdf
3. https://sci-hub.tw/10.1016/j.worlddev.2014.04.007
Con
#2
Thanks, Speedrace
RESOLVED: On balance, economic globalization benefits worldwide poverty reduction.
CON agrees to provided definitions & ruleset.
CON agrees to shared BoP, since both instigator and contender are presenting constructives.
OBSERVATIONS:
- There are two types of poverty: absolute and relative. If PRO can only reduce one but not the other, they do not fulfill their BoP (as it would not result in a net reduction of poverty, only absolute poverty). Wikipedia gives definitions of the two:
“Absolute poverty is the complete lack of the means necessary to meet basic personal needs, such as food, clothing, and shelter.[3] The threshold at which absolute poverty is defined is always about the same, independent of the person's permanent location or era.
On the other hand, relative poverty occurs when a person cannot meet a minimum level of living standards, compared to others in the same time and place. Therefore, the threshold at which relative poverty is defined varies from one country to another, or from one society to another.”
- PRO has made little effort to show a decline in relative poverty. Only absolute poverty.
- When weighing impacts, voters should prioritize long-term impacts over short-term ones.
CONSTRUCTIVE
CONTENTION 1: A PERMANENT LOWER CLASS
Globalization exacerbates inequality, leading to crippled poverty reduction and empowerment of wealthy elites... The end result is a permanent lower class. It is a problem when “the richest 1% in the world have more than double the wealth of 6.9 billion people.”
There are at least 3 reasons:
- OUTSOURCING
According to Investopedia, “the outsourcing of labor overseas is a natural result of the globalization of markets, and businesses' drive to cut costs to maximize profits.”
If companies can outsource labor for a lower cost, they will do so at the expense of their local labor population. For example, in the US, “international trade depressed wages for non-college educated workers by 5.5 percent, costing the average worker $1,800.”
If this wasn’t already bad, in the process, they also exacerbate already highly unequal wealth distributions in developing nations. The Economist explains:
“Contrary to popular belief, multinationals in poor countries often employ skilled workers and pay high wages. One study showed that workers in foreign-owned and subcontracting clothing and footwear factories in Vietnam rank in the top 20% of the country’s population by household expenditure. A report from the OECD found that average wages paid by foreign multinationals are 40% higher than wages paid by local firms. What is more, those skilled workers often get to work with managers from rich countries, or might have to meet the deadlines of an efficient rich-world company. That may boost their productivity. Higher productivity means they can demand even higher wages. By contrast, unskilled workers, or poor ones in rural areas, tend not to have such opportunities.”
(Here is another link for anyone blocked by a paywall)
The result is simple: while a segment of the workforce enriches itself off of foreign multinationals, the rest of the population suffers a different fate. The end result is a growth of inequality within the nation.
This is evidenced by the World Inequality Report in 2018, where they find:
“In 2016, the share of total national income accounted for by just that nation’s top 10% earners (top 10% income share) was 37% in Europe, 41% in China, 46% in Russia, 47% in US-Canada, and around 55% in Sub-Saharan Africa, Brazil, and India. In the Middle East, the world’s most unequal region according to our estimates, the top capture 61% of national income”
AND
“since 1980, income inequality has increased rapidly in North America, China, India, and Russia. Inequality has grown moderately in Europe.” The sole exceptions are the countries in the Middle East, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Brazil… Their inequality has stayed stable at soaring high levels.
- MARKET INSTABILITY
Globalization leads to capital-account liberalization. This destroys all barriers to capital flow in/out of countries, and the end result is shaky and volatile markets.
Siddarth Mohandas, originally writing for the Council on Foreign Relations, elaborates:
“Although open capital markets bring some benefits, such as foreign direct investment, they also create a substantial risk of instability. Despite this, the IMF, believing that free capital markets make economies more efficient, pushed liberalization onto developing countries...The problem with full capital-account liberalization is that it allows speculative “hot money” to flow into a developing economy–funds that can be pulled out overnight at the slightest shift in investor confidence.”
The result is high instability and periodic recessions. For example, in the 2008 Great Recession, the crisis was greatly exacerbated by the volatile state of the global markets. In fact, in his book “The Multiple Faces of Globalisation,” Jordi Canals comments:
“the crisis has brought out the fact that it is not possible to construct a stable global economy, nor a balanced globalization process, on the basis of such fundamental imbalances in the foreign accounts of the large economies.”
Unfortunately, these recessions disproportionately affect the poor in developing nations.
The Global Policy Forum gives examples:
“In Korea, Mexico and Thailand, financial crises reduced the income shares of the bottom 80 percent of households compared to the top 20 percent. In Mexico, the accompanying recession in 1995 led the poor to take their children out of school – and many never returned. In developing countries, the bank bailouts that follow crises generate high public debt (amounting to 10 to 40 per cent of annual GDP compared to 2-3 per cent on average in advanced economies). High public debt keeps domestic interest rates high, stifling investment, growth and job creation – all bad for the poor.”
The end result is more inequality.
- CORPORATE GREED
Historically, multinational corporations have pocketed their profit and refused to raise wages.
In fact, inequality within the workers at a company is observed to increase 50% when the company is multinational, according to the US Department of Commerce. “On average, the CEO-to-worker pay ratio is about 50 percent higher among the exporting and multinational firms than among domestic firms.”
They further:
“The key mechanism is that the gains from trade are not distributed evenly within the same firm. The compensation of an executive is positively linked to the size of the firm, while the wage paid to the workers is determined in a country- wide labor market. Any extra profit earned in the foreign markets benefits the executives more than the average worker.”
In other words, CEOs are pocketing money while their workers stay underpaid.
No, literally, underpaid.
Two brothers testify that “they worked 12 hours a day, six days a week, for $120 to $200 a month, far less than they are required to be paid by law. When government inspectors visit the factory, the young brothers are given the day off, they said.”
RECALL also that these workers are in the top percentiles of their countries, and many of them are skilled. Even they are underpaid.
CONTENTION 2: ENVIRONMENTAL ANNIHILATION
With globalization comes an increase in consumption, production, and movement that has a high cost. Global trade and interactions have harmed the environment and definitively led to a change in the world's climate along with a loss of biodiversity.
- TRASH DUMPING
According to the World Bank,
“Around the world, waste generation rates are rising. In 2016, the worlds’ cities generated 2.01 billion tonnes of solid waste, amounting to a footprint of 0.74 kilograms per person per day. With rapid population growth and urbanization, annual waste generation is expected to increase by 70% from 2016 levels to 3.40 billion tonnes in 2050.”
They further:
“In low-income countries, over 90% of waste is often disposed of in unregulated dumps or openly burned. These practices create serious health, safety, and environmental consequences.”
If that weren’t bad enough, developed nations are dumping huge amounts of waste in these developing nations.
“Between 400,000 and 1 million people die each year in developing countries because of diseases caused by mismanaged waste, estimates poverty charity Tearfund.”
This is a problem that can be blamed almost exclusively on globalization. With disease and trash ravaging poor nations, it can be assumed it not only substantially hinders progress in the eradication of poverty, but kills millions of people. Surely, the voter would agree that this is not a cost we want to pay, both on logical and ethical grounds.
- GLOBAL WARMING
As said before, globalization brings an increase in consumption, production, and movement that has a high cost.
Production of goods on mass scale makes a sizable chunk of world carbon emissions, and with globalization this percentage is growing.
According to EPA:
“Industry (21% of 2010 global greenhouse gas emissions): Greenhouse gas emissions from industry primarily involve fossil fuels burned on site at facilities for energy. “
Globalization also increases global movement, leading to increased emissions.
“Transportation (14% of 2010 global greenhouse gas emissions): Greenhouse gas emissions from this sector primarily involve fossil fuels burned for road, rail, air, and marine transportation. Almost all (95%) of the world's transportation energy comes from petroleum-based fuels, largely gasoline and diesel.”
The results are a huge increase in CO2 over time.
“Global carbon emissions from fossil fuels have significantly increased since 1900. Since 1970, CO2 emissions have increased by about 90%, with emissions from fossil fuel combustion and industrial processes contributing about 78% of the total greenhouse gas emissions increase from 1970 to 2011.”
- IMPACT
The impacts are devastating, especially to the poor.
By 2030, globalization will lead to more than double the current global warming death rate:
“Researchers believe that global warming is already responsible for some 150,000 deaths each year around the world, and fear that the number may well double by 2030 even if we start getting serious about emissions reductions today.”
The result is millions upon millions of deaths spanned over decades. What’s worse? These are mostly impoverished lives.
According to the Guardian:
“Maarten van Aalst, director of the Red Cross climate centre and an author of the report, said the agency was already seeing evidence that the poor were being hit hardest in weather-related disasters.
"It's the poor suffering more during disasters, and of course the same hazard causes a much bigger disaster in poorer countries, making it even poorer," he said.”
RECALL: Economic hardships disproportionately affect the poor, especially in a globalized economy.
Even currently, globalization has a vast effect on people’s lives:
“Weather catastrophes in the United States have incurred a cost of over $1 trillion in damages over the past 30 years. Climate disruption has driven up food prices increased the risk of West Nile outbreaks across the U.S. and helped fuel wildfires that caused over $1 billion in damages in 2013.”
Furthermore, over 40% of the world’s population live on coasts. Sea-level rise is accelerating, and that is currently forcing some to migrate inwards, and will force millions of others in the future to also. Ripping people from their homes is a surefire way to ruin any progress we make erasing poverty.
The dire news doesn’t stop here. According to MercyCorp,
“Research suggests the planet has lost around one-third of its arable land over the past 40 years, in large part due to climate disasters and poor conservation, and every year more trees and soil are lost. More than 1.3 billion people live on deteriorating agricultural land, putting them at risk of depleted harvests that can lead to worsening hunger, poverty and displacement. Soil is being lost between 10 and 100 times faster than it is forming.”
This is bad, because according to the same source, 3/4ths of impoverished people depend on agriculture to survive.
REFUTATIONS
A/2 PRO Contention 1
Even if the voter bought all of PRO’s 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Contentions, CON’s case would STILL outweigh because the voter should prioritize long-term impacts over short-term ones.
