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08a6a2bd0d5098a066678392ae2f46d2	Monitoring allows parents to correct children who are wasting their time. Parents also need to monitor their children to ensure that they are properly using the time they have with the computer and the mobile phone. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation 40% of 8- to 18-year olds spend 54 minutes a day on social media sites.[1] and that “when alerted to a new social networking site activity, like a new tweet or Facebook message, users take 20 to 25 minutes on average to return to the original task” resulting to 20% lower grades. [2] Thus, parents must constantly monitor the digital activities of their children and see whether they have been maximizing the technology at their disposal in terms of researching for their homework, connecting with good friends and relatives, and many more. [1] Foehr, Ulla G., Rideout, Victoria J., and Roberts, Donald F., “Generation M2 Media in the Lives of 8- to 18-Year-Olds”, The Kaiser Family Foundation, January 2010, p.21 [2] Gasser, Urs, and Palfrey, John, “Mastering Multitasking”, Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, March 2009, p.17	[ { "docid": "338734b598e5c0c172cd065a5c5168be", "text": "society family youth digital freedoms privacy house would allow parents Certainly parents should help their children to make most of their time with the computer and their phone. However, monitoring children in order to do so is lazy, or more precisely a form of ‘remote-control parenting’. Parents abuse of their children’s inherent right to privacy and feel that they have satisfactorily fulfilled their parental role when instead they are just lazy and unwilling to talk to their child personally about being a responsible netizen. [1] How are children to develop a healthy relationship to sharing information and privacy protection if they are constantly being surveilled by their own parents? More effective parents would instead choose to personally and positively teach their children about time management.\n\n[1] Shmueli, Benjamin, and Ayelet Blecher-Prigat. “Privacy for Children.” Columbia Human Rights Review. Rev. 759 (2010-2011): 760-795. Columbia Law School. Web. May 2013.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "c09f65594010f6a506c0f4a5c9baae57", "text": "society family youth digital freedoms privacy house would allow parents While it is certainly beneficial for parents to immerse themselves in the digital world, it may not be good for them to be partially and informally educated by simple monitoring. Especially for parents who are not already familiar with the internet, monitoring may simply condition them to a culture of cyberstalking and being excessively in control of the digital behavior of their children. As it is, a number of children have abandoned Facebook because they feel that their parents are cyberstalking them. [1] Besides, there are other ways of educating oneself regarding ICT which include comprehensive online and video tutorials and library books that may cater to an unfamiliar parent’s questions about the digital world.\n\n[1] “Kids Are Abandoning Facebook To Flee Their Cyber-Stalking Parents.” 2 Oceans Vibe News. 2 Oceans Vibe Media. 11 Mar 2013. Web. May 2013\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5da4f42b2b706bd8f9744042b5fa6448", "text": "society family youth digital freedoms privacy house would allow parents Indeed it is important to consider that children do not receive or send sexually disturbing media. However, as proposition has already stated parents are much less likely to be digitally savvy than their children. Should they wish to learn children are likely to be able to penetrate any elaborate digital monitoring set by a parent. As it is, Defcon, one of the world’s largest hacker conventions, is already training 8- to 16-year olds to hack in a controlled environment. [1] That pornography is so widely available and so desirable is the product of a culture the glorifies sexuality and erotic human interaction. The effects on childrens well-being are by no means clear, indeed it can be argued that much of what parents are no able to communicate to their children in the way of sexual education is communicated to them through Internet pornography. While this brings with it all manner of problems, aside from the outrage of their parents there is little scientific data to suggest that mere exposure to pornography is causing wide-scale harm to children. Instead, it may be that many of the ‘objects’ of these debates on the rights of children are themselves quite a bit more mature than the debates would suggest..\n\n[1] Finkle, Jim. “Exclusive: Forget Spy Kids, try kiddie hacker conference.” Reuters. Thomas Reuters. 23 Jun 2011. Web. May 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "fef373dc9e6b03c7f1271099bd1482c2", "text": "society family youth digital freedoms privacy house would allow parents While cyberbullying is indeed a danger to children, it is not an excuse to invade their personal life-worlds. The UNCRC clearly states that “(1) No child shall be subjected to arbitrary or unlawful interference with his or her privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to unlawful attacks on his or her honour and reputation,” and that, “(2) The child has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attack.” These ‘interferences’ or ‘attacks’ not only apply to third parties but to parents as well. [1] Moreover in less traditional ‘offline’ spaces children have far greater ability to choose which information they share with their parents and what they do not. As online spaces are not inherently more dangerous than those offline, it seems reasonable to suggest that similar limitations and restrictions on invasions of privacy that apply online should also apply offline. What a parent can do is to be there for their children and talk to them and support them. They should also spend time surfing the Internet together with them to discuss their issues and problems. But the child should always also have the opportunity to have his or her own protected and private space that is outside the every watchful surveilant eye of the parent..\n\n[1] United Nations Children’s Fund. Implementation Handbook for the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Fully revised 3rd edition. Geneva. United Nations Publications. Google Search. Web. May 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8c1fade690a053445bcc9308cf185a3a", "text": "society family youth digital freedoms privacy house would allow parents The individual right to privacy must certainly encompass the digital realm as proposition says. It is also undeniable that individual privacy enhances individuality and independence. However, this privacy can and should be regulated lest parents leave children ‘abandoned’ to their rights. [1] “One cannot compare reading a child’s journal to accessing his or her conversations online or through text messages,” says Betsy Landers, the president of the National Parent-Teacher Association of the US and explains, “It’s simply modern involvement.” [2] Thus, Hillary Clinton argues, “children should be granted rights, but in a stage-by-stage manner that accords with and pays attention to their physical and mental development and capacities.” [1] Applying this principle, children should be given digital privacy to an equitable extent and regulated whereby both conditions depend upon the maturity of the child.\n\n[1] Shmueli, Benjamin, and Ayelet Blecher-Prigat. “Privacy for Children.” Columbia Human Rights Review. Rev. 759 (2010-2011): 760-795. Columbia Law School. Web. May 2013.\n\n[2] Landers, Betty. “It’s Modern Parental Involvement.” New York Times. 28 June 2012: 1. New York Times. May 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c23f57def7ef1f081e76cf127631839c", "text": "society family youth digital freedoms privacy house would allow parents It is true that trust is a cornerstone of relationships. Admittedly, the act of monitoring may initially stimulate feelings of distrust which are particularly destructive in relationships. But nonetheless, trust is earned, not granted. The only proactive way to gauge how much trust and responsibility to give a child in the digital world is monitoring. By monitoring a child, parents come to assess the initial capability of the child in digital responsibility and ultimately the level of trust and the level of responsibility he or she deserves and to be assigned subsequently. Ideally, the initial level of monitoring and follow-through should be maximum in order to make clear to the child that he is being guided. Only when a child proves himself and grows in digital maturity can monitoring and follow-through be gradually minimized and finally lifted. [1]\n\n[1] Bodenhamer, Gregory. Parents in Control. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1995 Inc. Web. May 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9b6e74e61296630cb478bb4b6242b38d", "text": "society family youth digital freedoms privacy house would allow parents While it is practical to use these parental controls, it is not always realistic to set such limited parameters to the digital freedom of children. Children need to understand that they have the capacity to breach their parents’ trust. [1] This not only allows a child to understand how to interact sensibly with the internet, but to experience taking an initiative to actually obey parents in surfing only safe sites. Selectively restricting a child’s digital freedom does not help in this case. Thus, monitoring is the only way for children to experience digital freedom in such a way that they too are both closely guided and free to do as they wish. Moreover, this is also self-contradictory because opposition claimed that children are capable of circumvention which children would be much more likely to do when blocked from accessing websites than simply monitored.\n\n[1] Shmueli, Benjamin, and Ayelet Blecher-Prigat. “Privacy for Children.” Columbia Human Rights Review. Rev. 759 (2010-2011): 760-795. Columbia Law School. Web. May 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "99b4a38eab5bfd11fd51b53ed8c83826", "text": "society family youth digital freedoms privacy house would allow parents Opposition claims that monitoring is ‘laziness’. Admittedly, monitoring makes digital parenting more efficient and comprehensive. But, such technology makes parenting practical, not ‘lazy’. As it is, many people blame technology for their own shortcomings. [1] Thus, parents need to know that monitoring will not do all the work for them. It is not lazy to monitor your children, it is clearly essential that children are monitored when involved in activities such as sports. The internet is a dangerous environment just as the sports field is and should have similar adult supervision.\n\n[1] Bradley, Tony. “Blaming Technology for Human Error: Trying To Fix Social Problems With Technical Tools.” About. About. 30 Mar 2005.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5cd19a718ad89cd2b89ada7d18df3313", "text": "society family youth digital freedoms privacy house would allow parents Monitoring decreases children’s involvement with pornography.\n\nA 2005 study by the London School of Economics found that “while 57 per cent of the over-nines had seen porn online, only 16 per cent of parents knew.” [1] That number is almost certain to have increased. In addition sexting has also become prevalent as research from the UK suggests “over a third (38%) [of] under 18’s have received an offensive or distressing sexual image via text or email.” [2] This is dangerous because this digital reality extends to the real world. [3] W.L. Marshall says that early exposure to pornography may incite children to act out sexually against other children and may shape their sexual attitudes negatively, manifesting as insensitivity towards women and undervaluing monogamy. Only with monitoring can parents have absolute certainy of what their children are doing on the Internet. It may not allow them to prevent children from viewing pornography completely, but regulating the digital use of their children in such a way does not have to limit their digital freedoms or human rights.\n\n[1] Carey, Tanith. “Is YOUR child watching porn? The devastating effects of graphic images of sex on young minds”. Daily Mail. Daily Mail and General Trust. 25 April 2011. Web. May 2013.\n\n[2] “Truth of Sexting Amongst UK Teens.” BeatBullying. Beatbullying. 4 Aug 2009. Web. May 2013.\n\n[3] Hughes, Donna Rice. Kids Online: Protecting Your Children in Cyberspace. Michigan: Fleming H. Revell, 1998. ProtectKids. Web. May 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9cbe429588e6cfcdf30337a807d1640d", "text": "society family youth digital freedoms privacy house would allow parents Monitoring prevents cyberbullying.\n\nSocial approval is especially craved by teens because they are beginning to shift focus from family to peers. [1] Unfortunately, some teens may resort to cyberbullying others in order to gain erroneous respect from others and eliminate competitors in order to establish superficial friendships. Over the last few years a number of cyberbullying cases have caused the tragic suicides of Tyler Clementi (2010), Megan Meier who was bullied online by a non-existent Josh Evans whom she had feelings for (2006), and Ryan Halligan (2003) among others. [2] Responsible parents need to be one step ahead because at these relevant stages, cognitive abilities are advancing, but morals are lagging behind, meaning children are morally unequipped in making informed decisions in cyberspace. [1] One important way to make this guidance more effective would be if parents chose to monitor their children’s digital behavior by acquiring their passwords and paying close attention to their social network activity such as Facebook and chat rooms, even if it means skimming through their private messages. Applying the categorical imperative, if monitoring becomes universal, then cyberbullying will no longer be a problem in the cyberspace as the perpetrators would be quickly caught and disciplined.\n\n[1] Bauman, Sheri. Cyberbullying: a Virtual Menace. University of Arizona, 2007. Web. May 2013.\n\n[2] Littler, Chris. “8 Infamous Cases of Cyber-Bullying.” The Sixth Wall. Koldcast Entertainment Media. 7 Feb 2011. Web. May 2013 .\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "52daa5a1b5efe02df4eb857ca52e1522", "text": "society family youth digital freedoms privacy house would allow parents Monitoring raises digital awareness among parents.\n\nParents who are willing to monitor their children’s digital communications also benefit themselves. By setting up the necessary software and apps to secure their children’s online growth, parents familiarize themselves with basic digital skills and keep up with the latest in social media. As it stands there is a need to raise digital awareness among most parents. Sonia Livingston and Magdalena Bober in their extensive survey of the cyber experience of UK children and their parents report that “among parents only 1 in 3 know how to set up an email account, and only a fifth or fewer are able to set up a filter, remove a virus, download music or fix a problem.” [1] Parents becoming more digitally involved as a result of their children provides the added benefit of increasing the number of mature netizens so encouraging norms of good behavior online.\n\n[1] Livingstone, Sonia, and Magdalena Bober. “UK Children Go Online: Surveying the experiences of young people and their parents.” UK Children Go Online. Second Report (2004): 1-61.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a0ece19575be99a9524d96a63d59f009", "text": "society family youth digital freedoms privacy house would allow parents Monitoring is lazy parenting.\n\nThe proposition substitutes the good, old-fashioned way of teaching children how to be responsible, with invasions of their privacy, so violating an inherent rights [1]. Such parenting is called remote-control parenting. Parents who monitor their children’s digital behavior feel that they satisfactorily fulfil their parental role when in fact they are being lazy and uninvolved in the growth of their child. Children, especially the youngest, are “dependent upon their parents and require an intense and intimate relationship with their parents to satisfy their physical and emotional needs.” This is called a psychological attachment theory. Responsible parents would instead spend more time with their children teaching them about information management, when to and when not to disclose information, and interaction management, when to and when not to interact with others. [2] That parents have the ability to track their children is true, but doing so is not necessarily likely to make them better adults [3]. The key is for parents and children to talk regularly about the experiences of the child online. This is a process that cannot be substituted by parental monitoring.\n\n[1] United Nations Children’s Fund. Implementation Handbook for the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Fully revised 3rd edition. Geneva. United Nations Publications. Google Search. Web. May 2013.\n\n[2] Shmueli, Benjamin, and Ayelet Blecher-Prigat. “Privacy for Children.” Columbia Human Rights Review. Rev. 759 (2010-2011): 760-795. Columbia Law School. Web. May 2013.\n\n[3] “You Can Track Your Kids. But Should You?” New York Times. 27 June 2012: 1. New York Times. May 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2e71cad9b6b08473d6a4a58bd5d74817", "text": "society family youth digital freedoms privacy house would allow parents Monitoring is a hindrance to forming relationships both outside and inside the family.\n\nIf children are being monitored, or if it seems to children that they are being monitored, they would immediately lose trust in their parents. As trust is reciprocal, children will also learn not to trust others. This will result in their difficulty in forging human connections, thereby straining their psychosocial growth. For them to learn how to trust therefore, children must know that they can break their parents’ trust (as said by the proposition before). This will allow them to understand, obey, and respect their parents on their own initiative, allowing them to respect others in the same manner as well. [1] This growth would only be possible if parents refuse this proposition and instead choose to educate their children how to be responsible beforehand.\n\n[1] Shmueli, Benjamin, and Ayelet Blecher-Prigat. “Privacy for Children.” Columbia Human Rights Review. Rev. 759 (2010-2011): 760-795. Columbia Law School. Web. May 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "06ea4e09ea79c903a622d0b8179b5fe3", "text": "society family youth digital freedoms privacy house would allow parents This proposal is simply an invasion of privacy.\n\nChildren have as much right to privacy as any adult. Unfortunately there is yet to be a provision on the protection of privacy in either the United States Constitution or the Bill of Rights, though the Supreme Court states that the concept of privacy rooted within the framework of the Constitution. [1] This ambiguity causes confusion among parents regarding the concept of child privacy. Many maintain that privacy should be administered to a child as a privilege, not a right. [2] Fortunately, the UNCRC clearly states that “No child shall be subjected to arbitrary or unlawful interference with his or her privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to unlawful attacks on his or her honour and reputation,” [3] making child privacy an automatic right. Just as children should receive privacy in the real world, so too should they in the digital world. Individual rights, including right to privacy, shape intrafamilial relationships because they initiate individuality and independence. [1]\n\n[1] Shmueli, Benjamin, and Ayelet Blecher-Prigat. “Privacy for Children.” Columbia Human Rights Review. Rev. 759 (2010-2011): 760-795. Columbia Law School. Web. May 2013. P.764\n\n[2] Brenner, Susan. “The Privacy Privilege.” CYB3RCRIM3. Blogspot. 3 April 2009. May 2013.\n\n[3] United Nations Children’s Fund. Implementation Handbook for the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Fully revised 3rd edition. Geneva. United Nations Publications. Google Search. Web. May 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "36784366b3e8a8bda6c69940addcea9f", "text": "society family youth digital freedoms privacy house would allow parents Other parental controls are more practical and reasonable to administer.\n\nMonitoring would be extremely tedious and time-consuming. Many teens send over 100 texts a day, it would clearly be very time consuming to read them all along with all other digital communication.[1] By contrast content filtering, contact management, and privacy protection parental controls, which can be used to block all incoming and outgoing information, require only minimal supervision. Parents who meanwhile deem their children immature when it comes to social networking and gaming can instead impose user restrictions on the relevant websites and devices. [2] Administering these alternative parental controls leave for more quality time with children. In this case, only when children acquire sufficient digital maturity and responsibility can these controls be lifted. As they have learnt to be mature in the digital environment the children would most likely continue to surf safely even when the parental controls are lifted.\n\n[1] Goldberg, Stephanie, “Many teens send 100-plus texts a day, survey says”, CNN, 21 April 2010\n\n[2] Burt, David. “Parental Controls Product Guide.” 2010 Edition. n.d. PDF File. Web. May 2013.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
d13d8dc7b2035356c29c39fe23fed8e3	Private investors have a right to privacy The public scrutiny on think tank funders may backlash on perfectly innocent investors. Investors may be accused of corruption if think tanks that share their values independently reach favourable conclusions. Alternatively, minor investors may become guilty by association, for instance, if notorious companies or political parties have been seen supporting the same think tanks – even if this is done for completely different reasons. The motivations of think tanks cannot be made synonymous with their funders, but these funders should also not be made synonymous with each other. Thus for example Policy exchange is both seen as a think tank for UK conservative modernisers – the progressive wing of the party while also having been labelled as a “neo-con attack dog”. [1] [1] Helm, Toby, and Hope, Christopher, “The top twelve think tanks in Britain”, The Telegraph, 24 January 2008, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/1576447/The-top-twelve-think-tanks-in-Britain.html	[ { "docid": "e89922b9bdb9364cf772eb632ee5875b", "text": " general government digital freedoms access knowledge house would force This is not an inherent flaw in the system. In the status quo, large investors can still publically advertise the fact that they are funding a project, and this too can have repercussions and bring negative associations for other investors. It is a risk anyone makes when investing in a given idea. The right to privacy of investors in political campaigns was discarded once evidence of potential abuses and political arrangements surfaced. Similarly, this right cannot apply to think tank funders. [1]\n\n[1] “The Political Activity of Think Tanks: The Case for Mandatory Contributor Disclosure”, Harvard Law Review, Vol. 115, No. 5, March 2002, pp. 1502-1524. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1342554\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "93bed68977c80f8e5a0800febcf54c83", "text": " general government digital freedoms access knowledge house would force Such a system, in which one allows think tanks to accept substantial anonymous donations, has immense downsides. It is simply too easy for a think tank to claim all, or most, of its funding is anonymous to them when it is questioned, while in fact they have been having informal strategic talks with potential funders days prior to, during, or after the donation. We cannot adopt a policy that is so easy too abuse, and since all think tanks must know who their funders are, we are not restricting their independence any further by asking them to make it public.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "38eb643f3e2d628c04c2faccbc32a121", "text": " general government digital freedoms access knowledge house would force People are capable of assessing a biased idea after discovering its bias, while it is dangerous to present potentially biased ideas as genuine, for this limits discussion. This is especially so in the status quo, where the suspicions of who may be funding think tanks remain when they choose not to disclose their funders. A blanket obligation of all think tanks to reveal their funding allows for open discourse and thus more space to discuss the ideas themselves.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "92dd6b1ea9d0e4bd8b32c1d373511c5c", "text": " general government digital freedoms access knowledge house would force On the other hand, by disclosing funders more corporations and individuals will have an incentive to fund think tanks. They will be assured that they will be publically recognised for it, and thus be rewarded when the think tanks they support produce good ideas.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "979f95882e2dba3d2dd3505254f0a5f7", "text": " general government digital freedoms access knowledge house would force It does not matter if think tanks are used in this way, so long as the conclusions that are reached by the think tanks are true. If there is objective value in an idea it should be communicated as well as possible. If this cannot be done with conventional marketing, it is good for it to be possible through a think tank. If the think tank’s idea and conclusion is wrong, the fact that it is presented objectively makes it no less falsifiable. Think tanks do not exist in a vacuum, and for every false idea presented as positive there will be another think tank to scrutinise it. In either case, the consumer is given useful information in an accessible way that can still be questioned.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d5e84cc0403cf32a7dbbef455ae9fb1d", "text": " general government digital freedoms access knowledge house would force There is no necessity to disclose think tank funding publically in order to circumvent this issue. As long as there are public institutions that scrutinise think tanks and are also bound to secrecy unless there are anomalies, the risk of terrorism can be successfully regulated. Being a think tank does not prevent an organisation from having to be transparent to government about their finances. It is unnecessary to expose think tanks that do not act illicitly to the general public.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "af5fd73bb9939c676af2abc80e41b58c", "text": " general government digital freedoms access knowledge house would force Think tanks can choose transparency in the status quo anyway (as shown by nef): this benefit is relatively small. On the other hand, it harms the many other think tanks that need to protect the information of who funds them if, for instance, the funders do not wish to disclose it. It is a loss of freedom for the majority, not a gain.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6a916d67a6a9f49b1ab05c79a090c324", "text": " general government digital freedoms access knowledge house would force It is already in the interest of think tanks to be transparent. Think tanks exist in societies that depend on open communication and the free flow of ideas. Numerous organisations exist to criticise and unmask non-transparent think tanks: [1] this is sufficient incentive for them to reveal their funding. There may be exceptions in which the benefits of non-disclosure overrule the disadvantages in terms of trust, but these are rare, and it does not follow that it will be abused.\n\n[1] Who Funds You, Political Innovation, http://www.whofundsyou.org/about\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "db6f0d7665d466bc777c6cf4d3158990", "text": " general government digital freedoms access knowledge house would force Think tanks don’t have any legislative power. At the end of the day, what they do is merely make suggestions. If they were active lobbyists they would lose their privileged legal position as an academic organisation. [1] Even if there may be other benefits of them being transparent, the legal concept of transparency cannot be extended to them. That would open the door to forcing other independent private institutions to reveal details of their organisation. Furthermore, think tanks rarely claim to be completely impartial. They usually have an agenda and are aligned with a political party. This concession in terms of impartiality merits equal concessions in terms of demanded transparency. At the end of the day it is their work that influences the agenda and that same work shows where their sympathies lie.\n\n[1] “The Political Activity of Think Tanks: The Case for Mandatory Contributor Disclosure”, Harvard Law Review, Vol. 115, No. 5, March 2002, pp. 1502-1524. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1342554\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ea90c146a4d9e4c16b88719d937cad8b", "text": " general government digital freedoms access knowledge house would force Overregulating think tanks sets a dangerous precedent\n\nThe public scrutiny on think tank funders may backlash on perfectly innocent investors. Investors may be accused of corruption if think tanks that share their values independently reach favourable conclusions. Alternatively, minor investors may become guilty by association, for instance, if notorious companies or political parties have been seen supporting the same think tanks – even if this is done for completely different reasons. The motivations of think tanks cannot be made synonymous with their funders, but these funders should also not be made synonymous with each other. Thus for example Policy exchange is both seen as a think tank for UK conservative modernisers – the progressive wing of the party while also having been labelled as a “neo-con attack dog”. [1]\n\n[1] Helm, Toby, and Hope, Christopher, “The top twelve think tanks in Britain”, The Telegraph, 24 January 2008, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/1576447/The-top-twelve-think-tanks-in-Britain.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2f2f63c9876d09d4228fdb9055da3b65", "text": " general government digital freedoms access knowledge house would force Think tanks should be assessed by the value of their ideas, not by who funds them\n\nOne can conceive of an infinite amount of cases in which results of a think tank’s research are completely independent of their funders. Their opposition, however, will be likely to signal corruption, when in fact there may be no relation between a funder and certain results. Even if they are associated by sharing a perspective or an aim, this is not a sign of corruption or bias, and it should not enter into the value of a think tank. There has been one study of charity donations (as think tanks are) that concludes that anonymous donations are “a costly signal of a charity’s quality by an informed donor”. [1]\n\n[1] Peacey, Mike W., “Masked Heroes: endogenous anonymity in charitable giving”, Centre for Market and Public Organisation Bristol Institute of Public Affairs, May 2013, p.27 http://www.bristol.ac.uk/cmpo/publications/papers/2013/wp303.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6f5b4fa2b3f48eceef1a79677dfe4252", "text": " general government digital freedoms access knowledge house would force Think tanks should be able to choose not to know who funds them\n\nThe information think tanks provide can be extremely useful to society. Therefore we should be hesitant to restrict their key strength, which is their independence. There may be scenarios in which think tanks, in need of funding for a purely positive project, ask for donations from anyone who believes in their values. Wanting to avoid any negative associations or any accusations of bias, they choose not to find out who their funders are, and thus they cannot disclose that information. For think tanks who claim independence by only asking for anonymous donors, this is no longer an option when they are forced to disclose. The attempt to create more objectivity actually removes one of the ways of being perfectly impartial.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "aef52b9e9b742fa043f7d93198ac3cef", "text": " general government digital freedoms access knowledge house would force Being subject to scrutiny discourages investors from supporting good projects\n\nThink tanks depend largely on voluntary funding for their projects, [1] so they must be careful when risking potential investments. Investors are likely to be put off from funding think tanks with good aims if this funding will be scrutinised and their interests questioned. [2] They are likely not to wish to risk being associated with seemingly biased results: a system by which funders can support ideas in themselves, perhaps even anonymously for the think tanks themselves, is the one in which think tanks best flourish and best produce results. Those that produce the best and most interesting ideas will be those who succeed in obtaining funding.\n\n[1] Think Tank Funding, On Think Tanks, http://onthinktanks.org/topic-pages/think-tank-funding/ accessed 11 June 2013\n\n[2] Butcher, Jonathan, “Does it Matter Who Funds You?” One World Trust, 12 July 2012, http://www.oneworldtrust.org/blog/?p=579/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "09a9cdf3452b6397c60988f5703689c2", "text": " general government digital freedoms access knowledge house would force Think tanks’ power of objectivity is the best form of marketing for biased views\n\nThink tanks are considered more credible than corporate marketing. [1] In the case of corporate marketing the recipient is aware that he is being sold a product. In the case of think tanks, the recipient believes he is being given unbiased information. Therefore, it is tempting for corporations to finance think tanks and encourage them to reach the conclusions that they otherwise would promote through marketing. This way, think tanks can be powerful tools for promoting a biased agenda: if done successfully the same message is communicated but in the form of credible information rather than manipulative marketing. In fact, it is common practice for journalists to quote think tanks without labelling their political bias. [2] And they most certainly don’t say if there is funding from a particular interest for example with the supposedly free market Institute of Public Affairs in Australia that somehow ends up arguing for government investment and intervention in Northern Australia – a position suspiciously close to several big mining companies. [3] This violates people’s freedom to make an informed decision, and can give biased views disproportionate and undue influence. By forcing them to disclose, any corruption or bias will become obvious to all.\n\n[1] Mayer, Jane. “Covert Operations”, A Reporter at Large, The New Yorker. 30 August 2010 http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/08/30/100830fa_fact_mayer\n\n[2] Dolny, Michael. “What’s in a Label?”, Extra!, FAIR. 1 May 1998 http://fair.org/extra-online-articles/Whats-in-a-Label/\n\n[3] MediaWatch, “Disclosing the funding of think tanks”, ABC News, 27 May 2013, http://www.abc.net.au/mediawatch/transcripts/s3768536.htm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8a9bcac3e95b63b36a61206a016144f1", "text": " general government digital freedoms access knowledge house would force Think tanks may become smoke screens for criminal groups\n\nIn the status quo, the ability of think tanks to be non-transparent potentially provides a framework for criminal groups, or in extreme cases organisations, to handle large amounts of money without revealing where their money comes from or goes. We are allowing extremist groups to be exempt from answering to the government or shareholders in their management of money or information. In the US and Canada, think tanks are also exempt from tax. [1] By this mechanism, false think tanks can be used, for example, to channel money from openly extremist groups that could otherwise not access those parts of the world.\n\n[1] 26 USC § 501 - Exemption from tax on corporations, certain trusts, etc., Legal Information Institute http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/26/501\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "81fac9be9dd14d1c29fa7b5f77bc1996", "text": " general government digital freedoms access knowledge house would force The status quo promotes non-transparency\n\nNon-disclosure can be perceived as objectivity. It is easier for the public to criticise a think tank that is openly associated with a particular funder. That kind of prejudice is stronger than the more general the prejudice against non-disclosure. A person might distrust a non-transparent think tank, but dislike a think tank that is funded by an organisation they are already prejudiced towards. [1] In any comparison between two such organisations the distrusted organisation will have greater impact than the disliked organisation. [2] This gives non-transparent think tanks an advantage over transparent and honest ones. Billionaires are then able to buy influence by secretly funding organisations such as the Global Warming Policy Foundation or the Institute of Economic Affairs that is then listened to, by the media and therefore the public, when their own views would simply be dismissed due to the personal motivations of the backers. [3] By forcing all think tanks to reveal their funding, we level the playing field.\n\n[1] Bentley, Guy. “The state funding swindle: how left wing think-tanks are pulling taxpayer-funded wool over our eyes”, Commentary, The Commentator. 20 September 2012, http://www.thecommentator.com/article/1679/the_state_funding_swindle_how_left_wing_think_tanks_are_pulling_taxpayer_funded_wool_over_our_eyes\n\n[2] “The Political Activity of Think Tanks: The Case for Mandatory Contributor Disclosure”, Harvard Law Review, Vol. 115, No. 5, March 2002, pp. 1502-1524. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1342554\n\n[3] Monbiot, George. “The educational charities that do PR for the rightwing ultra-rich”, Comment is Free, The Guardian. 18 February 2013 http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/feb/18/charities-pr-rightwing-ultra-rich\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c111b0b79f278a24d7810a229dd90068", "text": " general government digital freedoms access knowledge house would force People have a right to know where their information comes from\n\nDemocracies rely on transparency. Our commitment to transparency means surrendering part of our autonomy for the collective. This does not mean that our autonomy does not still belong to us; the institutions that affect our lives are under a constant obligation to justify their decisions and existence in relation to us. I do not have a right to know everything about the local football club (if I don’t play football and they are not a public company their decisions don’t affect me). Think tanks, however, are highly influential, and directly affect the society in which we live: some have, for example, lobbied successfully against action to prevent global warming. [1] Therefore they are to be considered a power in society, and the principle of transparency must be extended to them.\n\n[1] Monbiot, George. “The educational charities that do PR for the rightwing ultra-rich”, Comment is Free, The Guardian. 18 February 2013, http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/feb/18/charities-pr-rightwing-ultra-rich\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "bd9b390edf67e3db3aabe5d86e763ee7", "text": " general government digital freedoms access knowledge house would force Legally requiring disclosure from all benefits think tanks\n\nEven think tanks benefit from the introduction of this policy. The status quo leaves disclosure as a strategic device: think tanks are unwilling to disclose more than their competition for fear of being unfavourably portrayed. Such negative competition, i.e. competition in factors that do not improve the products of the market, makes them unable to make rational decisions about their funding if, for instance, potential funders want to contribute only on the condition that this funding be made public. As a consequence, the advent of organisations who call for transparency has been praised by prominent think tanks like the New Economics Foundation. [1] By depriving everybody of the strategic tool of revealing none or only a part of their funding, think tanks cannot be pressured into hiding or providing certain information about their funders, and they can thus act more independently.\n\n[1] Read, Sam. “Think tank funding matters: it’s central to democracy”, the nef blog, 22 June 2012, http://www.neweconomics.org/blog/entry/think-tank-funding-matters-its-central-to-democracy\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
1ca2127888418e292942624b419b7e34	Too many strings India is a booming economy with GDP growth of 7% over most of the last twenty years, and it is likely to overtake the UK economy within a decade. [1] As a result development aid today to India is small by comparison to what India itself can and does spend on its poorest citizens. The UK gives just £280 million per year, less than 0.04% of India’s GDP [2] and only enough to provide £1 per year for every one of India’s poorest. This foreign aid is therefore not essential for poverty reduction in India. Indeed China has been the country most successful at reducing poverty and it has done it through economic growth not large amounts of development aid. [3] Aid money should therefore go to countries that really do need the money for development rather than those who are already succeeding at financing it themselves. [1] Gilligan, Andrew, ‘India tells Britain: We don’t want your aid’, The Telegraph, 4 February 2012 [2] Ghosh, Jayati, ‘Yes: Should rich countries stop sending development aid to India?’, BMJ, Vol.346, No. 7891, pp.1-42, p.20 [3] Data and Research, ‘New Estimates Reveal Drop In Extreme Poverty 2005-2010’, The World Bank, 29 February 2012	[ { "docid": "9a654af4ce506dbeffe5e0e2029f5c8a", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development The geography of poverty has changed; in 1990 94% of those in poverty lived in ‘low income countries’ today that is down to 28%. The rest live in ‘middle income countries’ that are often fast growing and able to provide much of their own poverty reduction funding. [1] Should all money go to those few countries that are still classed as ‘low income’? Instead it must be recognised that the impact of aid is on individuals not the nation as a whole. Aid that builds a school and provides for teachers will have little impact on the whole of the nation but a large impact on those who are able to attend school where they would not have had the chance before.\n\n[1] Ravillion, Martin, ‘Should we care equally about poor people wherever they may live?’, 8 November 2012\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "583f14948762ec0c45b33e4094df24d5", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development It is nonsense to compare aid with the west’s actions during the nineteenth century. Yes the west with aid sometimes wants to encourage its own values but this is a long way from forcing those values on the other state. The IMF may demand certain changes and liberalisation but regardless of how much India needed the help it could have said no.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7575baa79672999edfd27467537bd6b6", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development It is likely true that people on the ground sometimes see aid as ‘free money’. But the existence of corruption shows a need for greater accountability and more pressure from donors to ensure that occurs rather than less. Leaving a country because of corruption would simply show unwillingness to tackle one of the major issues that need to be tackled in order to ensure development.\n\nDevelopment aid is sometimes spent on implementing schemes that may be the result of a new idea that may not work that becomes a ‘fad’. But to object to this is to object to innovation; new ideas must be tried out on the ground before the development community knows for sure they won’t work. Development thinking is moving towards just handing out cash rather than subsidies; will this work? We don’t know, but won’t know for sure until it is tried more comprehensively than it has been so far. [1]\n\n[1] See Helling, Alex, ‘This House would give cash to the poor to reduce poverty’, Debatabase, 24 January 2013\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "07ed71d3dfbe5b9729c455bf081eb5e2", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development It does not make sense that India should receive aid simply because it still has poor people. Aid is used to help when the government cannot provide for its own people and India clearly already provides the vast majority of help for its own people and will provide more and more as the economy grows. The absolute numbers make very little difference because aid at current levels will never pull all 1.4 billion out of poverty at once. The government of India is improving he conditions of its poor so aid should be used somewhere where the government is less capable.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3e5b02bd415dc98a07859764cc78a8a3", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development The opposite is true; aid results in less Indian spending on poverty not more. In a few rare cases there may be sufficient media coverage of an aid program to shame the government into action but most of the time if others are spending that simply means the Indian government will save its own money. This was the assessment of House of Lords Economic Affairs Select Committee when it said “British development aid to the poorest Indian states may provide a perverse incentive to the Indian government to use less of its own revenue to alleviate poverty.” [1]\n\n[1] Economic Affairs Select Committee, ‘Abstract’, Parliament.uk, 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4e44e4de3909b7c9a6f63c41d62b51d2", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development Clearly it is good where aid makes a difference to someone’s life but we are not advocating ending aid. That aid would instead be spent in a poorer country that is more in need than India. The country that is more in need clearly needs more aid to provide that infrastructure that helps multiply the value of aid. It is therefore clearly the place where more funding should go.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9fa77788e6e9b3d048a3e4260fc475de", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development Clearly this is taking a double standard; India cannot immediately eliminate poverty using only its domestic capacity, but the aid from other nations at the current level cannot currently do this either. India can be reducing poverty and as the economy grows will eventually be able to eliminate poverty entirely.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "988f8a9af7ae80ade7d0d2838eb3dff8", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development “White Man’s Burden”\n\nAid is simply a continuation of the “white man’s burden” and is therefore demeaning to the countries where it is meant to help. It implies that western countries have to provide money to those who are less ‘developed’ in order to develop them. This sounds very similar to westerners having to go out into the world in order to civilize the other countries and civilizations around the world. This similarity is made even closer when western aid has strings and institutions like the IMF impose ‘liberalisation’ of markets as it did for India at the end of the 1980s. [1] Far from providing help it is imposing western ideas and values on others.\n\n[1] Weinraub, Bernard, ‘Economic Crisis Forcing Once Self-Reliant India to Seek Aid’, The New York Times, 29 June 1991\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "35390735c3d457ee0c0185f4c0c64f93", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development The west does not know best\n\nIt is clear that the donor countries do not know how best to spend the money they give as aid. Instead they want their money spent on the latest development fad whether this is the privatisation of basic services, microcredit, conditional cash, or particular infrastructure projects. [1]\n\nDevelopment can also be misspent as a result of corruption and a lack of oversight, for example the UK suspended its aid to Uganda as a result of indications it was being misused by the Ugandan government and not “going towards helping the poorest people lift themselves out of poverty”. [2] The Lords Economic Affairs select committee explained why this is the case; “aid is essentially seen by those entrusted with it as \"free money\", whose loss will go unnoticed by the giver and whose appropriation is nothing like as morally reprehensible as appropriating local tax revenue”. [3]\n\n[1] Ghosh, Jayati, ‘Yes: Should rich countries stop sending development aid to India?’, BMJ, Vol.346, No. 7891, pp.1-42, p.20\n\n[2] Tran, Mark, and Ford, Liz, ‘UK suspends aid to Uganda as concern grows over misuse of funds’, The Guardian global development, 16 November 2012\n\n[3] Economic Affairs Select Committee, ‘Chapter 4: The Impact of Aid’, Parliament.uk, 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "04422e00e64f87075918a78dcf24c01b", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development The money makes no difference\n\nIndia is a booming economy with GDP growth of 7% over most of the last twenty years, and it is likely to overtake the UK economy within a decade. [1] As a result development aid today to India is small by comparison to what India itself can and does spend on its poorest citizens. The UK gives just £280 million per year, less than 0.04% of India’s GDP [2] and only enough to provide £1 per year for every one of India’s poorest.\n\nThis foreign aid is therefore not essential for poverty reduction in India. Indeed China has been the country most successful at reducing poverty and it has done it through economic growth not large amounts of development aid. [3] Aid money should therefore go to countries that really do need the money for development rather than those who are already succeeding at financing it themselves.\n\n[1] Gilligan, Andrew, ‘India tells Britain: We don’t want your aid’, The Telegraph, 4 February 2012\n\n[2] Ghosh, Jayati, ‘Yes: Should rich countries stop sending development aid to India?’, BMJ, Vol.346, No. 7891, pp.1-42, p.20\n\n[3] Data and Research, ‘New Estimates Reveal Drop In Extreme Poverty 2005-2010’, The World Bank, 29 February 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1a472ded1e0c42f8b58c2566046409f2", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development India cannot end poverty on its own\n\nClearly if India could end poverty within the country it would do so, however at the moment it cannot. If those in India who are not poor (considering this to mean earn more than $13 a day, the US poverty line) were to give 100% of their income above this level to those who live on less than $1.25 per day they would still not eliminate poverty in the country. “Indeed, appropriating all of the incomes of those living in India above the US poverty line would cover only a modest fraction of the country’s aggregate poverty gap.” So India does not yet have the domestic capacity to eliminate poverty on its own. [1]\n\n[1] Ravillion, Martin, ‘Should we care equally about poor people wherever they may live?’, 8 November 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "12ff23d725bcfa72a3c77397c6371c5d", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development Pressure from international donors is essential\n\nCurrently the culture of giving in India is not mature enough to enable India to fight poverty on its own. Aid to India therefore provides more than one role. It does not just provide the money and supplies that the poorest need, it also encourages India to do more. When aid is needed to put primary children into school as a result of the mere 3% of national income spent on education it encourages the Indian government and people to spend more on alleviating their own compatriot’s poverty. [1]\n\n[1] Agrawal, Nisha, ‘India needs to do more for its people but cutting foreign aid now won’t help – Oxfam’, Alertnet, 13 November 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "466f260c275db42694779c5a7cff8f9a", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development India still has the most people in poverty\n\nAid should go to those who need it most around the world regardless of which country they live in. India still has the largest concentration of people in poverty in the world, according to the world bank there are “240 million rural poor and 72 million urban poor”. [1] So still almost a quarter of the world’s 1.4billion people in poverty. [2] With so many of the world’s poor people it is clear that India should be receiving a significant portion of the world’s development aid to end their poverty.\n\n[1] Poverty Reduction & Equity, ‘India: Achievements and Challenges in Reducing Poverty’, The World Bank, 2011\n\n[2] Poverty Reduction & Equity, ‘Overview’, The World Bank, August 2008\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e906d9ca81166c65e775dea6848f146e", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development Development aid still makes a difference\n\nClearly someone earning $1 a day in India is as worthy of aid as someone earning the same amount in Burkina Faso. Equally the same amount of development aid can still make a similar amount of difference to the individuals it is targeted. It may potentially make even more of a difference in the richer country because that country has the infrastructure to ensure that the aid is sustainable and effective. [1] For example an aid program may help poor farmers to grow more food but that aid is much more sustainable and valuable if there is a road network so that they can sell some of their produce. In India UK aid has helped 1.2 million children go to school in the past 10 years [2] and this investment is potentially made more effective by India having universities these children could go on to attend if they wish.\n\n[1] Economic Affairs Select Committee, ‘Chapter 4: The Impact of Aid’, Parliament.uk, 2012\n\n[2] Agrawal, Nisha, ‘No: Should rich countries stop sending development aid to India?’, BMJ, Vol.346, No. 7891, pp.1-42, p.21\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
ee526856ed322a3c878bc6b780f17fdc	Pressure from international donors is essential Currently the culture of giving in India is not mature enough to enable India to fight poverty on its own. Aid to India therefore provides more than one role. It does not just provide the money and supplies that the poorest need, it also encourages India to do more. When aid is needed to put primary children into school as a result of the mere 3% of national income spent on education it encourages the Indian government and people to spend more on alleviating their own compatriot’s poverty. [1] [1] Agrawal, Nisha, ‘India needs to do more for its people but cutting foreign aid now won’t help – Oxfam’, Alertnet, 13 November 2012	[ { "docid": "3e5b02bd415dc98a07859764cc78a8a3", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development The opposite is true; aid results in less Indian spending on poverty not more. In a few rare cases there may be sufficient media coverage of an aid program to shame the government into action but most of the time if others are spending that simply means the Indian government will save its own money. This was the assessment of House of Lords Economic Affairs Select Committee when it said “British development aid to the poorest Indian states may provide a perverse incentive to the Indian government to use less of its own revenue to alleviate poverty.” [1]\n\n[1] Economic Affairs Select Committee, ‘Abstract’, Parliament.uk, 2012\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "07ed71d3dfbe5b9729c455bf081eb5e2", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development It does not make sense that India should receive aid simply because it still has poor people. Aid is used to help when the government cannot provide for its own people and India clearly already provides the vast majority of help for its own people and will provide more and more as the economy grows. The absolute numbers make very little difference because aid at current levels will never pull all 1.4 billion out of poverty at once. The government of India is improving he conditions of its poor so aid should be used somewhere where the government is less capable.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4e44e4de3909b7c9a6f63c41d62b51d2", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development Clearly it is good where aid makes a difference to someone’s life but we are not advocating ending aid. That aid would instead be spent in a poorer country that is more in need than India. The country that is more in need clearly needs more aid to provide that infrastructure that helps multiply the value of aid. It is therefore clearly the place where more funding should go.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9fa77788e6e9b3d048a3e4260fc475de", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development Clearly this is taking a double standard; India cannot immediately eliminate poverty using only its domestic capacity, but the aid from other nations at the current level cannot currently do this either. India can be reducing poverty and as the economy grows will eventually be able to eliminate poverty entirely.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9a654af4ce506dbeffe5e0e2029f5c8a", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development The geography of poverty has changed; in 1990 94% of those in poverty lived in ‘low income countries’ today that is down to 28%. The rest live in ‘middle income countries’ that are often fast growing and able to provide much of their own poverty reduction funding. [1] Should all money go to those few countries that are still classed as ‘low income’? Instead it must be recognised that the impact of aid is on individuals not the nation as a whole. Aid that builds a school and provides for teachers will have little impact on the whole of the nation but a large impact on those who are able to attend school where they would not have had the chance before.\n\n[1] Ravillion, Martin, ‘Should we care equally about poor people wherever they may live?’, 8 November 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "583f14948762ec0c45b33e4094df24d5", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development It is nonsense to compare aid with the west’s actions during the nineteenth century. Yes the west with aid sometimes wants to encourage its own values but this is a long way from forcing those values on the other state. The IMF may demand certain changes and liberalisation but regardless of how much India needed the help it could have said no.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7575baa79672999edfd27467537bd6b6", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development It is likely true that people on the ground sometimes see aid as ‘free money’. But the existence of corruption shows a need for greater accountability and more pressure from donors to ensure that occurs rather than less. Leaving a country because of corruption would simply show unwillingness to tackle one of the major issues that need to be tackled in order to ensure development.\n\nDevelopment aid is sometimes spent on implementing schemes that may be the result of a new idea that may not work that becomes a ‘fad’. But to object to this is to object to innovation; new ideas must be tried out on the ground before the development community knows for sure they won’t work. Development thinking is moving towards just handing out cash rather than subsidies; will this work? We don’t know, but won’t know for sure until it is tried more comprehensively than it has been so far. [1]\n\n[1] See Helling, Alex, ‘This House would give cash to the poor to reduce poverty’, Debatabase, 24 January 2013\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9a654af4ce506dbeffe5e0e2029f5c8a", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development The geography of poverty has changed; in 1990 94% of those in poverty lived in ‘low income countries’ today that is down to 28%. The rest live in ‘middle income countries’ that are often fast growing and able to provide much of their own poverty reduction funding. [1] Should all money go to those few countries that are still classed as ‘low income’? Instead it must be recognised that the impact of aid is on individuals not the nation as a whole. Aid that builds a school and provides for teachers will have little impact on the whole of the nation but a large impact on those who are able to attend school where they would not have had the chance before.\n\n[1] Ravillion, Martin, ‘Should we care equally about poor people wherever they may live?’, 8 November 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "04422e00e64f87075918a78dcf24c01b", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development The money makes no difference\n\nIndia is a booming economy with GDP growth of 7% over most of the last twenty years, and it is likely to overtake the UK economy within a decade. [1] As a result development aid today to India is small by comparison to what India itself can and does spend on its poorest citizens. The UK gives just £280 million per year, less than 0.04% of India’s GDP [2] and only enough to provide £1 per year for every one of India’s poorest.\n\nThis foreign aid is therefore not essential for poverty reduction in India. Indeed China has been the country most successful at reducing poverty and it has done it through economic growth not large amounts of development aid. [3] Aid money should therefore go to countries that really do need the money for development rather than those who are already succeeding at financing it themselves.\n\n[1] Gilligan, Andrew, ‘India tells Britain: We don’t want your aid’, The Telegraph, 4 February 2012\n\n[2] Ghosh, Jayati, ‘Yes: Should rich countries stop sending development aid to India?’, BMJ, Vol.346, No. 7891, pp.1-42, p.20\n\n[3] Data and Research, ‘New Estimates Reveal Drop In Extreme Poverty 2005-2010’, The World Bank, 29 February 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1a472ded1e0c42f8b58c2566046409f2", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development India cannot end poverty on its own\n\nClearly if India could end poverty within the country it would do so, however at the moment it cannot. If those in India who are not poor (considering this to mean earn more than $13 a day, the US poverty line) were to give 100% of their income above this level to those who live on less than $1.25 per day they would still not eliminate poverty in the country. “Indeed, appropriating all of the incomes of those living in India above the US poverty line would cover only a modest fraction of the country’s aggregate poverty gap.” So India does not yet have the domestic capacity to eliminate poverty on its own. [1]\n\n[1] Ravillion, Martin, ‘Should we care equally about poor people wherever they may live?’, 8 November 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "466f260c275db42694779c5a7cff8f9a", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development India still has the most people in poverty\n\nAid should go to those who need it most around the world regardless of which country they live in. India still has the largest concentration of people in poverty in the world, according to the world bank there are “240 million rural poor and 72 million urban poor”. [1] So still almost a quarter of the world’s 1.4billion people in poverty. [2] With so many of the world’s poor people it is clear that India should be receiving a significant portion of the world’s development aid to end their poverty.\n\n[1] Poverty Reduction & Equity, ‘India: Achievements and Challenges in Reducing Poverty’, The World Bank, 2011\n\n[2] Poverty Reduction & Equity, ‘Overview’, The World Bank, August 2008\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e906d9ca81166c65e775dea6848f146e", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development Development aid still makes a difference\n\nClearly someone earning $1 a day in India is as worthy of aid as someone earning the same amount in Burkina Faso. Equally the same amount of development aid can still make a similar amount of difference to the individuals it is targeted. It may potentially make even more of a difference in the richer country because that country has the infrastructure to ensure that the aid is sustainable and effective. [1] For example an aid program may help poor farmers to grow more food but that aid is much more sustainable and valuable if there is a road network so that they can sell some of their produce. In India UK aid has helped 1.2 million children go to school in the past 10 years [2] and this investment is potentially made more effective by India having universities these children could go on to attend if they wish.\n\n[1] Economic Affairs Select Committee, ‘Chapter 4: The Impact of Aid’, Parliament.uk, 2012\n\n[2] Agrawal, Nisha, ‘No: Should rich countries stop sending development aid to India?’, BMJ, Vol.346, No. 7891, pp.1-42, p.21\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "988f8a9af7ae80ade7d0d2838eb3dff8", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development “White Man’s Burden”\n\nAid is simply a continuation of the “white man’s burden” and is therefore demeaning to the countries where it is meant to help. It implies that western countries have to provide money to those who are less ‘developed’ in order to develop them. This sounds very similar to westerners having to go out into the world in order to civilize the other countries and civilizations around the world. This similarity is made even closer when western aid has strings and institutions like the IMF impose ‘liberalisation’ of markets as it did for India at the end of the 1980s. [1] Far from providing help it is imposing western ideas and values on others.\n\n[1] Weinraub, Bernard, ‘Economic Crisis Forcing Once Self-Reliant India to Seek Aid’, The New York Times, 29 June 1991\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "35390735c3d457ee0c0185f4c0c64f93", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development The west does not know best\n\nIt is clear that the donor countries do not know how best to spend the money they give as aid. Instead they want their money spent on the latest development fad whether this is the privatisation of basic services, microcredit, conditional cash, or particular infrastructure projects. [1]\n\nDevelopment can also be misspent as a result of corruption and a lack of oversight, for example the UK suspended its aid to Uganda as a result of indications it was being misused by the Ugandan government and not “going towards helping the poorest people lift themselves out of poverty”. [2] The Lords Economic Affairs select committee explained why this is the case; “aid is essentially seen by those entrusted with it as \"free money\", whose loss will go unnoticed by the giver and whose appropriation is nothing like as morally reprehensible as appropriating local tax revenue”. [3]\n\n[1] Ghosh, Jayati, ‘Yes: Should rich countries stop sending development aid to India?’, BMJ, Vol.346, No. 7891, pp.1-42, p.20\n\n[2] Tran, Mark, and Ford, Liz, ‘UK suspends aid to Uganda as concern grows over misuse of funds’, The Guardian global development, 16 November 2012\n\n[3] Economic Affairs Select Committee, ‘Chapter 4: The Impact of Aid’, Parliament.uk, 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "fbc526588c4437a4d42c5d4850d71654", "text": "economic policy international asia global house would stop sending development Too many strings\n\nIndia is a booming economy with GDP growth of 7% over most of the last twenty years, and it is likely to overtake the UK economy within a decade. [1] As a result development aid today to India is small by comparison to what India itself can and does spend on its poorest citizens. The UK gives just £280 million per year, less than 0.04% of India’s GDP [2] and only enough to provide £1 per year for every one of India’s poorest.\n\nThis foreign aid is therefore not essential for poverty reduction in India. Indeed China has been the country most successful at reducing poverty and it has done it through economic growth not large amounts of development aid. [3] Aid money should therefore go to countries that really do need the money for development rather than those who are already succeeding at financing it themselves.\n\n[1] Gilligan, Andrew, ‘India tells Britain: We don’t want your aid’, The Telegraph, 4 February 2012\n\n[2] Ghosh, Jayati, ‘Yes: Should rich countries stop sending development aid to India?’, BMJ, Vol.346, No. 7891, pp.1-42, p.20\n\n[3] Data and Research, ‘New Estimates Reveal Drop In Extreme Poverty 2005-2010’, The World Bank, 29 February 2012\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
605fa07fb9e8c6eb42f6ce658aec5ba6	The free market is the most efficient way to match supply and demand In a free market, goods are voluntarily exchanged at a price arranged solely by the mutual consent of sellers and buyers. The aggregate ‘market price’ is the result of all individual transactions and contains important information for both buyers and sellers. When there is more demand than supply, prices rise (because buyers have to ‘outbid’ each other), making it attractive for new producers to enter the market and thus adding supply. When there is more supply than demand, prices fall, causing some sellers to leave the market since their production costs are higher than the price at which they can sell. Thus, in the long run, markets settle on an ‘equilibrium price’ where demand and supply are exactly equal. Examples of the free market actually working are all around us: take the supply of the pen and paper used to take notes on. If the price is too high at one store, anyone would move to another store where it’s cheaper. Therefore, sellers have an incentive to provide the best quality at the lowest price. [1] Central planning can never be as efficient as myriads of individually planning buyers and sellers in reaching this equilibrium. For example, a central planner who sets a price floor will likely create excess supply in that specific market. This has happened in the European Union, where the EU set a price floor on dairy products. The result were the well-known ‘butter mountains’ and ‘milk lakes’. [1] It is of course slightly more complicated as there are multiple layers of supply and demand. There is a free market in the sale of pen and paper from stores to consumers. The stores themselves are also in a free market when it comes to sourcing the pen and paper from wholesellers or the producers. The producers are then also in a free market to source the materials to make the pens. The price at the retailer therefore has a floor below which someone will make a loss due to the cost of the production.	[ { "docid": "0415ae70bedd850db926da39592b4f07", "text": "economic policy economy general philosophy political philosophy house would It might be that under theoretical conditions, free markets match up supply and demand in the long run, but as the famous economist John Maynard Keynes said: “in the long run we are all dead”. Even if a stable equilibrium is theoretically possible, in practice, it almost never happens, with high fluctuations in price, shortages and excesses as a consequence (A Tract on Monetary Reform, 2000).\n\nAn example of a market never reaching equilibrium is the so-called, empirically observed, ‘Pork Cycle’. When prices for pork meat are high, producers flock to the market. Since it takes a while, anywhere from months to over a year, to raise pigs before slaughter, prices will continue to rise and producers continue to join – until suddenly, the new supply reaches maturity and there is a sudden excess of pork meat on the market. This excess will then last for a longer period, since many producers are ‘locked in’, waiting for their pigs to mature. The same dynamics operate in the market for skilled labour, since getting the required vocational training also takes time.\n\nEven if equilibrium is reached, the outcome isn’t necessarily fair. An example is the Irish Great Famine: due to circumstance and bad policy, potato supply in Ireland dropped dramatically. This caused prices to rise beyond the budget of the average Irish citizen, but England could still pay the higher price. The perverse result was that even during the Great Famine, Ireland was actually still a net exporter of food (The Great Irish Famine, 1996).\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "cdd6b88454121cd3f56fbecfcdb0435d", "text": "economic policy economy general philosophy political philosophy house would The free market doesn’t invest in fundamental research this is research to understand fundamental principles as it does not have a commercial purpose and may never result in a commercial product, ultimately, fundamental research is the key enabler of innovation. Private companies don’t invest in fundamental research, because by its nature it is open ended and very expensive and as a result may never pay back the investment.\n\nOne example is the invention of the laser: the foundations were laid by theoretical physicists like Albert Einstein. This theoretical work wasn’t done with the purpose to invent something like a laser, but to probe deeper into the fundamentals of reality. The first actual existing lasers emerged only 40 years later, and only then did corporations begin to be interested. More examples are Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), a military research lab, and CERN, the operator of the world’s largest particle accelerator. Between them, they serendipitously invented the key technologies of the internet, something that no one could have foreseen.\n\nGovernments have both the resources and the patience to invest in open-ended and long-term projects like this, whereas for corporations, this would have been too risky to be a sensible business decision.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d876310dae934c615e491aec3a4aabbf", "text": "economic policy economy general philosophy political philosophy house would The procedural justice of free exchange is important, but is presumes that humans are born with equal talents and in equally enabling environments. This is obviously not true: people can be born to parents with high or low socio-economic status and the talents they are born with, like IQ, are normally distributed.\n\nSuppose you’re born with high talents but to parents with a low socio-economic status. That means your parents do not have enough income to spend on your education: their money is all spent on the basic necessities like food and housing. Since you don’t get the education you need to further develop your talents, you will also likely remain stuck in the same socio-economic class, as will your children, and their children. At the same time, the children of rich parents get more opportunities: even when they’re moderately talented, their parents can invest in maximally developing their talents or even give them a large endowment to live from.\n\nAn example of this lack of ‘social mobility’ is the United States, where parental income is an important predictor of a child’s future (Upper Bound, 2010). This is not just a gross and unfair inequality: it is also an infringement upon the liberty of the individual, who, in a free market, is effectively and structurally constrained to develop his or her own talents.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4702f32c607d4d78b6cac386ac80a2d6", "text": "economic policy economy general philosophy political philosophy house would It’s not true that all markets naturally lead to a concentration of power. Whenever concentration of market power, even leading up to a monopoly, does happen, this is caused by the underlying cost structure of the industry, whereby a company experiences increasing returns to scale and relatively high fixed costs. This means it is most efficient for the first entrant in a market to become as big as possible, as fast as possible. An example of such a natural monopoly used to be the markets for utilities: when the distributing networks for water or energy weren’t built yet, the first company to expand would gain a natural monopoly.\n\nGiven that a natural monopoly is a consequence of the underlying cost structure of the industry, there is not much one can do to change it. Basically, one can choose between a private unregulated monopoly, private monopoly regulated by the state, and government monopoly (Capitalism and Freedom, 2002). Of these, the private monopoly is best. A government monopoly would not just be a monopoly, but would also have the force of law to back it – the result would be the most direct form of regulatory capture, where the business interest takes over the public interest of the government agency.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d3d34e426e9e70ee779b0589c8475187", "text": "economic policy economy general philosophy political philosophy house would The notion that labour alienates might have looked true in Marx’s days, but nowadays, employers have learnt that if they want to get the most from their workforce, they need to make their jobs meaningful. Employers can do this by offering work that fits an employee’s ‘intrinsic motivation’ (Intrinsic motivation at work, 2009), and by designing the work process in such a way that it facilitates ‘flow’ (Beyond boredom and anxiety, 2000). Interestingly, these days, companies actually compete for labour by making their work environment more meaningful, as for example Google’s ‘Life at Google’-page shows (Life at Google).\n\nAs to the idea of allowing a market in organs: if people willingly and knowingly choose to sell their organs, what is wrong with it?\n\nAlso, consider the status quo: demand is still there, but the prohibition effectively lowers supply, leading to a significant number of deaths every year for lack of donor organs. Why is that morally more justifiable?\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "aadf8ac6ac6f5de3c635dd7a5af4897e", "text": "economic policy economy general philosophy political philosophy house would A free market can only operate when some basic conditions have been met. One of these is the condition that exchange of private property is possible. It’s important to realize that private property is both a normative concept but also a legal reality: in everyday life, private property exists because there are contracts and title deeds that prove that something is my private property.\n\nThis legal dimension of private property is key to realizing how the government can make free markets work even for common and public goods. The key is to create private property rights that are rivalrous and excludable, and enforce them accordingly. It is these private property rights that are traded, not necessarily the good itself (The Private Production of Public Goods, 1970).\n\nFor the public good of roads, the private property right the government can create is the right to operate a toll booth on that road. For the common good of fisheries, the government can create conditional exploitation rights to private actors, and for carbon dioxide emitting industries, the government can create limited, tradable emissions rights. The most well-known example of government created private property rights is intellectual property: even though listening to music is non-rivalrous and with the internet, relatively non-excludable, the government’s enforcement of intellectual property allows a business like iTunes to survive and thrive.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "97ce5595e4a785b5de4c157b8e1b3581", "text": "economic policy economy general philosophy political philosophy house would The free market best ensures innovation\n\nCompanies in the free market not only compete on price, the also compete on innovation. This is because innovation allows companies to ‘leapfrog the competition’ by either driving their competitors out of the market by suddenly being able to provide a similar good for a fraction of the cost, or by creating a completely new market for a good or service. In the latter case, the company can expect to reap monopoly-profits for a while until the competition catches up. The corollary of this is that this innovation literally destroys older, more inefficient businesses in a process called ‘creative destruction’ (Capitalism, socialism and democracy, 2008).\n\nCurrently well-known examples of this are Apples’ iPad, which created a market for tablet computers that didn’t exist before, Microsoft’s capturing of the PC-software market or Google’s search engine, which made the competition irrelevant overnight.\n\nThese monopolies are, by their nature, temporary: the benefits of creating a new market are so large, that companies structurally and continuously dedicate resources to ‘out-innovate’ the current monopolies and create a new temporary monopoly for themselves. In this way, innovation becomes the key driver of every business (The Free Market Innovation Machine, 2004).\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "611dbce562370259e8d56f797ce7f544", "text": "economic policy economy general philosophy political philosophy house would The free market is morally superior because it operates on liberty\n\nLiberty is one of the highest values human beings strive for. Liberty means that individuals ‘own’ themselves: individuals only decide for themselves what to do with their minds and bodies during their lifetime. Private property is an extension of this, because private property comes about by undertaking an activity with one’s own body or mind: when I pluck apples from a wild apple tree, they become my property through me using my own body to do the plucking. Similarly, free exchange is an extension of this, because it only comes about if both parties perceive the exchange to be beneficial to them: I will only sell the apples I plucked if I get more value in exchange than the value that continued possession of the apples gives me.\n\nFree markets are the only system of allocating goods and wealth in society that relies on these basic notions of liberty to operate. If someone becomes rich in a free market, then that came about through free exchange: this person has provided so many goods and services of value to other people, that they gave him or her great wealth in return.\n\nCompare this to the government redistributing wealth: that would require the government appropriating part of someone’s income via taxes. That income is private property. Appropriating private property, not voluntary exchange, amounts to theft, which means that taxes are a form of theft and therefore a significant harm to individual liberty. Free markets don’t harm liberty like this, which is why they are morally superior.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "058cc6e4455678f264c13f8d1fff3b6e", "text": "economic policy economy general philosophy political philosophy house would The free market fails in providing public and common goods\n\nA ‘common good’ is a resource which has finite but replenishable supply but which is by its nature ‘non-excludable’ (meaning it’s hard to exclude individuals from using the resource). One example is the stock of fish in the sea. If all fishermen would refrain from overfishing, the fish population would have time to restore itself. But each individual fisherman has an incentive to capture and sell as much as possible. Since in a free market, there is no government coordinating supply and demand, each fisherman acts on their individual incentives. The result is rapid, irreversible depletion of the common good (Tragedy of the commons, 1968).\n\nA ‘public good’ is a resource which is also ‘non-excludable’ but is also ‘non-rivalrous’, that is a good whose consumption by one consumer still allows simultaneous consumption by other consumers. One example of this is the air we breathe: every breath I take does not prevent you from taking a breath, nor can I feasibly exclude you from breathing. Other examples of public goods are schools, roads and national defense. Public goods suffer from the ‘free rider’ problem: once the good is produced, no one has an incentive to pay for the good. Since the good is non-excludable, no one can prevent someone from using it. This also leads to what economists call ‘negative externalities’: industries can freely pollute the air we breathe and not bear the costs for it. The issues of climate change are a direct example of this: corporations aren’t forced to pay for the negative externality of emitting greenhouse gases, and so continue doing it.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0d80e232077b66210459ca141521a490", "text": "economic policy economy general philosophy political philosophy house would The free market naturally leads to concentration of power in the hands of corporations\n\nMany global markets are dominated by a few big firms: look, for example, to the markets in fast food, dominated by McDonald’s, or the market for drilling and selling oil, dominated by Exxon, Shell and BP. This concentration of market power is natural outcome of free markets, this is because of economies of scale – a production line can produce each individual unit faster and more cheaply than if products were made individually. Also partly because the transaction costs of markets are too high (i.e. the costs of negotiating, monitoring and managing all the exchange relations necessary for production and distribution of the good or service involved), corporations have an incentive to structurally organize themselves into large firms (The Nature of the Firm, 1937). This also creates barriers to entry; while an individual may be able to manufacture an individual unit it is much more difficult to set up a whole factory from scratch in order to compete, there is then little possibility of competitors entering the market as a result of price rises.\n\nBeing so large gives them an unfair advantage towards both their suppliers and their consumers. Large firms can collude to form oligopolies. This generates more profit for the firms involved, but raises prices above the market clearing price for consumers as the firms agree not to undercut each other, this may also be informal simply raising prices by reducing the amount of choice or supply.\n\nVis-à-vis their suppliers, these firms gain an equally unfair bargaining advantage. A prime example is the market for (low skilled) labour: with a surplus of (low skilled) labour, each individual worker either has to accept a very low wage or be replaced by someone who does want to work for that low wage. This unequal bargaining power keeps the price for labour very low, so low that workers have no surplus budget to invest in themselves to be able gain skills, negotiate better jobs and thereby lift themselves out of poverty.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6e2c3e8332ff98f0e8607b3c30accd6b", "text": "economic policy economy general philosophy political philosophy house would The free market degrades human dignity\n\nThe free market views the human body and the human mind as a mere instrument: the only value an individual being has is the value it can sell its labour (whether it be manual or mental work) for on the market. Workers don’t work because they want to produce something they themselves find inherently valuable; they work to earn a living. And given that most people are not entrepreneurs or business owners, this means that most people will spend the most of their waking day labouring for goals set to them by others, in partial processes subdivided and defined for them by others, all to create products and services which are only valuable to others, not to themselves (Alienation, 1977).\n\nThis commodification of the human body and mind can go so far that humans actually start selling themselves: free market proponents propose to legalize the selling of one’s own organs. When humans start selling themselves, they perceive no value in themselves anymore – all they see in themselves is an instrument to satisfy other people’s desires, a product to be packaged and sold.\n\nThis becomes even more pronounced when we take into account that the free market exacerbates inequality: if someone is born into a poor family and can’t get out of it, it might seem the only way to get out of it, is to sell oneself. Thus, the proposal to legalize the selling of one’s own organs amounts to an ‘unconscionable choice’: a choice which is, given the circumstances, unreasonable to ask of someone.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
