Resolved: The United States federal government should establish a policy substantially increasing the number of persons serving in one or more of the following national service programs: AmeriCorps, Citizen Corps, Senior Corps, Peace Corps, Learn and Serve America, Armed Forces.
Introduction
The topic area advertised for vote, and the area paper from which this resolution grew, was articulated as “national service.” Although the resolution lists multiple areas where participation can be increased, I think it is useful to break it down into four areas: Armed Forces, Peace Corps, Citizen Corps, and the others (AmeriCorps, Senior Corps, Learn and Serve America)2 . Many of the latter areas are inextricably related, and there are better affirmative and negative strategies that apply to each of the four main areas than ones that apply to all of them collectively.
Despite the fact that these areas are relatively unrelated – some deal with foreign service, some deal with domestic service, some will claim advantages that are irrelevant to other areas, and different counterplans, kritiks, and disadvantages apply best to each – one thing that unites all three or four (depending on your categorization – see footnote 2) is that all call on the affirmative to defend the idea of “national service.” This essential question of the desirability of “national service” is arguably the core question of the resolution, uniting otherwise disparate topic areas.
The “National Service” Question
Since the topic defines the six “national service” programs the affirmative can choose to increase participation in, the question of what specifically constitutes “national service” does not seem to be particularly important. After all, affirmative teams that defend one of these programs are unlikely to lose on “national service” topicality. Nonetheless, it is important for you to unpack what constitutes “national service” when researching for a couple of reasons. First, as will be discussed, many of the programs identified in the resolution perform both “national” and “community” service. Simply acting through one of the listed programs does not mean that the affirmative’s plan is necessarily about national service. For example, helping the elderly in a community may be a form of community service, but it is arguably not a form of national service. Second, affirmatives will want to defend national service and use that defense as leverage against states counterplans and kritiks. Negatives will want to run kritiks and disadvantages to supporting “national service.” Negatives may attempt to advocate a “floating pic” — an alternative to a kritik that enables the negative to support doing the plan without, in this instance, supporting the idea of “national service.” Teams that understand what national service is, and the different manifestations of it, will be most prepared to engage in debates on its merits.
It is the “Liberal Democrats” and the “Progressives” who believe in government action (conservatives call it “big government”) to improve the human condition. For example, Marc Magee and Will Marshall (2005) of the Progressive Policy Institute support the development of national service programs3 . Although they support service in general, conservatives and libertarians are very critical of government-supported national service programs (Bandow, 2000; Bandow, 1996). Other literature on the general merits of national service also exists (Bass, 2005; Brooks, 2005; Dionne, E.J., 2005). It is this fundamental clash of perspectives that will drive much debate on this year’s resolution. A strong liberal defense of government action will provide the affirmative with excellent offense against kritiks that throw a “kritikal” spin on any attempt by the government to do good.
Although the Bush Administration took a strong stance in favor of national service at the beginning of its tenure in the White House (Milbank, 2002), the Administration never endorsed mandatory national service and recent budget cut-backs threaten the viability of many of the programs discussed in the resolution. A discussion of the budget status of each of the programs follows below.
AmeriCorps www.AmeriCorps.gov
AmeriCorps workers work to solve problems in one of four areas: Early childhood and elementary school education, crime prevention and victim services, rebuilding housing and helping the homeless, and improving natural wild lands and community environments (BLACK COLLEGIAN, 1994). AmeriCorps is really an umbrella for other programs, such as Habitat for Humanity. AmeriCorps is a “’loose confederation of full-time and part-time national service slots that are locally independent and nationally interdependent..., a ‘network,’ a ‘flag’ that could fly over Peace Corps and VISTA.” (Byron, 1993). Individuals volunteer through AmeriCorps. AmeriCorps then receives grant proposals from various nonprofit groups whose workers then fill-out paperwork to become AmeriCorps members. Approximately 65,000 Americans serve through various AmeriCorps-supported programs.
An individual can participate in AmeriCorps in one of the following ways:
AmeriCorps National Civilian Community Corps (NCCC). One thousand NCCC participants live in four retired military bases and are supervised by retired U.S. military officers. Individuals are trained to go directly into communities to do community improvement work. Participants may be teachers’ aids in classrooms or may test buildings for lead paint. The program was created in 1993 and originally had a budget of approximately $400 million. Participants are ages 18 to 24. Volunteers receive a living stipend and nearly $5,000 to apply to college tuition or student loans. Last year the program was funded at $27 million, but Bush’s new budget proposes cutting it to $5 million (Lee (2006); SACRAMENTO BUSINESS JOURNAL (2006)). This $5 million is only enough to shut-down the program.
AmeriCorps State: AmeriCorps State works with governor-appointed State Service Commissions to provide grants to state and local public service organizations. The purpose of these grants is to recruit and train AmeriCorps members to meet community needs in “education, public safety, health, and the environment...Sample activities include tutoring and mentoring youth, assisting crime victims, building homes, and restoring parks.”