That said, there are intrinsic errors in the way conclusions are made in PRO’s sources.
According to ScienceDirect,
“standard poverty numbers––the ones normally used in discussions about the state of the world––come from the World Bank's data set.”
These data sets are flawed due to 2 reasons too technical for CON to properly summarize. Instead, CON will cite the proper source.
a. Large Margin of Error
“There are several reasons to expect a large margin of error, regardless of direction. First, the poverty headcount is very sensitive to the precise level of the international poverty lines… Second, the poverty headcount is very sensitive to the reliability of household surveys of income and expenditure. The available surveys are of widely varying quality, and many do not follow a standard template...Third, China and India, the two most important countries for the overall trend, have PPP-adjusted income figures that contain an even bigger component of guess work than for most other significant countries.“
b. Downward Bias
“Further sources of error bias the results downward, making the number of people in poverty seem lower than it really is; and the bias probably increases over time, making the trend look rosier than it is....First, the Bank's international poverty line underestimates the income or expenditure needed for an individual (or household) to avoid periods of food-clothing-shelter consumption too low to maintain health and well-being...Third, future “updating” of the international poverty line will continue artificially to lower the true numbers, because average consumption patterns (on which the international poverty line is based) are shifting toward services whose prices relative to food and shelter are lower in poor than in rich countries, giving the false impression that the cost of the basic consumption goods required by the poor is falling.”
Even if the voter does not buy this, consider this source that actually finds the opposite of PRO’s.
“the whole truth is that rapid population growth has actually increased the absolute number of poor people in Africa, from 278 million to 413 million.“
This should demonstrate to the voter the unreliability of poverty numbers in general.
RECALL: CON’s first contention demonstrating why inequality and greed create a permanent lower class in these nations. Also recall the long-term effects of global warming and trash dumping.
A/2 PRO Contention 2
Apply all of the above refutations.
Additionally, CON urges the voter to consider China, who is one of the most globalized nations in the world, and yet their poverty decline has no link to their status as a globalized nation… Even according to PRO’s own data. “The annual national poverty estimates as well as World Bank estimates referred to above show that the largest part of the decline in poverty already happened by the mid-1980s, before the big strides in foreign trade and investment in China in the 1990s and later.”
A/2 PRO Contention 3
Apply all of the above refutations.
VERDICT:
PRO’s data is unreliable, and real world facts point to a system in which the poor are abused by the elite and made to be a permanent lower class. Even if the voter doesn’t buy that, however, the voter will surely agree CON’s Contention 2 outweighs all of PRO’s impact by far in the long run.
Back to you, Speedrace.
Round 2
Pro
#3
Con Observations:
Firstly, CON claims that PRO loses the debate if PRO cannot
prove that economic globalization causes a decrease in absolute and relative
poverty. This is false because this was not specified in the debate resolution.
If it was, the resolution would read “On balance, economic globalization benefits
worldwide absolute and relative poverty reduction.”
REFUTATIONS
CON Contention 1:
While giving a lot of evidence to back up his position, CON fails
to give any real studies showing a strong correlation between globalization and
inequality, instead relying on logical induction. A voter should always weigh
scientific studies over logical induction as the former analyzes the data more
closely than the latter.
In fact, experts have confirmed that globalization does not
increase income inequality.
To put it in other words, consider a resolution
saying X factor reduces the amount of fruit in the world. If PRO was to argue X
factor reduces the amount of apples in the world, while not affecting the
amount of other kinds of fruit, PRO would still be meeting their BoP because
they have shown an overall decrease in fruit – the type does not matter. Similarly,
when PRO shows a decrease in absolute poverty, PRO shows an overall decrease in
poverty and therefore meets PRO’s BoP.
Beyond this, the definition of poverty
was already agreed to, and relative poverty does not fit into that definition.
Therefore, it is not PRO's BoP to prove that globalization decreases relative
poverty. By trying to change the definition of poverty, CON is breaking the ruleset.
REFUTATIONS
“Income inequality is measured by the Kuznets ratio and the Gini coefficient. Globalisation and the poverty and income inequality measures are first analysed through linear regression. The results show that high levels of globalisation relate to low levels of poverty, suggesting that globalisation improves the situation of the poor in developing countries. The results also show that globalisation reduces income inequality. By having tested globalisation with different poverty and income inequality measures, we see that there are no differences when poverty is defined in relative or absolute terms. This shows that the argument often used, that poverty might be reduced by globalisation but income inequality worsens, has been proven wrong…When globalisation is related to income inequality the globalisation coefficient becomes insignificant, showing that income inequality is than explained by unobserved regional heterogeneity and no longer by globalisation.” [1]
Not only does this evidence show that globalization has
little relationship with income inequality, but that income inequality is
caused by regional heterogeneity, explaining the factors that CON outlined.
Other experts confirm this:
“’Ravallion (2001, p. 1813) deals with the same issue but takes a prudent position, pointing to the need for “more micro, country-specific, research on the factors determining why some poor people are able to take up the opportunities afforded by an expanding economy (...) while others are not’. A similar conclusion is reached by the CEPR (2002, p. 67) report to the European Commission Group of Policy advisors, which stresses that ‘there is no strong evidence that globalization-related phenomena observed during the last two decades or so have contributed to increasing within-country inequality’.”[2]
Voters should agree that PRO’s arguments outweigh CON's because they are
supported by the analysis of multiple experts, while CON’s is not.
CON Contention 2:
CON has outlined contributions that globalization has made
to the environment. PRO would like to remind the voter that this debate is
about the world poverty, and therefore environmental arguments are outside of
the scope of this debate. Furthermore, CON’s specific impact looks to the
future, while the scope of this debate was defined to specifically be the
present, and CON agreed with this. These impacts are important to analyzing the
overall merits of globalization, but do not pertain to this specific debate.
Even if voters allow CON’s impacts, CON’s arguments are not true.
Firstly, trash dumping is a non-unique argument because it
is specifically motivated by “rapid population growth and
urbanization,” two things
that would continue to grow regardless of economic globalization.
Secondly, globalization is not the main culprit of environmental
problems.
“Of course, globalization has an impact on the environment, but it is a mixed one and generally far less scary than many people think. Most ecological problems are still local as opposed to global, and while cross-border integration can make the environment dirtier in some places, it can also help with cleaning it up.” [5]
While some
effects can be attributed to globalization, the issue is not as bad as CON
would want you to think. Beyond this, globalization is necessary in order to
prevent further environmental destruction.
“Climate change is by far the most difficult environmental externality of all to combat because of its (unusual) distance-insensitivity. Therefore, in order to tackle it we need more, rather than less, international cooperation.” [5]
Countries
separating now would only make the issue worse. Therefore, if voters allow CON’s
impact, it actually works for PRO by showing why globalization is even more
necessary.
And finally,
even if voters allow CON’s impact and reject PRO’s analysis of it, PRO offers a
counter-impact. According to a study, individual and area-level poverty killed
172,000 people in the U.S. in 2000 alone [6]. If that is what happened
in America, imagine how many hundreds of thousands more deaths must have occurred
in other countries. Having no economic globalization means allowing this number to grow higher. This clearly outweighs CON’s impact by far.
DEFENSE
PRO’s Contentions:
CON presents a source outlining why World Bank data is flawed. This source’s claims on margins of error can be summarized as follows:
PRO would like to point out what CON’s source
says directly afterwards:
CON presents a source outlining why World Bank data is flawed. This source’s claims on margins of error can be summarized as follows:
- Poverty headcount are sensitive to change in the
international poverty lines and to household surveys
- China and India’s numbers contain even more
guesswork
- There is bias within World Bank
“On the other hand, it is quite plausible that the proportion of the world's population living in extreme poverty has fallen over the past 20 years or so. For all the problems with Chinese and Indian income figures we know enough about trends in other variables––including life expectancy, heights, and other nonincome measures––to be confident that their poverty headcounts have indeed dropped dramatically over the past 20 years. If it is the case (as some experts claim) that household surveys are more likely to miss the rich than the poor, their results may overstate the proportion of the population in poverty. The magnitude of world population increase over the past 20 years is so large that the Bank's poverty numbers would have to be huge underestimates for the world poverty rate not to have fallen.” [4]
So even according to CON’s own source, it is “quite plausible”
that poverty rates have dramatically dropped. Furthermore, this claims that
household surveys may overstate the proportion of the population that is
in poverty. This is especially useful to PRO because the only World Bank data
that PRO’s strongest source (the study done by Laurence Chandy and Geoffrey
Gertz; source 2 in PRO’s round 1 speech)[1] uses is household surveys provided
by the World Bank, meaning it is possible that the original numbers stated in
PRO’s round 1 speech have understated the drop of poverty worldwide. The
international poverty line used was fixed and therefore sensitivity to change in
it is irrelevant.
CON also presents a source allegedly saying the opposite of
PRO’s main claim. This source does five things that CON has overlooked:
All this source has done is proved that population growth
has outpaced globalization efforts in Africa – but even in that scenario,
globalization is decreasing poverty, and PRO wins. Even if the voter buys CON’s
claim, this source looks only at Africa, which ignores the scope of the
debate. PRO’s sources look at the entire world.
Finally, CON claims that globalization had no effect on
China’s poverty reduction. Even if this claim is true, PRO’s sources still show
poverty decreasing around the world, and the scope of the debate is not just China.
Secondly, the source still says that globalization affected China and helped
it, simply less so than internal Chinese efforts. This means that globalization
did have a positive effect on China.
Conclusion:
PRO has shown:
Sources:
- Directly blames population growth, not
globalization, for the numbers – “rapid population growth has actually increased the
absolute number of poor people in Africa” [3]
- Directly states that the proportion of people in
poverty in Africa has decreased – “Overall, the proportion of people in Africa living in
monetary poverty has clearly declined, from 54% in 1990 to 41% in
2015," [3]
- Directly cites the World Bank, which CON claims is unreliable – “World Bank economist Luc Christiaensen said in the DW
interview” [3]
- Directly states that it is up to the governments
of Africa to reduce poverty – “20%
of all people in sub-Saharan Africa will still be living in poverty in 2030
unless the governments of Africa significantly step up their poverty reduction
efforts.” [3]
- Only looks at
Africa when the debate’s scope is the entire world.