01340399e5de0358093b5c8b82ed2def	The minimum wage provides a baseline minimum allowing people to embark freely in the pursuit of happiness Without a minimum wage, the lowest paid members of society are relegated to effective serfdom, and their decisions of these members often force others to follow suit, accepting similarly low wages. There is no real freedom of choice for people at this lowest level of the social structure, since they must accept whatever wage is offered in order to feed themselves and their families. Their poverty and desperation for work makes it much more difficult for them to act collectively to bargain for better wages. The minimum wage frees people from this bondage and guarantees them resources with which to make meaningful choices. [1] Without resources there can be no true choice, as all choices would be coerced by necessity. Because people’s choices are intrinsically interconnected, and wages tend to reflect the prevailing pressures of demand and supply, when an individual makes the choice to work for less than anyone else, he necessarily lowers the wage that others can ask, leading to a downward spiral of wages as workers undercut one another, each competing to prove he is worth the least. A minimum wage ensures workers do not harm each other through self-destructive wage competition. [2] What the minimum wage does to alleviate these problems is that it gives individuals the ability to pursue the good life, something that has become a global ideal. People want to be happy, and find that only way to obtain the resources necessary to attain comfort and security is through employment. Fundamentally, the minimum wage grants the freedom not to be exploited, giving individuals the freedom to control their own destinies. [1] Waltman, The Politics of the Minimum Wage, 2000 [2] Hillman, Public Finance and Public Policy: Responsibilities and Limitations of Government, 2009	[ { "docid": "0aaec8337a8bd3c3dbb879239f7d16b5", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage While it is of course socially desirable that everyone be able to find gainful employment and pursue happiness, this is not accomplished even remotely by the existence of a minimum wage. In fact, it denies more people the ability to pursue happiness because the minimum wage forces unemployment up as it becomes more expensive to hire workers. The choice to work should belong to the individual, whether his decisions have an effect on the wages of others or not. Individuals can only have control of their destinies when they are not limited in the range of their potential actions, which must include the right to sell their labor at whatever rate they find acceptable, be it at some arbitrary minimum or lower.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "4a5e839af8bc20c25097e6b788a4a0e3", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The incentive to enter the illicit market is actually higher when there is a minimum wage. While the relative advantage of entering the black market might be diminished for some who can enter the legitimate workforce and find employment, the higher numbers of people now unemployed would find it necessary either to seek welfare payments from the government or find alternative employment. Such employment could be readily found in the illegal market.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6e1606adab31810db92c4a76d1d814d2", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage Employers are not stupid. Many do see the value of higher paid workers and appreciate their harder work and dedication. That is exactly why a minimum wage is unnecessary; firms in pursuit of their own self-interest will pay workers competitive wages. Furthermore, social welfare payments will not decrease with the advent of a minimum wage since while some workers will not require income supplements from the state, the higher numbers of unemployed workers will look to the state exclusively as their source of income, raising the cost to the state and the taxpayer.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "753f0d78a8bbf08468cdbcc5f012313c", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage There is no social justice in denying people the ability to work. The minimum wage serves to benefit insiders who are employed and harm outsiders who do not have jobs and cannot get them due to the dearth of jobs created by the wage laws. [1] The state may have the best interests of its citizens at heart when it institutes a minimum wage, but it accomplishes little when it leaves more of its citizens without work, and thus dependent upon the state for survival.\n\n[1] Dorn, Minimum Wage Socialism, 2010\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "da87a192bae8b102d6bdc6acfb10d22f", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The state has an obligation to protect people from making bad decisions. Just as it tries to protect people from the harms of drugs by making them illegal, the state protects people from exploitation by setting wages at a baseline minimum. Everyone deserves a living wage, but they will not get this if there is no minimum wage. Businesses ruthlessly seeking to increase profit margins will always seek to reduce wages. This behavior is particularly harmful to those who receive the lowest wages. Upholding the right to work for any wage does not give people on the lowest wages a real choice, since it means people must work for what they are given, resulting in terrible exploitation. [1] Clearly, the minimum wage is a necessary safeguard for the protection of the weak and the vulnerable, and to guard people from unconscionable choices that an absolute right to work would force. Furthermore, the right to work does not mean much if an individual can only find employment in jobs which pay so lowly that they cannot support themselves. Thus, there is little difference between being employed below the minimum wage and being unemployed at the minimum wage. When employed, a person is no longer on unemployment statistics and the government has less pressure to act. When unemployed, they have the incentive and time to campaign for government action.\n\n[1] Waltman, The Politics of the Minimum Wage, 2000\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8a367c8417fcf930b3141afec35a3cc7", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage Businesses are concerned with their bottom line. They will pay workers as little as possible in order to maximize profits. Certainly in some businesses employers require highly skilled workers for which they will be willing to pay competitive wages. However, the people who most require worker protection, those on minimum wage, are generally unskilled and interchangeable with a large body of potential employees. For this reason there is little impetus to pay workers at the lowest echelons of firms anything but the lowest possible wages. Even if some firms are willing to offer comparatively higher wages to entice honest and diligent non-skilled workers, the overall wage schedule will be depressed as far as is economically possible.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9e69f6136617a2fb61f5029fcca2474c", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage While economies may bounce back somewhat less quickly from downturns if wages are prevented from falling beneath a set minimum, it is a worthwhile sacrifice for the sake of preventing the exploitation of workers. The minimum wage is particularly important to uphold in times of recession, since increased unemployment encourages employers to slash wages unmercifully. Such reductions can severely harm individuals and families that often suffer from reductions in real wealth as a result of recessions. Furthermore, in the case of competitiveness, companies do not make their decisions of where to locate based solely on prevailing wage rates. Rather, they value educated, socially stable populations. A minimum wage ensures that working individuals have the resources to provide for the necessities of their families and tends to promote social stability and contentment by engendering feelings of social buy-in that are absent in the presence of exploitation and meager wages. [1] Furthermore, it is not clear that the minimum wage has a significantly detrimental impact on employment. [2]\n\n[1] Waltman, The Politics of the Minimum Wage, 2000\n\n[2] Allegretto et al, Do Minimum Wages Really Reduce Teen Employment?, 2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f67beaf412f81b321a9e98e74b4104c0", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage An individual can maintain little dignity when he is subjected to outright exploitation from employers who are unconcerned about their welfare and who have no incentive to pay them anything but the lowest possible wages. A minimum wage ensures that people who find employment can feel real self-worth. Furthermore, if people do indeed only feel self-fulfilled when they are employed, people will be all the more likely to accept poor working conditions and low wages for sake of their self-image. Also, young workers do have means of gaining experience, such as through unpaid internship programs. The minimum wage serves to protect workers of all ages and skill-levels, as no one deserves to be exploited.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "893be2d8b0ae3148f8d4f283d047c85f", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage Higher wages boost economic growth\n\nEmployees work harder when they are paid more, but employers can often be more concerned with the short-term bottom line and will not treat workers in the lowest echelons of their firms with much consideration, viewing them instead as disposable and replaceable economic units. [1] Mandating a minimum wage can thus benefit firms, even if they do not recognize it, by making workers more productive and also fostering a general work ethic. [2] As workers feel more valued in the economic system, the more likely they are to work loyally and diligently for their employers. Furthermore, better pay means more disposable income in the hands of employees, which leads to greater demand by them for goods and services. This demand-induced economic growth is a very important part of economic growth. The more people are able to spend, the more money flows into the economy, leading to more business and higher employment. Without the minimum wage, a downward spiral of spending can ensue, proving deleterious to firms and the economy generally. Additionally, the minimum wage decreases expensive social welfare payments, since workers no longer need as many supplements to their wages from the state in order to make up for the shortfall created by too-low wages.\n\n[1] Freeman, Minimum Wages – Again!, 1994\n\n[2] Filion, EPI’s Minimum Wage Issue Guide, 2009\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7c018edc0668fd95cf2e93bdd6ba35c8", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The minimum wage aids in the propagation of social justice and the fair treatment of workers\n\nBusinesses operating in a free market are concerned principally with their bottom lines. In order to increase profits, firms will seek to exploit workers, to lower wages as far as possible. This exploitation will continue indefinitely, unless the state intervenes. The state does so by implementing a minimum wage. The lowest paid workers tend to be less educated, less skilled, and less organized than higher-paid employees. This makes them the easiest to manipulate and the easiest to replace. [1] In order to stop this outright exploitation of the most vulnerable members of society, the power of wage setting must fall to some extent within the purview of the state. Certainly, it is far better for state, which has citizens’ best interest at heart, to weigh in on the issue of setting wages than businesses, which tend not to care about their workers’ welfare or have competing interests. Furthermore, a minimum wage sends a social signal of valuation; it affirms that all people have worth, cannot be exploited, and are owed by dint of their humanity a certain level of treatment in the workforce, i.e. a minimum wage. This is important as a means to assist the self-empowerment of the poorest members of society, by encouraging them to value themselves. Also, the minimum wage aids in promoting social justice and equality by lowering wage disparities. [2] Citizens of more equal societies tend to have more in common and can share more in the construction of societal goals and aims. This form of social justice is certainly preferable to the class divisions propagated in the absence of a minimum wage, in which a part of society is relegated to permanent wage slavery.\n\n[1] Filion, EPI’s Minimum Wage Issue Guide, 2009\n\n[2] Waltman, The Politics of the Minimum Wage, 2000\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d8b9c66868a07ceed565ca59b9257a25", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The minimum wage encourages people to join the workforce rather than pursuing income through illegal channels\n\nWhen wages are extremely low the incentive to enter alternative markets is increased. This is particularly harmful in the case of illegal markets, such as those for drugs or prostitution. [1] When there is little to be gained from obtaining a legitimate job, no matter how plentiful they might be in the absence of a minimum wage, they would be undesirable by comparison to potentially highly lucrative black market opportunities. The minimum wage is essential for keeping the opportunity cost of entering the black market sufficiently high that people opt always to enter the mainstream, legal market. Furthermore, when the possibility of work in the legitimate market exists, even if work is harder to find due to a minimum wage, the very possibility of getting such a job will serve as a disincentive to pursuing illegal employment.\n\n[1] Kallem, Youth Crime and the Minimum Wage, 2004\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1a59aeedccc7c3c57ada35453fbc4ee6", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage Individuals gain a sense of dignity from employment, as well as develop human capital, that can be denied them by a minimum wage\n\nThe ability to provide for oneself, to not be dependent on handouts, either from the state in the form of welfare or from citizens’ charity, provides individuals with a sense of psychological fulfillment. Having a job is key to many people’s self worth, and most capitalist-based societies place great store in an individual’s employment. Because the minimum wage denies some people the right to work, it necessarily leaves some people unable to gain that sense of fulfillment. [1] When people are unemployed for long stretches of time, they often become discouraged, leaving the workforce entirely. When this happens in communities, people often lose understanding of work entirely. This has occurred in parts of the United States, for example, where a cycle of poverty created by a lack of job opportunities has generated a culture of dependence on the state for welfare handouts. This occurrence, particularly in inner cities has a seriously corrosive effect on society. People who do not work and are not motivated to work have no buy-in with society. This results in crime and social disorder. Furthermore, the minimum wage harms new entrants to the workforce who do not have work experience and thus may be willing to work for less than the prevailing rate. This was once prevalent in many countries, often taking the form of apprenticeship systems. When a minimum wage is enforced, it becomes more difficult for young and inexperienced workers to find employment, as they are comparatively less desirable than more experienced workers who could be employed for the same wage. [2] The result is that young people do not have the opportunity to develop their human capital for the future, permanently disadvantaging them in the workforce. The minimum wage takes workers’ dignity and denies them valuable development for the future.\n\n[1] Dorn, Minimum Wage Socialism, 2010\n\n[2] Butler, Scrap the Minimum Wage, 2010\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ca1e0b0fd5c2ebdd3c6cd75a6ce867db", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The free market tends to treat workers fairly\n\nIn the absence of a minimum wage the free market will not tend toward the exploitation of workers. Rather, wages will reflect the economic situation of a country, guaranteeing that employment will be at the highest possible rate, and not be hampered by an artificial minimum. Some incomes may fall, but overall employment will rise, increasing the general prosperity of the country. [1] Employers understand that high pay promotes hard work. Businesses will not simply slash wages in the absence of a minimum wage, but will rather compete with one another to coax the best and most dedicated workers into their employ. This extends even into the lowest and least-skilled lines of work, as although workers may be largely interchangeable in terms of skill, they are distinct in their level of dedication and honesty. There is thus a premium at all levels of a business to hire workers at competitive wages. Furthermore, employers also take into account that there is a social safety net in virtually every Western country that prevents unemployed workers from starving or losing the barest standard of living. For this reason, wages can never fall below the level of welfare payments, as individuals will necessarily withhold their labor if they can receive the same or better benefit from not working at all than from being employed. Clearly, businesses will seek to employ the best workers and will thus offer competitive wages.\n\n[1] Newmark and Wascher, Minimum Wages, 2010\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b2228c3b8b2a98d785ccecabf3e4b739", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The minimum wage restricts an individual’s fundamental right to work\n\nIndividuals are autonomous beings, capable of making decisions for themselves. This includes the ability to make a value judgment about the value of one’s time and ability. If an individual wishes to sell his labor for a certain price, then he should not be restricted from doing so by the state. A minimum wage is in effect the government saying it can place an appropriate value on an individual, but an individual cannot value himself, which is an absurdity as the individual, who knows himself better than the state ever could, has a better grasp of the value of his own labor. At the most basic level, people should have their right to choice maximized, not circumscribed by arbitrary government impositions. When the state denies individuals the right to choose to work for low wages, it fails in its duty of protection, taking from individuals the right to work while giving them nothing in return other than the chimerical gift of a decent wage, should they ever be able to find a job. [1] Clearly, the minimum wage is an assault on the right to free choice.\n\n[1] Butler, Scrap the Minimum Wage, 2010\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "679b148eb47a8484df75c9a8fd934218", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The minimum wage is little more than a political tool that ultimately harms the overall economy by raising the unemployment rate and driving businesses elsewhere\n\nPoliticians have transformed the minimum wage into an indicator of social development. Governments often cite their raising of the minimum wage as an example of their commitment to fostering social justice and equality. This is all nonsense. The minimum wage is nothing more than a useful, simple tool that politicians can exploit without addressing underlying social and economic ills in society. [1] During times of economic expansion wages are generally rising as new businesses are formed and existing firms take on more capacity and workers. During such times, raising the minimum wage has no effect other than being a useful political move. In times of economic contraction, firms close and lay off workers and unemployment rates rise. In such times, the minimum wage hampers the market from clearing, keeping more people out of work than necessary. For markets to function efficiently, wages must be allowed to fluctuate freely, equilibrating with demand for labor and reflecting the macroeconomic situation. Minimum wages tend to lock in wages at pre-recession levels making countries less competitive and less quick to recover when economic downturns occur. Furthermore, minimum wages can often make countries unattractive for businesses to invest in, as the cost of hiring workers can serve as a serious disincentive. For this reason, businesses tend to locate in countries with no minimum wage laws, such as Germany, or where they are comparably low. In order to stay competitive, to bolster economic dynamism and gain global competitiveness, countries should treat labor like the commodity it is and allow the labor market to self-correct, and not institute minimum wage laws.\n\n[1] Dorn, Minimum Wage Socialism, 2010\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
52fad39c865a7a1a5205aceeec7fe053	The minimum wage encourages people to join the workforce rather than pursuing income through illegal channels When wages are extremely low the incentive to enter alternative markets is increased. This is particularly harmful in the case of illegal markets, such as those for drugs or prostitution. [1] When there is little to be gained from obtaining a legitimate job, no matter how plentiful they might be in the absence of a minimum wage, they would be undesirable by comparison to potentially highly lucrative black market opportunities. The minimum wage is essential for keeping the opportunity cost of entering the black market sufficiently high that people opt always to enter the mainstream, legal market. Furthermore, when the possibility of work in the legitimate market exists, even if work is harder to find due to a minimum wage, the very possibility of getting such a job will serve as a disincentive to pursuing illegal employment. [1] Kallem, Youth Crime and the Minimum Wage, 2004	[ { "docid": "4a5e839af8bc20c25097e6b788a4a0e3", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The incentive to enter the illicit market is actually higher when there is a minimum wage. While the relative advantage of entering the black market might be diminished for some who can enter the legitimate workforce and find employment, the higher numbers of people now unemployed would find it necessary either to seek welfare payments from the government or find alternative employment. Such employment could be readily found in the illegal market.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "0aaec8337a8bd3c3dbb879239f7d16b5", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage While it is of course socially desirable that everyone be able to find gainful employment and pursue happiness, this is not accomplished even remotely by the existence of a minimum wage. In fact, it denies more people the ability to pursue happiness because the minimum wage forces unemployment up as it becomes more expensive to hire workers. The choice to work should belong to the individual, whether his decisions have an effect on the wages of others or not. Individuals can only have control of their destinies when they are not limited in the range of their potential actions, which must include the right to sell their labor at whatever rate they find acceptable, be it at some arbitrary minimum or lower.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6e1606adab31810db92c4a76d1d814d2", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage Employers are not stupid. Many do see the value of higher paid workers and appreciate their harder work and dedication. That is exactly why a minimum wage is unnecessary; firms in pursuit of their own self-interest will pay workers competitive wages. Furthermore, social welfare payments will not decrease with the advent of a minimum wage since while some workers will not require income supplements from the state, the higher numbers of unemployed workers will look to the state exclusively as their source of income, raising the cost to the state and the taxpayer.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "753f0d78a8bbf08468cdbcc5f012313c", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage There is no social justice in denying people the ability to work. The minimum wage serves to benefit insiders who are employed and harm outsiders who do not have jobs and cannot get them due to the dearth of jobs created by the wage laws. [1] The state may have the best interests of its citizens at heart when it institutes a minimum wage, but it accomplishes little when it leaves more of its citizens without work, and thus dependent upon the state for survival.\n\n[1] Dorn, Minimum Wage Socialism, 2010\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "da87a192bae8b102d6bdc6acfb10d22f", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The state has an obligation to protect people from making bad decisions. Just as it tries to protect people from the harms of drugs by making them illegal, the state protects people from exploitation by setting wages at a baseline minimum. Everyone deserves a living wage, but they will not get this if there is no minimum wage. Businesses ruthlessly seeking to increase profit margins will always seek to reduce wages. This behavior is particularly harmful to those who receive the lowest wages. Upholding the right to work for any wage does not give people on the lowest wages a real choice, since it means people must work for what they are given, resulting in terrible exploitation. [1] Clearly, the minimum wage is a necessary safeguard for the protection of the weak and the vulnerable, and to guard people from unconscionable choices that an absolute right to work would force. Furthermore, the right to work does not mean much if an individual can only find employment in jobs which pay so lowly that they cannot support themselves. Thus, there is little difference between being employed below the minimum wage and being unemployed at the minimum wage. When employed, a person is no longer on unemployment statistics and the government has less pressure to act. When unemployed, they have the incentive and time to campaign for government action.\n\n[1] Waltman, The Politics of the Minimum Wage, 2000\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8a367c8417fcf930b3141afec35a3cc7", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage Businesses are concerned with their bottom line. They will pay workers as little as possible in order to maximize profits. Certainly in some businesses employers require highly skilled workers for which they will be willing to pay competitive wages. However, the people who most require worker protection, those on minimum wage, are generally unskilled and interchangeable with a large body of potential employees. For this reason there is little impetus to pay workers at the lowest echelons of firms anything but the lowest possible wages. Even if some firms are willing to offer comparatively higher wages to entice honest and diligent non-skilled workers, the overall wage schedule will be depressed as far as is economically possible.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9e69f6136617a2fb61f5029fcca2474c", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage While economies may bounce back somewhat less quickly from downturns if wages are prevented from falling beneath a set minimum, it is a worthwhile sacrifice for the sake of preventing the exploitation of workers. The minimum wage is particularly important to uphold in times of recession, since increased unemployment encourages employers to slash wages unmercifully. Such reductions can severely harm individuals and families that often suffer from reductions in real wealth as a result of recessions. Furthermore, in the case of competitiveness, companies do not make their decisions of where to locate based solely on prevailing wage rates. Rather, they value educated, socially stable populations. A minimum wage ensures that working individuals have the resources to provide for the necessities of their families and tends to promote social stability and contentment by engendering feelings of social buy-in that are absent in the presence of exploitation and meager wages. [1] Furthermore, it is not clear that the minimum wage has a significantly detrimental impact on employment. [2]\n\n[1] Waltman, The Politics of the Minimum Wage, 2000\n\n[2] Allegretto et al, Do Minimum Wages Really Reduce Teen Employment?, 2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f67beaf412f81b321a9e98e74b4104c0", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage An individual can maintain little dignity when he is subjected to outright exploitation from employers who are unconcerned about their welfare and who have no incentive to pay them anything but the lowest possible wages. A minimum wage ensures that people who find employment can feel real self-worth. Furthermore, if people do indeed only feel self-fulfilled when they are employed, people will be all the more likely to accept poor working conditions and low wages for sake of their self-image. Also, young workers do have means of gaining experience, such as through unpaid internship programs. The minimum wage serves to protect workers of all ages and skill-levels, as no one deserves to be exploited.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6d20440b8a99cb54e571f18ae5388ee6", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The minimum wage provides a baseline minimum allowing people to embark freely in the pursuit of happiness\n\nWithout a minimum wage, the lowest paid members of society are relegated to effective serfdom, and their decisions of these members often force others to follow suit, accepting similarly low wages. There is no real freedom of choice for people at this lowest level of the social structure, since they must accept whatever wage is offered in order to feed themselves and their families. Their poverty and desperation for work makes it much more difficult for them to act collectively to bargain for better wages. The minimum wage frees people from this bondage and guarantees them resources with which to make meaningful choices. [1] Without resources there can be no true choice, as all choices would be coerced by necessity. Because people’s choices are intrinsically interconnected, and wages tend to reflect the prevailing pressures of demand and supply, when an individual makes the choice to work for less than anyone else, he necessarily lowers the wage that others can ask, leading to a downward spiral of wages as workers undercut one another, each competing to prove he is worth the least. A minimum wage ensures workers do not harm each other through self-destructive wage competition. [2] What the minimum wage does to alleviate these problems is that it gives individuals the ability to pursue the good life, something that has become a global ideal. People want to be happy, and find that only way to obtain the resources necessary to attain comfort and security is through employment. Fundamentally, the minimum wage grants the freedom not to be exploited, giving individuals the freedom to control their own destinies.\n\n[1] Waltman, The Politics of the Minimum Wage, 2000\n\n[2] Hillman, Public Finance and Public Policy: Responsibilities and Limitations of Government, 2009\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "893be2d8b0ae3148f8d4f283d047c85f", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage Higher wages boost economic growth\n\nEmployees work harder when they are paid more, but employers can often be more concerned with the short-term bottom line and will not treat workers in the lowest echelons of their firms with much consideration, viewing them instead as disposable and replaceable economic units. [1] Mandating a minimum wage can thus benefit firms, even if they do not recognize it, by making workers more productive and also fostering a general work ethic. [2] As workers feel more valued in the economic system, the more likely they are to work loyally and diligently for their employers. Furthermore, better pay means more disposable income in the hands of employees, which leads to greater demand by them for goods and services. This demand-induced economic growth is a very important part of economic growth. The more people are able to spend, the more money flows into the economy, leading to more business and higher employment. Without the minimum wage, a downward spiral of spending can ensue, proving deleterious to firms and the economy generally. Additionally, the minimum wage decreases expensive social welfare payments, since workers no longer need as many supplements to their wages from the state in order to make up for the shortfall created by too-low wages.\n\n[1] Freeman, Minimum Wages – Again!, 1994\n\n[2] Filion, EPI’s Minimum Wage Issue Guide, 2009\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7c018edc0668fd95cf2e93bdd6ba35c8", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The minimum wage aids in the propagation of social justice and the fair treatment of workers\n\nBusinesses operating in a free market are concerned principally with their bottom lines. In order to increase profits, firms will seek to exploit workers, to lower wages as far as possible. This exploitation will continue indefinitely, unless the state intervenes. The state does so by implementing a minimum wage. The lowest paid workers tend to be less educated, less skilled, and less organized than higher-paid employees. This makes them the easiest to manipulate and the easiest to replace. [1] In order to stop this outright exploitation of the most vulnerable members of society, the power of wage setting must fall to some extent within the purview of the state. Certainly, it is far better for state, which has citizens’ best interest at heart, to weigh in on the issue of setting wages than businesses, which tend not to care about their workers’ welfare or have competing interests. Furthermore, a minimum wage sends a social signal of valuation; it affirms that all people have worth, cannot be exploited, and are owed by dint of their humanity a certain level of treatment in the workforce, i.e. a minimum wage. This is important as a means to assist the self-empowerment of the poorest members of society, by encouraging them to value themselves. Also, the minimum wage aids in promoting social justice and equality by lowering wage disparities. [2] Citizens of more equal societies tend to have more in common and can share more in the construction of societal goals and aims. This form of social justice is certainly preferable to the class divisions propagated in the absence of a minimum wage, in which a part of society is relegated to permanent wage slavery.\n\n[1] Filion, EPI’s Minimum Wage Issue Guide, 2009\n\n[2] Waltman, The Politics of the Minimum Wage, 2000\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1a59aeedccc7c3c57ada35453fbc4ee6", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage Individuals gain a sense of dignity from employment, as well as develop human capital, that can be denied them by a minimum wage\n\nThe ability to provide for oneself, to not be dependent on handouts, either from the state in the form of welfare or from citizens’ charity, provides individuals with a sense of psychological fulfillment. Having a job is key to many people’s self worth, and most capitalist-based societies place great store in an individual’s employment. Because the minimum wage denies some people the right to work, it necessarily leaves some people unable to gain that sense of fulfillment. [1] When people are unemployed for long stretches of time, they often become discouraged, leaving the workforce entirely. When this happens in communities, people often lose understanding of work entirely. This has occurred in parts of the United States, for example, where a cycle of poverty created by a lack of job opportunities has generated a culture of dependence on the state for welfare handouts. This occurrence, particularly in inner cities has a seriously corrosive effect on society. People who do not work and are not motivated to work have no buy-in with society. This results in crime and social disorder. Furthermore, the minimum wage harms new entrants to the workforce who do not have work experience and thus may be willing to work for less than the prevailing rate. This was once prevalent in many countries, often taking the form of apprenticeship systems. When a minimum wage is enforced, it becomes more difficult for young and inexperienced workers to find employment, as they are comparatively less desirable than more experienced workers who could be employed for the same wage. [2] The result is that young people do not have the opportunity to develop their human capital for the future, permanently disadvantaging them in the workforce. The minimum wage takes workers’ dignity and denies them valuable development for the future.\n\n[1] Dorn, Minimum Wage Socialism, 2010\n\n[2] Butler, Scrap the Minimum Wage, 2010\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ca1e0b0fd5c2ebdd3c6cd75a6ce867db", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The free market tends to treat workers fairly\n\nIn the absence of a minimum wage the free market will not tend toward the exploitation of workers. Rather, wages will reflect the economic situation of a country, guaranteeing that employment will be at the highest possible rate, and not be hampered by an artificial minimum. Some incomes may fall, but overall employment will rise, increasing the general prosperity of the country. [1] Employers understand that high pay promotes hard work. Businesses will not simply slash wages in the absence of a minimum wage, but will rather compete with one another to coax the best and most dedicated workers into their employ. This extends even into the lowest and least-skilled lines of work, as although workers may be largely interchangeable in terms of skill, they are distinct in their level of dedication and honesty. There is thus a premium at all levels of a business to hire workers at competitive wages. Furthermore, employers also take into account that there is a social safety net in virtually every Western country that prevents unemployed workers from starving or losing the barest standard of living. For this reason, wages can never fall below the level of welfare payments, as individuals will necessarily withhold their labor if they can receive the same or better benefit from not working at all than from being employed. Clearly, businesses will seek to employ the best workers and will thus offer competitive wages.\n\n[1] Newmark and Wascher, Minimum Wages, 2010\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b2228c3b8b2a98d785ccecabf3e4b739", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The minimum wage restricts an individual’s fundamental right to work\n\nIndividuals are autonomous beings, capable of making decisions for themselves. This includes the ability to make a value judgment about the value of one’s time and ability. If an individual wishes to sell his labor for a certain price, then he should not be restricted from doing so by the state. A minimum wage is in effect the government saying it can place an appropriate value on an individual, but an individual cannot value himself, which is an absurdity as the individual, who knows himself better than the state ever could, has a better grasp of the value of his own labor. At the most basic level, people should have their right to choice maximized, not circumscribed by arbitrary government impositions. When the state denies individuals the right to choose to work for low wages, it fails in its duty of protection, taking from individuals the right to work while giving them nothing in return other than the chimerical gift of a decent wage, should they ever be able to find a job. [1] Clearly, the minimum wage is an assault on the right to free choice.\n\n[1] Butler, Scrap the Minimum Wage, 2010\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "679b148eb47a8484df75c9a8fd934218", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The minimum wage is little more than a political tool that ultimately harms the overall economy by raising the unemployment rate and driving businesses elsewhere\n\nPoliticians have transformed the minimum wage into an indicator of social development. Governments often cite their raising of the minimum wage as an example of their commitment to fostering social justice and equality. This is all nonsense. The minimum wage is nothing more than a useful, simple tool that politicians can exploit without addressing underlying social and economic ills in society. [1] During times of economic expansion wages are generally rising as new businesses are formed and existing firms take on more capacity and workers. During such times, raising the minimum wage has no effect other than being a useful political move. In times of economic contraction, firms close and lay off workers and unemployment rates rise. In such times, the minimum wage hampers the market from clearing, keeping more people out of work than necessary. For markets to function efficiently, wages must be allowed to fluctuate freely, equilibrating with demand for labor and reflecting the macroeconomic situation. Minimum wages tend to lock in wages at pre-recession levels making countries less competitive and less quick to recover when economic downturns occur. Furthermore, minimum wages can often make countries unattractive for businesses to invest in, as the cost of hiring workers can serve as a serious disincentive. For this reason, businesses tend to locate in countries with no minimum wage laws, such as Germany, or where they are comparably low. In order to stay competitive, to bolster economic dynamism and gain global competitiveness, countries should treat labor like the commodity it is and allow the labor market to self-correct, and not institute minimum wage laws.\n\n[1] Dorn, Minimum Wage Socialism, 2010\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
14203a2a3d2c9aa0f75ac0796e92811b	Individuals gain a sense of dignity from employment, as well as develop human capital, that can be denied them by a minimum wage The ability to provide for oneself, to not be dependent on handouts, either from the state in the form of welfare or from citizens’ charity, provides individuals with a sense of psychological fulfillment. Having a job is key to many people’s self worth, and most capitalist-based societies place great store in an individual’s employment. Because the minimum wage denies some people the right to work, it necessarily leaves some people unable to gain that sense of fulfillment. [1] When people are unemployed for long stretches of time, they often become discouraged, leaving the workforce entirely. When this happens in communities, people often lose understanding of work entirely. This has occurred in parts of the United States, for example, where a cycle of poverty created by a lack of job opportunities has generated a culture of dependence on the state for welfare handouts. This occurrence, particularly in inner cities has a seriously corrosive effect on society. People who do not work and are not motivated to work have no buy-in with society. This results in crime and social disorder. Furthermore, the minimum wage harms new entrants to the workforce who do not have work experience and thus may be willing to work for less than the prevailing rate. This was once prevalent in many countries, often taking the form of apprenticeship systems. When a minimum wage is enforced, it becomes more difficult for young and inexperienced workers to find employment, as they are comparatively less desirable than more experienced workers who could be employed for the same wage. [2] The result is that young people do not have the opportunity to develop their human capital for the future, permanently disadvantaging them in the workforce. The minimum wage takes workers’ dignity and denies them valuable development for the future. [1] Dorn, Minimum Wage Socialism, 2010 [2] Butler, Scrap the Minimum Wage, 2010	[ { "docid": "f67beaf412f81b321a9e98e74b4104c0", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage An individual can maintain little dignity when he is subjected to outright exploitation from employers who are unconcerned about their welfare and who have no incentive to pay them anything but the lowest possible wages. A minimum wage ensures that people who find employment can feel real self-worth. Furthermore, if people do indeed only feel self-fulfilled when they are employed, people will be all the more likely to accept poor working conditions and low wages for sake of their self-image. Also, young workers do have means of gaining experience, such as through unpaid internship programs. The minimum wage serves to protect workers of all ages and skill-levels, as no one deserves to be exploited.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "da87a192bae8b102d6bdc6acfb10d22f", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The state has an obligation to protect people from making bad decisions. Just as it tries to protect people from the harms of drugs by making them illegal, the state protects people from exploitation by setting wages at a baseline minimum. Everyone deserves a living wage, but they will not get this if there is no minimum wage. Businesses ruthlessly seeking to increase profit margins will always seek to reduce wages. This behavior is particularly harmful to those who receive the lowest wages. Upholding the right to work for any wage does not give people on the lowest wages a real choice, since it means people must work for what they are given, resulting in terrible exploitation. [1] Clearly, the minimum wage is a necessary safeguard for the protection of the weak and the vulnerable, and to guard people from unconscionable choices that an absolute right to work would force. Furthermore, the right to work does not mean much if an individual can only find employment in jobs which pay so lowly that they cannot support themselves. Thus, there is little difference between being employed below the minimum wage and being unemployed at the minimum wage. When employed, a person is no longer on unemployment statistics and the government has less pressure to act. When unemployed, they have the incentive and time to campaign for government action.\n\n[1] Waltman, The Politics of the Minimum Wage, 2000\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8a367c8417fcf930b3141afec35a3cc7", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage Businesses are concerned with their bottom line. They will pay workers as little as possible in order to maximize profits. Certainly in some businesses employers require highly skilled workers for which they will be willing to pay competitive wages. However, the people who most require worker protection, those on minimum wage, are generally unskilled and interchangeable with a large body of potential employees. For this reason there is little impetus to pay workers at the lowest echelons of firms anything but the lowest possible wages. Even if some firms are willing to offer comparatively higher wages to entice honest and diligent non-skilled workers, the overall wage schedule will be depressed as far as is economically possible.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9e69f6136617a2fb61f5029fcca2474c", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage While economies may bounce back somewhat less quickly from downturns if wages are prevented from falling beneath a set minimum, it is a worthwhile sacrifice for the sake of preventing the exploitation of workers. The minimum wage is particularly important to uphold in times of recession, since increased unemployment encourages employers to slash wages unmercifully. Such reductions can severely harm individuals and families that often suffer from reductions in real wealth as a result of recessions. Furthermore, in the case of competitiveness, companies do not make their decisions of where to locate based solely on prevailing wage rates. Rather, they value educated, socially stable populations. A minimum wage ensures that working individuals have the resources to provide for the necessities of their families and tends to promote social stability and contentment by engendering feelings of social buy-in that are absent in the presence of exploitation and meager wages. [1] Furthermore, it is not clear that the minimum wage has a significantly detrimental impact on employment. [2]\n\n[1] Waltman, The Politics of the Minimum Wage, 2000\n\n[2] Allegretto et al, Do Minimum Wages Really Reduce Teen Employment?, 2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0aaec8337a8bd3c3dbb879239f7d16b5", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage While it is of course socially desirable that everyone be able to find gainful employment and pursue happiness, this is not accomplished even remotely by the existence of a minimum wage. In fact, it denies more people the ability to pursue happiness because the minimum wage forces unemployment up as it becomes more expensive to hire workers. The choice to work should belong to the individual, whether his decisions have an effect on the wages of others or not. Individuals can only have control of their destinies when they are not limited in the range of their potential actions, which must include the right to sell their labor at whatever rate they find acceptable, be it at some arbitrary minimum or lower.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4a5e839af8bc20c25097e6b788a4a0e3", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The incentive to enter the illicit market is actually higher when there is a minimum wage. While the relative advantage of entering the black market might be diminished for some who can enter the legitimate workforce and find employment, the higher numbers of people now unemployed would find it necessary either to seek welfare payments from the government or find alternative employment. Such employment could be readily found in the illegal market.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6e1606adab31810db92c4a76d1d814d2", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage Employers are not stupid. Many do see the value of higher paid workers and appreciate their harder work and dedication. That is exactly why a minimum wage is unnecessary; firms in pursuit of their own self-interest will pay workers competitive wages. Furthermore, social welfare payments will not decrease with the advent of a minimum wage since while some workers will not require income supplements from the state, the higher numbers of unemployed workers will look to the state exclusively as their source of income, raising the cost to the state and the taxpayer.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "753f0d78a8bbf08468cdbcc5f012313c", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage There is no social justice in denying people the ability to work. The minimum wage serves to benefit insiders who are employed and harm outsiders who do not have jobs and cannot get them due to the dearth of jobs created by the wage laws. [1] The state may have the best interests of its citizens at heart when it institutes a minimum wage, but it accomplishes little when it leaves more of its citizens without work, and thus dependent upon the state for survival.\n\n[1] Dorn, Minimum Wage Socialism, 2010\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ca1e0b0fd5c2ebdd3c6cd75a6ce867db", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The free market tends to treat workers fairly\n\nIn the absence of a minimum wage the free market will not tend toward the exploitation of workers. Rather, wages will reflect the economic situation of a country, guaranteeing that employment will be at the highest possible rate, and not be hampered by an artificial minimum. Some incomes may fall, but overall employment will rise, increasing the general prosperity of the country. [1] Employers understand that high pay promotes hard work. Businesses will not simply slash wages in the absence of a minimum wage, but will rather compete with one another to coax the best and most dedicated workers into their employ. This extends even into the lowest and least-skilled lines of work, as although workers may be largely interchangeable in terms of skill, they are distinct in their level of dedication and honesty. There is thus a premium at all levels of a business to hire workers at competitive wages. Furthermore, employers also take into account that there is a social safety net in virtually every Western country that prevents unemployed workers from starving or losing the barest standard of living. For this reason, wages can never fall below the level of welfare payments, as individuals will necessarily withhold their labor if they can receive the same or better benefit from not working at all than from being employed. Clearly, businesses will seek to employ the best workers and will thus offer competitive wages.\n\n[1] Newmark and Wascher, Minimum Wages, 2010\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b2228c3b8b2a98d785ccecabf3e4b739", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The minimum wage restricts an individual’s fundamental right to work\n\nIndividuals are autonomous beings, capable of making decisions for themselves. This includes the ability to make a value judgment about the value of one’s time and ability. If an individual wishes to sell his labor for a certain price, then he should not be restricted from doing so by the state. A minimum wage is in effect the government saying it can place an appropriate value on an individual, but an individual cannot value himself, which is an absurdity as the individual, who knows himself better than the state ever could, has a better grasp of the value of his own labor. At the most basic level, people should have their right to choice maximized, not circumscribed by arbitrary government impositions. When the state denies individuals the right to choose to work for low wages, it fails in its duty of protection, taking from individuals the right to work while giving them nothing in return other than the chimerical gift of a decent wage, should they ever be able to find a job. [1] Clearly, the minimum wage is an assault on the right to free choice.\n\n[1] Butler, Scrap the Minimum Wage, 2010\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "679b148eb47a8484df75c9a8fd934218", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The minimum wage is little more than a political tool that ultimately harms the overall economy by raising the unemployment rate and driving businesses elsewhere\n\nPoliticians have transformed the minimum wage into an indicator of social development. Governments often cite their raising of the minimum wage as an example of their commitment to fostering social justice and equality. This is all nonsense. The minimum wage is nothing more than a useful, simple tool that politicians can exploit without addressing underlying social and economic ills in society. [1] During times of economic expansion wages are generally rising as new businesses are formed and existing firms take on more capacity and workers. During such times, raising the minimum wage has no effect other than being a useful political move. In times of economic contraction, firms close and lay off workers and unemployment rates rise. In such times, the minimum wage hampers the market from clearing, keeping more people out of work than necessary. For markets to function efficiently, wages must be allowed to fluctuate freely, equilibrating with demand for labor and reflecting the macroeconomic situation. Minimum wages tend to lock in wages at pre-recession levels making countries less competitive and less quick to recover when economic downturns occur. Furthermore, minimum wages can often make countries unattractive for businesses to invest in, as the cost of hiring workers can serve as a serious disincentive. For this reason, businesses tend to locate in countries with no minimum wage laws, such as Germany, or where they are comparably low. In order to stay competitive, to bolster economic dynamism and gain global competitiveness, countries should treat labor like the commodity it is and allow the labor market to self-correct, and not institute minimum wage laws.\n\n[1] Dorn, Minimum Wage Socialism, 2010\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6d20440b8a99cb54e571f18ae5388ee6", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The minimum wage provides a baseline minimum allowing people to embark freely in the pursuit of happiness\n\nWithout a minimum wage, the lowest paid members of society are relegated to effective serfdom, and their decisions of these members often force others to follow suit, accepting similarly low wages. There is no real freedom of choice for people at this lowest level of the social structure, since they must accept whatever wage is offered in order to feed themselves and their families. Their poverty and desperation for work makes it much more difficult for them to act collectively to bargain for better wages. The minimum wage frees people from this bondage and guarantees them resources with which to make meaningful choices. [1] Without resources there can be no true choice, as all choices would be coerced by necessity. Because people’s choices are intrinsically interconnected, and wages tend to reflect the prevailing pressures of demand and supply, when an individual makes the choice to work for less than anyone else, he necessarily lowers the wage that others can ask, leading to a downward spiral of wages as workers undercut one another, each competing to prove he is worth the least. A minimum wage ensures workers do not harm each other through self-destructive wage competition. [2] What the minimum wage does to alleviate these problems is that it gives individuals the ability to pursue the good life, something that has become a global ideal. People want to be happy, and find that only way to obtain the resources necessary to attain comfort and security is through employment. Fundamentally, the minimum wage grants the freedom not to be exploited, giving individuals the freedom to control their own destinies.\n\n[1] Waltman, The Politics of the Minimum Wage, 2000\n\n[2] Hillman, Public Finance and Public Policy: Responsibilities and Limitations of Government, 2009\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "893be2d8b0ae3148f8d4f283d047c85f", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage Higher wages boost economic growth\n\nEmployees work harder when they are paid more, but employers can often be more concerned with the short-term bottom line and will not treat workers in the lowest echelons of their firms with much consideration, viewing them instead as disposable and replaceable economic units. [1] Mandating a minimum wage can thus benefit firms, even if they do not recognize it, by making workers more productive and also fostering a general work ethic. [2] As workers feel more valued in the economic system, the more likely they are to work loyally and diligently for their employers. Furthermore, better pay means more disposable income in the hands of employees, which leads to greater demand by them for goods and services. This demand-induced economic growth is a very important part of economic growth. The more people are able to spend, the more money flows into the economy, leading to more business and higher employment. Without the minimum wage, a downward spiral of spending can ensue, proving deleterious to firms and the economy generally. Additionally, the minimum wage decreases expensive social welfare payments, since workers no longer need as many supplements to their wages from the state in order to make up for the shortfall created by too-low wages.\n\n[1] Freeman, Minimum Wages – Again!, 1994\n\n[2] Filion, EPI’s Minimum Wage Issue Guide, 2009\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7c018edc0668fd95cf2e93bdd6ba35c8", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The minimum wage aids in the propagation of social justice and the fair treatment of workers\n\nBusinesses operating in a free market are concerned principally with their bottom lines. In order to increase profits, firms will seek to exploit workers, to lower wages as far as possible. This exploitation will continue indefinitely, unless the state intervenes. The state does so by implementing a minimum wage. The lowest paid workers tend to be less educated, less skilled, and less organized than higher-paid employees. This makes them the easiest to manipulate and the easiest to replace. [1] In order to stop this outright exploitation of the most vulnerable members of society, the power of wage setting must fall to some extent within the purview of the state. Certainly, it is far better for state, which has citizens’ best interest at heart, to weigh in on the issue of setting wages than businesses, which tend not to care about their workers’ welfare or have competing interests. Furthermore, a minimum wage sends a social signal of valuation; it affirms that all people have worth, cannot be exploited, and are owed by dint of their humanity a certain level of treatment in the workforce, i.e. a minimum wage. This is important as a means to assist the self-empowerment of the poorest members of society, by encouraging them to value themselves. Also, the minimum wage aids in promoting social justice and equality by lowering wage disparities. [2] Citizens of more equal societies tend to have more in common and can share more in the construction of societal goals and aims. This form of social justice is certainly preferable to the class divisions propagated in the absence of a minimum wage, in which a part of society is relegated to permanent wage slavery.\n\n[1] Filion, EPI’s Minimum Wage Issue Guide, 2009\n\n[2] Waltman, The Politics of the Minimum Wage, 2000\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d8b9c66868a07ceed565ca59b9257a25", "text": "business economic policy economy general house believes national minimum wage The minimum wage encourages people to join the workforce rather than pursuing income through illegal channels\n\nWhen wages are extremely low the incentive to enter alternative markets is increased. This is particularly harmful in the case of illegal markets, such as those for drugs or prostitution. [1] When there is little to be gained from obtaining a legitimate job, no matter how plentiful they might be in the absence of a minimum wage, they would be undesirable by comparison to potentially highly lucrative black market opportunities. The minimum wage is essential for keeping the opportunity cost of entering the black market sufficiently high that people opt always to enter the mainstream, legal market. Furthermore, when the possibility of work in the legitimate market exists, even if work is harder to find due to a minimum wage, the very possibility of getting such a job will serve as a disincentive to pursuing illegal employment.\n\n[1] Kallem, Youth Crime and the Minimum Wage, 2004\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
97fed8bae25127190ac0fc72231f1eef	The inferiority complex within older generations in the developing countries affects intellectuals’ sense of belonging while in their countries An inferiority complex still exists among the older generations in the developing countries as regards the western technical know-how and organisation. A persisting attitude to place more confidence in the experts and specialists belonging to the developed countries than the educated nationals of the country (3) could foster a feeling of underestimation amongst intellectuals while in their countries, and becomes an additional driver of the continuous intellectual migration.	[ { "docid": "6ac250e58500f536ce6b70eb602eab55", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities It seems hardly likely that feeling undervalued for their skills is a main reason for moving. When moving abroad many will instead encounter racism and concern about increasing numbers of migrants which would at least balance against being undervalued at home. They go instead because the ‘value’ of their skills is monetary – therefore about opportunities – not in terms of reputation and confidence or belonging.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "64aa77aa17441f5f9cd331fd3fbe6f5e", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Education is a crossover point; migrating for education may be about a sense of belonging but it is also an opportunity. A conservative culture that does not educate young women is not providing them with an opportunity that is available elsewhere.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1583fd3ecaad82e7536bb9c0776a47e2", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities If these young intellectuals really are politically conscious then they should desire to stay in their native country and change its system of government. It is the intellectuals who are needed to create, and then grow a democracy so that it represents the whole spectrum of opinion within the country and respects intellectual freedoms.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c346bd8c8417e2de508059e80bb68ceb", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Intellectual migrants do not necessarily discard a traditional value to replace it with a corresponding western value. For example, they seldom renounce their religion in favor of a western one (3).\n\nA weaker sense of nationalism does not have to mean greater internationalism. Instead there may be greater ties to traditional culture, to a region or village. There may be fewer ties to nation, but throughout much of the developing world religion has a far greater adherence than in the west. Thus with a couple of exceptions (Communist states such as China and North Korea) it is more developed countries that are mostly non religious.(12)\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0921e01d55dfd6c684d4845b95dd9064", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities If there is really no freedom then these migrants will be asylum seekers and refugees not true intellectual migrants by choice.\n\nEven if there is some alienation from their own native culture these migrants are still travelling to a much more alien culture. This being the case it seems unlikely that alienation is the main cause. Rather they are travelling to a culture that is more alien because they believe there are better opportunities there.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "443d6d4ce43416e6aea93888a75f1ad9", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Most job vacancies in African countries ask for a university degree even if a degree is ultimately not the most important attribute for the job. (13) So the opportunities are there for those who would be considered to be intellectuals, it is everyone else for whom opportunities in their native land are lacking.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "21bdbc175a9f66897d1ae923a9b1ec24", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Making a start in encouraging entrepreneurship and gender identity is not likely to be enough to make a county attractive when compared against countries that are much further down the path. According to the Global Gender Gap Report 2016 Tunisia is still in the bottom quartile of the rankings on gender equality.(15)\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "daf4815370e09ad2c46523171caee6bd", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities A strong national identity does not necessarily result in a strong sense of belonging. That national identity may have precluded other senses of belonging such as religion, or even close community ties and interactions.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7db79888d6b1ac0a26c0adac94b74e5f", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Intellectual women migrants outnumber intellectual men migrants\n\nThe need of belonging is greater for women than for men – Bardo and Bardo found that they miss home much more (5). On the other hand, unequal and discriminatory norms can be strong drivers of intellectual female migration (1). More young women than men now migrate for education and, in several European countries today, highly skilled migrant women outnumber highly skilled migrant men (1). Between 2000 and 2011, the number of tertiary-educated migrant women in OECD countries rose by 80%, which exceeded the 60% increase in the number of tertiary-educated migrant men. In Africa for example, the average emigration rates of tertiary-educated women are considerably higher than those of tertiary-educated men (27.7% for women and 17.1% for men).\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "da05cf90f18e2436072174f33d923a83", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Intellectual migrants are more impregnated by ideas of internationalism and universalism\n\nThe concept of nationalism as developed in Europe during the 19th century did not undergo the same evolution in the developing countries. Intellectuals do not identify themselves with their countries the way Europeans do. They are more impregnated by ideas of internationalism and universalism than the western nationalist – for example Mohsin Hamid argues our views of liberal values should be extended beyond nation states with their often unnatural borders. Thus, if they stay abroad after having adhered to the western way of life, they consider themselves part of the great human lot, value free movement as a basic human right, and do not necessarily suffer from complexes of disloyalty towards their home country (3).\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "255a656359afb8c0d7f52fcfbca2bd5c", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Some intellectual migrants already feel a certain degree of alienation towards their national culture before leaving their country\n\nIntellectuals need stimulation, organisation, freedom, and recognition (3) that they usually struggle to find in their countries of origin. Some intellectuals from developing countries already feel a certain degree of alienation towards their national culture before leaving their own country (3). This may be a result of government policy; a lack of intellectual freedom, or because of a generally conservative culture. Thus, they experience a strong lack of intellectual belonging despite the arising economic opportunities resulting from their countries’ investments.\n\nFamily ties also play a strong role in aggravating or mitigating alienation. This is why it is the young, who don’t have dependents themselves, who are often the likeliest to migrate.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9507ac868d83a8515fef53528ffc1227", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Most young intellectuals from developing countries are politically conscious and want to be \"actors\" in policy making\n\nYoung intellectuals from developing countries are to a very large extent politically conscious and active. They want to be \"actors\" and not \"spectators\" in policy making, all the more so when their specialism is impacted by government policy. Those who grow up in an autocratic, or not very democratic state are likely to want to go where they can use their voice. Even in many democracies intellectuals often largely liberal views both for government and teaching are not readily approved by the conservative regimes of their countries where usually the older generation is in power and constitutes a barrier against their progress.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "fdc0f223e39a7aecaf5fdc512263aa13", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Many migrants come from countries with strong sense of belonging\n\nMany migrants come from countries with strong sense of belonging, national identities, and political consciousness. For instance, they are European migrants, and in 2016, they were 19.3 million residing in a different EU Member State from the one where they were born (7). With migration an issue even from countries with strong national identities it is clear that that identity is not the major driver of movement.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ffd1df9e1f3b8aa38579a5a392ee2e08", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Developing countries have high unemployment rates and need to invest in job creation\n\nDeveloping countries invest in education and job creation because they have high unemployment rates (6). They need to address the lack of opportunities in order to improve their economy and reduce migration. This is as much the case for those at graduate level as for those who have less of an education. Africa’s 668 universities produce almost 10 million graduates a year, but only half find work.(14) It should therefore be no surprise that many migrate overseas for opportunities.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0cdfaffffd134e1bae4a94db30b0368d", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Many developing countries support entrepreneurship and gender equality\n\nIn many developing countries, entrepreneurship is supported to create jobs and dynamic work conditions, and women are empowered and politically represented reducing any concerns of feeling as if they don’t belong.\n\nFor example in Tunisia, many initiatives are being introduced to promote the entrepreneurship ecosystem including angel investing and attempts to reduce administrative barriers (9). Moreover, regarding gender equality, Tunisia’s Parliament has approved an amendment ensuring that women have greater representation in local politics. This amendment includes a proposal for gender parity in electoral law. (10)\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
