Critical Neglect Negative Supplement - Northwestern 2013 6WeekSeniors

8/13/2019 Critical Neglect Negative Supplement - Northwestern 2013 6WeekSeniors

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NDI 2013 – 6WS – CRITICAL NEGLECT NEG



---FRAMEWORK---



***Negative***



AT: This Topic Is Different

Discussion of specific policies in Latin America is the only way to achieve political

autonomyKingstone and Young ’09 (Peter Kingstone- Assistant Professor of Political Science, University of Connecticut and Joseph Young-

Assistant Professor of Political Science, Southern Illinois University; “Partisanship and Policy Choice: What's Left for the Left in Latin America?”;

March 2009; Source: Political Research Quarterly, Vol. 62, No. 1 (Mar., 2009), pp. 29-41; available on JStor—

http://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/27759843.pdf)

As powerful and plausible as these constraints appear on the surface, some scholars have made important

arguments defending the possibility of policy autonomy , at least in the OECD context. For example, Garrett (1998)

makes a case for policy autonomy drawing on an extensive literature about the relationship between left

party power and union power. In this conception, leftist governments are more capable of maintaining

wage discipline in tandem with strong, encompassing labor unions than right-wing governments are.

Thus , left-wing govern ments can finance social-democratic programs and avoid inflationary pressure

because of negotiated wage restraint . An alternative argument comes from Carles Boix (1998) that focuses on different ways

of shaping supply-side policies. Boix observes that internationalization of the economy has forced gov ernments to focus on the supply-side of

the economy, but there are different ways to shape supply-side poli cies that conform clearly to partisan preferences. Left-wing governments

are more concerned with employment and therefore seek to increase produc tivity of capital and labor through investment in edu cation and

infrastructure (and even potentially through a public business sector). In contrast, right wing governments prefer to improve productivity and

efficiency through increased private sector control of investments. Thus, right-wing governments lower taxes and attempt to limit public

sector spending. Both Garrett and Boix are supported by a number of quantitative studies supporting the

view that OECD countries are able to maintain policy autonomy, regardless of the pressure of the

international finan cial system (for example, Oatley 1999).



AT: Valdes 01 Evidence

Critical theory fails---research and policy focus in Latin America are vital---key to

prevent poverty and other issuesPribble et al ’09 (Jennifer Pribble- Assistant Professor of Political Science and International Studies at the University of Richmond;

Evelyne Huber- Morehead Alumni Professor of Political Science and Chair of the Department of Political Science at the University of North

Carolina, Chapel Hill; John D. Stephens- Distinguished Professor of Political Science and Sociology; Director, Center for European Studies,

received his B.A. (1970) from Harvard University and his Ph.D. (1976) from Yale University; “Politics, Policies, and Poverty in Latin America”; July

2009; Comparative Politics, Vol. 41, No. 4 (July 2009), pp. 387-407; available on Jstor @ http://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/40599215.pdf)

This focus on the role of politics- political regime type, parties, and state- provided social policy - builds on a growing body of research

about the political economy of Latin American poverty. This new line of investigation has begun to move

away from the Washington Consensus' nearly exclusive focus on the impact of economic growth on poverty

reduction and toward a more nuanced view of the achievement of social welfare. At the height of the neoliberal Washington

Consensus, economists and policymakers stressed that Latin America's high poverty levels were largely the

result of slow growth.4 This explanation gained support in the wake of the 1982 debt crisis and was maintained throughout the 1 990s

by national and international technocrats, who argued that Latin America's poor economic performance was the result of decades of "in-efficient" economic policy in the form of trade barriers, exchange rate controls, and a large public sector. Proponents of the Washington

Consensus encouraged governments to liberalize their markets with the aim of boosting economic growth. This growth in GDP was expected to

have automatic spill-over effects, such as increased employment and poverty reduction. In essence, technocrats suggested that, with

the proper reforms, countries in the region could "grow" themselves out of poverty. In this way, the Washington

Consensus painted a picture of Latin American poverty in which politics was of marginal importance,

and the policy prescriptions paid little attention to political factors that mediate the effects of growth

on poverty. This view of poverty reduction began to be challenged in the late 1990s, when after several years of steady growth in Latin

America many countries continued to lag behind in poverty reduction. The puzzle presented by the coexistence of economic growth and high

levels of poverty prompted a revision of the most orthodox versions of the Washington Consensus. Indeed, several new studies

stressed the importance of public policy in determining poverty levels. This new policy-oriented

approach to poverty reduction was supported by international financial institutions, such as the World Bank, and a

new "human capital" approach to poverty reduction began to attract attention.5 While this new approach to poverty

reduction recognizes the important role of public policy , particularly investment in education and healthcare, it still pays

relatively little attention to domestic political factors such as the nature of parties, regime type, and the institutional structure of the state. This

neglect of political differences among countries is shortsighted; differences in political regime type and partisan ideology have an important

effect on cross-national variation in Latin American poverty

Moral obligation to bridge the gap between theoretical and pragmatic approaches---

scholars must engage in the policy debate

González no date (Francisco E.- Riordan Roett Senior Associate Professor of Latin American Studies at Johns Hopkins and British

Academy Postdoctoral Fellow at Nuffield College at the University of Oxford; was a professorial lecturer at SAIS's Bologna Center and a lecturer

in politics at St. John's College at the University of Oxford; received 2006 SAIS Excellence in Teaching Award; Ph.D., politics, University of

Oxford; “POLITICS AND POLICIES”; http://lasa.international.pitt.edu/LARR/prot/fulltext/vol48no1/48-1_221-227_gonzales.pdf)

The growing interest in the interaction of policies and politics is a welcome antidote to the gapbetween theoretical and applied knowledge in the social sciences. Given the winners and losers and

the sometimes dramatic political, social, and economic consequences of public policies, it is morally as

well as professionally important to continue to try to bridge this chasm . The complexity of politics as

they really happen means that policies usually result in consequences different from those intended

by their designers and executors. It therefore makes sense for outsiders—in this case scholars —to

join politicians, technocrats, interest groups, lobbyists, pundits, and the like in scrutinizing the



complex interaction of politics and policies. The four volumes reviewed in these pages make original

individual and collective contributions to this endeavor.



AT: Valdes 97 Evidence

Link turn---the 1AC is analogous to Latin American politicians using rhetoric to winvotes instead of discussing substantive policies---policy proposals facilitate discussion

among officials on how to solve systemic problems in Latin America

IRI ’12 (International Republican Institute; “Latin America Think Tank Policy Initiative”;

http://www.iri.org/sites/default/files/Latin%20America%20Think%20Tank%20Policy%20Initiative%2011-4-11_0.pdf)

An ongoing political trend in Latin America is the inconsistent execution of parties to create substantive

policies that address social and economic needs of their countries. While citizens are hungry for solutions to

problems affecting their everyday lives – challenges such as unemployment, high crime, bad roads, poor education

and lack of medicine – their political parties are many times only offering speeches and rhetoric intended to

win votes on Election Day. Within the ‘marketplace of ideas’, descriptive policy, strategic substance and thoughtful

analysis give way to ambiguity, unachievable promises and shallow discourse . Within this framework,

the race to win seats in public office no longer rely on the best ideas and the best plans, but instead hinge on the

influence of money, scandals, superficial advertising and sensationalist journalism. The International Republican Institute’s (IRI) Latin

America Think Tank Policy Initiative addresses this phenomenon and helps make political discourse substantive and relevant to the needs and

interests of citizens. The initiative regularly joins together thought leaders and think tanks from countries in the region to share policy opinions

and create common platforms of regional thematic priorities. In turn, these enlightened think tank analysts return their focus to their home

countries and educate parties on innovative policy ideas, regional trends and helpful data. The goal is that parties and candidates will open

themselves to this substantive influence and ultimately create their own thoughtful platforms. To help encourage the advancement of

substantive policies, IRI fosters a policy-focused network that allows independent and party-affiliated think tanks throughout

Latin America to not only convene and discuss important issues, but helps them share resources to study issues, share opinion research and

develop specific policy direction that will ultimately be shared throughout the region. The network is focusing on eight priority themes

which affect practically countries in Latin America: poverty reduction; education needs; health care

improvement; environmental challenges; economic development, tax and fiscal policy; citizen

security; democratic participation; and social inclusion. In the second phase of the initiative, IRI utilizes its relationships

with political stakeholders, media and civil society to share these cooperative policy ideas more broadly, working with political leaders to

incorporate these ideas into their own campaign platforms, policy agendas and governing strategies. Ultimately, these policy

proposals will help drive more substantive discussion and debate among political leaders and

elected officials on how to solve the most pressing issues facing Latin America.



AT: Radical Openness

Only researching specific mechanisms will result in policies geared towards theinterest of Latin Americans

Margheritis and Pereira ’07 (Ana- assistant professor of international relations and Latin American politics at the University of

Florida and Anthony- associate professor of political science at Tulane University; “The Neoliberal Turn in Latin America: The Cycle of Ideas and

the Search for an Alternative”; Latin American Perspectives, Vol. 34, No. 3, Contested Transformation (May, 2007),pp. 25-48)

This analysis is offered from a critical point of view in the hope that it may not only provide a better

understanding of the recent past but inform current debates about the way forward in economic

policy making in Latin America. It is our conviction that the contested character of the recent reform process

requires a revisionist exercise that unveils the shortcomings of prior policies and paves the way for

innovative ideas that address the material aspirations and demands of the majority of Latin

Americans better than the Washington Consensus did. Our position is not that ideas were the prime movers of

neoliberal transformation—interests and institutions were also important—but that the mechanisms for their promulgation have

been understudied.



AT: Meszaros Evidence

The 1AC fails---we’ve been open to Latin American ideas but have failed to act---the

drug war proves---they want concrete proposals---that means their bracketingargument doesn’t make sense

Huffington Post 6-4-13 (“Latin America Will Push U.S. To Discuss New Drug War Strategies At OAS Meeting”;

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/04/new-drug-war-strategy-_n_3383786.html)

ANTIGUA, Guatemala — Latin American countries frustrated by the United States' refusal to change its drug

war strategy are pushing the U.S. government to look at alternatives to a fight that has killed tens of thousands in a

region beset by drug cartels.Guatemalan Foreign Relations Secretary Fernando Carrera said the subject of drugs will top the agenda at the

Organization of American States' General Assembly, which began its three-day session in Antigua on Tuesday evening."We have already

reached a consensus and agreed that our final declaration will include changes to the current anti-drug

model," Carrera said. "We already have some ideas on how to change drug-fighting policies."U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and

Assistant Secretary for the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs William R. Brownfield were attending the meeting,

which comes two weeks after the OAS released a report calling for a serious discussion on legalizing marijuana.The OAS study doesn't make

specific proposals and found there is "no significant support" among the OAS's 35 member states for legalizing cocaine, the illegal drug with the

greatest impact on Latin America, or other harsher drugs.The study was commissioned after some Latin American leaders called

on President Barack Obama to rethink the war on drugs at last year's Summit of the Americas in Cartagena, Colombia.It

urges "assessing existing signals and trends that lean toward the decriminalization or legalization of the production, sale and use of marijuana.

Sooner or later decisions in this area will need to be taken."The Obama administration, however, believes it has already adopted a

comprehensive counter-narcotics approach that melds cutting demand for drugs and treatment withlaw enforcement and interdiction of

supply.A senior U.S. official traveling with Kerry said the OAS would endorse that multi-pronged strategy and pointed out that there is no

consensus either within the hemisphere or in individual countries on legalization.This is true even in the United States, where several states

have legalized marijuana, said the official, who was not authorized to preview Kerry's discussions publicly. The U.S is open to discussing ideas,

but will not as a federal government support decriminalization.Human Rights Watch urged the OAS countries to explore legal regulation as a

way to help stem the violence of organized crime and drug traffickers inflicted on many Latin American countries. The international human

rights group said that criminalizing personal drug use "undermine" basic human rights."The ̀ drug war' has taken a huge toll in the Americas,

from the carnage of brutal drug trafficking organizations to the egregious abuses by security forces fighting them," the group's Americas

director, Jose Miguel Vivanco, said in a statement. "Governments should find new policies to address the harm drug

use causes, while curbing the violence and abuse that have plagued the current approach."Dozens of human rightsorganizations from Canada to Argentina signed a letter Monday asking for leaders "to discuss and rethink the

existing initiatives with a view to place human rights in the center of the debate."Among those countries

pushing for a dialogue on drugs in the Western Hemisphere are many who have been close allies of the United States' fight against drugs,

including Colombia and Guatemala.Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos was among those urging a discussion of legalization.

He said that while his country extradites hundreds of alleged drug traffickers for trial in the U.S., criminals turn to other countries where law

enforcement is weaker. Central America and Mexico in particular have been hit hard as traffickers shifted operations there.President Otto

Perez Molina of Guatemala, a hard-hit cocaine transit country along with neighboring Honduras, made headlines shortly after taking office last

year when he proposed legalizing drugs."The message has been sent that the hemisphere wants to look at alternative approaches and wants

the United States to be part of that discussion," said Cynthia Arnson, director of the Latin American program at the Washington-based

Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.Arnson said Latin American leaders will use the meeting to spur a discussion that can be

sustained as countries try to go forward with a new strategy."Latin American countries will mostly be looking for ways to diminish the violence

and the negative effects on their societies and their economies posed by organized crime and they may increasingly diverge with the United

States over what policies to adapt," she said.While the OAS meeting promises to serve as a forum to begin discussing the legalization of

marijuana, talking about harder drugs like cocaine, heroin and methamphetamines may be harder to bring to the table, Arnson said."It's onething to say, `Let's break the ice on talking about these issues,' and it's another thing to come forward with

concrete proposals for dealing with harder drugs that many countries can sign on to, including the United States," she said.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/04/new-drug-war-strategy-_n_3383786.html






AT: Grosfoguel Evidence

State action is good---fiat allows us to imagine the possibility of any one of theplethora of possible ethical policies

Sanchez and Sholar ’12 [December 2012, Peter, PhD Loyola University Chicago, and Megan, PhD Loyola University Chicago,

“Power and Principle: A New US Policy for Latin America”, http://www.ijhssnet.com/journals/Vol_2_No_23_December_2012/3.pdf]

Pragmatically, we understand that worse case scenarios will often win out in the realist, security-

focused decisionmaking process. US policy-makers probably never considered ignoring the communist

“threat” they perceived. Instead, they envisioned impending disaster: that the USSR would gain

influence and the region would go “communistic,” as President Johnson liked to say . Therefore,

Washington carried out policies that emphasized military and covert solutions to the potential of

increased Soviet/communist influence. When danger seemed imminent, foreign policy makers

believed that the ends would justify the means. The means, however, while not necessarily enhancing US military and

economic power, undermined America’s soft power. ¶ The Cold War is now a part of history, and despite the recent alarm over the turn to theleft, Latin America is completely devoid of any serious threats to democracy, capitalism, or U.S. security

interests. If a clear danger exists, it is the threat posed by militaries that still retain some of the power

amassed during the Cold War years when Washington gave them extensive material and moral

support. If it is going to behave like a hegemon in Latin America, then the United States should

introduce a more ethical (hegemonic) foreign policy toward the region. To this end we would

recommend a few modest proposals to current U.S. policy. If Washington is not bold enough to take

these steps in Latin America, then it is doomed to maintaining an anachronistic realpolitik stance that

in the long term will undermine America’s power and image. A hegemonic power’s inability to provide

collective, universal goods to subordinate states will necessarily result in its own downfall.¶ First and

foremost, the United States should unilaterally adopt a policy of non-intervention and non-interference.