- That income inequality is not caused by economic
globalization
- That CON’s environmental impacts are outside the scope of this debate, and that even if accepted by
voters, those impacts make globalization even more necessary
- That CON’s own sources backup PRO’s claims that
economic globalization decreases worldwide poverty
- That PRO’s data is not unreliable, and that even if voters accept CON’s argument that it is, PRO’s base claim is not
affected
- http://repec.iza.org/dp2223.pdf
- https://amsacta.unibo.it/4835/1/459.pdf
- https://www.dw.com/en/africa-more-poverty-despite-economic-growth/a-52840817
- https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305750X04000075
- https://hbr.org/2012/05/globalization-plays-a-bit-part
- https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21680937/
Con
#4
Thanks, Speedrace!
OBSERVATIONS DEFENSE:
“Firstly, CON claims that PRO loses the debate if PRO cannot prove that economic globalization causes a decrease in absolute and relative poverty. This is false because this was not specified in the debate resolution. If it was, the resolution would read “On balance, economic globalization benefits worldwide absolute and relative poverty reduction.””
PRO can not claim that because something is not specified within the resolution itself, it does not carry over to their BoP. Oftentimes, in order to prove one thing, it is implicitly required that other more specific things must be proven as well. For example, if I claim I am eradicating all terrorism, I am required to prove I am eradicating domestic and international terrorism since they terrorism is an umbrella term for the two.
“consider a resolution saying X factor reduces the amount of fruit in the world. If PRO was to argue X factor reduces the amount of apples in the world, while not affecting the amount of other kinds of fruit, PRO would still be meeting their BoP because they have shown an overall decrease in fruit – the type does not matter. Similarly, when PRO shows a decrease in absolute poverty, PRO shows an overall decrease in poverty and therefore meets PRO’s BoP.”
PRO’s response and metaphor ignores the fact that people in absolute poverty are also in relative poverty. This means that reducing absolute poverty does not mean that they leave the poverty umbrella. Ergo, a net reduction in absolute poverty does not translate into a net reduction in poverty in general.
“Beyond this, the definition of poverty was already agreed to, and relative poverty does not fit into that definition. Therefore, it is not PRO's BoP to prove that globalization decreases relative poverty. By trying to change the definition of poverty, CON is breaking the ruleset.”
CON did not change the definition of poverty in the least. The definition of terorrism is still “the unlawful use of violence and intimidation, especially against civilians, in the pursuit of political aims.” despite the obvious distinctions of domestic and international terrorism.
Similarly, the definition of poverty we agreed to was “"The state of being so financially poor that one's needs are not fully met." despite the clear and well-known distinction of relative and absolute poverty. As said above, poverty is functionally an umbrella term for many different things, this is why Wikipedia categorizes relative and absolute poverty under the same poverty entry.
CONTENTION 1 DEFENSE:
“While giving a lot of evidence to back up his position, CON fails to give any real studies showing a strong correlation between globalization and inequality, instead relying on logical induction. A voter should always weigh scientific studies over logical induction as the former analyzes the data more closely than the latter.”
Two responses:
a. PRO tries to portray CON’s case as relying on logic and induction alone. PRO is only half-right. It is true CON’s case uses solid logic and induction, but CON’s case also contains plentiful statistics and studies accompanying every point therein which the voter can view at their leisure.
b. Should studies always be the 1st say? Maybe not when the studies in question have been demonstrated to be largely speculative and varying widely in results.
IZA & UB:
PRO uses an IZA source and a University of Bologna source.
Six responses:
a. PRO’s IZA and University of Bologna sources use unreliable World Bank numbers, skewing the results.
b. PRO’s own IZA source immediately follows the PRO quote with:
“data availability has been cumbersome... For some countries the data was not available and data is included from earlier years. Furthermore, it would be much better to make use of panel data, to see how globalisation and poverty behaves over time. However, as mentioned earlier, this is very unlikely that this will ever be possible, due to the lack of proper data. Furthermore, the extended index is not yet developed well enough to our liking. One could argue for further additions to the index such as cultural effects and movement of skilled labour between countries.“
c. PRO’s own UB source immediately states in the introduction:
“Unfortunately, we still know very little about globalization, and for several reasons which can be summarized as follows: (i) globalization, inequality and poverty all suffer from severe measurement and definition shortcomings. Empirical analysis is therefore a minefield in which it is easy to lose one’s bearings; (ii) globalization (actually, this kind of globalization) is a quite recent phenomenon spanning the last twenty years, or less, of economic development; (iii) a priori assumptions and ideological factors typify the discussion on globalization, and they often give rise to biased interpretations.”
d. In a more recent, actual panel data analysis (unlike the previous studies), they find the opposite:
“the results show that economic freedom is associated with more
wage inequality, especially in Organisation for Economic Co-operation and
Development (OECD) countries. The estimation results from country groups
indicate that more deregulation is associated with more earnings inequality in
OECD countries.”
At the very least, the judge should recognize that studies on poverty and inequality vary greatly in quality and results. The judge should prioritize logic and real world facts.
e. The real world facts are, whether due to globalization or not, inequality is soaring and is keeping poor people poor. So even if the judge doesn’t buy the responses above, this negates any positive effect globalization might have.
RECALL: “since 1980, income inequality has increased rapidly in North America, China, India, and Russia. Inequality has grown moderately in Europe.” The sole exceptions are the countries in the Middle East, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Brazil… Their inequality has stayed stable at soaring high levels.”
f. Even if the judge does not buy every response above, they should still outweigh on the basis of CON’s 2nd Contention.
CONTENTION 2 DEFENSE:
“PRO would like to remind the voter that this debate is about the world poverty, and therefore environmental arguments are outside of the scope of this debate”
Globalization-induced environmental arguments are absolutely within the scope of the debate because they directly affect the livelihoods of the impoverished.
With death and disaster both economically and physically ravaging the poor, it is impossible to argue that globalization is a positive factor in poverty reduction.
“CON’s specific impact looks to the future, while the scope of this debate was defined to specifically be the present, and CON agreed with this.”
“On balance” implies that we are considering the overall effects of affirming or negating. That means that both the present and future should be weighed. And, as stated in CON’s observations, judges should prioritize long-term impacts because they cancel out short-term ones.
Lastly, CON never agreed to PRO’s interpretation (To be honest, CON overlooked it while writing their rebuttals). That said, CON immediately clashed with this interpretation in R1.
“Firstly, trash dumping is a non-unique argument because it is specifically motivated by “rapid population growth and urbanization,” two things that would continue to grow regardless of economic globalization.”
Two responses:
a. Even if the voter buys PRO’s framing that population growth and urbanization are solely to blame, globalization actively increases both.
Newsweek finds:
“Globalization has led to significant change in the demographics in these parts of the world; in Africa, more and more people are moving out of the rural areas and into the growing cities”
New York Times agrees:
“In the developing world, urbanization has often taken the form of exploding populations in megacities. Mumbai's population increased to 19 million in 2007 from 10.8 million in 1985. Bangalore, the urban symbol of the flat world, has had its population double over two decades, to 6.8 million today from 3.4 million in 1985. The growth of these cities and the continuing strength of older urban areas like New York, London and Paris is no accident. Globalization and new technologies attract people to big cities, by increasing the returns to urban proximity”
b. That said, globalization in and of itself increases trash dumping.
RECALL: Globalization increases both production and consumption of goods. Many of these goods end up in trash dumps.
“While some effects can be attributed to globalization, the issue is not as bad as CON would want you to think. Beyond this, globalization is necessary in order to prevent further environmental destruction.”
Two responses:
a. The key word in PRO’s source is “most.” Trash dumps are uniquely caused by globalization as demonstrated above.
b. Climate change is also uniquely caused by globalization and has worldwide (rather than local) effects.
“Climate change is by far the most difficult environmental externality of all to combat because of its (unusual) distance-insensitivity. Therefore, in order to tackle it we need more, rather than less, international cooperation.” [5]Countries separating now would only make the issue worse. Therefore, if voters allow CON’s impact, it actually works for PRO by showing why globalization is even more necessary”
Two responses.
a. The resolution refers specifically towards “economic globalization,” not international diplomacy due to increased diplomatic ties.
b. Even the judge doesn’t buy that this argument falls out of the scope of the debate, international diplomacy and cooperation is not enough.
Consider the Paris Climate Agreement. It was a total failure.
According to Heritage:
“Even if every country met its commitments—a big “if” considering China has already underreported its carbon dioxide emissions, and there are no repercussions for failing to meet the pledges—the changes in the earth’s temperature would be almost undetectable.”
Indeed, RECALL that global emissions are still growing.
“Global carbon emissions from fossil fuels have significantly increased since 1900. Since 1970, CO2 emissions have increased by about 90%, with emissions from fossil fuel combustion and industrial processes contributing about 78% of the total greenhouse gas emissions increase from 1970 to 2011.”
Additionally, because the US pulled from the agreement, other countries are following suit:
“the U.S. decision to withdraw has created political and moral cover for further defections from the agreement. Russia and Turkey have abandoned plans to ratify, while Australia reversed a decision to implement measures to comply with its Paris pledge, all citing Trump’s withdrawal decision. Most significantly, the newly elected president of Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro, has promised to withdraw from the Paris Agreement, also pointing to the precedent established by Trump.”
To combat climate change, a fundamental shift is needed. Globalization simply makes things worse.
RECALL: Production of goods on mass scale makes a sizable chunk of world carbon emissions, and with globalization this percentage is growing. Globalization also increases global movement, leading to increased emissions.
“PRO offers a counter-impact. According to a study, individual and area-level poverty killed 172,000 people in the U.S. in 2000 alone [6]. If that is what happened in America, imagine how many hundreds of thousands more deaths must have occurred in other countries. Having no economic globalization means allowing this number to grow higher. This clearly outweighs CON’s impact by far.”
