When forced to choose, a just government . . . (see text for full resolution)

Pro has given us a proposed national debate topic to test. We have given the resolution a fair test in comprehensive debate. I conclude that the topic, when well debated, oght not be affirmed. A debate resolution is a call to action. Our subject resolution calls upon governments to act: "When forced to choose, a just government ought to prioritize universal human rights over its national interest." The resolution calls for governments to act regardless of the will of the people. We know from history that given the opportunity to chose, people will sometimes sacrifice national interest to advance human rights, but not always. America cannot merely choose to play international policeman, as it did in Bosnia, it is compelled to adopt that role. The resolution demands an end to democracy. Suppose the people of a country are starving? Too bad, because the government must choose to spend whatever resources it has on advancing universal human rights, no matter how pressing the national interest. Who defines universal human rights? Pro says a "just government" will know. But every government thinks it is just, and the resolution neither identifies the rights are nor gives a mechanism outside of individual governments for deciding. North Korea can prioritize freeing South Korea from the yoke of capitalism as its priority, providing Kim Il-Jung thinks his government is just.. Democracies agree on some rights as being universal, but they disagree on everything from the right to bear arms to the right to use hate speech. Pro suggests it would be reasonable to only prioritize the agreed upon rights. It might be reasonable, but the resolution allows no limits on the crusade. Canadians must prioritize Americans establishing a right to health care, while Americans must prioritize Canadians having a right to hate speech -- each country prioritizing the quest for rights above national interest. National interests, including economic recovery and defense against terrorist attack, must be subordinated to the crusade for whatever the government of a country believes to be universal human rights. There are serious questions about what constitutes "universal human rights." The resolution leaves it to governments to decide. the resolution might have specified the rights either directly or by referencing a document, but it did not. Pro contends that democratic nations have good agreement on the basic human rights, and I agree. However, the resolution does not say that the core rights agreed to by democracies should b prioritized above self interest. All rights must be given priority. I named many rights claimed by some democracies, but not by others. If the U.S. believes that there is right to "hate speech" while Britain and France do not. The resolution requires each country to press its concept of universal human rights above self interest. North Korea and China are obligated by the resolution to prioritize their concepts of human rights. Pro argues that only "just governments" are subject to the requirement, which leaves out North Korea and the like. But the resolution has no mechanism for determining which governments are just. The call to action is solely to government, so only the government decides whether it is just, along with deciding what the rights are to be prioritized. Pro offers the possibility that just governments are established as a precondition to applying the resolution. I claim that it makes no sense for the resolution to b posed for a world other than our own, in which there is no predetermination of just governments. Instead, it makes sense to suppose the resolution means, "... for a government to be just, it ought to prioritize human rights over its national interest." That makes sense for an academic debate. The resolution is then asking if the prioritization is just or unjust. Clearly, it is unjust to always prioritize universal human rights above national interest. It abolishes democracy, because the people of a nation do not get to choose whether they prefer to increase their own security rather than advance human rights in a distant part of the globe. Government acts without considering their wishes. Moreover, it is unjust and immoral to place the interests of others universally above the interests of ones family and countrymen. I posed a case in which the government of India had to choose between devoting resources to economic development in rural India or using the resources to advance human rights overseas. Pro rebutted that human rights locally ought to take precedence, but after that n-country human rights ought to prevail over those overseas. However, he characterized local economic development as mere "comfort," not human right. "Comfort" might even include fending off potential starvation. None of Pro's suggestions for agreed upon universal human rights included any level of economic comfort or economic stability. I believe we agreed that countries must always choose to either spend their resources internally or use those resources t advance human rights. We debated whether negating the resolution allowed countries to operate as they have, choosing national interest sometimes and advancing rights other times. I argued that the negation of "ought to prioritize" is "need not prioritize." If so, then clearly the resolution fails, because their are minimum levels of national interest in economic stability and self-defense that ought to take precedence. A just government, I claim, must be democratic and look after the needs of its people. Pro argued that the negation requires always prioritizing national interest. If so, the resolution must nonetheless be negated. The self-interests of democratic government, economic health, and national security must take precedence over always attempting to police the world in a quest for universal human rights. This allows that sometimes advancing human rights elsewhere is sometimes in the national interest. Each of the reasons I have given suffices to reject the resolution. We should not require indefinite crusades by governments contrary to the wishes of their people. The resolution fails.