d7f8dc36b559d119dc9d73569abc14a7	Many developing countries support entrepreneurship and gender equality In many developing countries, entrepreneurship is supported to create jobs and dynamic work conditions, and women are empowered and politically represented reducing any concerns of feeling as if they don’t belong. For example in Tunisia, many initiatives are being introduced to promote the entrepreneurship ecosystem including angel investing and attempts to reduce administrative barriers (9). Moreover, regarding gender equality, Tunisia’s Parliament has approved an amendment ensuring that women have greater representation in local politics. This amendment includes a proposal for gender parity in electoral law. (10)	[ { "docid": "21bdbc175a9f66897d1ae923a9b1ec24", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Making a start in encouraging entrepreneurship and gender identity is not likely to be enough to make a county attractive when compared against countries that are much further down the path. According to the Global Gender Gap Report 2016 Tunisia is still in the bottom quartile of the rankings on gender equality.(15)\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "443d6d4ce43416e6aea93888a75f1ad9", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Most job vacancies in African countries ask for a university degree even if a degree is ultimately not the most important attribute for the job. (13) So the opportunities are there for those who would be considered to be intellectuals, it is everyone else for whom opportunities in their native land are lacking.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "daf4815370e09ad2c46523171caee6bd", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities A strong national identity does not necessarily result in a strong sense of belonging. That national identity may have precluded other senses of belonging such as religion, or even close community ties and interactions.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "64aa77aa17441f5f9cd331fd3fbe6f5e", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Education is a crossover point; migrating for education may be about a sense of belonging but it is also an opportunity. A conservative culture that does not educate young women is not providing them with an opportunity that is available elsewhere.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6ac250e58500f536ce6b70eb602eab55", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities It seems hardly likely that feeling undervalued for their skills is a main reason for moving. When moving abroad many will instead encounter racism and concern about increasing numbers of migrants which would at least balance against being undervalued at home. They go instead because the ‘value’ of their skills is monetary – therefore about opportunities – not in terms of reputation and confidence or belonging.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1583fd3ecaad82e7536bb9c0776a47e2", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities If these young intellectuals really are politically conscious then they should desire to stay in their native country and change its system of government. It is the intellectuals who are needed to create, and then grow a democracy so that it represents the whole spectrum of opinion within the country and respects intellectual freedoms.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c346bd8c8417e2de508059e80bb68ceb", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Intellectual migrants do not necessarily discard a traditional value to replace it with a corresponding western value. For example, they seldom renounce their religion in favor of a western one (3).\n\nA weaker sense of nationalism does not have to mean greater internationalism. Instead there may be greater ties to traditional culture, to a region or village. There may be fewer ties to nation, but throughout much of the developing world religion has a far greater adherence than in the west. Thus with a couple of exceptions (Communist states such as China and North Korea) it is more developed countries that are mostly non religious.(12)\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0921e01d55dfd6c684d4845b95dd9064", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities If there is really no freedom then these migrants will be asylum seekers and refugees not true intellectual migrants by choice.\n\nEven if there is some alienation from their own native culture these migrants are still travelling to a much more alien culture. This being the case it seems unlikely that alienation is the main cause. Rather they are travelling to a culture that is more alien because they believe there are better opportunities there.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "fdc0f223e39a7aecaf5fdc512263aa13", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Many migrants come from countries with strong sense of belonging\n\nMany migrants come from countries with strong sense of belonging, national identities, and political consciousness. For instance, they are European migrants, and in 2016, they were 19.3 million residing in a different EU Member State from the one where they were born (7). With migration an issue even from countries with strong national identities it is clear that that identity is not the major driver of movement.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ffd1df9e1f3b8aa38579a5a392ee2e08", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Developing countries have high unemployment rates and need to invest in job creation\n\nDeveloping countries invest in education and job creation because they have high unemployment rates (6). They need to address the lack of opportunities in order to improve their economy and reduce migration. This is as much the case for those at graduate level as for those who have less of an education. Africa’s 668 universities produce almost 10 million graduates a year, but only half find work.(14) It should therefore be no surprise that many migrate overseas for opportunities.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7db79888d6b1ac0a26c0adac94b74e5f", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Intellectual women migrants outnumber intellectual men migrants\n\nThe need of belonging is greater for women than for men – Bardo and Bardo found that they miss home much more (5). On the other hand, unequal and discriminatory norms can be strong drivers of intellectual female migration (1). More young women than men now migrate for education and, in several European countries today, highly skilled migrant women outnumber highly skilled migrant men (1). Between 2000 and 2011, the number of tertiary-educated migrant women in OECD countries rose by 80%, which exceeded the 60% increase in the number of tertiary-educated migrant men. In Africa for example, the average emigration rates of tertiary-educated women are considerably higher than those of tertiary-educated men (27.7% for women and 17.1% for men).\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4a6227e3793ac6c69352683ef99dcc17", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities The inferiority complex within older generations in the developing countries affects intellectuals’ sense of belonging while in their countries\n\nAn inferiority complex still exists among the older generations in the developing countries as regards the western technical know-how and organisation. A persisting attitude to place more confidence in the experts and specialists belonging to the developed countries than the educated nationals of the country (3) could foster a feeling of underestimation amongst intellectuals while in their countries, and becomes an additional driver of the continuous intellectual migration.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "da05cf90f18e2436072174f33d923a83", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Intellectual migrants are more impregnated by ideas of internationalism and universalism\n\nThe concept of nationalism as developed in Europe during the 19th century did not undergo the same evolution in the developing countries. Intellectuals do not identify themselves with their countries the way Europeans do. They are more impregnated by ideas of internationalism and universalism than the western nationalist – for example Mohsin Hamid argues our views of liberal values should be extended beyond nation states with their often unnatural borders. Thus, if they stay abroad after having adhered to the western way of life, they consider themselves part of the great human lot, value free movement as a basic human right, and do not necessarily suffer from complexes of disloyalty towards their home country (3).\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "255a656359afb8c0d7f52fcfbca2bd5c", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Some intellectual migrants already feel a certain degree of alienation towards their national culture before leaving their country\n\nIntellectuals need stimulation, organisation, freedom, and recognition (3) that they usually struggle to find in their countries of origin. Some intellectuals from developing countries already feel a certain degree of alienation towards their national culture before leaving their own country (3). This may be a result of government policy; a lack of intellectual freedom, or because of a generally conservative culture. Thus, they experience a strong lack of intellectual belonging despite the arising economic opportunities resulting from their countries’ investments.\n\nFamily ties also play a strong role in aggravating or mitigating alienation. This is why it is the young, who don’t have dependents themselves, who are often the likeliest to migrate.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9507ac868d83a8515fef53528ffc1227", "text": "employment international global society immigration minorities Most young intellectuals from developing countries are politically conscious and want to be \"actors\" in policy making\n\nYoung intellectuals from developing countries are to a very large extent politically conscious and active. They want to be \"actors\" and not \"spectators\" in policy making, all the more so when their specialism is impacted by government policy. Those who grow up in an autocratic, or not very democratic state are likely to want to go where they can use their voice. Even in many democracies intellectuals often largely liberal views both for government and teaching are not readily approved by the conservative regimes of their countries where usually the older generation is in power and constitutes a barrier against their progress.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
933a7a1d75289d033f73be3054eaf9ac	NAFTA was severely damaging to independent Mexican farmers. US farm subsidies make it impossible for Mexican farmers to compete without tariffs; the so-called free trade act disadvantages Mexican workers because their American counterparts are not working under a free trade system1. While Mexican consumers benefit from lower prices, rural farmers tend to be much poorer than city residents in Mexico. Therefore this agricultural loss benefits the rich at the expense of the poor1. 1 Joseph E. Stiglitz, "The Broken Promise of NAFTA," New York Times, January 6, 2004.	[ { "docid": "0cf673d57c20d1a80f39fda854f03909", "text": "economic policy international americas house believes nafta has benefitted all Corn is only one product in a complex trade system. While NAFTA has undoubtedly given US corn farmers an advantage, it has also benefited Mexican avocado famers- and everyone employed in the industry1. Automobile production has shifted away from the US and towards Mexico after NAFTA2. Each country cannot expect to export more of every product- what Mexico has lost in corn production, it has gained in other areas.\n\n1Amy Clark, \"Is NAFTA good for Mexico's Farmers?,\" CBS, February 11, 2009.\n\n2 Scott, Robert, Carlos Salas, and Bruce Campbell. \"Revisiting NAFTA: Still Not Good for North America's Workers.\" Economic Policy Institute, September 28, 2006.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "c8e4b329fa85a2ef4a6cdbda5defb357", "text": "economic policy international americas house believes nafta has benefitted all The loss of US production jobs is part of a greater global trend; NAFTA is not responsible for this change. Mexico and Canada are responsible for only one-fifth of the growth in the US trade deficit. The rapid acceleration of technological communication has made outsourcing and offshore production easier than ever1, and the US is losing jobs to countries that do the work as a fraction of the cost.\n\n1 Thomas L. Friedman, \"The World is Flat: a Brief History of the Twenty-First Century,\" (New York: Picador, 2007), 148.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "142bde9d46213f82c874ad549e1e9fbb", "text": "economic policy international americas house believes nafta has benefitted all NAFTA gave Mexico an edge; that does not mean Mexico's problems would disappear. Mexico's economic problems are the result of a low tax base and poor education, among other issues1. A trade agreement alone cannot solve a nation's complex socioeconomic issues. Though it is impossible to know what would have happened, it is fair to speculate that Mexico would import even fewer goods to the US if not for NAFTA. Therefore, even if Mexico has yet to become an industrial powerhouse, NAFTA can still be considered advantageous.\n\n1 Joseph E. Stiglitz, \"The Broken Promise of NAFTA,\" New York Times, January 6, 2004\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b130565be663d09480bc72cfca16c04e", "text": "economic policy international americas house believes nafta has benefitted all NAFTA allows companies to shed light on antiquated regulations. The advantages and disadvantages of MMT are contested1, and the Canada's grounds for prohibitions on the water exportation that Sun Belt wanted to do were questionable1. Environmental protection is necessary, but should be reasonable; if regulations are preventing business for no good reason, those regulations should be reconsidered.\n\n1 http://www.autos.ca/auto-tech/environment/auto-tech-mmt-the-controversy-... \"> Jim Kerr, \"Auto Tech: MMT: the Controversy Over this Fuel Additive Continues,\" March 10, 2004, <\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "05c6733bfac657c15258c9eb2c132b3f", "text": "economic policy international americas house believes nafta has benefitted all NAFTA has reduced the cost of production. In a free trade economy, workers only have the upper hand in bargaining if there is a labor shortage. NAFTA does not deprive workers of something they are entitled to; if a company saves money by relocating production, new workers get hired, goods become cheaper, and consumers benefit. NAFTA may have disadvantaged certain workers, but it benefits other workers and consumers.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "25ca07a4f6fc2d4c3e31a1469f25d378", "text": "economic policy international americas house believes nafta has benefitted all NAFTA's harmful effects on American industry outweigh its benefits. Americans are not helped by lower prices if they lose their job and have no money. Furthermore, evidence shows the American jobs lost through NAFTA were largely high-wage manufacturing jobs, thereby exacerbating income inequality.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a8e82c19298afe65c6fbb0c8cfabbc99", "text": "economic policy international americas house believes nafta has benefitted all If anything, NAFTA has harmed international cooperation by damaging the parties involved. Due to the continental free trade agreement, Mexican farmers have lost their livelihoods, American manufacturers have been laid off, environmental harms have increased, and the agreement has failed to create the job stimulus it promised. We can only hope that NAFTA is not a typical example of international cooperation, for such would not bode well for the international community.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6588777962ce79881ede122551be0748", "text": "economic policy international americas house believes nafta has benefitted all There is little reason to believe that NAFTA was a key agent in Mexican political change. In the time after NAFTA was signed, Mexico also experienced an economic crisis linked to a currency collapse1. Its president fled the country on corruption charges and drug-related corruption continues to plague the country. Mexico has had both good and bad political and economic experiences since the implementation of NAFTA, and it is impossible to say that NAFTA caused the freer elections in 1994 and therefore has been overall beneficial for Mexico.\n\n1Paul Magnusson, \"Did NAFTA Backers Bamboozle America?\" Business Week, May 8, 2000.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0b00015aef7a5855a529e6db7e93e5d5", "text": "economic policy international americas house believes nafta has benefitted all While Canada has experienced some economic benefits due to NAFTA, these benefits do not outweigh the harms for North America overall. Furthermore, as the Con discusses below, Canada has struggled to reconcile its environmental regulations with NAFTA, thereby hurting it environmentally, if not economically.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c51c38a7a337f974af9a6edde021003f", "text": "economic policy international americas house believes nafta has benefitted all NAFTA has reduced workers' bargaining power.\n\nIn reducing barriers to imports and exports, NAFTA has shifted bargaining power in favor of producers, who can more easily relocate factories if workers in an area are too demanding. This allows more exploitation of workers, something that we should be preventing rather than encouraging. By allowing companies to move production across the US, Canada, and Mexico, NAFTA creates a disadvantage for workers in all three countries1. This essentially helps the rich get richer while making those who are poor, or middle class poorer increasing income inequality.\n\n1 Scott, Robert, Carlos Salas, and Bruce Campbell. \"Revisiting NAFTA: Still Not Good for North America's Workers.\" Economic Policy Institute, September 28, 2006.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ee053c2bd575172880493b331b5eaa15", "text": "economic policy international americas house believes nafta has benefitted all NAFTA has interfered with Canadian laws concerning environmental protection.\n\nUnder NAFTA, if foreign investors believe they are being harmed by regulations, they may sue for reparations under special tribunals1. Canada regulates commercial use of its lake and river water2, fearing ecosystem damage, and had previously banned the importation of a gasoline additive MMT3. Due to lawsuits brought by American companies Sun Belt Water Inc. and Ethyl Corporation, the Canadian government was forced to change legislation to allow these companies to conduct business. By compelling Canada to reduce its standards for environmental protection, NAFTA has failed to meet Canada's interests.\n\n1 Joseph E. Stiglitz, \"The Broken Promise of NAFTA,\" New York Times, January 6, 2004.\n\n2 \"The Sun Belt NAFTA Case.\" Sun Belt Water, 2004.\n\n3 Kerr, Jim. \"Auto Tech: MMT: the Controversy Over this Fuel Additive Continues.\" March 10, 2004.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f5a5fa87b79d303b84f001b59cca61ec", "text": "economic policy international americas house believes nafta has benefitted all NAFTA has failed to give Mexico a competitive edge in the global economy.\n\nAlthough NAFTA gives Mexico a slight advantage over its competitors, this edge has been insufficient; Chinese labor is still cheaper, and imports more goods to the US than Mexico does1. Real wages in Mexico have actually decreased 0.2% and income disparities between Mexico and the US have grown2. In failing to provide sufficient means for Mexico to compete with other developing nations, NAFTA has failed to serve its parties' interests.\n\n1 Smith, Geri and Cristina Lindblad. \"Mexico: Was NAFTA Worth it: A Tale of What Free Trade Can and Cannot Do.\" Business Week, December 22, 2003.\n\n2 Stiglitz, Joseph E. \"The Broken Promise of NAFTA.\" New York Times, January 6, 2004.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "bd5d4713a69d9f28c5bca2ecb1247449", "text": "economic policy international americas house believes nafta has benefitted all NAFTA caused a severe trade imbalance between the US and its neighbors.\n\nAs NAFTA has allowed manufacturing to relocate south of the border and export to the United States the US has turned from having a trade surplus to a trade deficit. In 1993, the US had a trade surplus with Mexico and a stable deficit with Canada1. After NAFTA, the US' deficit with its neighbors increased $107.3 billion, creating a net displacement of over 1 million jobs. NAFTA was supposed to stimulate job growth in the US, not job loss; this failure demonstrates the harms that NAFTA has caused its members.\n\n1 Scott, Robert, Carlos Salas, and Bruce Campbell. \"Revisiting NAFTA: Still Not Good for North America's Workers.\" Economic Policy Institute, September 28, 2006.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6230e4ec5e3b4e8c1eb0e9e0bac328b9", "text": "economic policy international americas house believes nafta has benefitted all The US has benefitted from NAFTA through lower prices and increased trade\n\nThe increase in low-cost Mexican goods has benefitted US consumers1, thereby improving the standard of living for working Americans. US exports have increased by $104 billion2, thereby bolstering manufacturing. While some jobs have been lost due to NAFTA, these have been primarily low-skill jobs; reducing the number of low-skill jobs in the economy allows the US to concentrate on more profitable, white-collar jobs. And even these low skilled workers benefit from having to pay less for their goods.\n\n1 Marla Dickerson, \"NAFTA has had its Tradeoffs for the U.S.: Consumers and Global Companies Benefitted, but Critics See Pitfalls,\" Los Angeles Times, March 3, 2008.\n\n2 Robert Scott, Carlos Salas, Bruce Campbell, \"Revisiting NAFTA: Still Not Good for North America's Workers,\" Economic Policy Institute, September 28, 2006, 5.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ca9776d53968dc4cf83ae765cb088b16", "text": "economic policy international americas house believes nafta has benefitted all NAFTA has improved democracy in Mexico.\n\nTrade liberalization has caused social upheaval that created greater demand for genuine democracy within Mexico1. The election of 1994 is considered to be the first free election in the modern history of Mexico2. In 2000, the first opposition president (not a member of the Institutional Revolution Party) since 1929 was elected3. Many scholars credit the liberalized economic environment fostered by NAFTA for this political development towards a genuine democracy4.\n\n1Kevin Kelley, \"Good NAFTA?,\" Utne: The Best of the Alternative Press, 2011, 2.\n\n2Renee G. Scherlen, \"Lessons to Build on: the 1994 Mexican Presidential Election,\" Journal of Interamerican Studies and World Affairs, 1998, 21.\n\n3Sam Dillon, \"Mexico's Ousted Party Tries to Regroup After Stunning Defeat,\" New York Times, July 13, 2000.\n\n4 Geri Smith and Cristina Lindblad, \"Mexico: Was NAFTA Worth it: A Tale of What Free Trade Can and Cannot Do,\" Business Week, December 22, 2003.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5cd37690fba1033838d92adacd719a1c", "text": "economic policy international americas house believes nafta has benefitted all NAFTA has benefitted Canada.\n\nCanada already benefited from having the world's biggest market next door and under NAFTA this benefit is expanded immensely. Under NAFTA, Between 1994 and 2003, Canada's economy grew at 3.6% annually, and employment has risen1. NAFTA has also help equalize agricultural flows between the US and Canada. NAFTA has given Canada an advantage in the US, the world's biggest market, as well as zero-tariff access to a wide variety of American products2.\n\n1 Lee Hudson Teslik, \"NAFTA's Economic Impact,\" Council on Foreign Relations, July 7, 2009.\n\n2 George Myles and Matthe Cahoon, \"Canada and NAFTA: a 10-Year Measure of Success,\" BNET, January 2004.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f9471a25c35fd34a0887ce709cf2f96b", "text": "economic policy international americas house believes nafta has benefitted all NAFTA has bolstered cross-continental cooperation.\n\nBy expanding their free trade regions to the entire continent, Canada, the US, and Mexico have demonstrated the plausibility of greater international cooperation. Although NAFTA is not on the scale of the EU, it similarly demonstrates the ability of nations to work together for mutual benefit, thereby increasing international cooperation. NAFTA helps create a secure North American continent where none of the states need be worried about the other members in much the same way as the European Union does in Europe. Competition and potentially wars are prevented through greater trade integration as is shown by European integration since the second world war.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
0a6a8a3405c3155b6929598c84f3a105	Privatising social security will increase the amount of money that reitrees can draw on Private accounts would provide retirees with a higher rate of return on investments. [1] Privatization would give investment decisions to account holders. This does not mean that Social Security money for the under 55’s would go to Wall Street.. This could be left to the individual's discretion. Potentially this could include government funds. But with government’s record of mismanagement, and a $14 trillion deficit, it seems unlikely that many people would join that choice. [2] As Andrew Roth argues, "Democrats will say supporters of personal accounts will allow people's fragile retirement plans to be subjected to the whims of the stock market, but that's just more demagoguery. First, personal accounts would be voluntary. If you like the current system (the one that [can be raided by] politicians), you can stay put and be subjected to decreasingly low returns as Social Security goes bankrupt. But if you want your money protected from politicians and have the opportunity to invest in the same financial assets that politicians invest in their own retirement plans (most are well-diversified long term funds), then you should have that option." [3 Social Security privatization would actually help the economically marginalised in two ways. Firstly, by ending the harm social security currently does; Those at the poverty level need every cent just to survive. Even those in the lower-middle class don’t money to put into a wealth-generating retirement account. They have to rely on social security income to pay the bills when they reach retirement. Unfortunately, current social security pay-outs are at or below the poverty level. The money earned in benefits based on a retiree’s contributions during their working life is less than the return on a passbook savings account. [4] Secondly, these same groups would be amongst the biggest 'winners' from privatization. By providing a much higher rate of return, privatization would raise the incomes of those elderly retirees who are most in need. The current system contains many inequities that leave the poor at a disadvantage. For instance, the low-income elderly are most likely to be dependent on Social Security benefits for most or all of their retirement income. But despite a progressive benefit structure, Social Security benefits are inadequate for the elderly poor's retirement needs. [5] Privatizing Social Security would improve individual liberty. Privatization would give all Americans the opportunity to participate in the economy through investments. Everyone would become capitalists and stock owners reducing the division of labour and capital and restoring the ownership that was the initial foundation of the American dream. [6] Moreover, privatized accounts would be transferable within families, which current Social Security accounts are not. These privatized accounts would be personal assets, much like a house or a 401k account. On death, privatised social security accounts could pass to an individual’s heirs. With the current system, this cannot be done. Workers who have spent their lives paying withholding taxes are, in effect, denied a proprietary claim over money that, by rights, belongs to them. [7] This would make privatization a progressive move. Because the wealthy generally live longer than the poor, they receive a higher total of Social Security payments over the course of their lifetimes. This would be evened out if remaining benefits could be passed on. [8] Privatizing Social Security increases personal choice and gives people control over what they paid and thus are entitled to. Overall, therefore, privatizing Social Security would increase the amount of money that marginalised retirees receive and would give all retirees more freedom to invest and distribute social security payments. [1] Tanner, Michael. "Privatizing Social Security: A Big Boost for the Poor." CATO. 26 July 1996. http://www.socialsecurity.org/pubs/ssps/ssp4.html [2] Roth, Andrew. "Privatize Social Security? Hell Yeah!". Club for Growth.21 September 21 2010. http://www.clubforgrowth.org/perm/?postID=14110 [3] Roth, Andrew. "Privatize Social Security? Hell Yeah!". Club for Growth.21 September 21 2010. http://www.clubforgrowth.org/perm/?postID=14110 [4] Tanner, Michael. "Privatizing Social Security: A Big Boost for the Poor." CATO. 26 July 1996. http://www.socialsecurity.org/pubs/ssps/ssp4.html [5] Tanner, Michael. "Privatizing Social Security: A Big Boost for the Poor." CATO. 26 July 1996. http://www.socialsecurity.org/pubs/ssps/ssp4.html [6] Tanner, Michael. "Privatizing Social Security: A Big Boost for the Poor." CATO. 26 July 1996. http://www.socialsecurity.org/pubs/ssps/ssp4.html [7] Roth, Andrew. "Privatize Social Security? Hell Yeah!". Club for Growth.21 September 21 2010. http://www.clubforgrowth.org/perm/?postID=14110 [8] Tanner, Michael. "Privatizing Social Security: A Big Boost for the Poor." CATO. 26 July 1996. http://www.socialsecurity.org/pubs/ssps/ssp4.html	[ { "docid": "76d70ad791f3e3d4fe603b681972abdc", "text": "economic policy society family house would privatize usas social security schemes Nobel Laureate economist Paul Krugman. Argued in 2004 that: “Social Security is a government program that works, a demonstration that a modest amount of taxing and spending can make people's lives better and more secure. And that's why the right wants to destroy it.\" [1] The problem with Social Security is not that it does not work, nor that it fails the poor. Rather, as Krugman notes, social security uses limited taxation to implement a clear and successful vision of social justice. As a consequence, the social security system has been repeatedly attacked by right wing and libertarian politicians. Such attacks are not motivated by the merits or failure of the social security system itself, but by political ambition and a desire to forcefully implement alternative normative schema within society.\n\nPrivatizing Social Security would require costly new government bureaucracies. From the standpoint of the system as a whole, privatization would add enormous administrative burdens – and costs. The government would need to establish and track many small accounts, perhaps as many accounts as there are taxpaying workers—157 million in 2010. [2] Often these accounts would be too small so that profit making firms would be unwilling to take them on. There would need to be thousands of workers to manage these accounts. In contrast, today’s Social Security has minimal administrative costs amounting to less than 1 per cent of annual revenues. [3]\n\nIt is also unlikely that individuals will be able to invest successfully on their own, although they may believe they can, leading to a great number of retirees actually being worse off after privatization.\n\n[1] Paul Krugman. \"Inventing a crisis.\" New York Times. 7 December 2004. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/07/opinion/07krugman.html?_r=2&scp=539&sq...\n\n[2] Wihbey, John, ‘2011 Annual Report by the Social Security Board of Trustees’, Journalist’s Resource, 9 June 2011, http://journalistsresource.org/studies/government/politics/social-security-report-2011/\n\n[3] Anrig, Greg and Wasow, Bernard. \"Twelve reasons why privatizing social security is a bad idea\". The Century Foundation. 14 February 2005. http://tcf.org/media-center/pdfs/pr46/12badideas.pdf\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "dd073ce604993483721216eee3fb2aa5", "text": "economic policy society family house would privatize usas social security schemes Social Security is not in crisis and there is no need for privatization. Social Security is completely solvent today, and will be into the future because it has a dedicated income stream that covers its costs and consistently generates a surplus, which today is $2.5 trillion.\n\nProposition’s dire prediction of the collapse of social security’s financial situation is misleading. The Social Security surplus will grow to approximately $4.3 trillion in 2023, and that reserves will be sufficient to pay full benefits through to 2037. Even after this it would still be able to pay 78%. Moreover, there are plenty of ways to reform Social Security to make it more fiscally sound without privatizing it, including simply raising taxes to fund it better. [1]\n\nFurthermore the problem that affects social security of falling numbers of contributors to each retiree will also affect private pensions, at least in the short to medium term, just in a different way. If all younger pensioners went over to just paying for their own future retirement who is to pay for current retirees or those who are shortly to retire. These people will still need to have their pensions paid for. They will not have time to save up a personal pension and so will be relying on current workers – but such workers will not want to pay more when they are explicitly just paying for someone else as they are already paying for themselves separately.\n\n[1] Roosevelt, James.\"Social Security at 75: Crisis Is More Myth Than Fact.\" Huffington Post. 11 August 11 2010. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/james-roosevelt/social-security-at-75-cri_...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "dddb9c67da7f54d1e7a089718b93c701", "text": "economic policy society family house would privatize usas social security schemes Privatizing Social Security would harm economic growth, not help it. Privatization during the current economic crisis would have been disaster, and so doing it now is a risk for any upcoming or future crisis. Privatization in the midst of the greatest economic downturn since the Great Depression would have caused households to have lost even more of their assets, had their investments been invested in the U.S. stock market or in funds exposed to complicated and high risk financial instruments.\n\nPrivatizing social security might therefore increase economic growth in the boom times but this would be at the expense of sharper downturns. Proposition’s argument implicitly assumes that the money at the moment does not improve economic growth. On the contrary the government is regularly investing the money in much the same way as private business would – and often on much more long term projects such as infrastructure that fit better with a long term saving than the way that banks invest.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0add56b3247e2cde35ac948db12e56d9", "text": "economic policy society family house would privatize usas social security schemes Most of these arguments can be undercut by noting that the privatization of Social Security accounts would be voluntary, and thus anyone who believed the argument that the government invests better would be free to leave their account as it is, unchanged.\n\nThose who believe they can do a better job of investing and managing their money on their own should be given the freedom to do so. In this respect it is important to remember the origin of the money in these accounts: it has been paid in by the individuals themselves. As James Roosevelt (CEO of the health insurance firm Tufts Health Plan) notes: \" Those ‘baby boomers’ who are going to bust Social Security when they retire? They have been paying into the system for more than 40 years, generating the large surplus the program has accumulated. Much of the money that baby boomers are and will be drawing on from Social Security, is, and will be, their own.” [1] As it is their money which they have paid in in the first place, members of the baby boomer generation should have a right to choose how they invest –it. If that means choosing to go private and pursue riskier investments, so be it. The money paid out by the social security system belongs to those who paid it in, and the government should not deprive taxpayers from exercising free choice over the uses to which their money is put. Moreover, none of the other arguments adduced by side opposition do anything to address the ways in which Social Security currently harms the poor, the redressing of which alone justifies privatizing Social Security.\n\n[1] Roosevelt, James.\"Social Security at 75: Crisis Is More Myth Than Fact.\" Huffington Post. 11 August 11 2010. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/james-roosevelt/social-security-at-75-cri_b_677058.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c99d7dfeece009eb28480730912d3df3", "text": "economic policy society family house would privatize usas social security schemes The American people do not oppose privatization -in fact, most support it. A 2010 poll showed overwhelming support for personal accounts. Republican voters support it 65-21, but even Democrat voters like it, 50-36. [1] A poll commissioned by the Cato Institute through the prestigious Public Opinion Strategies polling company showed that 69 percent of Americans favored switching from the pay-as-you-go system to a fully funded, individually capitalized system. Only 11 percent said they opposed the idea. [2] A 1994 Luntz Research poll found that 82 percent of American adults under the age of 35 favored having at least a portion of their payroll taxes invested instead in stocks and bonds. In fact, among the so-called Generation Xers in America, by a margin of two-to-one they think they are more likely to encounter a UFO in their lifetime than they are to ever receive a single Social Security check.\n\nEven more remarkable, perhaps, was a poll taken in 1997 by White House pollster Mark Penn for the Democratic Leadership Council, a group of moderate Democrats with whom President Clinton was affiliated prior to his election. That poll found that 73 percent of Democrats favor being allowed to invest some or all their payroll tax in private accounts. [3] Moreover, the 'alternatives liks raising taxes and reducing benefits are merely kicking the problem further down the road but it will still become a problem at some point. At the same time either raising taxes or reducing benefits would be unfair – raising taxes because it would mean today’s generation of workers paying more than their parents for the same benefit and cutting benefits because it would mean that retirees would be getting less out than they were promised.'\n\nThe alternatives would also be particularly devastating for the poor. Individuals who are hired pay the cost of the so-called employer's share of the payroll tax through reduced wages. Therefore, an increase in the payroll tax would result in less money in workers' going to workers. It is also important to remember that the payroll tax is an extremely regressive tax. Likewise a reduction in benefits would disproportionately hurt the poor since they are more likely than the wealthy to be dependent on Social Security benefits. [4]\n\n[1] Roth, Andrew. \"Privatize Social Security? Hell Yeah!\". Club for Growth.21 September 21 2010. http://www.clubforgrowth.org/perm/?postID=14110\n\n[2] Crane, Edward. \"The Case for Privatizing America's Social Security System.\" CATO Institute. 10 December 1997. http://www.cato.org/testimony/art-22.html\n\n[3] Crane, Edward. \"The Case for Privatizing America's Social Security System.\" CATO Institute. 10 December 1997. http://www.cato.org/testimony/art-22.html\n\n[4] Tanner, Michael. \"Privatizing Social Security: A Big Boost for the Poor.\" CATO. 26 July 1996. http://www.socialsecurity.org/pubs/ssps/ssp4.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c9c92305e7c32e3a69a360a31071ecf0", "text": "economic policy society family house would privatize usas social security schemes Privatization would increase national savings and provide a new pool of capital for investment that would be particularly beneficial to the poor. As it stands, Social Security is a net loss maker for the American taxpayer, and this situation will only continue to get worse unless privatization is enacted: those born after the baby boom will forfeit 10 cents of every dollar they earn in payments towards the up keep of the Social Security system.\n\nBy contrast, under privatization people would actually save resources that businesses can invest. As Alan Greenspan has pointed out, the economic benefits of privatization of Social Security are potentially enormous. In Chile, as Dr. Piñera has noted, there has been real economic growth of 7 percent a year over the past decade, energized by a savings rate in excess of 20 percent. [1]\n\nMartin Feldstein, a Harvard economist, formerly Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors under President Reagan, estimated that the present value to the U.S. economy of investing the future cash flow of payroll taxes in real assets would be on the order of $10 to $20 trillion. That would mean a permanent, significant boost to economic growth. [2]\n\n[1] Crane, Edward. \"The Case for Privatizing America's Social Security System.\" CATO Institute. 10 December 1997. http://www.cato.org/testimony/art-22.html\n\n[2] Crane, Edward. \"The Case for Privatizing America's Social Security System.\" CATO Institute. 10 December 1997. http://www.cato.org/testimony/art-22.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8a5602cdc1b9ecadb195fa7dc3dbf794", "text": "economic policy society family house would privatize usas social security schemes The social security system is unsustainable in the status quo\n\nSocial Security is in Crisis. Social Security in the United States, as in most western liberal democracies, is a pay-as-you-go system and has always been so. As such, it is an intergenerational wealth transfer. The solvency of the system therefore relies on favourable demographics; particularly birth rate and longevity. In the United States the birth rate when Social Security was created was 2.3 children per woman but had risen to 3.0 by 1950. Today it is 2.06. The average life expectancy in 1935 was 63 and today it is 75. While this may be representative of an improvement in quality-of-life for many Americans, these demographic changes also indicate the increasing burden that social security systems are being put under. [1]\n\nAs a result of changing demographic factors, the number of workers paying Social Security payroll taxes has gone from 16 for every retiree in 1950 to just 3.3 in 1997. This ration will continue to decline to just 2 to 1 by 2025. This has meant the tax has been increased thirty times in sixty-two years to compensate. Originally it was just 2 percent on a maximum taxable income of $300, now it is 12.4 percent of a maximum income of $65,400. This will have to be raised to 18 percent to pay for all promised current benefits, and if Medicare is included the tax will have to go to nearly 28 percent. [2]\n\nSocial Security is an unsuitable approach to protecting the welfare of a retiring workforce. The social security system as it stands is unsustainable, and will place an excessive tax burden on the current working population of the USA, who will be expected to pay for the impending retirement of almost 70 million members of the “baby boomer” generation. This crisis is likely to begin in 2016 when- according to experts- more money will be paid out by the federal government in social security benefits than it will receive in payroll taxes. [3]\n\nIn many ways Social Security has now just become a giant ponzi scheme. As the Cato Institute has argued: “Just like Ponzi's plan, Social Security does not make any real investments -- it just takes money from later 'investors' or taxpayers, to pay benefits to the scheme’s earlier, now retired, entrants. Like Ponzi, Social Security will not be able to recruit new \"investors\" fast enough to continue paying promised benefits to previous investors. Because each year there are fewer young workers relative to the number of retirees, Social Security will eventually collapse, just like Ponzi's scheme.” [4]\n\nFaced with this impending crisis, privatizing is at worst the best of the 'bad' options. It provides an opportunity to make the system sustainable and to make it fair to all generations by having everyone pay for their own retirement rather than someone else’s. [5]\n\n[1] Crane, Edward. \"The Case for Privatizing America's Social Security System.\" CATO Institute. 10 December 1997. http://www.cato.org/testimony/art-22.html\n\n[2] Crane, Edward. \"The Case for Privatizing America's Social Security System.\" CATO Institute. 10 December 1997. http://www.cato.org/testimony/art-22.html\n\n[3] San Diego Union Tribune. \"Privatizing Social Security Still a Good Idea.\" San Diego Union Tribune. http://www.creators.com/opinion/daily-editorials/privatizing-social-security-still-a-good-idea.html\n\n[4] Cato Institute. “Why is Social Security often called a Ponzi scheme?”. Cato Institute. 11 May 1999. http://www.socialsecurity.org/daily/05-11-99.html ;\n\n[5] Kotlikoff, Lawrence. \"Privatizing social security the right way\". Testimony to the Committee on Ways and Means. 3 June 3 1998. http://people.bu.edu/kotlikof/Ways&Means.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "20abfc8041b3c327acdf4ec1ac129e8d", "text": "economic policy society family house would privatize usas social security schemes Privatising social security would improve economic growth\n\nPrivatizing social security would enable investment of savings. Commentator Alex Schibuola argues that: \"If Social Security were privatized, people would deposit their income with a bank. People actually save resources that businesses can invest. We, as true savers, get more resources in the future.\" [1] As a result private accounts would also increase investments, jobs and wages. Michael Tanner of the think tank the Cato Institute argues: \"Social Security drains capital from the poorest areas of the country, leaving less money available for new investment and job creation. Privatization would increase national savings and provide a new pool of capital for investment that would be particularly beneficial to the poor.\" [2]\n\nCurrently Social Security represents a net loss for taxpayers and beneficiaries. Social Security, although key to the restructuring the of USA’s social contract following the great depression, represents a bad deal for the post-war American economy. Moreover, this deal has gotten worse over time. 'Baby boomers' are projected to lose roughly 5 cents of every dollar they earn to the OASI program in taxes net of benefits. Young adults who came of age in the early 1990s and today's children are on course to lose over 7 cents of every dollar they earn in net taxes. If OASI taxes were to be raised immediately by the amount needed to pay for OASI benefits on an on-going basis, baby boomers would forfeit 6 cents of every dollar they earn in net OASI taxes. For those born later it would be 10 cents. [3]\n\nChange could be implemented gradually. Andrew Roth argues: “While Americans in retirement or approaching retirement would probably stay in the current system [if Social Security were to be privatized], younger workers should have the option to invest a portion of their money in financial assets other than U.S. Treasuries. These accounts would be the ultimate \"lock box\" - they would prevent politicians in Washington from raiding the Trust Fund. The truth is that taxpayers bail out politicians every year thanks to Social Security. Congress and the White House spend more money than they have, so they steal money from Social Security to help pay for it. That needs to stop and there is no responsible way of doing that except with personal accounts.” [4] This would make social security much more sustainable as there would no longer be the risk of the money being spent elsewhere.\n\nPut simply, privatizing Social Security would actually boost economic growth and lead to better-protected investments by beneficiaries, benefiting not only themselves but the nation at large. Thus Social Security should be privatized.\n\n[1] Schibuola, Alex. \"Time to Privatize? The Economics of Social Security.\" Open Markets. 16 November 2010. http://www.openmarket.org/2010/11/16/time-to-privatize-the-economics-of-...\n\n[2] Tanner, Michael. \"Privatizing Social Security: A Big Boost for the Poor.\" CATO. 26 July 1996. http://www.socialsecurity.org/pubs/ssps/ssp4.html\n\n[3] Kotlikoff, Lawrence. \"Privatizing social security the right way\". Testimony to the Committee on Ways and Means. 3 June 3 1998. http://people.bu.edu/kotlikof/Ways&Means.pdf\n\n[4] Roth, Andrew. \"Privatize Social Security? Hell Yeah!\". Club for Growth.21 September 21 2010. http://www.clubforgrowth.org/perm/ ?\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7ce5fa88bb8fe7aa1c5c22d1a89fb944", "text": "economic policy society family house would privatize usas social security schemes Privatising the social security system would harm economic growth\n\nCreating private accounts could have an impact on economic growth, which in turn would hit social security's future finances. Economic growth could be hit as privatizing Social Security will increase federal deficits and as a result debt significantly, while increasing the likelihood that national savings will decline which will happen as baby boomers retire anyway and draw down their savings.\n\nAn analysis by the Centre on Budget and Policy Priorities shows that the proposed privatization by Obama would add $1 trillion in new federal debt in its first decade of implementation, and a further $3.5 trillion in the following decade. [1] Because households change their saving and spending levels in response to economic conditions privatization is actually more likely to reduce than increase national savings. This is because households that consider the new accounts to constitute meaningful increases in their retirement wealth might well reduce their other saving. Diamond and Orszag argue, 'If anything, our impression is that diverting a portion of the current Social Security surplus into individual accounts could reduce national saving.' That, in turn, would further weaken economic growth and our capacity to pay for the retirement of the baby boomers.\" [2]\n\nThe deficit, and as a result national debt, would increase because trillions of dollars which had previously been paying for current retirees would be taken out of the system to be invested privately. Those who are already retired will however still need to draw a pension so the government would need to borrow the money to be able to pay for these pensions. [3]\n\nContrary to side proposition’s assertions, privatization also would not increase capital available for investment. Proponents of privatization claim that the flow of dollars into private accounts and then into the equity markets will stimulate the economy. However, as the social security system underwent the transition into private ownership, each dollar invested in a financial instrument via the proprietary freedoms afforded to account holders, would result in the government borrowing a dollar to cover pay outs to those currently drawing from the social security system.\n\nThus, the supposed benefit of a privatised social security system is entirely eliminated by increased government borrowing, as the net impact on the capital available for investment is zero. [4]\n\nWhile four fifths of tax dollars for social security is spent immediately the final fifth purchases Treasury securities through trust funds. Privatization would hasten depletion of these funds. President Bush proposed diverting up to 4 percentage points of payroll tax to create the private accounts but with payroll currently 12.4% this would still be significantly more than the one fifth that is currently left over so depleting reserves. Funds now being set aside to build up the Trust Funds to provide for retiring baby boomers would be being used instead to pay for the privatization accounts. The Trust Funds would be exhausted much sooner than the thirty-eight to forty-eight years projected if nothing is done. In such a short time frame, the investments in the personal accounts will not be nearly large enough to provide an adequate cushion. [5]\n\n[1] Anrig, Greg and Wasow, Bernard. \"Twelve reasons why privatizing social security is a bad idea\". The Century Foundation. 14 February 2005. http://tcf.org/media-center/pdfs/pr46/12badideas.pdf\n\n[2] Anrig, Greg and Wasow, Bernard. \"Twelve reasons why privatizing social security is a bad idea\". The Century Foundation. 14 February 2005. http://tcf.org/media-center/pdfs/pr46/12badideas.pdf\n\n[3] Spitzer, Elliot. \"Can we finally kill this terrible idea?\" Slate. 4 February 2009. http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/the_best_policy/2009/02/privatize_social_security.html\n\n[4] Spitzer, Elliot. \"Can we finally kill this terrible idea?\" Slate. 4 February 2009. http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/the_best_policy/2009/02/privatize_social_security.html\n\n[5] Anrig, Greg and Wasow, Bernard. \"Twelve reasons why privatizing social security is a bad idea\". The Century Foundation. 14 February 2005. http://tcf.org/media-center/pdfs/pr46/12badideas.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cb7308b4b5642271b0783acb8e78eb71", "text": "economic policy society family house would privatize usas social security schemes Privatising social security will harm retirees\n\nAs Greg Anrig and Bernard Wasow of the non-partisan think tank the Century Foundation argue: \"Privatization advocates like to stress the appeal of 'individual choice' and 'personal control,' while assuming in their forecasts that everyone’s accounts will match the overall performance of the stock market. But… research by Princeton University economist Burton G. Malkiel found that even professional money managers over time significantly underperformed indexes of the entire market.” [1] Most people don’t have the knowledge to manage their own investments. A Securities and Exchange Commission report showed the extent of financial illiteracy for example half of adults don’t know what a stock market is, half don’t understand the purpose of diversifying investments and 45% believe it provides “a guarantee that [their] portfolio won’t suffer if the stock market falls” [2] Including all the management costs it is safe to say that growth from individual accounts will be lower than the market average.\n\nThe private sector is therefore in no better a position to make investment decisions than the state. Privatised accounts would bring their own problems. They are vulnerable to market downturns. Despite crashes the long term return from shares has always been positive. But this does not help those that hit retirement age during a period when the stock market is down. With private pensions people would be relying on luck that they retire at the right time or happened to pick winning stocks. [3]\n\nThe economist Paul Krugman has pointed out, privatizers make incredible assumptions about the likely performance of the market in order to be able to justify their claim that private accounts would outdo the current system. The price-earnings ratio would need to be around 70 to 1 by 2050. This is unrealistic and would be an immense bubble as a P/E ratio of 20 to 1 is considered more normal today. [4]\n\nIf returns are low then there the added worry that privatized social security may not beat inflation. This would mean that retiree’s pensions become worth less and less. At the moment Social Security payouts are indexed to wages, which historically have exceeded inflation so providing protection. Privatizing social security would have a big impact on those who want to remain in the system through falling tax revenues. Implementing private accounts will take 4 per-cent of the 12.4 per-cent taken from each worker’s annual pay out of the collective fund. Thus, almost a 3rd of the revenue generated by social security taxes will be removed. Drastic benefit cuts or increased taxes will have to occur even sooner, which is a recipe for disaster. [5]\n\nIt is for reasons such as these that privatization of similar social security systems has disappointed elsewhere, as Anrig and Wasow argue: \"Advocates of privatization often cite other countries, such as Chile and the United Kingdom, where the governments pushed workers into personal investment accounts to reduce the long-term obligations of their Social Security systems, as models for the United States to emulate. But the sobering experiences in those countries actually provide strong arguments against privatization. A report last year from the World Bank, once an enthusiastic privatization proponent, expressed disappointment that in Chile, and in most other Latin American countries that followed in its footsteps, “more than half of all workers [are excluded] from even a semblance of a safety net during their old age.”” [6] Therefore privatizing Social Security would actually harm retirees and undermine the entire system, and so Social Security should not be privatized.\n\n[1] Anrig, Greg and Wasow, Bernard. \"Twelve reasons why privatizing social security is a bad idea\". The Century Foundation. 14 February 2005. http://tcf.org/media-center/pdfs/pr46/12badideas.pdf\n\n[2] Office of Investor Education and Assistance Securities and Exchange Commission, ‘The Facts on Saving and Investing’, April 1999, http://www.sec.gov/pdf/report99.pdf pp.16-19\n\n[3] Spitzer, Elliot. \"Can we finally kill this terrible idea?\" Slate. 4 February 2009. http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/the_best_policy/2009/02/privatize_social_security.html\n\n[4] Spitzer, Elliot. \"Can we finally kill this terrible idea?\" Slate. 4 February 2009. http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/the_best_policy/2009/02/privatize_social_security.html\n\n[5] Anrig, Greg and Wasow, Bernard. \"Twelve reasons why privatizing social security is a bad idea\". The Century Foundation. 14 February 2005. http://tcf.org/media-center/pdfs/pr46/12badideas.pdf\n\n[6] Anrig, Greg and Wasow, Bernard. \"Twelve reasons why privatizing social security is a bad idea\". The Century Foundation. 14 February 2005. http://tcf.org/media-center/pdfs/pr46/12badideas.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d5902944c6af806efa2c5a456a40b26d", "text": "economic policy society family house would privatize usas social security schemes The problems with the social security are systemic, not inherent\n\nSocial security is currently solvent and will be into the future due to its dedicated income stream that consistently generates a surplus, which today is $2.5 trillion. This surplus will even grow to approximately $4.3 trillion in 2023, It is only after 2037 when there will begin to be a deficit.(11)\n\nSide opposition will concede that there is a long-run financing problem, but it is a problem of modest size. There would only need to be revenues equal to 0.54% of GDP to extend the life of the social security trust fund into the 22nd century, with no change in benefits. This is only about one-quarter of the revenue lost each year because of President Bush's tax cuts. [1]\n\nBudget shortfalls- of the sort that side proposition’s case is based on- Nobel Laureate economist Paul Krugman argues: \" has much more to do with tax cuts - cuts that Mr. Bush nonetheless insists on making permanent - than it does with Social Security. But since the politics of privatization depend on convincing the public that there is a Social Security crisis, the privatizers have done their best to invent one.\" [2]\n\nKrugman goes on to argue against the twisted logic of privatization: “My favorite example of their three-card-monte logic goes like this: first, they insist that the Social Security system's current surplus and the trust fund it has been accumulating with that surplus are meaningless. Social Security, they say, isn't really an independent entity - it's just part of the federal government… the same people who claim that Social Security isn't an independent entity when it runs surpluses also insist that late next decade, when the benefit payments start to exceed the payroll tax receipts, this will represent a crisis - you see, Social Security has its own dedicated financing, and therefore must stand on its own. There's no honest way anyone can hold both these positions, but very little about the privatizers' position is honest. They come to bury Social Security, not to save it. They aren't sincerely concerned about the possibility that the system will someday fail; they're disturbed by the system's historic success.” [3]\n\nThere are many other ways to improve and reform Social Security without privatizing it. Robert L. Clark, an economist at North Carolina State University who specializes in aging issues, formerly served as a chairman of a national panel on Social Security's financial status; he has said that future options for Social Security are clear: \"You either raise taxes or you cut benefits. There are lots of ways to do both.\" These alternatives are also backed by the American people. The American people, despite voting for Republicans, have said over and over in polls that they would pay more in taxes to save entitlements such as Social Security. [4] Therefore Social Security is not fundamentally unsound, and alternative reforms should be made without privatizations.\n\n[1] Paul Krugman. \"Inventing a crisis.\" New York Times. 7 December 2004. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/07/opinion/07krugman.html?_r=2&scp=539&sq...\n\n[2] Paul Krugman. \"Inventing a crisis.\" New York Times. 7 December 2004. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/07/opinion/07krugman.html?_r=2&scp=539&sq...\n\n[3] Paul Krugman. \"Inventing a crisis.\" New York Times. 7 December 2004. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/07/opinion/07krugman.html?_r=2&scp=539&sq...\n\n[4] Dick, Stephen. \"Op-Ed: Yes, leave Social Security alone.\" CNHI News Service. 19 November 2010. http://record-eagle.com/opinion/x877132458/Op-Ed-Yes-leave-Social-Securi...\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
6a0e393f969bdd42df3222fd128f2c7c	Political union is necessary for Eurozone recovery What is needed for the Eurozone to flourish is an economic-political union with a single budget, so that capital can flow to where it is needed and fiscal policy can make up for imbalances between Member States (20). The alternative, as we have seen, is internal devaluation, which is a very painful and excruciatingly ineffective ways of achieving the same for a ridiculous price. (21) The European Union therefore needs to be looking forward to more integration rather than backwards to less. More integration can fix many of the problems in Europe; balancing regional disparities through fiscal transfers, eliminating the democratic deficit through a more powerful parliament, and preventing problems with nationalism by empowering regions. (20) Traynor, Ian. “Eurozone should form political union, says Germany’s ECB firefighter”, The Guardian. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/may/21/eurozone-political-union-germany-firefighter (21) Persson, Mats. “Can the euro be saved through internal devaluation alone – and at what political cost?”, The Telegraph. 28 September 2012. http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/finance/matspersson/100020411/can-the-euro-be-saved-through-internal-devaluation-alone-and-at-what-political-cost/	[ { "docid": "d3a341f3d38418b68e7dd72da3df0bb9", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european The Eurozone is not the same thing as the single market, which is the foundation of the EU trade bloc. It would probably even be good for Europe for the Eurozone to be dismantled as it would allow currency devaluations to restore competitiveness to failing economies in Europe’s periphery. The European trade bloc would certainly survive, and it is likely that the weaker economies would be in a much better position in the long-term because their products would be cheaper while still being a part of the single market (22). Further political union, on the other hand, would involve huge financial risks by eliminating any form of national flexibility to deal with economic problems. (23)\n\n(22) See “This House Would Abolish the Single European Currency”, Debatabase. http://idebate.org/debatabase/debates/economy/house-would-abolish-single-european-currency\n\n(23) Issing, Otmar. “The case for political union isn’t convincing”, Europe’s World. 1 June 2013. http://europesworld.org/2013/06/01/the-case-for-political-union-isnt-convincing/\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "6b4967954d51ef2f45225b7d9d6e27fa", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european While it might be true that some of these benefits are a consequence of the political union, all of these can be maintained in other forms. This is particularly evident by the fact that non-EU countries such as Switzerland and Iceland participate in these schemes, without becoming members of the political bloc. By disassembling the political union, countries can furthermore opt to participate in some agreements, while not participating in others, thus maximising everyone’s benefit.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0a21efe57d0d5df14b2fa8b0fde05a12", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european The EU, in practice, is not a particularly consistent or effective promoter of democracy. It has been unsuccessful in countries such as Ukraine and Georgia in the European neighbourhood (18): this suggests the EU can only lead countries into democracy when the conditions already exist for this change to happen naturally.\n\nThe example of Hungary shows how powerless the EU can be when pressing Member States to stay democratic once they have got in, extremist parties have expanded, the independence of the judiciary threatened and freedom of the press reduced (19). Its structure may make it difficult to become a member without democratizing, but also difficult to justify expelling a Member State. Such cases damage the credibility of the EU as a promoter of democracy. But a change to a trade bloc would not damage the ability of the EU to promote democracy; states could still be forced to democratize as a condition of joining.\n\n(18) Emerson, Aydin, Noutcheva, Tocci, Vahl and Youngs. “The Reluctant Debutante: The European Union as Promoter of Democracy in its Neighbourhood”, Working Document, Centre for European Studies, No. 223. July 2005. http://www.fride.org/download/OTR_Debutante_ENG_oct05.pdf\n\n(19) Landry, David. “Hungary: “Test case” for EU democracy?”, Budapest Business Journal. 1 August 2013. http://www.bbj.hu/politics/hungary-test-case-for-eu-democracy_67257\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "27cf3e8a562394e01ad9498dc3183ab9", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european The benefits outlined in the argument are only valid if the political aspect of the EU functions efficiently. The EU’s undemocratic nature and unnecessary bureaucracy create uncertainty about whether the EU will even exist in the long-term. Adding to that the growing resentment to the EU in several Member States and looming referenda, the EU is an unstable entity.\n\nA trade bloc, on the other hand, is not conflated with issues regarding sovereignty, national identity, immigration and other sensitive political issues. Therefore, it is likely to be considered safer by potential trading partners. When the EU is not a political agreement, foreign investors can have more trust that the countries involved now will remain involved in the future.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "aeb896c3588a9a0cc687bcb3370dbb36", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european The premise of this argument is that European countries are so connected that in entering war with another European country you would directly harm yourself. A European trade bloc is enough to ensure this, by interconnecting European economies to make war too expensive to be considered.\n\nFurthermore, while it is clear that there have been no great wars since World War Two, conflicts have not entirely been prevented; to the extent that they have, perhaps it is not the EU’s merit as the EU did not do much to prevent conflict in the former Yugoslavia (25); finally, perhaps the EU may even be blamed for the rise of nationalism and ensuing political tension in countries such as Greece so there is a growing potential for future conflict as a direct result of political union (26).\n\n(25) “The EU and the Nobel Peace Prize”, Charlemagne, The Economist. 12 October 2012. http://www.economist.com/blogs/charlemagne/2012/10/eu-and-nobel-peace-prize\n\n(26) Mariam Onti, Nicky. “Soros Blames Merkel For Golden Dawn”, Greek Reporter. 7 October 2013. http://eu.greekreporter.com/2013/10/07/soros-blames-merkel-for-golden-dawn/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9d3c21cc56df3447d8506c67ddf4edb3", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european It is important to remember that many areas of policy remain under national control and even those areas that are decided at the European level are agreed by the member states (9). The EU legislation, however, is important for creating trust between trading partners in the EU. Even if some of the laws seem trivial or unnecessary, it is the trust in the other countries’ compliance even in these laws, which creates a stable market in which actors can expect larger laws and agreements to be honoured. The political aspects of the union therefore complement the economic aspects.\n\nAs regards austerity, the British are implementing their own austerity policies, without Commission involvement, and are doing just as badly as anyone else (10). On the contrary, someone needed to sanitise the Greek economy, and it was evident that they were not going to do so themselves. EU decisions, as a whole, are preferable. We should remember that when countries agree to austerity as part of a bailout it is not a violation of sovereignty; they have the choice to say no and probably default as a result.\n\n(9) Bache, Ian; Bulmer, Simon; George, Stephen. “Politics in the European Union”, 3rd edition, Oxford University Press. 17 February 2011.\n\n(10) Giles, Chris; Bounds, Andrew. “Brutal for Britain”, The Financial Times. 15 January 2012. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/5cc73ea0-3e04-11e1-91ba-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2igLfoxJI\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7bc740952bab0c01de80539c6865be32", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european The reason that there is such trust in the status quo lies in that these countries have collaborated in a political union for decades. Once this structure has been removed, it is easy to turn protectionist and to start trade wars. This is precisely the source of the failure of trade blocs such as NAFTA. Without the presence of a political body, it was possible for the US to develop protectionist policies within the trade bloc framework. By subsidising their agricultural products to outcompete Mexico’s in Mexico itself, the US severely harmed its trade partner’s economy (14). This is a harmful form of trade. The EU benefits from its current more balanced, controlled and mutually beneficial structure.\n\n(14) Faux, Jeff. “How NAFTA Failed Mexico”, The American Prospect. 16 June 2003. http://prospect.org/article/how-nafta-failed-mexico\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6e012eaea4d9b463cec503f7fe958904", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european It is uncertain how many countries would realistically want remain in a trade bloc that does not support democracy as a core value.\n\nDistilling the EU to a trade bloc that does not care about democracy and human rights would run the risk of allowing in non-democracies which in turn would merely alienate most of its current members. Many EU countries would not wish to be associated with non-democracies. Even only concerning trade, many would not want to make trade concessions to undemocratic countries whose regimes they cannot trust, as this might jeopardise the reliability of their trade with this country. (12) As such there would be very few potential new members as a result of moving back to a trade bloc. The better solution is to bring the standard of democracy in neighbouring countries up to the point where they can join the EU. To encourage other democracies such as Norway to join there could be concessions made such as on the common fisheries policy.\n\n(12) Mansfield, Edward D.; Milner, Helen V.; Rosendorff, B. Peter. “Free to Trade: Democracies, Autocracies, and International Trade”, American Political Science Review. Vol. 94, No. 2. June 2000. http://www.stanford.edu/class/polisci243b/readings/v0002547.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0f608ecafa8455da3106d49a1e6bdee1", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european It is not true that not being fully representative makes a political entity undemocratic. In national politics we elect representatives to then make decisions on our behalf rather than have constant referenda, or even rather than require unanimity within Parliament. We expect not to have perfect representation. Furthermore, states that feel disenfranchised always have the option of leaving the EU; in fact it is much easier than it would be to leave an unrepresentative nation state. It is important to remember that Member States have consented to acting within this framework.\n\nEven if the political entity is flawed, it can always be improved. Much more power could be given to the European Parliament, and there are already plans for the President of the Commission to be elected through the Parliament. Moreover if turnout is a problem for the elected legislature’s legitimacy then this is a question of encouraging turnout which might happen organically due to increased relevance but if not could be managed if necessary through compulsory voting. Finally not being a flawless democracy must be weighed against not having an entity at all.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6bfa4eaebbc73ed40c52f35d00c65cce", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european Political union has numerous non-economic benefits which a trade bloc lacks\n\nLinking countries together politically is something we have done throughout history to preserve peace and ensure consistent channels of communication. Thanks to the European Union not only have millions of people gained greater freedom of movement and a freer flow of ideas: we have also secured very stable relations between a large number of states that previously were often at war with each other. All Member States, since they are tied both politically and economically, have a great interest in preserving stability in Europe and are incredibly unlikely to engage in hostility. Simple economics does not prevent war, as shown by the amount of trade before World War I, but political unions ensure that differences are worked out through dialogue. Because of this, it seems unthinkable for war to happen in the near future, an achievement that has been recognised by the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize (24). Eliminating the political union would compromise this great achievement.\n\n(24) “The Nobel Peace Prize for 2012”, Announcement, Prize Laureates, The Nobel Peace Prize. 12 October 2012. http://nobelpeaceprize.org/en_GB/laureates/laureates-2012/announce-2012/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "20c07e1a4b7840c0504188116f353368", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european Political union lends international credibility to a trade bloc\n\nTrust is a valued asset on the international market. When multinational corporations trade in astronomical figures, they must be able to trust in the political goodwill of the governments of the trading partner, to ensure that all parties to the agreement honour its conditions. Major trading partners, such as China and the US, are immense markets where one body can represent the whole country; this is also the case with the European Union through the European Commissioner for Trade. Having one person who can negotiate for the whole bloc has immense benefits in terms of economies of scale and making the European Union a major power in trade negotiations. Without a political union that provides a framework that binds them all members equally Europe would lose out (16).\n\nA single point of contact for trade negotiations is good because it gives the EU a larger market share, it allows smaller EU countries to benefit from the larger EU countries’ economic gravity, and it contributes to long-term trade relations between the EU and other large international entities.\n\n(16) “EU position in world trade”, Trade, European Commission. http://ec.europa.eu/trade/policy/eu-position-in-world-trade/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3a058dc1320611f3cc40d99b612227e7", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european European integration has been immensely beneficial to EU economies\n\nThe political union has had extensive benefits for the European trade bloc. Member States have the same legislation, for example, on labour conditions and protection of consumers (15). They also have similar property law. This allows products and ideas to freely move and be sold in different countries much more easily as there can be less bureaucracy at borders and companies can more easily expand abroad. The European political union also allows countries to streamline their production, students to access better international tuition, companies to move to countries where they can most boost growth, and cheap labour to move to where there is demand for their work as is currently the case with people from the Mediterranean countries moving to Germany for work, it is estimated that 80,000 south Europeans are moving to Germany every year (27). If the EU did not have a common legislation, its freedom of movement and thus its economic advantage would slow down.\n\n(15) “Consumers”, Summaries of EU legislation, Europa. http://europa.eu/legislation_summaries/consumers/index_en.htm\n\n(27) Connolly, Kate, “Young Spaniards flock to Germany to escape economic misery back home”, The Observer, 7 July 2013, http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jul/07/spanish-youth-germany-unemployment-crisis\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7a68352cf5d6ebc53ea70281ad04b45f", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european The European political union is a tool for promoting democracy\n\nThe EU has the ability to demand certain conditions from candidate states before they join. It has explicitly set a democratic standard countries must satisfy to be members. This is a powerful tool that repeatedly has incentivised reform in terms of human rights and democracy. In particular, countries emerging from Former Yugoslavia and Turkey have engaged in structural reform during the last decade as part of the process towards becoming Member States (17). It is also stronger for enabling a common foreign and security policy which encourages cooperation between member states when setting policy ensuring all members work together. The EU, therefore, can be a strong force for democracy. This is good, not only because democracy is intrinsically preferable to non-democratic systems, but also because democracies will be more likely to trade and freer trade produces more economic benefits. If the EU were to be merely a trade bloc, it could not put pressure on its countries to stay democratic and endorse the free market. Thus, both in political and financial terms, the EU’s role as a promoter of democracy should be defended.\n\n(17) Dimitrova, Antoaneta; Pridham, Geoffrey. “International actors and democracy promotion in central and eastern Europe: the integration model and its limits”, Democratization. Volume 11, Issue 5. 1 June 2004. http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13510340412331304606#.Um7QIvkvnZ4\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "30a76c222c45a9caf3630b8f30f99916", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european A European political union intrudes on its members’ sovereignty\n\nMany of the policies of the political union intrude on national legislation. In many cases, EU policies go against national traditions or redefine laws that were already functional. Occasionally EU policies even cause direct harm, when countries have less freedom to tailor them to their own conditions.\n\nDuring the past few years, the Commission’s powers have included monitoring Member States implementation of austerity policies in return for bailouts. However, everyone, including the IMF, agrees that austerity was unsuccessful and has seriously hampered recovery (7). Being a part of a political union inevitably means that sacrifices have to be made and this often intrudes on national sovereignty by reducing he room for manoeuvre of national governments.\n\nIntrusion by the EU would be justified if it creates substantially better laws or solid trade benefits; however, regulations on the shape of cucumbers (8) do neither of these. The EU should not have legislative power on these areas.\n\n(7) Blanchard, Olivier; Leigh, Daniel. “Growth Forecast Errors and Fiscal Multipliers”, IMF Working Paper. January 2013. http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/wp/2013/wp1301.pdf\n\n(8) Geiger, Susanne. “The strange curvature of the cucumber”, The German Times. January 2007. http://www.german-times.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=94&Itemid=34\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4028a052ecadbf356ae074fff5bf0c6b", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european The EU as a trade bloc would be more inclusive to current and new members\n\nThe European project has gone too far for many European countries. For some such as Norway or Switzerland the EU has already gone far past the amount of integration they would be willing to allow. Even Member States are increasingly finding that the EU’s intrusiveness and the cost of supporting smaller economies outweigh any potential benefit. Britain has expressed this discontent particularly strongly. (11)\n\nThis is a problem for the European Union. The problem of its alienated Member States is only likely to get worse as it seeks to continue expanding: new countries will have increasingly divergent values and will be harder to integrate while deepening will mean more countries are left behind. In practice, this means that the EU will face massive barriers to its goal of integration, and compromise all its other goals in the process. The best solution then is to go back to a stage in the EU’s development that every country supports; the single market without the politics attached. This would bring the benefit of encouraging those who have been left out like Norway and Switzerland to join.\n\n(11) “Goodbye Europe”, The Economist. 8 December 2012. http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21567940-british-exit-european-union-looks-increasingly-possible-it-would-be-reckless\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ff2fb13ec923bc250754647e9dcd72f8", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european A European political union is by necessity undemocratic\n\nThe EU is too large for a democratic structure. Since it deals not with citizens directly but with Member States, a question arises as to which agents should make fundamental decisions. Should every Member State get an equal vote, or a vote in proportion to the size of its population? If nation states get equal votes, a lot of people in larger states such as Germany, France or Spain may find themselves highly disenfranchised. On the other hand, if states get votes in proportion to the size of its population, countries such as Luxembourg will be forever hesitant to join, and rightly so, for its citizens would most likely be excluded.\n\nThe democratic deficit in the EU is no less visible in practice. The Commission is not directly elected (4); Council politics are confusing, take a long time, and grind to a halt whenever Germany is in the middle of elections (5); and the voting turnout for European elections, where MEPs are elected, is too low to be considered a fair representation of voters’ views (6).\n\nThis poses a problem the moment the EU begins having legislative power in its Member States: we must not let more and more aspects of citizen’s lives be affected by an institution that is increasingly undemocratic.\n\n(4) “About the European Commission”, European Commission. http://ec.europa.eu/about/\n\n(5) Pop, Valentina. “German elections to set EU agenda in coming months”, Agenda, EU Observer. 2 September 2013. http://euobserver.com/agenda/121263\n\n(6)Dowling, Siobhán. “Europe’s Unpopular Elections: Who Is to Blame for EU Voter Apathy?”, Spiegel Online International. 3 June 2009. http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/europe-s-unpopular-elections-who-is-to-blame-for-eu-voter-apathy-a-627958.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9c2774f0944c679a07ed949421821578", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european A European trade bloc can succeed without a political union\n\nThe European area only consists of liberal democracies, which consistently honour their agreements. While historically a political union might have been necessary to further strengthen the Coal and Steel Treaty (the EU as it originated) between recently belligerent states, these countries can now obtain the benefit of the trade union through multilateral agreements. They simply have to regulate protectionism and tariffs so countries can remain competitive and barriers to trade remain low. In the event that a country does not comply, the external pressure from the other countries, together with soft sanctions, is more than enough to keep the trade bloc functional.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