AmeriCorps National. The difference between AmeriCorps National and AmeriCorps State is that the national program provides grants to national nonprofit organizations, Indian tribes, and consortia that expand across two or more states. The purpose of the grants and the sample activities are identical to what occur at the state level, except that the service organizations include Indian tribes and work at the national level.
AmeriCorps VISTA. AmeriCorps VISTA provides full-time members to community service organizations and public agencies to expand programs that benefit low- income individuals.
AmeriCorpsengages in both national and community service. According to THE MONROE TIMES (2006), “The mission of AmeriCorps is to strengthen communities and develop leaders through team-based national and community services.” So, everything that AmeriCorps does may arguably not constitute “national service,” thus narrowing the topic substantially.
Senior Corps www.seniorcorps.gov
The Senior Corps provides grants and volunteer citizens age 60 and over to Foster Grandparents, a program that connects volunteers with children, the Senior Companion Program, and the Retired Senior Volunteer Program (RSVP) matches senior volunteers with various programs. All of the programs provide Senior volunteers to service individuals in the community that struggle with day-to-day needs. The first two programs offer stipends, the third one does not.
Affirmatives that wish to run Senior Corps affirmatives could restore the funding that has been cut under the new Bush budget proposal. Participation requirements could also be changed. Lenkowsky (2003) advocates lowering the age requirement and increasing the income requirement for Senior Corps participants:
By raising the income requirement, lowering the age requirement to 55, and building in more flexibility, the programs not only will operate more effectively, but they should also become more appealing to the 76 million Baby Boomers who are on the verge of retirement but who express less interest in volunteering than previous generations.
The age requirement for RSVP has been lowered to 55, but it remains at 60 for the other two programs.
Learn and ServeAmerica
www.learnandserve.org
Learn and Service American provides support to schools, higher education institutions, and community-based organizations that seek to provide learning opportunities to students through service (“service learning”).
Citizen Corps www.citizencorps.gov
Citizen Corps is a national service program that is coordinated by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). DHS works with a variety of partners, such as the National Fire Protection Service and the Civil Air Patrol, to promote community service programs that “support homeland security and community safety.” Since this is coordinated by the DHS, it is conceptually more difficult to imagine the states doing it than the programs just discussed, but since it is state and local councils that actually do the recruiting for the program it is not that difficult to imagine. The Citizen Corps was involved in Hurricane Katrina relief efforts (Citizen Corps, 2005).
Peace Corps www.peacecorps.gov
McCarron (2000) explains the origin and function of the Peace Corps:
The Peace Corps, founded in 1961, trains and sends volunteers to work with people of developing countries on grassroots improvement projects. Since its inception, over 150,000 Peace Corps volunteers have served in more than 130 countries. Volunteers serve for 2 years and return as “cultural ambassadors,” educating the U.S. public about other countries and their customs. During their assignment, Peace Corps volunteers are immersed in their host country’s culture. Living among the people with whom they work, Peace Corps volunteers make a positive contribution to their host country and promote goodwill between it and the United States. Peace Corps applicants must be over age 18; there is no upper age limit. They also must be U.S. citizens. Almost all volunteers have at least a bachelor’s degree, but some applicants without a college degree qualify with 3 or more years of work experience. Although the Peace Corps is to receive a small increase under Bush’s proposed 2007 budget, it will be cut substantially in future years:
“Discretionary spending beyond next year are simply numbers filled in to make a future deficit look small,” Riedl said. “Those discretionary numbers are driven by the goal to cut the deficit in half by 2009.” To meet that goal, Congress would have to embrace a sustained effort to cut even the most sensitive programs. Under the Bush figures, student financial assistance would plunge, to $13.7 billion in 2010 from $19.2 billion this year. By the end of the decade, higher-education assistance would be cut nearly in half, to $1.1 billion from $2 billion. Numerous programs Bush favors for increases in 2007 would find their budgets in steady decline from there, including the Women, Infants and Children’s nutrition program, the Home Investment Partnerships program, which promotes homeownership, homeless assistance grants, the U.S. Marshals Service and the Peace Corps. (WASHINGTON POST, 2006).
Affirmatives may wish to simply restore this level of funding and claim the general benefits associated with the Peace Corps as advantages. Bridgeland (2002) argues that the Peace Corps generates a strong image of the U.S. abroad, an image Joseph Nye (2004) argues is important to our “soft power.”
Other, more specific, plans are also advocated in the literature. A USATODAY (2005) article contends that the Peace Corps should recruit more professionals with greater technical expertise to assist with such projects as agricultural development and Information Technology advancement. Wolf (2005) argues that gay couples should be allowed to co-habitate and participate as couples in the Peace Corps. Although gays are not prohibited from serving in the Peace Corps individually as they are in the military, they are prohibited from serving together as heterosexual couples are. Wolf explains:
But it turns out you are not worth a damn thing to the Peace Corps if you’re queer—unless you want to give up your partner. Jamie pulled up the Peace Corps e-mail address and I sent off a brief note of inquiry asking what the process and the options for a gay couple would be. The response was very brief: “We don’t recognize or accept gay and lesbian couples as partners.”