Latin American scholars and political leaders have called for these policies almost since the time of

independence in the early 1820s. Rather than comply, American presidents issued two interventionistpolicies, the Monroe Doctrine in 1823 and the Roosevelt Corollary to that doctrine in 1904, also

known as Big Stick Diplomacy. In the 1930s , however, when the United States wanted Latin America’s

cooperation, Franklin Delano Roosevelt announced the Good Neighbour Policy which called for non-

intervention, non-interference, and consultation. At the time, the Organization of American States (OAS) did

not exist so a regional international organization was not available for multilateral consultation. Along

with non-intervention and non-interference, however, Washington should emphasize America’s

commitment to deal with regional problems through the OAS, rather than unilaterally and via US

pressure. If the US government adopted non-intervention as its default position, the nations of Latin

America would, as they did in the 1930s, rejoice and begin to admire the colossus to the north.¶ This policy

would be essentially cost-free (if not cost-saving, given the costs associated with intervention) and would go a

long way to improve US-Latin American relations. A policy of non-intervention would moveWashington away from one of the “sins” of US foreign policy—a heavy reliance on military solutions

to global problems (Johnson, 2007, chapter 3). Former undersecretary of defence and noted scholar Joseph Nye underscored this

problem when he wrote the following: “While Congress has been willing to spend 16 percent of the national budget on defence, the percentage

devoted to international affairs has shrunk from 4 percent in the 1960s to just 1 percent today. Our military strength is important, but it is not

sixteen times more important than our diplomacy” (Quoted in Pieterse, 2004, p. 18). This first step would yield a classic win-win

situation since it would be enthusiastically welcomed throughout Latin America, would cost nothing,

and would almost immediately enhance the US image in the region, thus enhancing rather than

limiting US hegemony.¶ Along with the spirit of non-intervention is the notion of non-interference. Thus, we suggest that the

http://www.ijhssnet.com/journals/Vol_2_No_23_December_2012/3.pdf





United States should refrain to the greatest extent possible from using CIA covert operations and

refrain from engaging in regime changes in democratic countries. We are not suggesting that this agency be

abolished.¶ The CIA can be used to collect information, or “intelligence,” that may be useful for US decision-

makers to keep well-informed and make sound decisions. Problems with intelligence have emerged in the past not so

much from the accuracy of the information but from the way in which presidents have used the information. The US invasion of Iraq in 2003 is a

dramatic, recent example. Washington’s mishandling of intelligence, however, is not new. For example, prior to the Cuban missile crisis, the CIA

became aware via human intelligence that the Soviets were installing missiles on the island. The Kennedy Administration, however, did notconsider the information as reliable because Khrushchev had personally given Kennedy assurances that he would take no such action. In the

Dominican Republic in 1965, the CIA informed Washington that President Busch’s supporters were for the most part non-communist. Again, US

decision makers ignored the information and decided to intervene militarily. On numerous occasions, then, the CIA has acquired valuable

information that could have been very useful for making potentially good decisions. Consequently, a CIA that collects intelligence on friendly

nations can be an important foreign policy asset. A CIA, however, that engages in covert operations against democracies is something that

should be rejected both on ethical and realist grounds. More recently, the rapid U.S. recognition of governments that carried out military coups

against elected presidents in Venezuela (2004) and Honduras (2009) shows that Washington continues to be more concerned with promoting

pro-US regimes than preserving the principle of democratic rule. The dirty tactics of the Cold War, and earlier, should be terminated

immediately, particularly since not one of the countries in the region can be even remotely perceived as an existential security threat to the

United States.¶ Related to ending CIA dirty tricks is the recommendation that the U.S. government should cease special

operations in Latin America by the US military and CIA. Covert incursions into sovereign territory of

friendly and mostly democratic countries should not be a standard procedure conducted by the

United States. No “threat” in Latin America can justify a breach of international law against countries

that are friendly to the United States, especially those that have accepted the US political andeconomic models. If the US government believes that the drug trade is such a serious problem that covert operations are warranted,

then it should seek and gain the consent of the nations in the region, or the particular country in which the operation is to be carried out,

before carrying out such operations. Needless to say, Washington should also terminate its unilateral policy of

“certification” of nations that are cooperating in the anti-drug effort. The certification process is mostly used for

political purposes and only serves to develop a negative image of the United States. The drug problem is mostly a US consumption problem

rather than a Latin American production and transhipment problem and thus Washington should be deal with it principally at home.¶ Next,

the United States should introduce a socioeconomic development program for Latin America. In 1961,

John F. Kennedy unveiled the Alliance for Progress, a bold, new U.S. policy initiative that called for

Latin America’s socioeconomic transformation and development. The region was delighted with the

Alliance and to this date there are literally hundreds of schools in the region named after Kennedy.

The United States, via the Washington consensus, pressured the countries of the region to adopt

neoliberal economic policies in the 1980s—policies that would help the US economy by opening theregion to US exports. Latin America, for the most part although with hesitance, embraced these policies even though

they were, and continue to be, disruptive politically and economically. Washington needs to ensure that these policies

yield economic benefits for the region and thus should establish a new policy that helps the countries

of the region with debt payments and to weather economic transformation. One drawback with Kennedy’s

Alliance was that it also had a dark, militaristic side. Since the Alliance was designed principally to minimize the appeal of communism, the US

government also provided large amounts of military aid to the militaries of the region, helping to undermine democracies and to

overinstitutionalize the region’s armed forces. Since America currently faces no substantial threat in Latin America,

a bold, new economic policy toward the region does not require a military dimension. Rather than instituting

controversial initiatives such as Plan Colombia, the United States should instead assist the nations of the region in developing their civilian

institutions— but only if those nations want assistance.



AT: Bartlett Evidence

Our framework is the best methodology---reformist policies are key to Latin Americaneconomic prosperity

Carstens ‘6 *2006, Agustín, Mexican economist who serves as the Governor of the Bank of Mexico, “Transcript of “Opening Remarks by

Agustín Carstens”, http://www.imf.org/external/np/tr/2006/tr060523.htm]

The economic challenges that Latin America faces are well known. The region needs higher and more sustained growth than it

has experienced in recent decades, and growth needs to be more inclusive. It needs to bring about greater reductions in poverty and inequality

than have happened in the past. Javier offers hope that some changes may be underway that would help the region meet these challenges. He

notes that we may be witnessing in much of Latin America the emergence of the `politics or pragmatism'. I like this

phrase very much. I think it is a very fortunate phase. It refers to a politics that, and here I am quoting from the book, "is more

concerned with effective outcomes than with conceptual purity." The real challenge is: how do you get it

going, how can you really bring about the political consensus to make this `politics of pragmatism' really

work out. But I think this is a very close description of what is going on and more of such politics would be quite fruitful in the region.

Growth in the past has suffered from policy reversals. Economic policies in the region have too often swung between

extremes driven by the political whims of the party or person in power. It would be a welcome

development if policies are chosen on the basis of evidence of what has worked. This ensures broad continuity

in policies and sets a basis for sustained growth. To me, the clearest evidence of such a shift in attitudes is in the

conduct of macroeconomic policies, particularly monetary policies.

http://www.imf.org/external/np/tr/2006/tr060523.htm





AT: Smith Evidence

Aff is not a prior question---Latin American countries want pragmatic politics---the afffails without a solution to years of neglect

IADPP ’12 (Inter-American Dialogue Policy Report; “Remaking the Relationship the United states and Latin America”; April 2012;

http://www.thedialogue.org/PublicationFiles/IAD2012PolicyReportFINAL.pdf)

Pragmatic Politics —Most Latin American countries are turning toward centrist, pragmatic politics that are directed at

economic growth, social progress, and democratic governance . Ideology has not disappeared—and it is still important in some countries—but

it drives politics in only a very few nations where global alignments have an ideological cast . To be sure, politics across the region remain

competitive and highly contentious, and partisan battles are waged on the full spectrum of issues . But, for most countries, the emphasis in

recent years has been on finding practical solutions to the problems at hand . The shift may reflect the region’s

economic gains and the expansion of middle class voters



Latin America Policy Focus Good

Specific pragmatic reforms are key in Latin America

Giordano and Li 12 [November 2012, Paolo, PhD in Economics from the Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris, Lead Economist at the

Integratoin and Trade Sector of the IADB, and Kun, Research Fellow at IADB, “An Updated Assessment of the Trade and Poverty Nexus in Latin

America,” pages 375-377, http://www.iadb.org/en/publications/publication-detail,7101.html?id=67029]

Despite the move towards more open trade regimes, Latin American economies are still relatively closed to international trade. Under the

pressure of globalisation, it is likely that in the coming years the region will need to open further and adjust to compete in an increasingly

challenging global environment. Latin America being one of the most unequal regions of the world, the

assessment of the trade and poverty nexus is crucial to devise policies aiming at better distributing

the gains from trade. Latin America-specific research on this topic will provide policymakers and

stakeholders with evidence necessary to underpin a debate which seems to be nurtured more by

anxiety than rigorous knowledge. In this light, it is useful to refer to a few conclusions with the aim of building up a

solid base for policy debates and future research. There is a gap in the availability of methodologies to explore the link

between macro policy reforms like trade liberalisation and micro-economic determinants of welfare and poverty. It is therefore crucialto invest in the generation of data and research techniques, to adapt the research agenda to the

specificity of Latin America and to consider qualitative issues that are difficult to measure. Meanwhile, normative statements

referring to the trade policy nexus should cautiously consider the limitations of current positive knowledge. Trade openness,

inequality and poverty are wide multidimensional concepts. Measuring and attributing causal

relations among these variables without carefully qualifying the specific dimensions explored or

the particular transmission mechanisms at play may be misleading. It is mportant to disentangle the specific

dimension of the trade and poverty nexus from the wider debate on globalisation and financial integration, the competing concepts of

relative and absolute inequality and the objective and subjective dimension of poverty and deprivation. Despite the impossibility

to rigorously and unambiguously assert that trade openness is conducive to growth and poverty reduction,

the preponderance of evidence supports this conclusion. However, the majority of empirical macro studies also

show that the impact of trade on growth and poverty is also generally small and that the causes of indigence are to be found elsewhere.

But it is in fact extremely arduous to find evidence that supports the notion that trade protection isgood for the poor. The question is therefore how to make trade and growth more pro-poor and

not how to devise improbable alternatives to trade integration aiming at improving the livelihood

of the poor. Specific evidence on Latin America reveals that deductive generalisations of the neoclassical trade

theory and global cross-country empirical studies may be of little help in understanding the trade

and poverty nexus in the region. Several factors may explain why the integration of Latin America into the global economy

may not necessarily bring about rising wages of unskilled workers and poverty reduction. The most compelling arguments are related to

the existence of rigidities in the labour markets, the historical pattern of protection that created rents in unskilled intensive sectors, the

emergence of low wage countries such as China and India that shifts the comparative advantage of Latin American economies, and

institutional factors that protract the effects of an initial unequal distribution of factor endowments against the poor. Trade

liberalisation may in fact be associated with rising inequality. But country case studies present

contrasting indications. Although there is some evidence of rising inequality in the aftermath of trade opening, such as in the case

of Mexico, Colombia, Argentina and Chile, it seems that the specific effects of trade liberalisation are small orindirect. Skill-biased technical change, often directly related with the increase of foreign direct

investment or with capital account liberalisation, seems to have a stronger explanatory power

than trade liberalisation. There is also little evidence that trade opening has generated more informality. On the other hand,

the case of Brazil, where trade liberalisation seems to have contributed to the reduction of wage

inequality, is illustrative of the conditions under which trade reforms may have progressive distributive effects The empirical

analysis addressing the direct effect of trade integration on poverty reveals a similar landscape. Trade integration seems

to be good for the poor but the effects are small. Generalisations should be taken with a great deal of

http://www.iadb.org/en/publications/publication-detail,7101.html?id=67029

http://www.iadb.org/en/publications/publication-detail,7101.html?id=67029



caution because this is a domain where data may present considerable shortcomings. In any event it seems that foreign trade reforms

are more important for poverty reduction than unilateral ones or than the national component of reciprocal trade reforms. The countries

of the region may therefore expect further contributions of trade integration to poverty reduction, particularly from the liberalisation of

the agriculture sector where the greatest pockets of residual protectionism are still concentrated. However, predicting ex ante the

pro-poor effects of trade reforms is an extremely sensitive task highly dependent on the quality of the data and the correct

specification of the simulation instruments. It is hard to overstate the importance of strengthening the

capacity of policymaking in this area.



Pragmatic Anti-Neolib Strategies Good

The affirmatives rejection fails—it makes political action impossible—a pragmatic

attack against neoliberalism solves bestFerguson ’10 *2010, James, Stanford anthropology chair and professor, “Toward a left art of government: from ‘Foucauldian critique’ to

Foucauldian politics”,History of the Human Sciences 2011 24: 61, SAGE+

One of the founding premises of this special issue and the conference with which it began is that Foucault has been read, and used, in different

ways in different academic disciplines. In this article I will discuss one common way of using Foucault’s thought in my own discipline of

anthropology. I will suggest that the strategy of using Foucauldian modes of analysis to ‘critique power’ (as it is often put)

has frequently led to a rather sterile form of political engagement. Attention to some of Foucault’s own remarks

about politics hints at a different political sensibility, in which empirical experimentation rather than moralistic denunciation takes center place.

I will reference some examples of such experimentation that come out of my current research on the politics of social assistance in southern

Africa (though I do not have space here to give a full exposition of these). The sort of use of Foucault that I have in mind is well represented in

the anthropology of development (and the related field of what is sometimes called critical development studies). Here, the

characteristic strategy is to use Foucauldian analysis to reveal the way that interventions, projects, etc., which claim

to be merely technical or benevolent, really involve relations of power. This is a perfectly reasonable thing to do, but too

often, in this field, such a simple demonstration is apparently seen as the end of the exercise. Power has

been ‘critiqued’, an oppressive system has been exposed as such, and that seems to be taken as a

satisfactory end to the matter. This impasse in development studies and anthropology is related, I think, to a wider predicament

that progressive or left politics seems to find itself in today. The predicament is that the left seems increasingly to be

defined by a series of gestures of refusal – what I call ‘the antis’ (anti-globalization, anti-neo-

liberalism, anti-privatization, anti-Bush, sometimes even anti-capitalism – but always ‘anti’, never ‘pro’). The current world

system, the politics of the ‘anti-’ points out, rests on inequality and exploitation. The global poor are being screwed, while the rich are

benefiting. The powerless are getting the short end of the stick. This is all perfectly true, of course, if not terribly illuminating. But such lines

of argument typically have very little to propose by way of an alternative ‘art of government’. Governing

is exercising power over others, which is what the powerful do to the downtrodden. It appears as something to be resisted or

denounced, not improved or experimented with. My first observation about this sort of analysis is that it rests on whatseems tome a very un-Foucauldian idea of the political. Foucault did, certainly, valorize certain forms of resistance, and worked tirelessly to

undermine and denaturalize taken-for-granted arrangements of power. But he never suggested that power ought not be exercised, or that it

was illegitimate for someto seek to govern the conduct of others.On the contrary, he repeatedly insisted that it made no sense (in his scheme

of things) to wish for a world without power.1 Naive readings of Foucault turned his skeptical analytics of power into a simple denunciation.

Thus the question (once posed to him by an interviewer) of whether it would be an intolerable use of power for a parent to prevent a child

from scribbling on the walls of a house. Foucault’s instructive answer was: If I accepted the picture of power that is frequently adopted –

namely, that it’s something horrible and repressive for the individual – it’s clear that preventing a child from scribbling would be an unbearable

tyranny. But that’s not it. I say that power is a relation. A relation in which one guides the behavior of others. And there’s no reason why this

manner of guiding the behavior of others should not ultimately have results which are positive, valuable, interesting, and so on. If I had a kid, I

assure you he would not write on the walls – or if he did, it would be against my will. The very idea! (Foucault, 1988a: 11 –13) In the same

interview, he complained of those who . . . think I’m a sort of radical anarchist who has an absolute hatred of power. No! What I’m trying to do

is to approach this extremely important and tangled phenomenon in our society, the exercise of power, with the most reflective, and I would

say prudent, attitude. . . . To question the relations of power in the most scrupulous and attentive manner possible, looking into all the domains

of its exercise, that’s not the same thing as constructing a mythology of power as the beast of the apocalypse. (ibid.: 11–13) In fact,

Foucault was as fascinated and attracted by power as he was by resistance, and his fundamentalconcern was with how (not whether) power is exercised. This led him, naturally enough, to the

problem of government, which he inevitably took up as a pragmatic puzzle. Some contemporary

practitioners of what I have termed ‘Foucauldian critique’ seem to think it is some sort of scandal that people should

be governed at all – supposing it to be somehow illegitimate that some should seek to guide the conduct of others. But Foucault took a

deep and largely sympathetic interest in the development of what he called ‘arts of government’. Indeed, he once suggested (in a

provocative set of remarks on neo-liberalism) that while the right had, in the mid- to late 20th century, invented powerful new

arts of government, the left had suffered from the ‘absence of a socialist art of government’, and a



historic failure to develop an ‘autonomous governmentality’ comparable to liberalism (Foucault, 2008: 93 –

4). This observation leads to a question that must be a central one for what I am here terming ‘Foucauldian politics’. That is: What might a

genuinely ‘left’ art of government look like? And where might we find the specific governmental

techniques and rationalities that might enable such an art? Looking at the world as a whole – and especially at the

poorest and most disadvantaged parts of it, in which both I and my discipline have long taken a special interest – it seems evident that we can

only answer such questions if we are willing to question some of the foundational assumptions that have dominated left thought throughout

the last century or more. Let me cite just two reasons for this. First, in much of the world (and especially in the poorest parts of it),

formal wage labor does not play the central role that so much left thought ascribes to it. The semimythical

figure of the proletarian was, of course, at the heart of ideologies of state socialism, even as the extraction of labor was foundational to its

political economy. But the ‘able bodied worker’ was hardly less central to the workings of social democracies and welfare states, where

Keynesian policies implied a kind of pact between capital and labor, mediated by the state. ‘Society’, in such a scheme, was grounded on the

