Placing political conditions on humanitarian aid to foreign countries is unjust.

Note, in the comments it has been agreed between my opponent and myself, that we may follow standard LD speeches, which means I will post a rebuttal at the end of this, and she will have the last speech. "One of the main findings if this analysis is that well-targeted, timed, designed, and delivered programs with strong conditionalities are a good substitute for the dollar amounts of assistance," Marek Dabrowski. I stand in firm negation of the resolution, "Resolved: Placing political conditions on humanitarian to foreign countries is unjust. " My value is Government legitimacy. Government legitimacy will be defined as a virtue of political institutions and of the decisions"about laws, policies, and candidates for political office"made within them. My value criterion is upholding state autonomy. State autonomy will be defined simply as the right of a state to govern itself. For a better understanding of the resolution, I offer the following definitions: Political conditions: The criteria which are applied to a specific situation regarding the behavior of the government (Summarized from the SDC). Humanitarian aid: "Aid that seeks to save lives and alleviate suffering of a crisis-affected population" (World Health Organization). I will now support my position with the following contentions: The resolution itself cannot be upheld and there is no injustice in conditional aid to be claimed by the affirmative. Contention 1: The resolution itself cannot be upheld. Subpoint A. In at least one situation it is justified for political conditions on humanitarian aid. According to Joanna Macrae from the Humanitarian Policy Group, Overseas Development Institute: "[Macedonia] is a case where political and military actors had a comparative advantage over humanitarian actors and their involvement secured humanitarian objectives. Political and military actors had at their disposal important assets bargaining chips that UNHCR clearly lacks. These include: political legitimation in the international community; access to key decision-makers in the host government; diplomatic infrastructure in the shape of embassies; and a significant stand-by capacity for logistics and engineering work. In the case of Macedonia, a further important incentive that diplomats could offer was with regard to burden sharing, under the HEP, which relied upon agreement from ministries of the interior in the respective home countries. " Subpoint B. Effectiveness can justify political conditions on humanitarian aid. In the case I"ve read, the only way the humanitarian aid would"ve gotten to the citizens is if there were political conditions in place. The infrastructure and organization needed to distribute the aid needed political involvement. Humanitarian actors by themselves would not have achieved the goal of humanitarian aid. Since humanitarian aid was the objective, if political conditions are capable of increasing the effectiveness of distributing the aid, it would be just to put those political conditions on the government. Subpoint C. It is impossible for the resolution to be upheld. The resolution presents a clear universal statement. It should be assumed that the resolution is applicable to any case where political conditions are placed on humanitarian aid. As such is the case, the resolution only one example to be disproven. For example, if I say that all horses are solid black, and I find at least one horse that is not solid black, it would be intellectually irresponsible to claim that all horses are black. 2) There is no injustice in conditional aid to be claimed by the affirmative. Injustice implies some sort of oppression of human rights. Every state is first obligated to their own people and not to another states' people. It is not the fault of a foreign state that another state's people are suffering. The foreign state is not causing an injustice, and if they offer help they have no moral obligation to offer it without any strings attached as they are not required to give it in the first place. A government's duty is to the benefit of its own nation. A government is each obligated to its own populace and is not responsible for the lives of another governments populace. It may be morally good to give a populace of another country humanitarian aid, but as it is not obligatory, the government may place conditions on what the other government must do to get that aid. This is not unjust. Giving handouts to other nations is not to the benefit of one's own nation. This means it would be unjust for them to be in any way restricted, either by a moral principle or by a law, in the manner which it presents its humanitarian aid. Now, I will address my opponent's case. Address her value of justice and her value criterion of preserving human dignity: These are values that the resolution would naturally support as being important, however, my opponent has not upheld the resolution to the fullest extent. There is not generalizing phrase in the resolution, such as, "on balance" or "in general" thus the resolution is universal. Now my opponent must either refute the examples I give where conditional aid was just or show why the resolution is not universal. Until then, I have adequately negated her position and even upheld her value and value criterion in some cases, while she upholds it in other cases. Her contention one actually agrees with my contention one, subpoint B in a manner of principle. Her contention asserts that because of the ineffectiveness of conditional aid in certain cases, it is not just to place political conditions on humanitarian aid in those cases. On the other side of the coin, if I give scenarios where conditional aid was more effective and unconditional aid, I have proven it to be just in some cases or scenarios. Therefore, in principle it has been agreed that my examples are valid and just. Her subpoint A and B thus fall under that central point. Her second contention uses a poor example to support her point. In this contention, my opponent provides the example of North Korea to prove why conditional aid harms the donor country. I have two responses: 1) She uses inductive reasoning to apply this to all cases. One example does not in any way cover all possible situations of conditional aid. There are too many variables in governments for one example to be able to be applied universally. She must prove why the actual act can be considerably harmful in all cases by principle of the act itself, not because in one country it was harmful to the donor country. 2) North Korea is among the most corrupt governments on modern day earth. The people of North Korea experience severe oppression of human rights, and they have an extremely low quality of life. The government itself, being a corrupt autocracy, can be expected to stockpile humanitarian aid rather than distribute it to the people if political conditions aren't placed on the aid. A condition of the aid can simply be that the government distribute the aid to its people equally. That is a just example of placing political conditions on humanitarian aid that can be considered. This is more effective than simply giving the aid, which justifies the conditions. Her third contention does not render conditional aid unjust. The aid itself is not obligatory. As my second contention points out, a government's duty is to it's own populace and not to another government's populace relieving them of any sort of responsibility. Since it is not their responsibility to give the aid, if they choose to give it, charging another country for it is just. If the country refuses to pay, then the situation remains unchanged. If the country pays, then the donor state receives money for their product. Looking back at my own value and value criterion, we must accept that before anything else, each government is obligated to uphold virtue to their own people. This means if a country wants something in return for the aid, they are justified. Giving handouts to another nation does not help the donor country. Thank you for reading, and thank you for instigating this debate, itslizyall.