PRO’s attempted counter-impact fails on all fronts.
Three responses:
a. This counter-impact only works if PRO can achieve his impacts of poverty reduction.
RECALL: inequality is soaring and is keeping poor people poor.
RECALL: PRO’s evidence is intrinsically flawed, even according to his own evidence.
b. Even if the voter doesn’t buy those responses,
RECALL: Climate change and economic hardships disproportionately affect the poor, especially in a globalized economy.
RECALL: Even now, “Weather catastrophes in the United States have incurred a cost of over $1 trillion in damages over the past 30 years. Climate disruption has driven up food prices increased the risk of West Nile outbreaks across the U.S. and helped fuel wildfires that caused over $1 billion in damages in 2013.”
RECALL: “over 40% of the world’s population live on coasts. Sea-level rise is accelerating, and that is currently forcing some to migrate inwards, and will force millions of others in the future to also. Ripping people from their homes is a surefire way to ruin any progress we make erasing poverty.”
RECALL: “According to MercyCorp,
“Research suggests the planet has lost around one-third of its arable land over the past 40 years, in large part due to climate disasters and poor conservation, and every year more trees and soil are lost. More than 1.3 billion people live on deteriorating agricultural land, putting them at risk of depleted harvests that can lead to worsening hunger, poverty and displacement. Soil is being lost between 10 and 100 times faster than it is forming.”
This is bad, because according to the same source, 3/4ths of impoverished people depend on agriculture to survive.”
It is safe to conclude that even if the judge buys PRO’s argument that globalization decreases poverty, globalization inadvertently increases poverty overall substantially through climate change.
c. Even if the judge does not buy any of the above arguments, climate change death rates are set to more than double by 2030, and continue to increase exponentially over time, and thus easily overtaking the poverty death rate PRO presents.
A/2 PRO’s DEFENSE:
“So even according to CON’s own source, it is “quite plausible” that poverty rates have dramatically dropped. “
Three responses.
a. RECALL that both of PRO’s sources (IZA & UB) agree that poverty numbers are intrinsically flawed.
b. PRO misrepresents what the source actually said in this quote. The source did not say it is plausible that rates have “dramatically dropped” across the board, they say it may have “dramatically dropped” specifically in India and China. CON has proven in R1 the drop in Chinese poverty numbers have little to do with globalization even if true.
RECALL: “The annual national poverty estimates as well as World Bank estimates referred to above show that the largest part of the decline in poverty already happened by the mid-1980s, before the big strides in foreign trade and investment in China in the 1990s and later.”
As for the Indian numbers, the same thing becomes evident. Experts agree that Indian poverty started declining in 1970, long before their trade numbers went up.
c. Even if the voter buys that poverty declined in proportion, the study maintains in its conclusion that globalization had little to do with it.
“6. Conclusion
The failure of the predicted effects aside, the studies that claim globalization as the driver are weakened by (a) the use of changes in the trade/GDP ratio or FDI/GDP ratio as the index of globalization or openness, irrespective of level (though using the level on its own is also problematic, the level of trade/GDP being determined mainly by country size); (b) the assumption that trade liberalization drives increases in trade/GDP; and (c) the assumption that increases in trade/GDP drive improved economic performance. The problems come together in the case of China and India, whose treatment dominates the overall results. They are classed as “globalizers,” their relatively good economic performance is attributed mainly to their “openness,” and the deviation between their economic policies––substantial trade protection and capital controls, for example––and the core economic policy package of the World Bank and the other multilateral economic organizations is glossed.”
“Furthermore, this claims that household surveys may overstate the proportion of the population that is in poverty. This is especially useful to PRO because the only World Bank data that PRO’s strongest source (the study done by Laurence Chandy and Geoffrey Gertz; source 2 in PRO’s round 1 speech)[1] uses is household surveys provided by the World Bank, meaning it is possible that the original numbers stated in PRO’s round 1 speech have understated the drop of poverty worldwide.“
The probability of this being true is extraordinarily low. Despite the possibility existing, the study in question still holds in its conclusion:
“It is plausible, and important, that the proportion of the world's population living in extreme poverty has probably fallen over the past two decades or so, having been rising for decades before then. Beyond this we cannot be confident, because the World Bank's poverty numbers are subject to a large margin of error, are probably biased downward, and probably make the trend look rosier than it really is.”
“CON also presents a source allegedly saying the opposite of PRO’s main claim. This source does five things that CON has overlooked”
PRO’s responses here completely miss the point of CON’s argument. CON is arguing that poverty numbers are oftentimes contested and unreliable, not that poverty is for sure going down. Indeed, the fact that the source cites the World Bank shows that with the same pool of numbers PRO is using one can identify a positive or negative trend depending on what one is looking for.
RECALL that both of PRO’s sources (IZA & UB) agree that poverty numbers are intrinsically flawed.
RECALL CON’s R1 quote that PRO overlooks: “This should demonstrate to the voter the unreliability of poverty numbers in general.”
Additionally, PRO does not seem to realize that poverty can either be measured as a percentage of the population, or as a total number. CON’s source identified a rise in the total number of those in poverty, while at the same time noting a decline in the percentage of the population in poverty. This is possible because of population growth.
“Only looks at Africa when the debate’s scope is the entire world.”
Indeed the scope is the entire world, but Africa is a uniquely important area of focus since it is the world’s biggest cluster of poor and developing nations.
“All this source has done is proved that population growth has outpaced globalization efforts in Africa – but even in that scenario, globalization is decreasing poverty, and PRO wins.”
This is untrue. If the source is correct and the total number of Africans in poverty is increasing, it means that poverty is not being truly reduced.
“Even if this claim is true, PRO’s sources still show poverty decreasing around the world, and the scope of the debate is not just China.”
China accounts for 20% of the world population and is a notable example of a developing nation, thus if the trend does not hold true with China then it weakens the neoliberal theory severely.
“Secondly, the source still says that globalization affected China and helped it, simply less so than internal Chinese efforts. This means that globalization did have a positive effect on China.”
Two responses.
a. This is not what the source says. The source simply acknowledges growth within the nation. Nowhere does it even remotely note the help of globalization.
In fact, this is how the source responds to the idea that globalization was a driving force in economic growth:
“China has become a poster boy for the international financial press and free-trade economists when they wax eloquent about the poverty-reducing effects of globalisation. Yet there is no convincing statistical demonstration of this, as no one has yet tested a causal model where, controlling for other factors and applying a suitable identification strategy, global integration has been found to be the main cause of the dramatic decline of poverty in China. In the absence of such a demonstration, a careful eyeballing of the data suggests that the more important reason for the large decline of poverty over the last three decades may actually lie elsewhere."
RECALL: “The annual national poverty estimates as well as World Bank estimates referred to above show that the largest part of the decline in poverty already happened by the mid-1980s, before the big strides in foreign trade and investment in China in the 1990s and later.”
b. Even the judge buys PRO’s weak refutation, they have essentially acknowledged that globalization has a weak positive effect, if any. Thus the judge can easily outweigh with CON’s 2nd Contention.
VERDICT:
There exists a cloud of doubt surrounding poverty and inequality numbers, even acknowledged by PRO’s sources. Still, even if the judge buys that poverty numbers are decreasing even slightly, it is a mistake to attribute that decrease to globalism. Additionally, it is irrefutable that inequality is not getting any better and that the environmental consequences of globalism vastly outweigh any impact of PRO’s.
Back to you, Speedrace.
Round 3
Round 4
Pro
#7
Con Observations:
PRO can not claim that because something is not specified within the resolution itself, it does not carry over to their BoP. Oftentimes, in order to prove one thing, it is implicitly required that other more specific things must be proven as well. For example, if I claim I am eradicating all terrorism, I am required to prove I am eradicating domestic and international terrorism since they terrorism is an umbrella term for the two.
I can claim that. Your
analogy does not work because it specifies “all terrorism.” Our resolution does
not specify “all types of poverty.”
PRO’s response and metaphor ignores the fact that people in absolute poverty are also in relative poverty. This means that reducing absolute poverty does not mean that they leave the poverty umbrella. Ergo, a net reduction in absolute poverty does not translate into a net reduction in poverty in general.
I have to show that economic globalization benefits worldwide poverty reduction. It decreasing absolute poverty shows that.
CON did not change the definition of poverty in the least. The definition of terorrism is still “the unlawful use of violence and intimidation, especially against civilians, in the pursuit of political aims.” despite the obvious distinctions of domestic and international terrorism.
This is a false
analogy, again, because the resolution given by CON specifies “all terrorism.”
Our resolution does not do the same for poverty.
Similarly, the definition of poverty we agreed to was “"The state of being so financially poor that one's needs are not fully met." despite the clear and well-known distinction of relative and absolute poverty. As said above, poverty is functionally an umbrella term for many different things, this is why Wikipedia categorizes relative and absolute poverty under the same poverty entry.
The fact that we
agreed to a definition makes moot the fact that poverty can be an umbrella term
for many things. If we were using poverty as an umbrella term, that would have
been specified in Round 1. It wasn’t, so hence, we are not.
Con Contention 1:
Con Contention 1:
“ PRO tries to portray CON’s case as relying on logic and induction alone. PRO is only half-right. It is true CON’s case uses solid logic and induction, but CON’s case also contains plentiful statistics and studies accompanying every point therein which the voter can view at their leisure.”
Induction made by
non-experts does not beat analysis done by multiple experts. CON also failed to
respond to PRO’s argument that the factors CON had presented are accounted for
by regional heterogeneity, according to a credible source.
PRO’s IZA source, after the quote from CON, goes on to say:
PRO’s IZA source, after the quote from CON, goes on to say:
“The fact that economic integration relates to poverty is rather clear cut. Increase in trade and foreign direct investments, a reduction in tariffs and other trade policies result in an increase of economic activities. These factors lead to higher GDP per capita, resulting in a decrease in poverty when the poor are also benefiting from the increase in GDP per capita. From this study it appears that from the economic integration the poor benefit too. Similar mechanisms apply for technological advancement.” [1]
Even with limitations acknowledged, they still believe that
the relationship found by their study is “clear cut.”