Armed Forces
The “Armed Forces” are “People on active duty with the United States Army, Air Force, Navy, Marine Corps, or Coast Guard” (South Carolina Community Profiles, http://ww.sccommunityprofiles.org/ glossary.asp). This is probably the most commonly understood and intuitive definition of the term and it permits the affirmative to do what one would expect: recruit more troops.
Other definitions include the entire military organization: “The armed forces4 of a state are its military organization. They exist to further the foreign and domestic policies of their governing body. They may consist of both military and paramilitary forces (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armed_forces). So the Affirmative doesn’t necessarily have to just increase the raw number of troops, but they can also arguably increase the number of administrative individuals in the Armed Forces. For example, the Affirmative could expand the number of human rights monitors in its Iraqi detention camps.
One important thing to note is that the “Armed Forces” do not include people in the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) or the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Many proposals to expand “national service,” particularly those that favor widespread national service, include placing individuals in jobs such as border patrol or port security guards. Those proposals are arguably not topical under this resolution because they involve placing persons in programs outside the parameters of any of the programs listed. Affirmatives may be able to push the envelope some by claiming that these individuals are part of the citizen corps, but they are not part of the Armed Forces.
Moreover, the “Armed Forces” does not include people in the National Guard because those individuals are not considered to be on “active duty” – “In the United States military active duty refers to military members who are currently serving full time in their military capacity…Members of the Military Reserves and National Guard are not considered active duty ” (wikipedia.org/ wiki/Active_duty). This is important because it likely means that cases that attempt to create a general national service corps of people who are generally available to provide homeland security and fill-in with basic tasks while troops are stationed overseas (Moskos, 2005) is not topical.
Although the CIA, for example, is an intelligence agency that operates outside of the DOD, there are intelligence agencies that operate within the armed forces. The Air Force (http://aia.lackland.af.mil/aia/ site.cfm), The Army (https://icon.army.mil/), the Navy (http://www.nmic.navy.mil/), and the Marine Corps (http://www.nmic.navy.mil/) all have their own intelligence services. Affirmatives could recruit individuals to improve each of these.
The original topic wording required the affirmative to implement “mandatory national service.” While Israel and some countries in Eastern Europe have programs that require/mandate that all citizens participate in two years of national service, there is very little support for such an idea in the United States, and even most European countries are moving to phaseout their programs. Nonetheless, there are advocates for draft (Galston, 2004; Moskos, 2001; Rangel, 2003). And debates on the draft introduce debaters to some of the core issues on the topic, such as military readiness and the argued need for civic engagement and service to the nation. Most commentators and scholars writing in the area of military readiness support greater efforts to recruit more volunteers (Moskos, 2005; Lacy, 2003; Boot, 2005a). Mines (2005) argues for 125,000 troops, O’Hanlon (2004, 2005) for 30,000 more. MacKubin (2006) argues that the army needs to expand from 43 to 48 combat teams. Boot (2005) argues that we should let foreigners into the military. These scholars far outnumber the number of individuals that support a draft. Rangel’s bill only had three co-sponsors and failed 404-2 when it came to a vote in the House. Even Moskos (2005) has backed-off the need for the draft. Moskos now argues that sufficient incentives could be provided to recruit 10% of the college graduating class and that those individuals could adequately meet our national needs. For more on the draft debate, see Mjoset (2002), Duindam (1999).
Affirmatives are, of course, not limited to cases that more generally increase the number of persons, particularly troops, serving in the Armed Forces. The DOD’s Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) (February 2006) lays out a number of things that the military does that the affirmative could recruit more people to do better or on a more widespread basis. These include foreign disaster relief, such as for the Tsunami of 2005 or the earthquake in Pakistan, domestic disaster response for things like Hurricane Katrina, increased drug interdiction, the development of special forces (Shanker, 2005), and improving the quality and quantity of military foreign language specialists (GAO, 2001). One important thing to point out in regard to these specific affirmatives is that it is critical for the affirmative to defend that the number of persons serving in these programs need to be increased and not just that greater emphasis should be placed on these things within the programs themselves. This evidence does exist for the foreign language specialists affirmative. As noted by the QDR:
Developing broader linguistic capability and cultural understanding is also critical to prevail in the long war and to meet 21st century challenges. The Department must dramatically increase the number of personnel proficient in key languages such as Arabic, Farsi and Chinese and make these languages available at all levels of action and decision – from the strategic to the tactical.
Beyond the general “readiness” area, affirmatives could also deal primarily with social policy in the military, limiting socially problematic limitations to the number of persons serving in the military. Affirmatives could, for example, lift restrictions on women serving in combat (Skaine, 1999) or gays serving in the military (Fenner, 2001; Belkin, 2003; Herrick, 1996; Rimmerman, 1996).
