The hegemonic practices of soft power and hard power are immoral

Many thanks to my opponent for his perspective.Hard and Soft PowerAs Wilson (2008) explains: “In international politics, having ‘power’ is having the ability to influence another to act in ways in which that entity would not have acted otherwise.” (Wilson, p. 114) Hard power denotes the strategic use of coercive force or the threat of force, whereas soft power is the capacity of persuasion in the absence of coercion and imply the absence of force. Methods of exercising hard power take the form of military intervention or economic sanctions to advance the interests of actors, whereas soft power is a concept developed by Harvard University professor Joseph Nye is exercised by getting an actor to change their behavior to suit one’s interests with neither the threat or use of force or coercion. Both hard and soft power are tools of statecraft, whereby actors attempt to influence other actors to advance their interests. Statecraft, simply defined, is the use of power in the realm of international politics; and comprises the methods and strategies states use to advance their national interests (Kaplan, 1952 at pp. 548). So, statecraft includes both hard and soft power which are exercised by state actors to advance their interests. If statecraft is the use of power (either hard or soft) to advance a state’s interests, to morally evaluate practices of statecraft requires (a) a consideration of the interests pursued, (b) the means utilized to pursue them, (c) the ends effectuated and/or (d) the intent of the pursuit of the interests advanced. To begin, it cannot be said that a state pursuing its interests is immoral because by definition politicians are morally obliged to serve the interests of the constituents they represent whether the state is a democracy or not. So, because of the moral obligation of political leaders to act in the interests of their constituents, where measures of statecraft are exercised by political leaders to serve those interests, it must be said that states are adhering to their moral obligation. However, the means by which those interests are pursued may not escape scrutiny also. The basis on which to evaluate the means of a state pursuing its interest, however, must begin with a calculation of maximized utility to a state’s interests. If, for instance, the means of pursuing an end renders the attainment of the end impossible or more costly than the good the end’s achievement would hypothetically render, it cannot be said that the pursuit of the end in question is good. However, where the means by which an end is pursued requires less harm than the good of the end achieved, political leaders are compelled of necessity to pursue that end and therefore morally justified in doing so, because pursuing the good in question means advancing the interests of state and likewise the interests of its people. The intent, however, of a pursued end, must similarly be scrutinized. Where the intent of any state action is predicated upon the advancement of human rights, the intent of that action is itself good -perhaps to such an extent that the intent of state action to that end is beyond impunity. Cases of American Hegemonic Statecraft Criticized by My Opponent:Soft Power1. Security Council Veto Power International law and norms proscribe the means by which security challenges are addressed in international politics. The US enjoys permanent membership status on the UNSC. Likewise, the US enjoys the freedom to vote for its interests and does so accordingly. Because the US’s votes on the UNSC are in pursuit of those interests, it cannot be said that those votes are immoral. (Let it be noted that because UNSC resolutions carry the threat of force from member nations, it likewise cannot be said that this is a measure of soft power -but this is the heading under which my opponent categorized it, so I will refute it as such.)2. US Trade Embargo to Cuba It cannot be said that the United States is culpable for the economic failures of any nation with which US has not engaged in trade for more than five decades. Because the United States does not trade with Cuba, the US unworthy of blame for the economic status quo of Cuba or the impact to the Cuban people. Whatever spurious connection my opponent seeks to make is inexcusably devoid of a causal link, and as such reduces to the logic of post hoc egro propter hoc.3. Food Aid My opponent argues that American food aid to foreign countries is immoral because it was mishandled by non-Americans upon delivery to foreign countries. If we are to assume that this is the case, we must hold Americans responsible for actions which they did not themselves commit. That America intends to feed the world’s hungry does not make them morally culpable for the actions of those who hold ransom the benevolence of the United States. Also, where the United States has recognized a negative economic impact of food aid to local producers, it has discontinued providing the form of aid which caused harm, and employed alternative methods to at once economically empower local producers and advance the nutrition of the world’s hungry. Indeed, “U.S. food aid programs are more than a hand out, they are a hand up, improving living conditions, incomes, nutrition and agriculture.” (foodaid.org)Hard Power1. Islam, Rhetoric and 9/11 My opponent argues that Bush (I’m sure he meant George W. Bush, not H. W. Bush) fostered American prejudice against all muslims and socially constructed an terrorist enemy of “brown people.” This is factually incorrect. During his Address to the Nation on September 20, 2001 and thereafter Bush made direct distinctions between Islam and the perversion of it practiced by the terrorists who perpetrated the September 11 attacks. Moreover, even if this fictitious “social construction” of threats did take place, because it’s formulation does not entail the coercive exercise of force on other actors, it cannot be properly described as an exercise of hard power. "The terrorists practice a fringe form of Islamic extremism that has been rejected by Muslim scholars and the vast majority of Muslim clerics -- a fringe movement that perverts the peaceful teachings of Islam." -GWB 2. Fascism My opponent’s point has no bearing on the moral culpability of the United States.Moral WeighingThe question of moral evaluation must begin with one of moral obligation, which is to ask: “To whom are political leaders obliged?” given that it is indeed political leaders who exercise measures of statecraft. Because political leaders are only morally obliged to serve the interests of their respective states, where exercise of state power in international politics is in the pursuit of state interest, it must be said that those measures of statecraft are moral. Moreover, while my opponent has listed gratuitous examples of US statecraft in various forms, with all examples he either failed to offer sufficient evidence to indicate the moral culpability of the United States for its exercise of power or perpetrated historical falsehood. However, even if it were the case that he did offer sufficient evidence to indicate the moral culpability of the United State’s use of state power in international politics, the mere American use of power in that manor is insufficient to indicate the moral worth of the exercise of state power itself. case because the exercise of state power transcends the United States both in the present and across the years of time. Simply stated, even if one accepts that the United States makes immoral use of statecraft, that is not sufficient to indicate the immorality of all statecraft. So, my opponent has confused the definitions of hard and soft power. He has offered invalid examples to evaluate the morality of state power, none of the examples he has cited -even if they were valid- would be sufficient to affirm the resolution, which states that hegemonic practices of soft power and hard power are immoral.