Similarly, with PRO’s UB source, it states after:
“The construction of a reliable and independent database on poverty open to different approaches (as the UNU-WIDER database is for income distribution) should be one of the main goals on the poverty research agenda. This paper presents and uses a provisional framework for such a database.” [2]
They outline how they can work around such limitations and
then proceed to do so in their study, and still arrive at conclusions that
benefit PRO’s position.
As for the source presented by CON, CON completely misrepresents it’s conclusions. This quote is taken directly from the conclusion of the study:
As for the source presented by CON, CON completely misrepresents it’s conclusions. This quote is taken directly from the conclusion of the study:
“The static panel data estimation results imply that wage inequality increases with political globalization, smaller government, and more deregulation…the overall EFI and its subcomponent measuring the degree of economic freedom to international trade are found to be insignificant…Overall EFI and its subcomponents measuring the legal structure and degree of deregulation are associated with more earnings inequality in OECD countries.”
Again, CON’s sources fail to prove anything benefitting his
position. This source directly blames political factors, not economic factors,
for wage inequality. Therefore, CON has failed to prove that wage inequality is
caused by economic globalization.
The real world facts are, whether due to globalization or not, inequality is soaring and is keeping poor people poor.
PRO agrees that inequality is rising; that is not a disputed
fact. However, we have shown that economic globalization is not the cause of it,
and therefore this contention does not work against PRO’s case. Even if the voter
does not agree with PRO’s points, CON himself says that economic globalization has
not been proved to raise or lower inequality, and therefore CON cannot claim
that globalization raises inequality.
The voter should believe that economic globalization does
not increase wage inequality because all sources presented thus far corroborate
that claim, even the one presented by CON.
So even if the judge doesn’t buy the responses above, this negates any positive effect globalization might have.
Globalization-induced environmental arguments are absolutely within the scope of the debate because they directly affect the livelihoods of the impoverished.
With death and disaster both economically and physically ravaging the poor, it is impossible to argue that globalization is a positive factor in poverty reduction.
This is only true if those factors literally increase poverty.
If they do not, they are irrelevant to this debate. The voter should not take
this as PRO disregarding the lives of the impoverished, but should recognize that
PRO is staying true to the resolution.
“On balance” implies that we are considering the overall effects of affirming or negating. That means that both the present and future should be weighed. And, as stated in CON’s observations, judges should prioritize long-term impacts because they cancel out short-term ones.
Lastly, CON never agreed to PRO’s interpretation (To be honest, CON overlooked it while writing their rebuttals). That said, CON immediately clashed with this interpretation in R1.
There is nothing in the phrase “considering the overall effects
of affirming or negating” that talks about the present or the future. The scope
of this debate was specifically made to be the present, and just because CON
overlooked it does not mean that the scope is now made moot. The scope of this
debate cannot be ignored.
Trash Dumping
All of CON’s arguments completely ignore PRO’s rebuttal. Pro
specifically showed that trash dumping is a non-unique argument because
trash-dumping would continue regardless of economic globalization because urbanization
and rapid population growth have been rising since before economic globalization.
Trash Dumping
“US cities became more numerous and much larger during the
nineteenth century because of two trends. The first was immigration, as waves
of immigrants from Ireland and then Italy and other nations began coming to the
United States during the 1820s. The second was industrialization, as people
moved to live near factories and other sites of industrial production.”
[4]
“The key word in PRO’s source is “most.” Trash dumps are uniquely caused by globalization as demonstrated above.”
What word “most”?
I don’t see that word in the quote presented by CON. PRO requests that the
voter ignores this argument because PRO cannot adequately respond to it due to
some error on CON’s part.
“The resolution refers specifically towards “economic globalization,” not international diplomacy due to increased diplomatic ties. “
International
diplomacy and ties are directly related to economic globalization. CON cannot
argue for alleged side of effects of economic globalization like climate change
and then argue against other factors that are actually directly linked to globalization.
However, if the voter accepts CON’s arguments, the voter must also completely
reject all “side effects” presented by CON.
“Globalization links
cultures and international relations on a variety
of levels; economics, politically, socially, etc.” [5]
“To combat climate change, a fundamental shift is needed. Globalization simply makes things worse.”
Note that CON completely
skips stating exactly what fundamental shift is needed. CON’s argument implies
that all international cooperation efforts should be dropped because one policy
failed. This is false; it instead shows that we need a revised policy with stipulations
that will cause a decrease in climate change.
PRO’s Counter Impact:
a. PRO can achieve PRO’s impacts, as shown in both
previous rounds by the fact that the amount of people in poverty is quite
literally going down. Inequality is not caused by economic globalization and is
therefore irrelevant. PRO’s evidence still agrees that it’s conclusions are
true even in light of some limitations.
b. From the source given by CON: “But while climate change can lead to conflict, it can also provide an opportunity for collaboration. These challenges present a unique opportunity for collective action and cooperation in order to mitigate the impacts. For some communities, food, health and lives will depend on cooperation over conflict.” [6]
More cooperation is needed to stop this crisis
and that comes through increased globalization to collectively stop this.
PRO Defense:
a. This was
addressed above.
b. The exact quote: “On the other hand, it is quite plausible that the proportion of the world's population living in extreme poverty has fallen over the past 20 years or so. For all the problems with Chinese and Indian income figures we know enough about trends in other variables––including life expectancy, heights, and other nonincome measures––to be confident that their poverty headcounts have indeed dropped dramatically over the past 20 years. If it is the case (as some experts claim) that household surveys are more likely to miss the rich than the poor, their results may overstate the proportion of the population in poverty.”
It literally says that the proportion
of poor people in the world has fallen. Whether or not the voter agrees
that Chinese and Indian numbers were caused by other factors, this still shows
a worldwide decrease in poverty.
However, Indian numbers at
least have. This is the last sentence from the source CON provided: “Then our results indicate
that urbanisation has played an important role in poverty reduction in
post-reform India.” [7] CON himself has credited globalization for the
rise in urbanization.
c. PRO
has presented far more evidence showing the opposite of CON’s conclusion; one
source is not enough.
PRO’s Counter Impact:
b. From the source given by CON: “But while climate change can lead to conflict, it can also provide an opportunity for collaboration. These challenges present a unique opportunity for collective action and cooperation in order to mitigate the impacts. For some communities, food, health and lives will depend on cooperation over conflict.” [6]
b. The exact quote: “On the other hand, it is quite plausible that the proportion of the world's population living in extreme poverty has fallen over the past 20 years or so. For all the problems with Chinese and Indian income figures we know enough about trends in other variables––including life expectancy, heights, and other nonincome measures––to be confident that their poverty headcounts have indeed dropped dramatically over the past 20 years. If it is the case (as some experts claim) that household surveys are more likely to miss the rich than the poor, their results may overstate the proportion of the population in poverty.”
The source also says “There has been a downward trend
in poverty measures since 1970, with an acceleration post-1991, despite rising
inequality. Post-1991 data suggest stronger inter-sectoral linkages. Urban
consumption growth came with gains to both the rural and urban poor. The
primary/secondary/tertiary composition of growth has ceased to matter, as all
three sectors contributed to poverty reduction.” [7] So even though
the decrease may have started in 1970, globalization sped it up. This is yet
again a source confirming that globalization has benefited worldwide poverty reduction.
“The probability of this being true is extraordinarily low. Despite the possibility existing, the study in question still holds in its conclusion:”
Nowhere does it say that the odds are extraordinarily low.
“It is plausible, and important, that the proportion of the world's population living in extreme poverty has probably fallen over the past two decades or so, having been rising for decades before then. Beyond this we cannot be confident, because the World Bank's poverty numbers are subject to a large margin of error, are probably biased downward, and probably make the trend look rosier than it really is.”
I’ve shown how they still show that poverty decreased. Also,
this specifically states that it was rising BEFORE globalization.
PRO’s responses here completely miss the point of CON’s argument. CON is arguing that poverty numbers are oftentimes contested and unreliable, not that poverty is for sure going down. Indeed, the fact that the source cites the World Bank shows that with the same pool of numbers PRO is using one can identify a positive or negative trend depending on what one is looking for.
This is false. CON
has yet to show two sources both citing the World Bank that claim opposite
trends.
“Additionally, PRO does not seem to realize that poverty can either be measured as a percentage of the population, or as a total number. CON’s source identified a rise in the total number of those in poverty, while at the same time noting a decline in the percentage of the population in poverty. This is possible because of population growth.”
I did acknowledge
this.
This is untrue. If the source is correct and the total number of Africans in poverty is increasing, it means that poverty is not being truly reduced.
My BoP is to show
that economic globalization benefits worldwide poverty reduction, not that the
total amount of poor people is going down.
Even if the judge concludes that economic globalization has not affected China, PRO has already proven numerous times that it has affected numerous other countries.
Conclusion:
I want to remind the judge of what I must do. I have to show that globalization benefits worldwide poverty reduction. Even if poverty is on the rise, if globalization is slowing it down, I have met my BoP. Multiple sources, presented by both CON and PRO, have shown this trend to hold true.
Sources:
1. http://repec.iza.org/dp2223.pdf
2. https://amsacta.unibo.it/4835/1/459.pdf
3. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/311716408_Globalization_Economic_Freedom_and_Wage_Inequality_A_Panel_Data_Analysis
4. https://open.lib.umn.edu/socialproblems/chapter/14-1-a-brief-history-of-urbanization/
5. http://www.culturaldiplomacy.org/academy/content/pdf/participant-papers/2011-12-cdac/Globalization-and-International-Relations-Lianna-Amirkhanyan.pdf
6. https://www.mercycorps.org/blog/climate-change-poverty
7. https://voxeu.org/article/revisiting-poverty-reduction-india-60-years-data
Even if the judge concludes that economic globalization has not affected China, PRO has already proven numerous times that it has affected numerous other countries.
Conclusion:
I want to remind the judge of what I must do. I have to show that globalization benefits worldwide poverty reduction. Even if poverty is on the rise, if globalization is slowing it down, I have met my BoP. Multiple sources, presented by both CON and PRO, have shown this trend to hold true.