Advantage Areas
Some of the advantage areas are relatively unique to the particular topic area. First I will discuss advantages that are unique to each of the areas and then ones that apply to both.
AmeriCorps et al Advantages
Job training/employment. Participation in various national service programs could provide important job skills and experience that one could use to obtain a job.
Crime reductions. Participation in these programs is correlated with reduced participation in criminal activity.
Community development/poverty reduction.
Supporting projects in communities, such as job training, could reduce poverty and generally improve the environment in communities.
Education. One of the many objectives of AmeriCorps programs, and the main objective of Learn and Service America, is to strengthen education. Advantages that stem from improvements in education are likely to be popular advantages in this topic area.
Peace Corps Advantages
Global Development. The original purpose of the Peace Corps was to provide opportunities for American youth to improve the lives of people living in the “underdeveloped” areas of the world – Africa, Latin America, for example. Affirmatives could claim to increase participation in the Peace Corps for a general development purpose or particular purpose, such as preventing cholera outbreaks.
Soft Power. Our ability to make friends and influence others is known as soft power (Nye, 2004). As discussed, substantially expanding the Peace Corps could promote a more positive image of the U.S. abroad, boosting our soft power.
MilitaryAdvantages
Readiness. In March of 2005 the Department of Defense released the Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR). In the QDR the Pentagon shifted its focus away from how to meet specific enemies (such as Iran or North Korea) toward how to deal with specific capabilities that any future adversary may possess. The DOD has identified four major threat types:
Irregular threats. These include adversaries that are likely to use terrorism, insurgency, or civil war to obtain their objections.
Catastrophic threats. These threats include threats from Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDS) – chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons.
Traditional threats. There are the threats posed by traditional state- controlled militaries.
Disruptive threats. These threats aim to undermine U.S. technological advantages, such as its information warfare advantage.
Affirmatives, who must topically increase the number of persons serving in the Armed Forces will argue that more people are needed in to keep pace with future, and even existing, capabilities and threats. Two recently released (January 2006) studies argue that the current U.S. military, largely due to extended deployments in Iraq, lacks adequate person power. The studies (Krepinevich, 2006; National Security Advisory Group, 2006) argue that the U.S. military faces recruiting shortfalls, that many people are quitting the military, that we lack an adequate number of “boots on the ground” in Iraq, and that we can’t adequately deter other threats because we are tied-down in Iraq. All of this, they argue, threatens our deterrence. The National Security Advisory Group (2006) explains:
In the meantime, the United States has only limited ground force capability ready to respond to other contingencies. The absence of a credible strategic reserve in our ground forces increases the risk that potential adversaries will be tempted to challenge the United States. Although the United States can still deploy air, naval, and other more specialized assets to deter or respond to aggression, the visible overextension of our ground forces could weaken our ability to deter aggression….As a global power with global interests, the United States must be able to deal with challenges to its interests in multiple regions of the world simultaneously. Today, however, the United States has only limited ground force capability ready to respond outside the Afghan and Iraqi theaters of operations. If the Army were ordered to send significant forces to another crisis today, its only option would be to deploy units at readiness levels far below what operational plans would require – increasing the risk to the men and women being sent into harm’s way and to the success of the mission. As stated rather blandly in one DOD presentation, the Army “continues to accept risk” in its ability to respond to crises on the Korean Peninsula and elsewhere.
Although the United States can still deploy air, naval, and other more specialized assets to deter or respond to aggression, the visible overextension of our ground forces has the potential to significantly weaken
our ability to deter and respond to some contingencies Advocates of increasing the number of troops argue that insurgencies can only be defeated by troops on the ground (Beinert, 2005), that we need more troops to fight additional conflicts, such as in the Taiwan Strait (O’Hanlon, 2005), and the need for Iraqi and Afghani stability (Mines, 2005).
Despite the conclusions of these studies there is far from universal agreement that the military faces a personnel shortage. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld strongly disagrees with the idea that the military suffers from troop shortages. Rumsfeld argues that our readiness in the modern world requires a high-tech military that can exploit its economic weaknesses. Rumsfeld opposes creating a larger military that would sap resources from his defense transformation and at the same time recruit soldiers unable to use the military’s new high-tech tools. The importance of troop levels in sustaining readiness is wide-open to debate.
U.S. Leadership. Sustaining a military of appropriate size and boosting our readiness is arguably important to our overall global leadership and hegemony. Cross-Cutting Advantages
Civic engagement. This advantage is more strongly linked to the “AmeriCorps et al” group of cases than the Peace Corps and military groupings, but it applies to those as well, particularly if it is a draft affirmative. The civic engagement advantage stems from the idea that Americans are too focused on individual gain at the expense of their communities (Adams, 1994), an idea that has been well developed by Robert Putnam in his book BOWLING ALONE. Declines in civic engagement have been noted by many scholars and pundits (Kaplan, 2005; Crenson, 2003; Oesterle, 2004). When people feel less interdependent they are vulnerable to being kept together through coercion — authoritarianism. Participation in programs such as Americorp programs has boosted civic engagement, moving people away from this sense of individualism. ABT (2004) notes: Overall, we find that participation in AmeriCorps results in numerous positive and statistically significant effects on members’ attitudes, especially with respect to attitudes toward civic engagement. Specifically, participation in State and National programs results in positive, statistically significant effects for all eight civic engagement attitudinal outcomes, while participation in NCCC results in positive, statistically significant effects for half of the civic engagement attitudinal outcomes. Given the strong emphasis on service participation, civic engagement, and community involvement during the programs, we are not surprised to find such a large number of positive civic engagement outcomes.