7353af363da6f7f23ab3d5ebf0873b15	The European political union is a tool for promoting democracy The EU has the ability to demand certain conditions from candidate states before they join. It has explicitly set a democratic standard countries must satisfy to be members. This is a powerful tool that repeatedly has incentivised reform in terms of human rights and democracy. In particular, countries emerging from Former Yugoslavia and Turkey have engaged in structural reform during the last decade as part of the process towards becoming Member States (17). It is also stronger for enabling a common foreign and security policy which encourages cooperation between member states when setting policy ensuring all members work together. The EU, therefore, can be a strong force for democracy. This is good, not only because democracy is intrinsically preferable to non-democratic systems, but also because democracies will be more likely to trade and freer trade produces more economic benefits. If the EU were to be merely a trade bloc, it could not put pressure on its countries to stay democratic and endorse the free market. Thus, both in political and financial terms, the EU’s role as a promoter of democracy should be defended. (17) Dimitrova, Antoaneta; Pridham, Geoffrey. “International actors and democracy promotion in central and eastern Europe: the integration model and its limits”, Democratization. Volume 11, Issue 5. 1 June 2004. http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13510340412331304606#.Um7QIvkvnZ4	[ { "docid": "0a21efe57d0d5df14b2fa8b0fde05a12", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european The EU, in practice, is not a particularly consistent or effective promoter of democracy. It has been unsuccessful in countries such as Ukraine and Georgia in the European neighbourhood (18): this suggests the EU can only lead countries into democracy when the conditions already exist for this change to happen naturally.\n\nThe example of Hungary shows how powerless the EU can be when pressing Member States to stay democratic once they have got in, extremist parties have expanded, the independence of the judiciary threatened and freedom of the press reduced (19). Its structure may make it difficult to become a member without democratizing, but also difficult to justify expelling a Member State. Such cases damage the credibility of the EU as a promoter of democracy. But a change to a trade bloc would not damage the ability of the EU to promote democracy; states could still be forced to democratize as a condition of joining.\n\n(18) Emerson, Aydin, Noutcheva, Tocci, Vahl and Youngs. “The Reluctant Debutante: The European Union as Promoter of Democracy in its Neighbourhood”, Working Document, Centre for European Studies, No. 223. July 2005. http://www.fride.org/download/OTR_Debutante_ENG_oct05.pdf\n\n(19) Landry, David. “Hungary: “Test case” for EU democracy?”, Budapest Business Journal. 1 August 2013. http://www.bbj.hu/politics/hungary-test-case-for-eu-democracy_67257\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "6b4967954d51ef2f45225b7d9d6e27fa", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european While it might be true that some of these benefits are a consequence of the political union, all of these can be maintained in other forms. This is particularly evident by the fact that non-EU countries such as Switzerland and Iceland participate in these schemes, without becoming members of the political bloc. By disassembling the political union, countries can furthermore opt to participate in some agreements, while not participating in others, thus maximising everyone’s benefit.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d3a341f3d38418b68e7dd72da3df0bb9", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european The Eurozone is not the same thing as the single market, which is the foundation of the EU trade bloc. It would probably even be good for Europe for the Eurozone to be dismantled as it would allow currency devaluations to restore competitiveness to failing economies in Europe’s periphery. The European trade bloc would certainly survive, and it is likely that the weaker economies would be in a much better position in the long-term because their products would be cheaper while still being a part of the single market (22). Further political union, on the other hand, would involve huge financial risks by eliminating any form of national flexibility to deal with economic problems. (23)\n\n(22) See “This House Would Abolish the Single European Currency”, Debatabase. http://idebate.org/debatabase/debates/economy/house-would-abolish-single-european-currency\n\n(23) Issing, Otmar. “The case for political union isn’t convincing”, Europe’s World. 1 June 2013. http://europesworld.org/2013/06/01/the-case-for-political-union-isnt-convincing/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "27cf3e8a562394e01ad9498dc3183ab9", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european The benefits outlined in the argument are only valid if the political aspect of the EU functions efficiently. The EU’s undemocratic nature and unnecessary bureaucracy create uncertainty about whether the EU will even exist in the long-term. Adding to that the growing resentment to the EU in several Member States and looming referenda, the EU is an unstable entity.\n\nA trade bloc, on the other hand, is not conflated with issues regarding sovereignty, national identity, immigration and other sensitive political issues. Therefore, it is likely to be considered safer by potential trading partners. When the EU is not a political agreement, foreign investors can have more trust that the countries involved now will remain involved in the future.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "aeb896c3588a9a0cc687bcb3370dbb36", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european The premise of this argument is that European countries are so connected that in entering war with another European country you would directly harm yourself. A European trade bloc is enough to ensure this, by interconnecting European economies to make war too expensive to be considered.\n\nFurthermore, while it is clear that there have been no great wars since World War Two, conflicts have not entirely been prevented; to the extent that they have, perhaps it is not the EU’s merit as the EU did not do much to prevent conflict in the former Yugoslavia (25); finally, perhaps the EU may even be blamed for the rise of nationalism and ensuing political tension in countries such as Greece so there is a growing potential for future conflict as a direct result of political union (26).\n\n(25) “The EU and the Nobel Peace Prize”, Charlemagne, The Economist. 12 October 2012. http://www.economist.com/blogs/charlemagne/2012/10/eu-and-nobel-peace-prize\n\n(26) Mariam Onti, Nicky. “Soros Blames Merkel For Golden Dawn”, Greek Reporter. 7 October 2013. http://eu.greekreporter.com/2013/10/07/soros-blames-merkel-for-golden-dawn/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9d3c21cc56df3447d8506c67ddf4edb3", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european It is important to remember that many areas of policy remain under national control and even those areas that are decided at the European level are agreed by the member states (9). The EU legislation, however, is important for creating trust between trading partners in the EU. Even if some of the laws seem trivial or unnecessary, it is the trust in the other countries’ compliance even in these laws, which creates a stable market in which actors can expect larger laws and agreements to be honoured. The political aspects of the union therefore complement the economic aspects.\n\nAs regards austerity, the British are implementing their own austerity policies, without Commission involvement, and are doing just as badly as anyone else (10). On the contrary, someone needed to sanitise the Greek economy, and it was evident that they were not going to do so themselves. EU decisions, as a whole, are preferable. We should remember that when countries agree to austerity as part of a bailout it is not a violation of sovereignty; they have the choice to say no and probably default as a result.\n\n(9) Bache, Ian; Bulmer, Simon; George, Stephen. “Politics in the European Union”, 3rd edition, Oxford University Press. 17 February 2011.\n\n(10) Giles, Chris; Bounds, Andrew. “Brutal for Britain”, The Financial Times. 15 January 2012. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/5cc73ea0-3e04-11e1-91ba-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2igLfoxJI\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7bc740952bab0c01de80539c6865be32", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european The reason that there is such trust in the status quo lies in that these countries have collaborated in a political union for decades. Once this structure has been removed, it is easy to turn protectionist and to start trade wars. This is precisely the source of the failure of trade blocs such as NAFTA. Without the presence of a political body, it was possible for the US to develop protectionist policies within the trade bloc framework. By subsidising their agricultural products to outcompete Mexico’s in Mexico itself, the US severely harmed its trade partner’s economy (14). This is a harmful form of trade. The EU benefits from its current more balanced, controlled and mutually beneficial structure.\n\n(14) Faux, Jeff. “How NAFTA Failed Mexico”, The American Prospect. 16 June 2003. http://prospect.org/article/how-nafta-failed-mexico\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6e012eaea4d9b463cec503f7fe958904", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european It is uncertain how many countries would realistically want remain in a trade bloc that does not support democracy as a core value.\n\nDistilling the EU to a trade bloc that does not care about democracy and human rights would run the risk of allowing in non-democracies which in turn would merely alienate most of its current members. Many EU countries would not wish to be associated with non-democracies. Even only concerning trade, many would not want to make trade concessions to undemocratic countries whose regimes they cannot trust, as this might jeopardise the reliability of their trade with this country. (12) As such there would be very few potential new members as a result of moving back to a trade bloc. The better solution is to bring the standard of democracy in neighbouring countries up to the point where they can join the EU. To encourage other democracies such as Norway to join there could be concessions made such as on the common fisheries policy.\n\n(12) Mansfield, Edward D.; Milner, Helen V.; Rosendorff, B. Peter. “Free to Trade: Democracies, Autocracies, and International Trade”, American Political Science Review. Vol. 94, No. 2. June 2000. http://www.stanford.edu/class/polisci243b/readings/v0002547.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0f608ecafa8455da3106d49a1e6bdee1", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european It is not true that not being fully representative makes a political entity undemocratic. In national politics we elect representatives to then make decisions on our behalf rather than have constant referenda, or even rather than require unanimity within Parliament. We expect not to have perfect representation. Furthermore, states that feel disenfranchised always have the option of leaving the EU; in fact it is much easier than it would be to leave an unrepresentative nation state. It is important to remember that Member States have consented to acting within this framework.\n\nEven if the political entity is flawed, it can always be improved. Much more power could be given to the European Parliament, and there are already plans for the President of the Commission to be elected through the Parliament. Moreover if turnout is a problem for the elected legislature’s legitimacy then this is a question of encouraging turnout which might happen organically due to increased relevance but if not could be managed if necessary through compulsory voting. Finally not being a flawless democracy must be weighed against not having an entity at all.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6bfa4eaebbc73ed40c52f35d00c65cce", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european Political union has numerous non-economic benefits which a trade bloc lacks\n\nLinking countries together politically is something we have done throughout history to preserve peace and ensure consistent channels of communication. Thanks to the European Union not only have millions of people gained greater freedom of movement and a freer flow of ideas: we have also secured very stable relations between a large number of states that previously were often at war with each other. All Member States, since they are tied both politically and economically, have a great interest in preserving stability in Europe and are incredibly unlikely to engage in hostility. Simple economics does not prevent war, as shown by the amount of trade before World War I, but political unions ensure that differences are worked out through dialogue. Because of this, it seems unthinkable for war to happen in the near future, an achievement that has been recognised by the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize (24). Eliminating the political union would compromise this great achievement.\n\n(24) “The Nobel Peace Prize for 2012”, Announcement, Prize Laureates, The Nobel Peace Prize. 12 October 2012. http://nobelpeaceprize.org/en_GB/laureates/laureates-2012/announce-2012/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "20c07e1a4b7840c0504188116f353368", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european Political union lends international credibility to a trade bloc\n\nTrust is a valued asset on the international market. When multinational corporations trade in astronomical figures, they must be able to trust in the political goodwill of the governments of the trading partner, to ensure that all parties to the agreement honour its conditions. Major trading partners, such as China and the US, are immense markets where one body can represent the whole country; this is also the case with the European Union through the European Commissioner for Trade. Having one person who can negotiate for the whole bloc has immense benefits in terms of economies of scale and making the European Union a major power in trade negotiations. Without a political union that provides a framework that binds them all members equally Europe would lose out (16).\n\nA single point of contact for trade negotiations is good because it gives the EU a larger market share, it allows smaller EU countries to benefit from the larger EU countries’ economic gravity, and it contributes to long-term trade relations between the EU and other large international entities.\n\n(16) “EU position in world trade”, Trade, European Commission. http://ec.europa.eu/trade/policy/eu-position-in-world-trade/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3942cd57b317056fde295e23365d349b", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european Political union is necessary for Eurozone recovery\n\nWhat is needed for the Eurozone to flourish is an economic-political union with a single budget, so that capital can flow to where it is needed and fiscal policy can make up for imbalances between Member States (20). The alternative, as we have seen, is internal devaluation, which is a very painful and excruciatingly ineffective ways of achieving the same for a ridiculous price. (21) The European Union therefore needs to be looking forward to more integration rather than backwards to less. More integration can fix many of the problems in Europe; balancing regional disparities through fiscal transfers, eliminating the democratic deficit through a more powerful parliament, and preventing problems with nationalism by empowering regions.\n\n(20) Traynor, Ian. “Eurozone should form political union, says Germany’s ECB firefighter”, The Guardian. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/may/21/eurozone-political-union-germany-firefighter\n\n(21) Persson, Mats. “Can the euro be saved through internal devaluation alone – and at what political cost?”, The Telegraph. 28 September 2012. http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/finance/matspersson/100020411/can-the-euro-be-saved-through-internal-devaluation-alone-and-at-what-political-cost/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3a058dc1320611f3cc40d99b612227e7", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european European integration has been immensely beneficial to EU economies\n\nThe political union has had extensive benefits for the European trade bloc. Member States have the same legislation, for example, on labour conditions and protection of consumers (15). They also have similar property law. This allows products and ideas to freely move and be sold in different countries much more easily as there can be less bureaucracy at borders and companies can more easily expand abroad. The European political union also allows countries to streamline their production, students to access better international tuition, companies to move to countries where they can most boost growth, and cheap labour to move to where there is demand for their work as is currently the case with people from the Mediterranean countries moving to Germany for work, it is estimated that 80,000 south Europeans are moving to Germany every year (27). If the EU did not have a common legislation, its freedom of movement and thus its economic advantage would slow down.\n\n(15) “Consumers”, Summaries of EU legislation, Europa. http://europa.eu/legislation_summaries/consumers/index_en.htm\n\n(27) Connolly, Kate, “Young Spaniards flock to Germany to escape economic misery back home”, The Observer, 7 July 2013, http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jul/07/spanish-youth-germany-unemployment-crisis\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "30a76c222c45a9caf3630b8f30f99916", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european A European political union intrudes on its members’ sovereignty\n\nMany of the policies of the political union intrude on national legislation. In many cases, EU policies go against national traditions or redefine laws that were already functional. Occasionally EU policies even cause direct harm, when countries have less freedom to tailor them to their own conditions.\n\nDuring the past few years, the Commission’s powers have included monitoring Member States implementation of austerity policies in return for bailouts. However, everyone, including the IMF, agrees that austerity was unsuccessful and has seriously hampered recovery (7). Being a part of a political union inevitably means that sacrifices have to be made and this often intrudes on national sovereignty by reducing he room for manoeuvre of national governments.\n\nIntrusion by the EU would be justified if it creates substantially better laws or solid trade benefits; however, regulations on the shape of cucumbers (8) do neither of these. The EU should not have legislative power on these areas.\n\n(7) Blanchard, Olivier; Leigh, Daniel. “Growth Forecast Errors and Fiscal Multipliers”, IMF Working Paper. January 2013. http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/wp/2013/wp1301.pdf\n\n(8) Geiger, Susanne. “The strange curvature of the cucumber”, The German Times. January 2007. http://www.german-times.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=94&Itemid=34\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4028a052ecadbf356ae074fff5bf0c6b", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european The EU as a trade bloc would be more inclusive to current and new members\n\nThe European project has gone too far for many European countries. For some such as Norway or Switzerland the EU has already gone far past the amount of integration they would be willing to allow. Even Member States are increasingly finding that the EU’s intrusiveness and the cost of supporting smaller economies outweigh any potential benefit. Britain has expressed this discontent particularly strongly. (11)\n\nThis is a problem for the European Union. The problem of its alienated Member States is only likely to get worse as it seeks to continue expanding: new countries will have increasingly divergent values and will be harder to integrate while deepening will mean more countries are left behind. In practice, this means that the EU will face massive barriers to its goal of integration, and compromise all its other goals in the process. The best solution then is to go back to a stage in the EU’s development that every country supports; the single market without the politics attached. This would bring the benefit of encouraging those who have been left out like Norway and Switzerland to join.\n\n(11) “Goodbye Europe”, The Economist. 8 December 2012. http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21567940-british-exit-european-union-looks-increasingly-possible-it-would-be-reckless\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ff2fb13ec923bc250754647e9dcd72f8", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european A European political union is by necessity undemocratic\n\nThe EU is too large for a democratic structure. Since it deals not with citizens directly but with Member States, a question arises as to which agents should make fundamental decisions. Should every Member State get an equal vote, or a vote in proportion to the size of its population? If nation states get equal votes, a lot of people in larger states such as Germany, France or Spain may find themselves highly disenfranchised. On the other hand, if states get votes in proportion to the size of its population, countries such as Luxembourg will be forever hesitant to join, and rightly so, for its citizens would most likely be excluded.\n\nThe democratic deficit in the EU is no less visible in practice. The Commission is not directly elected (4); Council politics are confusing, take a long time, and grind to a halt whenever Germany is in the middle of elections (5); and the voting turnout for European elections, where MEPs are elected, is too low to be considered a fair representation of voters’ views (6).\n\nThis poses a problem the moment the EU begins having legislative power in its Member States: we must not let more and more aspects of citizen’s lives be affected by an institution that is increasingly undemocratic.\n\n(4) “About the European Commission”, European Commission. http://ec.europa.eu/about/\n\n(5) Pop, Valentina. “German elections to set EU agenda in coming months”, Agenda, EU Observer. 2 September 2013. http://euobserver.com/agenda/121263\n\n(6)Dowling, Siobhán. “Europe’s Unpopular Elections: Who Is to Blame for EU Voter Apathy?”, Spiegel Online International. 3 June 2009. http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/europe-s-unpopular-elections-who-is-to-blame-for-eu-voter-apathy-a-627958.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9c2774f0944c679a07ed949421821578", "text": "eurozone crisis economy general international europe house believes european A European trade bloc can succeed without a political union\n\nThe European area only consists of liberal democracies, which consistently honour their agreements. While historically a political union might have been necessary to further strengthen the Coal and Steel Treaty (the EU as it originated) between recently belligerent states, these countries can now obtain the benefit of the trade union through multilateral agreements. They simply have to regulate protectionism and tariffs so countries can remain competitive and barriers to trade remain low. In the event that a country does not comply, the external pressure from the other countries, together with soft sanctions, is more than enough to keep the trade bloc functional.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
351a25cea8292648bef6b5786a7b0c26	Forced evictions are political land grabbing. Politics justifies, and legitimises, forced evictions. Previous cases across African cities [1] show how ethnicity, race, and political party preferences, are heavily embedded in the process. Inhabitants may have legal rights to occupy land - however, as in the case of the 1990 Muoroto demolition in Kenya [2] , ‘legal rights’ were trumped by ethnic tribalism and inter-party competition. Further, a majority of African cities are built informally, therefore what can be defined as illegal? Forced evictions will fail where entire cities are built on a state of informality. [1] Examples include: Zimbabwe (Operation Murambatsvina), Kenya, South Africa, Tanzania, Nigeria, Ghana. [2] See further readings: Klopp, 2008; and Ocheje, 2007.	[ { "docid": "f663fdab18ead375d1674af947765588", "text": "economic policy international africa society family immigration house believes Within cities land grabbing is a myth. A number of cases shown as political land-grabbing and rent-seeking are misrepresented, and misunderstood. Difficulties remain in defining what is a land grab and the extent of which the state, and politics, are involved in land speculations.\n\nThe media coverage of evictions in Mogadishu showcase the myth and hyperbole surrounding African politics and evictions. The government are entitled to reclaim land and reform it for public use [1] .\n\n[1] See BBC News (2013) for full debate, whereby Mohammed Yusuf, an Official at Mogadishu City, defends the eviction.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "6502b1826a4beee48d2884b257ee068a", "text": "economic policy international africa society family immigration house believes Slums and informal settlements are constraining African cities from becoming global players. Space needs to be cleared and new investors attracted, which will bring positive development. As a result of Johannesburg’s global status, Johannesburg’s Stock Exchange has continued to grow and improve [1] . Exchange Square, in Johannesburg, shows what African cities need to become. To become integrated into the global-economy city space, and priorities, need to be redesigned.\n\n[1] See Johannesburg Stock Exchange (2011), whereby classified as first for regulation of security exchanges.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ae82879a25e048325459807737c7ae24", "text": "economic policy international africa society family immigration house believes Evictions show the government are recognising residents as holding rights and entitlements - rights to live in a safe environment, rights to a home, and rights to sanitary conditions. The Millenium Development Goals will be met as a result of such policies - ensuring environmental sustainability, reducing child mortality, improving maternal health, and combating diseases [1] .\n\n[1] UN MDGs, 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "daa77ca0ab522a064a65612bed4c99a3", "text": "economic policy international africa society family immigration house believes Forced evictions are following, and imposing, the law. A heavy hand is need for rights to be granted to all in the future. A majority of informal settlements are also illegal, future cities in Africa need to be built on a sense of legality and law.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d1e26c7645be620fce7c403014cb24d4", "text": "economic policy international africa society family immigration house believes Forced evictions are needed to resolve the crisis. The crisis is emerging not out of a mismatch between supply and demand, but rather a lack of space and the inefficient use of space available. Plans need to be followed for housing to meet need, and evictions ensure such ambitions can be achieved. Evictions provide space to build housing effectively.\n\nTake the newly proposed Kigali City Plan 2040 [1] . 34,000 affordable homes will be built, in estates, for different socioeconomic groups. Space and organised planning - based on evictions - are essential to achieve this.\n\n[1] See further readings: Nuwagira, 2013; and Kigali City Plan 2040.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "de93f2f7c122cd039e7791c2392973d6", "text": "economic policy international africa society family immigration house believes There remains a danger of not learning from past mistakes. Forced evictions are unlawful, and have minimal benefits in terms of human development [1] . Evictions only show the natural path of the lawless nature of capitalism. Within capitalism, public space becomes privatised over time in order to enable the creation, and circulation, of profits.\n\nCities are social spaces, and therefore need to be designed for, and around, people not profits. Evictions dispossess of their land, livelihoods, and homes; while the city is redesigned for investors, the elite, and footloose companies. Social development and security needs to be seen as the natural path of development.\n\nFurther, comparatively, the context of African cities differs to that of Europe and the US.\n\n[1] For more information see further readings: United Nations Human Development Reports.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "904fec3fd29e31375cdde2a15a8b4161", "text": "economic policy international africa society family immigration house believes Since 2000, over 2mn experienced forced evictions in Nigeria [1] . Recent plans to implement the Eko Atlantic project along Lagos’ coastline has been designed with an intention for reducing emissions, protecting the vulnerability of Victoria Island to climate change, and promoting sustainable development. However, an exclusive landscape has been planned - targeting commuters, financial industries, and tourists. The need to include quotas for providing adequate housing or public services has been neglected. Furthermore, the designs present the construction of exclusive open spaces. Informal workers, such as street traders, will become unwelcome, destroying livelihoods.\n\n[1] COHRE, 2008.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "84ebccd5963239f0a9cd52fea8f3c2f0", "text": "economic policy international africa society family immigration house believes The idea of promoting a ‘slum-free’ environment is often used to justify evictions. However, for just urban planning, alternative methods need to be used. On the one hand, cases show how slum upgrading can be achieved through community organisations and the provision of tenure security. Organisations such as Abahlali BaseMjondolo and Muungano wa Wanavijiji are positive examples.\n\nOn another hand, the Master Plan’s [1] , justifying evictions, are wrong. Exclusive spaces are created as the new developments cater to elites and the right to health becomes accessible by a minority. Additionally, slums persist as forced evictions have a different agenda. Slum-dwellers are merely relocated to new settlements, with poor sanitation, inaccessible, and insecure.\n\nFurthermore, in the case of Kenya’s 2030 Vision, a number of cases indicate tensions are emerging. Rights over land, and therefore who receives compensation, are contested. Slum dwellers are given little warning on when the eviction will occur. Displacement resulted as residents were unable to afford new builds and not granted a new build.\n\n[1] See further readings.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "96ca371c86331b2966246b9869b5d660", "text": "economic policy international africa society family immigration house believes Forced evictions are not solutions as those displaced will simply build new shanty towns so it will not stop rapid growth. They fail to tackle underlying issues across African cities - such as the lack of access to adequate housing, services, and bad governance.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d88334ef416ed35690931124e2a39bb7", "text": "economic policy international africa society family immigration house believes It remains questionable whether the FIFA World Cup has been a success for South Africa, and for the majority of South Africa's citizens. The costs of forced evictions have outweighed the benefits in the international arena. The publicised nature of evictions across South Africa, in the build up to FIFA 2010, highlighted a negative image of urban planning in Africa and the unresolved issues of equality and rights. Forced evictions have resulted in the loss of architectural heritage for new builds, homelessness, and the publication of communities living without freedom to rights.\n\nThe Western Cape Anti-Eviction Campaign is a clear example. The social movement gained momentum to expose the undemocratic world poor communities live in and fight evictions. The communities were relocated into 'Tin Can Towns' and 'Transit Camps'. [1] The negativity raised will have future repercussions.\n\n[1] For more information see further readings: Smith (2010) and War on Want (2013).\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "38cfe060a39a7d2b7451ff3633d34f21", "text": "economic policy international africa society family immigration house believes The housing crisis is unresolved by forced evictions.\n\nAcross African cities there is a housing crisis - whereby there is a mismatch between housing demand and supply. Kigali, capital of Rwanda, for example needs to build half a million new homes. [1] As evictions continue the crisis is being exacerbated. Evictions displace individuals by destroying homes; are forcing lives’ to be rebuilt; and cause a rise in homelessness. In addition, in cases whereby resettlement housing is provided issues emerge. The new locations of resettlement show the crisis is unresolved. Residents are rehoused into unsanitary areas, areas far from employment opportunities, and on undesired land. Slums, and informal settlements, will continue to re-emerge in new locations as solutions are not being provided. Residents are forced out of central locations without being provided with an effective, affordable, alternative replacement.\n\nAlternatives need to be introduced and considered.\n\n[1] Agutamba, 2013\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "06036059e6a0aeed37281ce4f90da73e", "text": "economic policy international africa society family immigration house believes Denying individuals rights to the city commons.\n\nForced evictions create an exclusive city. The process of evictions means individuals are targeted, and criminalised, particularly the poor. The right to the city - to use the city, live in the city, and build the city - is denied to the poor and criminalised. Such denials have implications for the livelihood strategies of the poor.\n\nFor example, in the case of Johannesburg, South Africa, informal street traders have been evicted from using open, public space within the city centre. Such spaces are their means of employment, and as Abahlali Base Mjondolo show, the evictions represent a denial of legal and human rights [1] .\n\n[1] Abahlali Base Mjondolo are a movement of shack-dwellers based in Durban and operating across South Africa. Updated articles are provided.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "02e180d2eb6fb7ab314f1ef6954d2463", "text": "economic policy international africa society family immigration house believes African cities should not aim for ‘global city’ status.\n\nThere is debate as to the extent to which Africa is experiencing rapid urbanisation. Data shows that across several countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, in reality, urbanisation is slowing or static [1] . A process of counter-urbanisation is occurring as a result of return migration and fictitious data. The political discourse of Africa’s rapid urbanisation and Megacities promotes unjustified dangerous intervention, such as forced evictions.\n\nAfrican cities are unique, and need to promote an alternative image to define their status. A different brand and image of global city status is required, rather than following the current definition. The current definition fails to recognise the diversity of what cities do. The definition of global cities introduces a criteria to follow, and forces conformity in cities worldwide. Mega cities are not negative but have been constructed as being so. There remains a danger of following a path towards 'worlding' cities: who is included and invited to participate in it?\n\n[1] Potts, 2009.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7aea426c940b949d7dc41536ddaf1063", "text": "economic policy international africa society family immigration house believes Forced evictions are inhumane, and make state violence an increasing reality in African cities.\n\nForced evictions are unjust and reflect a threat to human rights. By carrying out such events, the state has become a key actor enforcing violence, fear and insecurity to those whom remain in need of protection [1] . In Luanda, Angola, where 18 mass evictions have been noted between 2002-2006 by the Human Rights Watch [2] , individuals have been killed and imprisoned in the process. Intimidation by the state and government officials becomes a dangerous norm; and inhabitants are not treated as humans.\n\n[1] Amnesty International Campaign.\n\n[2] Human Rights Watch, 2007.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8eedbfad406eb277abb3324e1a75bf83", "text": "economic policy international africa society family immigration house believes Forced evictions are a natural path of development.\n\nForced evictions have occurred globally across time, they show the natural progression of development. Cases across Europe and the USA show evictions were a feature of cities and urbanisation in the past. London experienced numerous ‘slum clearances’ from the 18th to the 20th Century, one such clearance was the building of the Metropolitan railway to the City which destroyed the slums around Farringdon and forced relocation of 5-50,000 people from 1860-4. [1] Firstly, as modernisation theory shows transition occurs as society progresses from ‘traditional’ to an ‘age of mass consumption’. Evictions often occur where inhabitants may not have the legal titles to occupy land. Evictions enable the transition from communities who occupy land based on traditional laws and beliefs to the emergence of a refined legal system.\n\nSecondly, development can only progress once new land becomes available - investment requires space. Therefore space has to be cleared for the city to be re-planned and new investments made. New investments can ensure African cities become sites of prosperity and continue to attract investors.\n\n[1] Temple, 2008\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e5837eecf7b8c18fb56b31faf6234d7d", "text": "economic policy international africa society family immigration house believes Forced evictions pave the road for African cities to set a trend towards Eco-Cities.\n\nA key character of global cities are the global connections made. Whether financial, economic, political, or cultural - global cities become a fundamental hub providing key resources. Forced evictions provide space in overcrowded, unorganised, cities whereby new architecture and districts can be built, and new trends set. Forced evictions provide spaces for new financial districts and beautiful cities to emerge across Africa.\n\nRecently plans have been set to implement 'Eco' projects across African cities. Proposed projects include the Konza Techno City, Nairobi; Eko Atlantic, Lagos; HOPE, Ghana; and Kampala Tower, Kampala, as part of the Venus Project.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7c55dfc29266c7592f38f3fa14af7a53", "text": "economic policy international africa society family immigration house believes Forced evictions are a means to control rapid urbanisation and gain global city status.\n\nAfrica is undergoing rapid urbanisation of 3.5% per year (by comparison China’s is only2.3%). [1] With the rising number of ‘Megacities’ [2] across Africa, the government need to introduce methods to control the sprawling nature of cities and create a sense of order.\n\nMega, and Million, cities have become a representation of Africa’s urban future. Urbanisation in Africa is occurring much faster than the governments are able to cope with. As Mike Davis (2007) suggests African nations showcase a new type of city - a city of slums, decay, and prevailing revolution. The government need to take more control to effectively build future cities and define the path of urbanisation.\n\n[1] Worldstat info, 2013\n\n[2] ‘Megacities’ are defined as cities with over 10 million inhabitants (Wikipedia, 2013).\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f158a12e474a350877bc31dae34198b6", "text": "economic policy international africa society family immigration house believes Forced evictions are necessary to change perceptions.\n\nWestern media and institutions often present an image of 'Africa' which fails to understand the reality, and continues to position 'Africa' as the 'other', 'unknown', and in need of assistance. Cities across Africa are an opportunity to change this idea of Africa. Forced evictions enable local, and national, governments to redesign African cities. Taking the case of South Africa forced evictions, in cities, have been central in promoting its new image.\n\nIn 2010, South Africa hosted the FIFA World Cup. Stadiums were built in Johannesburg, Cape Town, and Durban and provided the international community an opportunity to see the beauty of South Africa and confirm its ability to deliver as a BRIC country. Evictions occurred to create an aesthetic city, for the greater good. The evictions were only a small cost in the broader scale, whereby a better city would be built for all to enjoy, employment created, and tourists attracted [1] .\n\n[1] Although accurate figures of the number of evictions carried out, and/or number of residents displaced, are unavailable, cases have been reported where around 20,000 people could have been evicted in one settlement. See further readings: Werth, 2010.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c59cdff029ea28c08fa9511038a14bbe", "text": "economic policy international africa society family immigration house believes Forced evictions will create cities without slums in the long-run.\n\nSlums and informal settlements need upgrading; and the percentage of slums remains highest in Sub-Saharan Africa [1] where slums can be up to 72% of the urban population. [2] Slums are unhealthy spaces - spaces where disease festers, there is limited access to sanitation and services, and overcrowding presents a squalid environment. Forced evictions are an effective urban planning tool to build healthier cities. Residents need to be evicted to enable infrastructure to be built (i.e. roads, lighting, sewage), and services constructed (i.e. hospitals and schools). Evictions enable a healthier environment and homes to be built in the process of redevelopment, beneficial for inhabitants in the long-run.\n\nThis has been the motive of Kenya Vision 2030 [3] which aims to provide access to adequate housing and a secure environment for urban dwellers. In upgrading slums, such as Kibera, the first stage required relocating residents in Kibera to multiple sites (i.e. Soweto East).\n\n[1] Fox, 2013.\n\n[2] Tibaijuka, 2004\n\n[3] Kenya Vision 2030, 2013.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
6fa7b8f5c289ec12351c8549d4d18b15	Graduates may move abroad to avoid tax payments As taxes are collected nationally there is no reason why a UK graduate could not simply upon graduating leave the country and avoid paying the education tax. If enough people exploited this obvious loophole in the system the Government could end up severe deficit in the education budget which ultimately could lead to lower investment which would have a detrimental effect on the quality of education on offer. The proposed system then is simply not a practical one seeing as this massive and clear to see loophole exists with it.	[ { "docid": "57ac213250d9f66e94a92baa61262479", "text": "employment tax education university house would fund provision higher education As taxes are collected nationally there is no reason why a UK graduate could not simply upon graduating leave the country and avoid paying the education tax. If enough people exploited this obvious loophole in the system the Government could end up severe deficit in the education budget which ultimately could lead to lower investment which would have a detrimental effect on the quality of education on offer. The proposed system then is simply not a practical one seeing as this massive and clear to see loophole exists with it.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "d7f6cd6c73c0165df7663c8b73c0e4d4", "text": "employment tax education university house would fund provision higher education In the long term a graduate tax would save the state money by shifting the burden of costs to the main beneficiaries of higher education. It would also help to make the costs of expanding access to higher education more predictable and controllable, improving long-term planning. This means the early costs of setting up the system could be spread into the future by a bond issue, for example. The money saved can be spent better elsewhere in the education system, perhaps by improving secondary schooling so that more school leavers have the academic qualifications needed to attend university. Using the argument that change is not needed simply does not with students which a being saddled with debts before they even have work.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "33243aafae34e60f552edd96838575a2", "text": "employment tax education university house would fund provision higher education A graduate tax put into an independent trust fund could in fact conversely help universities gain more academic freedom than they have now. They would be more free from market constraints which may restrict them, for example universities could be able to offer courses which may only be taken all be a very small fringe and would not usually be financially viable to run but which are culturally beneficially to have experts in if not useful economically. The argument that the state could interfere with the running of universities under a graduate tax system is erroneous, universities would still retain current levels of freedom from the government as the trust fund would be independent from government decision making and would be controlled by the stakeholders including universities meaning that they could worry a bit less about funding and exercise more independence on academic issues leading to better universities which are concentrating on their students’ needs and not just their own.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "bb15d3c8029d6fb9fc6ac5fea2596980", "text": "employment tax education university house would fund provision higher education The alternatives to a graduate tax are worse: Full state funding encourages many without clear motivation or ability to enter university, leading to high dropout rates, while removing incentives to complete courses in a timely manner. The USA has a philanthropic culture absent in many other countries, meaning private colleges have large endowment funds offering a very large number of bursaries and scholarships to poorer students. Nonetheless, the individual states do fund universities and few students pay the full cost of their higher education. Elsewhere in the world the absence of state funding tends to limit access to university to the children of a prosperous elite. Even in the USA students from some ethnic minorities are much more reluctant to take on high levels of personal debt, and are therefore very underrepresented in higher education. The USA’s high level of personal bankruptcy is linked to the high levels of debt built up while at university. A graduate tax then can be seen as a happy medium between the two extremes of Full state funding and No funding whereby the student pays for the benefit of having a higher education only when they are fit to do so.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0e97353880210006c93d718faa89fcca", "text": "employment tax education university house would fund provision higher education The main problem with the proposition argument is the belief that a graduate will be earning £40,000 immediately after leaving university, this is clearly not the case, particularly in the current economic climate, the average starting wage for a graduate was in 2009 £23,500 with only one in ten exceeding £36,000. (Milkround, 2009) The argument does in part accept this weakness however what it does not point out is that many careers which require a university degree may never pay greater than £40,000. What a graduate tax focuses on is getting a job after university, this is not always the reason that people wish to go to university, take for example a mature student who just wants to self-better themselves, could they still get access to education when the system would be built upon getting young people into work? University should not be commoditized, it should be considered sacred in its own right; introducing a graduate tax turns university into a means to get a career rather than being a place of pure education.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b53201da75d3d2f6a3624040443b7935", "text": "employment tax education university house would fund provision higher education As higher earners, graduates already pay a lot more on average in taxes over their lifetime, while consuming less in welfare payments, thus more than repaying their “debt to society”. In addition, the whole of society gains from higher education through increased economic growth and prosperity, and from the social mobility and integration that open access to university promotes. If the cost of higher education is an investment in the country’s future, it is appropriate for the government to fund it out of general taxation. In any case, the argument that an individual doesn’t use a particular government service, so why should they pay for it, could apply elsewhere and undermine most aspects of government activity and the taxation that pays for it.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "694d9a3148b6e3777d89f0528cd92d9c", "text": "employment tax education university house would fund provision higher education The prospect of life-long higher-tax status will in fact act as a deterrent to many weaker students who doubt their abilities to make a success of a university degree, or those from poorer backgrounds with no family tradition of higher education. Introducing a graduate tax will simply come across as penalizing those who want to go into higher education rather than encouraging it. The real key to improved access to higher education lies in both better secondary education, as at present many potentially able students are failed by poor schools and are unable to achieve the qualifications needed to go on to university and by providing more bursaries for those from disadvantaged backgrounds.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "62448a8127af4f7f0e7cdc386bb3177a", "text": "employment tax education university house would fund provision higher education Alternative- and more efficient- methods of funding universities are available\n\nThere are a number of viable alternatives to a graduate tax as a means of paying for Higher Education: Full state funding operates in many EU countries as part of an extensive and popular welfare state paid for out of general taxation; the value the state clearly places upon Higher Education has made it a common aspiration across all social classes. Other countries make individual students pay for all or most of the cost of their university education, which is widely seen as an investment in increased future earning potential. In the USA this has produced very high levels of enrollment and broad access to higher education as motivated students readily work to pay their way through college. Most also take out commercial loans, which are later paid off once the student is in employment; unlike a graduate tax these repayments are not open-ended and will one day be completed. The cost of educating a student to degree level varies widely both between and within countries, showing clear room for efficiency savings to be made in many institutions, perhaps through some focusing solely upon teaching rather than research, or by academic specialization.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e6734f5339d7a6fa632f020a18658717", "text": "employment tax education university house would fund provision higher education Setting up a graduate tax system would be damagingly expensive\n\nA graduate tax would be a very expensive scheme to put into effect, as it would require high levels of government spending on student grants before the first graduates began to repay anything through taxation. If all the 2011 English applications for university we’re accepted at the new top price of £9,000 it would cost the Government in the first year just over £3 million, and this figure does not take into account all the other grants universities receive and as time goes on and more years enter the system the figure will grow greatly. (Guardian, 2011.) It is likely then to be two decades of investment or more before the system begins properly to pay for itself. Furthermore a costly increase in government bureaucracy would be necessitated by the need to keep track of so many graduates and by the complications the system introduces to the general taxation system. With many Governments taking up austerity measures it is simply impractical to setup a new funding system which is not needed.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "858117c0cb3f91de8609034a52101b7f", "text": "employment tax education university house would fund provision higher education A graduate tax would reduce teh autonomy of universities\n\nIf a graduate tax were introduced the money would go to the national treasury which would result in universities competing for the same money as colleges. At the moment the money generated from tuition fees goes straight to where it should go, straight to the universities bank accounts who provide the education. Under graduate tax proposals from the UK’s National Union of Students, raised revenue from the tax would go into a centralized higher education fund which could be distributed by the government through various means which could result in some universities getting unfair levels of funding relative to both their standing and student bodies. (Barr, N. 2009) This is impractical for universities to plan investments as they will never be entirely sure what funding they will have and furthermore and for many arguably most importantly universities will ultimately lose their independence from the state.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c11c57dd41c05ab5a8fd8320e5c7d6d8", "text": "employment tax education university house would fund provision higher education A graduate tax would make university funding more sustainable\n\nA graduate tax would potentially give universities more than they get from traditional funding, as a contribution would depend directly on a person’s salary rather than just being a flat rate fare for services rendered over a short time. For example a person earning £40,000 would pay about £125 per month. (Shepard, J. 2009) That over 20 years could amount to £30,000, more than enough to cover the costs of a university education in a way which is manageable. Admittedly that sum is based on a person rising like a rocket but it still hints at the possibilities of the tax and how it could bring in more money than simply universities rising their fees. Secondly, it would change as a person’s salary rises or falls over a twenty year period, being more sustainable and increasing the chance of the costs being recovered. Thirdly, rather than giving a person a required fee to pay it would be giving a person a chance to pay over a set time period, reducing the financial impact of the bill.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ea43a126b1d26a95dfb0deeb48ee7ba3", "text": "employment tax education university house would fund provision higher education A graduate tax would make access to higher education fairer and more equitable\n\nA graduate tax would be fairer for everyone in society. Graduates earn considerably more than non-graduates, on average over £100,000 more in a lifetime (Channel 4 News, 2010.), experience lower rates of unemployment and greater job security, they therefore benefit hugely from higher education. They should therefore be expected to pay for the privilege of having an education which has put them in that position rather than having the rest of society fund there degrees, going to university should be an honor and not a privilege. While having a degree is useful it is not necessary for getting on with life, if someone wants to go to university they should have that opportunity regardless of their background but they should be expected to contribute to that education which is why the graduate tax works as students of all social classes can join university, not be loaded with debt and can contribute fiscally when viable.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "09462cad0eed7185fc01160be4cef31c", "text": "employment tax education university house would fund provision higher education Delivering funding via a graduate tax is the best way to encourage more students to enter higher education\n\nA graduate tax is the best way to increase access to higher education without massively burdening the government with an open-ended financial commitment. It is not a deterrent to the poorer students in the way fees and loans-based schemes are and which simply appear to block access, yet it still delivers sufficient extra capital to fund the increase of students entering university. Australia’s introduction of a graduate tax has been successful enough to allow university places to grow rapidly following its introduction with participation from both high and low income groups increasing by approximately one third. (Chapman, B. 1997). Therefore, a graduate tax removes the expensive barriers to entry that had previously kept out low-income groups, whilst not discouraging the high-income groups from tertiary education.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
acbac0d767e4caf7557118f83009d389	SWFs should be welcomed for the benefits they bring rather than ostracized for doing what others do. Developed countries are guilty of a great deal of hypocrisy in their attitude to the sovereign wealth funds of emerging economies. In the past their own companies were used as instruments of state power, for example BP’s origins lie in Britain’s attempt to dominate Iran’s (at the time known as Persia) oil wealth. [1] The developed world is always willing to buy assets on the cheap, as shown by American banks buying up Asian banks during the Asian Financial crisis at the end of the 1990s. [2] Recently SWFs have proved willing to channel a great deal of investment into poorer states, particularly in Africa, their investments have already surpassed the IMF and World bank’s, [3] boosting their economies and assisting their long-term development through the provision of infrastructure such as roads and ports. This is a much more equal relationship than that promoted by the west, with its manipulation of aid and loans to maintain political influence in former colonies. [1] BP, ‘Our history’. http://www.bp.com/extendedsectiongenericarticle.do?categoryId=10&content... [2] The Economist, ‘The rise of state capitalism’, 2008. http://www.economist.com/node/12080735 [3] Cilliers, Jakkie, ‘Africa and the future’. http://www.regjeringen.no/nb/dep/ud/kampanjer/refleks/innspill/afrika/ci...	[ { "docid": "35f453517c3a2546743d3a80c0e1fd93", "text": "finance economy general house would act regulate activities sovereign wealth The amounts sovereign wealth funds invest in the poorest countries is tiny compared to their overall portfolio. In 2008 the head of the World Bank Robert Zollick was attempting to persuade sovereign wealth funds to invest just 1% of their assets in Africa. [1] Investment by SWFs in Africa is not all good. Sovereign wealth funds are guilty of bad behaviour in the developing world. Some government-backed firms from China and the Arab world (not all of the SWFs) have provided capital to maintain some of Africa’s worst rulers in power, in exchange for the opportunity to gain access to the natural resources of their misruled states. Sudan for example has sold 400,000 hectares to the United Arab Emirates. [2] This has allowed dictators to ignore the conditions (e.g. for political freedoms and economic reforms) attached to funding offered by western aid donors and international institutions such as the World Bank. It also contrasts sharply with the behaviour of western companies, who are led to act more responsibly by pressures from their own governments, investors and media.\n\n[1] Stilwell Amy, and Chopra, Geetanjali S., ‘Sovereign Wealth Funds Should Invest in Africa, Zoellick Says’, 2008. http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/NEWS/0,,contentMDK:21711325~pag...\n\n[2] The Economist, ‘Buying farmland abroad, Outsourcing’s third wave’, 2009. http://www.economist.com/node/13692889\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "430640af234dae7518a347cb058d4010", "text": "finance economy general house would act regulate activities sovereign wealth In many cases sovereign wealth funds are not even good for the states that own them. Almost all are emerging economies with limited financial expertise available to them, and they are not equipped to invest the money wisely. This has led to SWFs paying inflated prices for dodgy western companies, whose share price has subsequently collapsed, resulting in the loss of billions of dollars of national wealth for example China Investment Corporation lost $500million on Blackstone, Qatar Investment Authority may have lost as much as $2billion in its attempt to buy Sainsburys. [1] Surely it would be better to invest the money at home, or even return it to their people in the form of lower taxes.\n\n[1] The Economist, ‘The rise of state capitalism’, 2008. http://www.economist.com/node/12080735\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4cb04f7c692a5e8755764b9894acf5e9", "text": "finance economy general house would act regulate activities sovereign wealth Fears about the unrestrained influence of sovereign wealth funds will likely stimulate wider protectionism anyway if effective regulation is not introduced. Protectionist politicians may exploit fears of foreigners to restrict any kind of foreign investment, and seek to build up national champions as a defensive measure. This risks losing all the economic benefits of globalisation, such as opportunities to unwind financial imbalances and to spread expertise, while directing capital to areas where it can have the greatest impact. Better to regulate SWFs now for fear of a greater backlash later.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e5097649298ef2ceea0095a824edd295", "text": "finance economy general house would act regulate activities sovereign wealth Sovereign Wealth Funds could potentially help the financial system but they will only do so if it is in the national interest of their country to do so. It is this political dimension that is the reason for more regulation. Moreover regulation of SWFs will not prevent these funds from helping the global financial system. They will still be free to invest. Moreover it does not reduce the incentives for them to do so either, regulation will make no difference to a state’s motivations in a time of crisis – the national interest will remain key.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0488a719a8237d73d47e9c9256684f8c", "text": "finance economy general house would act regulate activities sovereign wealth Fears about national security are greatly overblown, and are often simply an attempt to justify protectionist measures. Very few companies pose a national security risk, and those that do are covered by existing regulations – so that, for example, the USA could veto Dubai Port World’s bid to take over American ports. Most SWFs do not seek full control of companies they invest in, so they are not in a position to manipulate their assets for political gain, even if they wished to. [1] In reality, countries set up SWFs for economic reasons and they represent a major national investment, the value of which would be expensively destroyed if they once tried to abuse their position. Nor are there any actual examples of a country trying to exert political influence through its sovereign wealth fund. Overall, tying a wide variety of states into the international economic and financial system is beneficial, as it gives them a stake in the peace which the global economy needs for prosperity and so makes them less likely to pursue aggressive foreign policies. Conversely, alienating the governments of other states by designating them as dangerous predators who cannot be allowed to invest in our companies is a sure way to create enemies.\n\n[1] Rose, Paul, ‘Sovereign Wealth Funds: Active or Passive Investors?’, 2008. http://thepocketpart.org/2008/11/24/rose.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b3e96a4230e2a39a64efb4c914f77063", "text": "finance economy general house would act regulate activities sovereign wealth Regulations already exist to prevent foreign investments that might compromise national security. [1] Other than this it would be unfair to discriminate against certain classes of investors. Wealth-creating capitalism relies upon investors seeking to maximise the value of their investments. Without voting rights or the possibility of exercising majority control of a company, SWFs would be unable to ensure that managers were working hard on their behalf, allocating resources efficiently and being held accountable for their decisions.\n\n[1] Gibson, Ronald J., and Milhaupt, Curtis J., ‘Sovereign Wealth Funds and Corporate Governance: A Minimal Solution to the New Mercantilism’, 2009. http://legalworkshop.org/2009/07/19/sovereign-wealth-funds-and-corporate...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cf76c15b1984da5565496d9f7fbf46fe", "text": "finance economy general house would act regulate activities sovereign wealth While it may be true that the state is often a bad manager of assets and businesses in this case the state is not usually involved in the management of the assets. This is being done through the wealth fund which is often in large part run by people whose background is in finance rather than in government. This use of external independent asset managers in itself should be enough to ease worries over state control. [1] Because SWFs don’t seek to have control over the majority of the businesses they invest in discredited government economic planning is not an issue. [2] Indeed SWFs are operating much more like private companies than state owned enterprises.\n\n[1] Mezzacapo, Simone, ‘The so-called “Sovereign Wealth Funds”: regulatory issues, financial stability and prudential supervision’, 2009, p.46. http://ec.europa.eu/economy_finance/publications/publication15064_en.pdf\n\n[2] Rose, Paul, ‘Sovereign Wealth Funds: Active or Passive Investors?’, 2008. http://thepocketpart.org/2008/11/24/rose.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e1ae0626c6910f4dedf8f7862acc4156", "text": "finance economy general house would act regulate activities sovereign wealth Transparency is a good thing, but it would be unfair to single out sovereign wealth funds for special punishment over this issue. Hedge funds and private equity groups are even less transparent than SWFs, and their influence in the global economy is much greater. [1] Some countries (e.g. Norway) already operate very transparent investment strategies. Many have agreed to the Santiago Principles which encourage transparency and disclosure of financial information. [2] It is likely that other countries will come over time to follow their lead voluntarily, as it is in the interest of their own citizens to see that the state is managing their money in an efficiently and honestly.\n\n[1] Avendaño, Rolando, and Santiso, Javier, ‘Are Sovereign Wealth Funds’ Investments Politically Biased? A Comparison with Mutual Funds’, 2009, p.9. http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/43/0/44301172.pdf\n\n[2] Ibid\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c6b6f286ac80d33ef8c0ebee47f356f8", "text": "finance economy general house would act regulate activities sovereign wealth Sovereign wealth funds are not new and they are still only a tiny part of the global financial system. They represent only about 2% of global traded securities, and are dwarfed by other financial actors such as mutual funds, or private equity groups and hedge funds. [1] What is more, in comparison with these other players in the global financial system, SWFs are long-term investors looking many years, even decades into the future. This means that they are likely to bring calm, rather than irrational volatility to markets, as they will not be rushed into dumping assets based on a few months of bad data.\n\n[1] The Economist, ‘Sovereign Wealth Funds Asset-backed insecurity’, 2008, http://www.economist.com/node/10533428\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "769b31e82ab7595744e377c73136c64f", "text": "finance economy general house would act regulate activities sovereign wealth SWFs can help the financial system in times of trouble\n\nSovereign wealth funds should be credited with coming to the rescue of the global financial system during the turmoil of 2008. With their long-term horizons for a return on their investments they have been willing to provide billions of dollars in new capital to distressed companies, at a time when other sources of funding have headed for the door. [1] Their money has allowed firms to continue trading and so safeguarded jobs at a time of great uncertainty. It has also helped prevent complete collapse of global equities prices, on which many people, through their pension funds, depend for a secure future. Moreover unlike some other types of funds such as hedge funds SWFs have an interest in keeping the global economy stable and reducing the impact of any downturns as their own country is bound to be affected by global economic conditions so responsible investment practices are encouraged. SWFs therefore “can play a shock-absorbing role in global financial markets”. [2]\n\n[1] Beck, Roland, and Fidora, Michael, ‘Sovereign Wealth Funds – Before and Since the Crisis’, 2009, p.363. http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayFulltext?type=1&fid=6245144&...\n\n[2] Lipsky, John, ‘Sovereign Wealth Funds: Their Role and Significance’, 2008. http://www.imf.org/external/np/speeches/2008/090308.htm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3a1ade19bdb449d74f4f075bdaba14d7", "text": "finance economy general house would act regulate activities sovereign wealth SWFs represent good economic management by countries with surpluses\n\nSovereign wealth funds are highly beneficial for states with large financial surpluses. Traditionally they have been run by resource-rich countries which wish to diversify their assets to smooth out the impact of fluctuations in commodity prices on their economies and revenues. The fund can then be drawn down then prices are low. [1] Indeed 30 of 38 SWFs in 2008 were established for such a stabilization role. [2] By holding investments abroad, oil-rich countries such as Qatar and Norway have also built up valuable national reserves against the day when their fossil fuels eventually run out. Kiribati, a pacific island country, put aside wealth from mining guano from fertilizer. Now the guano is all mined but the $400million fund boosts the island’s GDP by a sixth. [3] In any case, allowing all the income from natural resources into your domestic economy is well known to lead to wasteful investments and higher inflation – better to manage the revenues responsibly by using them to create wealth for the future. More recently many Asian countries with big current account surpluses and massive government reserves have sought higher returns than they could get through more traditional investment in US Treasury bonds. Again, this is a responsible strategy pursued by states seeking to do their best for their citizens.\n\n[1] Ziemba, Rachel, ‘Where are the sovereign wealth funds?’, 2008, http://qn.som.yale.edu/content/where-are-sovereign-wealth-funds\n\n[2] Lipsky, John, ‘Sovereign Wealth Funds: Their Role and Significance’, 2008. http://www.imf.org/external/np/speeches/2008/090308.htm\n\n[3] The Economist, ‘Sovereign Wealth Funds Asset-backed insecurity’, 2008. http://www.economist.com/node/10533428\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "421a1456d3843b4c0400b4145666f804", "text": "finance economy general house would act regulate activities sovereign wealth Restricting SWFs is protectionism\n\nRestricting the activities of sovereign wealth funds is a form of protectionism, which is itself likely to stimulate further demands for barriers against globalisation. Western countries oppose protectionism when it is from other countries preventing western companies investing so it would be hypocritical to want protectionism against those same countries buying the firms that want so much to invest in emerging markets. [1] It should be remembered that almost 40% of SWF assets are controlled by SWFs from advanced industrialised states. [2] As a result SWF investments abroad contribute to greater economic openness around the world. By exposing emerging economies and authoritarian states to developed world standards of transparency, meritocracy and corporate social responsibility, they will help to spread liberal values and raise standards. They will also give many more nations a stake in international prosperity through trade, encouraging cooperation rather than confrontation in foreign policy, and giving a boost to liberalising trade deals at the WTO. Finally as with all protectionism there is the risk that the SWFs will pull out their wealth and not invest as a result of protectionism resulting in lost jobs or jobs that would otherwise be created going somewhere more hospitable to SWFs. [3]\n\n[1] The Economist, ‘The rise of state capitalism’, 2008. http://www.economist.com/node/12080735\n\n[2] Drezner, Daniel W., ‘BRIC by BRIC: The emergent regime for sovereign wealth funds’, 2008, p.5. http://danieldrezner.com/research/swf1.pdf\n\n[3] Ibid, p10\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "43a96ceefb177dcd1f984e37766d8ec0", "text": "finance economy general house would act regulate activities sovereign wealth SWFs can harm national security\n\nSovereign wealth funds raise worrying issues about national security. Unlike mutual funds or private equity groups, which seek only to maximise their investors’ returns, SWFs must be regarded as political entities. Rather than passively holding their assets, they may seek to use their purchases to gain access to natural resources, advanced technologies, including those crucial to our defence, or other strategic sectors. [1] For example Gulf states are using their SWFs to invest in food and natural resources from Latin America. [2] They may engage in economic nationalism, shutting factories in western countries to give an unfair advantage to their own industries [3] . While it has not yet happened they may even attempt economic blackmail, threatening to turn off the lights through their control of energy companies and utilities if governments do not fall in with their foreign policy aims. Allowing countries such as China, Russia and various Gulf states to buy up western companies at will is potentially very dangerous. Even if we regard these states as friendly at the moment, there is no guarantee that they will stay that way, especially as none of them share our political values.\n\n[1] Lyons, Gerard, ‘State Capitalism: The rise of sovereign wealth funds’, 2007, p.14 http://banking.senate.gov/public/_files/111407_Lyons.pdf\n\n[2] Pearson, Samantha, ‘Sovereign wealth funds: Foreign cash has its drawbacks’, 2011, http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/e5e4f274-6ef5-11e0-a13b-00144feabdc0.html#axzz...\n\n[3] Balin, Bryan J., ‘Sovereign Wealth Funds: A Critical Analysis’, 2008, p.4, http://www.policyarchive.org/handle/10207/bitstreams/11501.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4f79a4a7e6f07252ac4c8b996f3e36d2", "text": "finance economy general house would act regulate activities sovereign wealth Sovereign wealth funds must be regulated\n\nA number of possible models of regulation have been suggested for sovereign wealth funds. Some, such as Gilson and Milhaupt, have argued that state-owned investment vehicles that buy shares abroad should not be allowed voting rights in that stock. [1] Others would put a cap on SWF investments, so that they cannot take a stake of more than, say 20% in any business without government approval within the country the SWF is investing in [2] – meaning that they can only be passive investors. Both these proposals would ensure that they are unable to abuse a dominant position while still allowing countries to benefit from cross-border investment in a globalised economy. At the same time such rules would prevent any broader protectionist backlash so the Sovereign Wealth Funds themselves could welcome the regulation.\n\n[1] Gibson, Ronald J., and Milhaupt, Curtis J., ‘Sovereign Wealth Funds and Corporate Governance: A Minimal Solution to the New Mercantilism’, 2009. http://legalworkshop.org/2009/07/19/sovereign-wealth-funds-and-corporate...\n\n[2] Garten, Jeffrey, ‘We need rules for sovereign funds, 2007, http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/0b5e0808-454a-11dc-82f5-0000779fd2ac.html#axzz...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "dbdaa1f47874cb0610e08c020ba40f26", "text": "finance economy general house would act regulate activities sovereign wealth Sovereign Wealth funds are not transparent\n\nSovereign wealth funds suffer from an almost total lack of transparency. Most countries maintain secrecy about the size of their funds and the extent of their holdings, their accountability to government, their investment strategies and their approach to risk management. Without knowing these things, it is impossible to gauge whether political or economic objectives will dominate the SWFs’ behaviour, or indeed whether they will make safe and responsible shareholders in any business – secrecy breeds corruption. For these reasons, Jeffrey Garten of Yale has argued that SWFs should be obliged to publish independently audited accounts twice a year. He has also pointed out that many countries operating SWFs protect their domestic economy from foreign competition and investment. We should demand reciprocity, so that countries seeking investments abroad must open up their own economies fully before they are allowed to hold significant assets elsewhere. [1]\n\n[1] Garten, Jeffrey, ‘We need rules for sovereign funds, 2007. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/0b5e0808-454a-11dc-82f5-0000779fd2ac.html#axzz...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1b81af9c8eea9de3524c847b968be03a", "text": "finance economy general house would act regulate activities sovereign wealth Sovereign wealth funds can undermine economic independence\n\nSovereign wealth funds (SWFs) have become very important players in the global economy. The already exceed the assets controlled by hedge funds and will surpass the stock of global foreign exchange reserves. [1] They are now so big that their activities can shift markets, such as Norway’s Government Pension Fund did when short selling Iceland’s banks, leading to panic and instability when they sell assets suddenly. [2] Their purchases can mean that companies owned by other states can end up dominating the economies of smaller countries, undermining their own sovereignty and economic independence. It is also worrying that many SWFs are controlled by undemocratic states which have a questionable commitment to capitalism; should we allow such states to exercise so much power over our economies?\n\n[1] Lipsky, John, ‘Sovereign Wealth Funds: Their Role and Significance’, 2008, http://www.imf.org/external/np/speeches/2008/090308.htm\n\n[2] The Economist, ‘Sovereign Wealth Funds Asset-backed insecurity’, 2008, http://www.economist.com/node/10533428\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b8565738b0a6bd98f3f0f85547e16845", "text": "finance economy general house would act regulate activities sovereign wealth State ownership is not a good way of controlling funds\n\nThe ownership of important businesses by sovereign wealth funds runs counter to the economic policy pursued by almost every government over the past 25 years. In the 1970s many states owned nationalised industries as part of an attempt at socialist economic planning that has now been discredited. State ownership distorted incentives, interfered with management and produced decades of underinvestment, poor service to consumers, and national economic failure with the most extreme example being the Soviet Union itself. Since the 1980s countries everywhere have followed the example of Thatcher’s Britain and privatised their industries, freeing them to compete efficiently and to generate more wealth and jobs than they had ever done in state hands. Going back to state ownership of business is a dangerous backward step, especially as it is now foreign governments that are doing the nationalising.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