Sources:
1. http://repec.iza.org/dp2223.pdf
2. https://amsacta.unibo.it/4835/1/459.pdf
3. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/311716408_Globalization_Economic_Freedom_and_Wage_Inequality_A_Panel_Data_Analysis
4. https://open.lib.umn.edu/socialproblems/chapter/14-1-a-brief-history-of-urbanization/
5. http://www.culturaldiplomacy.org/academy/content/pdf/participant-papers/2011-12-cdac/Globalization-and-International-Relations-Lianna-Amirkhanyan.pdf
6. https://www.mercycorps.org/blog/climate-change-poverty
7. https://voxeu.org/article/revisiting-poverty-reduction-india-60-years-data
Con
#8
Thanks, Speedrace.
FINAL ROUND OBSERVATIONS:
- Even if the entire PRO case stands, CON’s case outweighs on the basis of its 2nd Contention.
- Even if the voter does not buy that PRO must prove a decrease in both absolute and relative poverty, CON still wins that poverty numbers are generally questionable. Even if the judge doesn’t buy that, again, CON’s case outweighs on the basis of its 2nd Contention.
- The voter must prioritize long-term impacts. RECALL: ““On balance” implies that we are considering the overall effects of affirming or negating. That means that both the present and future should be weighed. And, as stated in CON’s observations, judges should prioritize long-term impacts because they cancel out short-term ones.”
- PRO is cherry-picking the arguments they want to respond to, completely ignoring the following arguments from CON:
1. Globalization increases consumption
2. Diplomacy is not sufficient to stop climate change
3. Global emissions are growing
4. Globalization intrinsically increases emissions
5. Climate change death rates by far outweigh PRO's poverty reduction numbers.
6. Poverty numbers are fickle so that studies can portray them however they like
“I can claim that. Your analogy does not work because it specifies “all terrorism.” Our resolution does not specify “all types of poverty.”
Once again, “poverty” is an umbrella term. Terrorism is also an umbrella term. That is what makes me have to prove a general decline, not the word “all.”
RECALL: PRO’s response and metaphor ignores the fact that people in absolute poverty are also in relative poverty. This means that reducing absolute poverty does not mean that they leave the poverty umbrella. Ergo, a net reduction in absolute poverty does not translate into a net reduction in poverty in general.
“I have to show that economic globalization benefits worldwide poverty reduction. It decreasing absolute poverty shows that.”
PRO essentially repeats their previous statement with even less detail.
Refer to above once again.
Additionally, we defined “benefit” as "Decreases the amount of people in poverty worldwide.”
If you make no difference in the total number of people under some form of poverty, you have made no “benefit” under our mutually agreed definition.
“This is a false analogy, again, because the resolution given by CON specifies “all terrorism.” Our resolution does not do the same for poverty.”
RECALL all of the above refutations.
“The fact that we agreed to a definition makes moot the fact that poverty can be an umbrella term for many things. If we were using poverty as an umbrella term, that would have been specified in Round 1. It wasn’t, so hence, we are not.”
This is, once again, PRO simply restating their previous argument.
RECALL CON’s R2 refutation:
“CON did not change the definition of poverty in the least. The definition of terorrism is still “the unlawful use of violence and intimidation, especially against civilians, in the pursuit of political aims.” despite the obvious distinctions of domestic and international terrorism.
Similarly, the definition of poverty we agreed to was “"The state of being so financially poor that one's needs are not fully met." despite the clear and well-known distinction of relative and absolute poverty. As said above, poverty is functionally an umbrella term for many different things, this is why Wikipedia categorizes relative and absolute poverty under the same poverty entry.”
CONTENTION 1 DEFENSE (CONTINUED):
“CON did not change the definition of poverty in the least. The definition of terorrism is still “the unlawful use of violence and intimidation, especially against civilians, in the pursuit of political aims.” despite the obvious distinctions of domestic and international terrorism.
Similarly, the definition of poverty we agreed to was “"The state of being so financially poor that one's needs are not fully met." despite the clear and well-known distinction of relative and absolute poverty. As said above, poverty is functionally an umbrella term for many different things, this is why Wikipedia categorizes relative and absolute poverty under the same poverty entry.”
CONTENTION 1 DEFENSE (CONTINUED):
“Induction made by non-experts does not beat analysis done by multiple experts. CON also failed to respond to PRO’s argument that the factors CON had presented are accounted for by regional heterogeneity, according to a credible source.”
PRO is once again being dishonest. CON’s case contains 29 sources, many of which are direct citations of studies and commentary by experts in the field.
As for the “regional heterogeneity” argument, PRO’s source simply said it was an alternate cause, and since they thought there was “no link” between globalization and income inequality, they simply opted for the former over the latter.
CON made many responses to this source (the source in question is the IZA source, for voter reference).
As for the “regional heterogeneity” argument, PRO’s source simply said it was an alternate cause, and since they thought there was “no link” between globalization and income inequality, they simply opted for the former over the latter.
CON made many responses to this source (the source in question is the IZA source, for voter reference).
“PRO’s IZA source, after the quote from CON, goes on to say:
“The fact that economic integration relates to poverty is rather clear cut. Increase in trade and foreign direct investments, a reduction in tariffs and other trade policies result in an increase of economic activities. These factors lead to higher GDP per capita, resulting in a decrease in poverty when the poor are also benefiting from the increase in GDP per capita. From this study it appears that from the economic integration the poor benefit too. Similar mechanisms apply for technological advancement.” [1]”
Several responses.
“the results show that economic freedom is associated with more
wage inequality, especially in Organisation for Economic Co-operation and
Development (OECD) countries. The estimation results from country groups
indicate that more deregulation is associated with more earnings inequality in
OECD countries.”
“At the very least, the judge should recognize that studies on poverty and inequality vary greatly in quality and results. The judge should prioritize logic and real world facts.
e. The real world facts are, whether due to globalization or not, inequality is soaring and is keeping poor people poor. So even if the judge doesn’t buy the responses above, this negates any positive effect globalization might have.
RECALL: “since 1980, income inequality has increased rapidly in North America, China, India, and Russia. Inequality has grown moderately in Europe.” The sole exceptions are the countries in the Middle East, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Brazil… Their inequality has stayed stable at soaring high levels.”
f. Even if the judge does not buy every response above, they should still outweigh on the basis of CON’s 2nd Contention.”
a. Just because they acknowledged their limitations does not mean their results are optimal.
Remember that they said a panel study would be better, and RECALL that the actual panel study that CON cites in R2 says:
wage inequality, especially in Organisation for Economic Co-operation and
Development (OECD) countries. The estimation results from country groups
indicate that more deregulation is associated with more earnings inequality in
OECD countries.”
b. RECALL that PRO’s study uses unreliable World Bank numbers.
c. RECALL CON’s R2 e-f responses:
e. The real world facts are, whether due to globalization or not, inequality is soaring and is keeping poor people poor. So even if the judge doesn’t buy the responses above, this negates any positive effect globalization might have.
RECALL: “since 1980, income inequality has increased rapidly in North America, China, India, and Russia. Inequality has grown moderately in Europe.” The sole exceptions are the countries in the Middle East, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Brazil… Their inequality has stayed stable at soaring high levels.”
f. Even if the judge does not buy every response above, they should still outweigh on the basis of CON’s 2nd Contention.”
“Similarly, with PRO’s UB source, it states after:
“The construction of a reliable and independent database on poverty open to different approaches (as the UNU-WIDER database is for income distribution) should be one of the main goals on the poverty research agenda. This paper presents and uses a provisional framework for such a database.” [2]
They outline how they can work around such limitations and then proceed to do so in their study, and still arrive at conclusions that benefit PRO’s position.”
Several responses.
“Nevertheless, these shortcomings exist, and they hamper independent research. The use of some poverty definitions, measures and sources of data rather than others can yield different results and entail divergent policy implications.”
a. CON has already established how work-arounds do not translate into reliable results.
b. RECALL that PRO’s study uses unreliable World Bank numbers.
c. RECALL CON’s R2 e-f responses
d. PRO misrepresents his source once again. His source does not purport to be exempt from the shortcomings of other inequality research.
“As for the source presented by CON, CON completely misrepresents it’s conclusions. This quote is taken directly from the conclusion of the study:
“The static panel data estimation results imply that wage inequality increases with political globalization, smaller government, and more deregulation…the overall EFI and its subcomponent measuring the degree of economic freedom to international trade are found to be insignificant…Overall EFI and its subcomponents measuring the legal structure and degree of deregulation are associated with more earnings inequality in OECD countries.”
Again, CON’s sources fail to prove anything benefitting his position. This source directly blames political factors, not economic factors, for wage inequality. Therefore, CON has failed to prove that wage inequality is caused by economic globalization.”
Two responses.
“The static panel data estimation results imply that wage inequality increases with political
globalization, smaller government, and more deregulation. The dynamic system
GMM estimation results indicate a strongly persistent component in the wage ine-
quality index. Although the overall EFI and its subcomponent measuring the degree
of economic freedom to international trade are found to be insignificant, there is
some indication that more economic freedom is associated with more wage inequali-
ty in some country groups. Overall EFI and its subcomponents measuring the legal
structure and the degree of deregulation are associated with more earnings inequality
in OECD countries. This result is compatible with the view that market-oriented pol-
icies (e.g. deunionization and deregulation) tend to increase earnings inequality in
more developed countries.”
a. PRO cherry-picks which parts of the conclusions they want to present. Here is the full thing, where they conclude that under ALL measurements there is a clear link between globalization and income inequality:
globalization, smaller government, and more deregulation. The dynamic system
GMM estimation results indicate a strongly persistent component in the wage ine-
quality index. Although the overall EFI and its subcomponent measuring the degree
of economic freedom to international trade are found to be insignificant, there is
some indication that more economic freedom is associated with more wage inequali-
ty in some country groups. Overall EFI and its subcomponents measuring the legal
structure and the degree of deregulation are associated with more earnings inequality
in OECD countries. This result is compatible with the view that market-oriented pol-
icies (e.g. deunionization and deregulation) tend to increase earnings inequality in
more developed countries.”
b. Political policies favoring economic globalization are precisely what we are debating. Economics and politics are intrinsically linked (i.e. trade deals, market deregulation, etc.)