That last piece of evidence on the value of national service as training for civic engagement does not end the debate, however. Bennet (2003) argues that participation in community service projects actually discourages political participation and Crenson (2003) and Crowley (1999) argue that the programs turn individuals toward “consumerism” and away from “citizenship.” And, even the ABT Associates study found that participation in AmeriCorps did not boost leadership skills or build tolerance.
National Service. Tied to, yet distinct from, civic engagement is the question of national service. By inserting the term “national service” the resolution does more than push the affirmative to support the involvement of the individual in the community, but requires the affirmative to defend serving the state (the government). Buckley (1990) celebrates individual service to the state and Rorty (1998) argues for the need to “Achieve Our Country.” If the affirmative develops a “national service” focus to the case it will help them generate offense against the states counterplan and kritiks6.
General Disadvantages
Politics. In the current budgetary environment there is not a lot of political support for expanding the AmeriCorpsstyle or PeaceCorps programs. Some support exists for expanding the military in limited ways, but almost no support exists for large-scale expansion or for the draft. Generally, Lenkowski (2003) notes that Republicans are opposed to national service programs: “”Republicans generally remained skeptical and, in Congress, actively opposed national service at every opportunity.”
Volunteerism. This applies more to affirmatives that advocate mandatory national service, but a strong general argument can be made that when national service is required by the government, or even payed for and organized by the government, it undermines a volunteer ethic and reduces the actual personal value and civic nature of the service (Bennett, 2003). Dowd explains in 2002:
By making government the conduit between those who serve and those who are served, AmeriCorps diminishes authentic volunteering, and in the long- term it could even undermine the nonprofit sector. Charities, churches, and synagogues simply cannot compete with a program that pays people to do what was once volunteer work. Nor can they compete with a program that is compulsory.
Spending. The Bush administration has made a serious effort to keep non-defense & domestic spending, and now even national security spending, very limited. Its new budget makes cuts to many domestic programs, including the AmeriCorps programs. Many argue that spending limitations in these areas are critical to send a signal of “fiscal discipline” to the financial markets.
Military Disadvantages
Defense Transformation. This disadvantage argues that the military is currently undergoing a transition to a transformed fighting machine in which limited resources are invested in a comparatively small number of professional soldiers and high- tech weapons. Increasing the number of persons in the military, something Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld strongly opposes, will divert financial, training, and equipment resources away from defense transformation (Gray, 2005).
Civil-Military Relations. Imposing more troops on the military could threaten relations between the civilians (Congress) and the military. Undermining civil-military relations could threaten readiness or even risk a coup.
Preemption. If the military were more ready the Bush administration may be tempted to undertake more wars, such as in Iran or North Korea. There is good evidence that a lack of readiness prevented Bush from striking those countries.
Cross-Cutting Counterplans
The Courts. One plan option for the affirmative, or counterplan option for the negative, is the courts. The negative could fiat that the federal district courts or the Supreme Court interpret the various Amendments to the Constitution, existing legislation, or existing court case law to require a particular practice. It will be easy for teams to find cards that say practice “X” violates the law in some way and that it would be struck-down. For example, a team could argue that the military’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy is unconstitutional and that it should be struck-down by the courts.
The States. The states will have almost no ability to solve affirmatives that deal with the military or the Peace Corps. They will, however, be able to solve most of the volunteer-centered services Many states have adopted service learning programs, for example. Crenson (2003) explains: Schools have not abandoned all of these rituals. But there is a pronounced shift from these electoral exercises to “student service learning.” Maryland was the first state to make it a requirement for high school graduation, but other states are quickly following suit. Elementary and secondary school students are expected to “volunteer” for public service jobs with charitable, civic, and public interest groups. Student service learning is also a growing presence on college campuses, and there have been calls to make it a graduation requirement in the state colleges and universities of California.