f4c0bc9c65fc1ab11f66e3f806f6a43a	This policy is good for EU economies. If the government is employing people then it is going to be boosting the economy. Providing a fiscal boost by spending money is one of the most accepted ways of boosting the economy. In this case spending money on temporary workers is good in several ways. First it is a fiscal boost to the economy. The government will be paying the temporary workers. These workers will have more money to spend and will probably mostly spend it rather than saving. This in turn boosts demand for other goods and services so meaning there needs to be more output with the result that some jobs will be made permanent. There is therefore a positive feedback loop. The second way in which this helps the economy is that it is investment. It is investment because the government is paying for young people to gain experience and for companies to be training these temporary workers. The result of this is a more skilled workforce who in the long term will be more productive. There is a final possible benefit. With government paying for workers they are effectively subsidizing firms. Even if they are new trainees the young temporary workers will be providing output for companies at next to no cost. This then makes that firm more competitive against its global competitors.	[ { "docid": "988dafabf7a858d8ef293afad2d0f0bd", "text": "business economic policy employment eurozone crisis house believes eu member These placements will only be for six months. This combined with the intent not to make the program too expensive means that the benefit will be limited in terms of the fiscal boost provided. Those who are getting a salary only for six months are not likely to feel rich from getting that money so will probably try to save any they can.\n\nAlso, these roles would be most likely to be unskilled. The benefit in terms of investment would therefore not be particularly great. Yes the young people involved are getting experience but this is different from providing them with technical skills that make them competitive in a global marketplace.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "f004df5b7bea650ae1e2f5f81d26aac0", "text": "business economic policy employment eurozone crisis house believes eu member Guaranteeing a temporary job for young people is a temporary solution. Having a job for a short period of time will not guarantee more permanent employment. Britain’s Mandatory Work Activity scheme does some of this proposal by having very short term unpaid job placements however a study has shown that having this placement had zero benefit when it comes to getting a job. [1] Even if it did impact on those who took part in the scheme it is no help if it does not increase the number of permanent jobs as there will be the same number of young people in the same small pool. A more long term solution is necessary. This would require more jobs, and more training to ensure that skills fit the jobs that are available.\n\n[1] Malik, Shiv, ‘Mandatory work scheme does not improve job chances, research finds’, 13 June 2012, http://www.theguardian.com/society/2012/jun/13/mandatory-work-scheme-government-research\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ee22ddaa2e2a4b76d2cce140f4cd1d93", "text": "business economic policy employment eurozone crisis house believes eu member While there is a benefit to diversity it does not have to be obtained by employing younger people but instead by having racial and gender diversity.\n\nCompanies have the right to choose their own recruitment practices. It is up to them, and them alone, who they choose to recruit. If they believe in such benefits and that they outweigh any other priorities then they will already be recruiting young people. That they are not doing so shows that businesses do not believe the benefits are as high as they are made out to be. Government should not be compelling business to employ people government should only be interfering with business in order to create a level playing field between companies.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0708626fd917224e5dafe596bdfae261", "text": "business economic policy employment eurozone crisis house believes eu member Age ‘discrimination’ runs both ways. Many companies operate policies of age discrimination against older workers. Older employees are often likely to have more out of date skills. According to a survey of businesses, the reasons for not hiring older workers are their lack of flexibility and unwillingness to learn new techniques, lack of foreign languages, little knowledge of technology and a dislike of change [1] . Those who are nearing the end of their career and are just as likely to be unable to find a news job because of these problems and are therefore likely to find themselves forced into early retirement.\n\nWhen this happens these people will no longer be counted among the statistics for unemployment so much older unemployment is hidden. If a ‘lack’ of experience is a good reason for the government to provide a job then having the ‘wrong’ experience should be just as good a reason. Focusing just on youth would be wrong.\n\n[1] Daskalova, Nadezhda, ‘Company attitudes towards employing older workers’, EWCO, 10 July 2009, http://www.eurofound.europa.eu/ewco/2009/05/BG0905019I.htm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5aa6559b42d0e09063f4ed9bca403c8c", "text": "business economic policy employment eurozone crisis house believes eu member Businesses are already regulated in who they can hire and on what terms– for that reason there are child labour, minimum wage and anti-discrimination laws. These kind of regulations come both from national governments and the European Union. Governments have always had this right.\n\nThis policy is therefore not damaging freedom of choice any more than many other regulations. It will most likely not be necessary to make taking on the temporary jobs compulsory because the government is paying for it and how many companies will turn down something that is essentially a subsidy?\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f518110fc3c3c8b5cbec4f9c244c14fa", "text": "business economic policy employment eurozone crisis house believes eu member Training is indeed the answer but it makes sense for this to be done on the job rather than simply in lecture theatres. Where there are skills gaps these gaps should be filled by encouraging and paying for temporary jobs to help fill those roles. In this way the young people involved will gain the skills for an area of the economy where there are vacancies.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "36ebff8ecfd96b81c357ab2f28f5ba75", "text": "business economic policy employment eurozone crisis house believes eu member It should not be assumed that today’s unemployed youth will be the target for recruiters in the future. In four or five years’ time there will be more graduates from high schools and universities looking for work and those companies that want to employ young people will look to them rather than people who have been out of work for several years. The result then will be a generation who have never worked and never picked up the skills for a job and may never get the opportunity to do so without government help. Older people who are unemployed at least have the skills they have learned in the workplace and a past record to fall back on.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c897b13fb6a421f7c7ed0d412ce3d129", "text": "business economic policy employment eurozone crisis house believes eu member This policy is necessary to avoid a lost generation\n\nRising youth unemployment can be considered an international timebomb. Young people are the next generation of workers and consumers in the economy. When they are unemployed, the situation can be alarming. This is because of the importance of getting a job early on so as to avoid becoming long term unemployed. The UN Secretary general, Ban Ki-Moon, has called for stronger policies involving young people [1] . The ILO has warned that youth unemployment can lead to apathy towards government and political instability [2] . The lack of experience in work may cause a lost generation.\n\nThis must be averted, and the EU is one of the best placed to do this. The temporary work scheme would encourage business to change their attitude and hire more young workers. Having to hire young people, even for a short time, would help break negative stereotypes and often the employers would then offer longer term work. This would help to fill the 2million unfilled vacancies that exist in the EU with young people. [3]\n\n[1] Youth Business International, ‘Global Youth Unemployment: a ticking timebomb’, The Guardian, 27 March 2013, http://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionals-network/2013/mar/26/global-youth-unemployment-ticking-time-bomb\n\n[2] Youth Business International, ‘Global Youth Unemployment: a ticking timebomb’, The Guardian, 27 March 2013, http://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionals-network/2013/mar/26/global-youth-unemployment-ticking-time-bomb\n\n[3] European Commission, ‘Youth Unemployment’, ec.europa.eu, 2013, http://ec.europa.eu/social/main.jsp?catId=1036\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6839731f4f110a7d1c0a0f65408ec498", "text": "business economic policy employment eurozone crisis house believes eu member Increased workforce diversity\n\nWhile we often think of workplace diversity as being about having people from all over the world and both men and women a good age balance is necessary too. By bringing in this policy, younger workers will be in the same workplaces as older employees, and vice versa, making for more workplace diverse. Employees will learn from those with more experience, in addition to the other advantages of a more diverse workforce. [1] One of these is more engagement and engaged workers perform 20% better and are less likely to leave. [2] Another is that young people will contribute new and innovative ways of thinking, with different viewpoints pushing the business forward. [3] Finally a company needs to have all ages in the business to ensure that there are people with experience when older workers retire.\n\nDiversity is also crucial for the appearance of a business. The kind of company that attracts a broader pool of individuals means a greater range of talented candidates to choose from. Businesses who create more diverse workplaces perform better.\n\n[1] Dutta, Pallab, ‘Importance of Workplace Diversity’, the Houston Chronicle, accessed 30/09/13, http://smallbusiness.chron.com/importance-workplace-diversity-43235.html\n\n[2] Anand, Dr. Rohini, ‘How Diversity and Inclusion Drive Employee Engagement’, DiversityInc, accessed 30/09/13, http://www.diversityinc.com/diversity-management/how-diversity-and-inclusion-drives-employee-engagement/\n\n[3] Ingram, David, ‘Advantages and Disadvantages of Diversity in Workplace, The Houston Chronicle, accessed 30/09/13, http://smallbusiness.chron.com/advantages-disadvantages-diversity-workplace-3041.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "33460723006e8c1508978a580058888b", "text": "business economic policy employment eurozone crisis house believes eu member The EU should guarantee youth a job in order to equal their chances.\n\nThe EU member states should rely more on public employment services, which should be focused on finding jobs for young people. With government funding, they can work with the private sector to offer decent temporary jobs to young people. This model is common in the Nordic states [1] and other countries, such as Austria, Germany and Switzerland also have similar programs.\n\nYouth unemployment is already far higher than for older people. Less than a third of under 25s who were looking for a job in 2010 found one in 2011 [2] – this may be due to ageist discrimination against young people, and employers seeking people with experience.\n\nPeople over 25 are also considered as a high risk group. They have little experience so the employer is taking a risk in employing them. There is also a desire for stability; those who already have a family are unlikely to want large changes so employers feel they can bet on them for the long term.\n\nIf the problem is a lack of experience then this proposal solves the problem. Giving younger people a temporary job and the experience that goes with it will help give everyone an equal chance at getting a job, irrespective of age. Therefore, the EU should step in and help provide jobs for younger people.\n\n[1] International Labour Office, ‘Youth guarantees: a response to the youth unemployment crisis?’, International Labour Organization, 2012 http://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/---ed_emp/documents/publication/wcms_209468.pdf\n\n[2] European Commission, ‘Youth employment’, ec.europa.eu, 2013, http://ec.europa.eu/social/main.jsp?catId=1036\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9be37535f05fb692ace467d6a1d4faef", "text": "business economic policy employment eurozone crisis house believes eu member This policy would only serve to discriminate against unemployed people older than 25\n\nEven though there are large numbers of young people unemployed, they only make up around a fifth of the total unemployed population. 26.654 million men and women were unemployed in July 2013 in European Union. Only 5.560 million of them are young people. [1]\n\nThe result then is clearly going to be discriminatory against those who are not among the young. This would simply mean that more qualified, equally unemployed people would be passed over due to their age.\n\nIt should be remembered that the youth will be more capable of bouncing back when the recession finally ends and there are jobs available. They are more flexible, they have more of the skills necessary for modern work such as knowledge of computers, and they are more willing to retrain to get a job. The result is that when the jobs are available they will be the ones who are able to find work. Older people on the other hand will find it much harder to find another job without government help even when the economy picks up.\n\nYoung people can wait to get their careers off to a start. Older workers can’t.\n\n[1] Eurostat, ‘Unemployment statistics’, epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu, modified 30 August 2013, http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/statistics_explained/index.php/Unemployment_statistics\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d03cfa3fb9cab80a618262a4cac8f3c1", "text": "business economic policy employment eurozone crisis house believes eu member Temporary employment for youth acts against freedom of choice for businesses\n\nIn a free market the core concept is freedom of choice. The consumer chooses what they want to buy. And by the same measure there needs to be freedom of choice for employers. They need to be able to decide what products to make, how to market them, and who to employ. Companies should be looking for those who are best qualified for the job rather than satisfying a government quota to provide temporary contracts to young people.\n\nEven if the government is paying for this employee they are still utilising the resources of businesses. Businesses will often have limited space so having some of that space taken up by mandated temporary workers is not the most productive use that the company could be making of that space.\n\nIt is clear that this would be a ‘make work’ scheme because there are already only around two million vacancies, compared to five and a half million unemployed under 25s, in the entire European Union [1] . Moreover that these vacancies exist shows that the real problem is with matching jobs and workers with the right skills. This is best done by training not temporary, probably unskilled, employment.\n\n[1] European Commission, ‘Youth Unemployment’, ec.europa.eu, 2013, http://ec.europa.eu/social/main.jsp?catId=1036\n\nEurostat, ‘Unemployment statistics’, epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu, modified 30 August 2013, http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/statistics_explained/index.php/Unemployment_statistics\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "136910f76eba663fd59a44c08533a2de", "text": "business economic policy employment eurozone crisis house believes eu member The policy is not a long term solution.\n\nJob guarantees for young people may place them in employment for some time at a low cost, but does not offer a permanent solution. The Swedish job guarantee scheme has been criticised for this reason [1] . They will not create a solution based on skills, qualifications and economic growth because employers have little incentive to train up workers who are only temporary. If the company is not looking to expand there will be little point in wasting resources on someone they are not going to take on over the long term.\n\nTraining has to be the solution to youth unemployment. The government should be training young people to fill the gaps that do exist in the market place such as care workers. When young people have skills that are in demand then they will be able to get full time employment without having to rely on temporary employment schemes to ‘make work’ for them to do.\n\n[1] Eurofound, ‘ Youth Guarantee: Experiences from Finland and Sweden’, Eurofound.europa.eu, EF/12/42/EN, 2012, http://www.eurofound.europa.eu/pubdocs/2012/42/en/1/EF1242EN.pdf\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
f787b8a55268ab6ff9b00000a536645b	Technology will lead job growth for youths. The rate of unemployment in Sub-Saharan Africa remains above the global average, at 7.55% in 2011, with 77% of the population in vulnerable employment [1] . Economic growth has not been inclusive and jobs are scarce. In particular, rates of youth unemployment, and underemployment, remain a concern [2] . On average, the underutilisation of youths in the labour market across Sub-Saharan Africa stood at 67% in 2012 (Work4Youth, 2013). Therefore 67% of youths are either unemployed, inactive, or in irregular employment. The rate of unemployment varies geographically and across gender [3] . There remains a high percentage of youths within informal employment. Technology can introduce a new dynamic within the job market and access to safer employment. Secure, high quality jobs, and more jobs, are essential for youths. Access to technology is the only way to meet such demands. Technology will enable youths to create new employment opportunities and markets; but also employment through managing, and selling, the technology available. [1] ILO, 2013. [2] Definitions: Unemployment is defined as the amount of people who are out of work despite being available, and seeking, work. Underemployment defines a situation whereby the productive capacity of an employed person is underutilised. Informal employment defines individuals working in waged and/or self employment informally (see further readings). [3] Work4Youth (2013) show, on average, Madagascar has the lowest rate of unemployment (2.2%) while Tanzania has the highest (42%); and the average rate of female unemployment stands higher at 25.3%, in contrast to men (20.2%).	[ { "docid": "5be915f66646debec550c2463db42410", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Recent evidence by the World Bank indicates unemployment is not only due to the limited availability of jobs. A high proportion of youths have been identified as ‘idle’ - not in school, training, or work, and not actively seeking employment. Although variations are found, in 2009 only ~2% of male youths, aged 15-24, and ~1% of female youths, who were not in school or employment in Tanzania, were actively looking for work [1] . Without motivation technology will not make a difference.\n\n[1] WDR, 2013.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "16d25984d21c5ffdb9b2437268a5d0e6", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Currently 3 in 4 youths work informally or within vulnerable employment - working without a formal written contract (Work4Youth, 2013). Although technology may create new markets it will not change the type of employment youths engage in. The use of technology will mean a majority of youths will continue to work informally - without access to social security, a valuable pension scheme, and social protection in the event of a crisis. Self-employment and having the flexibility to connect to different markets provides a temporary fix and income. Stability and security is not provided for youths.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "51d8f3963d4ac51d78fca0311d54cbed", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Cultural industries don’t always provide a positive role. If entrepreneurial youths today are using technology to create films on witchcraft in the public sphere, what effect will this have on future generations? Growth cant just rely on creative industries as there needs to be money created to drive demand for these films, and any money that might be made by the creative industries are undermined by piracy. Without a solution small time films are hardly the most secure of jobs.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "fc554952adb8b6785391be52c59a00e3", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Despite programs distributing technology into schools does the availability of technology provides future benefits? Having a tablet does not ensure teachers are well-trained to assist and guide the children. Without proper oversight it might prove more of a distraction. Technology in schools might also mean students having technology substituted for teachers. With programs still being implemented, and results variable, the causality between technology, education, and the rise of well educated, motivated, youths remains precarious.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4fafb682c30e4e041beb3c8f45b1ddbf", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Such platforms are known, and accessible, by a minority within Africa - limiting who benefits from the technology available. Rising entrepreneurs across Africa typically are able to access resources required and network their ideas, whilst a majority of youths remain out of the innovation loop.\n\nAs inequality disparities continue to increase in Africa, a similar trend is identifiable to youth technology and entrepreneurialism. Entrepreneurs rising in Africa show the future of a ‘young millionaire’s club’. They hold the right connections, access to credit and electricity, and time to apply to their business model. The millionaire entrepreneurs continue to create new technologies - not vice-versa.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "35e1de149bc5cc95fdffd8847f81d3ac", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Credit is now becoming more accessible through technology. Mobile-banking schemes such as MPESA across East Africa and ZAAB in Somalia, use mobile phones to transfer money and payments. The mobile banking scheme is increasing the efficiency of borrowing money from social circles, enabling quick transactions to be carried out, and introducing users to a wealth of market opportunities.\n\nTechnology is integral to entrepreneurship.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "bfc20c71593c41edfab1f125f322b16e", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Several examples may be found on established partnerships between multinational technology firms and civil-society groups. Microsoft has become a key investor in South Africa to tackle youth unemployment.\n\nMicrosoft has established a Students to Business initiative in South Africa, aiming to build human capital and provide professional skills to students, thus assisting job opportunities. Multinational companies are investing in youths as they recognise the burden of high unemployment and the potential talents youth have. By providing young students with key skills and sharing knowledge, a new generation of technology developers, leaders, and entrepreneurs will arise.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e4c0b8299bdf17cdb6415228f5d9430e", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Technology is enhancing security, not threatening it. Measures are being implemented to ensure cyber-security and further technology is creating new, local, initiatives for security on the ground. Ushahidi Crowdmapping - an interactive, collective, mapping tool - was used to expose, and remember, political violence that occurred in Kenya’s 2007 presidential election [1] .\n\n[1] See further readings: Ushahidi, 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "bc6193fdf492c72ebb197ceddf893ea4", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies The technological revolution across Africa is broad, ranging from mobile technology to internet connectivity. The availability of mobiles has broadened who can use technology - being more inclusive to multiple socio-economic groups.\n\nInternet.org [1] has been established to resolve issues, making connectivity affordable. The initiative, which involves a collaborative partnership between Facebook and technological organisations, has a vision of ensuring access to the internet for the two-thirds who remain unconnected. Connectivity is a fundamental necessity to living in our ‘knowledge economy’. Their mission has centred on three aspects: affordability, improving efficiency, and innovative partnerships to expand the number of people connected. Intervention has therefore focused on removing barriers to accessing information by connecting people.\n\nFurthermore in Kenya, mobile phones have been made accessible to a wider audience through the removal of the general sales tax in 2009.\n\n[1] See further readings: Internet.org, 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e6a5434f4fc0afd77827cbef0eb8bb9c", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Technology has driven youths to identify new markets\n\nA key technology for youths are mobile phones and devices. Across West and East Africa the possession of mobile phones has enabled citizens to network and form solutions to social problems. By 2015, there are expected to be 1 billion mobile cellular subscriptions in Sub-Saharan Africa (Sambira, 2013). This is the first African generation directly accessing high-technology, although uncertainty remains in the amount of youths having access to technology. Through mobile phones new business opportunities, and flows of money, are being created. Furthermore, mobile phones are providing innovative solutions to health care treatment, ensuring better health for future entrepreneurs and youths.\n\nSlimTrader is a positive example [1] . SlimTrader uses mobile phones to provide a range of vital services - from airplane and bus tickets to medicine. The innovative e-commerce provides a space to advertise skills, products, and opportunities - to, on the one hand, identify new consumer demands; and on another hand, create notices to exchange goods.\n\nMobile technology is making it faster, quicker, and simpler to tap into new markets [2] .\n\n[1] See further readings: SlimTrader, 2013; Ummeli, 2013.\n\n[2] See further readings: Nsehe, 2013. Inspite of challenges Patrick Ngowi has earned millions through the construction of Helvetic Solar Contractors.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b18c8bd9d853a1685fbafaf0a5788130", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Technology has enabled Africa’s cultural industries to grow.\n\nTechnology has enabled the development of entrepreneurial ideas for business, but also within Africa’s cultural industry. Access to video recording mobile phones, the internet, and televised publications has created a new culture of expression for African youths. Cultural industries are raising critical questions for politics, and empowering youth to tell their stories. The use of journalism has become mobilised by youths - as seen in initiatives such as, African Slum Voices, of which are encouraging youths to pro-actively raise their opinions and voices on issues occurring within their communities.\n\nFurthermore, the music and film industry in Africa has arisen as a result of access to new technologies at a lower-cost. Two key components responsible for the growth of Nollywood (Nigeria’s Film Industry) include access to digital technology and entrepreneurship. Youths have become vital within Nollywood, as actors, producers and editors. Today Nollywood’s low-budget films have inspired the growth of regional film industries across Africa and contributed to its status as the third largest film industry. Nollywood’s revenue stand’s at around $200mn a year [1] .\n\n[1] See further readings: ABN, 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "afc3687df781559d5d0e414a315388f9", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Technology is building a platform for sharing ideas.\n\nEntrepreneurialism can be encouraged through an awareness, and sharing, of new ideas. The technological revolution has provided a platform for personal expression, delivery of up-to-date news, and the vital sharing of local ideas and thoughts. In Nigeria the Co-Creation Hub has emerged, encouraging an entrepreneurial spirit. Further, Umuntu and Mimiboards’ are connecting individual communities to the web by encouraging local content creation [1] .\n\nSuch platforms are enabling the transfer of knowledge and innovative ideas. Innovative solutions are being introduced to routine problems, such as ‘Mafuta Go’ an app to find the best price for petrol (Christine Ampaire).\n\n[1] See further readings: Co-Creation Hub Nigeria, 2013\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "042df77b109de4fc2b67df3b4c7d802a", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Changing education systems and democracy.\n\nTechnology has enabled access to e-books and resources for students and teachers [1] . Such changes have enabled improved efficiency in teaching, with the availability of up-to-date resources and awareness of relevant theories. Furthermore, the ease by which students are able to access multiple resources and buy books online is expanding their intellectual curiosity and library.\n\nIn addition to raising new students, technology can be seen as a tool for democracy. Technology provides a tool for government accountability, transparency in information, and for good governance. Organisations, such as Ushahidi (Crowdmapping) following Kenya’s 2007 post-election violence; and mySociety which updates citizens on parliamentary proceedings in South Africa, show how technology is feeding democratisation for youths [2] .\n\n[1] See further readings: Turcano, 2013.\n\n[2] See further readings: Treisman, 2013; Usahidi, 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6ed98b6d1a2f7ccf3c8fade6fa1eb8b2", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies The technological revolution has been hyped.\n\nDebates may be raised as to whether the technological revolution is actually a reality across Africa [1] . Have expectations been too high; the benefits exclusive; and the reality over-exaggerated?\n\nOn the one hand, the type of technology raises significant questions. Although the population with access to a mobile phone has risen, the quality of the phones indicates a hyped-reality. Although technology has become easily accessible, the quality of such technologies puts constraints on what it can be used for. A vast majority of mobile phones are imported from China - at low-cost but also poor quality. Quality testing on imports, and locally produced products, is needed to approve market devices.\n\nOn another hand, the reality of internet connectivity is not high-speed, and therefore of limited use. Better connectivity emerges in certain geographical locations, to those who can afford higher prices, and within temporary fluxes.\n\n[1] See further readings: BBC World Service, 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cd7e666ee16269caed5809c0c36129f5", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Technology has only benefited private companies.\n\nUltimately, technology, its provision, distribution, and function, is based on a business model. Profits are sought and losers emerge. The technology hype has attracted global technology giants, ranging from IBM to Google – a key issue as to whether entrepreneurialism can emerge amongst youths and technology used sustainably. The monopolisation of technology markets by multinational companies puts constraints on the ability for small businesses to break through. Any profits created are not recirculated in their locality, or Africa, but return to the country of origin.\n\nFor entrepreneurialism to be gained, and youth jobs emerge, the technological giants investing in Africa’s rising future need to partner with communities and small businesses.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "095fe449a954ab3db540c757252f18f8", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Technology will not result in entrepreneurialism without providing a foundational basis.\n\nThe key constraint for entrepreneurship is the lack of access to finance, credit, and basic infrastructure - whether a computer or technical skills on how to use different systems. Limited accessibility acts as an obstacle to entrepreneurialism.\n\nIn order to encourage an inclusive capability for youths to get involved in entrepreneurial ideas, technology training and equal start-up credit is required. Furthermore, dangers arise where credit has become easily accessible - putting individuals at risk of debt where a lack of protection and payment planning is provided.\n\nKenya’s Uwezo Fund provides a positive example, whereby action has been taken to provide youths with safe credit. The government collaboration is calling for youths to apply for grants and loans in a bid to encourage entrepreneurial activity for all. Loans are interest-free.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "63f46ed807650bba7e976445907d27d7", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Technology remains insecure and a security risk.\n\nThe internet remains at risk. Cybersecurity is a key concern, and the prevalence of hacking events across Africa identifies the need to promote security for the new digital users. Cyber-crime costs the Kenyan government around Ksh.2 billion (Mutegi, 2013); and affects around 70% of South Africans. In order to encourage more users in technology their safety, against fraud, hacking, and identity theft, needs to be prioritised. Without security technology can’t help entrepreneurs as customer details, business plans etc can’t be kept private.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
4cc8eff70090581a8c56bdcc0e3e2da4	Technology remains insecure and a security risk. The internet remains at risk. Cybersecurity is a key concern, and the prevalence of hacking events across Africa identifies the need to promote security for the new digital users. Cyber-crime costs the Kenyan government around Ksh.2 billion (Mutegi, 2013); and affects around 70% of South Africans. In order to encourage more users in technology their safety, against fraud, hacking, and identity theft, needs to be prioritised. Without security technology can’t help entrepreneurs as customer details, business plans etc can’t be kept private.	[ { "docid": "e4c0b8299bdf17cdb6415228f5d9430e", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Technology is enhancing security, not threatening it. Measures are being implemented to ensure cyber-security and further technology is creating new, local, initiatives for security on the ground. Ushahidi Crowdmapping - an interactive, collective, mapping tool - was used to expose, and remember, political violence that occurred in Kenya’s 2007 presidential election [1] .\n\n[1] See further readings: Ushahidi, 2013.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "35e1de149bc5cc95fdffd8847f81d3ac", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Credit is now becoming more accessible through technology. Mobile-banking schemes such as MPESA across East Africa and ZAAB in Somalia, use mobile phones to transfer money and payments. The mobile banking scheme is increasing the efficiency of borrowing money from social circles, enabling quick transactions to be carried out, and introducing users to a wealth of market opportunities.\n\nTechnology is integral to entrepreneurship.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "bfc20c71593c41edfab1f125f322b16e", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Several examples may be found on established partnerships between multinational technology firms and civil-society groups. Microsoft has become a key investor in South Africa to tackle youth unemployment.\n\nMicrosoft has established a Students to Business initiative in South Africa, aiming to build human capital and provide professional skills to students, thus assisting job opportunities. Multinational companies are investing in youths as they recognise the burden of high unemployment and the potential talents youth have. By providing young students with key skills and sharing knowledge, a new generation of technology developers, leaders, and entrepreneurs will arise.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "bc6193fdf492c72ebb197ceddf893ea4", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies The technological revolution across Africa is broad, ranging from mobile technology to internet connectivity. The availability of mobiles has broadened who can use technology - being more inclusive to multiple socio-economic groups.\n\nInternet.org [1] has been established to resolve issues, making connectivity affordable. The initiative, which involves a collaborative partnership between Facebook and technological organisations, has a vision of ensuring access to the internet for the two-thirds who remain unconnected. Connectivity is a fundamental necessity to living in our ‘knowledge economy’. Their mission has centred on three aspects: affordability, improving efficiency, and innovative partnerships to expand the number of people connected. Intervention has therefore focused on removing barriers to accessing information by connecting people.\n\nFurthermore in Kenya, mobile phones have been made accessible to a wider audience through the removal of the general sales tax in 2009.\n\n[1] See further readings: Internet.org, 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "16d25984d21c5ffdb9b2437268a5d0e6", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Currently 3 in 4 youths work informally or within vulnerable employment - working without a formal written contract (Work4Youth, 2013). Although technology may create new markets it will not change the type of employment youths engage in. The use of technology will mean a majority of youths will continue to work informally - without access to social security, a valuable pension scheme, and social protection in the event of a crisis. Self-employment and having the flexibility to connect to different markets provides a temporary fix and income. Stability and security is not provided for youths.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "51d8f3963d4ac51d78fca0311d54cbed", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Cultural industries don’t always provide a positive role. If entrepreneurial youths today are using technology to create films on witchcraft in the public sphere, what effect will this have on future generations? Growth cant just rely on creative industries as there needs to be money created to drive demand for these films, and any money that might be made by the creative industries are undermined by piracy. Without a solution small time films are hardly the most secure of jobs.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "fc554952adb8b6785391be52c59a00e3", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Despite programs distributing technology into schools does the availability of technology provides future benefits? Having a tablet does not ensure teachers are well-trained to assist and guide the children. Without proper oversight it might prove more of a distraction. Technology in schools might also mean students having technology substituted for teachers. With programs still being implemented, and results variable, the causality between technology, education, and the rise of well educated, motivated, youths remains precarious.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4fafb682c30e4e041beb3c8f45b1ddbf", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Such platforms are known, and accessible, by a minority within Africa - limiting who benefits from the technology available. Rising entrepreneurs across Africa typically are able to access resources required and network their ideas, whilst a majority of youths remain out of the innovation loop.\n\nAs inequality disparities continue to increase in Africa, a similar trend is identifiable to youth technology and entrepreneurialism. Entrepreneurs rising in Africa show the future of a ‘young millionaire’s club’. They hold the right connections, access to credit and electricity, and time to apply to their business model. The millionaire entrepreneurs continue to create new technologies - not vice-versa.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5be915f66646debec550c2463db42410", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Recent evidence by the World Bank indicates unemployment is not only due to the limited availability of jobs. A high proportion of youths have been identified as ‘idle’ - not in school, training, or work, and not actively seeking employment. Although variations are found, in 2009 only ~2% of male youths, aged 15-24, and ~1% of female youths, who were not in school or employment in Tanzania, were actively looking for work [1] . Without motivation technology will not make a difference.\n\n[1] WDR, 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6ed98b6d1a2f7ccf3c8fade6fa1eb8b2", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies The technological revolution has been hyped.\n\nDebates may be raised as to whether the technological revolution is actually a reality across Africa [1] . Have expectations been too high; the benefits exclusive; and the reality over-exaggerated?\n\nOn the one hand, the type of technology raises significant questions. Although the population with access to a mobile phone has risen, the quality of the phones indicates a hyped-reality. Although technology has become easily accessible, the quality of such technologies puts constraints on what it can be used for. A vast majority of mobile phones are imported from China - at low-cost but also poor quality. Quality testing on imports, and locally produced products, is needed to approve market devices.\n\nOn another hand, the reality of internet connectivity is not high-speed, and therefore of limited use. Better connectivity emerges in certain geographical locations, to those who can afford higher prices, and within temporary fluxes.\n\n[1] See further readings: BBC World Service, 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cd7e666ee16269caed5809c0c36129f5", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Technology has only benefited private companies.\n\nUltimately, technology, its provision, distribution, and function, is based on a business model. Profits are sought and losers emerge. The technology hype has attracted global technology giants, ranging from IBM to Google – a key issue as to whether entrepreneurialism can emerge amongst youths and technology used sustainably. The monopolisation of technology markets by multinational companies puts constraints on the ability for small businesses to break through. Any profits created are not recirculated in their locality, or Africa, but return to the country of origin.\n\nFor entrepreneurialism to be gained, and youth jobs emerge, the technological giants investing in Africa’s rising future need to partner with communities and small businesses.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "095fe449a954ab3db540c757252f18f8", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Technology will not result in entrepreneurialism without providing a foundational basis.\n\nThe key constraint for entrepreneurship is the lack of access to finance, credit, and basic infrastructure - whether a computer or technical skills on how to use different systems. Limited accessibility acts as an obstacle to entrepreneurialism.\n\nIn order to encourage an inclusive capability for youths to get involved in entrepreneurial ideas, technology training and equal start-up credit is required. Furthermore, dangers arise where credit has become easily accessible - putting individuals at risk of debt where a lack of protection and payment planning is provided.\n\nKenya’s Uwezo Fund provides a positive example, whereby action has been taken to provide youths with safe credit. The government collaboration is calling for youths to apply for grants and loans in a bid to encourage entrepreneurial activity for all. Loans are interest-free.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e6a5434f4fc0afd77827cbef0eb8bb9c", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Technology has driven youths to identify new markets\n\nA key technology for youths are mobile phones and devices. Across West and East Africa the possession of mobile phones has enabled citizens to network and form solutions to social problems. By 2015, there are expected to be 1 billion mobile cellular subscriptions in Sub-Saharan Africa (Sambira, 2013). This is the first African generation directly accessing high-technology, although uncertainty remains in the amount of youths having access to technology. Through mobile phones new business opportunities, and flows of money, are being created. Furthermore, mobile phones are providing innovative solutions to health care treatment, ensuring better health for future entrepreneurs and youths.\n\nSlimTrader is a positive example [1] . SlimTrader uses mobile phones to provide a range of vital services - from airplane and bus tickets to medicine. The innovative e-commerce provides a space to advertise skills, products, and opportunities - to, on the one hand, identify new consumer demands; and on another hand, create notices to exchange goods.\n\nMobile technology is making it faster, quicker, and simpler to tap into new markets [2] .\n\n[1] See further readings: SlimTrader, 2013; Ummeli, 2013.\n\n[2] See further readings: Nsehe, 2013. Inspite of challenges Patrick Ngowi has earned millions through the construction of Helvetic Solar Contractors.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b18c8bd9d853a1685fbafaf0a5788130", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Technology has enabled Africa’s cultural industries to grow.\n\nTechnology has enabled the development of entrepreneurial ideas for business, but also within Africa’s cultural industry. Access to video recording mobile phones, the internet, and televised publications has created a new culture of expression for African youths. Cultural industries are raising critical questions for politics, and empowering youth to tell their stories. The use of journalism has become mobilised by youths - as seen in initiatives such as, African Slum Voices, of which are encouraging youths to pro-actively raise their opinions and voices on issues occurring within their communities.\n\nFurthermore, the music and film industry in Africa has arisen as a result of access to new technologies at a lower-cost. Two key components responsible for the growth of Nollywood (Nigeria’s Film Industry) include access to digital technology and entrepreneurship. Youths have become vital within Nollywood, as actors, producers and editors. Today Nollywood’s low-budget films have inspired the growth of regional film industries across Africa and contributed to its status as the third largest film industry. Nollywood’s revenue stand’s at around $200mn a year [1] .\n\n[1] See further readings: ABN, 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "afc3687df781559d5d0e414a315388f9", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Technology is building a platform for sharing ideas.\n\nEntrepreneurialism can be encouraged through an awareness, and sharing, of new ideas. The technological revolution has provided a platform for personal expression, delivery of up-to-date news, and the vital sharing of local ideas and thoughts. In Nigeria the Co-Creation Hub has emerged, encouraging an entrepreneurial spirit. Further, Umuntu and Mimiboards’ are connecting individual communities to the web by encouraging local content creation [1] .\n\nSuch platforms are enabling the transfer of knowledge and innovative ideas. Innovative solutions are being introduced to routine problems, such as ‘Mafuta Go’ an app to find the best price for petrol (Christine Ampaire).\n\n[1] See further readings: Co-Creation Hub Nigeria, 2013\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7bffd2f7829e44e991dc181b5826ec02", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Technology will lead job growth for youths.\n\nThe rate of unemployment in Sub-Saharan Africa remains above the global average, at 7.55% in 2011, with 77% of the population in vulnerable employment [1] . Economic growth has not been inclusive and jobs are scarce. In particular, rates of youth unemployment, and underemployment, remain a concern [2] . On average, the underutilisation of youths in the labour market across Sub-Saharan Africa stood at 67% in 2012 (Work4Youth, 2013). Therefore 67% of youths are either unemployed, inactive, or in irregular employment. The rate of unemployment varies geographically and across gender [3] .\n\nThere remains a high percentage of youths within informal employment. Technology can introduce a new dynamic within the job market and access to safer employment.\n\nSecure, high quality jobs, and more jobs, are essential for youths. Access to technology is the only way to meet such demands. Technology will enable youths to create new employment opportunities and markets; but also employment through managing, and selling, the technology available.\n\n[1] ILO, 2013.\n\n[2] Definitions: Unemployment is defined as the amount of people who are out of work despite being available, and seeking, work. Underemployment defines a situation whereby the productive capacity of an employed person is underutilised. Informal employment defines individuals working in waged and/or self employment informally (see further readings).\n\n[3] Work4Youth (2013) show, on average, Madagascar has the lowest rate of unemployment (2.2%) while Tanzania has the highest (42%); and the average rate of female unemployment stands higher at 25.3%, in contrast to men (20.2%).\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "042df77b109de4fc2b67df3b4c7d802a", "text": "business international africa computers phones house believes new technologies Changing education systems and democracy.\n\nTechnology has enabled access to e-books and resources for students and teachers [1] . Such changes have enabled improved efficiency in teaching, with the availability of up-to-date resources and awareness of relevant theories. Furthermore, the ease by which students are able to access multiple resources and buy books online is expanding their intellectual curiosity and library.\n\nIn addition to raising new students, technology can be seen as a tool for democracy. Technology provides a tool for government accountability, transparency in information, and for good governance. Organisations, such as Ushahidi (Crowdmapping) following Kenya’s 2007 post-election violence; and mySociety which updates citizens on parliamentary proceedings in South Africa, show how technology is feeding democratisation for youths [2] .\n\n[1] See further readings: Turcano, 2013.\n\n[2] See further readings: Treisman, 2013; Usahidi, 2013.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
94cd22ee0c00608297c32fd962506a6c	We need to unshackle the economy The UK needs to unshackle the economy from the restrictions the EU places upon it. EU bureaucracy and red tape holds back Britain’s service industries. Regulations on employment rights, hiring, and firing restrict the supply of workers pushing up costs to businesses. To take one example Britain is facing a curry crisis; curry houses are closing due to an inability to secure skilled chefs from the Indian subcontinent. [1] Being able to set the UK’s own migration system would enable the UK to hire people with the skills we need. [1] Robinson, Nick, ‘Who will cook your Indian curry?’, BBC News, 26 May 2016, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-36378655	[ { "docid": "bdee6d78a1dad4af51b412a0d3cfb55d", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically The Brexit can’t have it both ways that it will both deregulate promoting the free market and enable an industrial policy that allows subsidies. In practice unshackling the economy means damaging workers’ rights that are protected by EU legislation of which the Working Time Directive is just the best known. Leaving would also damage just those sectors the Brexit side says it will help; finance needs access to Europe, as do many other creative industries.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "e17236d6dba8905d888090755997cca2", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically The UK is already insulated from the Euro crisis by not being a member of the Eurozone. With the pound sterling the UK is no more exposed in the EU than it would be outside of the EU. Finance is globally interconnected. Leaving the EU will make no difference to this. The UK has already negotiated, in 2015, a deal which ensures that the UK will not be liable for any bailouts in the Eurozone. [1] However Britain could cause such a Eurozone crisis, by leaving as the UK leaving would have an impact on the EU economies just as it would on the UK’s own.\n\n[1] BBC News, ‘UK ‘strikes deal’ over Greek bailout’, 16 July 2015, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-33556085\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a8c43b561e6feb7d892eda677499e61e", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically Most of the claimed £350 million per week either is accounted for by the British rebate, £4.8billion in 2015 [1] – which never actually leaves the UK – or is money the EU spends in the UK. The £120 million remainder is however buys access to the EU’s market. Norway pays €340 million per year – about £63 million per week if it had a comparable population to the UK – to get access to the EU market but does not have any chance to influence that market. [2]\n\n[1] 94.4million per week, HM Treasury, ‘European Union Finances 2015: statement on the 2015 EU Budget and measures to counter fraud and financial mismanagement’, gov.uk, December 2015, https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/483344/EU_finances_2015_final_web_09122015.pdf#page=18\n\n[2] Solberg, Erna, ‘The ‘Norwegian model’ would be a poor alternative to EU membership for the UK’, LSE, 19th April 2013, http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/europpblog/2013/04/19/norwegian-model-poor-alternative-eu-uk-membership-eea-erna-solberg/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "982db54e5b60569f31e619bdc05036f0", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically British government policy has been against state intervention in industry for decades. Rather since the Thatcher government the free market has been considered to know best and so companies or factories that make a loss should be allowed to go bust.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9cd8107d060d417bde4ec5420c2430b2", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically Britain can have free trade without all the baggage of political decisions being made in Brussels. Just as the EU accounts for a high portion of UK trade so the UK is a high proportion of EU trade; around 16% of EU exports go to the UK, [1] so the EU would want to have a deal with the UK to allow this trade to continue.\n\n[1] Portes, J., ‘After Brexit: how important would UK trade be to the EU?’, National Institute of Economic and Social Research, 2 November 2015, http://www.niesr.ac.uk/blog/after-brexit-how-important-would-uk-trade-be-eu#.V0hbCr7iv7Y\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f9d41ff57f95a0edae64297c58575df0", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically There is considerable churn in the jobs market already; with 3.7 million jobs lost a year already but simply being replaced by new jobs. [1] Leaving the EU would therefore make little difference.\n\n[1] Bourne, Ryan, ‘The EU Jobs Myth’, Institute of Economic Affairs, March 2015, http://www.iea.org.uk/sites/default/files/publications/files/Briefing_1502_The%20EU%20Jobs%20Myth_web.pdf p.9.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5c3fa5d21b9edc48b667743d0ac27a1c", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically While it is almost certain that there will be a brief short term shock caused by uncertainty no one knows for sure what will happen in the long term. A Britain that is out of Europe will be better able to run its economy to encourage growth so will likely do better than it does under the status quo.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2bb2607dcc5916d56b0e5ae903b2a02b", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically There is no guarantee that the EU will actually implement anything in the agreement with David Cameron. The wording is clear enough but with no specifics about how or when the administrative burden will be lowered. Yes the UK may be fighting to create a more business friendly Europe but more important however is the way that the EU increases the regulatory burden on the UK. This regulatory burden can be much easier done away with by leaving the EU than by negotiating reductions with the rest of the Union.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "854f9227be2c010136b12bb97ace4d9b", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically There will be £350 million more to spend a week\n\nThrough leaving the EU Britain will no longer send £350million per week to Europe so can spend it at home. [1] Of course much of this sum comes back to the UK but the UK will gain greater control over how and where the money is spent. Thus for example some money comes back in the form of CAP. We would however be able to decide how this money is used on farming rather than being dictated to by the EU or take the money out of farming all together. Even taking in to account money that comes back to the UK, and the rebate, the UK still sends £120million per week to Europe. [2] Money which would be freed up to spend on helping the NHS or building more affordable houses upon leaving.\n\n[1] ‘A vote to remain is the riskier option’, Vote Leave, http://www.voteleavetakecontrol.org/balance_sheet\n\n[2] Ashworth-Hayes, Sam, ‘UK doesn’t sent EU £350m a week or £55m a day’, infacts.org, 25 February 2016, http://infacts.org/uk-doesnt-send-eu-350m-a-week-or-55m-a-day/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ac19ad7ce01e02d48a8eb9cebd740f8e", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically Leaving would take back power to control the economy\n\nVoting to leave would take back the power over the British economy that the European Union currently has and give it back to the sovereign British Parliament. EU common fisheries and agriculture (CAP) policies control how many fish we can catch and what is commercially farmable. If the UK were to leave the British government would be once more able to shape an industrial policy; for example under EU rules it did not have the power to save Port Talbot as it is not allowed to provide subsidies to support the failing plant. [1]\n\n[1] Rankin, Jennifer, ‘EU sets tone as it cracks down on subsidies for struggling steelworks’, theguardian.com, 20 January 2016, https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/jan/20/eu-cracks-down-subsidies-struggling-steelworks-belgium\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d635a4d49a217a189910edfaa0865a30", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically A step away from a failing Eurozone\n\nThe Euro is failing as has been demonstrated by the years’ long slow motion crisis involving Greece and other peripheral countries Ireland, Spain, and Portugal. The chancellor George Osborne has in the past said that a Eurozone recession is the biggest economic risk to the UK. [1] This is still true. The UK will be safer taking a step away from integration with Europe by leaving the EU.\n\n[1] Chan, Szu Ping, ‘Eurozone recession is biggest risk to UK, says George Osborne’, The Telegraph, 10 October 2014, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/11154749/Eurozone-recession-is-biggest-risk-to-UK-says-George-Osborne.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "bfa0798add0cba0b4318bb5ddb31cc0e", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically Britain is needed to create a more business friendly Europe\n\nThe UK is a leader among the countries in the EU that is in favour of greater deregulation, privatisation, and free trade. As such the UK has been a strong positive influence on the EU in favour of these things. In the same way the UK played a strong role in encouraging the EU’s expansion to create a bigger market. The UK needs to remain in the EU to ensure the organisation flourishes. Prime Minister Cameron’s deal with Europe prior to the referendum for example included a promise by the EU to engage in “lowering administrative burdens and compliance costs on economic operators, especially small and medium enterprises, and repealing unnecessary legislation” something that benefits not just the UK but the EU as a whole. [1]\n\n[1] Reuters, ‘Full text of EU's special status deal for Britain’, 19 February 2016, http://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-britain-eu-factbox-idUKKCN0VS2SH\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9233bae41ecdc046f391c93f5620493b", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically Leaving may increase British unemployment\n\nAlongside this likely shock to the economy will most likely be a loss in jobs as a result in a loss in trade. Some big employers, such as many car makers, are located in the UK in large part as a result of the access to the EU market. It is estimated that three million UK jobs are linked to trade with the EU. [1] Estimates of the number of jobs lost vary considerably; the CBI has suggested 950,000 [2] while the Treasury thinks 500,000. [3] The number may turn out to be less but clearly a large number of livelihoods will be damaged.\n\n[1] Ashworth-Hayes, Sam, ‘Will 3 million jobs be lost if we quit EU?’, infacts.org, 15 March 2016, http://infacts.org/will-3-million-jobs-lost-quit-eu/\n\n[2] Kollewe, Julia, ‘ Brexit could cost £100bn and nearly 1m jobs, CBI warns’, theguardian.com, 21 March 2016, http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/mar/21/brexit-could-cost-100bn-and-nearly-1m-jobs-cbi-warns\n\n[3] HM Treasury, ‘Britain to enter recession with 500,000 UK jobs lost if it left EU, new Treasury analysis shows’, gov.uk, 23 May 2016, https://www.gov.uk/government/news/britain-to-enter-recession-with-500000-uk-jobs-lost-if-it-left-eu-new-treasury-analysis-shows\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "305f98ee23bbe4444d75ebf69bb3309e", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically Economic growth comes with closer integration with your neighbours\n\nEconomic integration with neighbours is the best way to economic growth. Neighbouring countries are almost always the countries a nation trades most with; in the UK’s case the EU accounts for 44.6% of exports and 53.2% of imports. [1] It is therefore in the UK’s interest to increase integration to encourage this trade. Throughout the world the trend is towards regional integration rather than away from it with regional organisations from Mercosur in South America to ASEAN in South East Asia encouraging integration.\n\n[1] Office for National Statistics, ‘How important is the European Union to UK trade and investment?’, 26 June 2015, http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20160105160709/http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/international-transactions/outward-foreign-affiliates-statistics/how-important-is-the-european-union-to-uk-trade-and-investment-/sty-eu.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a07a8bd228fd6178dae98d4c3c181ba8", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically Leaving will cause a shock to the British economy\n\nThe UK leaving the EU would likely be damaging not just to the British economy but globally with the G7 saying it would be “a further serious risk to growth.” [1] The damage to the UK economy would come for several reasons. First there would be uncertainty about what comes next; no one is quite sure what kind of deal the UK will get with the EU, or what will happen to EU migrants in the UK. Additionally businesses that trade with the EU will have uncertainty over that trading relationship and the UK will be a less favourable investment prospect because it is no longer a bridge to 500milion EU consumers. The treasury has estimated that GDP will be lower by 6.2% by 2030 as a result so many people will be considerably worse off. [2]\n\n[1] Asthana, Anushka, ‘Brexit would pose ‘serious risk’ to global growth, say G7 leaders’, theguardian.co.uk, 27 May 2015, http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/may/27/brexit-would-pose-a-serious-risk-to-global-growth-say-g7-leaders\n\n[2] HM Treasury, ‘HM Treasury analysis shows leaving EU would cost British households £4,300 per year’, gov.uk, 18 April 2016, https://www.gov.uk/government/news/hm-treasury-analysis-shows-leaving-eu-would-cost-british-households-4300-per-year\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
5f7c6496bbe2eadd9029cd5d2ccbdc8d	Britain is needed to create a more business friendly Europe The UK is a leader among the countries in the EU that is in favour of greater deregulation, privatisation, and free trade. As such the UK has been a strong positive influence on the EU in favour of these things. In the same way the UK played a strong role in encouraging the EU’s expansion to create a bigger market. The UK needs to remain in the EU to ensure the organisation flourishes. Prime Minister Cameron’s deal with Europe prior to the referendum for example included a promise by the EU to engage in “lowering administrative burdens and compliance costs on economic operators, especially small and medium enterprises, and repealing unnecessary legislation” something that benefits not just the UK but the EU as a whole. [1] [1] Reuters, ‘Full text of EU's special status deal for Britain’, 19 February 2016, http://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-britain-eu-factbox-idUKKCN0VS2SH	[ { "docid": "2bb2607dcc5916d56b0e5ae903b2a02b", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically There is no guarantee that the EU will actually implement anything in the agreement with David Cameron. The wording is clear enough but with no specifics about how or when the administrative burden will be lowered. Yes the UK may be fighting to create a more business friendly Europe but more important however is the way that the EU increases the regulatory burden on the UK. This regulatory burden can be much easier done away with by leaving the EU than by negotiating reductions with the rest of the Union.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "9cd8107d060d417bde4ec5420c2430b2", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically Britain can have free trade without all the baggage of political decisions being made in Brussels. Just as the EU accounts for a high portion of UK trade so the UK is a high proportion of EU trade; around 16% of EU exports go to the UK, [1] so the EU would want to have a deal with the UK to allow this trade to continue.\n\n[1] Portes, J., ‘After Brexit: how important would UK trade be to the EU?’, National Institute of Economic and Social Research, 2 November 2015, http://www.niesr.ac.uk/blog/after-brexit-how-important-would-uk-trade-be-eu#.V0hbCr7iv7Y\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f9d41ff57f95a0edae64297c58575df0", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically There is considerable churn in the jobs market already; with 3.7 million jobs lost a year already but simply being replaced by new jobs. [1] Leaving the EU would therefore make little difference.\n\n[1] Bourne, Ryan, ‘The EU Jobs Myth’, Institute of Economic Affairs, March 2015, http://www.iea.org.uk/sites/default/files/publications/files/Briefing_1502_The%20EU%20Jobs%20Myth_web.pdf p.9.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5c3fa5d21b9edc48b667743d0ac27a1c", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically While it is almost certain that there will be a brief short term shock caused by uncertainty no one knows for sure what will happen in the long term. A Britain that is out of Europe will be better able to run its economy to encourage growth so will likely do better than it does under the status quo.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "bdee6d78a1dad4af51b412a0d3cfb55d", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically The Brexit can’t have it both ways that it will both deregulate promoting the free market and enable an industrial policy that allows subsidies. In practice unshackling the economy means damaging workers’ rights that are protected by EU legislation of which the Working Time Directive is just the best known. Leaving would also damage just those sectors the Brexit side says it will help; finance needs access to Europe, as do many other creative industries.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e17236d6dba8905d888090755997cca2", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically The UK is already insulated from the Euro crisis by not being a member of the Eurozone. With the pound sterling the UK is no more exposed in the EU than it would be outside of the EU. Finance is globally interconnected. Leaving the EU will make no difference to this. The UK has already negotiated, in 2015, a deal which ensures that the UK will not be liable for any bailouts in the Eurozone. [1] However Britain could cause such a Eurozone crisis, by leaving as the UK leaving would have an impact on the EU economies just as it would on the UK’s own.\n\n[1] BBC News, ‘UK ‘strikes deal’ over Greek bailout’, 16 July 2015, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-33556085\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a8c43b561e6feb7d892eda677499e61e", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically Most of the claimed £350 million per week either is accounted for by the British rebate, £4.8billion in 2015 [1] – which never actually leaves the UK – or is money the EU spends in the UK. The £120 million remainder is however buys access to the EU’s market. Norway pays €340 million per year – about £63 million per week if it had a comparable population to the UK – to get access to the EU market but does not have any chance to influence that market. [2]\n\n[1] 94.4million per week, HM Treasury, ‘European Union Finances 2015: statement on the 2015 EU Budget and measures to counter fraud and financial mismanagement’, gov.uk, December 2015, https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/483344/EU_finances_2015_final_web_09122015.pdf#page=18\n\n[2] Solberg, Erna, ‘The ‘Norwegian model’ would be a poor alternative to EU membership for the UK’, LSE, 19th April 2013, http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/europpblog/2013/04/19/norwegian-model-poor-alternative-eu-uk-membership-eea-erna-solberg/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "982db54e5b60569f31e619bdc05036f0", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically British government policy has been against state intervention in industry for decades. Rather since the Thatcher government the free market has been considered to know best and so companies or factories that make a loss should be allowed to go bust.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9233bae41ecdc046f391c93f5620493b", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically Leaving may increase British unemployment\n\nAlongside this likely shock to the economy will most likely be a loss in jobs as a result in a loss in trade. Some big employers, such as many car makers, are located in the UK in large part as a result of the access to the EU market. It is estimated that three million UK jobs are linked to trade with the EU. [1] Estimates of the number of jobs lost vary considerably; the CBI has suggested 950,000 [2] while the Treasury thinks 500,000. [3] The number may turn out to be less but clearly a large number of livelihoods will be damaged.\n\n[1] Ashworth-Hayes, Sam, ‘Will 3 million jobs be lost if we quit EU?’, infacts.org, 15 March 2016, http://infacts.org/will-3-million-jobs-lost-quit-eu/\n\n[2] Kollewe, Julia, ‘ Brexit could cost £100bn and nearly 1m jobs, CBI warns’, theguardian.com, 21 March 2016, http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/mar/21/brexit-could-cost-100bn-and-nearly-1m-jobs-cbi-warns\n\n[3] HM Treasury, ‘Britain to enter recession with 500,000 UK jobs lost if it left EU, new Treasury analysis shows’, gov.uk, 23 May 2016, https://www.gov.uk/government/news/britain-to-enter-recession-with-500000-uk-jobs-lost-if-it-left-eu-new-treasury-analysis-shows\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "305f98ee23bbe4444d75ebf69bb3309e", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically Economic growth comes with closer integration with your neighbours\n\nEconomic integration with neighbours is the best way to economic growth. Neighbouring countries are almost always the countries a nation trades most with; in the UK’s case the EU accounts for 44.6% of exports and 53.2% of imports. [1] It is therefore in the UK’s interest to increase integration to encourage this trade. Throughout the world the trend is towards regional integration rather than away from it with regional organisations from Mercosur in South America to ASEAN in South East Asia encouraging integration.\n\n[1] Office for National Statistics, ‘How important is the European Union to UK trade and investment?’, 26 June 2015, http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20160105160709/http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/international-transactions/outward-foreign-affiliates-statistics/how-important-is-the-european-union-to-uk-trade-and-investment-/sty-eu.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a07a8bd228fd6178dae98d4c3c181ba8", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically Leaving will cause a shock to the British economy\n\nThe UK leaving the EU would likely be damaging not just to the British economy but globally with the G7 saying it would be “a further serious risk to growth.” [1] The damage to the UK economy would come for several reasons. First there would be uncertainty about what comes next; no one is quite sure what kind of deal the UK will get with the EU, or what will happen to EU migrants in the UK. Additionally businesses that trade with the EU will have uncertainty over that trading relationship and the UK will be a less favourable investment prospect because it is no longer a bridge to 500milion EU consumers. The treasury has estimated that GDP will be lower by 6.2% by 2030 as a result so many people will be considerably worse off. [2]\n\n[1] Asthana, Anushka, ‘Brexit would pose ‘serious risk’ to global growth, say G7 leaders’, theguardian.co.uk, 27 May 2015, http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/may/27/brexit-would-pose-a-serious-risk-to-global-growth-say-g7-leaders\n\n[2] HM Treasury, ‘HM Treasury analysis shows leaving EU would cost British households £4,300 per year’, gov.uk, 18 April 2016, https://www.gov.uk/government/news/hm-treasury-analysis-shows-leaving-eu-would-cost-british-households-4300-per-year\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c67f9fc0f315e7a52e7357f772a50f0a", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically We need to unshackle the economy\n\nThe UK needs to unshackle the economy from the restrictions the EU places upon it. EU bureaucracy and red tape holds back Britain’s service industries. Regulations on employment rights, hiring, and firing restrict the supply of workers pushing up costs to businesses. To take one example Britain is facing a curry crisis; curry houses are closing due to an inability to secure skilled chefs from the Indian subcontinent. [1] Being able to set the UK’s own migration system would enable the UK to hire people with the skills we need.\n\n[1] Robinson, Nick, ‘Who will cook your Indian curry?’, BBC News, 26 May 2016, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-36378655\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "854f9227be2c010136b12bb97ace4d9b", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically There will be £350 million more to spend a week\n\nThrough leaving the EU Britain will no longer send £350million per week to Europe so can spend it at home. [1] Of course much of this sum comes back to the UK but the UK will gain greater control over how and where the money is spent. Thus for example some money comes back in the form of CAP. We would however be able to decide how this money is used on farming rather than being dictated to by the EU or take the money out of farming all together. Even taking in to account money that comes back to the UK, and the rebate, the UK still sends £120million per week to Europe. [2] Money which would be freed up to spend on helping the NHS or building more affordable houses upon leaving.\n\n[1] ‘A vote to remain is the riskier option’, Vote Leave, http://www.voteleavetakecontrol.org/balance_sheet\n\n[2] Ashworth-Hayes, Sam, ‘UK doesn’t sent EU £350m a week or £55m a day’, infacts.org, 25 February 2016, http://infacts.org/uk-doesnt-send-eu-350m-a-week-or-55m-a-day/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ac19ad7ce01e02d48a8eb9cebd740f8e", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically Leaving would take back power to control the economy\n\nVoting to leave would take back the power over the British economy that the European Union currently has and give it back to the sovereign British Parliament. EU common fisheries and agriculture (CAP) policies control how many fish we can catch and what is commercially farmable. If the UK were to leave the British government would be once more able to shape an industrial policy; for example under EU rules it did not have the power to save Port Talbot as it is not allowed to provide subsidies to support the failing plant. [1]\n\n[1] Rankin, Jennifer, ‘EU sets tone as it cracks down on subsidies for struggling steelworks’, theguardian.com, 20 January 2016, https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/jan/20/eu-cracks-down-subsidies-struggling-steelworks-belgium\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d635a4d49a217a189910edfaa0865a30", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis house believes uk would be better economically A step away from a failing Eurozone\n\nThe Euro is failing as has been demonstrated by the years’ long slow motion crisis involving Greece and other peripheral countries Ireland, Spain, and Portugal. The chancellor George Osborne has in the past said that a Eurozone recession is the biggest economic risk to the UK. [1] This is still true. The UK will be safer taking a step away from integration with Europe by leaving the EU.\n\n[1] Chan, Szu Ping, ‘Eurozone recession is biggest risk to UK, says George Osborne’, The Telegraph, 10 October 2014, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/11154749/Eurozone-recession-is-biggest-risk-to-UK-says-George-Osborne.html\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