“PRO agrees that inequality is rising; that is not a disputed fact. However, we have shown that economic globalization is not the cause of it, and therefore this contention does not work against PRO’s case. Even if the voter does not agree with PRO’s points, CON himself says that economic globalization has not been proved to raise or lower inequality, and therefore CON cannot claim that globalization raises inequality. The voter should believe that economic globalization does not increase wage inequality because all sources presented thus far corroborate that claim, even the one presented by CON.”
On the contrary, CON has given plenty of reasons and evidence to believe that globalization is intrinsically linked to economic inequality.
Additionally, CON never said that “economic globalization has not been proved to raise or lower inequality.” Not sure where PRO is getting this from. What CON HAS said, is that “studies on poverty and inequality vary greatly in quality and results. The judge should prioritize logic and real world facts.”
This is saying because we are in highly contested academic territory, the judge should vote based off the obvious correlation between exploding amounts of globalization and increasing economic inequality, even if the causal link could technically be disputed.
Additionally, CON never said that “economic globalization has not been proved to raise or lower inequality.” Not sure where PRO is getting this from. What CON HAS said, is that “studies on poverty and inequality vary greatly in quality and results. The judge should prioritize logic and real world facts.”
This is saying because we are in highly contested academic territory, the judge should vote based off the obvious correlation between exploding amounts of globalization and increasing economic inequality, even if the causal link could technically be disputed.
“So even if the judge doesn’t buy the responses above, this negates any positive effect globalization might have.
This is another false claim. Inequality rising does not work in CON’s favor unless CON has proven that economic globalization is the cause. CON has not, and therefore it does not work in CON’s favor.”
Even IF economic globalization were contributing NOTHING to the currently increasing inequality in the world, the fact that income inequality IS increasing shows that it has a negligible effect in uplifting the poor, if any. So yes, this does work in CON’s favor because it means PRO’s poverty reduction link is weak, and thus easily outweighed by CON’s 2nd Contention.
“This is only true if those factors literally increase poverty. If they do not, they are irrelevant to this debate. The voter should not take this as PRO disregarding the lives of the impoverished, but should recognize that PRO is staying true to the resolution.”
Yes, environmentally ravaging the poor “literally” increases poverty.
“There is nothing in the phrase “considering the overall effects of affirming or negating” that talks about the present or the future. The scope of this debate was specifically made to be the present, and just because CON overlooked it does not mean that the scope is now made moot. The scope of this debate cannot be ignored.”
I don’t think PRO grasps the word “overall” nor the phrase “on balance.”
Merriam Webster defines overall as “viewed as a whole.” If viewed as a whole, economic globalization increases environmental damage and the trends clearly point towards the impacts outweighing current short-term benefits.
Since this is pretty much CON’s word vs PRO’s, let me ask the voter: what would you, as a policymaker, prioritize? Short-term gain in exchange for long-term disaster, or vice versa? This is the lense through which the resolution should be viewed.
TRASH DUMPING DEFENSE:
Merriam Webster defines overall as “viewed as a whole.” If viewed as a whole, economic globalization increases environmental damage and the trends clearly point towards the impacts outweighing current short-term benefits.
Since this is pretty much CON’s word vs PRO’s, let me ask the voter: what would you, as a policymaker, prioritize? Short-term gain in exchange for long-term disaster, or vice versa? This is the lense through which the resolution should be viewed.
TRASH DUMPING DEFENSE:
“All of CON’s arguments completely ignore PRO’s rebuttal. Pro specifically showed that trash dumping is a non-unique argument because trash-dumping would continue regardless of economic globalization because urbanization and rapid population growth have been rising since before economic globalization.”
Unfortunately, PRO flat-out lies as to what CON has and hasn’t responded to.
RECALL CON’s R2 argument:
“a. Even if the voter buys PRO’s framing that population growth and urbanization are solely to blame, globalization actively increases both.
Newsweek finds:
“Globalization has led to significant change in the demographics in these parts of the world; in Africa, more and more people are moving out of the rural areas and into the growing cities”
New York Times agrees:
“In the developing world, urbanization has often taken the form of exploding populations in megacities. Mumbai's population increased to 19 million in 2007 from 10.8 million in 1985. Bangalore, the urban symbol of the flat world, has had its population double over two decades, to 6.8 million today from 3.4 million in 1985. The growth of these cities and the continuing strength of older urban areas like New York, London and Paris is no accident. Globalization and new technologies attract people to big cities, by increasing the returns to urban proximity”
If globalization actively causes what increases trash dumping, how is that NOT proving CON’s argument?
RECALL CON’s R2 argument:
“a. Even if the voter buys PRO’s framing that population growth and urbanization are solely to blame, globalization actively increases both.
Newsweek finds:
“Globalization has led to significant change in the demographics in these parts of the world; in Africa, more and more people are moving out of the rural areas and into the growing cities”
New York Times agrees:
“In the developing world, urbanization has often taken the form of exploding populations in megacities. Mumbai's population increased to 19 million in 2007 from 10.8 million in 1985. Bangalore, the urban symbol of the flat world, has had its population double over two decades, to 6.8 million today from 3.4 million in 1985. The growth of these cities and the continuing strength of older urban areas like New York, London and Paris is no accident. Globalization and new technologies attract people to big cities, by increasing the returns to urban proximity”
If globalization actively causes what increases trash dumping, how is that NOT proving CON’s argument?
“The key word in PRO’s source is “most.” Trash dumps are uniquely caused by globalization as demonstrated above.”
What word “most”? I don’t see that word in the quote presented by CON. PRO requests that the voter ignores this argument because PRO cannot adequately respond to it due to some error on CON’s part.”
a. PRO obviously did not put a lot of effort into finding out what CON was referring to.
CON was referring to PRO’s source citation in R2:
““Of course, globalization has an impact on the environment, but it is a mixed one and generally far less scary than many people think. Most ecological problems are still local as opposed to global, and while cross-border integration can make the environment dirtier in some places, it can also help with cleaning it up.” [5]”
b. PRO tries to use his own lack of effort to discount the entire CON argument.
“International diplomacy and ties are directly related to economic globalization.”
a. It is true that international diplomacy and economic globalization are linked. No one is denying this.
However, any international diplomacy fostered from economic globalization is always in direct relation to economics itself (trade deals, economic deregulation, removing/adding tariffs, etc. In fact, CON openly acknowledged this earlier in this round. Since PRO has now acknowledged this, PRO can not discount CON’s income inequality argument on the basis of it “relating to politics.”)
Anyway, this means that as for how economic globalization relates to environmental policy, the correlation is not close enough to be able to argue that economic globalization encourages international diplomacy on the issue of environment and climate change. The two are very unrelated.
“Consider the Paris Climate Agreement. It was a total failure.
According to Heritage:
“Even if every country met its commitments—a big “if” considering China has already underreported its carbon dioxide emissions, and there are no repercussions for failing to meet the pledges—the changes in the earth’s temperature would be almost undetectable.”
Indeed, RECALL that global emissions are still growing.
“Global carbon emissions from fossil fuels have significantly increased since 1900. Since 1970, CO2 emissions have increased by about 90%, with emissions from fossil fuel combustion and industrial processes contributing about 78% of the total greenhouse gas emissions increase from 1970 to 2011.”
Additionally, because the US pulled from the agreement, other countries are following suit:
“the U.S. decision to withdraw has created political and moral cover for further defections from the agreement. Russia and Turkey have abandoned plans to ratify, while Australia reversed a decision to implement measures to comply with its Paris pledge, all citing Trump’s withdrawal decision. Most significantly, the newly elected president of Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro, has promised to withdraw from the Paris Agreement, also pointing to the precedent established by Trump.”
To combat climate change, a fundamental shift is needed. Globalization simply makes things worse.
RECALL: Production of goods on mass scale makes a sizable chunk of world carbon emissions, and with globalization this percentage is growing. Globalization also increases global movement, leading to increased emissions.”
However, any international diplomacy fostered from economic globalization is always in direct relation to economics itself (trade deals, economic deregulation, removing/adding tariffs, etc. In fact, CON openly acknowledged this earlier in this round. Since PRO has now acknowledged this, PRO can not discount CON’s income inequality argument on the basis of it “relating to politics.”)
Anyway, this means that as for how economic globalization relates to environmental policy, the correlation is not close enough to be able to argue that economic globalization encourages international diplomacy on the issue of environment and climate change. The two are very unrelated.
b. Even if the voter does not buy this, RECALL that international diplomacy as it relates to climate policy is a double-edged sword.
“Consider the Paris Climate Agreement. It was a total failure.
According to Heritage:
“Even if every country met its commitments—a big “if” considering China has already underreported its carbon dioxide emissions, and there are no repercussions for failing to meet the pledges—the changes in the earth’s temperature would be almost undetectable.”
Indeed, RECALL that global emissions are still growing.
“Global carbon emissions from fossil fuels have significantly increased since 1900. Since 1970, CO2 emissions have increased by about 90%, with emissions from fossil fuel combustion and industrial processes contributing about 78% of the total greenhouse gas emissions increase from 1970 to 2011.”
Additionally, because the US pulled from the agreement, other countries are following suit:
“the U.S. decision to withdraw has created political and moral cover for further defections from the agreement. Russia and Turkey have abandoned plans to ratify, while Australia reversed a decision to implement measures to comply with its Paris pledge, all citing Trump’s withdrawal decision. Most significantly, the newly elected president of Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro, has promised to withdraw from the Paris Agreement, also pointing to the precedent established by Trump.”
To combat climate change, a fundamental shift is needed. Globalization simply makes things worse.
RECALL: Production of goods on mass scale makes a sizable chunk of world carbon emissions, and with globalization this percentage is growing. Globalization also increases global movement, leading to increased emissions.”