(normatively male) wage earning worker and ‘his family’, while ‘social welfare’ intervention was available for those left outside the security of

labor (whether through injury, old age, or periodic dips in the business cycle). Insurance rationality provided the technical means for

universalizing certain sorts of social citizenship (at the level of the nation-state) on the basis of the non-universal (but sufficiently widespread)

social condition of wage labor. This template never really applied very well to Africa, where wage laborers have always been a small minority of

the population. And it applies even less well today, when economic restructuring and de-industrialization

have meant that formal wage employment is ever more the exception than the rule. In the rapidly expanding

cities of today’s Africa, the great mass of the population is not ‘employed’ in the usual sense of the word, and increasingly lacks connections (or

rights) to land as well. Neither workers nor peasants, they dwell in the socalled ‘informal economy’, eking out a meagre survival through an

impressive range of improvised bits of this and that (cf. Davis, 2007). The poverty of our analytical vocabulary in describing such people and

their way of life (Are they ‘the lumpen’? ‘The youth’? ‘The informal’ – whatever that means?) ismatched by our inability to conceive of forms ofpolitics that would given them a central place. Certainly, the old left strategy of dismissing such people as a residual and degenerate fringe

(Marx’s ‘lumpenproletariat’) can hardly suffice when we are talking (as we often are today) about the majority of the population. The

second challenge I wish to note to conventional left thinking is the rise of forms of social assistance

that bypass nation-states. The usual left stance identifies ‘neo-liberalism’ as the enemy of the state, and thus of such social goods as

welfare and pensions. But in much of Africa, most forms of ‘social assistance’ are funded and implemented by non-state agencies. This has long

been the case, in many areas, thanks to the key role of Christian missions in providing education, health care and other social services from the

colonial era onward. The NGO revolution of the recent decades has only accentuated the pattern, to the point where many of the key

governmental relations that servicer eceiving Africans have are not with state bureaucracies, but with NGOs funded by transnational

philanthropic foundations. The most common left response to this transnationalization of ‘the social’ has

been to oppose such developments (again, the ‘anti’), and to defend the sovereignty o f African states,

which are imagined as being (at least potentially) the agents of development and resistors of imperialism. Such stances have

sometimes been justified, but they have not led to very effective forms of politics. Might another sort

of left politics not be possible – one that would look forward and try to identify new possibilities andopenings in the current transnational regime, instead of looking back to an (often misremembered or

idealized) era of sovereign ‘developmental states’? And (crucially for my purposes here), might it not

be possible to identify or discover new ‘arts of government’ that might take advantage of (rather than

simply fighting against) recent transformations in the spatial organization of government and social

assistance? This is the sort of rethinking that will be necessary if we are to get beyond the politics of the ‘anti’ and arrive at a convincing

response to Foucault’s challenge to develop a true left art of government. Such rethinking will have to be willing to

decenter the two sacred touchstones of 20th-century progressive politics – the worker and the nation-

state – while finding or reinventing techniques of government that can gain traction in settings where

most of ‘the masses’ are not workers, and most social services are not delivered by states. In such

circumstances, simply attacking ‘neo-liberalism’ and defending ‘the welfare state’ is not terribly helpful. What is

needed instead is a revitalized notion of the political good – and of what ‘social assistance’ might mean in a world where so many of the

assumptions of the Keynesian welfare state no longer obtain. In matters of ‘social policy’, Foucault’s 1983 observation remains true nearly aquarter-century later: We are still bound up with an outlook that was formed between 1920 and 1940, mainly under the influence of Beveridge,

a man who was born over a hundred years ago. For the moment . . . we completely lack the intellectual tools necessary to envisage in new

terms the form in which we might attain what we are looking for. (Foucault, 1988b: 166) My recent work is concerned with empirical domains

in which some of the conceptual innovation that Foucault called for may be under way. Perhaps the most provocative finding

to date is that some of the most interesting and promising new forms of government being devised

seem to be taking market mechanisms that we are used to associating with neo-liberalism, and

putting them to new political uses. Consider, for instance, new anti-poverty programs in southern Africa that seek to provide cash

support for incomes, and thus (in theory) harness markets to the task of meeting the needs of the poor. This is happening in several African

countries, but also in a great many other postcolonial states – from Brazil and Venezuela to Mexico and Bangladesh – where leftist and rightist



regimes alike have seen fit to introduce policies that transfer cash directly into the hands of the poor (Fiszbein and Schady, 2009; cf. Ferguson,

2010). The South African Basic Income Grant campaign is the example I know best. This involves a proposal to deal with a crisis of persistent

poverty by providing a small unconditional minimum monthly payment to all. The argument goes like this: markets are not working for poor

people because they are too poor to participate in them. Government programs are not working for them because the state is inefficient. So:

provide income support directly, in the form of cash, then say to the poor: ‘You are now empowered to solve your own problems in the way

you see best.’ In contrast to older forms of ‘welfare’ assistance, the claim is that such grants rely on poor people’s own ability to solve their own

problems, without imposing the policing, paternalism and surveillance of the traditional welfare state. The ‘social’ of the social welfare state is

largely discarded, in this scheme. Assistance is largely decoupled from familistic assumptions and insurance rationality alike, while the state is

imagined as both universally engaged (as a kind of direct provider for each and every citizen) and maximally disengaged (taking no real interestin shaping the conduct of those under its care, who are seen as knowing their own needs better than the state does). (See Standing and

Samson, 2003; Barchiesi, 20007; Ferguson, 2007.) Similar new lines of thought are visible in recent campaigns for an increased role for direct

cash transfers in many forms of social and humanitarian policy. For instance, an increasingly influential argument in the area of humanitarian

assistance maintains that hunger is best dealt with by boosting the purchasing power of those at risk, rather than by distributing food aid. The

current international food aid system involves taking excess grain (produced under subsidized conditions in rich countries) and transporting it

to places (largely in Africa) where people are at risk of hunger. Following Amartya Sen, critics have long noted the perverse effects of this:

depressing producer prices for local farmers, and damaging the local institutions for producing and distributing food crops. Once food aid has

arrived, local food production often never recovers, and the ‘temporary’ crisis becomes permanent. As an alternative, Sen’s f ollowers have

pushed for cash payments to be made directly to those at risk of food deficit. People with money in their pockets, Sen points out, do not starve.

And the economic chain of events that is set in motion by boosting purchasing power leads (through market forces) to increased capacity for

local production and distribution (Sen, 1983; Dreze and Sen, 1991). The argument recalls Jane Guyer’s groundbreaking work on feed ing African

cities (1989). Consider, Guyer suggests, how food ends up in bellies in the vast mega-cities of West Africa such as Lagos. The logistical task of

moving thousands of tons of food each day fromthousands of local producers to millions of urban consumerswould be beyond the

organizational capacity of any state (to say nothing of the less-than-exemplary Nigerian one). Here, market mechanisms, drawing on the power

of vast self-organizing networks, are very powerful, and very efficient. Such forms of organization must appear especially attractive wherestates lack capacity (and let us remember how many progressive dreams in Africa have crashed on the rocks of low state capacity). Why

should relying on this sort of mechanism be inherently right-wing? Well, the answer is obvious: markets serve

only those with purchasing power. But the food aid example shows a way of redirecting markets

toward the poor, by intervening not to restrict the market, but to boost purchasing power. I have become convinced that (at

least in the case of food aid) this is good public policy. Is it also neo-liberal? Perhaps that is not the

right question. Let us rather ask: Are there specific sorts of social policy that might draw on characteristic

neo-liberal ‘moves’ (like using markets to deliver services) that would also be genuinely pro-poor? That seems to me a

question worth asking. It seems clear that the governmental programs I have discussed here do draw on

recognizably neo-liberal elements (including the valorization of market efficiency, individual choice and autonomy; themes of

entrepreneurship; and skepticism about the state as a service provider).2 But those who advocate and fight for these

policies would insist that they are, in fact ‘pro-poor’, and that they are ways of fighting against (rather than capitulating to)

the growing inequality that recent ‘neo-liberal’ economic restructuring has produced. These claims, I think, are not easily dismissed. Andthis, in turn, raises the fascinating possibility that the ‘neo-liberal’ and the ‘pro-poor’ may not be so

automatically opposed as we are used to supposing. What is of special interest here is the way that

certain sorts of new progressive initiatives may involve not simply ‘opposing the neo-liberal project’,

but appropriating key mechanisms of neo-liberal government for different ends. This does not mean

that these political projects are therefore suspect – ‘contaminated’ by their association with neo-

liberal rationality. Rather, it means that they are appropriating certain characteristic neo-liberal

‘moves’ (and I think of these discursive and programmatic moves as analogous to the moves one

might make in a game) that while recognizably ‘neo-liberal’, can be used for quite different purposes

than that term usually implies. As I have argued in a related paper (Ferguson, 2010), this situation may be analogous to the way

that statistical techniques that were developed in the 19th century for calculating the probabilities of workplace injuries eventually became

building blocks of the insurance techniques that enabled the rise of the welfare state. Such techniques were originally developed in the 19th

century by large employers to control costs, but they eventually became the technical basis for social insurance, and ultimately helped enableunprecedented gains for the working class across much of the world (Ewald, 1986). Techniques have no necessary loyalty to the political

program within which they were developed, and mechanisms of government that were invented to serve one purpose can easily enough be

appropriated for surprising other uses. ‘Market’ techniques of government such as those I have discussed were, like workplace statistics,

undoubtedly conservative in their original uses. But it seems at least possible that they may be in the process of being creatively appropriated,

and repurposed for different and more progressive sorts of ends. To be sure: we need to be skeptical about the facile

idea that problems of poor people can be solved simply by inviting them to participate in markets and

enterprise. Such claims (which often ascribe almost magical transformative powers to such unlikely vehicles as ‘social entrepreneurship’ or

‘microcredit’) are almost always misleading, and often fraudulent. But it would be a mistake to dismiss the coupling of pro-



poor social policy with market mechanisms out of hand, out of a reflexive sense that the latter are

‘neo-liberal’ and thus ‘bad’. Again, my interest here is in the potential mobility of a set of governmental devices. These devices

originated within a neo-liberal project that deserves all the criticism it gets. But they may be in the process of being redeployed in creative

ways. If so, some emergent political initiatives that might appear at first blush to be worryingly ‘neo-

liberal’ may, on closer inspection, amount to something a good deal more hopeful. This leaves us with

a politics that requires more of us than simply denouncing neo-liberalism. The political demands and policy

measures I have mentioned here (whether conditional cash transfers, basic income, or cash-based food aid) do not merit, I think, eitherwholesale denunciation or uncritical acceptance. Instead, they call on us to remain skeptical and vigilant, but also curious and hopeful. They

leave us less with strong opinions than with the sense that we need to think about them a bit more, and learn a bit more about the specific

empirical effects that they may produce. Are cash transfers, for instance, a device for demobilizing the poor (as some traditional Marxists claim)

– effectively buying the political quiescence of those who have the most to gain from radical social change for a paltry sum? Or do they have

the contrary effect, as many proponents of basic income argue – opening up a new space of mobilization and political demand by radically

decoupling labor and consumption and opening a new domain of decommodification? This is not a question to be answered theoretically or

ideologically; the only answer that really convinces is the empirical and experimental one: Let us find out! Such a stance, I suggest, brings us

much closer toward a truly Foucauldian politics. For politics, for Foucault, was always more about experimentation than denunciation. In an

interview on social security, Foucault insisted that what was required for a progressive rethinking of social policy was not a theoretically derived

‘line’, but, as he put it, ‘a certain empiricism’. We have to transform the field of social institutions into a vast experimental field, in such a way

as to decide which taps need turning, which bolts need to be loosened here or there, to get the desired change. . . . What we have to do . . . is

to increase the experiments wherever possible in this particularly interesting and important area of social life. (Foucault, 1988b: 165) What

this implies is a form of politics that has less to do with critique and denunciation than with

experimentation and assessment. It is a matter not of refusing power, but rather exercising it in a way

that would be provisional, reversible, and open to surprise. If we are indeed to arrive at viable left

‘arts of government’, we will need to be open to the unexpected, ready to ‘increase the experiments

wherever possible’, and attentive to the ways that governmental techniques originally deployed for

nefarious purposes can be appropriated toward other ends. To do this, we will need to forgo the

pleasures of the easy, dismissive critique, and instead turn a keen and sympathetic eye toward the

rich world of actual social and political practice, the world of tap-turning and experimentation. That is a world still full of

invention and surprise, where the landscape of political possibility and constraint that we have come to take for granted is being redrawn, even

as we speak.

Pragmatic approach is key

Kolodko ‘13 [January 25th

, 2013, Grzegorz, Professor and expert on economic policy, “The New Pragmatism and the Future of World

Economy”, http://www.economonitor.com/blog/2013/01/the-new-pragmatism-and-the-future-of-world-economy/]

The confrontation of two views of modern capitalism – neoliberal capitalism and state capitalism - will

determine the social market economy that forms the New Pragmatism in the future. Even the International

Monetary Fund, for many years the hub of economic orthodoxy, admits that policy should be focused on increasing tax revenue, rather than on

cutting budget expenditure (at cost of socioeconomic inequality). How to reconcile the practical approach with an

approach which is fundamentally principled? Is it possible to practice economic pragmatism and

remain a man of principle? Is it worth it? It is, indeed, both possible and worthwhile. If we want to live in a world of

peace and harmonious development – and we certainly do – new values must be introduced to the process of

economic reproduction, however without disregarding the requirements of pragmatism, which is a

fundamental and indispensable feature of rational economic management. We need to adopt a more

pragmatic approach, favoring multiculturalism and one emanating from a system of values that

promote participatory globalization, social cohesion and sustainable development. There is no contradiction,as the core values underlying the social management process and its economic purposes are

concordant to a large extent. The most important aspect of the two approaches is a balanced, long-term

socio-economic development. Its equilibrium should be three-fold: (1) sustainable economic growth, or

growth associated with goods and capital markets, as well as investment, finance and labor; (2) socially sustainable growth, or

growth associated with a fair, socially acceptable distribution of income and an appropriate participation of the

main population groups in basic public services; (3) environmentally sustainable growth, or growth associated with

maintaining adequate relations between our economic activity and nature. Therefore, we do not have to

http://www.economonitor.com/blog/2013/01/the-new-pragmatism-and-the-future-of-world-economy/





sacrifice basic principles on the altar of short-term economic matters or tactical issues but, instead,

adapt practical strategic activities to these principles. This imperative charts the evolutionary path for

the political economy of the future.



Mexico Policy Focus Good

Pragmatic action is key in the context of Mexico

Acosta et al. ‘12 [April 1st, 2012, Mariaclaire, Project Director, Freedom House – Mexico, Bill Bratton, Chairman, Kroll Advisory

Solutions, former Chief of the Los Angeles Police Department and former New York City Police Commissioner, Georey Cowan, President, The

Annenberg Foundation Trust at Sunnylands, John Engler, President, Business Roundtable, former Governor of Michigan, Rafael Fernández de

Castro Chair, Department of International Studies, Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México, former Foreign Policy Advisor to President

Calderón Michael Govan, CEO and Wallis Annenberg Director, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Jane Harman, Director, President, and CEO,

Wilson Center, former Member of Congress, Carlos Heredia, Director of International Studies, Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económicas,

CIDE, former Member of Congress, Phil Heymann, James Barr Ames Professor of Law, Harvard Law School, former Deputy Attorney General,

Barry Jackson, Chief of Staff to the Speaker of the House John Boehner, Enrique Krauze, Historian and Essayist, Founder and Editor-in-Chief of

Letras Libres, Isaac Lee, President, News, Univision Communications Inc., Emilio Lozoya, Chairman, JFH Lozoya Investments, Mel Martinez,

Chairman, Florida, Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean for JPMorgan Chase & Co., Chairman, JPMorgan Chase Foundation, Doris

Meissner, Senior Fellow, Migration Policy Institute, former Commissioner of Immigration and Naturalization Service “Policy Recommendations

for U.S.-Mexico Relations” Annenberg Retreat with the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars,

http://sunnylands.org/files/posts/159/stronger_f.pdf]

The U.S.-Mexico relationship is among the most important and complex bilateral relationships in the

world. The plethora of issues, actors, and stakeholders add political challenges to what at timesappear to be common sense, win-win solutions. Such complexity should not lead to fatalism, but

rather creative and intensive joint problem solving. Within the broad array of voices that take interest

in the relationship, there exists the potential for alliances and coalitions powerful enough to

overcome opposition and to achieve significant advances. Right now, during the recovery from joint economic crises,

cooperation to create jobs and strengthen the competitiveness of regional manufacturers offers a tremendous opportunity and should be at

the center of the bilateral agenda. Prioritizing measures to enhance trade and reactivating the alliance between

the private sectors of the United States and Mexico could change the tone and politics of the

relationship. The security challenges faced by each country are real and unavoidable. They should be prioritized, yet balanced with an

agenda based on economic opportunity and shared prosperity. The definition and implementation of new, more focused security strategies

designed to reduce violence and strengthen the rule of law, within a framework of shared responsibility, may bring new energy and popular

support to a difficult ongoing issue. Political spaces may be opening for each nation to tackle what are in

political terms primarily domestic issues, despite their significant regional implications. The major decline in

illegal immigration and corresponding improvement in border security in the United States presents a new starting point for discussions of

comprehensive immigration reform. Along similar lines, a burgeoning pragmatism toward the development of

petroleum resources in Mexico could change the parameters of the debate on energy reform. Progress

in either Mexico or the United States on these seemingly intractable issues could breathe new energy

into the bilateral relationship, and each side should seek to capitalize on any potential developments. Partisan politics generally loom large in election years, and 2012 is no different for the United States or Mexico. The truth is that there will be

real political limitations on what the winner of each election can do, but if there is a lesson from the history of U.S.-Mexico

relations, it is that an inclusive process of strategic planning can generate sound ideas and strengthen

the political will to seek real advances. This is precisely why the Wilson Center and The Annenberg Retreat at Sunnylands came

together: to stimulate this process. The ideas presented in this document are based on the observation that Mexico, the United States, and the

global context have all undergone major transformations since the last time the two countries had simultaneous election years in 2000.

http://sunnylands.org/files/posts/159/stronger_f.pdf

http://sunnylands.org/files/posts/159/stronger_f.pdf





---CASE---



***Negative***



Status Quo Solves

Status quo solves---the era of neglect their authors describe is coming to a close

Margheritis and Pereira ’07 (Ana- assistant professor of international relations and Latin American politics at the University of

Florida and Anthony- associate professor of political science at Tulane University; “The Neoliberal Turn in Latin America: The Cycle of Ideas and

the Search for an Alternative”; Latin American Perspectives, Vol. 34, No. 3, Contested Transformation (May, 2007),pp. 25-48)

There are clear signs that the era of the Washington Consensus and neoliberal economics in Latin

America is drawing to a close. The optimism about economic development of the early 1990s has receded, and a slow but

perceptible political backlash has set in. A series of political events has occurred that represents, at least in part, an

intensification of popular dissatisfaction with the reigning economic model. These include the election

of Hugo Chavez in Venezuela in 1998, the coup that overthrew President Jamil Mahuad in Ecuador in 2000, the

Argentine debt default and street protests of December 2001, followed by the election of Nestor Kirchner

in 2003, the election of Lucio Gutierrez in Ecuador in 2002, the violent protests in Bolivia in 2003 that led

to the resignation of President Gonzalo Sanchez de Losada, and the election of Tabare Vasquez to the

Uruguayan presidency in 2004. These events reflect the differential impact of recent economicreforms and show that in Latin America, once again, a prior consensus on economic policy is breaking

down.