Some, including the Board of Directors of the Corporation for National Service (2000), even go so far as to argue that many of the national programs should be devolved to the states:
The Board of Directors supports strengthening State Service Commissions and other grantees to increasingly devolve National Service program authorities. State Service Commissions are the operational linchpins. They select and recommend projects for funding and are responsible for the preparation of comprehensive National Service plans for the states. Each State Service Commission, led by 15-25 governor-appointed volunteers, reflects the breadth of the service environment in each state. Three major strategies form the basis of the Board of Director’s recommendation:
Re-allocation. As discussed, there are literally thousands of different problems that could be solved by targeting an increase in the number of persons serving in the programs. Recruiting environmental specialists to clean-up a problem at a particular military base is just one example. Given that it is literally impossible to prepare for all of these different affirmatives, negatives will need to be prepared to run a counterplan to use existing resources/ people to solve problems rather than increasing the number of persons in the military or other programs. Disadvantages such as Spending and Politics can function as net-benefits to these counterplans. Affirmatives may be well-prepared to argue for the need to solve a particular program, but will struggle to argue that participation needs to be increased to do so. A defense of increasing the number of persons will be especially difficult in the military area.
Framework. Although affirmatives will likely be able to identify a number of things that need to be done, and that could be done through one of the listed programs or the Armed Forces, it will be harder for them to defend that the plan must be implemented through one of the programs. For example, it may very well be the case that a particular park may need to be cleaned-up, but that does not necessarily mean that the park has to be cleaned-up via the involvement of AmeriCorps. The negative could counterplan to support solving the identified problem directly without involving AmeriCorps. Affirmatives need to be able to defend not only that the problem that they identify could be solved through the program identified in the plan, but that it needs to be solved through that program. This burden will be much easier for the military affirmatives to meet than it will be for others to meet.
Counterplans Specific to the Military
Off-Shore Balancing. Off-shore balancing is a concept that has been developed by Stephen Walt (2005a, 2005b, 2005c) and articulated by other pundits and academics (Pena, 2005; Pena 2006). Off-shore balancing is a way to reduce the size of the
U.S. military while still countering threats. The basic idea of offshore balancing is that the U.S. could develop a strong military force that could both defend the homeland and deter regional military conflict while pre-positioning the majority of our assets in a slimmed-down military on or near the homeland. Pena (2006) explains: Prior to Operation Iraqi Freedom, the total number of U.S. active-duty military personnel was more than 1.4 million troops, of which 237,473 were deployed in foreign countries. Assuming twice as many troops need to be deployed in the United States in order to rotate those deployments at specified intervals,11 then more than 700,000 active-duty troops, along with their associated force structure, are required to maintain a global military presence. Since the United States does not in fact have to maintain its current worldwide deployments, U.S. security against nation- state threats can be achieved at significantly lower costs. Instead of a Cold War–era extended defense perimeter and forward-deployed forces, today’s nation- state threat environment affords the United States the opportunity to adopt a “balancerof- last-resort” strategy. Such a strategy would place greater emphasis on allowing countries to build regional security arrangements, even in important areas such as Europe and East Asia. In 2001, Ivan Eland argued: The regional arrangements could include a regional security organization (such as any newly formed defense subset of the European Union), a great power policing its sphere of influence, or simply a balance of power among the larger nations of a region. Those regional arrangements would check aspiring hegemonic powers and thus keep power in the international system diffuse. Ted Galen Carpenter at the Cato Institute also argues in favor of a balancer-of-last-resort strategy: The United States no longer faces a would-be hegemonic rival, nor is any credible challenger on the horizon. That development should fundamentally change how we view regional or internecine conflicts. In most cases such disorders will not impinge on vital U.S. interests. Washington can, therefore, afford to view them with detachment, intervening only as a balancer of last resort when a conflict cannot be contained by other powers in the affected region and is expanding to the point where America’s security is threatened. Stephen Walt of the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University echoes Eland and Carpenter in his argument for an offshore balancing strategy: The final option is offshore balancing, which has been America’s traditional grand strategy. In this strategy, the United States deploys its power abroad only when there are direct threats to vital American interests. Offshore balancing assumes that only a few areas of the globe are of strategic importance to the United States (that is, worth fighting and dying for). Specifically, the vital areas are the regions where there are substantial concentrations of power and wealth or critical natural resources: Europe, industrialized Asia, and the Persian Gulf. Offshore balancing further recognizes that the United States does not need to control these areas directly; it merely needs to ensure that they do not fall under the control of a hostile great power and especially not under the control of a so- called peer competitor. To prevent rival great powers from doing this, offshore balancing prefers to rely primarily on local actors to uphold the regional balance of power. Under this strategy, the United States would intervene with its own forces only when regional powers are unable to uphold the balance of power on their own. Solutions to Iraq. The primary, if not the exclusive, cause of U.S. military overextension is the continuing conflict/ insurgency in Iraq. If a solution to this growing quagmire could be found, the burden on the U.S. military would be substantially decreased and it would be more difficult to defend the need to increase participation. Negatives should peruse the literature on Iraq in search of solutions to the identified problem(s). Popular past solutions include turning Iraq over to the UN or increasing indigenous training.
Consultation. The U.S. usually consults its allies, particularly NATO, when making large changes to its military posture. Given the past popularity of the consult NATO counterplan, this will likely be very popular next year against cases in the Armed Forces area of the topic.
