Promoting world wide democratic principles should be a higher priority than promoting sovereignty.

DEFINITIONS 1. The only article requiring definition within the resolution is that of sovereignty. Sovereignty is by definition a possession of all sovereign states. Accordingly sovereignty shall be defined as the possession of a sovereign, or a supreme lawmaking authority with a monopoly on force. Notice that sovereignty need not reside in any specific individual, and can reside in a group of people, as is the case with the democratic sovereign states listed by my opponent. OBSERVATION 1. The points of advocacy within the resolution are not necessarily exclusive. You will notice that in my opponent's cited list of sovereign states, both the US and the UK are listed, and both of them are considered nations under "democratic principles", as cited by my opponent in her second point of analysis. Sovereignty and democracy are, under most conceivable circumstances, neither exclusive to one another nor in conflict. ANALYSIS 1. The "worldwide" clause in the resolution stipulates an interesting point of advocacy for the Affirmative. While it is widely held that democracy is the "best" form of government, situations exist where the establishment of democracy would either exacerbate existing conflicts or fail due to logistical obstacles. WHAT CONSTITUTES A DEMOCRACY? Democracies are literally governments "by the people." However (to my knowledge,) no democratic system of governance has spontaneously existed in the absence of a state. That is, there has never been a concrete example of a democracy arising through mutual agreement of all members of society, because there must be some power with recognized authority to use force against those who would infringe on the citizen's rights. SOVEREIGNTY AND THE CONSTITUTION OF A STATE A government without a method of governance isn't really a government at at all. As seen above, democracy cannot gain holding without having some organization or method in place to regulate the system. That is, any state wishing to establish any system of government, must have the necessary authority and use of force that is necessary in the establishment of the state. What separates myself from the state is that that state holds the firepower necessary to incarcerate me should I pose a significant harm to my neighbors. POPULAR SOVEREIGNTY In the specific case of democracy, sovereignty is held in the hands of the people, who then use their sovereign power to elect or acknowledge other people or groups of people to create legal regulations and monopolize force. Were a democracy to rise of its own accord, it would arrive side by side with sovereignty, with neither in priority. However, such an occurrence has, to my knowledge, never actually happened, as there usually must be some individual or group of individuals to put the plans for democracy into motion. IN RESPONSE My opponent would suggest to you that democratic principles necessarily preclude sovereignty in a state. This is easily countered by the fact that most scholars agree that the first democracy was established c. 500 BC by the Athenians, while the idea of the nation, including cases such as Israel and Babylon, clearly predate the establishment of democracy. The remainder of my opponent's points can be countered through two aforementioned facts: 1. Large masses of people (states) have, in the past, existed together in absence of democratic systems, but 2. Large masses of people (states) have always required a body with recognized authority to utilize force and create laws. The alternative to sovereignty is anarchy, and ultimately sovereignty, democratic or otherwise, must be established in order for stability to arise. I have reached my character limit. I look forward to my opponent's response. http://en.wikipedia.org... http://plato.stanford.edu...