Recent trends prove the status quo is improving---economic improvements, social

progress, and political structures are better than they’ve ever been

IADPP ’12 (Inter-American Dialogue Policy Report; “Remaking the Relationship the United states and Latin America”; April 2012;


It is the good news of Latin America’s progress that has most altered hemispheric re lations . In the past

decade, the region has posted its best economic performance in a generation and managed largely to

sidestep the world financial crisis in 2008 –2009 . The ranks of the middle classes have swelled .The region’s

political structures have also opened up, giving way to growing participation by women, indigenous

and Afro-descendant populations, and other once-excluded groups . All Latin Americans across a broadening

spectrum have greater access to education and health services, consumer goods, and foreign travel . They

now have real and rapidly expanding stakes in their societies. These advances have also led to new social stirrings which, along with demands

and expectations, are notably on the rise . There are more and more pressures for further change and improvements .Impressive

economic, political, and social progress at home has, in turn, given Brazil, Mexico, Chile, Colombia, Peru,

and many other countries greater access to worldwide opportunities . Indeed, the region’s most salient

transformation may be its increasingly global connections and widening international relationships .Brazil’s dramatic rise on the world stage

most visibly exemplifies the shift .But other countries, too, are participating actively in global affairs and developing extensive networks of

commercial and political ties . China is an increasingly prominent economic actor, but India and other Asian countries are intensifying their ties

to the region as well.

Economic engagement is well received---Latin America has a favorable view ofAmerica only when we are engaging

Wilson 7-24-13 (Tim Wilson- freelance journalist for Near Shore America; “Despite Chavez and Snowden, Pro-U.S. Sentiment Grows in

Latin America”; http://www.nearshoreamericas.com/chavez-snowden-latin-america-perceptions-us/)

This is a common phenomenon. The Pew Research Center, in tracking attitudes in Latin America’s two biggest economies, found

that in 2012 69% of people in both Brazil and Mexico had a favorable attitude to American music, movies,

and television. But when it comes to how Americans “do business”, only 43% of Mexicans and 45% of Brazilians had a favorable view. By

contrast, the most recent data indicate that favorable views of the United States have experienced a



significant boost: 73% for Brazilians (up from 61% in 2012), and 66% for Mexicans (up from 56% in 2012).¶ “You can

see the change in U.S. favorability ratings in Mexico in our 2013 report ,” Molly Rohal of the Pew Research Center

tells Nearshore Americas. “We also have trend data in the Global Indicators Database .”¶ The trend is your friend¶

Specific to Latin America, the trend data is cause for optimism, given that Latin America is a young continent, and younger

people have a more positive view of the U.S. In Brazil, for example, 78% of those between 18 to 29 years of age, and 72% of

those between 30 to 49, had a positive view of US popular culture. In Mexico, the percentages were 79% and 70% respectively. And for those

over 50 years of age? Only 55% of Brazilians had a positive view, and 57% of Mexicans.¶ But Latin America is more than Mexico and Brazil, andthe greater region is experiencing an ideological divide between populist left leaning governments (Argentina, Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador,

Cuba, and Nicaragua) and neo-liberal regimes embracing market reforms (Colombia, Chile, and most of Central America). The populist

governments like to ratchet up the anti-US rhetoric, echoing the Cold War divide when the United

States supported many repressive right wing dictatorships.¶ The irony is that the overall perceptions are not

that bad, and that the lower the economic engagement with the United States, the less favorable the

view. This is interesting in that “business” scores low, suggesting that there is a more general challenge faced by the private sector, and not

one that is specific to U.S. businesses. In fact, when U.S. business is involved, the populace tends to have a

positive view.¶ Consequently, high-contact and business friendly governments like Chile and El Salvador have

favorable views , at 68% and 79%, respectively. By comparison, 55% of Bolivians see the U.S. in a favorable light. In Argentina – a

country that makes a habit of rounding out the bottom of positive attitudes to the U.S. – only 41% of the population has a positive view of theU.S.¶ Other research has revealed that Latin America, as a region, has a more positive view of the United States

and her people than any other . The tenth joint report by Americas Quarterly and Efecto Naím, for example, has indicated that

popular support for the U.S. exists even in those countries that have populist regimes critical of the

United States. And ongoing research from Latinobarómetro has shown that majorities in most Latin American countries have a positive

view of the United States.¶ As with other research, Latinobarómetro has found that close economic and cultural ties

build a positive experience. Trade, remittances, and investment – including in technology driven

areas that involve a skilled workforce, such as Business Process and IT Outsourcing – can build

goodwill.

ALBA movements are succeeding now—their authorHattingh ‘8 *July 2nd, 2008, Shawn, International Labour Research and Information Group, “ALBA: Creating a Regional Alternative to

Neoliberalism?” Monthly Review, http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/2008/hattingh070208.html]

In order to achieve these broad objectives, it is important that the peoples of the member states are

involved in and direct ALBA. ALBA encourages popular participation in its planning and functioning. For that purpose, it has three

councils that oversee its operations. The first two councils are the presidential and ministerial councils, while the third is made up of social

movements. Though this, social movements have become directly involved in the planning and administration of ALBA. Currently, some of

the largest social movements in Latin America -- such as the MST and Via Campesina -- participate in

ALBA through this council. Their ideas about land redistribution, free healthcare, free education, and

food security have become part of ALBA's goals. ALBA not only promotes participatory democracy in

its own structures, it also commits member states to implement participatory democracy within their

borders. The aim of promoting participatory democracy in ALBA sets it apart from the neo-liberal "free" trade agreements that are being

foisted upon poorer states by the US and the EU. Indeed, ALBA's success hinges on its ability to fulfill its aim of participatory democracy.¶ ALBA

has been in existence for only four years, and yet it has already recorded a number of successes. Since 2004, Venezuela has been

exchanging oil for the services of 30,000 Cuban doctors and teachers. Under this deal, Cuba has received 1

billion dollars worth of subsidized oil a year, which has allowed Cuba to improve its economy. For

Venezuela, this deal has allowed it to staff the thousands of new clinics and schools that it has built.

This has seen Venezuela eradicating illiteracy and providing free healthcare to millions of people.¶

Cuba and Venezuela have also used ALBA's umbrella to create 5 major agricultural projects that are

http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/2008/hattingh070208.html


http://www.mst.org.br/mst/home.php

http://viacampesina.org/main_en/index.php

http://viacampesina.org/main_en/index.php

http://www.mst.org.br/mst/home.php




producing soy beans, rice, poultry, and dairy products. The goal behind these projects is to guarantee food

security in both Cuba and Venezuela. In fact, Venezuela has used these projects to provide free or

subsidized food to millions of people. Venezuela has also supplied Cuba with buses to improve its public

transport system, assisted Cuba with the construction of a massive aqueduct to improve its water

supply, and has helped Cuba revamp its main oil refinery .



Case Frontline Addendum

Their interrogation ignores historical trends which disproves their argument

Barnett ‘5 *2005, Clive, Open University social sciences faculty, “The Consolations of ‘Neoliberalism”, Geoforum, 36.1, ScienceDirect+

3. There is no such thing as neoliberalism! The blind-spot in theories of neoliberalism—whether neo-Marxist and Foucauldian—comes

with trying to account for how top-down initiatives ‘take’ in everyday situations. So perhaps the best

thing to do is to stop thinking of “neoliberalism” as a coherent “hegemonic” project altogether. For all

its apparent critical force, the vocabulary of “neoliberalism” and “neoliberalization” in fact provides a

double consolation for leftist academics: it supplies us with plentiful opportunities for unveiling the

real workings of hegemonic ideologies in a characteristic gesture of revelation; and in so doing, it

invites us to align our own professional roles with the activities of various actors “out there”, who are

always framed as engaging in resistance or contestation. The conceptualization of “neoliberalism” as a “hegemonic” project does

not need refining by adding a splash of Foucault. Perhaps we should try to do without the concept of “neoliberalism” altogether, because it might actually

compound rather than aid in the task of figuring out how the world works and how it changes. One reason for this is

that, between an overlyeconomistic derivation of political economy and an overly statist rendition of governmentality, stories

about “neoliberalism” manage to reduce the understanding of social relations to a residual effect of

hegemonic projects and/or governmental programmes of rule (see Clarke, 2004a). Stories about “neoliberalism” pay little

attention to the pro-active role of socio-cultural processes in provoking changes in modes of governance, policy, and regulation.

Consider the example of the restructuring of public services such as health care, education, and criminal justice in the UK o ver the last two or three decades. This

can easily be thought of in terms of a “hegemonic” project of “neoliberalization”, and certainly one dimension of this process has been a form of anti -statism that

has rhetorically contrasted market provision against the rigidities of the state. But in fact these ongoing changes in the terms of public-policy debate involve a

combination of different factors that add up to a much more dispersed populist reorientation in policy, politics, and culture . These factors include changing

consumer expectations, involving shifts in expectations towards public entitlements which follow from the generalization of consumerism; the decline of deference,

involving shifts in conventions and hierarchies of taste, trust, access, and expertise; and the refusals of the subordinated, referring to the emergence of anti-

paternalist attitudes found in, for example, women’s health movements or anti-psychiatry movements. They include also the development of the politics of

difference, involving the emergence of discourses of institutional discrimination based on gender, sexuality, race, and disability. This has disrupted the ways in which

welfare agencies think about inequality, helping to generate the emergence of contested inequalities, in which policies aimed at addressing inequalities of class and

income develop an ever more expansive dynamic of expectation that public services should address other kinds of inequality as well (see Clarke, 2004b J. Clark,

Dissolving the public realm? The logics and limits of neo-liberalism, Journal of Social Policy 33 (2004), pp. 27 –48.Clarke, 2004b). None of these populist tendencies is

simply an expression of a singular “hegemonic” project of “neoliberalization”. They are effects of much longer rhythms of soc io-cultural change that emanate from

the bottom-up. It seems just as plausible to suppose that what we have come to recognise as “hegemonic neoliberalism” is

a muddled set of ad hoc, opportunistic accommodations to these unstable dynamics of social change as

it is to think of it as the outcome of highly coherent political-ideological projects. Processes of privatization, market liberalization,

and de-regulation have often followed an ironic pattern in so far as they have been triggered by

citizens’ movements arguing from the left of the political spectrum against the rigidities of statist

forms of social policy and welfare provision in the name of greater autonomy, equality, and participation (e.g. Horwitz, 1989). The political re-

alignments of the last three or four decades cannot therefore be adequately understood in terms of a

straightforward shift from the left to the right, from values of collectivism to values of individualism, or

as a re-imposition of class power. The emergence and generalization of this populist ethos has much longer, deeper, and wider roots t han those ascribed to

“hegemonic neoliberalism”. And it also points towards the extent to which easily the most widely resonant political rationality in the world today is not right-wing

market liberalism at all, but is, rather, the polyvalent discourse of “democracy” (see Barnett and Low, 2004). Recent theories of “neoliberalism” have retreated from

the appreciation of the long-term rhythms of socio-cultural change, which Stuart Hall once developed in his influential account of Thatcherism as a variant of

authoritarian populism. Instead, they favour elite-focused analyses of state bureaucracies, policy networks, and the like. One consequence of the residualization ofthe social is that theories of “neoliberalism” have great difficulty accounting for, or indeed even in

recognizing, new forms of “individualized collective-action” (Marchetti, 2003) that have emerged in

tandem with the apparent ascendancy of “neoliberal hegemony”: environmental politics and the

politics of sustainability; new forms of consumer activism oriented by an ethics of assistance and

global solidarity; the identity politics of sexuality related to demands for changes in modes of health

care provision, and so on (see Norris, 2002). All of these might be thought of as variants of what we might want to call bottom-up

governmentality. This refers to the notion that non-state and non-corporate actors are also engaged in trying to govern various fields of activity, both by acting on

the conduct and contexts of ordinary everyday life, but also by acting on the conduct of state and corporate actors as well. Rose (1999, pp. 281 –284) hints at the



outlines of such an analysis, at the very end of his paradigmatic account of governmentality, but investigation of this phenomenon is poorly developed at present.

Instead, the trouble-free amalgamation of Foucault’s ideas into the Marxist narrative of

“neoliberalism” sets up a simplistic image of the world divided between the forces of hegemony and

the spirits of subversion (see Sedgwick, 2003, pp. 11 –12). And clinging to this image only makes it all the more

difficult to acknowledge the possibility of positive political action that does not conform to a

romanticized picture of rebellion , contestation, or protest against domination (see Touraine, 2001). Theories of “neoliberalism” are unable to

recognize the emergence of new and innovative forms of individualized collective action because their critical imagination turns on a simple evaluative opposition

between individualism and collectivism, the private and the public. The radical academic discourse of “neoliberalism” frames

the relationship between collective action and individualism simplistically as an opposition between

the good and the bad. In confirming a narrow account of liberalism, understood primarily as an

economic doctrine of free markets and individual choice, there is a peculiar convergence between the

radical academic left and the right-wing interpretation of liberal thought exemplified by Hayekian conservatism. By

obliterating the political origins of modern liberalism—understood as answering the problem of how to live freely in societies divided by interminable conflicts of

value, interest, and faith—the discourse of “neoliberalism” reiterates a longer problem for radical academic

theory of being unable to account for its own normative priorities in a compelling way. And by

denigrating the value of individualism as just an ideological ploy by the right, the pejorative

vocabulary of “neoliberalism” invites us to take solace in an image of collective decision-making as a

practically and normatively unproblematic procedure. The recurrent problem for theories of “neoliberalism” and

“neoliberalization” is their two-dimensional view of both political power and of geographical space. They can only account for the relationship between top-downinitiatives and bottom-up developments by recourse to the language of centres, peripheries, diffusion, and contingent realizations; and by displacin g the

conceptualization of social relations with a flurry of implied subject-effects. The turn to an overly systematized theory of

governmentality, derived from Foucault, only compounds the theoretical limitations of economistic

conceptualizations of “neoliberalism”. The task for social theory today remains a quite classical one, namely to try to specify “the recurrent

causal processes that govern the intersections between abstract, centrally promoted plans and social life on the small scale” (Tilly, 2003, p. 345). Neither

neoliberalism-as-hegemony nor neoliberalism-as-governmentality is really able to help in this task, not least because both invest in a deeply embedded picture of

subject-formation as a process of “getting-at” ordinary people in order to make them believe in things against their best interests. With respect to the problem of

accounting for how “hegemonic” projects of “neoliberalism” win wider consensual legitimacy, Foucault’s ideas on governmentality seem to promise an account of

how people come to acquire what Ivison (1997) calls the “freedom to be formed and normed”. Over time, Foucault’s own work moved steadily away from an

emphasis on the forming-and-norming end of this formulation towards an emphasis on the freedom end. This shift was itself a reflection of the realization that the

circularities of poststructuralist theories of subjectivity can only be broken by developing an account of the active receptivity of people to being directed. But, in the

last instance, neither the story of neoliberalism-as-hegemony or of neoliberalism-as-governmentality can account for the forms of receptivity, pro-activity, and

generativity that might help to explain how the rhythms of the everyday are able to produce effects on macro-scale processes, and vice versa. So, rather than

finding convenient synergies between what are already closely related theoretical traditions, perhaps it is better to keep open those tireso me debates about the

degree of coherence between them, at the same time as trying to broaden the horizons of our theoretical curios ity a little more widely.