“Note that CON completely skips stating exactly what fundamental shift is needed. CON’s argument implies that all international cooperation efforts should be dropped because one policy failed. This is false; it instead shows that we need a revised policy with stipulations that will cause a decrease in climate change.”
If all it takes is one country to defy a treaty to cause the whole thing to backfire while globalization continues to fuel the flames of climate disaster, it is safe to say that globalization and its unfulfillable promises is making things worse.
A/2 PRO’s COUNTERIMPACT (CONTINUED):
A/2 PRO’s COUNTERIMPACT (CONTINUED):
“a. PRO can achieve PRO’s impacts, as shown in both previous rounds by the fact that the amount of people in poverty is quite literally going down. Inequality is not caused by economic globalization and is therefore irrelevant. PRO’s evidence still agrees that it’s conclusions are true even in light of some limitations.
b. From the source given by CON: “But while climate change can lead to conflict, it can also provide an opportunity for collaboration. These challenges present a unique opportunity for collective action and cooperation in order to mitigate the impacts. For some communities, food, health and lives will depend on cooperation over conflict.” [6]”
a. CON has shown repeatedly that this is contestable, and even IF poverty is definitely going down, it is only going down slightly, and it is NOT caused by economic globalization. As for inequality, RECALL all of the responses above.
b. PRO openly admits climate change is a unique and dangerous challenge. The source saying this does not discredit CON’s argument because CON has already demonstrated that countries will not rise to this unique challenge, and the source does not disagree. Saying something “should” happen is very different from saying it “will.”
c. PRO completely ignores CON’s third response. RECALL: “Even if the judge does not buy any of the above arguments, climate change death rates are set to more than double by 2030, and continue to increase exponentially over time, and thus easily overtaking the poverty death rate PRO presents.”
A/2 PRO’s DEFENSE (CONTINUED):
a.
“This was addressed above.”
It was addressed, and then promptly refuted by CON.
b.
“It literally says that the proportion of poor people in the world has fallen. Whether or not the voter agrees that Chinese and Indian numbers were caused by other factors, this still shows a worldwide decrease in poverty.”
Taking out India and China reduces the amount of poverty reduction to the point of nonexistence, especially when one takes into account the fact that Africa is seeing no reduction in the numbers of people in poverty.
“However, Indian numbers at least have. This is the last sentence from the source CON provided: “Then our results indicate that urbanisation has played an important role in poverty reduction in post-reform India.” [7] CON himself has credited globalization for the rise in urbanization.”
First of all, PRO admits China’s supposed reduction in poverty has no link to globalization. This is bad for PRO, because China alone accounts for 40% of the supposed poverty drop worldwide.
Secondly, PRO completely misrepresents the source by saying it credits urbanization with all of India’s poverty reduction.
Here is their actual conclusion:
”The consequences of these marked differences in the impacts of different sources of growth on poverty are borne out by our poverty-growth accounting exercises for the two periods. Pre-1991, poverty reduction was almost entirely driven by rural growth and favourable distributional changes; the contribution of urban growth was negligible. Post-1991, rural growth, though still important, has been displaced by urban growth as the most important contributor to the observed (and more rapid) poverty reduction, even though urban growth has had adverse distributional effects.”
In other words, not only was poverty declining in rural India, but it was declining without having the adverse effects of income-inequality.
Furthermore, CON disagrees that urbanization was a main driver in India after 1991.
The analysis ignores the massive increase in wealth redistribution programs in India that has played a large role in reducing that poverty.
Additionally, many of the impoverished in India are undocumented.
“As agriculture is barely a lucrative option, their only job option is to seek out work in the cities’ informal economies. Millions migrate to the cities every day to take up informal jobs such as domestic help, driving cars for middle-class people, taxi driving, construction site work, etc. However, this creates overcrowding in the already packed urban infrastructure. Lack of affordable housing leaves these people address-less on paper. They settle wherever they can, but as more people join, a whole community of undocumented settlers emerges. This further complicates the procedure of accessing basic services like electricity, water and sanitation, etc. as the authorities and public utilities can only serve those registered on paper – this is how poverty begins.”
This means that the poverty numbers for cities in India are wholly unreliable.
Secondly, PRO completely misrepresents the source by saying it credits urbanization with all of India’s poverty reduction.
Here is their actual conclusion:
”The consequences of these marked differences in the impacts of different sources of growth on poverty are borne out by our poverty-growth accounting exercises for the two periods. Pre-1991, poverty reduction was almost entirely driven by rural growth and favourable distributional changes; the contribution of urban growth was negligible. Post-1991, rural growth, though still important, has been displaced by urban growth as the most important contributor to the observed (and more rapid) poverty reduction, even though urban growth has had adverse distributional effects.”
In other words, not only was poverty declining in rural India, but it was declining without having the adverse effects of income-inequality.
Furthermore, CON disagrees that urbanization was a main driver in India after 1991.
The analysis ignores the massive increase in wealth redistribution programs in India that has played a large role in reducing that poverty.
Additionally, many of the impoverished in India are undocumented.
“As agriculture is barely a lucrative option, their only job option is to seek out work in the cities’ informal economies. Millions migrate to the cities every day to take up informal jobs such as domestic help, driving cars for middle-class people, taxi driving, construction site work, etc. However, this creates overcrowding in the already packed urban infrastructure. Lack of affordable housing leaves these people address-less on paper. They settle wherever they can, but as more people join, a whole community of undocumented settlers emerges. This further complicates the procedure of accessing basic services like electricity, water and sanitation, etc. as the authorities and public utilities can only serve those registered on paper – this is how poverty begins.”
This means that the poverty numbers for cities in India are wholly unreliable.
c.
“PRO has presented far more evidence showing the opposite of CON’s conclusion; one source is not enough.”
This is a very lazy response.
RECALL: “Even if the voter buys that poverty declined in proportion, the study maintains in its conclusion that globalization had little to do with it.”
The voter can flow through this argument uncontested.
Furthermore, the study CON cites attacks studies on globalization relating to poverty as a whole.
RECALL: “Even if the voter buys that poverty declined in proportion, the study maintains in its conclusion that globalization had little to do with it.”
The voter can flow through this argument uncontested.
Furthermore, the study CON cites attacks studies on globalization relating to poverty as a whole.
““The probability of this being true is extraordinarily low. Despite the possibility existing, the study in question still holds in its conclusion:”
Nowhere does it say that the odds are extraordinarily low.”
It did not say those exact words. CON did. What it DID say was that:
“Beyond (there being a decline) we cannot be confident, because the World Bank's poverty numbers are subject to a large margin of error, are probably biased downward, and probably make the trend look rosier than it really is.”
“Also, this specifically states that it was rising BEFORE globalization”
But again, the study maintains globalization had little to do with it.
“This is false. CON has yet to show two sources both citing the World Bank that claim opposite trends.”
This is basically PRO saying “no u” in response to an argument.
“I did acknowledge this.”
Where? And how does PRO acknowledging it refute CON’s argument?
“My BoP is to show that economic globalization benefits worldwide poverty reduction, not that the total amount of poor people is going down.
Even if the judge concludes that economic globalization has not affected China, PRO has already proven numerous times that it has affected numerous other countries.”
PRO makes this argument despite the fact our definition of “benefits poverty reduction” is PRECISELY THAT:
“Benefits the reduction of world poverty: "Decreases the amount of people in poverty worldwide"
Carry over all of above responses.
But FINALLY, RECALL: Even if the entire PRO case stands, CON’s case outweighs on the basis of its 2nd Contention.
In fact, even if poverty has declined far more than even PRO suggests, the voter can STILL outweigh in favor of CON.
FINAL VERDICT:
There continues to exist a cloud of doubt surrounding poverty and inequality numbers, even acknowledged by PRO’s sources. Still, even if the judge buys that poverty numbers are decreasing even slightly, it is a mistake to attribute that decrease to globalism. Additionally, it is irrefutable that inequality is not getting any better and that the environmental consequences of globalism vastly outweigh any impact of PRO’s.
VOTE CON!
“Benefits the reduction of world poverty: "Decreases the amount of people in poverty worldwide"
Carry over all of above responses.
But FINALLY, RECALL: Even if the entire PRO case stands, CON’s case outweighs on the basis of its 2nd Contention.
In fact, even if poverty has declined far more than even PRO suggests, the voter can STILL outweigh in favor of CON.
There continues to exist a cloud of doubt surrounding poverty and inequality numbers, even acknowledged by PRO’s sources. Still, even if the judge buys that poverty numbers are decreasing even slightly, it is a mistake to attribute that decrease to globalism. Additionally, it is irrefutable that inequality is not getting any better and that the environmental consequences of globalism vastly outweigh any impact of PRO’s.
VOTE CON!
Criterion
Pro
Tie
Con
Points
Better arguments
3 point(s)
Better sources
2 point(s)
Better legibility
1 point(s)
Better conduct
1 point(s)
Reason:
Needless to say, this one will be getting an HoF nomination from me for the next round. Both debaters did very well, and this was a very tough decision.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1WrGlu9qoj5uy75sxlwVgJkOhypZkiQwX3vjs4ucDY_E/edit
For real. And it was by a narrow margin too. I've never seen Speed fight so hard.
You know its good when there is a RFD that is nine pages long.
It was definitely hard-fought on both sides. Probably the best debate I've had on the site
Not gonna lie, even with the waiving this might just be the longest debate I have ever read.
LOL me too
Don't let Bearman hear this but I'm lowkey glad we only made it 3 rounds
This'll take a day or two, but I'm on it.
Holy shit. my fingers. So many characters
lol
You cut it very close!
My brain is actually dead after writing that.
I had to do it to em
That's cool
I'm going to be throwing a big block of text at you soon... Sorry in advance
Regardless I've been pretty busy lately lol. We will see what I can scrap together
Meh it could be much better if I wasn't so lazy lol
Good opening!
To be fair it evens things out ig
Bruh I wish lol
Wanna switch? xD
You think this errs on the side of Pro? I completely disagree
Yes, and I suffer from a PRO-side bias, so this will be interesting
Literally glad I pulled out from this tournament. That topic is even harder.