8e45d171f11ff682bfaf2703bf9e745c	Neo-functionalism explains the cause of integration Spill-over is the following concept – in order to enjoy the full benefits of integration of the first sector you need to integrate the related sectors. An example of this is the ECSC (European Coal and Steel Community) evolving into other energy sectors and forming Euratom. There are three types of spill-over – functional spill-over, political spill-over and cultivated spill-over. Firstly, functional spill-over, which regards spill-over in an economic context. For example, this might involve integrating coal and steel, then integrating transport systems so that coal and steel are moved around more easily. Secondly, there is Political spill-over, where political actors shift their allegiance to a new centre, for example from the national parliament to Brussels. Thirdly, there is cultivated spill-over, which is the idea that institutions drive further integration by being in practice; for example the European Commission’s growing autonomy. [1] [1] Tranholm-Mikkelsen, Jeppe "Neo-functionalism: Obstinate or Obsolete? A Reappraisal in the Light of the New Dynamism of the EC Millennium - Journal of International Studies, Vol. 20, No. 1, pp.1-22, http://www.df.lth.se/~cml/spill-over.txt	[ { "docid": "f33cd4251d8113f9af4f0f137eed2f1a", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political The counter theory to spill-over is the logic of diversity. Neo-functionalism is flawed as it assumes that integration in low politics (economic) will lead to integration in areas of high politics. This is not possible as issues of high politics are integral to the national interest; so integration will only be possible when national interests coincide, which is possible but unlikely. Neo-functionalism believes areas of high politics can be cultivated into integration, whereas intergovernmentalism believes that the fate of the nation-state should never be subject to the decisions of others.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "db354bc09700607d9d5e7e097b136098", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Neo-functionalism believes in building a community Europe, but then the question is raised, what is the purpose of this new entity? There is no common outlook and getting the major powers of Europe to agree what this should be will be near impossible. Intergovernmentalists would also argue that economic determinism regarding integration is wrong. As they believe national governments have to consciously make these decisions and will not be economically driven alone, ‘Extensive cooperation is not at all ruled out: on the contrary, such cooperation will benefit all participants as long as it corresponds to and enhances mutual interests’. It will always be politics that drive integration, while the motive may be economic – to solve a crisis or even just to profit – the key decisions by all actors will be political. [1]\n\n[1] Martell, Luke, ‘Globalisation and Economic Determinism’, Paper given at Global Studies Association conference, Challenging Globalization, September 2009, www.sussex.ac.uk/Users/ssfa2/globecdet.pdf , p.4\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "73d5af626b4d818b45a9b67c312f51f9", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political The role of elites acting in their national interest better explains the logic behind integration. Key players such as Charles De Gaulle and his untiring opposition to British membership and Qualified Majority Voting (QMV) in the Council of Ministers and his success in gaining what he set out to achieve through the Luxembourg compromise demonstrates that the true power actually lay with him and the state. Another example to contradicting the role Delors played was that of Margaret Thatcher. Her relentless demand for a British rebate (1979) and general demeanour in the European Council demonstrated a powerful state elite getting her way. The single market came about because Thatcher wanted it more than most and was thus willing to compromise on certain areas of the Single European Act (i.e. on QMV in the Council of Ministers). [1] It is because of this that the role of individual elites is far superior to that of supranational entrepreneurs.\n\n[1] Dinan, Desmond, ‘The Single European Act’, European Union Centre of Excellence, http://euce.dal.ca/Files/Dinan_SEA_paper.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ddb4c4f2a2cb398306b1392e23b65782", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Neo-functionalism is too simple, it does not account for external forces well, as some states have better defined their international position more towards US hegemony than towards each other. “Whereas in economic issues (soft power) the EU has been able to respond to the US in trade disputes, in political and security affairs (hard power) the panorama is mostly discouraging“. [1] Intergovernmentalism rejects economic determinism and therefore rejects Neo-functionalism’s ability to predict. Neo-functionalism may provide a starting point for analysis but it requires much more to be able to explain other pressures of integration.\n\n[1] Dominguez-Rivera, Roberto, ‘Dealing with the U.S. hegemony: soft and hard power in the external relations of the EU’, 8th International Conference of the European Union Studies Association, 27 March 2003, http://aei.pitt.edu/6481/1/000459_1.PDF\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a7ad12f223d9a1f8698ba6ab31e3434f", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Intergovernmentalism assumes states to be the core actors, this is difficult to deny as most economic boundaries and policies are administered by the nation state. It believes that the logic of diversity will prevail in areas of high politics (e.g. security), however it does accept the logic of integration in low politics, that when interests coincide integration is possible (when there is consensus among elites, similar external situations and domestic politics situations). Intergovernmentalism does not allow for the idealist aim of transforming the regional system to a ‘better’ order as what qualifies as ‘better’? The logic of diversity denies the possibility of states agreeing on what is ‘better’.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0801574de37b59e07afc5b0feb838325", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Ernst B. Haas was the founder of Neo-functionalism in 1951, Jeppe Tranholm-Mikkelsen identified the 3 types of spill-over within the theory. However neither author placed a time limit on how long the integration process would take. The revival of European integration in 1985 shows it may be many years between instances when Neo-functionalism is an adequate theory for explaining integration. This may be equally coming true in the financial crisis as the Euro is necessitating further reforms and may well lead to much greater integration in order to have the tools prevent members being forced out. The political spill-over concept makes account for the fact that national elites 'will undergo a learning process, developing the perception that their interests will be better served by seeking supranational than national solutions'. [1]\n\n[1] Tranholm-Mikkelsen, Jeppe, ‘Neo-functionalism: Obstinate or Obsolete? A Reappraisal in the Light of the New Dynamism of the EC’, Millennium - Journal of International Studies, Vol. 20, No. 1, pp.1-22, http://mil.sagepub.com/content/20/1/1.extract\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f2aa29ae985b1de83755f8911a7afec0", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Neo-functionalism has a liberal view of the international system; whereby agreements can be easily reached.\n\nActually the European Union has proven the exact opposite of the statement – “Nations prefer the certainty, or the self-controlled uncertainty, of national self-reliance, to the uncontrolled uncertainty of the untested blender” as they give more and more power to the united institutions of the European Union – the European Commission and the European Parliament. The most recent treaty, the Lisbon treaty, proves this as it gives more rights to the EU on account of national power Lisbon’ gives the European Parliament a much greater say in the EU’s decision-making process, it reduced national vetos, created a president and a representative for foreign affairs. [1]\n\n[1] Europa, ‘Treaty of Lisbon: The Treaty at a glance’, Europa.eu, http://europa.eu/lisbon_treaty/glance/index_en.htm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3ba6a985bd30e83b604fde2d47ca082c", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political The Empty Chair Crisis of 1965 may lead some to presume that National governments are all powerful, but it may have just been a ‘speed-bump’ on the road of spillover. Ben Rosamond (2005) [1] did a reassessment of Haas and concluded that he never abandoned Neofunctionalism; he just changed it and accepted more the view of ‘Complex Interdependence’. The revival of integration since 1985 including the Treaty of Maastricht 1991 led to co-decision procedures which are an example of Political spillover as political decisions and procedure moved to the supranational level.\n\n[1] Rosamond, Ben, 'The Uniting of Europe and the Foundations of EU Studies: Revisiting the Neofunctionalism of Enrst B. Haas', Journal of European Public Policy, Vol. 12, No. 2, 2005, pp. 237-254, http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/1076/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8ded9d70f347376e1b04d6f82e8b4491", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Intergovernmentalism too has proved 'out of date'. It fails to pay enough attention to supranational institutions; its focus is too exclusively on big treaty negotiations and fails to understand to increasing importance of economic issues. Intergovernmentalism as a theory collapses in the view of actual integration taking place: the revival of integration from mid-1980s onwards. In the 1990s Intergovernmentalism was supplanted by 'Liberal Intergovernmentalism' from the scholar Andrew Moravcsik in his work 'Preferences and Power in the European Community: A liberal Intergovernmentalist Approach' (1993). [1]\n\n[1] Moravcsik, Andrew, ‘Preferences and Power in the European Community: A Liberal Intergovernmentalist Approach’, Journal of Common Market Studies (30th Anniversary Edition) (December 1993). http://www.princeton.edu/~amoravcs/library/preferences1.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5de29ab639decb0f9d743beaacc486f6", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Neo-functionalism proposes a purpose to EU integration.\n\nNeo-functionalism proposed building a community Europe, through the concept of spillover the theory proposes economic determinism. Spill-over will eventually lead to a completely integrated Europe with a strong central government. This has not yet been proved true, as EU integration has become a long and difficult process. This is understandable since it is not exactly easy to integrate together all those policies, economies and people. However this would most probably be the eventual result, which is already visible: The experience of the European Union (EU) is widely perceived as not just an example, but the model for regional integration. In recent years, the EU has also been pursuing an increasing number of trade agreements which may in turn lead to spillover. [1] Furthermore the recent enlargements of the EU in Eastern Europe, as well as the ongoing negotiations with Croatia and Turkey have renewed the academic and political interest in the effects of European Economic integration. [2]\n\nOne of the theory’s strengths is to predict the outcome of integration and an eventual conclusion to the process, allowing for political and economic aims to be made and realised. For example ‘Larger companies have been acting on the assumption that the internal market will eventually be established’. [3]\n\n[1] Bilal, Sanoussi, ‘Can the EU Be a Model of Regional Integration?’, Paper to be presented at the CODESRIA - Globalisation Studies Network (GSN), 29-31 August 2005, http://www.ecdpm.org/Web_ECDPM/Web/Content/Download.nsf/0/52D667FD6C95057DC125719D004B65F6/$FILE/Bilal%20-%20Can%20EU%20be%20a%20model%20of%20RI%20Draft%20for%20comments.pdf\n\n[2] Lafourcade, Miren, and Paluzie, Elisenda, ‘European Integration, FDI and the Internal Geography of Trade: Evidence from Western-European Border Regions’, 23 December 2004, www.cepr.org/RESEARCH/Networks/TID/Paluzie.pdf\n\n[3] Tranholm-Mikkelsen, Jeppe, ‘Neo-functionalism: Obstinate or Obsolete? A Reappraisal in the Light of the New Dynamism of the EC’, Millennium - Journal of International Studies, Vol. 20, No. 1, pp.1-22, http://mil.sagepub.com/content/20/1/1.extract\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cdce748600df5087b4dbfd29fd864a1b", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Supranational Entrepreneurs played a crucial role in integration\n\nThe role of supranational entrepreneurs within the development of integration within Europe has been crucial. Characters such as Jean Monnet envisaged and worked continuously towards uniting Europe. As the head of France's General Planning Commission, Monnet was the real author of what has become known as the 1950 Schuman Plan to create the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC), forerunner of the Common Market. Later a similar role was played by Jacques Delors with the creation of the Single European Act (SEA) and the all-important 1992 project that would see the single market and eventually fully Economic and Monetary Union complete. These characters act in support of integration within Europe and represent an empirical example of cultivated spill-over. Unmitigated pressure from Delors in pushing for the single market ensured that it became a reality in the time it did.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3765ae94df38c4413f606f2bf4cc25d3", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Neo-functionalism - liberal theory of regional integration\n\nNeo-functionalism is an example of a liberal theory of regional integration. Its focus is on human welfare needs, not political conflict and law. Its focus is on individuals aggregated into interest groups as the main actors in integration, so the focus is on low politics and the areas which become integrated in the European Union reflect that. As such there has been much more progress on economic integration than there has on creating a common foreign and security policy. [1]\n\nIt also accepts the independent role of international organisations and that the transformation of the international regional system towards a better order is feasible so making the European Union a project worth investing effort in.\n\n[1] Center for European studies, ‘European Union –Common Foreign and Security Policy’, unc.edu, http://www.unc.edu/depts/europe/conferences/eu/Cfsp/cfsp1.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a311645720d9d6d7c03758e6c4ae5c32", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Neo-functionalism provides a good starting point for EU analysis.\n\nNeo-functionalism is an accessible theory which provides a good starting point for analysis. As a theory it has the advantages of being able to predict the outcome of integration and clearly explains which actors must be studied in order to explain integration. Haas and Lindberg’s “main thesis was that sectorial integration was inherently expansive - integration of some functional tasks would tend to spill over into\n\nintegration of other tasks(…) In the basis of this analysis, Haas argued that an acceleration of the\n\nintegration process could be 'safely predicted' and that it might lead to a 'political community of Europe' within a decade”. [1]\n\n[1] Tranholm-Mikkelsen, Jeppe \"Neo-functionalism: Obstinate or Obsolete? A Reappraisal in the Light of the New Dynamism of the EC Millennium - Journal of International Studies, Vol. 20, No. 1, pp.1-22, http://www.df.lth.se/~cml/spill-over.txt\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f31dcbf38d500076fa7c6d544407fc0e", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political The Founder of Neo-functionalism abandoned his own Theory (Haas).\n\nThe Founder of Neo-functionalist theory Ernst B. Haas later abandoned his own theory; According to Tranholm-Mikkelsen (1991)- “By the mid-1970 s, Ernst Haas had effectively abandoned the neo-functionalist theory by assimilating it within general interdependence theories of international relations”. [1] The theory proved a success in the economic realm but a fiasco in high politics; “…at the time of the ‘empty chair’ crisis [see next point] neo-functionalism was considered too incapable of describing the process of integration in general because of its extreme Eurocentric nature. Rosamond states that it is emerged from the process of complex web of actors pursuing their interests within a pluralist political environment.” [2] Neo-functionalism remained a partial theory, good at explaining particular parts of integration but required supplanting by other theories to keep it relevant.\n\n[1] Tranholm-Mikkelsen, Jeppe, ‘Neo-functionalism: Obstinate or Obsolete? A Reappraisal in the Light of the New Dynamism of the EC’, Millennium - Journal of International Studies, Vol. 20, No. 1, pp.1-22, http://mil.sagepub.com/content/20/1/1.extract\n\n[2] ‘European Political Theories: Neo – functionalism’, May 2011, http://testpolitics.pbworks.com/w/page/25795541/Neo%20-%20functionalism\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ad2d9607c8c7851a76996859a9617c2b", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political The international system is characterised by anarchy and the distribution of economic and military capabilities\n\nStanley Hoffman used a Neo-Realist view of International relations to build the theory of intergovernmentalism. In a neo-realist understanding the international system is characterised by anarchy and the distribution of economic and military capabilities is of primary importance. States will not trust each other but can still reach agreement, but the agreement will be characterised by bargaining and negotiation (not an automatic process!) ‘Nations prefer the certainty, or the self-controlled uncertainty, of national self-reliance, to the uncontrolled uncertainty of the untested blender’. [1]\n\n[1] Wikipedia, ‘Intergovernmentalism’, en.wikipedia.org, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intergovernmentalism\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e2f8cb716bb002451f9641327626abf1", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political The assumption of the automaticity of Spill-over is wrong.\n\nThe core of Neo-functionalism that spill-over being the main driving force behind continuing integration assumed the automaticity of integration. Once integration has started it will be a self-continuing force that will eventually integrate the whole of Europe - is clearly wrong. Supranational functionalism 'assumed first, that national sovereignty, already devalued by events, could be chewed up leaf by leaf like an artichoke'. [1] The functional method of spill-over is very limited, its success in the relatively painless area in which it works relatively well lifts the participants to the level of issues to which it does not apply well any more. For example no common defence or foreign policy within the community project has been successful. This failure in high politics is fundamental, without a coordinated foreign and security policy the role of the EU in the world is open to question. Opposition too much further enlargement reduces the role the EU can play outside the union unless a common foreign policy can be agreed. [2]\n\n[1] Hoffmann, S. ‘Obstinate or obsolete? The fate of the nation-state and the case of Western Europe.’, Daedalus, Vol. 95, No. 3, 1966, pp. 862-915, p882\n\n[2] Pabst, Adrian, ‘The EU as a Security/Defence Community?’, Luxembourg Institute for European and International Studies, 2/3 July 2004, http://www.ieis.lu/CONTENT%20of%20new%20Website/NEW%20Executive%20Summaries/PDF-Format/exs%204,%20EU%20as%20Security-Defence%20Community.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "eaf595f3f423f316f9910a8f73d1d61b", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political The Empty Chair Crisis 1965\n\nIn 1965 during the Empty Chair Crisis brought integration came to a halt and shifted the institutional balance of power away from the commission to the Council of Ministers, it shows that spillover will not always occur. [1] It was caused by President de Gaulle of France being in conflict with other member states, specifically Germany and Italy. France wanted a deal on the Common Agricultural Policy but was unwilling to agree to further integration through creating majority voting in the Council of Ministers. When France took on the Presidency the normal system of mediation was lost. Bonn and Rome were unwilling to give way. [2] De Gaulle pulled his ministers out of the Council of Ministers thus reasserting the power of national governments. This showed that states would not automatically be prepared to give up their national sovereignty and might of helped lead to the abandonment of Neo-functionalism in the 1970s.\n\n[1] Moga, Teodor Lucian, ‘The Contribution of the Neofunctionalist and Intergovernmentalist Theories to the Evolution of the European Integration Process’, Journal of Alternative Perspectives in the Social Sciences, Vol. 1, No. 3, 2009 pp.796-807, http://www.japss.org/upload/14._Mogaarticle.pdf , p.799\n\n[2] Ludlow, N. Piers, ‘De-commissioning the Empty Chair Crisis : the Community institutions and the crisis of 1965-6’, LSE Research Online, 2007, http://web.archive.org/web/20071025203706/http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/2422/01/Decommisioningempty.pdf\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
9afba0a0bb597775cfd008e8b4cddb87	The international system is characterised by anarchy and the distribution of economic and military capabilities Stanley Hoffman used a Neo-Realist view of International relations to build the theory of intergovernmentalism. In a neo-realist understanding the international system is characterised by anarchy and the distribution of economic and military capabilities is of primary importance. States will not trust each other but can still reach agreement, but the agreement will be characterised by bargaining and negotiation (not an automatic process!) ‘Nations prefer the certainty, or the self-controlled uncertainty, of national self-reliance, to the uncontrolled uncertainty of the untested blender’. [1] [1] Wikipedia, ‘Intergovernmentalism’, en.wikipedia.org, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intergovernmentalism	[ { "docid": "f2aa29ae985b1de83755f8911a7afec0", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Neo-functionalism has a liberal view of the international system; whereby agreements can be easily reached.\n\nActually the European Union has proven the exact opposite of the statement – “Nations prefer the certainty, or the self-controlled uncertainty, of national self-reliance, to the uncontrolled uncertainty of the untested blender” as they give more and more power to the united institutions of the European Union – the European Commission and the European Parliament. The most recent treaty, the Lisbon treaty, proves this as it gives more rights to the EU on account of national power Lisbon’ gives the European Parliament a much greater say in the EU’s decision-making process, it reduced national vetos, created a president and a representative for foreign affairs. [1]\n\n[1] Europa, ‘Treaty of Lisbon: The Treaty at a glance’, Europa.eu, http://europa.eu/lisbon_treaty/glance/index_en.htm\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "0801574de37b59e07afc5b0feb838325", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Ernst B. Haas was the founder of Neo-functionalism in 1951, Jeppe Tranholm-Mikkelsen identified the 3 types of spill-over within the theory. However neither author placed a time limit on how long the integration process would take. The revival of European integration in 1985 shows it may be many years between instances when Neo-functionalism is an adequate theory for explaining integration. This may be equally coming true in the financial crisis as the Euro is necessitating further reforms and may well lead to much greater integration in order to have the tools prevent members being forced out. The political spill-over concept makes account for the fact that national elites 'will undergo a learning process, developing the perception that their interests will be better served by seeking supranational than national solutions'. [1]\n\n[1] Tranholm-Mikkelsen, Jeppe, ‘Neo-functionalism: Obstinate or Obsolete? A Reappraisal in the Light of the New Dynamism of the EC’, Millennium - Journal of International Studies, Vol. 20, No. 1, pp.1-22, http://mil.sagepub.com/content/20/1/1.extract\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3ba6a985bd30e83b604fde2d47ca082c", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political The Empty Chair Crisis of 1965 may lead some to presume that National governments are all powerful, but it may have just been a ‘speed-bump’ on the road of spillover. Ben Rosamond (2005) [1] did a reassessment of Haas and concluded that he never abandoned Neofunctionalism; he just changed it and accepted more the view of ‘Complex Interdependence’. The revival of integration since 1985 including the Treaty of Maastricht 1991 led to co-decision procedures which are an example of Political spillover as political decisions and procedure moved to the supranational level.\n\n[1] Rosamond, Ben, 'The Uniting of Europe and the Foundations of EU Studies: Revisiting the Neofunctionalism of Enrst B. Haas', Journal of European Public Policy, Vol. 12, No. 2, 2005, pp. 237-254, http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/1076/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8ded9d70f347376e1b04d6f82e8b4491", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Intergovernmentalism too has proved 'out of date'. It fails to pay enough attention to supranational institutions; its focus is too exclusively on big treaty negotiations and fails to understand to increasing importance of economic issues. Intergovernmentalism as a theory collapses in the view of actual integration taking place: the revival of integration from mid-1980s onwards. In the 1990s Intergovernmentalism was supplanted by 'Liberal Intergovernmentalism' from the scholar Andrew Moravcsik in his work 'Preferences and Power in the European Community: A liberal Intergovernmentalist Approach' (1993). [1]\n\n[1] Moravcsik, Andrew, ‘Preferences and Power in the European Community: A Liberal Intergovernmentalist Approach’, Journal of Common Market Studies (30th Anniversary Edition) (December 1993). http://www.princeton.edu/~amoravcs/library/preferences1.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "db354bc09700607d9d5e7e097b136098", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Neo-functionalism believes in building a community Europe, but then the question is raised, what is the purpose of this new entity? There is no common outlook and getting the major powers of Europe to agree what this should be will be near impossible. Intergovernmentalists would also argue that economic determinism regarding integration is wrong. As they believe national governments have to consciously make these decisions and will not be economically driven alone, ‘Extensive cooperation is not at all ruled out: on the contrary, such cooperation will benefit all participants as long as it corresponds to and enhances mutual interests’. It will always be politics that drive integration, while the motive may be economic – to solve a crisis or even just to profit – the key decisions by all actors will be political. [1]\n\n[1] Martell, Luke, ‘Globalisation and Economic Determinism’, Paper given at Global Studies Association conference, Challenging Globalization, September 2009, www.sussex.ac.uk/Users/ssfa2/globecdet.pdf , p.4\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "73d5af626b4d818b45a9b67c312f51f9", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political The role of elites acting in their national interest better explains the logic behind integration. Key players such as Charles De Gaulle and his untiring opposition to British membership and Qualified Majority Voting (QMV) in the Council of Ministers and his success in gaining what he set out to achieve through the Luxembourg compromise demonstrates that the true power actually lay with him and the state. Another example to contradicting the role Delors played was that of Margaret Thatcher. Her relentless demand for a British rebate (1979) and general demeanour in the European Council demonstrated a powerful state elite getting her way. The single market came about because Thatcher wanted it more than most and was thus willing to compromise on certain areas of the Single European Act (i.e. on QMV in the Council of Ministers). [1] It is because of this that the role of individual elites is far superior to that of supranational entrepreneurs.\n\n[1] Dinan, Desmond, ‘The Single European Act’, European Union Centre of Excellence, http://euce.dal.ca/Files/Dinan_SEA_paper.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ddb4c4f2a2cb398306b1392e23b65782", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Neo-functionalism is too simple, it does not account for external forces well, as some states have better defined their international position more towards US hegemony than towards each other. “Whereas in economic issues (soft power) the EU has been able to respond to the US in trade disputes, in political and security affairs (hard power) the panorama is mostly discouraging“. [1] Intergovernmentalism rejects economic determinism and therefore rejects Neo-functionalism’s ability to predict. Neo-functionalism may provide a starting point for analysis but it requires much more to be able to explain other pressures of integration.\n\n[1] Dominguez-Rivera, Roberto, ‘Dealing with the U.S. hegemony: soft and hard power in the external relations of the EU’, 8th International Conference of the European Union Studies Association, 27 March 2003, http://aei.pitt.edu/6481/1/000459_1.PDF\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a7ad12f223d9a1f8698ba6ab31e3434f", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Intergovernmentalism assumes states to be the core actors, this is difficult to deny as most economic boundaries and policies are administered by the nation state. It believes that the logic of diversity will prevail in areas of high politics (e.g. security), however it does accept the logic of integration in low politics, that when interests coincide integration is possible (when there is consensus among elites, similar external situations and domestic politics situations). Intergovernmentalism does not allow for the idealist aim of transforming the regional system to a ‘better’ order as what qualifies as ‘better’? The logic of diversity denies the possibility of states agreeing on what is ‘better’.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f33cd4251d8113f9af4f0f137eed2f1a", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political The counter theory to spill-over is the logic of diversity. Neo-functionalism is flawed as it assumes that integration in low politics (economic) will lead to integration in areas of high politics. This is not possible as issues of high politics are integral to the national interest; so integration will only be possible when national interests coincide, which is possible but unlikely. Neo-functionalism believes areas of high politics can be cultivated into integration, whereas intergovernmentalism believes that the fate of the nation-state should never be subject to the decisions of others.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f31dcbf38d500076fa7c6d544407fc0e", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political The Founder of Neo-functionalism abandoned his own Theory (Haas).\n\nThe Founder of Neo-functionalist theory Ernst B. Haas later abandoned his own theory; According to Tranholm-Mikkelsen (1991)- “By the mid-1970 s, Ernst Haas had effectively abandoned the neo-functionalist theory by assimilating it within general interdependence theories of international relations”. [1] The theory proved a success in the economic realm but a fiasco in high politics; “…at the time of the ‘empty chair’ crisis [see next point] neo-functionalism was considered too incapable of describing the process of integration in general because of its extreme Eurocentric nature. Rosamond states that it is emerged from the process of complex web of actors pursuing their interests within a pluralist political environment.” [2] Neo-functionalism remained a partial theory, good at explaining particular parts of integration but required supplanting by other theories to keep it relevant.\n\n[1] Tranholm-Mikkelsen, Jeppe, ‘Neo-functionalism: Obstinate or Obsolete? A Reappraisal in the Light of the New Dynamism of the EC’, Millennium - Journal of International Studies, Vol. 20, No. 1, pp.1-22, http://mil.sagepub.com/content/20/1/1.extract\n\n[2] ‘European Political Theories: Neo – functionalism’, May 2011, http://testpolitics.pbworks.com/w/page/25795541/Neo%20-%20functionalism\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e2f8cb716bb002451f9641327626abf1", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political The assumption of the automaticity of Spill-over is wrong.\n\nThe core of Neo-functionalism that spill-over being the main driving force behind continuing integration assumed the automaticity of integration. Once integration has started it will be a self-continuing force that will eventually integrate the whole of Europe - is clearly wrong. Supranational functionalism 'assumed first, that national sovereignty, already devalued by events, could be chewed up leaf by leaf like an artichoke'. [1] The functional method of spill-over is very limited, its success in the relatively painless area in which it works relatively well lifts the participants to the level of issues to which it does not apply well any more. For example no common defence or foreign policy within the community project has been successful. This failure in high politics is fundamental, without a coordinated foreign and security policy the role of the EU in the world is open to question. Opposition too much further enlargement reduces the role the EU can play outside the union unless a common foreign policy can be agreed. [2]\n\n[1] Hoffmann, S. ‘Obstinate or obsolete? The fate of the nation-state and the case of Western Europe.’, Daedalus, Vol. 95, No. 3, 1966, pp. 862-915, p882\n\n[2] Pabst, Adrian, ‘The EU as a Security/Defence Community?’, Luxembourg Institute for European and International Studies, 2/3 July 2004, http://www.ieis.lu/CONTENT%20of%20new%20Website/NEW%20Executive%20Summaries/PDF-Format/exs%204,%20EU%20as%20Security-Defence%20Community.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "eaf595f3f423f316f9910a8f73d1d61b", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political The Empty Chair Crisis 1965\n\nIn 1965 during the Empty Chair Crisis brought integration came to a halt and shifted the institutional balance of power away from the commission to the Council of Ministers, it shows that spillover will not always occur. [1] It was caused by President de Gaulle of France being in conflict with other member states, specifically Germany and Italy. France wanted a deal on the Common Agricultural Policy but was unwilling to agree to further integration through creating majority voting in the Council of Ministers. When France took on the Presidency the normal system of mediation was lost. Bonn and Rome were unwilling to give way. [2] De Gaulle pulled his ministers out of the Council of Ministers thus reasserting the power of national governments. This showed that states would not automatically be prepared to give up their national sovereignty and might of helped lead to the abandonment of Neo-functionalism in the 1970s.\n\n[1] Moga, Teodor Lucian, ‘The Contribution of the Neofunctionalist and Intergovernmentalist Theories to the Evolution of the European Integration Process’, Journal of Alternative Perspectives in the Social Sciences, Vol. 1, No. 3, 2009 pp.796-807, http://www.japss.org/upload/14._Mogaarticle.pdf , p.799\n\n[2] Ludlow, N. Piers, ‘De-commissioning the Empty Chair Crisis : the Community institutions and the crisis of 1965-6’, LSE Research Online, 2007, http://web.archive.org/web/20071025203706/http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/2422/01/Decommisioningempty.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5de29ab639decb0f9d743beaacc486f6", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Neo-functionalism proposes a purpose to EU integration.\n\nNeo-functionalism proposed building a community Europe, through the concept of spillover the theory proposes economic determinism. Spill-over will eventually lead to a completely integrated Europe with a strong central government. This has not yet been proved true, as EU integration has become a long and difficult process. This is understandable since it is not exactly easy to integrate together all those policies, economies and people. However this would most probably be the eventual result, which is already visible: The experience of the European Union (EU) is widely perceived as not just an example, but the model for regional integration. In recent years, the EU has also been pursuing an increasing number of trade agreements which may in turn lead to spillover. [1] Furthermore the recent enlargements of the EU in Eastern Europe, as well as the ongoing negotiations with Croatia and Turkey have renewed the academic and political interest in the effects of European Economic integration. [2]\n\nOne of the theory’s strengths is to predict the outcome of integration and an eventual conclusion to the process, allowing for political and economic aims to be made and realised. For example ‘Larger companies have been acting on the assumption that the internal market will eventually be established’. [3]\n\n[1] Bilal, Sanoussi, ‘Can the EU Be a Model of Regional Integration?’, Paper to be presented at the CODESRIA - Globalisation Studies Network (GSN), 29-31 August 2005, http://www.ecdpm.org/Web_ECDPM/Web/Content/Download.nsf/0/52D667FD6C95057DC125719D004B65F6/$FILE/Bilal%20-%20Can%20EU%20be%20a%20model%20of%20RI%20Draft%20for%20comments.pdf\n\n[2] Lafourcade, Miren, and Paluzie, Elisenda, ‘European Integration, FDI and the Internal Geography of Trade: Evidence from Western-European Border Regions’, 23 December 2004, www.cepr.org/RESEARCH/Networks/TID/Paluzie.pdf\n\n[3] Tranholm-Mikkelsen, Jeppe, ‘Neo-functionalism: Obstinate or Obsolete? A Reappraisal in the Light of the New Dynamism of the EC’, Millennium - Journal of International Studies, Vol. 20, No. 1, pp.1-22, http://mil.sagepub.com/content/20/1/1.extract\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cdce748600df5087b4dbfd29fd864a1b", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Supranational Entrepreneurs played a crucial role in integration\n\nThe role of supranational entrepreneurs within the development of integration within Europe has been crucial. Characters such as Jean Monnet envisaged and worked continuously towards uniting Europe. As the head of France's General Planning Commission, Monnet was the real author of what has become known as the 1950 Schuman Plan to create the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC), forerunner of the Common Market. Later a similar role was played by Jacques Delors with the creation of the Single European Act (SEA) and the all-important 1992 project that would see the single market and eventually fully Economic and Monetary Union complete. These characters act in support of integration within Europe and represent an empirical example of cultivated spill-over. Unmitigated pressure from Delors in pushing for the single market ensured that it became a reality in the time it did.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3765ae94df38c4413f606f2bf4cc25d3", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Neo-functionalism - liberal theory of regional integration\n\nNeo-functionalism is an example of a liberal theory of regional integration. Its focus is on human welfare needs, not political conflict and law. Its focus is on individuals aggregated into interest groups as the main actors in integration, so the focus is on low politics and the areas which become integrated in the European Union reflect that. As such there has been much more progress on economic integration than there has on creating a common foreign and security policy. [1]\n\nIt also accepts the independent role of international organisations and that the transformation of the international regional system towards a better order is feasible so making the European Union a project worth investing effort in.\n\n[1] Center for European studies, ‘European Union –Common Foreign and Security Policy’, unc.edu, http://www.unc.edu/depts/europe/conferences/eu/Cfsp/cfsp1.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a6aabb8dc770fd8264d900928a229fc5", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Neo-functionalism explains the cause of integration\n\nSpill-over is the following concept – in order to enjoy the full benefits of integration of the first sector you need to integrate the related sectors. An example of this is the ECSC (European Coal and Steel Community) evolving into other energy sectors and forming Euratom. There are three types of spill-over – functional spill-over, political spill-over and cultivated spill-over. Firstly, functional spill-over, which regards spill-over in an economic context. For example, this might involve integrating coal and steel, then integrating transport systems so that coal and steel are moved around more easily. Secondly, there is Political spill-over, where political actors shift their allegiance to a new centre, for example from the national parliament to Brussels. Thirdly, there is cultivated spill-over, which is the idea that institutions drive further integration by being in practice; for example the European Commission’s growing autonomy. [1]\n\n[1] Tranholm-Mikkelsen, Jeppe \"Neo-functionalism: Obstinate or Obsolete? A Reappraisal in the Light of the New Dynamism of the EC Millennium - Journal of International Studies, Vol. 20, No. 1, pp.1-22, http://www.df.lth.se/~cml/spill-over.txt\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a311645720d9d6d7c03758e6c4ae5c32", "text": "economic policy economy general international europe philosophy political Neo-functionalism provides a good starting point for EU analysis.\n\nNeo-functionalism is an accessible theory which provides a good starting point for analysis. As a theory it has the advantages of being able to predict the outcome of integration and clearly explains which actors must be studied in order to explain integration. Haas and Lindberg’s “main thesis was that sectorial integration was inherently expansive - integration of some functional tasks would tend to spill over into\n\nintegration of other tasks(…) In the basis of this analysis, Haas argued that an acceleration of the\n\nintegration process could be 'safely predicted' and that it might lead to a 'political community of Europe' within a decade”. [1]\n\n[1] Tranholm-Mikkelsen, Jeppe \"Neo-functionalism: Obstinate or Obsolete? A Reappraisal in the Light of the New Dynamism of the EC Millennium - Journal of International Studies, Vol. 20, No. 1, pp.1-22, http://www.df.lth.se/~cml/spill-over.txt\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
633de539c591116a766fba4f40a0bf38	Free trade hurts the world's poor Free trade creates demand for extremely cheap products produced by poor people in terrible conditions in third world countries. In Indonesia, there are people working in sweatshops for 60 cents an hour1. It is estimated that there are 158 million child workers around the world2. Free trade creates demand for the products produced by this modern day form of child and adult slavery. The governments of the countries where this takes place do nothing to improve the working conditions. Sweatshops are produced by free trade and demand for cheap goods, and the way that workers are treated is inherently wrong. Therefore free trade is not a force for global betterment, but instead hurts the cause of the poor and their standard of living. 1 Krugman, Paul (1997), "In Praise of Cheap Labor", Slate.com, 2 UNICEF, "Child Labor",	[ { "docid": "04d53e4f17234f37c988cb3a4cb0ba46", "text": "finance economy general house believes global free trade Sweatshops are unfortunate, but free trade can benefit from cheap labor without relying on exploiting workers. Economically, cheap labor is a step in the right direction for poor countries and their people. Making 60 cents an hour in a factory that exports goods is better than 30 cents an hour working in the field, trying to feed a family in Indonesia1. Paul Krugman explains that sweatshops allow the poor to get jobs, and manufacturing development has a ripple effect on the rest of the economy and its development. Taiwan and South Korea, and even the US, went through this type of industrial development and it is better than the alternative, which is failed farming or dependence on aid1. If workers are being exploited—which is different from being paid low wages that are actually good by the standards of the country—then that should be regulated by governments, but that in no way infringes upon free trade.\n\n1 Krugman , Paul (1997), “In Praise of Cheap Labor”, Slate.com\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "c05698e700f8dedbde8d6752ba273457", "text": "finance economy general house believes global free trade Marian Tupy of the Center for Global Liberty and Propensity states, \"In the history of the world, no country has ever suffered military defeat, or capitulated to sanctions, due to the inability to produce a domestically producible product\"1. Globalization also means there are many partners to trade with, so even if a country is at war there are plenty of options of other countries from which to buy necessary products. 1 The Industrial College of the Armed Forces (2008), \"Industry Study\", National Defense University,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b5107a204aee1b4ec20e99cc8044d812", "text": "finance economy general house believes global free trade Opening up in FTAs is the first step towards liberalization in the larger sense and opening up to all free trade, so it should not be considered a failure. Additionally, free trade needs to balance international and domestic goals so coming to an agreement is difficult, but the WTO has been successful in the past. The current problems with the Doha round do not spell the end to the WTO or free trade1. 1 Meltzer, Joshua (2011), \"The Future of Trade\", Foreign Policy Magazine,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3d9f7c1b24ce3c4d8b7125fb329073f4", "text": "finance economy general house believes global free trade Even with tariffs the steel industry in losing jobs. Nothing can save steel. It simply does not operate as effectively as other global steel industries. Further, protectionism helps a small group of workers, the rest of American industry that is dependent on steel for their operation is hurt by high prices and inefficient production1. Protectionism puts the good of the few above the rest. Additionally, the WTO was created to ensure that dumping does not happen. The problem with infant industry is it's hard to determine when to start the transition away from protectionism, and often it never develops fully. For example, Brazil protected its computer industry and it never was able to compete even past the infant industry stage2.\n\n1 Lindsey, Brink and Griswold, Daniel T. (1999), \"Steel Quotas Will Harm US\", CATO Institute,\n\n2 Luzio, Eduardo and Greenstein, Shane (1995), \"Measuring the Performance of a Protected Infant Industry: The Case of Brazilian Microcomputers\", Review of Economics and Statistics,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9082c2c83b13442fd588841679c1505c", "text": "finance economy general house believes global free trade For countries that are dependent on their resources and lack developed industries, free trade does not promote efficiency. Free trade makes them overly dependent on their resources, which other countries are coming in and buying. This is because their domestic industries cannot compete with those of the developed world, so they have difficulty fostering sectors besides raw goods. They are forced to rely on supplying materials, rather than being able to build innovative industries. That does not offer efficiency, it just suppresses economies. For example Nigeria is dependent on oil for 95% of foreign exchange earnings and 80% of their budget money1. Trading oil is not making it a more diversified, sophisticated economy. 1 CIA World Fact Book, \"Nigeria\", CIA, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparative_advantage\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5f7bbc53be651a4989cdf2303cf781aa", "text": "finance economy general house believes global free trade Although free trade may promote innovation and growth, because of issues like dumping (where rich countries sell their products very cheaply in poorer countries and make it impossible for local industry to compete), or jobs being exported to places where labor is cheaper, free trade has significant costs and does not necessarily foster benefits for all. It is necessary to grow infant industries and create jobs, and free trade hurts both.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0bf17f716ae8bba9a952ea27ae08c74b", "text": "finance economy general house believes global free trade Therefore, there is no empirical evidence that proves that poverty is reduced. If countries removed all agricultural subsidies domestic production would decrease and world food prices would increase. Poor countries that import food will suffer from increased food prices due to trade liberalization. 45 of the least-developed countries on earth imported more food than they exported in 1999, so there are many countries that could be severely harmed by increasing food prices1.\n\n1 Panagariya, Arvind (2003), \"Think Again: International Trade\", Foreign Policy Magazine,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "dbccbb1b5aae6d38cd59c5653ccc9861", "text": "finance economy general house believes global free trade Free trade is the economic policy that many liberal countries—who are less likely to go to war with each other—have chosen. It’s not the policy that makes them liberal. These studies show such a strong correlation, because the countries that have chosen free trade are largely a huge block of countries that already get along, particularly the EU countries and the US. These countries already have the productive relationships necessary for peace. And history has shown that those relationships can be fostered without resorting to free trade. For example, for many years after World War II, Japan protected many national industries, but it was a peaceful country with a productive relationship with the West. Therefore, the costs of free trade are not necessary to achieve that benefit since it can be fostered under different conditions.\n\n1 Paul W. Kuznets, “An East Asian Model of Economic Development: Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea,” Economic Development and Cultural Change, vol. 35, no. 3 (April 1988)\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e009d74581849e248ca450104c393078", "text": "finance economy general house believes global free trade Implementing true free trade is unfeasible because it is unreasonable\n\nAn increasing number of countries are looking to bilateral Free Trade Agreements that will help them specifically. They are not directly open to free trade with all countries. These FTAs are undermining the position of the World Trade Organization which is meant to push countries towards economic liberalization1. Countries have no reason to start trading freely with everyone, if they already have FTAs with the most beneficial trading partners. The Doha round seeks to reduce trade barriers in industry and agriculture has been going on for ten years, but there is still no agreement. Disputes are becoming more common when it comes to trade. In 2009, there was a dispute over the US putting tariffs on Chinese tires that has created tension in the trade relationship between those two countries2. Considering that the WTO countries have been debating the Doha round for ten years, it is unreasonable to think that countries are going to adopt free trade policies with the whole world. It is much more likely they will concede to bilateral free trade agreements that specifically help themselves. Since it is unlikely for free trade to become a universal policy it is not beneficial for all countries.\n\n1 Meltzer, Joshua (2011), \"The Future of Trade\", Foreign Policy Magazine,\n\n2 Bradsher, Keith (2009), \"China-US Trade Dispute Has Broad Implications\", .\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "98ea5a39302e50190df2b6ff5c8f16d8", "text": "finance economy general house believes global free trade Free trade jeopardizes countries' security.\n\nIf a country goes to war with one of its trading partners, it needs to have the capacity to produce all of the necessary tools for war domestically, and not depend on other countries for supplies and parts. Additionally there is fear that disease-causing agents and bioterrorism can enter countries through the trade of poorly inspected food1. For reasons of national security it makes sense to retain the capacity to produce what is necessary to win a war and to protect the domestic population. This is one of the reasons why countries—such as the US1—like to protect their agricultural industry. Free trade is a threat to global security. For countries to stay safe, they need to retain some protectionism in their international trade policy.\n\n1 George W. Bush, “Homeland Security Presidential Directive 9: Defense of United States Agriculture and Food,” U.S. Department of Homeland Security, accessed July 15, 2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0169183429d75df83112747ed33a97dc", "text": "finance economy general house believes global free trade It is just to protect industry and jobs.\n\nWhen countries dump their products in other markets without barriers, they undercut the ability for local industries to compete. If those local industries try to compete, large foreign or multinational companies can use extremely low predatory pricing to make it impossible for the smaller industries to break into the market. The fully developed industries in rich countries are almost impossible for poorer, still developing economies to compete with. If they are not given the chance and have to compete with large international industries from the beginning, domestic industry in poor countries will have a hard time. The overall economic development of the country will thus be inhibited1. Additionally, competition can cost jobs, as industries become less profitable and labor is outsourced, so there is reason to retain protectionism as countries put their economic health first. For example, America has long protected its steel industry, as in 2002 when it adopted a controversial 40% tariff, because it was thought that competition put 600,000 jobs at risk2. Since 1977, 350,000 steel jobs have been shed, so these tariffs are justified3. Countries should put their economies and jobs first and therefore protectionism is warranted.\n\n1 Suranovic, Steven, \"The Infant Industry Argument and Dynamic Comparative Advantage\", International Economics,\n\n2 http://www.commondreams.org/views02/0307-05.htm \"> Flanders, Lauren (2002), \"Unfair Trade\", CommonDreams.org,\n\n3 Wypijewski, JoAnn (2002), \"Whose Steel?\", The Nation,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c5402534590aceb0764482d9782c3e43", "text": "finance economy general house believes global free trade Free trade promotes global efficiency through specialization.\n\nOperating at maximum productivity is one of the most important aspects of an efficient economy. The right resources and technology must be combined to produce the right amount of goods to be sold for the right price. Therefore all markets should strive for highest efficiency. In order to maximize efficiency in the international economy, countries need to utilize their comparative advantage. This means producing what you are best at making, compared to other countries. If Mary is the best carpenter and lawyer in the US, but makes more money being a lawyer, she should devote more of her time to law and pay someone for her carpentry needs. Mary has an absolute advantage in law and carpentry, but someone else has a comparative advantage in carpentry1. Comparatively it makes more sense for someone else to do the carpentry, and for Mary to be the lawyer. It is the same in the international economy. Countries can be more efficient and productive if they produce what they are best at based on their domestic resources and populations, and trade for other goods. This promotes efficiency and lower prices. Free trade enhances this. The Doha round that is currently being debated in the World Trade Organization would reduce trade barriers and promote free trade, economies of scale, and efficient production of goods. It is estimated that the Doha round would increase the global GDP by $150 billion alone just by promoting free trade2. Free trade leads to specialization and efficient production, which ultimately would increase the size of the global economy and the individual economies in it. 1 Library of Economics and Liberty, \"Comparative Advantage\",\n\n2 Meltzer, Joshua (2011), \"The Future of Trade\", Foreign Policy Magazine,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "593669a48339a3547614595713ed69ce", "text": "finance economy general house believes global free trade Free trade reduces poverty.\n\nFree trade reduces poverty for two reasons. First, it creates direct \"pull up\" as Columbia economist, Jagdish Bhagwati calls it because it creates demand for a country's good and industry and thus employs the poor and expands jobs1. Additionally it creates more revenue for government that can be directly targeted towards anti-poverty programs. Independent research Xavier Sala-i-Martin at Columbia University estimates that poverty has been reduced by 50 million people in the developing world during the era of free trade, since 19871. Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan have been liberalizing trade for the past 40 years and have not suffered from one-dollar-per-day poverty in the last 20 years1. If agricultural subsidies were removed from developed countries, food would become more expensive as there would be fewer producers, and poor farmers would have a better shot at competing and making a living. Free trade promotes the necessary monetary flow and demand for goods to increase jobs and sustainably grow an economy to reduce poverty. Prices are lower, more products are available, and the poor are able to achieve a higher standard of living.\n\n1 Panagariya, Arvind (2003), \"Think Again: International Trade\", Foreign Policy Magazine,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "11cc868f4b90f1841923fd76a07281ab", "text": "finance economy general house believes global free trade Free trade creates substantial cooperative relationships between trading partners.\n\nThere has long been a debate as to whether aid or trade is more effective in promoting development and cooperative relationships. Being interlocked through trading relationships decreases the likelihood of war. If you are engaged in a mutually beneficial relationship with other countries, then there is no incentive to jeopardize this relationship through aggression. It leads to more cooperative relationships because trading partners have incentives to consider the concerns of their trade partners since their economic health is at stake. This promotes peace, which is universal good. In 1996, Thomas Friedman famously pointed out that no two countries with a McDonalds—a sign of western liberal economic policies—have ever gone to war together.1 Academic studies have shown that this is specifically a result of free trade. In 2006 Solomon Polachek of SUNY Binghamton and Carlos Seiglie of Rutgers found that the last 30 years have shown that economic freedom is 50 times more likely to reduce violence between countries than democracy2. Erik Gartzke of Columbia University rated countries’ economic freedom on a scale of 1 (least free) to 10 (most free). He analyzed military conflicts between 1816 and 2000 and found that countries with a 2 or less on the economic freedom scale were 14 times more likely to be involved in armed conflicts than those with an 8 or higher2. Aside from war, free trade also solidifies countries’ alliances. For example, the US wants to begin a free trade relationship with South Korea to create a concrete partnership that will ultimately lead to greater cooperation3. Free trade promotes global connections and peace and therefore is a beneficial force.\n\n1 Thomas Friedman, “Foreign Affairs Big Mac,” New York Times, December 8, 1996\n\n2 http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/1120/p09s02-coop.html/ (page)/2\n\n3 http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/11/world/asia/11prexy.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2569d00740b8817995a82377e04fc680", "text": "finance economy general house believes global free trade Free trade promotes growth in all countries.\n\nThrough global competition, specialization, and access to technology, free trade and openness allow countries to grow faster—India and China started in the 1980s with restrictive trade policies, but as they have liberalized they have also improved their growth enormously1. The International Trade Commission estimates that a free trade agreement between just Colombia and the US would increase the US GDP by $2.5 billion2. When industries have to compete with competition around the world, they are pushed towards innovation and efficiency. Entrepreneurs are more productive if they have to compete. Free trade increases access to technology which also increases overall development. Because of free trade, prices are lower for everyone. Trade offers benefits to both developed and developing nations by encouraging competition, efficiency, lower prices, and opening up new markets to tap into.\n\n1 Panagariya , Arvind (2003), “Think Again: International Trade”, Foreign Policy Magazine\n\n2 White House (2010), “Benefits of US-Colombia Trade Promotion Agreement”\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
07ecfcb88ffa05f96bf6126f3f1470ca	Parents on welfare are more likely to need the incentives to take on the costs of sending children to school. Parents on welfare benefits are the most likely to need the extra inducements. They generally tend to be less educated and oftentimes be less appreciative of the long-term value of education. In the late 90's, 42% of people on welfare had less than a high school education, and another 42% had finished high school, but had not attended college in the US. Therefore they need the additional and more tangible, financial reasons to send their children to school. Children living in poverty in the US are 6.8 times more likely to have experienced child abuse and neglect1. While attendance might not be a sufficient condition for academic success, it is certainly a necessary one, and the very first step toward it. Some parents might be tempted to look at the short-term costs and benefits. Sending a child to school might be an opportunity cost for the parents as lost labor inside or outside the homes (especially in the third world) the household, or as an actual cost, as paying for things like supplies, uniforms or transportation can be expensive. Around the world there are an estimated 158 million working children, who often need to work to contribute to their family's livelihood2. In the UK it is estimated that sending a child to public school costs up to 1,200 pounds a year. If they lose money by not sending children to school, this would tilt the cost-benefits balance in favor of school attendance. 1 Duncan, Greg and Brooks-Gunn, Jeanne (2000), "Family Poverty, Welfare Reform, and Child Development", Child Development, [Accessed July 21, 2011] 2 http://www.unicef.org/protection/index_childlabour.html [Accessed July 13, 2011].	[ { "docid": "b72777de145c9cb189a9615ca1ade02b", "text": "economic policy education education general house believes payment welfare If school is so expensive, than shouldn't the government be subsidizing school costs instead of forcing parents to send kids to school when they can't afford the books and clothes? It is also unfair to assume that parents on welfare on neglectful and do not value education. Supporting meal programs in schools and subsidizing other costs are much more likely to draw children than forcing parents to send children to school when the kids are hungry and embarrassed1. 1 United States Department of Agriculture, \"The School Breakfast Program\",[Accessed July 21, 2011].\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "10a01ce627b53d2dca2a7309adbb5546", "text": "economic policy education education general house believes payment welfare Just because students attend school does not mean that they are going to receive a quality education. The best educated children are those whose parents are involved heavily in their school, helping them with their homework, and pushing them to excel1. Without involved parents, students can become just as easily discouraged. There really need to be programs to involve parents more in school, and provide good mentors and role models for students who don't have them. Schools also need to be improved. Just sending kids to school doesn't mean that they are going to learn and be determined to better themselves. Additionally particularly in the third world if children don't have good schools and qualified teachers, then what is the point of going to school? 1 Chavkin, Nancy, and Williams, David (1989), \"Low-Income Parents' Attitudes toward Parent Involvemet in Education\", Social Welfare, [Accessed July 21, 2011].\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1c82ae6debe1e587c1fa84b2a40a65ba", "text": "economic policy education education general house believes payment welfare The purpose of welfare is not to better society per se; it is to support those who have fallen into bad times and need extra help. Expecting people to render a service in exchange for help is demeaning and it undermines the purpose of welfare which is to help people get back on their feet versus tell them what they have to do to be considered beneficial to society.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b8f3a273ac6918e7ddaff3869d326c9d", "text": "economic policy education education general house believes payment welfare But the program in Brazil is biased towards rural communities versus cities. In the two largest cities in only 10% of families are enrolled versus 41% in the rural areas of Brazil [1] . To consider the program effective it needs to work equally with all members of the poor, which it does not.\n\n[1] 'How to get children out of jobs and into school', The Economist, 29 July 2010, http://www.economist.com/node/16690887\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4e3d28240b9bc087e4294d1ffa72e506", "text": "economic policy education education general house believes payment welfare There is nothing that says the two are mutually exclusive. Linking welfare to school attendance could be instituted next to other reforms that overall would create greater incentives for children to do well in school.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "da921af8f373abd343440c80807abdf1", "text": "economic policy education education general house believes payment welfare It is perfectly just to ask people to adjust behavior in exchange for funds. In fact, if the tax payers' dollars were being poured into an unchanging situation that would be unfair and unproductive. For a long time the US, and countries around the world, have struggled with making welfare a program that can lift people up. Connecting it to schools can help children.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8c5d5f882c8db0a1c8ea77b7169d76b4", "text": "economic policy education education general house believes payment welfare Yet if kids aren't going to school anyway it doesn't matter if the schools are inadequate. Getting kids in schools is the first step to improving the education situation and the dropout rate. As long as we look at the education system in the US and around the world as dismal and overwhelming, nothing will change.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f08b7f8d13c43cd4fec76a570610bc6a", "text": "economic policy education education general house believes payment welfare If families have incentives to send their children to school, and raise their children with a value of education, stressing the need for them to go to school they are more likely to finish high school and lift themselves out of these environments. The reason why some children would rather work then go to school is because they have been raised in an atmosphere that does not stress education and the necessity to finish high school. This type of program would push parents to change their children's values as they grow up. Additionally, a child's sense of duty to their family because of welfare payments being connected to their school attendance would give them further reason not to drop out, even if they do not like or value school.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7844cd4c50f7216026dbb9b896f4f9f2", "text": "economic policy education education general house believes payment welfare It is morally acceptable to make welfare conditional.\n\nWhen society has to step in and provide for those who've proved themselves unable to provide for themselves that should reasonably create certain expectations on the part of those being helped. In almost every aspect of life, money is given in return for a product, service or behavior. It is the same with welfare payments; money in exchange for children being put in school. We expect parents to do a good job in their role as parents. Ensuring that their children attend school is a crucial part of parental responsibility. Children on welfare in the US are 2 times more likely to drop out of school, however studies have shown that children who are part of early childhood education are more likely to finish school and remain independent of welfare1. Thus, when a parent is a welfare recipient, it is entirely reasonable to make it conditional on sending their kids to school. If tax payers' dollars are being spent on those who cannot provide for themselves, there needs to be a societal return. One of the greatest complaints about welfare is that people work hard for the money that they earn, which is then handed to others with no direct benefit to society. If children of people on welfare are in school it increases the likelihood that they will finish high school, maybe get a scholarship and go to college, and have the necessary tools to contribute to the work force and better society.\n\n1 Heckman, James (2000), \"Invest in the Very Young\", Ounce of Prevention and the University of Chicago, [Accessed July 25, 2011]. and Duncan, Greg and Brooks-Gunn, Jeanne (2000), \"Family Poverty, Welfare Reform, and Child Development\", Child Development, [Accessed July 21, 2011]\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "90d823131bef74ae1d583261d4741704", "text": "economic policy education education general house believes payment welfare The policy has been effective in the past\n\nThe main goal of this program is increasing school enrollment overall. If it was too much to expect from families, then the program would have failed in the cases that it was instituted. However, the opposite has been the case. 12.4 million families in Brazil are enrolled in a program called Bolsa Familia where children’s attendance in school is rewarded with $12 a month per child. The number of Brazilians with incomes below $440 a month has decreased by 8% year since 2003, and 1/6 of the poverty reduction in the country is attributed to this program [1] . Additionally it is much less expensive than other programs, costing only about .5% of the country’s GDP [2] . Considering that this program has been affordable and successful in both reducing poverty and increasing school enrollment it is worth using as an incentive in more programs around the world.\n\n[1] 'How to get children out of jobs and into school', The Economist, 29 July 2010, http://www.economist.com/node/16690887\n\n[2] 'How to get children out of jobs and into school', The Economist, 29 July 2010, http://www.economist.com/node/16690887\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e6c333c74b39f28420183fc884d5e817", "text": "economic policy education education general house believes payment welfare Requiring school attendance allows welfare to be the hand-up that it is meant to be, and keep children out of crime.\n\nIn the US, girls who grow up in families receiving welfare handouts are 3 times more likely to receive welfare themselves within three years of having their first child than girls who's families were never on welfare1. Children living in poverty were 2 times more likely to have grade repetition and drop out of high school and 3.1 times more likely to have children out of wedlock as teenagers2. They are 2.2 times more likely to experience violent crimes. Children of welfare recipients are more likely to end up on welfare themselves. Welfare should be a hand up, not a handout that leads to dependency on the state. It is the latter if we are only leading people to fall into the same trap as their parents. Education is the way to break the vicious cycle. Through education, children will acquire the skills and qualifications they need in order to obtain gainful employment once they reach adulthood, and overcome their condition. In the developing world, primary education has proven to reduce AIDS incidences, improve health, increase productivity and contribute to economic growth3. School can empower children, and give them guidance and hope that they may not receive at home. Getting kids in school is the first step to equipping them with the skills to better their situations, and if encouraged by their parents they might consider scholarships to college or vocational school. The program does not guarantee this for all, but it is likely more effective than the leaving parents with no incentive to push their children. Benefits are supposed to promote the welfare of both parents and children. One of the best ways to ensure that welfare payments are actually benefiting children is to make sure they're going to school. This is simply providing parents with an extra incentive to do the right thing for their children and become more vested in their kids' education. 1 Family Facts, \"A Closer Look at Welfare\", [Accessed July 21, 2011]. 2 Duncan , Greg and Brooks-Gunn, Jeanne (2000), \"Family Poverty, Welfare Reform, and Child Development\", Child Development, [Accessed July 21, 2011] 3http World Bank, \"Facts about Primary Education\",[Accessed July 21, 2011].\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "48542b6b0e455114266cd13a26c2ea58", "text": "economic policy education education general house believes payment welfare Connecting welfare to failure of parents is unfair.\n\nThis policy requires that parents be held accountable and punished for the actions of their children. It suggests that their failure in instilling good values is because they care less than middle-class, educated parents. That is a broad and stereotypical assumption. Such parents, many of whom are single mothers, find it harder to instill good values in their children because they live in corrupt environments, surrounded by negative influences[1]. They should be aided and supported, not punished for an alleged failure. Just encouraging putting children in schools does not recognize the larger problems. Some families cannot control their children, who would rather make money than go to school. And caps on the number of children these programs can apply to, as is the case in Brazil, creates problems as well for the families[2]. People are doing their best, but the environment is difficult. Providing safer and more low income housing could be a solution versus punishing people for what is sometimes out of their control. 1 Cawthorne, Alexandra (2008), \"The Straight Facts on Women in Poverty\", Center for American Progress, [Accessed July 21, 2011]. 2\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "592666c310364c9c494b76e36e106b67", "text": "economic policy education education general house believes payment welfare It is unjust to make welfare conditional\n\nWelfare should not be used as a tool of social engineering. These are people who cannot provide even basic necessities for their families. Asking them to take on obligations by threatening to take away their food is not requiring them to be responsible, it's extortion. It is not treating them as stakeholders and equal partners in a discussion about benefits and responsibilities, but trying to condition them into doing what the rest of society thinks is good for them and their families. There is a difference between an incentive and coercion. An incentive functions on the premise that the person targeted is able to refuse it. These people have no meaningful choice between 'the incentive' or going hungry. This policy does not respect people's basic dignity. There is no condition attached to healthcare and Medicaid that says people have to eat healthily or stop smoking, so why should welfare be conditional? Allowing them and their children to go without food if they refuse is callous. Making welfare conditional is taking advantage of people's situation and telling them what they need to do to be considered valuable to society; it is inherently wrong. It impedes on people's rights to free choice and demeans them as worthless.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4d601321c8ca41a67b217f7807b8b861", "text": "economic policy education education general house believes payment welfare There should be rewards for success in school, versus punishment for failure to attend.\n\nThis problem could be addressed by subsidizing school supplies or rewarding good attendance records with additional cash. Cutting benefits will only hurt the children we are trying to help, with their families deprived of the resources to feed them or care for them. Free breakfast programs in the US feed 10.1 million children every day1. Providing meals, mentors, programs that support and help students are ways to help them get along better in schools. There are already 14 million children in the US that go hungry, and 600 million children worldwide that are living on less than a dollar a day2. Why punish those families that have trouble putting their kids in school, which only hurts those children more? There should be rewards for good grades, and reduction to the cost of school and above all programs so that children don't have to sit in school hungry and confused. 1 United States Department of Agriculture, \"The School Breakfast Program\",[Accessed July 21, 2011]. 2 Feeding America (2010), \"Hunger in America: Key Facts\", [Accessed July 21, 2011]. and UNICEF, \"Goal: Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger\", [Accessed July 21, 2011].\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "bd9ea503531a40c6689f0d6a8ea3cb43", "text": "economic policy education education general house believes payment welfare School does not an education make\n\nSchool attendance is not a positive outcome in and of itself. It should be encouraged only if it is conducive to learning and acquiring the meaningful education needed to break out of the poverty trap. Blaming the poverty cycle on kids failing to attend school ignores the fact that schools are failing children. Public schools are often overcrowded, with poor facilities and lacking the resources necessary to teach children with challenging backgrounds. In 2011, 80% of America's schools could be considered failing according to Arne Duncan who is the secretary of education1. Schools in developing countries often lack qualified teachers, and can suffer from very high staff absenteeism rates2. A more effective school system would result in fewer kids dropping out, not the other way around. Additionally, involved parents are integral to effective education3. Simply blackmailing them with money to do the right thing will not work. In fact, you might actually experience backlash from parents and kids, who'll see school as a burdensome requirement that is met just so you can keep the electricity on. Throwing kids into school where they do not have confidence, support, and the necessary facilities is not productive. 1 Dillon , Sam (2011), \"Most Public Schools May Miss Targets, Education Secretary Says\", New York Times, [Accessed July 21, 2011]. 2 World Bank, \"Facts about Primary Education\",[Accessed July 21, 2011]. 3 Chavkin , Nancy, and Williams, David (1989), \"Low-Income Parents' Attitudes toward Parent Involvemet in Education\", Social Welfare, [Accessed July 21, 2011].\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