Latin American governments going to capitalism now

Petras ‘10 [January 5th

, 2010, James, former Professor of Sociology at Binghamton University, “U.S.-Venezuelan Relations: Imperialism

and Revolution”, http://dissidentvoice.org/2010/01/u-s-venezuelan-relations-imperialism-and-revolution/]

US-Latin America’s policy has failed to open a new relationship and certainly has deepened US

isolation. Obama has increased the degree of alienation and failed to recover hegemony. In large part for

the same reason that the Bush administration failed, Washington policymakers retain as the “model”, Latin American submission to US

supremacy during the “golden years” of the 1990’s. Undersecretary Arturo Valenzuela during his visit to Argentina revealed this reactionary

nostalgia when he recalled the “good times” during the Menem regime (1989-1999), a period of pillage, plunder and monumental corruption,

universally condemned. This gaffe provoked a storm of protest and further soured Argentine-US relations beyond what existed under Bush.

Rising militarization under Obama as evidenced in the US-Colombia-Venezuela triangle is out of sync with the Latin

America’s big push for greater trade diversification, higher growth and increased regional integration,

including countries targeted by Obama. Chavez, despite his defense spending, fits into the Latin American pattern, looking toward greater trade

with Argentina, Brazil, China, Iran while freezing trade relations with Colombia and attempting to lower dependence on the US market. The

Bush-Obama policy of confrontation and intimidation to force a break between Latin America’s

center-left and centrist governments and the “radicals” has boomeranged, exacerbating conflicts

across a series of diplomatic and economic issues. The strategy of isolating Cuba and Venezuela has

highlighted Washington’s lone vote on each occasion. Washington’s resort to a military strategy reflects its

global policy but one that is out of tune with the changing priorities and political complexion of Latin

regimes. As much as anything, the Obama regimes’ military position reflects the decline of economic

http://dissidentvoice.org/2010/01/u-s-venezuelan-relations-imperialism-and-revolution/





leverage, in part a reflection of the primacy of finance over manufacturing, in part a result of the demise of the empire-centered neo-liberal

ideology which greased the wheels of US hegemony. It is clear that Washington has failed to recognize that the

restoration of the type of client regimes of the previous decade is a highly dubious proposition; efforts

to that effect are likely to provoke greater regime and mass rejection of any overtures to ‘new

relations’. Washington’s double discourse of “free trade for your markets” and “protectionism for ours” does not fly. Brazil under Lula, a

staunch free marketer has said as much in the face of US tariffs on ethanol and other competitive exports. What is striking about US-

Latin American relations is that the deterioration occurs at a time when the so-called center-left

regimes have embraced capitalism, foreign investment, moderate regulations on capital flows, co-

opted radical social movements and trade unions, retained the bulk of the dubious privatizations and

the agro-mineral export model. That the US and particular the Obama regime have failed to build a

new positive relationship in these eminently democratic capitalist circumstances can only be

attributed to its extremism, its deep-going commitment to military driven empire building. Even in the

case of Venezuela, Bolivia, Nicaragua and Ecuador, joint economic ventures with foreign capital continue to

thrive; the private sector still controls the mass media, banking, agriculture, commerce and transport. Positive investment and

trade relations thrive with other economic blocs including the EU and the emerging dynamic capitalist

countries of China, South Africa, Russia as well as the Middle East. Chavez’ rejection of US military policies and

interventionism has solid popular backing and is supported by polls in the EU and even in the US. If Washington

proceeds toward a proxy war with Venezuela using Honduras as a dress rehearsal, (in addition to its overstretch today in

Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan and Yemen) can it win a prolonged offensive war? A highly dubious proposition. More likely it will re-

radicalize the continent and certainly turn Venezuela toward socialization of the economy and deepen

its ties to radical social movements elsewhere. As it stands today, Venezuela eschews ties to radical

social movements, favoring ties with social liberal and even conservative regimes willing to sign trade

and investment treaties and friendly diplomatic relations.

Impacts are inevitable---no shift from neolib

Liverman and Vilas ‘6 [November 2006, Diana, Professor of Environmental Science at Oxford University, Silvina, Professor of

Environmental Science at Oxford University, “Neoliberalism and the Environment in Latin America,” Annual Review of Environment and

Resources, vol. 31, http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1081964]

Despite the surge in antineoliberal sentiment in Latin America, it is unlikely that many environmentally

significant neoliberal policies will be reversed because governments do not have the financial

resources to reinstate subsidies and renationalize land and water and are unlikely to disengage

from the global trading system. More probable is a search for institutional solutions that mediate

the most negative social and ecological effects of free trade and less government. This might

include stronger oversight of private water and fisheries, enforceable standards for forest use and industrial activities, and targeted

financial assistance from government, international institutions, and nongovernmental organizations to certain

ecological regions or social groups. This suggests a need for more empirical and comparative studies that assess

what policies and institutions best sustain landscapes and livelihoods in particular places, especially under pressures of global

integration and in the context of local conditions.

http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1081964

http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1081964



Engagement Good

Delay DA---the affirmative makes things worse---economic engagement is good---

acting now is keyIADPP ’12 (Inter-American Dialogue Policy Report; “Remaking the Relationship the United states and Latin America”; April 2012;


There are compelling reasons for the United States and Latin America to pursue more robust ties

.Every country in the Americas would benefit from strengthened and expanded economic relations, with

improved access to each other’s markets, investment capital, and energy resources . Even with its current

economic problems, the United States’ $16-trillion economy is a vital market and source of capital (including remittances) and

technology for Latin America, and it could contribute more to the region’s economic performance . For its part, Latin America’s

rising economies will inevitably become more and more crucial to the United States’ economic future .The United States and many

nations of Latin America and the Caribbean would also gain a great deal by more cooperation on such global matters

as climate change, nuclear non-proliferation, and democracy and human rights . With a rapidly expanding USHispanic population of more than 50 million, the cultural and demographic integration of the United States and Latin America is proceeding at

an accelerating pace, setting a firmer basis for hemispheric partnership. Despite the multiple opportunities and potential benefits, relations

between the United States and Latin America remain disappointing . If new opportunities are not seized, relations will likely continue to drift

apart . The longer the current situation persists, the harder it will be to reverse course and rebuild vigorous

cooperation . Hemispheric affairs require urgent attention —both from the United States and from Latin America and the

Caribbean.



Alternate Causalities

Immigration reform is an alt cause---failure to pass a policy has bred resentment---the

aff makes it worseIADPP ’12 (Inter-American Dialogue Policy Report; “Remaking the Relationship the United states and Latin America”; April 2012;


Washington’s failure to repair the United States’ broken immigration system is breeding resentment across

the region, nowhere more so than in the principal points of origin and transit: Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean . Latin

Americans find the idea of building a wall on the US-Mexico border particularly offensive .Despite bitter

political battles over immigration in the United States, there is general agreement about what sensible reform would include . It combines

effective border and employer enforcement, the adoption of a general worker program consistent with labor market needs in the United

States, and a path toward residence and citizenship for the estimated 12 million unauthorized residents living in the country . This package is

similar to the reform effort (unfortunately defeated in Congress) proposed under President George W . Bush .The complicated and divisive

politics of the United States, compounded by the weakness of the US economy , have so far blocked this

comprehensive approach . But more limited measures such as the Dream Act, allowing children brought to the

United States without appropriate documentation an opportunity to qualify for citizenship, would not only be welcomed in US Latino

communities and in Latin America, but it would demonstrate that the issue is being taken seriously and with a

measure of compassion in Washington .Sensible US immigration policies promise to benefit the US economy .Migrants make up a

significant percentage of younger workers . Their presence would improve the labor demographic and increase the US capacity for economic

growth even while their contributions help sustain the US social security system . Immigration reform would also recognize the growing

“Latinoamericanization” of the United States . Roughly one sixth of the population is currently of Latino descent . The cultural, demographic and

family ties of those 50 million people will continue to deepen . The United States’ inability to respond to the policy

challenge of immigration will have increasingly negative consequences, standing in the way of a more

productive relationship with Latin America

Multiple alt causes prove the aff doesn’t fix anything. Latin America has a positive

long-term view of the USWilson 7-24-13 (Tim Wilson- freelance journalist for Near Shore America; “Despite Chavez and Snowden, Pro-U.S. Sentiment Grows in

Latin America”; http://www.nearshoreamericas.com/chavez-snowden-latin-america-perceptions-us/)

That said, Mexican attitudes are more highly sensitive to U.S. immigration policy than is the case with other Latin

American countries. The Arizona immigration law, for example, had a significant short-term effect on attitudes in

Mexico: in 2010 the Mexican favorability numbers for the U.S. dropped from 62% to 48%, but those have since rebounded impressively in

2013 to 66%.¶ Clearly, a government is not its people. The most recent fiasco with regard to leaks from former U.S. intelligence contractor

Edward Snowden is such example. Assertions that the U.S. has been intercepting phone calls and emails in

Argentina, Ecuador, Brazil, Colombia and Mexico, have created a flurry of diplomatic activity – but likely

won’t have a long-term effect on perception of the U.S. Similarly, over-arching U.S. policies toward Cuba, the war on drugs, and immigration,

may be unpopular, but appear to have little lasting impact on attitudes to the United States and her people.¶ And it would seem that many

people in Latin America are suspicious of the efforts by some populist, left-leaning governments to fan thefires of anti-Americanism. For example, Pew Research Center analyst Katie Simmons reports that “worsening ties

with America is something the Venezuelan public wants to avoid,” with only 22% of all Venezuelans reporting that

they would like their country to establish more distance from the U.S.¶ Over the years, “America the beautiful” has been represented by the

occasional “ugly American”. However, it would seem now that the majority of people in Latin America maintain a

positive view of the United States. And when they encounter American business people, more often

than not that understanding is reinforced – a good thing for all involved.



Anthropocentrism Turn

The 1AC ironically neglects the non-human world---that ensures replicating human-

centrism and reifying anthropocentric dominanceBell and Russell 2K (Anne C. by graduate students in the Faculty of Environmental Studies, York University and Constance L. a

graduate student at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto, Beyond Human, Beyond Words: Anthropocentrism,

Critical Pedagogy, and the Poststructuralist Turn, http://www.csse-scee.ca/CJE/Articles/FullText/CJE25-3/CJE25-3-bell.pdf)

For this reason, the various movements against oppression need to be aware of and supportive of each other. In critical pedagogy, however,

the exploration of questions of race, gender, class, and sexuality has proceeded so far with little

acknowledgement of the systemic links between human oppressions and the domination of nature.

The more-than-human world and human relationships to it have been ignored, as if the suffering and

exploitation of other beings and the global ecological crisis were somehow irrelevant. Despite the call for

attention to voices historically absent from traditional canons and narratives (Sadovnik, 1995, p. 316), nonhuman beings are

shrouded in silence. This silence characterizes even the work of writers who call for a rethinking of all culturally positioned

essentialisms. Like other educators influenced by poststructuralism, we agree that there is a need to scrutinize the language

we use, the meanings we deploy, and the epistemological frameworks of past eras (Luke & Luke, 1995, p.

378). To treat social categories as stable and unchanging is to reproduce the prevailing relations of

power (Britzman et al., 1991, p. 89). What would it mean, then, for critical pedagogy to extend this investigation and critique to include

taken-for-granted understandings of “human,” “animal,” and “nature”? This question is difficult to raise precisely because these

understandings are taken for granted. The anthropocentric bias in critical pedagogy manifests itself in silence and

in the asides of texts. Since it is not a topic of discussion, it can be difficult to situate a critique of it. Following feminist analyses, we find that

examples of anthropocentrism, like examples of gender symbolization, occur “in those places where speakers

reveal the assumptions they think they do not need to defend, beliefs they expect to share with their

audiences” (Harding, 1986, p. 112). Take, for example, Freire’s (1990) statements about the differences between “Man” and animals. To set

up his discussion of praxis and the importance of “naming” the world, he outlines what he assumes to be shared, commonsensical beliefs about

humans and other animals. He defines the boundaries of human membership according to a sharp, hierarchical dichotomy that establisheshuman superiority. Humans alone, he reminds us, are aware and self-conscious beings who can act to fulfill the objectives they set for

themselves. Humans alone are able to infuse the world with their creative presence, to overcome situations that limit them, and thus to

demonstrate a “decisive attitude towards the world” (p. 90). Freire (1990, pp. 87–91) represents other animals in terms of their lack of such

traits. They are doomed to passively accept the given, their lives “totally determined” because their

decisions belong not to themselves but to their species. Thus whereas humans inhabit a “world” which

they create and transform and from which they can separate themselves, for animals there is only

habitat, a mere physical space to which they are “organically bound.” To accept Freire’s assumptions is to believe

that humans are animals only in a nominal sense. We are different not in degree but in kind, and though we might recognize that other animals

have distinct qualities, we as humans are somehow moreunique. We have the edge over other creatures because we are able to rise above

monotonous, species-determined biological existence. Change in the service of human freedom is seen to be our primary agenda. Humans

are thus cast as active agents whose very essence is to transform the world – as if somehow

acceptance, appreciation, wonder, and reverence were beyond the pale. This discursive frame of

reference is characteristic of critical pedagogy. The human/animal opposition upon which it rests is

taken for granted, its cultural and historical specificity not acknowledged. And therein lies the

problem. Like other social constructions, this one derives its persuasiveness from its “seeming facticity

and from the deep investments individuals and communities have in setting themselves off from

others” (Britzman et al., 1991, p. 91). This becomes the normal way of seeing the world, and like other

discourses of normalcy, it limits possibilities of taking up and confronting inequities (see Britzman, 1995).

The primacy of the human enterprise is simply not questioned. Precisely how an anthropocentric pedagogy might

exacerbate the environmental crisis has not received much consideration in the literature of critical pedagogy, especially in North America.



Although there may be passing reference to planetary destruction, there is seldom mention of the relationship between education and the

domination of nature, let alone any sustained exploration of the links between the domination of nature and other social injustices. Concerns

about the nonhuman are relegated to environmental education. And since environmental education, in turn, remains peripheral to the core

curriculum (A. Gough, 1997; Russell, Bell, & Fawcett, 2000), anthropocentrism passes unchallenged. 1

A new political idealism based on nature solves selective intervention

Roberts no date – (Lynda Roberts- prof. at University of Utah; “The Wilderness Debate: A Conflict Between Values”;

http://www.naspaa.org/initiatives/paa/pdf/lynda_roberts.pdf)

Conflict is inherent in our founding ideals, and gives us the opportunity to debate issues that impact our lives. Wilderness preservation and use

affect every aspect of our lives, whether it is in the form of recreational pleasure to enrich our sense of well being or material resources to

support our lifestyle. Out of necessity our thinking must evolve from an anthropocentric to a biocentric point of

view . This may be possible as the world continues to move toward globalization and the consumption

patterns of industrialized countries are closely scrutinized. Since democratic ideals are spreading throughout the

world, they can now be used to generate global debate about environmental issues with resolutions via

majority rule. Efforts toward global change can be supported at local levels through bold leadership and

public policy. Change is not easy even when it is worthwhile and necessary. Human impacts on wilderness areas

will continue to degrade the environment unless people reshape their thinking about the land,

reevaluate their relationship to it, and curb their appetite for consumption. In other words, humans needto view themselves as citizens of the environmental community rather than conquerors of it: Indeed,

people cannot really understand why each organism possesses the characteristics it does until they fathom the entire animal and plant

community in which it functions .... Nature is infinitely more complex, and its individual parts more closely connected than anyone could have

suspected before the age of ecological research (Hinchman & Hinchman 1989, 210-11). Hopefully, global efforts to promote

environmental responsibility and develop sustainable living patterns will have a positive impact on

localized wilderness debates. Biocentric thinking will become stronger as more individuals begin to view humanity as part of the

environment rather than a species separate from and superior to it. In addition, culturally diverse ideas, like the diverse community

of plants and animals, will contribute to sustaining the whole (Hinchman & Hinchman 1989, 213). The human species is the

only one capable of destroying or protecting the natural world. Imagine a new political structure based on biocentric

thinking, where political boundaries follow natural boundaries of ecosystems ;12 where nature is

viewed as “the widest circle within which we dwell,” and politics is “the citadel that educates us to

the enduring value of nature, and ensures that there will be a nature left for us to experience”

(Hinchman & Hinchman 1989, 224). Perhaps the thought of biocentric politics is too idealistic to consider. But at one

time in history, the concept of a political system based on classical liberalism was considered idealistic.

