Developing countries should prioritize environmental protection over resource extraction

I Negate resolved developing countries should prioritize environmental protection over resource extraction when the two are in conflict. My value is morality Should in the resolution is defined as: used to indicate obligation duty or correctness usually when criticizing someone"s actions Therefore the resolution implies morality My Valued Criterion is consistency with the social contract John Locke"s social contract states that the government has the duty to protect the life liberty and property of its people in order to uphold the social contract. Only this way can the government become legitimate. If the government"s actions do not protect the citizens, the actions are considered immoral. The affirmative"s burden for this round is to prove that environmental protection would be more beneficial to the citizens of the country. If the neg proves that resource extraction is more beneficial or the aff cannot prove that environmental protection would be more beneficial, then neg automatically wins the round. The warrant is that, since the resolution implies morality, and the criterion is social contract, not choosing the more beneficial side would be immoral. Contention 1- Resource extraction helps decrease poverty. Poverty kills millions of people Prof. James Gilligan, "The 14 to 18 million deaths a year caused by poverty compare with about 100,000 deaths per year from armed conflict. Comparing this frequency of deaths"to the frequency of those caused by major military and political violence, such as World War II [where] an estimated 49 million military and civilian deaths, including those caused by genocide--or about eight million per year, [occurred]"In other words...every single year, two to three times as many people die from poverty throughout the world as were killed" in WWII." Resource extraction prevents poverty- The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) reports- "Mining can contribute to economic development in several ways: "direct investment (DI), employment, government revenues, foreign exchange earnings, innovation and development of related sectors. Minerals" supply is essential to modern economies and minerals exploitation represents the major part of DI flows in many developing countries, often dwarfing aid flows." Additionally, the World Bank states, "Natural resource extraction is capital-intensive, with annual global investments approaching $1 trillion, hence offering the potential for rapid infrastructure development and structural transformation in developing economies. Riches from the sector promise to be massive, with resource rents"estimated at about $4 trillion annually." The World Bank, after a meta-analysis of more than 50 nations, concludes that "poorest and least-poor quartiles obtain about 18 percent of their income from extraction, while middle-income groups obtain more. Across all income quartiles, dependence on resources is much lower in resource-scarce areas than in resource-rich areas." Thus, downplaying resource extraction would deprive the impoverished with a key source of income. Furthermore, Eleanor Fisher et al, [Centre for Development Studies, Swansea University], "The ladder that sends us to wealth": Artisanal mining and poverty reduction in Tanzania," Resources Policy, 2009. This article has focused on whether ASM has the potential to contribute to poverty reduction, an issue of contemporary relevance across sub-Saharan Africa. This research suggests that in the study areas, people working in mining or related services are less likely to be in poverty than people who are with other occupations in the sample sites. Although published literature widely associates ASM with vulnerability, the data demonstrate that a regular income from gold mining may also reduce vulnerability within mining households. Production from diamond mining is too sporadic to provide a dependable income to buffer households against vulnerability to livelihood shocks. The issue of vulnerability is complex, however, because people"s access to a mineral claim, and capacity to securely exploit and develop that claim, affects their ability to attain livelihood security And environmental protection does nothing to prevent poverty- "Paul D1riessen, (Staff, Atlas Economic Research Foundation), ECO-IMPERIALISM: GREEN POWER, BLACK DEATH, 2005, 10. The international green movement"s budget has been estimated to be in excess of $8 billion a year. As a result, well-organized, media-savvy pressure groups have unprecedented power to promote their agendas, define "society"s expectations," and influence public perceptions, corporate decisions, and legislative and regulatory initiatives. In the international arena, they frequently play a prominent role in negotiations, equal to or more dominant than many multinational companies and even some countries, especially Third World nations. Not surprisingly, the NGOs" agendas frequently conflict with and override the most pressing needs and concerns of people who are struggling to overcome widespread poverty and malnutrition, devastating epidemics, and a virtual absence of electricity and economic opportunity. Thus, since poverty causes people to die, by allowing this to happen the government is not upholding its end of the social contract because it is not protecting its citizens. In terms of the resolution, environmental protection doesn"t help those in poverty at all as proven before. Since resource extraction is the only way to prevent poverty and uphold the social contract, it is the only morally correct action. Contention 2- Resource extraction reduces conflict If you don"t buy my first contention, then I can prove that resource extraction is beneficiary in another way. Resource extraction prevents war. Christa Brunnschweiler 1, (Center of Economic Research at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology), SCIENCE, May 2, 2008, 616. Similarly, resource wealth also attenuated the risk of conflict. This is due to a positive indirect effect: Resource wealth raises income, and higher incomes, in turn, reduce the risk of conflict. Again, although the aggregate impact of resource abundance is slight"amounting to less than a 5% reduction in the risk of war in case of a standard-deviation increase in resources"it is still statistically significant. These findings are robust to using alternative measures of resource abundance, such as fuel and nonfuel mineral reserves per capita. Christa Brunnschweiler 2 It appears as if, across the board, resource riches may be associated with higher incomes and a lower risk of civil war. Although there are undoubtedly specific countries where specific resources have eroded institutions or torn countries apart in civil strife, we find this is not the general pattern. This is consistent with several case studies that fail to show a robust link between the onset of war and resource extraction and with evidence that the sector involved in turning natural resources into primary products has many more positive spillovers to the rest of the economy than often are argued. Thus not only does resource extraction reduce poverty, but it prevents war. If a country were to go to war then it is risking the lives of the citizens, and in the case that they lose they are totally failing their citizens. Therefore by going to war they are violating the social contract. So developing countries should turn to resource extraction because it benefits them in significant ways. Contention 3- Resource Resource extraction provides the most benefits. The only reason to turn to environmental protection would be because of risks to the human race caused by resource extraction. However the world environment is actually getting better. Lomberg 10" Given all the talk of impending catastrophe, this may come as a surprise, but as we approach the 40th anniversary of the first Earth Day, people who care about the environment actually have a lot to celebrate. Of course, that's not how the organizers of Earth Day 2010 see it. In their view (to quote a recent online call to arms), "The world is in greater peril than ever." But consider this: In virtually every developed country, the air is more breathable and the water is more drinkable than it was in 1970. In most of the First World, deforestation has turned to reforestation. Moreover, the percentage of malnutrition has been reduced, and ever-more people have access to clean water and sanitation. Apocalyptic predictions from concerned environmental activists are nothing new. Until about 10 years ago, I took it for granted that these predictions were sound. Like many of us, I believed that the world was in a terrible state that was only getting worse with each passing day. My thinking changed only when, as a university lecturer, I set out with my students to disprove what I regarded at the time as the far-fetched notion that global environmental conditions were actually improving. To our surprise, the data showed us that many key environmental measures were indeed getting better. So even while the environment is getting better, if species where to go extinct it would have little effect on human survival Sagoff that "the elimination of all but a tiny minority of our fellow creatures does not affect the material well-being of humans one iota." n344 This skeptic challenged ecologists to list more than 10,000 species (other than unthreatened microbes) that are essential to ecosystem productivity or functioning. n345 "The human species could survive just as well if 99.9% of our fellow creatures went extinct, provided only that we retained the appropriate 0.1% that we need." Thus you negate