c08852ee249095c709915bdb7fd3d6ab	Bribery is sometimes the cost of doing business Bribery is often inevitable for foreign companies that invest in those countries, where corruption is widespread and the conditions for business development are unfavourable. In Russia IKEA, the Swedish furniture company, was asked to pay bribes to get electricity for its stores and refused hiring generators instead, however the generators themselves had their price inflated, as a result IKEA suspended investment in Russia. [1] It illustrates that bribe giving is just a result of political system with weak democratic traditions. That is why many companies from developed countries, where corruption levels are low, tend to practise bribery in the developing world. [1] Kramer, Andrew E., ‘Ikea Tries to Build Public Case Against Russian Corruption’, The New York Times, 11 September 2009, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/12/business/global/12ikea.html?_r=1	[ { "docid": "89a0eaa2a7b05299b45c7971dd76a4af", "text": "economy general politics leadership house believes bribery sometimes acceptable The developed world also carries part of responsibility for the situation in the developing world due to its role as the bribe-payer. After all, it is largely multinational corporate interests that supply the bribe payments. They defraud the citizens of developing countries who get a less good deal as a result, as well as the interests of shareholders at home whose money is diverted into the pockets of foreign officials. This shows the necessity of treating the bribing of foreign officials as a criminal offence in companies’ home countries. It also requires the publication of all payments relating to foreign deals.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "5b8e2cade2cc5de2f8e505d76be25293", "text": "economy general politics leadership house believes bribery sometimes acceptable Corruption in any form creates inefficiency and ‘drag’ on the economy – it is an unofficial form of transaction tax and has the same effect on the economy.\n\nThe proposition focuses on the ‘seen’ detriment to public servants of losing income from bribery but ignores the ‘unseen’ benefit of ending bribery which is that the cost of living naturally falls with the cost of doing business.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "96b9fd6e04942a079b485e891f1c49dc", "text": "economy general politics leadership house believes bribery sometimes acceptable In different cultures the lines between the acceptable and unacceptable are drawn differently. However, there are limits in all societies, beyond which an action becomes corrupt and unacceptable. The abuse of power for private gain and the siphoning off of public or common resources to private pockets should be illegal and unacceptable in all cultures and societies.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f8ac4bb01c92859563360aa9b29816a8", "text": "economy general politics leadership house believes bribery sometimes acceptable The position of civil society plays a key role in reducing corruption. Its action in taking a moral stand against corrupted officials is an important precondition for effective anticorruption policy. Hence, citizens who put up with the necessity to give a bribe become a part of the problem. It is not just the case of public officials abusing their positions, but of people who are tempted to choose the easiest way out. Recent developments in India show how quickly expectations can change once people begin to make a stand. Anna Hazare went on a hunger strike creating a mass movement against bribery. Now there are websites such as ipaidabribe.com popping up to shine a spotlight on corruption. [1] The change is the first step in the fight against corruption.\n\n[1] Campion, Mukti Jain, ‘Bribery in India: A website for whistleblowers’, BBC News, 6 June 2011, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-13616123\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e3cd09b636788974d6531eadc64cf1a8", "text": "economy general politics leadership house believes bribery sometimes acceptable Corruption is not always wrong – it can sometimes be a reaction to greater injustice. For example, the Mafia arose in 19th Century Southern Italy as a mediating institution for an ‘in group’ facing autocratic tyranny. Outsiders are treated badly, but then most groups of people that we label as legitimate also treat outsiders differently to their members.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "78e2f5f5e576703f8a2081aebcb031ac", "text": "economy general politics leadership house believes bribery sometimes acceptable Foreign companies simply adapt to the political and economic conditions that exist in different countries. You cannot blame them for high level of corruption, which is the inner problem of the state. Involvement of business representatives in anti-corruption actions may contradict their interests by providing access to commercially sensitive information. If bribery was banned, companies would be unable to operate, resulting in less investment and so less development in some countries.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b8bb5aba8efcf3fd368c7f2c6830e6b9", "text": "economy general politics leadership house believes bribery sometimes acceptable The bribery of foreign officials cannot be fought by international means efficiently if the level of corruption at the national level is high. It depends on the political will of national governments, the activities of civil society and other social conditions that exists inside the state. This explains why in many countries there has been little enforcement of the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials. [1] In most OECD countries the political will to prosecute major bribery cases is lacking. This explains why international efforts to combat corruption are inefficient.\n\n[1] Transparency International, ‘2008 Progress Report on Enforcement of the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions’, 22 June 2008, http://www.transparency.org/news_room/in_focus/2008/4th_oecd_progress_report\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f134d3c3512152cb5f2bbf521017c388", "text": "economy general politics leadership house believes bribery sometimes acceptable Bribery is sometimes necessary for survival\n\n\"Survival\" corruption, practised by public servants, is usually the result of small salaries, perhaps in highly inflationary economies, which do not allow them to make a living. Such as with the junior police officers mentioned in the previous point. Without bribery, public administration would collapse altogether as no one would have any incentive to get anything done. Thus the level of corruption is determined by the poor economic situation of the country as well as by the policy of the government.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b3ba2d27f550b693933856faf41f7c69", "text": "economy general politics leadership house believes bribery sometimes acceptable Individuals may have no choice\n\nPeople are often made to give bribes to officials because of unfavourable economic, social or bureaucratic conditions. Officials may refuse to serve clients unless they are paid. For example in Delhi police officers regularly take lunch without paying and more senior officers take 10,000 each month to allow the restaurant to stay open late. [1] In those countries where state institutions are extremely corrupted, refusal to give a bribe may cost financial losses for business representatives or even health and liberty for citizens who need medical service and access to justice.\n\n[1] Burke, Jason, ‘Corruption in India: ‘All your life you pay for things that should be free’, guardian.co.uk, 19 August 2011, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/aug/19/corruption-india-anna-hazare\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6f23cd5bd6628acb1a5413d4929004b2", "text": "economy general politics leadership house believes bribery sometimes acceptable Bribery is only wrong under a Western-centric notion of corruption\n\nNorms and values differ between countries. In many non-western societies gift taking and giving in the public realm is a matter of traditions and customs. Moreover, gift giving is a part of negotiations and relationship building in some parts of the world. It is hypocritical for the west to target developing countries for this as many so-called democracies are hopelessly compromised by business interests through political funding and lobbying.\n\nThe United States Foreign Corrupt Practices Act bans large bribes but allows for the payment of small ‘customary’ sums in order to ease transactions. [1]\n\n[1] The Economist, ‘When a bribe is merely facilitating business’ June 11th 2011, http://www.economist.com/blogs/blighty/2011/06/anti-bribery-laws\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "db43841a5461da92db9953227b2dec41", "text": "economy general politics leadership house believes bribery sometimes acceptable Variation in standards leads to a ‘race to the bottom’ of corruptibility\n\nInternational standards on prosecution of companies who bribe foreign officials may encourage positive changes in national legislation as well, thus eliminating legal flaws to combat corruption. Different national rules and standards for combating corruption are not sufficient in the era of global investments and international business transactions. Variation between national standards enables corruption to spread. In much the same way as companies and rich individuals make use of tax havens and places where taxes are lower and less regulated, all but two of the UK’s FTSE 100 of top companies are set up in tax havens, [1] companies wishing to hide illicit transactions may attempt to take advantage of weaker standards, wherever they are found. In India national laws have clearly not worked with relation to political parties as only one of 45 parties has provided information in response to the Right to Information act. [2] That is why international efforts to ensure the prosecution of the companies that bribe foreign officials are necessary in the current situation.\n\n[1] Provost, Claire, ‘Tax havens and the FTSE 100: the full list’, Datablog guardian.co.uk, 11 October 2011, http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2011/oct/11/ftse100-subsidiaries-tax-data\n\n[2] Times of India, ‘One out of 45 parties disclose information on sources of funding’, 20 July 2013, http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2013-07-20/india/40694448_1_central-information-commission-political-parties-rti-act\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d0ef4d1ff539858c6f13d031f5cadf93", "text": "economy general politics leadership house believes bribery sometimes acceptable Bribery is morally wrong\n\nCorruption is the misuse of power for financial gain. It takes the core harm from unequal distribution of wealth and the resulting disparity in availability of goods and services and magnifies it by including access to just and nominally public services. It must always disproportionately harm the least well off in society either by denying them what is theirs by right or by forcing them into financial hardship to obtain it.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "486655bbe7f7c2f5c2ff5fcc66571d95", "text": "economy general politics leadership house believes bribery sometimes acceptable The demand for bribes would end if companies stopped supplying them\n\nThe risk of corruption demand greater transparency from business. Companies have a big impact on the social environment and they have a responsibility to address it. Co-operative actions between the business sector and state institutions are essential for effective anti-corruption policy.\n\nCompanies that gain a reputation for reporting officials asking for bribes will find that officials stop asking for them. In turn they need a legislative environment that protects their interests. The OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials is an important step forward in this sphere. [1]\n\n[1] ‘OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions’, oecd.org, 1997, http://www.oecd.org/document/21/0,3746,en_2649_34859_2017813_1_1_1_1,00.html\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
7d04b8a4eed879f01007630bbcb76eba	Workfare will eliminate scroungers, who are a financial drain on the system Making the unemployed work for their welfare benefits calls the bluff of those claiming benefit but not really looking for jobs. Such scroungers include the incurably lazy, those who are defrauding the taxpayer by claiming welfare while holding down a paying job, and those who are working in the black economy. Furthermore, workfare schemes require applicants also search for work whilst completing the scheme1. Moving from a traditional something-for-nothing welfare scheme to a workfare system stops all these individuals from being a burden on the state, cutting welfare rolls very rapidly and allowing the government to concentrate upon assisting the truly needy. 1: Kaus, M. (2000, April 16). Now She's Done It. Retrieved July 19, 2011, from Slate	[ { "docid": "4878ffc41cd546ce3a1df62df3e7c15a", "text": "employment house believes unemployed should be made work their welfare money The number of people defrauding the system is very small (only 0.007% of the total cost of the benefit system). The majority of people on benefits are seeking work. They will be hindered in so doing, because instead of applying for work, attending interviews and developing relevant skills they will be forced to attend their workfare scheme. Thus, people will remain on benefits for longer, costing the government more in the long term.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "9f2bf4f1013a95492069d0a4c9171073", "text": "employment house believes unemployed should be made work their welfare money Workfare does not break the dependency culture. People do not seek unemployment and dependency on the state. No one voluntarily seeks to live on the very low income provided by state benefits, instead people become unemployed through no fault of their own; workfare stigmatises them as lazy and needing to be forced into work by state coercion. The schemes ignore the talents and ambitions of those involved, typically using them for menial tasks and manual labour that teach them no useful skills\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8ece7e60ea444d0e53bcab05ee9db996", "text": "employment house believes unemployed should be made work their welfare money Workfares have low standards that produce poor and potentially unsafe products. Individuals forced into workfare schemes lack incentives to work to a high standard, and may be actively disaffected. The work they do is therefore unlikely to benefit anyone much and raises a number of safety issues: would you drive across a bridge built by workfare labour? Would you trust your aged parent or pre-school child to a workfare carer? Would you trust them with any job that required the handling of money? Given these constraints, it is clear that the government may be unable to find enough worthwhile things for their forced labourers to do.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1ea3d2f8de13b2841ffbee00cbd1a0e9", "text": "employment house believes unemployed should be made work their welfare money Workfare schemes are of little use if there are no jobs out there for people to do– something which is an issue of wider economic management. Often the skills which employers are really demanding are literacy, numeracy and familiarity with modern information technology, which menial make-work tasks are unlikely to provide the unemployed with. Far better to invest in proper education and training schemes instead. Even if such skills might be developed through workfare schemes, will forcing people into such work really mean they get the benefits? Most of the long-term unemployed are older, made redundant from declining industries; they do not lack skills but suffer instead from ageist prejudices among employers. Finally, if the ‘workfare’ jobs that unemployed people are being forced into are real jobs that need doing, then they should simply be employed to do them in the normal way (either by the state or by private companies)\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "62de662bba68ec16aafcd7066906701b", "text": "employment house believes unemployed should be made work their welfare money Workfare schemes are an investment in people. Spending money on workfare schemes is an investment in people, who gain the opportunity to lift themselves out of poverty, and the economy, which benefits from a better supply of labour. Although such schemes might cost more per person than just handing out dole money for doing nothing, their ability to deter fraudulent claimants makes them cheaper overall. Their success in moving the unemployed into real jobs also benefits the government and the wider economy, through taxation and increased consumer spending.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "54fc8b944e0d2948b87bcc9168e52d79", "text": "employment house believes unemployed should be made work their welfare money Workfare allows people to demonstrate both to themselves and others that a day at work will not always result in failure. This greatly benefits the self-esteem of many, who have become trapped in unemployment because their past experiences (perhaps beginning with unsuccessful schooldays) have lead them to believe that they cannot be useful and successful when doing a day at work. Workfare demonstrates that to be false by allowing them to work in a job where they can see the results of their labour, and not lose out (indeed, gain benefits) as a result.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f41438b3e2035ce0fc783f7a703e4058", "text": "employment house believes unemployed should be made work their welfare money Workfare projects can be designed so as not to displace low-paid jobs: Often workfare schemes are limited to non-profit organisations deliberately in order to avoid a negative impact upon the local job market. In any case, many workers on very low pay only do such work for a relatively short time before finding better jobs elsewhere, so this is not a rigid sector of the labour force, liable to be destroyed by workfare.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9b168a4aaebca3970e4af44e16f232f0", "text": "employment house believes unemployed should be made work their welfare money Workfare does help people to get jobs by increasing the perception amongst employers that the unemployed nevertheless have the potential to be productive citizens – they’re willing and able to work, and have gained skills from being in a working environment. This counters one of the key barriers to employment, which is the prioritisation of younger generations who have not been tarred with the brush of having had to claim benefits. Furthermore, many schemes allow welfare recipients to satisfy work requirements by counting class rime, work-study jobs and internships – therefore, if education is what is felt to be missing, Workfare does not discourage participants from going back to school1.\n\n1 New York Times. (2003, April 15). The Mayor's Mistake on Workfare. Retrieved July 19, 2011, from The New York Times\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "32144e7eaae3f5c054681f048df62c0a", "text": "employment house believes unemployed should be made work their welfare money Workfare schemes benefit society\n\nSociety also benefits from the work done by those on workfare schemes: These might include environmental improvement in local communities, service to assist the elderly and disabled, and work for charities or local authorities. In many cases the labour they provide would not have been available in any other way, so the addition they make to everyone's quality of life is a welcome bonus to the scheme. Furthermore, a 2011 study in Denmark found a 'strong and significant crime reducing effect of the workfare policy.'1\n\n1: Fallesen, P., Geerdsen, L., Imai, S., & Tranaes, T. (2011, March 1). The Effect of Workfare Policy on Crime. Retrieved July 19, 2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "634f989b08f40717dceed2f7fbabea87", "text": "employment house believes unemployed should be made work their welfare money Workfare provides skills to allow the unemployed to work their way out of poverty\n\nWorkfares offer the unemployed opportunities to develop skills to work their way out of poverty. Productive work raises the expectations of those involved by increasing their self-respect and provides them with more confidence in their abilities. It also develops skills associated with work, such as time keeping, taking and giving instructions, working in a team, accepting responsibility and prioritising. Such skills may seem mundane but they are very valuable to employers and their absence among the long-term unemployed is a key reason why they find it so hard to gain jobs. Individuals who are currently working are also more attractive to potential employers than those who are unemployed, especially the long-term unemployed. The evidence suggests Workfare is a success; studies of Workfare in Maryland found that 75 per cent of those who left welfare had earnings within 2.5 years1 .1: Kaus, M. (2000, April 16). Now She's Done It. Retrieved July 19, 2011, from Slate\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e538da9d6128a978b22c63c41abe1507", "text": "employment house believes unemployed should be made work their welfare money Workfare breaks the dependency culture\n\nMaking the unemployed work for their welfare money positively breaks the dependency culture. Receiving unemployment benefit for doing nothing makes individuals too reliant on the state and encourages apathy and laziness; this is particularly true of the long-term unemployed and of those who have never had a paying job since leaving school. As President Clinton said regarding welfare reform, 'the goal is to break the culture of poverty and dependence'. Tying welfare money to productive work challenges these something-for-nothing assumptions and shows that the state has a right to ask for something in return for the generosity of its taxpayers. In New York, workfare pays slightly less than the minimum wage, preserving the incentive for the unemployed to use workfare as a stepping stone into a better-paid, long-term job1.\n\n1: Kaus, M. (2000, April 16). Now She's Done It. Retrieved July 19, 2011, from Slate\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "fb8538c40ecd4f417f357b6c55092fdf", "text": "employment house believes unemployed should be made work their welfare money Workfare does not help people get jobs\n\nWorkfare schemes are of little use if there are no jobs out there for people to do. The evidence suggests that ‘the vast majority of unemployment – over 9-10ths – has nothing to do with people not wanting work, and everything to do with a lack of demand for labour’1. As such, with few jobs on offer, it is of little use to demand welfare recipients come in for work, rather than search harder and deeper for the few jobs that are available. Regardless, often the skills which employers are really demanding are specialised and at a high level, which menial make-work tasks are unlikely to provide the unemployed with. It would be far better to invest in proper education and training schemes instead. In 2003, 60 per cent of New York’s welfare recipients did not have high school diplomas; if they want this majority to find jobs, they should be paying for them to go back to school, not clean streets2.\n\n1 Dillow , C. (2010, November 8). Small Truths, Big Errors. Retrieved July 19, 2011, from Stumbling and Mumbling\n\n2 New York Times. (2003, April 15). The Mayor's Mistake on Workfare. Retrieved July 19, 2011, from The New York Times\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4518d431387113f9a192200dac62a526", "text": "employment house believes unemployed should be made work their welfare money Workfare schemes limit the opportunities to look for work\n\nPutting the unemployed into workfare schemes actually limits their opportunities to look for work, by making them show up for make-work schemes when they could be job hunting. Even if the numbers of those claiming unemployment benefit are reduced by the threat of such a scheme, that does not necessarily remove them from welfare rolls – they may, for example, be pushed into claiming other benefits, such as disability allowances. Others may prefer to turn to crime for income rather than be forced into workfare projects that don’t pay enough to be an attractive option. The evidence of the Workfare program in Argentina suggests that the policy has little positive effect on finding jobs for participants; ‘for a large fraction of participants, the program generated dependency and did not increase their human capital’1.\n\n1 Ronconi, L., Sanguinetti, J., Fachelli, S., Casazza, V., & Franceschelli, I. (2006, June).Poverty and Employability Effects of Workfare Programs in Argentina. Retrieved July 19, 2011, from PEP\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6e61e3ca531d4f9d34e2dc837a744a06", "text": "employment house believes unemployed should be made work their welfare money Workfare is more expensive than traditional benefits\n\nWorkfare is actually a more expensive option than traditional unemployment benefit. The jobless are ultimately given at least the same amount of taxpayers' money but the state also has to pay the costs of setting up the schemes, paying for materials, the wages of supervisors, transport and childcare costs, etc. In a recession, when the numbers of the unemployed rise substantially, the costs of workfare schemes could be prohibitive and lead to the collapse of the policy. Furthermore, even if the state wanted to, they couldn't enrol everyone– ‘given that most people who lose a job find another within six months, there’s no point dragging people into these schemes who will find work anyway given a little more time’1.\n\n1 Saunders , P. (2011, July 1). Those who can work must not be paid to sit at home.Retrieved July 19, 2011, from The Australian\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "83469ba94f77f1d5a447a08f9fe37248", "text": "employment house believes unemployed should be made work their welfare money Workfare will damage the existing labour market\n\nWorkfare harms those already in employment but on very low pay, because their menial jobs are the kind of labour that workfare projects will provide. Why should a local authority pay people to pick up litter or lay paving, if workfare teams can be made to do it for much less? If low-paid jobs are displaced, the ultimate result may be higher unemployment. In New York, public employee unions actively opposed Workfare specifically because they feared it would put public employees out of work1. Even if workfare projects are limited to labour for charities and non-profit groups, they discourage active citizenship and volunteerism as the state is assuming responsibility for these initiatives.\n\n1 Kaus, M. (2000, April 16). Now She's Done It. Retrieved July 19, 2011, from Slate\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
77237193ec6837d1046a89871a3ad6f0	Why a flat tax is fairer In a welfare state such as the United Kingdom, everyone enjoys the same access to services provided by the government, and so it should stand to reason that everyone should also contribute equally to the funding of those services. As not all individuals are equal in their wealth and income, it is impossible to do this on the basis of everyone paying in the exact same numerical amount of money. However, this parity can be achieved by everyone paying the same percentage of their income in tax to the government, and this is exactly what a flat tax is, and so equality in contribution to government services (mirroring equality in access to government services) is achieved. This principle of equality is important for two reasons: firstly, if wealthier citizens feel they are being unfairly burdened by the current requirement that they pay higher percentages of their income to fund government services than those on lower incomes, they may feel a disincentive to work hard (which creates wealth for the whole economy), or may even be driven abroad to states with lower rates of taxation or to tax havens. [1] Secondly this removes the ability of the majority of a population to engage in what the French economist Bastiat called 'legalized plunder', where they (as the majority of voters) assign higher percentages of income tax to the wealthy in order that the state may appropriate and redistribute it to them for their own use. [2] With a flat tax in place, there would be no ability for anyone to vote for a tax rise simply on other people and not on themselves, and thus such policies would receive more consideration and not be used by the majority simply to appropriate the property of others through the law. Thus a flat tax is fairer as it equalized the basis on which everyone pays for access to equal services, and prevents a poorer majority from victimizing a wealthier minority through punitive rates of income tax for the wealthy, which may cause them to flee the country for other states with less taxation. [1] Ramos, Joanne “Places in the Sun”. The Economist. Feb 22nd 2007 http://www.economist.com/node/8695139?story_id=8695139 [2] Bastiat, Frédéric. The Law. Ludwig von Mises Institute. 2007	[ { "docid": "7bae9b92fd8aaa1cf02348ef8452cded", "text": "tax philosophy political philosophy house would introduce flat tax The aim of a welfare state is to allow provide access to vital services for all, but especially for those who could not otherwise afford them -to lift the burden of poverty somewhat. A flat tax, however, would actually increase the burden on the poorest. [1] For example, if under a progressive taxation system the highest rate of tax was 50%, and the lowest 10%, if tax revenues were to be maintained when switching to a flat tax system, then it would be impossible to simply extend the 10% rate of tax to all, as this would mean a large effective drop in revenue (as 40% less is collected from the top bracket with no gains anywhere), and so the rate paid by all would have to be somewhere between 10% and 50%, meaning an effective tax rise on the poorest and middle classes, while the richest receive an effective tax cut. This hardly seems 'fair' or in keeping with the aims of a welfare state, as the argument purports to serve.\n\n[1] Ulbrich, Holley. “Flat Tax Is Class Warfare”. U.S. News & World Report. April 12, 2010. http://www.usnews.com/opinion/articles/2010/04/12/flat-tax-is-class-warfare\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "3b740b03c86ce179d8925cd595fec68a", "text": "tax philosophy political philosophy house would introduce flat tax The much-acclaimed simplicity of the flat tax in fact makes it too simple to properly reflect a very complicated reality. Goods and services vary in order to make them accessible to different people; there exist both luxury and economy versions of the same goods because companies recognise that people have differing ability and willingness to pay, and hence price these goods differently. It would therefore be strange for the state to tax both kinds of good at the same rate, as if their respective buyers had the same discretionary income and could both afford to buy the product with the additional uniform flat tax on it.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "938a775153d2aa04e52026f35d850030", "text": "tax philosophy political philosophy house would introduce flat tax This argument ignores the fact that there is still another channel for the allocation of resources, namely the government. In the given example of agriculture tax credits verses manufacturing without such credits, if resources did not go into agriculture because of the special credit, they would have gone not into manufacturing but into government (through the closing of loopholes, and thus the disappearance of a means of being taxed less), and government is far less neutral to the market than any other allocation. Therefore, if the argument assumes that the best allocation of resources is that which most closely resembles a genuinely free market, then in this example a flat tax produces a worse situation, as any allocation of economic resources in the private sector (no matter how 'distorted) is closer to the free market (and thus 'better), than if those resources went into the hands of the government. So if reflecting the market is the uppermost concern, a flat tax is a worse proposition as it brings into higher rates of taxation many areas which currently are less taxed ('loopholes'), thus distorting the market even further as even more resources fall into government hands\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "197755d47da77fb5f2f9007c46cac691", "text": "tax philosophy political philosophy house would introduce flat tax This argument fails to account for the fact that elected governments are even worse at determining what is 'fair' when it comes to tax policy than the arbitrary circumstances described when the government has the option to tax different persons at different rates on the basis of their income. In effect this allows the less wealthy majority to decide what the 'circumstances' of the more wealthy minority mean they 'should' pay in taxes, which may in fact be inaccurate and based more upon a desire to 'punish' the wealthy and appropriate their resources for the majority in an unfair manner. This populist tendency in elected governments is what makes them so bad at deciding 'fairly' based upon 'circumstances', not sectional or class interests, and so why the power to set different tax rates to different people should be taken out of the hands of the government by instituting a flat tax.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c047b541aa218ca3e80be2b93bff2bc0", "text": "tax philosophy political philosophy house would introduce flat tax The status quo, whereby governments select what areas to tax and at what rate, leads to even more examples of regressive taxation than is alleged of flat taxes. For example, the so-called 'sin tax' on alcohol and cigarettes are designed to limit people's consumption thereof (and thus mitigate the harms of excessive consumption and abuse), but in fact have highly regressive results. This is because those on lower incomes are both more likely to consume large amounts of alcohol and cigarettes, and because this expenditure thus represents a larger share of their income. Consequently, by proportion the taxes on alcohol and cigarettes actually redistribute wealth from the poor to the rich. [1] Therefore there is no reason to believe that government discretion in what is taxed and how much actually leads to less regressive taxation; it may even be more so.\n\n[1] Barro, Josh. “Alcohol Taxes are Strongly Regressive”. National Review Online. March 25, 2010 http://www.nationalreview.com/agenda/39020/alcohol-taxes-are-strongly-re...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f36e0f02f76d183c51cebdb143033e89", "text": "tax philosophy political philosophy house would introduce flat tax This argument again assumes that governments do a good job of deciding what areas and sectors 'deserve' loopholes and which do not. The fact that the distribution of resources would change if we abolished certain tax loopholes is probably a sign that these areas have been artificially inflated in terms of their resource allocation by these very tax credits and loopholes, and should therefore be returned to market standards. The selection of many of these sectors for credits may well have been done not on an economic but rather on a political basis, for example in order to protect jobs in some sectors and help boost a government's votes at election time.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "88d4daa967c7978acf82fe9bc96ac80f", "text": "tax philosophy political philosophy house would introduce flat tax Why a flat tax is simpler:\n\nThe current system of 'progressive' taxation whereby higher earners are taxed a higher percentage of their income requires the identification and administration of multiple different tax brackets spanning the entire spectrum of earnings in a nation. This causes a number of problems. The brackets themselves may be largely arbitrary cut-off lines based around round numbers, with no real justification as to why one person increasing their earnings by as little as £1000 should lead to them suddenly being propelled to a new tax bracket, when the actual difference to their income is negligible in overall terms. Moreover, the administration of multiple tax brackets is incredibly complicated and difficult, requiring every taxpayer to record their income and expenditure (in order to try and qualify for tax exemptions and 'loopholes') in meticulous detail and then to properly express this on lengthy and complicated government forms, a process which can cause anger, frustration and alienation amongst taxpayers. [1] In order to try and prevent tax evasion, governments are consequently compelled to have large bureaucracies that oversee this process and comb through looking for fraud, a costly and lengthy process. This may be contrasted with a flat tax system by taking the example of taxes on salaries paid to employees by a company under both systems. In the status quo, a tax collector must be aware in detail of exactly what is being paid to whom in order to ensure that everyone declares their income truthfully, allowing them to be placed in the correct bracket. However, under a flat tax, a tax collector could simply withhold the fixed flat tax rate (for example 20%) of the total company's payroll without needing to know what was paid to whom, as every pound is taxed at the same rate and thus it does not matter what goes to whom. This would allow for a massive simplification of tax forms, and for the down-scaling of the costly government departments dedicated to administering the different tax brackets. Thus the simplicity of a flat tax is a significant advantage.\n\n[1] The Economist Special Report “The case for flat taxes” The Economist. Apr 14th 2005. http://www.economist.com/node/3860731\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a3b080b4171f248c8510f6031a3ae359", "text": "tax philosophy political philosophy house would introduce flat tax Why closing tax loopholes is good:\n\nTax credits, deductions and loopholes distort resource allocation in a market situation because people respond to the differing tax rates and so put more resources into the areas which the loopholes apply to than they would otherwise. For example, current tax credits for investment mean that more resources go into investment than they would in the absence of that credit, as the returns on the placing of resources in this area are higher than others (as it is subject to a lower rate of tax). A government may even set certain tax credits and loopholes which favour certain industries or economic sectors, such as agriculture, on the basis that this is politically useful (in winning votes), when this again distorts resource allocation in the economy. These distortions may prove harmful as they cause certain sectors to be over-valued or over-invested in due to their favourable tax status, to the detriment and neglect of other more highly-taxed areas (for example, manufacturing) which may in fact be the more economically sound. A flat tax would abolish all 'credits' and 'loopholes' (and the politically-influenced government discretion which decides who gets credits and who does not) and therefore restore genuine market conditions without these harmful distortions. [1]\n\n[1] Rothbard, Murray. “The Case Against the Flat Tax”, The Free Market Reader. Auburn. Mises Institute. 1988 http://mises.org/rothbard/flattax.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c4d6a903ca3716e98d7311ea2dce1a81", "text": "tax philosophy political philosophy house would introduce flat tax Why tax 'loopholes' can be good:\n\nMany of the so-called 'loopholes' which a flat tax would close, by ending the exemptions given when you engage in certain kinds of expenditure under the current income tax system, are actually positive features which incentivize 'good' economic behaviour. One of the great advantages from owning a home, for example, is the resulting ability to deduct mortgage interest payments from taxes. This makes owning a home more expensive, meaning a greater number of people will be able unable or unwilling to buy homes, and will thus be forced to rent instead. This harms their long-term economic prospects, as their mortgage payments would result in them eventually owning an asset whereas rent payments bring them no return, and as self-owned homes become in less demand, the value of the homes which hundreds of thousands of people have already spent decades paying mortgages for will plummet. This would also cause great harm to the construction industry as fewer people can afford to buy new houses. Another example of a useful 'loophole' is that profits and capital gains are currently taxed differently. Under a flat tax they would both be taxed equally, representing a kind of 'double taxation' which would hit most heavily new, young venture capitalists going into high-risk industries, and so will stifle investment and innovation. Finally, the current income tax deductions we allow for charitable giving would be 'closed' with a flat tax, and hence charitable giving would become less affordable and less attractive to most taxpayers. [1] Thus, the closing of these 'loopholes' will in fact disincentivize what we consider to be beneficial economic behaviour, leading to a worse economic state for everyone.\n\n[1] Rothbard, Murray. “The Case Against the Flat Tax”, The Free Market Reader. Auburn. Mises Institute. 1988 http://mises.org/rothbard/flattax.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ee94495a585ebb9c40adcb4fe179d2e6", "text": "tax philosophy political philosophy house would introduce flat tax Why a flat tax isn't 'fair':\n\nThe arguments in favour of a flat tax argue that it is more 'fair' than other forms of taxation because it theoretically treats all persons and all forms of income equally by taxing them all at the same rate. This firstly fails to explain why any arbitrary percentage at which the tax is set is necessarily the 'fair' number and thus why everyone should receive the wonderful privilege of paying that exact number and not another based upon their income, expenditure and circumstances. The effect of the tax upon different individuals in different circumstances is thus key to the tax's supposed 'fairness', and to the undermining of this argument. For example, say both Mr Smith and Mr Jones earn £50,000 a year. However Mr Smith is a young man with few assets who relies upon his personal savings to finance a future business, and Mr Jones is an old man who has already built up or inherited £500,000 in assets. There is no clear reason why it is 'fair' for them to both pay the same rate of taxation despite their vastly different circumstances and the effect that the tax would have upon each of them, as Mr Jones' built-up wealth is protected, but Mr Smith's ability to build up assets and start a business in the first place is undermined. Or take the example of a sick man and a healthy man with the same income, but one of whom thus has much higher medical costs to pay. In the status quo they can be taxed differently (by allowing for income tax deductions for healthcare expenditure), however under a flat tax they would both be taxed the same, and it this would severely harm the sick man. Therefore, it seems counter-intuitive that in a world where all individuals are not the same and rates of taxation impact in highly different ways upon individuals depending on their differing circumstances (over which they may have little control), that every individual should pay exactly the same rate of tax, as if they were all the same. That hardly seems 'fair'.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5f5eb2fc08b4dbb7360581529b55d729", "text": "tax philosophy political philosophy house would introduce flat tax Why a flat tax is regressive\n\n'Regressive' means that a tax impacts upon the poor more greatly than upon the rich, and this is exactly what occurs with a flat tax. Because everyone pays the same percentage, both a rich and poor man would for example pay 10% of their income in tax. As the poor spend a greater percentage of their income on their basic necessities (such as rent and food) than the rich do, as the rich have far more discretionary income to spend on luxuries. [1] Therefore, the impact of a 10% tax upon a poorer person is far greater in terms of limiting their ability to buy things they may want or need than it is upon a richer person, and consequently the harm of taxing a poorer person at the same rate as a richer person is greater than the harm of taxing a richer person at a higher percentage. Even if the 'personal allowance' allows the poorest in our society to exempt their income from the flat tax (which, of course, offers no relief to the middle class, who now pay a greater percentage tax on their income), they will still be significantly worse off as a consequence of the sales component of the flat tax. This again stems from the poorest spending a greater percentage of their income on necessities, which are not currently subject to sales tax (VAT). Once these VAT 'loopholes' (such as on books, children's clothing and food) are closed, the poorest will be harmed as they have to pay out even more to obtain the necessities of life. Both These increased harms breed resentment and can lead to social disorder, as was seen in the UK in 1990 when an attempt to introduce a 'poll tax' (a form of flat tax, with everyone paying the same charge) led to severe rioting in London and caused the plan to be abandoned. [2] Therefore the regressive nature of a flat tax makes it undesirable and more harmful than current forms of taxation.\n\n[1] Encyclopedia of Business. “Discretionary Income”. Enotes. http://www.enotes.com/biz-encyclopedia/discretionary-income\n\n[2] BBC On This Day “1990: Violence flares in poll tax demonstration” BBC Home http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/march/31/newsid_2530000...\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
bfa5465590429ec1adc161b49ff6bfde	Keeping funds from government has negative consequences for spending Let us not forget that in most of the cases when we talk about oil revenues, we are talking about very large sums of money, which can have an immense impact on the budget. In countries where oil already contributes to the budget any change could be immensely disruptive to the government’s ability to deliver services. If we take Venezuela as an example oil revenues account for 25% of GDP (1), with government expenditure of 50% of GDP (2) any drop in oil revenues would have an immense impact upon social policies such as education, health and welfare. For those where the funding would be new that country would be foregoing a potentially transformative sum of money that could help to eliminate poverty or provide universal healthcare and education. Such a drop in funds flowing into the government would also have a huge impact on politics; politicians would block the implementation of a proposal that takes away so much revenue. If it did happen the independent fund would simply get criticism heaped on it as an excuse for why services can’t be improved. (1) Annual Statistical Bulletin 2013, ‘Venezuela facts and figures’, OPEC, 2013, http://www.opec.org/opec_web/en/about_us/171.htm (2) 2013 Index of Economic Freedom, ‘Venezuela’, Heritage Foundation, 2013, http://www.heritage.org/index/country/venezuela	[ { "docid": "cd94fb7677dd9bf9765181fd6b8f7fc7", "text": "economic policy international africa government house would put taxesrevenue oil The change need not be dramatic; it need not apply to all oil revenues at once. For example only revenues from new fields could go into the independent fund while existing revenues to the government are maintained. Services therefore won’t need to undergo contraction.\n\nThe impact on politics would also be minor; people elect those who get things done not those who blame others for their problems. Moreover all of the politicians will have the same constraint of a lack of funds so no single party will have an unfair advantage.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "00f2b8849c6725d065733336c3bc40b2", "text": "economic policy international africa government house would put taxesrevenue oil Politicians only think about themselves and only for the short term looking for re-election. The result will be the money used for populist measures even if it is not sustainable. The example of Greece proves this idea, as there public sector wages rose 50% between 1999 and 2007, despite having a deficit (1). Everyone wants more money, so will vote for such measures. They don’t think about the question of how that money will be acquired in the long run so will go for unsustainable policies that kick the problem to future generations. Only an independent body will be immune to short-termism.\n\n(1) ‘Eurozone crisis explained’, BBC News, 27 November 2012, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-13798000\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "dae40ae01250775a92e6876b931f4f63", "text": "economic policy international africa government house would put taxesrevenue oil Is it better that money should be wasted immediately or should the return be spread out? Any prudent population would choose the latter. Most populations are wary of untrammelled exploitation of natural resources of the kind being promoted for fear of the devastating environmental impact.\n\nRecent failures of big companies to protect the environment, like Chevron(1), only add to this discontent and lack of trust. The case of Rosia Montana Gold Company which wants to get a permit to mine for gold in Romania is also very illustrative. Following the request of this company to exploit certain mountainous areas in the Carpathian, a series of nation-wide protests have emerged. Thousands of people from across the nation are going out on the streets on a weekly basis to protest against this project.(2)\n\nAn independent fund won’t disincentivise investment; money will still be returned to the nation’s treasury to be used by politicians but because it takes longer to flow into the treasury there is less incentive for reckless investment that disregards the people’s will.\n\n(1) “Chevron's Toxic Legacy in Ecuador”, Rainforest Action Network, http://ran.org/chevrons-toxic-legacy-ecuador\n\n(2) Vlad Ursulean “Stopping Europe's biggest gold mine”, Al Jazeera, 27 Nov 2013 http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2013/11/stopping-europe-biggest-gold-mine-20131117102859516331.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4a6371240ae2e1d3d9e2b3bed1af9b8d", "text": "economic policy international africa government house would put taxesrevenue oil This is based on several potentially faulty assumptions first the trust fund may not be aimed at helping to prevent pollution of clean up afterwards; it may simply be given the role of generating the biggest possible return. Second it assumes that politicians see themselves as tied to the people so that they have a reason to prevent pollution, in practice in an autocracy or a faulty democracy this may not be the case. The desire may therefore be to invest as much money as possible in the trust fund and therefore to exploit the resource as fully and cheaply as possible. Even if the money is going into a trust fund the self interest is in polluting as we should remember that dictators are likely to believe they will still be around to see the benefits in decades to come.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d7a7611ccd0b8123980f4ef175c4204e", "text": "economic policy international africa government house would put taxesrevenue oil Having oil does not just provide the money to undermine, or prevent democracy taking hold; it also provides an immense source for corruption. Oil revenues provide a revenue stream that is not dependent on the people but simply upon the global market and oil production. In a country with no checks and balances, accountability or transparency the money will inevitably go to the elite. This is how Equatorial Guinea can be rich while having most of the population in poverty. Dictator Obiang himself is worth an estimated $700million or the equivalent of about 4% of GDP.(1)\n\nA trust fund can ensure that money from oil goes to the poorest not the richest. It is managed outside the country and away from political pressure. If the government is corrupt and uses the national budget to its own ends the trust fund can provide the dividends as investment in individual development projects to ensure the money is used where it is most needed. All the time it can be transparent to show when and where the government is trying to influence it or get backhanders.\n\n(1) ‘The Richest World Leaders Are Even Richer Than You Thought’, Huffington Post, 29 November 2013, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/29/richest-world-leaders_n_4178514.html?utm_hp_ref=tw\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "35e05b93c27c2e8cb4792d9beb5649f3", "text": "economic policy international africa government house would put taxesrevenue oil Not all politicians are incapable of investing for the long term. After the economic crisis in which the world saw the perils of “living in the moment”, politicians will be more cautious in the way they spend money. Politicians have in the past been able to build visionary projects such as the EU, or high speed rail, or invest in reducing greenhouse gas emissions; in Europe, domestic greenhouse gas emissions fell by over 15 % between 1990 and 2010, due also to improvements in energy and fuel efficiency, so there is no reason to think they could not do so again.(1)\n\nAs a result, we do not need a separate group for taking these decisions for the politicians, as they would do it by themselves.\n\n(1) European Environment Agency, “Mixed success for European environmental policies”, Spiral, 2012 http://www.spiral-project.eu/content/mixed-success-european-environmental-policies\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "13f49bda7c08667e4326dad90d5c9668", "text": "economic policy international africa government house would put taxesrevenue oil The biggest problem African countries face is instability whether from rebellions, coups, international conflicts, or terrorist organisation. The inevitable result is violence. What the population needs is safety to enable social benefits like healthcare and education. Money to pay for an army can therefore be a good thing. A good well paid professional force is needed to ensure stability and prevent conflict. Nigeria for example would surely have split apart without a large army; violence from terrorist groups like Boko Haram is increasing creating Muslim-Christian tensions.(1) Without stability there can be no democracy; votes can’t be held, so financing for stability is a good thing.\n\nEgypt is a good example that shows a well-trained army can work for the benefit of democracy; it first stood aside while the people overthrew Egyptian dictator Mubarak and then stepped in when it was believed Morsi threatened democracy.\n\n(1) “Nigeria’s troubles ,Getting worse”, The Economist, Jul 14th 2012 http://www.economist.com/node/21558593\n\n(2) Siddique, Haroon, ‘Egypt army was ‘restoring democracy’, claims Kerry’, theguardian.com, 2 August 2013, http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/02/egypt-army-restoring-democracy-kerry\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9db8a2705128574aeb58bb5ad942039e", "text": "economic policy international africa government house would put taxesrevenue oil An independent trust fund discourages investment.\n\nWhen it is politicians who control both the investment and the amount funds being returned from that investment then they have an incentive to encourage more investment. They will want more exploration to find more resources, they will promote technological advances to be able to extract more from the same fields, and they will be willing to grant more production licences.\n\nIf on the other hand the money goes into a trust fund then the government and parliament has little incentive to encourage the market and every incentive to hold it up. The oil only provides a risk; unpopularity due to environmental impacts without any benefit in return.\n\nThe result will be that the costs of drilling will be seen in the environmental damage it causes while communities do not get any of the benefit as the money is being squirreled away ‘for the future’. This is hindering the market and so reducing the economic benefits to the country.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "67978c9ae62193349c7ff27b2d8db126", "text": "economic policy international africa government house would put taxesrevenue oil For the people and accountable to the people\n\nA country’s resources should be used democratically. The resources that are found under the soil belong to the nation and therefore they should be used for the benefit of the people. Even where there is private ownership extending to mineral and energy resources it is the responsibility of the owners to use those resources for the good of the nation. The only way for this to happen is if there is a democratically accountable body in charge of the funding; this has to mean a democratic parliament.\n\nPutting the money in an ‘independent fund’ is not very accountable. Even if it is independent there is no saying what the money will be used for, or that the fund is not really designed to funnel money back to a few individuals.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "88609b9b6d169c7121a576e963f284e7", "text": "economic policy international africa government house would put taxesrevenue oil A fund would prevent pollution\n\nEnvironmental damage is an example of the ‘tragedy of the commons’ where if a resource is not owned by an individual (or is free to all) then it will be overexploited. This is because it is in everyone’s self-interest to use it as much as possible. The result is pollution; politicians and oil companies want to exploit the oil as cheaply as possible so they dump pollution on the local population.\n\nFor example, the $19 billion ruling handed down last year by a court in Lago Agrio, a town near Ecuador’s border with Colombia, held Chevron accountable for health and environmental damages resulting from chemical-laden wastewater dumped from 1964 to 1992(1).\n\nPutting oil wealth into a trust fund can help prevent this kind of abuse. There are two reasons for this. First if politicians are not getting an immediate benefit they will be less inclined to overlook pollution and there won’t be money to buy support for drilling and pollution to continue. The second is that since the fund is meant to provide long term benefits and investments one of the things it can be doing is being devoted to cleaning up any pollution that is created thus protecting the future generations.\n\n(1) Joe Carroll, Rebecca Penty & Katia Dmitrieva ” Chevron’s $19 Billion ‘Disaster’ Gets Hearing”, Bloomberg, 29 November 2012, http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-11-29/chevron-s-19-billion-disaster-gets-hearing-corporate-canada.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f65933a932fcdf62ebfc873136c4e91c", "text": "economic policy international africa government house would put taxesrevenue oil Long term benefits\n\nIt is very tempting to recklessly use an unexpected windfall of money immediately. But the best thing to do is to invest for the long term either to build infrastructure that will pay back its cost in future economic growth, or to invest it in funds that will continue paying dividends long into the future. The example of how Britain and Norway spent their North Sea oil revenues is very revealing: “the British governments spent their North Sea winnings on cutting national borrowing and keeping down taxes. Whatever came in went straight into the day-to-day budget. By contrast, for the past 16 years Norway has squirreled away the government's petroleum revenue in a national oil fund”(1) which now has $810 billion in assets, almost twice the country’s GDP, providing 5% returns.(2)\n\nThe advantage of such investment is that they will continue to bring income even after the oil is gone. The oil will therefore benefit future generations as well as the current one. A panel of experts which are immune to political influence is the most likely body to think about long-term needs of the country and devise a plan which can ultimately bring income for a long period of time.\n\n(1) Simon Gompertz “Has the UK squandered its North Sea riches?” , BBC News , 8 October 2012 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-19871411\n\n(2) Jonas Bergman, “World’s Biggest Wealth Fund Says Record Size Is Posing Hurdles”, Bloomberg, 1 November 2013, http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-11-01/world-s-biggest-wealth-fund-says-record-size-is-posing-hurdles.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c4438974caf8e4a02fafca4b0fbbb940", "text": "economic policy international africa government house would put taxesrevenue oil Oil wealth flowing to politicians discourages democracy\n\nThe wealth from oil, or other natural resources, holds back democratization as a result of the “resources curse” or “paradox of plenty”. Resources provide money, and money is what is needed to run a security state. When money can come from natural resources there is little need to tax the people, instead it becomes a “rentier” economy where the dictator has resources to buy support without recourse to taxation. [1] It is essentially the opposite of the well-known idea ‘no taxation without representation’; if the money comes not from taxes but from oil what need is there for democracy?\n\nThis proposal takes away the option of having access to large oil revenues instead providing only a limited amount to the state rather than the pockets of the dictator. This prevents the buying of key groups such as the army and the policy who can be used to repress the population. It is not by chance that the only countries in the Arab Middle East that could be considered democracies before the Arab Spring never had oil; Jordan and Lebanon.\n\n[1] Michel Chatelus and Yves Scehmeil, ‘Towards a New Political Economy of State Industrialisation in the Arab Middle East’, International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 16, No. 2 (May, 1984), pp.251-265, pp.261-262\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "828c68571ab6b913465f44fa52cc6a83", "text": "economic policy international africa government house would put taxesrevenue oil Preventing Corruption\n\nHaving oil does not just provide the money to undermine, or prevent democracy taking hold; it also provides an immense source for corruption. Oil revenues provide a revenue stream that is not dependent on the people but simply upon the global market and oil production. In a country with no checks and balances, accountability or transparency the money will inevitably go to the elite. This is how Equatorial Guinea can be rich while having most of the population in poverty. Dictator Obiang himself is worth an estimated $700million or the equivalent of about 4% of GDP.(1)\n\nA trust fund can ensure that money from oil goes to the poorest not the richest. It is managed outside the country and away from political pressure. If the government is corrupt and uses the national budget to its own ends the trust fund can provide the dividends as investment in individual development projects to ensure the money is used where it is most needed. All the time it can be transparent to show when and where the government is trying to influence it or get backhanders.\n\n(1) ‘The Richest World Leaders Are Even Richer Than You Thought’, Huffington Post, 29 November 2013, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/29/richest-world-leaders_n_4178514.html?utm_hp_ref=tw\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
fa5d9f8fb6ad0c30ab2909d90f2092c2	The US should focus on divising ways in which to pay the medicare and medicaid bills faced by its population The realities facing the US government are that it has two separate sets of bills to pay. On one hand there are those to central banks and overseas investors. The others are to its own citizens who have been giving the government their tax dollars over the course of a working lifetime on the understanding that they would recoup that money in healthcare and other benefits at a later stage. The priority has to be domestic expenditure.	[ { "docid": "3a331ef58cc2adfd1c77145d8f5e1450", "text": "economic policy finance tax house would prioritise eliminating budget deficit If China moves to recall the trillion dollars or so that they are owed because they no longer trust US debt, or even just to offload it, the effect on the average American would be devastating. The benefits in increased exports would be more than compromised by increased costs for basic goods and services. Inflationary pressures would become severe and interest rates – one of the Fed’s primary tools in fighting the recession – would be forced to rise to combat it.\n\nIt simply makes no sense to run the risk of the sort of collapse that would ensue if the government loses the ability to borrow because of a lack of confidence.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "620848d88086b6ac3fd698a7f0ca45bd", "text": "economic policy finance tax house would prioritise eliminating budget deficit This may well have been the case when a AAA credit rating could simply be taken for granted but it is no longer the case. Standard and Poor has down-graded America’s credit rating [i] and China looks set to follow suit [ii] .\n\nA lower rating means paying higher interest on government borrowing. This is new territory for the US; an economy that has no experience of anything other than top ratings. Suddenly all that money from China doesn’t look so cheap and the engine of the world economy is running in to trouble. It’s time to stop being reliant on other people’s money.\n\n[i] Robert Peston. “US Loses AAA Credit Rating After S&P Downgrade”. BBC. 6 August 2011.\n\n[ii] Peter Beaumont. “Chinese Ratings Agency Threatens US With New Debt Downgrade.” The Guardian. 12 November 2011.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4e207fda463b0781a10db7824a8ed36a", "text": "economic policy finance tax house would prioritise eliminating budget deficit At some point the US needs to come to terms with its debts and a gradual collapse of confidence in the US’s ability to pay its debts will not help the American economy or anyone else’s. With a declining tax base – both as a result of unemployment and an increasing burden of economic inactivity through retirement, the government will increasingly have to demonstrate that it is ‘good for the money’ rather than just assuming that something will turn up.\n\nDespite hundreds of billions poured into the economy since the start of Obama’s time in office, the economy remains stagnant. As a result it’s time for the government to demonstrate that it can use austerity as well as largesse to solve the problem.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "46bfc53adefa0d7f082b0ac77acdd9da", "text": "economic policy finance tax house would prioritise eliminating budget deficit The single biggest impact the US government, or any government, can have on the economy is what it does with its own money. By creating jobs through public expenditure it stimulates local economies and creates growth.\n\nProponents of the baby boomer crisis theory also ignore one very significant fact – these people did not cause a financial crisis before they started working in the late sixties. It also seems unlikely that all of them will stop work as life expectancies are now much longer than in the middle of the last century and a majority can be expected to remain economically active.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8f0b62c563ef4f7cda59aa1078a0b222", "text": "economic policy finance tax house would prioritise eliminating budget deficit The only ways to control the deficit, other than stimulating growth and the tax revenues it produces, would be either to cut services or to increase taxes. Both actions would harm the longer term objective of stimulating growth as they both take cash out of the real economy.\n\nBy contrast, focusing on domestic spending to restart the economy will produce long term stability; whether through stimulus packages or other methods.\n\nThe idea that there is no need to run at a deficit during a time of recession is absurd. In the light of the financial challenges currently faced by the US, but also in the longer term, it is vital that the government has the ability to run its expenses at a deficit to act as a stimulus.\n\nThe reality is that it is in the interests of everyone, not just Americans, for the US government to be able to spend relatively freely. Surpluses are nice but they are a luxury the world’s financial engine can rarely afford.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0a8a712471e238c568d2940fe3c8831f", "text": "economic policy finance tax house would prioritise eliminating budget deficit It is incredibly unlikely that China would ever call in its debts as any damage done to the dollar would be fairly insignificant compared to the impact on China’s own economy and currency.\n\nAmerica can afford to service its debts and doing so is a major stimulus to the global economy. Nobody has an interest in breaking the dollar, as doing so would cause a run on every bank in the world – including the Bank of China. China holds reserves roughly equivalent to M1 – cash in circulation in the US (although it’s worth nothing this represents about four percent of the actual dollars in the world) and so a massive release of dollar-denominated assets would hurt the dollar greatly. The results would see the price of oil, and most other commodities, skyrocket as they are priced in dollars and would bring the entire global financial system to a halt. China has no interest in either of these things happening.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "14d32ba990e574d2550236f56ebaa816", "text": "economic policy finance tax house would prioritise eliminating budget deficit A recession is not the point at whcih debts should be paid back. The state should focus on job creation strategies\n\nIt would be the height of irresponsibility for the US government to even think about giving anything a higher economic priority than the creation of jobs at a time when unemployment is running at 9.1%.\n\nIt is essential that the federal government uses its economic muscle to get Americans working again rather than settling fairly obscure points of economic theory.\n\nTaking money out of the system will cost jobs and hurt business, it will also lead to redundancies in the public sector. Ultimately it would be self-defeating. Admittedly, the Bush regime should have been running the economy at a surplus but it didn’t and that is the reality that the current government needs to deal with.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ec7c04880695fcabc85bc6aaaec92ee3", "text": "economic policy finance tax house would prioritise eliminating budget deficit Nobody is going to risk financial instability in the US by calling in the principle sum on the loans that it has taken out\n\nThere really is no problem with the Federal Government running at a deficit virtually permanently – as it has for most of its history. There is no threat of a default as this would require any lender to commit financial suicide as a result.\n\nThe deficit allows the most powerful economic actor on earth to act as a stimulus to those in smaller roles. Paying down the debt reduces money supply and, ultimately, contracts the economy. By relying on the savings of nations like China, through bonds and other instruments, the US is furthering its traditional role of being the primary engine of global economic growth. [i]\n\n[i] Rich Millar. “Democrats Rubin, Schwarz Clash on Spending Versus Deficit Cuts”. Bloomberg. 11 June 2007.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "928aa0d349b70f8070d1908244057261", "text": "economic policy finance tax house would prioritise eliminating budget deficit Paying off national debt via austerity measures would free-up money used for interest payments\n\nThe first of the baby boomers start retiring in 2011 and, as a result, qualify for Medicare. There are 78 million people in this generation and all of the statistics suggest that they are likely to live significantly longer than previous retiring generations [i] . As a result the US has some very big bills coming in the next few years and a decreasing base of those working and paying tax revenue to pay them.\n\nThis is really not the time to be wasting money on interest for deficits built up to support programmes that are unnecessary. Paying down the debt frees up tax revenue for much needed support, both financial and medical, for seniors as they retire.\n\n[i] Laurence J. Kotlikoff and Scott Burns. “The Coming Generational Storm.” MIT Press 2004.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c6c31a03b24879b2f646312d5e5f3505", "text": "economic policy finance tax house would prioritise eliminating budget deficit Many of the reasons for operating a debt have now been eliminated\n\nAt the end of the Clinton presidency the government was running at a healthy surplus following the longest sustained period of growth in US history. Bush Chose to spend that on tax cuts and two extremely expensive wars (the War in Iraq was the mostly costly war, in relative terms, in US history except for WWII). Obama was landed with the problems that Bush created, but has chosen to extend spending rather than control the deficit.As The country is no longer at war, there is no real reason to be running at a deficit.\n\nAlan Greenspan, and many others, have pointed out that the impact of continued deficits is likely to be higher interest rates – at a time when the country can ill afford them – which will hurt the economy. [i]\n\n[i] Mark Gongloff. “Greenspan Warns Against Deficits”. CNN. 26 February 2004.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "66fd3926debc47164f28a93f2cb71dd5", "text": "economic policy finance tax house would prioritise eliminating budget deficit Governments need to live within their means\n\nUltimately the US Government has to pay its bill just like everyone else. Ultimately maintaining a permanent deficit harms the economy creating both inflationary pressures and effecting interest rates.\n\nHowever, these pressures are not the main source of concern. Although deficits in times of plenty are a grave concern, during a recession most economist agree that deficits may be necessary. However, the US is no longer ‘mostly in debt to itself’ as has been the case in the past. [i]\n\nIncreasingly, its debt is owned by the major Asian economies; especially China. The implications should conflict arise between the two are severe as China, effectively has the capacity to bankrupt the US and the dollar at a time of its own choosing.\n\n[i] John W. Schoen. “Just who Owns the US National Debt?” MSNBC 3 April 2007\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