Human centrism is everyday unthinkable systemic violence on non-human life and

human life alike

Kochi and Ordan ‘8 (Dec. 2008, Tarik Kochi, PhD, Lecturer in Law & International Security, University of Sussex, Noam Ordan,

linguist and translator, conducts research in Translation Studies at Bar Ilan University, research focus on human cultural history, “An argument

for the global suicide of humanity,” Borderlands, http://www.borderlands.net.au/vol7no3_2008/kochiordan_argument.pdf)

When thinking about whether the human species is worth saving the naïve view sees these good and bad aspects as distinct. However, when

thinking about ‘human nature’ as a whole, or even the operation of human reason as a characteristic of the Enlightenment and

modernity, it is not so easy to draw clear lines of separation. As suggested by Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer (1997),

within what they call the ‘dialectic of enlightenment’, it is sometimes the very things which we draw upon to escape from evil, poverty and

harm (reason, science, technology) which bring about a s ituation which is infinitely more destructive (for example the atom bomb). Indeed,

it has often been precisely those actions motivated by a desire to do ‘good’ that have created profound

degrees of destruction and harm. One just has to think of all the genocides, massacres and wars within history justified by moral

notions such as ‘civilisation’, ‘progress’ and ‘freedom’, and carried out by numerous peoples acting with misguided, but genuine intentions.

When considering whether humanity is worth saving, one cannot turn a blind eye to the violence of

human history. This is not to discount the many ‘positive’ aspects of the human heritage such as art, medicine, the recogn ition of



individual autonomy and the development of forms of social organisation that promote social welfare. Rather, what we are

questioning is whether a holistic view of the human heritage considered in its relation to the natural

environment merits the continuation of the human species or not. Far too often the ‘positive’ aspects of the

human heritage are viewed in an abstract way, cut off from humanity’s destructive relation with the

natural environment. Such an abstract or one-sided picture glorifies and reifies human life and is used as

a tool that perpetually redeems the otherwise ‘evil’ acts of humanity. Humanity de-crowned Within the

picture many paint of humanity, events such as the Holocaust are considered as an exception, an

aberration. The Holocaust is often portrayed as an example of ‘evil’, a moment of hatred, madness and cruelty (cf. the differing accounts of

‘evil’ given in Neiman, 2004). The event is also treated as one through which humanity might comprehend its

own weakness and draw strength, via the resolve that such actions will never happen again. However, if we take seriously

the differing ways in which the Holocaust was ‘evil’, then one must surely include along side it the

almost uncountable numbers of genocides that have occurred throughout human history. Hence, if we are

to think of the content of the ‘human heritage’, then this must include the annihilation of indigenous

peoples and their cultures across the globe and the manner in which their beliefs, behaviours and social practices

have been erased from what the people of the ‘West’ generally consider to be the content of a human

heritage. Again the history of colonialism is telling here. It reminds us exactly how normal, regular and mundane acts of

annihilation of different forms of human life and culture have been throughout human history. Indeed the history of colonialism, in its various

guises, points to the fact that so many of our legal institutions and forms of ethical life (i.e. nation-states which pride themselves on protecting

human rights through the rule of law) have been founded upon colonial violence, war and the appropriation of other peoples’ land (Schmitt,

2003; Benjamin, 1986). Further, the history of colonialism highlights the central function of ‘race war’ that often

underlies human social organisation and many of its legal and ethical systems of thought (Foucault, 2003).

This history of modern colonialism thus presents a key to understanding that events such as the

Holocaust are not an aberration and exception but are closer to the norm, and sadly, lie at the heart of

any heritage of humanity. After all, all too often the European colonisation of the globe was justified by arguments that indigenous

inhabitants were racially ‘inferior’ and in some instances that they were closer to ‘apes’ than to humans (Diamond, 2006). Such violence

justified by an erroneous view of ‘race’ is in many ways merely an extension of an underlying attitude of speciesism involving a long history of

killing and enslavement of non-human species by humans. Such a connection between the two histories of inter-human violence (via the

mythical notion of differing human ‘races’) and interspecies violence, is well expressed in Isaac Bashevis Singer’s comment that whereas

humans consider themselves “the crown of creation”, for animals “all people are Nazis” and animal life is “an eternal Treblinka” (Singer, 1968,

p.750).

Anthro comes first---prior question to understanding politicsBarbas-Rhoden ’10 (Laura Barbas-Rhoden- Educational innovator & Spanish prof at Wofford C, author of Ecological Imaginations;

“Biopolitics and the Critique of Neoliberalism in El corazón del s ilencio by Tatiana Lobo”; Fall 2010;

http://www.ncsu.edu/project/acontracorriente/fall_10/articles/Barbas-Rhoden.pdf)

The inconclusive conclusion affirms certain key points, namely that a confrontation with the past is possible, if not embraced

by all involved, and that environmental destruction is ongoing for practical reasons, as well as sinister ones

involving power, profit, and fear. All told, the environmental details bring a new discourse of

environmentalism to bear upon “old” concerns like human rights and social justice in Latin America

and point to what Ursula Heise calls a “sense of planet.” Heise has argued that “in a context of rapidly

increasing connections around the globe, what is crucial for ecological awareness and environmental

ethics is arguably not so much a sense of place as a sense of planet—a sense of how political,

economic, technological, social, cultural, and ecological networks shape daily routines” (55). For Lobo,

daily routines around a globalized world have insidious links to repression based in phobias and hatreds . When

Lobo rewrites the picturesque town of her own childhood, she projects a different image, one that acknowledges the human and natural

landscape of Chile as a place of exploitation, where wounds do not heal or close, but are instead often unacknowledged and paved over with

progress. Lobo leaves readers with the vision of a town in which hydrangeas may grow in the garden, but the brutal past of the Pinochet years

persists just below the surface of prosperity—out of sight beneath the pavement, under the azure surface of the lake, and in the shuttered

memories of the town’s inhabitants. She also reminds us that a new biopolitics—in narrative and in praxis—must affirm not only “the life of

the political community but also of its very condition of material production” (Mendieta xiii).



Language Turn

Expropriating the term “American” is offensive---using one term to describe a diverse

and complex nation inevitably dehumanizes the indigenous populationsMabry no date (Donald J.-Professor of History Mississippi State University and The Historical Text Archive; “COLONIAL LATIN

AMERICA”; http://historicaltextarchive.com/latin/colonial.pdf)

Colonial Latin America, which lasted for about 300 years for most of the region, was extraordinarily

complex and rich in texture. There are enormous differences between Mexico, on the one hand, and

Brazil, on the other. The term “Latin America” is not only shorthand but also a bit of a misnomer, for

much of it was not Latin. It was Indian or mestizo or African, often with little more than a veneer of

Iberian culture. The degree to which it was any of these are Spanish, Portuguese, African, Indian, or

some combination thereof varies according to place and time. We have trouble deciding what to call

other humans. Some terms are inaccurate; some are invented to satisfy the politics of the day . Some

are acceptable in one era and unacceptable in another. In modern parlance, the earlier immigrants areoften called "Native Americans," a term as inaccurate as the term "Indian" or indio as the Iberians called

them. They immigrated just like everyone else but not all at the same time. Nor have we wanted to see

the coming of the Europeans and Africans to the Western Hemisphere as just another episode in the

many thousand years of its immigration history. One is at a loss to decide what terminology would be

accurate and inoffensive. Equally serious, is that most people, even scholars, ignore the DNA evidence

and the reasonable conclusions that are drawn from it. We do not want to think of all human beings as

cousins, which they are, because it forces us to reconsider all kinds of cherished beliefs. We prefer to

be inaccurate because it is easier and feels better. Similarly, we refer to some people as Spaniards

when, in 1500, there was no Spain. Some Latin Americans today point out that it is politically incorrect

for citizens of the United States to expropriate the name “American” for themselves . They see it as

sheer arrogance, which it is. On the other hand, we see the Mexican people called Aztecs when, in fact,only a fraction were in 1519; that they are called thusly is imperialism on the part of those who rule

Mexico. We do not have to look very hard in this part of the world to find other examples.

Their description of Latin America denies cultural difference and enforces

generalizations which are essentially racism in disguise---not only is it historically

inaccurate, but it also denies political independence by pinning the country with their

European and American imperialist heritage

Grande ’05 (Michael Grande is a graduate student of Literature and Culture. In addition to English, he also speaks Italian, Spanish, French

and basic Latin. In the past, he's been published in Manchester Times; “Latino & Hispanic? It’s Time to Rethink these Terms!”; 7/5/2005;

http://www.globalpolitician.com/default.asp?2946-hispanic-latin-america-south-america/)

The words Latino and Hispanic have been so carelessly thrown around, used to label individuals, taken advantage of by some of the popular

media (ie: Latin Grammy’s, AOL Latino, and the Hispanic Heritage Awards), and even used by some unknowing people as a tool to define their

heritage. Yet do we really know what these words mean? There are over 25 countries where Spanish is either the official, or

a commonly spoken language (including areas of the world that people don’t often associate with Spanish, like Andorra or the Philippines), and

Spanish is the second most spoken language in the world. Additionally there are myriad regional dialects; some examples are the original

Castilian Spanish of Spain (directly descended from the Latin language), Argentinean Spanish with its distinctive Italian flair, and Mexican

Spanish with its characteristic blend of indigenous (Native American) words. There is no “typical” skin color for Spanish

speakers - they range from the lightest whites to Mediterranean breeds, from those of Indian (Native Central/South American and

Caribbean) heritage to black. All of the Spanish-speaking countries have their own unique peoples and their own

distinctive cultures – they cannot be broadly and irresponsibly categorized into a “Latino” grouping. It



is entirely imprecise to use such broad, vague, inaccurate terminology to categorize people based

upon their language (whatever dialect it may be). Oddly enough, the term “Latino(a)” is never (or rarely) used in the USA to refer to

Western Europeans such as Spaniards and Italians, when in fact the original Latin cultures lie within Italy, Spain, Portugal, Romania, Andorra,

and France. Furthermore, when students arrive at college or pick up a book on European history, they will find that the term Latin, when used

to refer to a monolithic culture, will speak of the Ancient Roman society, which is contrary to the ambiguous terminology employed by

American media. The term Latin America first came into use in the late 1860’s and was used to describe

the French presence in Mexico. This term was later shortened to refer to people from “LatinAmerican” countries; thus solidifying the American misperception of the term. I have many Spanish-speaking

friends, all of whom hail from different countries. My ex-college Professor is from Argentina and has almost nothing culturally in common with

my friend from Mexico. As a matter of fact they too hate the use of the term Latino; they demand to be referred to according to their country

of heritage, and rightly so! Furthermore, the terms Latino and Hispanic have been irresponsibly used as a “minority labeling system.” I find this

to be even more reckless because any and all racism boils down to that which it always has: color. Another of my friends hails

from Chile and has red hair and blue eyes, but according to popular media, a job application, or a government form,

she is Latina or Hispanic, two terms that she earnestly hates because they pay no credence to her

unique culture. Somehow I don’t think she was the minority prototype that they were looking for, but possibly that’s because the

terminology is so rampantly and incorrectly used. Racism is despicable in any form, but if these silly questions are still going to be asked on

government forms and job applications then they should address that which is truly in question: race. Anyone who hails from

Central/South America or the Caribbean who is dark-skinned is likely to be either in part or fully of

Indian heritage. Instead of making tons of superfluous categories on forms, why not just leave two

boxes: Native American (North/Central/South/Caribbean) and African American? The other day I heard

someone say, “Did you know that Latinos constitute the second largest minority population in America?” I thought to myself, “This is

ridiculous.” Nobody needs to be forced into an inappropriate minority mentality; how has American cultural ignorance become so pervasive?

Who are the minorities? The indigenous (native) population or the mestizo (mixed) population? Who exactly does this refer to? It’s so

confusing. I am 100% Italian American. I speak both Spanish and Italian fluently. Since Italy is the patriarch of the Latin Culture, am I a minority

too? This has become a very perplexing issue indeed. In Western Europe the term Latin(o)(a) is commonly used to refer the cultures of Italy,

Spain, Portugal, Romania, and France. Additionally Europeans are shocked at how the term is used in America and who the term has been used

to label. The term Latino(a) refers to the Latin culture, a culture that originally flourished in Italy during

Roman times. It was during that time that the Romans spread the Latin language throughout Western

Europe; the language then morphed into the modern Romance Languages such as Italian, Spanish,

Portuguese, and French. In essence, the Italians are the original Latinos, and the only people who should be termed

“Latino(a)” are those whose ancestry stems from Western Europe or those who have strong cultural ties to Latin Culture. Why would

someone so irresponsibly refer to an indigenous Mexican as “Latino” when he has his own ancient,

Pre-Columbian Heritage, ie: Aztec, or Mayan? Why would someone use the term to refer to someoneof indigenous Peruvian heritage when he has his own Incan heritage? Why would someone label an

indigenous-blooded Puerto Rican as “Latino” when his bloodline lies with the Borinquen Indians?

People need to wake up and get educated on this issue. How many North Americans would like to be

referred to as “Norths” or “Anglos” based upon our geographical location or our mother tongue? I for

one, would not! The spread of such inaccurate terminology only helps to perpetuate myths that prevail in

our society. Cultural ignorance seems to be a popular phenomenon in the U.S.A. Americans do not

have the right to irresponsibly use terminology that attempts to alter history. We have the resources to become

culturally educated; let’s use them and begin to express our heritage by country, not vague, “media and commerce friendly” generalities. If

indeed we chose to speak of “Latinos,” using such a generalist quip, a quick reference term for all

those who trace their roots to Latin America., then we should include the maternal Latin countries in

that group: Italy, Spain, Portugal, even France. There is a pervasive Latin cultural flow that began inthose countries and spread to Latin America. Latinos wouldn’t be “Latinoamericano” without the

Europeans.



The term “Latin America” is an overarching claim that serves to marginalize and

dehumanize minorities---this strips them of their cultural identity and is a social

primer for exclusion

Rodriguez ’06 (Gregory Rodriguez- founding director of the Center for Social Cohesion, is a senior fellow at the New America

Foundation, and executive director of Zócalo Public Square. He has written widely on issues of social cohesion, civic engagement, national

identity, assimilation, race relations, religion, immigration, ethnicity, demographics and social and political trends in leading publications suchas The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Economist, Time, Newsweek, and the Los Angeles Times, where he is an op-ed columnist.

The author of Mongrels, Bastards, Orphans and Vagabonds: Mexican Immigration and the Future of Race in America (Pantheon), which The

Washington Post listed among the “Best Books of 2007,” Rodriguez is at work on a book on the American cult of hope; “Look beyond the

'Latino' label”; November 12, 2006; http://www.latimes.com/news/la-op-rodriguez12nov12,1,1839578.column)

HOMOGENIZING the image of the "other" has always been a way for groups to marginalize

undesirable minorities and foreigners. Two dozen centuries ago, Hippocrates wrote that the Scythians — nomadic people whom

the Greeks considered barbaric — all looked alike. By contrast, the good doctor could discern that his own people came in all shapes and sizes.

To refuse to make distinctions among members of any given group is the first step to stripping them of individuality.

And depriving people of individuality is the first step to dehumanizing them. You know the drill: All Jews are alike.

Black people are all this. White people are all that. Last week, David Hiller, the new publisher of The Times, wrote a memo

to his staff in which he expressed his belief that the newspaper needs to do a better job of reaching the readers he called "Hispanics" and the

Times prefers to call "Latinos." A flap ensued over which word was better suited to the task. Yet if the paper really wants to reach "Hispanics" or

"Latinos," what it must do is stop overusing such generic terms and instead concentrate on discerning the distinctions they cover up. Consider

this: Two-thirds of U.S. Latinos are of Mexican origin. In California, that figure rises to 83%. It is oddthen that over the last three decades, as the Mexican presence in the United States has grown

astronomically, the term "Mexican American" has all but disappeared in daily journalism, especially in

The Times. My concern is not a matter of ethnic pride. The use of the catchall term undermines the accuracy of

stories. A few years ago, a Times editorial referred to tacos as a "Latino favorite," which is a little like saying pasta is a "European favorite."