Military reform. A number of reforms could be made to the military that will increase its effectiveness even at current troop levels. Carafano (2005) proposes reforming military education, restructuring commands, developing a Unified Command, and developing new technologies. O’Hanlon (2004, 2005) proposes other types of restructuring. These counterplans all fundamentally address the question of military readiness without increasing the number of persons serving in the military.
European Union. I mention the European Union as an example of a counterplan that could solve some of the “development- style” advantages to the Peace Corps affirmatives. Net-Benefits to this counterplan include any domestic disadvantages, such as Spending or Politics.
Cross-Cutting Kritiks
General statism and kritiks of “national service.” In calling individuals to “national service,” the resolution facilitates individual service to the state. Any generic statism/state bad kritik applies to every affirmative on this topic. Particularly in regard to the “AmeriCorps et al” part of the topic, negatives will be able to argue that a given community service program should be supported, but that individuals should not be encouraged to participate in “national service.” Specifically, the concept of “national service” is highly “kritikable.” If you remember back to history, it was Hitler who originally championed the cause of national service. Grigg (1997) explains: The concept of “citizen-servant” was also a key tenet of the National Socialist version of collectivism. In a 1933 speech, Hitler insisted that “the higher interests involved in the life of the whole must here set the limits and lay down the duties of the interests of the individual.” According to Hitler, the noblest German attribute was a quality called pflichterfulling or “fulfillment of duty”: “It means not to be self-sufficient, but to serve the community.” One favored Nazi slogan was “Gemeinnutz vor Eigennutz!” (“The common interest before self!”) Nazi author Friedrich Sieburg offered this summary of the Nazi ethos: “There are no more private Germans; each is to attain significance only by his service to the state, and to find complete self-fulfillment in this service.” Like Clinton’s AmeriCorps and Lenin’s Young Communist League, the Hitler Youth were to serve as missionaries for the collectivist state. “This new Reich will give its youth to no one, but will itself take youth and give to youth its own education and its own upbringing,” Hitler announced in a May 1, 1937 speech. Hitler had earlier acknowledged that indoctrinating Germany’s youth in his preferred version of collectivism was one of his chief ambitions. “When an opponent says, ‘I will not come over to your side,’ I calmly say, ‘Your child belongs to us already,’” Hitler declared in a speech on November 6, 1933. “What are you? You will pass on. Your descendants, however, now stand in the new camp. In a short time they will know nothing else but this new community.” Moreover, there are a number of kritiks that overlap, or develop out of, the imperialism that is discussed below. Lifton (2000) and Spanos (2000), for example, both kritik the idea of American exceptionalism.
Libertarianism. This kritik would have been more popular if the word “mandatory” had remained in the topic, it does apply well to any affirmative to requires any form of national service. The libertarianism kritik argues that it is immoral to require any form of national service and that it is arguably even a form of slavery (Bandow, 1987).
Biopower/Foucault. Integrating individuals into the state in the name of accomplishing national service not only pulls individuals into the biopolitical control of the government, but also exposes individuals who “benefit” from those programs to both juridical and disciplinary power. Given the popularity of the “Biopower” kritik in the least two years, it is likely to be very popular next year.
Peace Corps Kritiks
Development Kritik. The development kritik will link well to most Peace Corps affirmatives. The development kritik argues that it is racist to try to remaking the “third world” in our image by changing their societies to be like our own. The best single source for this kritik is the DEVELOPMENT DICTIONARY.
Imperialism. Promoting the U.S. way of life on other continents such as Africa is arguably an exercise in Imperialism. This sort of Western imperialism has been heavily criticized by William Spanos in his book AMERICA’S SHADOW. This also links well to the Armed Forces section of the topic (Boggs, 2005; Falk, 2004; Gardner, 2004; Merry, 2005; Soderberg, 2005).
Military Kritiks
Militarism. It isn’t difficult to find evidence that says that the military and the military’s use of violence are very bad and that they fail to solve problems (Bacevich, 2005). The Non-Violence Kritik is likely to be very popular this year.
Threat Construction. The threat construction kritik argues that most threats are only imagined and that when we imagine them they tend to become real.
Strategizing
Developing ANegative Strategy
One of the most important things that negatives need to understand when approaching this topic is that there are at least three, and arguably four, related, but also rather distinct, topic areas within this resolution. Negatives should work to develop different strategies for “AmeriCorps et al” affirmatives, Citizen Corps affirmatives, Peace Corps affirmatives, and military readiness affirmatives.
As discussed in the counterplan section, most AmeriCorps-style affirmatives can be solved at state level. Also, it will be very difficult for affirmatives to defend operating with the AmeriCorps, VISTA, or Senior Corps frameworks. Military readiness and Peace Corps affirmatives cannot be solved at the state level. Although these affirmative cases cannot be solved at the state level, they each have a number of strong generic arguments against them. Military readiness affirmatives will have to fend-off strong kritiks of violence, militarism, and threat construction and defeat the Offshore- Balancing counterplan or similary “reduce presence” counterplans, such as withdraw from Iraq. Peace Corps affirmatives will attempt to link out of all of these kritiks, but will link well to strong imperialism-style kritiks. Furthermore, many of the advantages that can be claimed from Peace Corps action, for example, can be obtained through the action of the European Union or other international actor. Affirmatives will also have to defend using the framework of the program that they pick.