It's not untrue, but it makes you look silly. Likewise, a Los Angeles Times magazine story in the aftermath of the

Kobe Bryant rape accusation referred to Bryant's wife, Vanessa, as "Latina," and nothing more. That

tells me next to nothing about Mrs. Bryant. Does it mean she was born in Nicaragua or Uruguay? Or

that her parents are from rural Mexico? Or maybe that she is the granddaughter of a Dominican

plantation owner? There is no nation of Latinoland, and if her heritage is important to the story, then why not

connect her (or her family) to a country with a unique culture and tradition. It's not just national origin that the

term "Latino" masks. Times' reporters will refer to downtown Huntington Park, a heavily Mexican immigrant city, as a "Latino shopping

district." Montebello, a town heavily populated by U.S.-born Mexican Americans, is also usually identified as "mostly Latino." By referring to

both as Latino, journalists ignore critical distinctions between foreign and U.S.-born ethnic Mexicans. I'm not arguing to get rid of the terms

"Latino" or "Hispanic." There are many instances when the catchall ID applies. Nor am I arguing that a pan-Latino identity does not exist. It

does. But being Latino is a secondary — and oftentimes flimsy — identity in the same way that being European is. Just as Frenchmen and Poles

will tell you that they are French and Polish before they are Europeans, Cuban Americans and Salvadoran Americans tend to adhere to national-

origin identity more strongly than to the generic one. Not surprisingly, the generic terms are the products of politics. They gained currency in

the 1970s as Mexican Americans in the Southwest decided to make common cause with Puerto Ricans in the Northeast, and they needed terms

that bridged regional and cultural distinctions. The advent of race-based policies and set-asides encouraged Latino subgroups to forge a

common front to position themselves to receive federal largesse. Old-fashioned partisan politics also played a role. The Nixon administration

first pushed for a recognition of a "Spanish-speaking" identity group, as the GOP actively sought a strategy to lure Mexican American voters.

President Nixon also insisted on the addition of a Hispanic-origin question on the census form. Historian John D. Skrentny discovered a 1971

White House memo that points to the administration's ulterior motive: "Spanish-speaking Americans will take what they can get from

whomever will give it…. We should exploit Spanish-speaking hostility to blacks by reminding Spanish groups of the Democrats' commitment to

blacks at their expense." But to do this, the government had to throw Mexican Americans into a single,

overarching category that could be understood as analogous to blacks. In 1980, federal census demographers

discovered that other than a handful of political elites who understood the advantages of becoming Latino, few Americans of Latin American

origin wanted a collective name that suggested a collective identity. But a generation of the government and the media using the generic terms

has changed all that. Today, "Latino" and "Hispanic" have way too much popular currency, and their overuse does

nothing to give us a greater understanding of our city, state or nation. The terms are too broad to give us an accurate

portrayal of the dynamism of this vast and growing population. My modest proposal to employ more specific

descriptions is no panacea for this newspaper's outreach problems, but it could be a start. At least it'd make it more reflective of the complex

ethnic reality of Los Angeles.



Free Trade Turn

The aff kills free trade and hegemony---their author

Hattingh ‘8 *July 2nd, 2008, Shawn, International Labour Research and Information Group, “ALBA:

Creating a Regional Alternative to Neoliberalism?” Monthly Review,

http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/2008/hattingh070208.html]

Recently, however, a wind of change has been blowing across Latin America. Starting with anti-IMF riots in Caracas in 1989, and the rise of the

Zapatistas in the early 1990s, people in Latin America have started resisting neo-liberalism and US domination. Within the last few years, a

number of progressive leaders -- for example, Chavez in Venezuela, Morales in Bolivia, and Correa in Ecuador -- have come to power on the

back of this resistance. For these governments, breaking with neo-liberalism has been a priority.2 Perhaps the most important initiative for that

has been the creation of the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA). Indeed, ALBA is aimed at striking a major blow

against US hegemony, the IMF, the World Bank, "free" trade, and neo-liberalism in general.¶ ALBA as

an Alternative to "Free" Trade¶ Since the late 1990s, the US has been trying to secure a regional "free" trade agreement with Latin

American countries, known as the Free Trade Area for the Americas (FTAA). In 2001, under the Chavez government's leadership, a number of

Latin American states, trade unions, and social movements successfully banded together to block the FTAA. With this, the US state and its

corporate allies' hopes were smashed. However, the Chavez government was not satisfied with blocking the FTAA -- it

wanted to create a viable regional alternative to "free" trade. Under Venezuela's leadership, ALBA was born in late

2004.¶ Initially, ALBA consisted of only two member states: Venezuela and Cuba. When the benefits of ALBA became evident, however, other

states joined. At present, there are four full member states of ALBA: Bolivia, Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela. There are four observer states in

ALBA -- Ecuador, Uruguay, the Dominican Republic, and St. Kitts3 -- who will become full members in the near future.4¶ ALBA rejects

neo-liberalism and aims to forge a path away from "free" trade . ALBA itself has a wide range of guiding principles and

has the following objectives:¶ To promote trade and investment between member governments, based on cooperation, and with the aim of

improving people's lives, not making profits.

Free trade solves war---its distinct from trade in general

McDonald ‘4 [2004, Patrick, Professor at UT Austin, teaches courses on international relations theory, international political economy,

and international security. His current research focuses on the economic causes of war and peace. His book, The Invisible Hand of Peace:

Capitalism, the War Machine, and International Relations Theory, was published by Cambridge University Press in March 2009. His research has

been published in the American Journal of Political Science, International Studies Quarterly, the Journal of Conflict Resolution, The Washington

Quarterly, and World Politics. Prior to arriving at UT, Professor McDonald was a postdoctoral fellow at the Christopher H. Browne Center for

International Politics at the University of Pennsylvania, “Peace through Trade or Free Trade?” Journal of Conflict Resolution 48: 547, SagePub]

Theoretically, this shift enables the incorporation of important aspects of state society interactions that shape any link between trade and

conflict. Although it is yet to be fully integrated into the commercial peace debate, standard trade theory illustrates

that international commerce increases the aggregate income of an economy and simultaneously alters the

relative distribution of income across society. Groups that see their incomes decline from international trade, namely,

import-competing sectors, are unlikely to lobby the state for apacific foreign policy that promotes expanding transnational economic

ties. Moreover, the state is not a neutral arbiter in the domestic battle over commercial and foreign

policies. It can use economic regulation to co-opt societal support for its public policies, including those that lead to

war. A focus on free trade or the extent to which states regulate commerce in response to societal

demands shifts theoretical attention toward the domestic level of analysis and allows me to generate hypotheses

linking these distributional consequences of commerce to peace. This shift also carries important empirical implications. Most of the

literature relies on bilateral trade to gross domestic product (GDP) ratios to

operationalize such concepts as the relative dependence of an economy on trade and test the claims of commercial liberalism.1

Here I add more direct measures of the level of regulatory barriers on trade to standard statistical

models of conflict. Their inclusion allows me to separate out the respective effects of free trade and

trade on conflict while comparing the domestic explanation presented here with alternative hypotheses more commonly referred to in

the literature. More broadly, this study argues that a neglected version of commercial liberalism— rooted in standard


http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/2008/hattingh070208.html#_edn2










trade theory and the classical writings of Cobden (1868, 1870) and Schumpeter (1919/1951)—sheds new light on how

international commerce generates peace between states. Free trade, and not just trade, promotes peace

by removing an important foundation of domestic privilege—protective barriers to trade—that

enhances the domestic power of societal groups likely to support war, reduces the capacity of free-

trading interests to limit aggression in foreign policy, and creates a mechanism by which the state can

build supportive coalitions for war. A series of statistical tests supports these claims by showing that

lower regulatory barriers to trade were associated with a reduction in military conflict between states

during the post – World War II era.



Neoliberalism Good

Anti-neoliberalism movements fail---only neolib works

Ferguson ‘10 *2010, James, Professor of Anthropology at Stanford, “The Uses of Neoliberalism,” Antipode, 41.1,

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-8330.2009.00721.x/abstract]

This problem in recent progressive scholarship strikes me as related to a parallel problem in

progressive politics more broadly. For over the last couple of decades, what we call “the Left” has come to be

organized, in large part, around a project of resisting and refusing harmful new developments in

the world. This is understandable, since so many new developments have indeed been highly objectionable. But it has left us

with a politics largely defined by negation and disdain, and centered on what I will call “the antis.”

Anti-globalization, anti- neoliberalism, anti-privatization, anti-imperialism, anti-Bush, perhaps even anti-

capitalism—but always “anti”, not “pro”. This is good enough , perhaps, if one’s political goal is simply

to denounce “the system” and to decry its current tendencies. And, indeed, some seem satisfied with such a politics. In my own

disciplines of anthropology and African Studies, for instance, studies of state and development tend, with depressing predictability, to

conclude (in tones of righteous indignation) that the rich are benefiting and the poor are getting screwed. The powerless, it seems, aregetting the short end of the stick. This is not exactly a surprising finding, of course (isn’t it precisely because they are on the losing end of

things that we call them “powerless” in the f irst place?). Yet this sort of work styles itself as “critique”, and

imagines itself to be very “political”. But what if politics is really not about expressing indignation or

denouncing the powerful? What if it is, instead, about getting what you want? Then we progressives must ask: what do we

want? This is a quite different question (and a far more difficult question) than: what are we

against? What do we want? Such a question brings us very quickly to the question of government.

Denunciatory analyses often treat government as the simple expression of power or domination—

the implication apparently being that it is politically objectionable that people should be governed

at all. But any realistic sort of progressive politics that would seek a serious answer to the question

“what do we want?” will have to involve an exploration of the contemporary possibilities for

developing genuinely progressive arts of government.

Latin American neoliberalism is critical to reducing poverty and inequality

Miroff ‘12 [December 1st

, 2012, Nick, collective winner of a Pulitzer prize, writer for NPR, the Washington Post, San Francisco Chronicle,

“Latin American Equality: Free Markets or a Left Wing Success?” http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/americas/121130/latin-

america-middle-class-equality-poverty-left-wing-success-story]

HAVANA, Cuba — Latin America has long been a case study in the social ills brought by sharp economic inequality, its class-stratified societies

marked by too few haves and too many have-nots. But even as income divisions widen across the United States

and much of the developing world, they are narrowing in Latin America. Poverty in the region is

at its lowest point in decades, according to several new reports, and millions are moving

upward into the middle class. A World Bank survey released this month said Latin America’s broadening middle

grew by 50 percent between 2003 and 2009. It was followed by a new United Nations regional

economic study showing the percentage of Latin Americans living in poverty at the lowest level

in 30 years. Now the question is: Who gets credit for these trends? The region’s improved economic outlook has coincided with the rule

of left-wing governments in some of Latin America’s biggest economies: Brazil, Argentina and Venezuela. They have devoted a greater share of

their national resources to anti-poverty programs and development projects, boosting social spending. Yet the drop in poverty has

also come as Latin governments adopt many of the market-driven policy prescriptions long vilified by

the left as “neoliberalism.” Foreign investment has poured into countries like Peru, Colombia, and

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-8330.2009.00721.x/abstract

http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/americas/121130/latin-america-middle-class-equality-poverty-left-wing-success-story





http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-8330.2009.00721.x/abstract



Chile as they’ve opened their economies and embraced globalization. Foreign direct investment

into Latin America topped $150 billion last year, UN data shows, up from around $25 billion in 1990. Regardless

of political orientation, Latin American governments have also benefited from soaring demand

for raw materials, much of it fueled by China. High global commodity prices have allowed countries to reap billions in tax

revenues and direct income from sales of copper, gold, soybeans, oil, beef and other exports. In its report, the World Bank credited regional

governments for improved economic stability and the delivery of social programs, saying upward mobility has been driven byhigher levels of formal employment, urbanization, reduced family size and greater numbers of

women in the workforce. It defined the middle class broadly, as anyone earning between $10 and $50 a day, and said about half

the population of Latin America now falls into that range. “The recent experience of Latin America and the

Caribbean shows the world that policies balancing economic growth while still expanding

opportunities for the most vulnerable can spread prosperity to millions of people ,” World Bank

President Jim Yong Kim said of the findings. “Governments in Latin America and the Caribbean still need to do much more — one-third of the

population is still in poverty — but we should celebrate this achievement of growing the middle class and learn from it,” Kim said. Learning

from the trend is now a matter of defining what’s really driving it. Left-populist leaders such as Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez, Bolivia’s Evo Morales,

and Ecuador’s Rafael Correa have won at the polls in the past decade by railing against their country’s economic elites and promising to re-slice

the pie in favor of the masses. By directing more of their nations’ resource wealth to social spending, they have

eased poverty and invested billions into health care, education and other services. But their state-

driven development models are heavily dependent on high commodity prices, and often contrastedwith the so-called “Brazilian model” made fashionable by former President Luiz Inacio “Lula” da Silva. His

leftist government remained friendly to foreign investors and maintained pro-business policies even

as it lifted tens of millions out of poverty with greater social spending. Geoff Thale, program director at the DC-

based Washington Office on Latin America, said splitting the region into those two models is an

oversimplification. “While there's a lot of discussion about the differences between left-populists like Chavez and social democrats as

in Brazil, I don't think that the lines are drawn that clearly or that either camp has a single, well-defined approach,” he said. “In reality, it's

more an era of experimentation than of ideological lines.” Thale said he views the region today as dominated by

“post neoliberal” governments, “whose leaders believe that the state can and should play an

active role in the economy and the market, and that social spending targeted at the poorest

sectors (even when it's wrapped in neoliberal language about conditionality) is an important

government function.” “I think those left-of-center beliefs, shared by a wide range of governments,have had an impact on both poverty and inequality,” Thale added.

History goes neg

Kenny ‘13 [February 8th

, 2013, Charles, Senior Fellow at the Center for Global Development, MA in International Economics and

Development Studies, “The end of absolute poverty is closer than you think,” Globe and Mail,

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/commentary/the-end-of-absolute-poverty-is-closer-than-you-think/article8374398/)]

While the world’s rich countries have been wallowing in stagnation and growing inequality over the past few years, the good news is that

the poor countries have been experiencing economic growth – and making incredibly rapid progress

in the fight against absolute poverty. A new report by a World Bank economist projects that another billion people

can be raised out of absolute

poverty over the next 12 to 17

years – in effect almost

wiping out absolutepoverty by 2030. That’s great news for the world’s poorest people. But but ensuring that these projections

become reality should be a priority for the rich world’s policy makers. The planet’s ‘absolute poverty line’ is $1.25 a day. That’s around one-

tenth of the value of the poverty line in the United States. People in absolute poverty spend the considerable majority of that income on

buying the calories necessary just to stay alive. Everything else – including shelter, clothing, medicines, education, communication and

transport – gets a budget of maybe 30 or 40 cents a day. Not surprisingly, the absolute poor die younger, are less likely

to be literate or numerate, and more likely to be victims of violence and crime than richer people in the

same country or across the world. And every day presents agonizing choices – buy pills to treat a child’s sickness or a bus ticket to look for

work, shell out for a school textbook or buy a few fresh vegetables. So it is wonderful news for humanity that the

number of people living on less than $1.25 a day has been plummeting worldwide. According to a recent

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/commentary/the-end-of-absolute-poverty-is-closer-than-you-think/article8374398/

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/commentary/the-end-of-absolute-poverty-is-closer-than-you-think/article8374398/



paper by Martin Ravallion, former director of the World Bank’s research department, 43 per cent of the population of the deve loping world

lived in absolute poverty in 1990. By 2010 that had dropped to 21 per cent – it had more than halved. Behind that performance

is the historically unprecedented growth performance of China over the past two decades, but also rapid economic growth

across the rest of Asia, African and Latin America. Over the last decade, GDP growth rates in the developing world as a whole have

averaged 6 per cent. Thanks to more rapid progress against poverty in developing countries other than China since 2000, 280 million more

people have been lifted above the absolute poverty line. Still, as many as 1.2 billion people worldwide lived on less than $1.25 a day in

2010. And how fast that number drops depends on continuing economic growth across the

developing world. Assuming China continues to see robust GDP per capita performance over the next twenty years, there will be

close to zero absolutely poor in that country. Mr. Ravallion estimates that if the rest of the developing world continues to perform as well

as it has in the first decade of the new millennium, as many as one billion people will be lifted out of absolute poverty worldwide by 2027.

The global proportion of people in complete deprivation would be 3 per cent in that year. If economic performance lagged in the

developing world outside China, Mr. Ravallion estimates the global absolute poverty rate would remain as high as 12 per cent by 2030. Mr.

Ravallion’s numbers jibe with forecasts in a 2012 paper that I wrote with Andy Sumner and Jonathan Karver, colleagues at the Center for

Global Development. Using a different forecasting approach, we suggested that on a pessimistic scenario, 8 per cent of the world’s

population would live on less than $1.25 a day in 2030, and under an optimistic scenario that proportion would drop to 2.8 per cent. Both

Mr. Ravallion’s and our estimates suggest the world could be within striking distance of wiping out absolute deprivation by 2030. So what

can the rich countries of the world to help ensure we do actually lift a billion or more out of absolute poverty by 2030? Aid can

play a role. The Bolsa Familia program in Brazil targets poor families with cash transfers, conditional on parents sending their kids to

school and getting them vaccinated. Such programs target poverty directly, but also help ensure the next generation has the health and

education to keep themselves above the poverty line. Aid already supports similar programs in other countries – but they could be

dramatically scaled up. Beyond aid there’s a far larger agenda – not least reducing barriers on imports

from poor countries, encouraging Canadian companies to invest in Africa, increasing the proportion of immigrants

that the country admits each year that come from low-income countries and supporting the development of new

technologies – from malaria vaccines to cheap solar cells – that could benefit poor people

worldwide. Together, these pro-poor policies could have a huge impact on sustaining the global fight

against absolute deprivation. The battle against global poverty still won’t be won if we wipe out

absolute deprivation by 2030. People on an income of $1.25 have far too little income to afford a

good quality of life. People on four or five times that amount earn an income that would be

unacceptable in the West. But it would be a start. And for all we in North America are mired in

stagnation, we should play our part making sure it happens.



Vagueness Turn

Ethical policies and selfish policies are indistinguishable

Sanchez and Sholar ’12 [December 2012, Peter, PhD Loyola University Chicago, and Megan, PhD Loyola University Chicago,

“Power and Principle: A New US Policy for Latin America”, http://www.ijhssnet.com/journals/Vol_2_No_23_December_2012/3.pdf]

In our analysis, like realists, we assume that a Great Power like the United States will seldom want to act benevolently and will concern itself

principally with maintaining its security. Our goal, nevertheless, is to point out that in a hegemonic system an intersection

exists between policies based on selfish interest and ethical considerations. For a great power to be

accepted as a hegemon, it must act in ways that provide key benefits to subordinate states, principally

democracy, peace, and security. If not, the great power will rely solely on force, rather than leadership, to achieve influence. Therefore, and

perhaps ironically, an ethical US policy toward Latin America can better protect vital US interests than a

purely realist policy. We will point out, as other scholars have done, that selfish US policies in the past

have often been counterproductive in the long run, jeopardizing, rather than protecting, vital long-

term interests. But our argument is not the classic conflict between liberalism and realism; rather, it is a recognition that

the realist calculus changes when a Great Power becomes a hegemonic power. Nevertheless, if we canshow that an ethical policy can preserve US interests more effectively than a policy based purely on

selfish, immediate interests, then we can move closer to the acceptance of a policy that is increasingly

ethical and help to bridge the gap between two key schools of thought in American foreign policy—

realism and liberalism (Harries, 2005).¶ Moving beyond criticism, we then propose several concrete changes

to US policy that would enhance America’s ethical stance toward Latin America, thereby enhancing US

hegemony. In essence we provide a prescription that shows how a Great Power’s policies should change once it becomes a hegemonic

power. These modest policy recommendations, if enacted, would preserve US interests by improving America’s image, an also result in

enhanced security, democracy, and prosperity in the western hemisphere. Taking these steps is important for the United States because Latin

America remains a vital region for US strategic, geopolitical, and economic interests (Hsiang, 2003, 59-60). If Washington cannot secure its key

interests and be perceived positively in the Western Hemisphere, then attaining goals in the rest of the world will be a pipe dream.






***Affirmative***



AT: Anthropocentrism



Permutation

Latin America has ecological constitutions that solve their impacts---that means the

perm solves

Boff ’13 (Leonardo Boff- a theologian and writer, known for his active support for the rights of the poor and excluded. He currently servesas Professor Emeritus of Ethics, Philosophy of Religion and Ecology at the Rio de Janeiro State University; “Ecological Constitutionalism in Latin

America”; May 18, 2013; http://revolucionalimentaria.wordpress.com/2013/05/18/ecological-constitutionalism-in-latin-america/)

The failure to consider that each being has intrinsic value, independent of its human use, its rational use, and that it is the bearer of the right to

exist within the same common habitat, the planet Earth, has opened the path for nature to be treated as a mere object, to be exploited with no

other consideration, in some cases, to the point of exhaustion. However, it fell to Latin America, as Eugenio Raul Zaffaroni, noted

criminal lawyer and Justice of the Supreme Court of Argentina, shows in, Pachamama and the Human, (La Pachamama y el Humano, Ediciones

Colihue 2012), to develop a constitutional theory of an ecological nature, where the Earth and all natural

beings, particularly the animals and other living beings are endowed with rights. They must be

included in the modern Constitutions that have put aside the deeply rooted anthropocentrism and

the dominus paradigm of the human being as lord and dominant master of nature and of the Earth. The new Latin American constitutionalists unite two currents: one, the more ancestral, is that of the original

Nations, for whom the Earth (Pacha) is mother (Mama), hence the name, Pachamama, and is entitled to rights because she isalive and gives us all that we need, and, in the end, because we are part of and belong to her, in the same way as

the animals, woods, jungles, waters, mountains and landscape. They all deserve to exist and to coexist with us, forming

the great community and cosmic democracy. They integrate this ancestral, efficacious, tradition of the Andean

culture, that stretches from Patagonia to Central America, with the new understanding, derived from contemporary cosmology,

genetic and molecular biology, and systems theory, that understands the Earth as a living super-organism that self regulates, (Maturana-Varela

and Capra’s autopoiesis), seeking always to maintain life and the capacity to reproduce and to make it co-evolve. This Earth, called Gaia,

consists of all beings, and generates and sustains the fabric of life in its vast bio-diversity. The Earth, as

a generous Mother, must be respected, recognizing her potentialities and her limits, and therefore, accepted as a bearer of rights, -the

dignitas Terrae- the basis for making possible and sustaining all the other personal and social rights.



Epistemology/Methodology

Methodologies are always imperfect---endorsing multiple epistemological frameworks

is effective compensation

Stern and Druckman 00 (Paul, National Research Council and Daniel, Institute for Conflict Analysis and Resolution – GeorgeMason University, International Studies Review, Spring, p. 62-63)

Using several distinct research approaches or sources of information in conjunction is a valuable strategy for

developing generic knowledge. This strategy is particularly useful for meeting the challenges of measurement and inference. The

nature of historical phenomena makes controlled experimentation—the analytic technique best suited to making strong inferences about

causes and effects—practically impossible with real-life situations. Making inferences requires using experimentation in s imulated conditions

and various other methods, each of which has its own advantages and limitations, but none of which can alone provide the level of certainty

desired about what works and under what conditions. We conclude that debates between advocates of different research

methods (for example, the quantitative-qualitative debate) are unproductive except in the context of a search for

ways in which different methods can complement each other. Because there is no single best way to

develop knowledge, the search for generic knowledge about international conflict resolution should adopt

an epistemological strategy of triangulation, sometimes called “ critical multiplism .”53 That is, it should usemultiple perspectives, sources of data, constructs, interpretive frameworks, and modes of analysis to

address specific questions on the presumption that research approaches that rely on certain

perspectives can act as partial correctives for the limitations of approaches that rely on different ones. An

underlying assumption is that robust findings (those that hold across studies that vary along several dimensions) engender more confidence

than replicated findings (a traditional scientific ideal, but not practicable in international relations research outside the laboratory). When

different data sources or methods converge on a single answer, one can have increased confidence in the

result. When they do not converge, one can interpret and take into account the known biases in each

research approach. A continuing critical dialogue among analysts using different perspectives, methods, and data could lead to an

understanding that better approximates international relations than the results coming from any single study, method, or data source.



AT: Language Turn



Discourse Not Key

Discourse doesn’t shape policymaking

Tuathail ‘96 *1996, Gearóid, Professor of Government and International Affairs, Virginia Tech, “The patterned mess of history and the

writing of critical geopolitics: a reply to Dalby, Political Geography” 15:6/7, p 661-665]

While theoretical debates at academic conferences are important to academics, the discourse and

concerns of foreign-policy decisionmakers are quite different, so different that they constitute a

distinctive problemsolving, theory-averse, policy-making subculture. There is a danger that academics assume that

the discourses they engage are more significant in the practice of foreign policy and the exercise of power than they

really are. This is not, however, to minimize the obvious importance of academia as a general institutional structure among many that sustain

certain epistemic communities in particular states. In general, I do not disagree with Dalby’s fourth point about politics and discourse except to

note that his statement-‘Precisely because reality could be represented in particular ways political decisions could be taken, troops and

material moved and war fought’-evades the important question of agency that I noted in my review essay. The assumption that it is

representations that make action possible is inadequate by itself. Political, military and economic

structures, institutions, discursive networks and leadership are all crucial in explaining social action and should be theorized together

with representational practices. Both here and earlier, Dalby’s reasoning inclines towards a form of idealism. In response to Dalby’s fifth point(with its three subpoints), it is worth noting, first, that his book is about the CPD, not the Reagan administration. He analyzes certain CPD

discourses, root the geographical reasoning practices of the Reagan administration nor its public-policy reasoning on national security. Dalby’s

book is narrowly textual; the general contextuality of the Reagan administration is not dealt with. Second, let me simply note that I find that the

distinction between critical theorists and poststructuralists is a little too rigidly and heroically drawn by Dalby and other s. Third, Dalby’s

interpretation of the reconceptualization of national security in Moscow as heavily influenced by dissident peace researchers in Europe is highly

idealist, an interpretation that ignores the structural and ideological crises facing the Soviet elite at that time. Gorbachev’s reforms and his new

security discourse were also strongly selfinterested, an ultimately futile attempt to save the Communist Party and a discredited regime of

power from disintegration. The issues raised by Simon Dalby in his comment are important ones for all those interested in the practice of

critical geopolitics. While I agree with Dalby that questions of discourse are extremely important ones for political geographers to engage, there

is a danger of fetishizing this concern with discourse so that we neglect the institutional and the sociological,

the materialist and the cultural, the political and the geographical contexts within which particular discursive

strategies become significant. Critical geopolitics, in other words, should not be a prisoner of the sweeping ahistorical cant that

sometimes accompanies ‘poststructuralism nor convenient reading strategies like the identity politics narrative; it needs to always be open to

the patterned mess that is human history.



Accurate

It’s accurate---this is the Latin American point of view

Ardila ’96 (Ruben Ardila- Colombian psychologist, he received a BA in Psychology at the National

University of Colombia and later a PhD in Experimental Psychology at Nebraska University; “PoliticalPsychology: The Latin American Perspective”; June 1996; Political Psychology, Vol. 17, No. 2 (Jun., 1996),

pp. 339-351; available Jstor @ http://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/3791814.pdf?acceptTC=true)Social identity in Latin America has been a very complicated issue since the beginning and has awakened great interest in many researchers in

this region. What does it mean to be Latin American? What are the differences with the Anglo-Ameri- cans? What are

the factors that Latin American nations share with the rest of the world? Does racial mixture (white, black, and

indigenous) convey positive or negative implications? Are we a "global race" (a mixture of all races), or are we condemned to be second-class

citizens without making any legacy to universal culture? In reality, we Latin Americans are part of Western, Judeo-

Christian culture, inherited from Spaniards and Portuguese who colonized this part of the world 500

years ago. We are also members of the indigenous cultures and subcultures, rooted in this continent

many centuries before the arrival of the Europeans, and we are descendants of the black slaves

brought to America to work in the gold mines and plantations. We are the result of a mixture of

different cultures and ethnic groups, a new culture that is manifested in every nation of LatinAmerica, from Mexico to Patagonia, a culture that has many characteristics in common, despite the

differences that are observed among the various countries and within them. These points of

convergence are more relevant than those of divergence, and are related to language, history,

tradition, philosophy of life, and social conscience.



Not Violent

Geographers initiated the term---it’s not violent, simply convenient for productive

discussions

Holloway ‘08 (Thomas H.- author of “A Companion to Latin American History”; “Latin America: What’s in a Name?”; January 2008;http://www.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-1405131616.html>)

Geographers, it should be noted, giving priority to contiguous landmasses and bodies of water rather than to historical processes or

cultural commonalities, traditionally divide the Americas into two continents and two regions. The continents are

North America (from northern Canada to the isthmus of Panama) and South America (from the Panama-Colombia border to the

southern tip of Tierra del Fuego, an island south of the straight of Magellan). The sub-regions are Central America (from

Guatemala to Panama) and the Caribbean (the islands from the Bahamas and Cuba in the northwest to Trinidad and Tobago in the

southeast). These different approaches to regional divisions and groupings have led to confusion as frequent as it is superficial. For example,

Mexico might be placed in North America by geographers (and in the names of such economic and political

arrangements as the North American Free Trade Agreement, NAFTA), but it is definitely part of Latin America for

historians. And Puerto Rico, an island of the Caribbean, is politically attached to the United States,

but is historically and culturally part of Latin America.

The term “Latin America” originated in French intellectual circles in order to map the

region---it’s historically accurate

Holloway ‘08 (Thomas H.- author of “A Companion to Latin American History”; “Latin America: What’s in a Name?”; January 2008;

http://www.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-1405131616.html>)

Historically , the first use of the term Latin America has been traced only as far back as the 1850s . It did not

originate within the region, but again from outside, as part of a movement called “pan-Latinism” that emerged in

French intellectual circles, and more particularly in the writings of Michel Chevalier (1806-79). A contemporary of Alexis

de Tocqueville who traveled in Mexico and the United States during the late 1830s, Chevalier contrasted the “Latin” peoples

of the Americas with the “Anglo-Saxon” peoples (Phelan 1968; Ardao 1980, 1993). From those beginnings, by the time of Napoleon

III’s rise to power in 1852 pan-Latinism had developed as a cultural project extending to those nations whose

culture supposedly derived from neo-Latin language communities (commonly called Romance languages in English).

Starting as a term for historically derived “Latin” culture groups, L’Amerique Latine then became a

place on the map . Napoleon III was particularly interested in using the concept to help justify his intrusion into Mexican politics that

led to the imposition of Archduke Maximilian as Emperor of Mexico, 1864-67. While France had largely lost out in the global imperial

rivalries of the previous two centuries, it still retained considerable prestige in the world of culture, language, and

ideas (McGuinness 2003). Being included in the pan-Latin cultural sphere was attractive to some intellectuals of Spanish America, and use of

the label Latin America began to spread haltingly around the region, where it competed as a term with Spanish America (where Spanish is the

dominant language), Ibero-America (including Brazil but presumably not French-speaking areas), and other sub-regional terms such as Andean

America (which stretches geographically from Venezuela to Chile, but which more usually is thought of as including Colombia, Ecuador, Peru,

and Bolivia), or the Southern Cone (Chile, Argentina, Paraguay, and Uruguay) (Rojas Mix 1991).



No Alternative

Their logic means the term “America” is offensive, make them propose an alternative

Holloway ‘08 (Thomas H.- author of “A Companion to Latin American History”; “Latin America: What’s in a Name?”; January 2008;


It is commonly known that the more general term “America” derives from the name of Amerigo Vespucci

(1451?-1512), another navigator of Italian origin who made several voyages to the Caribbean region and along the

coast of northern Brazil from 1497 to 1502. Unlike Columbus, Vespucci concluded that Europeans did not

previously know about the lands he visited in the west, and he thus referred to them as the New

World. In a 1507 map by German cartographer Martin Waldseemuller, America appears for the first

time with that name. While the protocol of European exploration usually gives primacy to the first

“discoverer,” there would seem to be some justification for naming the newly known land mass after

the navigator who recognized it as separate from Asia (Amerigo Vespucci) rather than for the first European to report its

existence, but who subsequently insisted that he had confirmed a new way to reach Asia (Christopher Columbus) (Arciniegas 1990).

The term is politically correct and unproblematic---there’s no alternative or a root

causeHolloway ‘08 (Thomas H.- author of “A Companion to Latin American History”; “Latin America: What’s in a Name?”; January 2008;


Not until the middle of the 20th century did the label Latin America achieve widespread and largely

unquestioned currency in public as well as academic and intellectual discourse, both in the region (Marras 1992)

and outside of it. With the establishment of the Economic Commission for Latin America (ECLA, later adding Caribbean to become

ECLAC) under United Nations auspices in 1948, the term became consolidated in policy circles, with political overtones

challenging U.S. hegemony but largely devoid of the rivalries of culture, language, and “race” of earlier times

(Reid 1978). The 1960s saw the continent-wide Latin American literary “boom” and the near-universal adoption of “Latin

American Studies” by English-language universities in the U.S., Great Britain, and Canada. This trend began with the establishment of

the Conference on Latin American History in 1927 and was consolidated with the organization of the interdisciplinary Latin American Studies

Association in 1967. Despite the widespread and largely unproblematic use of the term in the main languages of

the western hemisphere since that era, regional variations remain: In Brazil América Latina is commonly assumed to

refer to what in the United States is called Spanish America, i.e., “Latin America” minus Brazil. While discussing the spontaneous

creation of such collective labels, we need to recognize that the terms “Latino” or “Latina/o” now widespread in the

United States have no basis in any specific nation or sub-region in Latin America. Like the latter term, from which it is

derived linguistically, Latina/o is an invented term of convenience—a neologism built on a neologism (Oboler 1995; Gracia 1999; Oboler &

González 2005; Dzidzienyo & Oboler, 2005). Whatever their origins, Latino or Latina/o have largely replaced the older “Hispanic” or Hispanic

American” within the United States, although that English-derived term, problematic on several counts, lingers in library subject classifications.

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