While the differences amongst these areas speak to the need to develop different negative strategies, negatives that are able to criticize the concept of “national service,” and lock affirmatives into supporting it, are likely to have a huge strategic advantage. Negatives can argue that while they support the plan’s mandates and at least most of its advantages, they do not endorse supporting “national service.”
Choosing An Affirmative
Although affirmatives will have a large number of potential cases to choose from, there will only be a limited number of cases that the affirmative will be able to win from a strategic perspective. As a result, there are a number of important things to consider when choosing an affirmative. First, affirmatives need a strong justification for federal action. Without this, affirmatives will repeatedly lose to the simple strategy of the states counterplan with politics and federal spending net- benefits. Second, affirmatives need to choose a case where they can claim large advantages. Relatively simple disadvantages such as Spending and Politics link to all of these affirmatives and have very large impacts that will outweigh small case advantages. Third, affirmatives will have to fend-off strong kritiks that are unique to their area, such as Militarism or the Development kritik. Fourth, affirmatives will have to defend the framework of the program that they choose. Fifth, affirmatives will have to defend adding additional persons to the programs rather than just targeting existing persons and programs Sixth, affirmatives will have to fend-off a variety of kritiks that link broadly (statism and/or kritiks of “national service”). These kritiks apply to all affirmatives, so they should not necessarily be a factor that determines affirmative choice7, but they are something that affirmatives need to overcome. Affirmatives that cannot defend the need for “national service,” will likely lose a lot of debates, even if they have a strong defense of their plan and advantages.
Given these restraints, a strong case can be made for choosing an affirmative in the Peace Corps or Military readiness/Armed Forces sections of the topic. These affirmatives have much larger impacts and are not vulnerable to the states counterplan. The kritiks of the military are probably better than the development-style kritiks, but it will be easier for the affirmative to defend the need to act through the military than to defend the need to act through the Peace Corps as many development agencies, such as the U.S Agency for International Development, are capable of accomplishing the plan’s goals.
Creative, “out of the box” thinking can even produce some affirmatives that potentially avoid, or even turn, some of the best kritiks of the military. For example, permitting cohabitation of gays and lesbians in the Peace Corps could topically increase participation, but the main advantage would come from the protection of gay rights. Moreover, affirmatives could play fast and loose with this military area. They could, for example, increase the participation of individuals who refuse to use violence in the military or increase the number of human rights activists. Creative affirmatives can simply “kritik” the military right out of the 1AC. That being said, there is one strategic weakness to the military affirmatives – the ability to defend the plan in the name of “national service.” A strong case can be made to recruit another 50,000 to 60,000 people in the military to prevent troop overstretch and sustain U.S. readiness. Making a strong case to do that as a form of national service will be more difficult. In fact, outside of the draft literature there is almost no discussion of the importance of recruiting more paid volunteers into the military as a way to promote service to the nation. This literature is more entwined with the cases that are more vulnerable to the states counterplan and otherwise lacking in sizable advantages – AmeriCorps, Learn and Serve America, etc. Moreover, Affirmatives defending these areas of the topic may be able defend a more favorable conception of national service than those advocating military recruiting.
Suggestions for Future/Initial Research
Learning more about each area of the topic will require some additional reading. Given that the three areas of the topic are relatively distinct subsets, it is difficult possible to point you to literature that thoroughly discusses all of them. Even the literature on the general merits of national service does not include sophisticated discussions of military readiness.
The one area where the literature overlaps to some degree is in the discussion of a draft or mandatory national service. Although I would not recommend running a mandatory approach as your affirmative because it is nearly impossible to defend, the literature on mandatory national service does access a number of important topic issues, particularly the core issue of service to and through the nation.
Many of the bibliographic resources listed below represent some of the core readings on the topic. Most of them are available online. Debaters who wish to get a jump- start on next year’s topic should delve right into them.
Conclusion
The topic area chosen for debate grew out of the general idea of “national service.”
The resolution requires that this national service be performed through a number of national service programs, meaning that the affirmatives ‘advocacy needs to be one that is in favor of service through and toward the nation. This central issue provides a unifying theme across what is an otherwise relatively disparate list of topic areas and one on which both sides need to be thoroughly prepared.
Good affirmatives will need to provide a strong defense of national service, prove that their plan can actualize it, outweigh strong disadvantages, defend the importance of federal action vis-à-vis the states, fight off highly applicable area- specific kritiks, and defend that it is essential to increase the number of persons serving in one or more of the programs. These are a number of difficult obstacles for the affirmative to jump through, but affirmatives that can do so are likely to be very successful. Negatives should work to make these obstacles as strong as possible. The tougher the obstacles the more likely it is that the negative will prevail.