81942ab3c0d37a02e2bfe2f67776d6ca	A Greek default would increase stability for the rest of the Eurozone A Greek exit from the ‘Eurozone does not mean the end of the euro. It will, instead, mark a new beginning. Germany has a long and proud tradition of currency strength, but it could not cope with going back to the deutschmark because it would rocket in value and destroy the country's competitiveness. Some 97% of the Eurozone's population will continue to use the single currency and their leaders will circle the policy wagons to protect what is left.’ [`] A Greek default and departure from the Eurozone would decrease uncertainty and fear within the rest of the Eurozone. This, in turn is likely to attract higher levels of investment and transactions across Eurozone members. [1] Parsons, Nick: “Eurozone crisis: what if… Greece leaves the single currency”, 14 May 2012, The Guardian, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/may/14/greece-euro-single-currency-expert-view	[ { "docid": "6109fcf722c1a4a875061280b91fc669", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis finance international europe politics government Greece’s default will not decrease uncertainty. If anything, the perceived risk of investing in other Eurozone members suffering from their own debt problems like Italy, Spain, Portugal and Ireland would rocket sky-high. The Eurozone project as a whole may struggle on with Germany trying to keep it together, but claiming that a Greek exit from the Eurozone would restore stability is short-sighted. Many of Greece’s creditors are European banks and financial organisations. Greece’s default would, therefore, be a heavy blow for many of their creditor companies who would be unlikely to be willing to invest in other nations suffering similar problems to Greece.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "4570830ac05a7335efa967a3f949dc1c", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis finance international europe politics government The proposition vastly understates the negative impact a default has on the local economy. It is unrealistic to compare Greece with Argentina. As a member of the Eurozone, the developments within the Greek debt crisis have a huge impact on nations suffering from similar problems, as well as the Eurozone as a whole. Moreover, devaluing the Drachma would be nowhere near as beneficial as the proposition suggests. Greece is not rich in natural resources or industry and so boosting exports will not make a huge difference.\n\nYes, a default would resolve the uncertainty about whether Greece will default and exit the Euro. However this new predictability would not be good; it would simply show investors that they cannot invest in Greece because they will lose their money. Ratings agencies are unlikely to consider Greece a safe investment for a long time so there will not be international investment.[1]\n\n[1] Pappa, Eppi: “Q&A: What happens if Greece leaves the euro?”, 14 May 2012, Al Jazeera, http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/05/2012510154748106118.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e8bb328564750c93cdf4d96dfc3af80e", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis finance international europe politics government The proposition’s claims that the austerity measures have totally failed are unfounded. Although it is true that the total debt % GDP ratio has not gone down, this is not as serious as the prop make out. The budget deficit is the main problem that needs to come down because a consistently high budget deficit is what will make the situation spiral out of control and make Greece default on its debts. There is nothing per se problematic with having a large total debt (look at the USA’s total debt of $10 trillion, or Japan’s much higher debt to GDP ratio of 230% which unlike in Greece has not resulted in high interest rates,[1] for example). The fact that Greece’s budget deficit has gone down from 16% to 9% is an encouraging sign of improvement.\n\nIn addition, the proposition are not contentious in their claims about the negative effects of austerity. What they have failed to demonstrate, however, is why defaulting is the only solution to the suffering Greek people and the inability of the austerity measures to have their desired effect. The austerity measures have failed thus far because they have been targeted at the wrong areas of the economy and because the Greek Government has not been implementing them properly. Hitting the private sector with high taxation has done nothing to fix the faulty public sector which is the real cause of the debt crisis. The Greek Government remains hugely reluctant to carry out redundancies and wage cuts within the public sectors, as well as privitisations. [2] Greece, therefore, must be made to see that they must fulfill their promises and actually tackle the public sector, while alleviating taxation from the private sector.\n\n[1] Free Exchange, ‘Defying gravity’, 14 August 2012, The Economist, http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2012/08/fiscal-sustainability\n\n[2] Babbington, Deepa: “Greek PM sings in tune, now must hit the hard notes”, Septembe 5 2012, e-kathimerini, http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/_w_articles_wsite1_1_04/09/2012_459620\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f03c78a07b3dbd42d8a3e9b60ab515c6", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis finance international europe politics government It is not necessarily true that the whole banking sector in Greece would collapse. Given that the default would be orderly and take place within the context of the European Union, the ECB and European Commission would still provide substantial liquidity aid for Greek banks. Moreover it is not true that a devaluation of domestic currency necessarily leads to high inflation – this was not the case, for example, when Britain exited the European Exchange-rate Mechanism in 1992 and pursued a devaluation policy of the British Pound. [1] Lastly, evidence of recent governments that have defaulted suggests that even though some of the harms the opposition refer to may actualise, recovery generally follows fairly quickly, as was the case with Argentina, South Korea and Indonesia. [2]\n\n[1] Ruparel, Raoul and Persson, Mats: “Better off Out? The short-term options for Greece inside and outside of the euro”, June 2012, Open Europe, 2012 http://www.openeurope.org.uk/Content/Documents/Pdfs/Greece_better_off_out.pdf\n\n[2] Becker, Garry: “Should Greece Exit the Euro Zone?”, The Becker-Posner Blog, 20.5.2012, http://www.becker-posner-blog.com/2012/05/should-greece-exit-the-euro-zone-becker.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f7e90baea1f6b6822b4c015a020bc1a8", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis finance international europe politics government Even in the long-term, continued Eurozone membership for Greece is not sustainable. The size of their total debt % GDP ratio is such that even if Greece were to recover (eventually) with the current austerity measures, Greece would always be susceptible to yet another debt crisis in the event of a future global or European recession. Eurozone membership denies Greece fiscal and monetary policy freedom required to face economic shocks to prevent this from happening. We thus see that in the long-term growth is more sustainable for Greece without the Euro.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d62eea1c4cfd10e1ace6ddca908e4b4d", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis finance international europe politics government The situation in Ireland, Italy, Spain and Portugal is not as extreme as that faced by Greece. It is therefore highly unlikely that a Greek default would have as severe a domino effect as the opposition suggests. Greece is the main source of political and economic uncertainty in the Eurozone, and their departure would ease the situation, facilitate investors and allow for the Eurozone to rally strongly. [1]\n\n[1] Ruparel, Raoul and Persson, Mats: “Better off Out? The short-term options for Greece inside and outside of the euro”, June 2012, Open Europe, 2012 http://www.openeurope.org.uk/Content/Documents/Pdfs/Greece_better_off_out.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "69474e9e668602142d1be43b4f5e2ce1", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis finance international europe politics government In receiving financial support from the ECB and European Commission to prevent the escalation of a major banking collapse in Greece, the Greek Government would be expected to continue with reforms of the public sector. What’s more, defaulting would grant the Greek Government more time to implement such reforms, making them more likely to succeed and less painful on the Greek populous. The oppositions fears are, therefore, unfounded.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7fdac8451acb22fd5cd822430c4ca8da", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis finance international europe politics government Defaulting would be the quickest route to economic recovery\n\nUnder the status quo, the Greek economy is only headed in one direction: deeper recession. There are no signs of the situation changing any time soon. Were the Greek Government to default on its debts, after a period of recession, conditions would quickly be favourable for economic growth once more. This is what was observed when Argentina and other nations [1] recently defaulted and can be explained by many factors. Firstly, defaulting and exiting the Eurozone would allow Greece to conduct monetary policy more freely: they would be able to quickly devalue their currency in order to make Greek goods and services more competitive on the international market. This would increase exports and attract investment, as well as tourists looking for cheaper holidays – all of which would contribute towards the rebuilding of the Greek economy. [2] Moreover, were Greece to default, it would put an end to the huge degree of unpredictability and uncertainty about the Greek economy. At the moment, nobody knows if the banks are safe, if the government will default etc. The constant chopping and changing of current austerity measures such as increases in varieties of corporate tax and changes in regulations also contribute to the huge degree of uncertainty in the Greek economy. Uncertainty breeds risk and risk breeds fear: a recipe that drives away foreign investors and makes it difficult for local businesses to start up. Were Greece to default, however, such elements of uncertainty would be seriously diminished, and conditions would be ripe for investment from abroad and locally. Greek would be able to start afresh.\n\n[1] Pettifor, Ann: “Greece: The upside of default”, 23 May 2012, BBC News, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-18143078\n\n[2] Lapavitsas, Costas: “Eurozone crisis: what if… Greece leaves the single currency”, 14 May 2012, The Guardian, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/may/14/greece-euro-single-currency-expert-view\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "183d0e20534543f837cf1db1279d94e8", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis finance international europe politics government The current austerity measures are not working\n\nThe Austerity measures put in place by the ECB, IMF and European Commission have led to nothing but misery for the Greek people. They have failed to cut down the total debt % GDP ratio and have also failed to increase the competitiveness of the Greek economy. This is because raising taxes and slashing the minimum wage has sent the economy deeper and deeper into recession. Unemployment is at a record high of 21% and there is a severe shortage of credit leading to severe difficulties in companies financing their day to day projects. What’s more, the country itself is plunged into depression. Escalated (inevitably) by the local and international media, the climate is one of despair and investment is at the bottom of anyone’s priorities. This further perpetuates the cycles of recession and prevents any of the austerity measures having their desired effect. Additionally, the drastic fall in GDP every quarter means that cuts in government spending are also not having their desired effect on reducing the budget deficit % GDP ratio. Worst of all, the economic hardships have drawn many people to despair and the suicide rates in Greece have dramatically risen over the last year and access to healthcare has drastically declined. [1] In this manner, the government is failing in fulfilling its most basic duties of safeguarding the lives and wellbeing of its citizens. If the current measures are not working then a new approach is needed. A default would alleviate much of the suffering caused by austerity.\n\n[1] Armitsead, Louise: “Why Greece should default and exit the euro” 23 February 2012, The Telegraph, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financialcrisis/9101397/Why-Greece-should-default-and-exit-the-euro.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9e2a638a79f152327e83a4b9ed0dbea4", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis finance international europe politics government Defaulting would not solve Greece’s problems\n\nThe proposition argue that the hardship endured by the default would only be temporary, but an analysis at the particular situation facing Greece indicates the opposite. Greece’s problems arose from a horrifically inefficient public sector embedded within a mentality of corruption and tax evasion. Even if we assume that defaulting would eventually boost Greek exports and help the economy recover, this would not solve the underlying problems that caused the crisis in the first place. By leaving the Eurozone and defaulting, Greece would lose easy access to borrowing, meaning that taxpayers would soon have to face the reality that they would have to pay for the inefficiencies within the public sector and support all the other structures that need reform. [1] Greece must, therefore, address these underlying issues or face the exact same problems in the future. Given that solving these problems necessarily involve austerity measures and job cuts, it makes most sense for Greece to undergo these changes now (as it is with the current austerity measures), under the framework of IMF, ECB and European Commission funding and supervision.\n\n[1] Barrell, Ray: “Eurozone crisis: what if… Greece leaves the single currency”, 14 May 2012, The Guardian, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/may/14/greece-euro-single-currency-expert-view\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0b2938b7a3938a942fa286a372ff3662", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis finance international europe politics government Leaving the Eurozone would be detrimental for Greece in the long-run.\n\nEven if the proposition are correct in claiming defaulting and leaving the Eurozone would stimulate growth in the Greek economy, such benefits are transitory whereas the benefits of remaining in the Eurozone are permanent. [1] Having the Euro provides stability for the Greek economy – investors know that the currency will not collapse, making their invested capital worthless. The gravity of the outcomes of a Greek default cannot be known for sure, however some economists have even suggested that hyperinflation could occur – leading to disastrous consequences for Greece. [2] Moreover, in the long term, a single currency makes investment and transactions with other Eurozone members much more efficient and profitable. This is particularly important given that the vast majority of Greek trade is carried out with other European members. In light of these benefits, a short term cost that comes with the austerity measures enforced under the status quo, would be worthwhile in the long term.\n\n[1] Barrell, Ray: “Eurozone crisis: what if… Greece leaves the single currency”, 14 May 2012, The Guardian, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/may/14/greece-euro-single-currency-expert-view\n\n[2] Ruparel, Raoul and Persson, Mats: “Better off Out? The short-term options for Greece inside and outside of the euro”, June 2012, Open Europe, 2012 http://www.openeurope.org.uk/Content/Documents/Pdfs/Greece_better_off_out.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "72efc7e56e3c76f0ba9e6ad0bac6c91d", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis finance international europe politics government Defaulting would cause chaos in Greece\n\nThere is no good solution for the crisis Greece finds itself in, only less bad ones. Austerity measures imposed on Greece may currently be causing suffering, but austerity is the least bad option available for the Greek people: default would be considerably worse. Here is what would most likely happen:\n\nThe Greek banking sector would collapse [1]. A large portion of the Greek debt is owed to Greek banks and companies, many of which would quickly go bankrupt when the Government defaults. This is also because Greek banks are almost totally reliant on the ECB for liquidity. [2] People would consequently lose their savings, and credit would be close to impossible to find.\n\nThe Government would quickly devalue the Drachma by at least 50%. This will lead to imported goods being more expensive and consequently to a huge rise in inflation with the living costs increasing tremendously.[3]\n\nThese two events would lead to a severe shortage of credit, making it almost impossible for struggling companies to survive. Unemployment would soar as a result. It will become increasingly difficult to secure supplies of oil, medicine, foodstuffs and other goods. Naturally, those hit worst would be the poor. The Government, in this respect, would be failing on an enormous scale in providing many citizens with the basic needs. [4]\n\n[1] Brzeski, Carsten: “Viewpoints: What if Greece exits euro?”, BBC News, 13 July 2012, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-18057232\n\n[2] Ruparel, Raoul and Persson, Mats: “Better off Out? The short-term options for Greece inside and outside of the euro”, June 2012, Open Europe, 2012 http://www.openeurope.org.uk/Content/Documents/Pdfs/Greece_better_off_out.pdf\n\n[3] ibid\n\n[4] Arghyrou, Michael: “Viewpoints: What if Greece exits euro?”, BBC News, 13 July 2012, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-18057232\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c231c5378b2d48e44efd0957aa57b70a", "text": "economic policy eurozone crisis finance international europe politics government A Greek default would have a negative domino-effect on other Eurozone countries.\n\nA Greek default will leave tremendous shockwaves across the Eurozone. Investors will instantly become wary of default in Portugal, Spain, Italy or Ireland, particularly given the sudden nature of the Greek default. Consequently, huge volumes of capital will flow out of these countries and into other more secure ones like Germany and the Netherlands. [1] This will, in turn, heighten speculation about the danger of default of other Eurozone nations. Speculation of default is particularly dangerous because it drives demand for government bonds down. This leads to the interest payments on government bonds rising which in turn raises the interest rates governments need to pay on their outstanding debt. The new, higher payments governments must make on their debt increases their budget deficit % GDP ratio, thus making it more likely that the country will actually default. We thus see how increased fears about the future of Italy, Portugal, Spain and Ireland that will arise from a Greek default, will cause big problems and will put even more strain on the ECB and primarily Germany in providing financial support.\n\n[1] Kapoor, Sony, “Viewpoints: What if Greece exits euro?”, BBC News, 13 July 2012, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-18057232\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
c5fd1cfc4dfe0b6a692ea657d462d957	Nuclear power is very expensive For nuclear power plants any cost figures normally include spent fuel management, plant decommissioning and final waste disposal. These costs, while usually external for other technologies, are internal for nuclear power. Costs are high compared to coal fired generation precisely because the externalities associated with high carbon outputs are not taken into account, whereas similar externalities relating to nuclear generation are. If costs are calculated equivalently to coal power stations then nuclear power is competitive. Also the cost of construction and decommissioning of nuclear power plants is often overestimated; the French and Swedish nuclear industries estimate decommissioning costs to be just 10 -15 % of the construction costs and budget this into the price charged for electricity1. Nuclear is actually increasing its competitiveness as gas and oil prices rise, new technology makes nuclear power more efficient and construction and decommissioning costs less. An OECD study in 2005 showed nuclear overnight construction costs ranged from US$ 1000/kW in Czech Republic to $2500/kW in Japan, and averaged $1500/kW. Coal plants were costed at $1000-1500/kW, gas plants $500-1000/kW and wind capacity $1000-1500/kW2. The difference, when weighed against nuclear power's other advantages, is thus not that great. 1 'Cost of nuclear power', 2 'The Economics of Nuclear Power', World Nuclear Association, January 2009,	[ { "docid": "9a1827f04f1d1b95a22420a3ddcb26af", "text": "economy general environment climate energy pollution house would go nuclear For nuclear power plants any cost figures normally include spent fuel management, plant decommissioning and final waste disposal. These costs, while usually external for other technologies, are internal for nuclear power. Costs are high compared to coal fired generation precisely because the externalities associated with high carbon outputs are not taken into account, whereas similar externalities relating to nuclear generation are. If costs are calculated equivalently to coal power stations then nuclear power is competitive.\n\nAlso the cost of construction and decommissioning of nuclear power plants is often overestimated; the French and Swedish nuclear industries estimate decommissioning costs to be just 10 -15 % of the construction costs and budget this into the price charged for electricity1. Nuclear is actually increasing its competitiveness as gas and oil prices rise, new technology makes nuclear power more efficient and construction and decommissioning costs less. An OECD study in 2005 showed nuclear overnight construction costs ranged from US$ 1000/kW in Czech Republic to $2500/kW in Japan, and averaged $1500/kW. Coal plants were costed at $1000-1500/kW, gas plants $500-1000/kW and wind capacity $1000-1500/kW2. The difference, when weighed against nuclear power's other advantages, is thus not that great.\n\n1 'Cost of nuclear power', 2 'The Economics of Nuclear Power', World Nuclear Association, January 2009,\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "05b527ef46504d477bed3a0e4231d78c", "text": "economy general environment climate energy pollution house would go nuclear The nuclear industry has a shameful safety record and it is haunted by the constant risk of meltdown or explosion. \"No reactor in the world is inherently safe. All operational reactors have inherent safety flaws, which cannot be eliminated by safety upgrading. Highly radioactive spent fuel requires constant cooling. If this fails, it could lead to a catastrophic release of radioactivity. They are also highly vulnerable to deliberate acts of sabotage, including terrorist attack\"1. Chernobyl and Japan's Fukushima plant has shown the world what happens when cooling systems fail.\n\nThe effects on the local people and the environment are devastating. It cannot be a coincidence that the rate of occurrence of certain types of cancer, such as leukaemia, is much higher in the population around nuclear plants. It is perfectly true that modern nuclear reactors are safer but they are not completely safe. It is not worth the risk.\n\nThe dumping of nuclear waste also presents a host of problems. The Nuclear Inspectorate in the UK has been very critical of safety standards within the industry; it is too dominated by the profit motive to really care about safety and too shrouded in secrecy to be accountable. According to Agenda 2000: \"The problem of nuclear safety in some candidate countries causes serious concerns to the EU... and should be urgently and effectively addressed. It is imperative that solutions, including closure where required, be found to these issues in accordance with the Community nuclear acquis and a \"nuclear safety culture\" as established in the western world as soon as possible\"2.\n\n1\"End the nuclear age.\" Greenpeace. October 2008 2 European Nuclear Threats Old and New, Nuclear Monitor, November 2003, pp.3-5,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ff79f0dfb9e7717cd2106d9d633cc9de", "text": "economy general environment climate energy pollution house would go nuclear We hear a lot about the depletion of supplies of fossil fuels, however it is not mentioned that there is also a potential problem with the supply of uranium: \"There is currently a gap in the amount of uranium being mined and the amount of uranium being consumed,\" states Nuclear Energy Corporation of South Africa (Necsa) CEO Rob Adam1.\n\nThis would potentially be ok if it did not look like we are approaching a uranium peak. The peak in supplies of uranium seems likely to arrive sometime between 2030 and 2040 with uranium being almost totally gone by 2070 or 2120 at the latest. It is the peak that matters, as after this point supply will not be able to keep up with demand. If you take into account that nuclear energy produces 16% of world electricity, and less than 5% primary energy supply, it seems impossible to me for nuclear energy with current technology to ever satisfy a big part of the world's energy demand2. It means that nuclear power is not a sustainable base which we should be looking to be dependent on.\n\n1 Matthew Hill, 'Global uranium production will need to double by 2015 to catch up with demand', Mining Weekly, 25th June 2007, 2 Uranium resources and nuclear energy, Energy watch group, December 2006, p.5.,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "991eb4363037f3d0933d06c4665b24b8", "text": "economy general environment climate energy pollution house would go nuclear Encouraging the further adoption of nuclear power is against our security interests. The scientific understanding and technology needed to generate nuclear power is the same as that needed to create nuclear weapons, and it is all too easy for rogue states to pretend they are only interested in peaceful uses while secretly pursuing military applications. This is the route India and Israel have followed, and that Iran may well be following at present. The process of enriching uranium to make it into fuel for nuclear power stations can be a step towards further enriching it to make nuclear weapons. Used fuel from nuclear power stations can be separated out to recover any usable elements such as uranium and plutonium through a method called reprocessing. Plutonium is a by-product of the nuclear fuel cycle and can also be used to make nuclear weapons1.\n\nEven if the intentions of foreign governments are good, widespread nuclear power plants are at risk of terrorism, in both the developed and developing world. If a 9/11-style bomb was flown into a nuclear power plant, the potential disaster would be catastrophic. And the more nuclear material is transported around the world, the easier it will be for terrorists to get hold of some in order to make their own nuclear weapons. An atomic bomb might one day be within the reach of some international terrorist groups, but even today a simple \"dirty bomb\" (in which highly-radioactive materials is blasted over an urban area using conventional explosives) could be deadly to many thousands of people. Encouraging the spread of nuclear technology enables the spread of nuclear weapons.\n\n1 'Reactor-grade and Weapons-grade plutonium in nuclear explosives', US Department of Energy Publication, January 1997,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f72e4e7c9846c6463c7a16aedd7aeab6", "text": "economy general environment climate energy pollution house would go nuclear Nuclear power is no better placed to deliver the amount of energy required. There is an unrealistic focus on nuclear power as a magical solution to climate change. Despite increasing demand the amount of electricity being generated by nuclear is projected to fall not rise. The share of nuclear energy will decrease from 30% to 25% in electricity generation by 2020. According to current projections, the nuclear generation capacity in the EU would fall by as much as 33 GWe by 2020; this fall would mostly have to be met by dirty power plants using gas, or particularly coal [1] .\n\nThe focus on nuclear power diverts attention from other renewables. In reality going nuclear would squeeze out renewables. Indeed, the former Secretary of State for Business Patricia Hewitt said in a Commons debate on a 2003 Energy White Paper: 'It would have been foolish to announce …. that we would embark on a new generation of nuclear power stations because that would have guaranteed that we would not make the necessary investment and effort in both energy efficiency and in renewables' [2] .\n\n[1] Update of the nuclear illustrative programme in the context of the second strategic energy review, 13th November 2008, Brussels.\n\n[2] The case against nuclear power\". Greenpeace. January 8, 2008\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e1e9797ddb06a2f3c2e6b7637fcedb68", "text": "economy general environment climate energy pollution house would go nuclear There is almost always one renewable resource that a given country can exploit with sufficient investment; tides for islands, the sun for equatorial countries, hot rocks for volcanic regions. Any given country can in principle become self-sufficient in terms of renewable energy. The global distribution of uranium is hugely uneven (much more so than fossil fuels) and the use of nuclear power therefore gives countries with uranium deposits disproportionate economic power. Kazakhstan became the world's number one supplier of uranium in 2009, and other major producers such as Russia, Namibia, Niger and Uzbekistan may not be reliable1. It is far from inconceivable that uranium could be subject to the same kind of monopoly that the OPEC (Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries) places on oil.\n\n1 'Kazakhstan plans to become global leader in uranium production by 2009', Silk Road Intelligencer, 23rd July 2008,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8e6ec9171dff6b66e7f6562da4df3f74", "text": "economy general environment climate energy pollution house would go nuclear Nuclear power plants are not much of an improvement over conventional coal-burning power plants despite claims that nuclear is the 'clean air energy.' Uranium mining, milling, leeching, plant construction and decommissioning all produce substantial amounts of greenhouse gases. Taking into account the carbon-equivalent emissions associated with the entire nuclear life cycle, not just the nuclear fission itself, nuclear plants contribute significantly to climate change and will contribute even more as stockpiles of high grade uranium are depleted1.\n\nNuclear waste can remain radioactive for thousands of years. It must be stored for all this time away from water into which it can dissolve and far from any tectonic activity. This is virtually impossible and there are serious concerns over the state of waste discarded even a few decades ago. A report by the Environment Agency attacked Britain's disposal system as many containers used to store the waste are made of second-rate materials, are handled carelessly, and are liable to corrode; computer models suggest up to 40% of them could be at risk of being compromised within as little as 200 years2. Tens of thousands of containers of this waste, bound in concrete, are simply being stored above ground, mainly at Sellafield, while the Government and the nuclear industry decide what to do with them. On present plans it is assumed they will remain there for up to another 150 years before being placed in a repository underground, and then another 50 years before it is sealed3. This problem would only be added to if more nuclear power stations were built.\n\n1The case against nuclear power\". Greenpeace. January 8, 2008 2 Geoffrey Lean, 'Nuclear waste containers likely to fail, warns \"devastating\" report', The Independent, 24th Aug., 2008, 3 Geoffrey Lean, 'Nuclear waste containers likely to fail, warns \"devastating\" report', The Independent, 24th Aug., 2008,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4f71d57f6c924035d38d33daccd79914", "text": "economy general environment climate energy pollution house would go nuclear Nuclear power is itself inefficient: For every three units of energy produced by the reactor core of a U.S. nuclear power plants, two units are discharged to the environment as waste heat. Nuclear plants are built on the shores of lakes, rivers, and oceans because these bodies provide the large quantities of cooling water needed to handle the waste heat discharge1.\n\nIt is perfectly true that alternative energy is not efficient enough to serve the energy needs of the world's population today. However, with investment all these methods could be made efficient enough. Not enough has been done to make use of all the natural energy sources that do not create the kind of damage nuclear power generation causes. We need to develop more efficient ways to capture wind, water and solar power, to explore other options and to reduce the level of power required. This is not an argument for nuclear power but one for greater resources to be put to develop natural energy sources and help protect the planet for future generations.\n\n1Got Water? Nuclear Power Plant Cooling Water Needs.\" Union of Concerned Scientists\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8193ac8985f84af824cb7bca02c387f9", "text": "economy general environment climate energy pollution house would go nuclear Promoting continued nuclear research is against our security interests\n\nSpreading the peaceful use of nuclear power brings important security benefits. The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, whose signatories include every state in the world apart from India, Pakistan and Israel (plus North Korea and Iran whose membership fluctuates), is largely a provision for the sharing of nuclear power technology, which it promises to share among members who do not produce nuclear weapons (or, in the case of the 5 nuclear states, who commit to a gradual and continual reduction in weapons stockpiles). This has seen states including Brazil and Argentina abandon their nuclear weapons programmes, in order to gain access to nuclear power technology1. It is in our interest to promote peaceful use of nuclear technologies, encouraging scientists to find employment in an industry which is both peaceful and useful rather than selling their skills to the highest rogue bidder. The treaty also establishes and sets the remit of the International Atomic Energy Agency, which all members are bound to grant unlimited access to in order to facilitate inspection of nuclear facilities. This ensures that facilities cannot surreptitiously be used to facilitate the creation of nuclear weapons.\n\n1 'Nuclear weapons not appealing to all countries' by Renee Montagne, npr, 17th April 2006,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0c4978f8d9b7d21dabd91d3e60309f1d", "text": "economy general environment climate energy pollution house would go nuclear Nuclear power is potentially extremely unsafe\n\nIt is unfortunately the case that the nuclear industry has a bad reputation for safety. This is undeserved. The overwhelming majority of nuclear reactors have functioned safely and effectively for their entire lifetimes. The four historic nuclear disasters (1957 Windscale Fire, 1979 Three Mile Island and 1986 Chernobyl, 2011 Fukushima, Japan) killed fewer people than the oil and coal industries have1. \"The multi-agency U.N. Chernobyl Forum reported last year that 56 deaths could be directly attributed to the accident, most of those from radiation or burns suffered while fighting the fire. Tragic as those deaths were, they pale in comparison to the more than 5,000 coal-mining deaths that occur worldwide every year\"2.\n\nFurther, the two major nuclear accidents, at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl, were both in old style reactors, made worse in the latter case by poor Soviet safety standards. The Chernobyl disaster took place at a time when our understanding of nuclear issues was much lesser than it is now, and was the result of poorly trained staff in the plant's control room. Power stations today are better staffed, better maintained and better understood, and because the effects of an attack upon them are acknowledged, they are better defended and monitored by the armed services. No system can be 100% safe, but solid design principles can minimize risk.\n\nPerhaps the best guarantee of safety standards in the nuclear industry is the increasing transparency with which the industry is presenting itself. Many of the problems in its early days were caused by excessive control due to the origin of nuclear energy from military applications. As the gap between the two separates so the nuclear industry becomes more accountable. The question is, is the slight risk of a nuclear accident a worse danger than the inevitable climate catastrophe that awaits us?\n\n1 'Risks of Nuclear Power' by Bernard Cohen, University of Pittsburgh, 2Patrick Moore, a prominent environmentalist and founding member of Greenpeace, \"Going Nuclear A Green Makes the Case\", Washington Post, 4/16/06\"\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1349dc54d243d17119bd26f7788573ec", "text": "economy general environment climate energy pollution house would go nuclear The supply of uranium needed for nuclear power is not actually unlimited, renewable or sustainable\n\nThe projected lifespan of uranium must be compared to that of oil, gas and coal which are irrefutably running out. Uranium supply is expected to last for over 200 years, which could be extended to 30,000 with modern technologies. There has not been sufficient research undertaken to explore new potential sites, new forms or ways of prolonging the life of that which we already have access to. For example, it has been claimed recently that there are potential alternatives to uranium which could be used in the nuclear process: \"There is also almost always thorium, a lightly radioactive metal, in the same ores, and it has to be disposed of.\" This disposal would create the same amount of energy as nuclear fission. The USA and Australia have potentially very big mines for rare earths and they are going to be producing Thorium as a waste product anyway, what better way to dispose of it than by creating energy?1\n\n1Tim Worstall, You Don't Bring a Praseodymium Knife to a Gunfight, Foreign Policy, 29/9/10, See also: http://www.economist.com/node/15865280?story_id=15865280\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "33daba88ba8813d60ee408fb20a655a2", "text": "economy general environment climate energy pollution house would go nuclear Energy demands are increasing exponentially and nuclear power is the only renewable source capable of matching it\n\nAlthough EU countries are using energy more efficiently, demand for energy continues to rise, especially in the new eastern European member states. The demand for electricity is expected to rise by 8-9% by 2020 meaning a much more urgent need for generating capacity [1] . At the same time world energy consumption is projected to expand by 50% from 2005 to 2030 leading to high oil and gas prices [2] . The production of renewable energy is not growing at a fast enough pace to replace fossil fuels; wind, wave and solar simply cannot provide the quantities of energy required. It is possible – indeed, desirable - to combine nuclear power with other renewables, but nuclear energy is a crucial part of that mix as the only option capable of producing the quantity of energy required. Nuclear power is actually more efficient than any other power source: a gram of uranium 235 contains as much energy as four tons of coal [3] .\n\n[1] Update of the nuclear illustrative programme in the context of the second strategic energy review, 13th November 2008, Brussels.\n\n[2] International Energy Outlook 2008, Energy Information Administration, June 2008, Chapter 1.\n\n[3] Max Schulz. \"Nuclear Power Is the Future\". Wilson Quarterly. Fall, 2006\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2a3a3638ff787be1a2f07222bb7a6678", "text": "economy general environment climate energy pollution house would go nuclear Nuclear power is clean and emits significantly less CO2 than other renewable energy sources\n\nIn many senses nuclear energy is the cleanest of renewables. It does not produce emissions such as CO2 and greenhouse gases, which are harmful to the population and the environment. Roughly 700 million metric tons of CO2 emissions are avoided each year in the United States by generating electricity from nuclear power rather than some other source; according to the U.S. Department of Energy, that is nearly equivalent to the CO2 released from all U.S. passenger cars [1] .\n\nIt is true that it does produce radioactive waste but since this is in solid form it can be dealt with relatively easily and stored away from centres of population. Furthermore, as new technology becomes available to allow the more efficient use of nuclear fuel, less nuclear waste will be produced. (A recent example is the development of the fast breeder reactor, which uses fuel much more efficiently [2] )\n\n[1] Max Schulz. \"Nuclear Power Is the Future\". Wilson Quarterly. September, 2006\n\n[2] ‘Breeder reactor’, Wikipedia.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "606c491adb6369cc2514f0cf82d35f6d", "text": "economy general environment climate energy pollution house would go nuclear Alternative renewables are inefficient for the cost\n\nNuclear power is the most practical renewable energy source as all the others face major difficulties either in scaling up to provide enough to be a major component of nations energy mix, don't provide energy all the time, the 'base load', or cause other environmental problems. Nuclear is a proven technology with large firms that can build large amounts of nuclear energy generation capacity.\n\nThe most efficient source of renewable energy has been hydroelectric power, however, this usually creates more problems than it solves. Building a large dam necessarily floods an enormous region behind the dam which in turn can displace thousands of people. There are also enormous ecological costs to dam building. A classical example is the Aswan dam in Egypt along the Nile. Not only did many thousands lose their homes but the yearly inundation of the Nile, which fertilised the surrounding land for thousands of year, was also stopped; the subsequent silting up of the river destroyed much wildlife1. A similar story of ecological destruction and human homelessness surrounded the more recent Three Gorges dam project in China2.\n\nWind, tidal, and solar power are all affected by issues of reliability. The tendency of wind power, in particular, to be a volatile source of energy, means that other power sources such as fossil fuel power stations have to make up the shortfall when wind levels drop. Tidal power technology is still in at an early stage and may take years to become profitable. It also has the potential to cause environmental problems in the marine environment. For a large area of the European Union, there is not the potential to exploit solar power as there are not enough hours of sunlight.\n\n\"Wind and solar power have their place, but because they are intermittent and unpredictable they simply can't replace big baseload plants such as coal, nuclear and hydroelectric. Natural gas, a fossil fuel, is too expensive already, and its price is too volatile to risk building big baseload plants. Given that hydroelectric resources are built pretty much to capacity, nuclear is, by elimination, the only viable substitute for coal. It's that simple.\"3\n\n1 'Environmental Impact of the Aswan High Dam', 2 'Three Gorges Dam is a disaster in the making, China admits' by Jane Macartney, Times Online 27th September 2007, 3\"Going Nuclear A Green Makes the Case\", by Patrick Moore, Washington Post. April 16th, 2006:\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4239074d8791ad9116f1d3b3195e3962", "text": "economy general environment climate energy pollution house would go nuclear Nuclear power gives countries energy security and self-sufficiency\n\nIn addition, the use of nuclear power reduces our foreign energy dependency. The European Union is a net importer for energy, and as such is reliant on Russia and Norway, predominantly, for oil and gas supplies. Events such as the dispute between Russia and the Ukraine over gas supplies demonstrated that the EU's energy can easily be disrupted by political situations outside its control1. It also means that the EU could be drawn into disputes between Russia and neighbouring countries because it has a vested interest in the region. This could set a dangerous precedent, where the EU could be intimidated by Russia, because the EU relies so heavily on Russian gas. Building more nuclear power stations would ensure a more secure supply of energy, thereby avoiding the potential for energy supply to become a politically charged issue on an international scale.\n\n1 'Russia-Ukraine gas dispute', Wikipedia\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
a44ed2364002315da78e9657bd3a86e9	Excessive regulation on the private sector puts burdens on free enterprise both in terms of administration and cost. By doing so it reduces consumer choice and acts as a drag on innovation and growth Government regulation assumes not only irresponsible companies but also stupid consumers. Although, realistically, very little regulation has any direct impact on the consumer but tends to involve time-consuming paperwork demonstrating compliance so that some civil servant can tick a box to prove that something that was already being done can be shown to have been be done. The effect of this tends to fall hardest on smaller businesses that don’t have large financial or legal departments. As a result it not only takes up valuable time that could be spent developing the business itself but more importantly acts to discourage people from starting in the first place. This is particularly so when it’s considered that many people who start up a new company do so after many years of working for someone else within the same sector. As a result they see the pressure that needless and time-consuming regulation puts upon that company.	[ { "docid": "dc57eeed9f4569ee4ae9fe2e8d29a53e", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house This again is a myth routinely put forward by the right. Governments already distinguish between regulations that should apply to all companies and those, more onerous ones, that apply to larger companies only. There are certain standards in terms of health and safety of foodstuffs, products and so forth. However, there is clearly a different role when it comes to regulating larger companies such as banks, insurance companies and major employers.\n\nThere are particular sectors that require more regulation than others but the bulk of regulation is there to protect both staff and customers and it is part of the reality of doing business.\n\nThe idea that regulation harms small business is simply absurd as they benefit from the regulation of larger businesses who may be either their suppliers or customers are also regulated.\n\nEqually start-up companies benefit from the fact that regulation evens up the playing field with more established competitors. If nobody is allowed to cut corners or perform other mildly criminal acts it is clearly an advantage to the new starters.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "ecb2cebedf48b102ed147ef348aba592", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house Were the theory put forward true, and that is debatable, it would require tax cuts to benefit the lowest paid individuals and the smallest companies. However the political reality is that it never does. Poor people and small companies do indeed spend money which has a stimulating effect on the economy, but spending only stimulates the economy if it is spent in the right way. It is not possible to guarantee that the funds that flow into a state’s economy as a result of tax cuts will benefit that economy exclusively. Most forms of good and commodity now exist within a global market; manufacturing and production have become concentrated within states such as China. Useful and productive business activity will always require that a proportion of a business’s funds be spent overseas.\n\nThe advantage of government funding is that it can be directed into the weakest areas of the domestic economy, with a degree of dynamism and control that the markets will never be able to achieve. However, recent history has suggested that tax cuts have tended to be directed to the wealthy and to large corporations who are under no obligation to spend or invest either domestically or immediately.\n\nThere is little benefit to any economy in allowing wealthy individual and organizations to further expand stagnant wealth or to invest in high end products bought internationally.\n\nThere is also a matter of scale, government has a capacity for borrowing against its own security of wealth that is simply not matched by any private individual or corporation. Equally government is uniquely placed to undertake infrastructural investment such as house building projects which directly supports sectors that are otherwise the hardest hit during times or economic downturn.\n\nEven where tax cuts are directed or fall evenly across all income ranges there is still no control over the areas of probable expenditure and are also unlikely to stimulate sectors such as construction.\n\nMost importantly tax cuts have no direct benefit for the unemployed which, of course, the creation of jobs by government itself does.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "41ea26d772ff16d5cfe636f49634bcb5", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house The myth of the greater efficiency in the private sector is one of the enduring fallacies of the politics of the right. Even the slightest glance at those areas where governments routinely outsource capital projects- defense procurement, major infrastructural projects and IT projects- there is astonishing inefficiency and it seems questionable as to how the public sector could be any less efficient.\n\nIt is an innate aspect of private companies that they need to make a profit, which is by nature an inefficiency, in that it takes resources out of any system. It is a strange thing that those who most passionately support the efficiency and effectiveness of the private sector become meek when it comes to the most important elements of public life- defense of the nation, policing the streets, educating the young. Equally when the astonishing levels of inefficiency and, frequently, incompetence that exist within the private sector come to light in the collapse of companies, be those banks or auto-giants, apparently it becomes fine for state to intervene to pick up the pieces and put things back together again.\n\nIt is equally wrong to suggest that the lack of culpability of senior managers has an impact on efficiency: the ultimate senior manager of a public service is a minister- either elected or appointed by someone who is- and is therefore accountable at the ballot box for the services provided. By contrast senior managers, in the shape of boards of directors, in the private sector seem relaxed about paying themselves huge salaries and bonuses even when their companies are running huge losses and shedding jobs: this scarcely suggests a high level of personal responsibility for success or failure.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2458ca17601d12b8875916fa90075c84", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house There is the world of difference between establishing basic rights and interfering in matters that are best agreed at a community or state level. That is the reason why the states collectively agree to constitutional amendments that can be considered to affect all citizens.\n\nHowever, different communities regulate themselves in different ways depending on both practical needs and the principles they consider to be important. Having the opinions of city-dwellers, who have never got closer to rural life than a nineteenth landscape in a gallery instruct farming communities that they cannot work the land to save a rare frog is absurd.\n\nTrying to establish policies such as a minimum wage or the details of environmental protection at a federal level simply makes no sense, as the implications of these things vary wildly between different areas of the country.\n\nEqually local attitudes towards issues such as religion, marriage, sexuality, pornography and other issues of personal conscience differ between communities and the federal government has no more business banning prayer in Tennessee than it would have mandating it in New York. These are matters for the states and sometimes for individual communities.\n\nThe nation was founded on the principle that individual states should agree, where possible, on matters of great import but are otherwise free to go their separate ways.\n\nIn addition to which, pretending that the hands of politicians and bureaucrats are free of blood in any of these matters is simply untrue – more than untrue, it is absurd.\n\nIf the markets are driven by profit- a gross generalisation - then politics is driven by the hunger for power and the campaign funds that deliver it. Business at least has the good grace to earn, and risk, its own money whereas government feels free to use other peoples for whatever is likely to buy the most votes. Likewise business makes its money by providing products and services that people need or want. Government, by contrast, uses other people’s money to enforce decisions regardless of whether they are wanted or needed by anyone.\n\nUltimately it is the initiative and industry of working Americans that has provided the funds for the great wars against oppression as well as the ingenuity to solve environmental and other technical solutions to the problems faced by humankind.\n\nPharmaceutical companies produce medicines – not the DHHS; engineering companies produce clean energy solutions – not the EPA; farmers put food on families’ tables – not the Department of Agriculture.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a40c06040056321b143b73ad75f18cd3", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house The primary difficulty with governments retaining surpluses is that the government has no proprietary right to the funds in its coffers. The taxpayer effectively subsidizes the government, on the understanding that it will undertake functions necessary for the defence, continued operation and normative improvement of the state and society.\n\nClearly defense has to be one of the core functions of government and there are a few others, such as maintaining law and order. For government to say that the only way of securing its own finances is running a small surplus in its current account budget is palpably not true when there is astonishing waste in government expenditure, which is in turn already bloated and intervenes into areas of public life where it simply does not belong.\n\nIn terms of using government expenditure as a tool to respond to recessions, there may well be a role in terms of how government uses its own purchasing power and it makes sense that should be used for domestic purchasing wherever possible, however there is little to be gained by government creating imaginary jobs undertaking roles that simply don’t produce anything.\n\nInstead the most useful role that government can play during a recession is not expanding its own size and, therefore, the final cost to the taxpayer, but reducing it. Cutting the size of government reduces the tax burden on business and individuals and cuts back on regulatory pressure. Both actions free up money for expenditure which creates real jobs in the real economy, producing real wealth, in turn spent on real products, which in turn create jobs. This beneficial cycle is the basis of economics, creating imaginary jobs simply takes skills out of the real economy and reduces the pressure on individuals to take jobs that they might not see as ideal.\n\nThe most sensible response to a government surplus is not to hoard it on the basis that it might come in useful at some undefined point in the future but to give it back to the people who earned it in the first place. Doing so means that it is spent in the real economy, creating real wealth and real jobs and thereby avoiding the prospect of recession in the first place.\n\nUltimately it comes down to a simple divide as to whether you believe governments or people are better at spending money. The evidence of waste and incompetence in government expenditure is compelling and it seems an absurd solution to governments mismanaging the money they already have to give them more.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7c9c73793c2e36d85a2b022deacfcc58", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house No country can pay its bills or increase the prosperity of its citizens if it is wasting money on unnecessary programmes. The principle problem with government funding is that it is not addressing any of the problems that Proposition raises. In many countries, The ideology of state intervention is has made government ever larger, building ever more excessive and bloated bureaucratic empires with fiefdoms and sinecures for every busybody and apparatchik more interested in monitoring change than making it, and more concerned with process than people.\n\nIt is not uncommon – indeed it is not even unusual - for private sector organisations to shed ten percent of their workforce when the judge themselves to have become uncompetitive, unprofitable or administratively unwieldy. Both the governments of France and Canada have done that in recent years and yet maintain high standards of government support [i] .\n\nFor average public sector wages to be out stripping those of the private sector (who ultimately pay them) is ridiculous. It becomes more worrying when preferential health and pension plans – where the public sector outstrips the private by nearly four to one are taken into account [ii] .\n\nThere is no question that it would be great if everybody could earn more, have more lucrative and more secure pensions, the world would be a nicer place. However, to penalise those who are making the money to subsidise those who aren’t simply makes no sense.\n\nTypically a government’s solution to an issue like child poverty is to establish a commission to discuss it – when it reports several years later it informs the waiting nation who paid for it that the solution might well be if their parents had a job. Most people could have figured this out in two minutes and at no cost [iii] .\n\n[i] \"Big government: Stop!\" The Economist. January 21st, 2010\n\n[ii] Dan Arnall. ABC News. Working in America: Public vs. Private Sector. 18 February 2011.\n\n[iii] Michael Cloud. “Why Not Big Government. Five Iron Laws.” The Centre for Small Government.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "47a724e82b883db2d3e2595c7d0d5d67", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house Reducing the size of government and, therefore, the amount it takes in tax frees up money which consumers can spend on goods or for companies to expand: Both create jobs\n\nGovernment costs money. That’s an indisputable fact. So that raises the question of whether that’s the best way of spending it. It is clear that money could be spent in other ways and so if this is the choice there is an opportunity cost in that decision as there is in any other.\n\nThere is compelling evidence that reducing the government’s take of total GDP stimulates the economy through freeing up funds to create jobs especially in manufacturing.\n\nThere is compelling evidence [i] that reducing the tax burden and unleashing the dynamism of the market by cutting regulation has a far greater effect than government massaging unemployment figures by expanding its own employment base. Indeed it also appears to be the case that the relatively high level of government salaries in fact just puts greater pressure on employers in the private sector to compete the resulting wage inflation has a dampening effect on the economy as a whole at a time when it can least afford it.\n\nIt’s further worth noting that jobs created during a recession tend to morph into permanent positions thereby building in an ever-continuing expansion in the size of the state unless it is periodically and deliberately culled.\n\nConversely the investment directly into the private sector creates wealth producing jobs that are paid at a level that is sustainable and is responsive to the health of the wider economy.\n\n[i] Alesina, Ardagna, Perotti, Schiantarelli. “Fiscal Policy, Profits and Investments”. National Bureau of Economic Research. 1999\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8c7e8eff39d1f8d4de9e61330b75d846", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house Government has a tendency to be inefficient as it has no need to compete in an open marketplace, and jobs in state institutions are safe because of the guarantees both of the tax base and government’s greater borrowing capacity.\n\nGovernments both as a whole and in terms of individual employees have a tendency towards astonishing inefficiency, because state institutions are not subject to any meaningful competitive pressures. Indeed, many government employees earn as much or more than those in comparable jobs in the private sector, have preferential pension and benefit plans, lower hours and longer vacations. It is of course unsurprising that anyone in possession of such a job would be reluctant to give it up but also suggests a lower level of competition for keeping it. In the private sector such preferential returns would suggest that a worker would be likely to work longer hours to keep them.\n\nEqually, because senior managers are not spending their own money and rarely have their salaries indexed to efficiency and effectiveness- in a way that is automatic for most companies- there is little pressure to find cost and operational efficiencies. As a result it is usually cheaper and more effective for services to be provided by the private sector wherever possible and appropriate. Although there are some areas which must be managed by the public sector, such as elections and the criminal justice system, it is difficult to see the benefits in other areas.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b6d3ff8bcf1295eae9539b58932c72ba", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house Government was required to drive through major changes such as drives for equality within society, universal education, and preservation of the environment. Mostly in the teeth of big business\n\nNobody would deny the role that remarkable individuals have played in the major social changes of history. They have, however, ultimately required the actions of government. Many of these have been achieved despite, rather than because of, the interests of business. Critically they have tended to be to the benefit of the weak, the vulnerable and the neglected.\n\nGovernments have been responsible for social reforms ranging from the abolition of slavery and child labor to the removal of conditions in factories and on farms that lead to injury and death, in addition to minimum wage regulations that meant that families could feed themselves. By contrast, the market was quite happy with cheap cotton sown by nimble young fingers.\n\nIn turn profit was given preference over any notion of job security or the right to a family life, the market was quite happy to see water poisoned and the air polluted – and in many cases is still happy with it. The logic of the market panders to slave-labor wages to migrant workers or exporting jobs where migrants are not available. Either way it costs the jobs of American citizens, pandering to racism and impoverishing workers at home and abroad. Although the prophets of the market suggest that the only thing standing between the average American and a suburban home - with a pool, 4x4 and an overflowing college-fund is the government, the reality could not be further from the truth.\n\nThe simple reality of the market is this: the profit motive that drives the system is the difference between the price of labor, plant and materials on one hand and the price that can be charged on the other. It makes sense to find the workers who demand the lowest wages, suppliers who can provide the cheapest materials and communities desperate enough to sell their air, water and family time. Whether those are at home or abroad. The market, by its nature has no compassion, no patriotism and no loyalty.\n\nThe only organization that can act as a restraint on that is, in the final reckoning, government which has legislative power to ensure that standards are maintained. It is easy to point to individual acts that have been beneficial but the reality is that the untrammeled market without government oversight has had a depressing tendency to chase the easiest buck, ditch the weakest, exploit where it can, pollute at will, corrupt where necessary and bend, break or ignore the rules.\n\nIt requires government as the agent of what the people consider acceptable to constrain the profit motive.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "042d27b3b4229e5d71024a13b6c79c0f", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house Big government can provide the stimulus the economy needs in the bad years as long as surpluses are not squandered during the boom years\n\nGovernment expenditure is the single biggest tool in times of economic difficulty. Those that are the quickest to complain about taxation and regulation during the good times are also the fastest to rush for a bailout during the lean times. Likewise, those that call for tax cuts in a boom also tend to be the first to criticize a deficit or public expenditure during a recession.\n\nThere is in all of this one simple economic reality: the government acts as the banker of last resort.\n\nThis only works, as Keynes understood, if the government holds on to reserves in the good years so that it can spend them in the tough ones to stimulate jobs and growth. On the other hand, where surpluses are blown on tax cuts- or expensive wars for that matter- then will be nothing left in the bank and government cannot fulfill its most useful role of using its own financial clout to balance the economy over the course of a financial cycle.\n\nSo-called small government Conservatives have been consistently profligate in recent history and have tended to leave fiscally cautious liberals to pick up the pieces. The party of small government never seems to find itself short of billions of dollars for expensive white elephants like the SDI missile shield or asserting American military power overseas in pursuit of yet another doomed cause – whether that’s’ propping up Latin American dictators or settling familial grudge matches in the Middle East.\n\nThe military adventurism of the Reagan presidency as well as those of both Bush senior and junior were conducted not just at the cost of domestic social stability, but also fiscal security.\n\nInstead of preserving a budget surplus from the Clinton presidency, the Bush administration spent it recklessly – not, as is widely declared, on the War Against Terror – on tax cuts for the wealthiest in society. As a result Bush, his cabinet and his backers robbed the country of the possibility of reserves when the economy was in a less positive situation.\n\nAs far as the War On Terror is concerned, the total cost of two international wars, $1.283tn, stands in stark contrast to the relatively cheap police-style operation that actually caught Osama Bin Laden. It is also worth noting that of that huge sum an entire 2%, according to the Congressional Research service, has been spent homeland security – anti-terror surveillance and enforcement within the USA’s borders [i] .\n\nSo called ‘Big Government’, withholding surpluses for a rainy day, provides financial security for American businesses and workers. So-called ‘small-government’ presidents spend trillions of dollars on free money to the super-rich and on military adventurism in other countries and, apparently, in space.\n\n[i] Amy Belasco. “The Cost of Iraq, Afghanistan, and Other Global War on Terror Operations Since 9/11”. Congressional Research Service. March 29 2011.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "dd42dc1355db935cf3c3a46de330b31e", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house Ultimately government has a responsible to provide a level playing field to ensure that everybody gets a far start in life and can at least survive throughout it\n\nGovernment, especially in a developed nation and even more so in the wealthiest nation in the world, should be able to ensure that children are not hungry, the mentally ill are not living on the streets, borders are policed, veterans don’t live in squalor, the population can read, crime is controlled, the elderly don’t freeze to death and a million other markers of a civilized society.\n\nThis is particularly true of children but most people need a helping hand at one time or another in life. However, the obscenity of children destined to fail before their lives have even started- condemned to schools that offer no hope and communities that offer no safety- would be disturbing anywhere in the world.\n\nIn a nation that prides itself as having the highest standard of living on the planet- and is unquestionably the richest and most powerful- levels of poverty and despair that are seen nowhere else in the developed world are simply obscene. By every measure, infant mortality, life expectancy, educational standards, child poverty, percentage of incarcerated adults, homicides per thousand deaths and many more, America lags considerably behind Japan, Canada, Western Europe, Australia and the rest of the developed world [i] .\n\nAll of the indicators mentioned above have been adversely affect during the thirty year obsession with pushing the government back in the name of handing unfettered control over to big business and the vicissitudes of the market.\n\nAmericans pay lower taxes than Western Europe and get, as a result, a much worse return on their money [ii] .\n\n[i] Newsweeks Interactive Graphic of the World’s Best Countries. Hosted on the Daily Beast and elsewhere.\n\n[ii] Jeffrey Sachs. \"The Case for Bigger Government.\" Time. January 8th, 2009\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
3f44e2e61848b90fa15c215509414a12	Reducing the size of government and, therefore, the amount it takes in tax frees up money which consumers can spend on goods or for companies to expand: Both create jobs Government costs money. That’s an indisputable fact. So that raises the question of whether that’s the best way of spending it. It is clear that money could be spent in other ways and so if this is the choice there is an opportunity cost in that decision as there is in any other. There is compelling evidence that reducing the government’s take of total GDP stimulates the economy through freeing up funds to create jobs especially in manufacturing. There is compelling evidence [i] that reducing the tax burden and unleashing the dynamism of the market by cutting regulation has a far greater effect than government massaging unemployment figures by expanding its own employment base. Indeed it also appears to be the case that the relatively high level of government salaries in fact just puts greater pressure on employers in the private sector to compete the resulting wage inflation has a dampening effect on the economy as a whole at a time when it can least afford it. It’s further worth noting that jobs created during a recession tend to morph into permanent positions thereby building in an ever-continuing expansion in the size of the state unless it is periodically and deliberately culled. Conversely the investment directly into the private sector creates wealth producing jobs that are paid at a level that is sustainable and is responsive to the health of the wider economy. [i] Alesina, Ardagna, Perotti, Schiantarelli. “Fiscal Policy, Profits and Investments”. National Bureau of Economic Research. 1999	[ { "docid": "ecb2cebedf48b102ed147ef348aba592", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house Were the theory put forward true, and that is debatable, it would require tax cuts to benefit the lowest paid individuals and the smallest companies. However the political reality is that it never does. Poor people and small companies do indeed spend money which has a stimulating effect on the economy, but spending only stimulates the economy if it is spent in the right way. It is not possible to guarantee that the funds that flow into a state’s economy as a result of tax cuts will benefit that economy exclusively. Most forms of good and commodity now exist within a global market; manufacturing and production have become concentrated within states such as China. Useful and productive business activity will always require that a proportion of a business’s funds be spent overseas.\n\nThe advantage of government funding is that it can be directed into the weakest areas of the domestic economy, with a degree of dynamism and control that the markets will never be able to achieve. However, recent history has suggested that tax cuts have tended to be directed to the wealthy and to large corporations who are under no obligation to spend or invest either domestically or immediately.\n\nThere is little benefit to any economy in allowing wealthy individual and organizations to further expand stagnant wealth or to invest in high end products bought internationally.\n\nThere is also a matter of scale, government has a capacity for borrowing against its own security of wealth that is simply not matched by any private individual or corporation. Equally government is uniquely placed to undertake infrastructural investment such as house building projects which directly supports sectors that are otherwise the hardest hit during times or economic downturn.\n\nEven where tax cuts are directed or fall evenly across all income ranges there is still no control over the areas of probable expenditure and are also unlikely to stimulate sectors such as construction.\n\nMost importantly tax cuts have no direct benefit for the unemployed which, of course, the creation of jobs by government itself does.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "41ea26d772ff16d5cfe636f49634bcb5", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house The myth of the greater efficiency in the private sector is one of the enduring fallacies of the politics of the right. Even the slightest glance at those areas where governments routinely outsource capital projects- defense procurement, major infrastructural projects and IT projects- there is astonishing inefficiency and it seems questionable as to how the public sector could be any less efficient.\n\nIt is an innate aspect of private companies that they need to make a profit, which is by nature an inefficiency, in that it takes resources out of any system. It is a strange thing that those who most passionately support the efficiency and effectiveness of the private sector become meek when it comes to the most important elements of public life- defense of the nation, policing the streets, educating the young. Equally when the astonishing levels of inefficiency and, frequently, incompetence that exist within the private sector come to light in the collapse of companies, be those banks or auto-giants, apparently it becomes fine for state to intervene to pick up the pieces and put things back together again.\n\nIt is equally wrong to suggest that the lack of culpability of senior managers has an impact on efficiency: the ultimate senior manager of a public service is a minister- either elected or appointed by someone who is- and is therefore accountable at the ballot box for the services provided. By contrast senior managers, in the shape of boards of directors, in the private sector seem relaxed about paying themselves huge salaries and bonuses even when their companies are running huge losses and shedding jobs: this scarcely suggests a high level of personal responsibility for success or failure.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "dc57eeed9f4569ee4ae9fe2e8d29a53e", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house This again is a myth routinely put forward by the right. Governments already distinguish between regulations that should apply to all companies and those, more onerous ones, that apply to larger companies only. There are certain standards in terms of health and safety of foodstuffs, products and so forth. However, there is clearly a different role when it comes to regulating larger companies such as banks, insurance companies and major employers.\n\nThere are particular sectors that require more regulation than others but the bulk of regulation is there to protect both staff and customers and it is part of the reality of doing business.\n\nThe idea that regulation harms small business is simply absurd as they benefit from the regulation of larger businesses who may be either their suppliers or customers are also regulated.\n\nEqually start-up companies benefit from the fact that regulation evens up the playing field with more established competitors. If nobody is allowed to cut corners or perform other mildly criminal acts it is clearly an advantage to the new starters.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2458ca17601d12b8875916fa90075c84", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house There is the world of difference between establishing basic rights and interfering in matters that are best agreed at a community or state level. That is the reason why the states collectively agree to constitutional amendments that can be considered to affect all citizens.\n\nHowever, different communities regulate themselves in different ways depending on both practical needs and the principles they consider to be important. Having the opinions of city-dwellers, who have never got closer to rural life than a nineteenth landscape in a gallery instruct farming communities that they cannot work the land to save a rare frog is absurd.\n\nTrying to establish policies such as a minimum wage or the details of environmental protection at a federal level simply makes no sense, as the implications of these things vary wildly between different areas of the country.\n\nEqually local attitudes towards issues such as religion, marriage, sexuality, pornography and other issues of personal conscience differ between communities and the federal government has no more business banning prayer in Tennessee than it would have mandating it in New York. These are matters for the states and sometimes for individual communities.\n\nThe nation was founded on the principle that individual states should agree, where possible, on matters of great import but are otherwise free to go their separate ways.\n\nIn addition to which, pretending that the hands of politicians and bureaucrats are free of blood in any of these matters is simply untrue – more than untrue, it is absurd.\n\nIf the markets are driven by profit- a gross generalisation - then politics is driven by the hunger for power and the campaign funds that deliver it. Business at least has the good grace to earn, and risk, its own money whereas government feels free to use other peoples for whatever is likely to buy the most votes. Likewise business makes its money by providing products and services that people need or want. Government, by contrast, uses other people’s money to enforce decisions regardless of whether they are wanted or needed by anyone.\n\nUltimately it is the initiative and industry of working Americans that has provided the funds for the great wars against oppression as well as the ingenuity to solve environmental and other technical solutions to the problems faced by humankind.\n\nPharmaceutical companies produce medicines – not the DHHS; engineering companies produce clean energy solutions – not the EPA; farmers put food on families’ tables – not the Department of Agriculture.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a40c06040056321b143b73ad75f18cd3", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house The primary difficulty with governments retaining surpluses is that the government has no proprietary right to the funds in its coffers. The taxpayer effectively subsidizes the government, on the understanding that it will undertake functions necessary for the defence, continued operation and normative improvement of the state and society.\n\nClearly defense has to be one of the core functions of government and there are a few others, such as maintaining law and order. For government to say that the only way of securing its own finances is running a small surplus in its current account budget is palpably not true when there is astonishing waste in government expenditure, which is in turn already bloated and intervenes into areas of public life where it simply does not belong.\n\nIn terms of using government expenditure as a tool to respond to recessions, there may well be a role in terms of how government uses its own purchasing power and it makes sense that should be used for domestic purchasing wherever possible, however there is little to be gained by government creating imaginary jobs undertaking roles that simply don’t produce anything.\n\nInstead the most useful role that government can play during a recession is not expanding its own size and, therefore, the final cost to the taxpayer, but reducing it. Cutting the size of government reduces the tax burden on business and individuals and cuts back on regulatory pressure. Both actions free up money for expenditure which creates real jobs in the real economy, producing real wealth, in turn spent on real products, which in turn create jobs. This beneficial cycle is the basis of economics, creating imaginary jobs simply takes skills out of the real economy and reduces the pressure on individuals to take jobs that they might not see as ideal.\n\nThe most sensible response to a government surplus is not to hoard it on the basis that it might come in useful at some undefined point in the future but to give it back to the people who earned it in the first place. Doing so means that it is spent in the real economy, creating real wealth and real jobs and thereby avoiding the prospect of recession in the first place.\n\nUltimately it comes down to a simple divide as to whether you believe governments or people are better at spending money. The evidence of waste and incompetence in government expenditure is compelling and it seems an absurd solution to governments mismanaging the money they already have to give them more.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7c9c73793c2e36d85a2b022deacfcc58", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house No country can pay its bills or increase the prosperity of its citizens if it is wasting money on unnecessary programmes. The principle problem with government funding is that it is not addressing any of the problems that Proposition raises. In many countries, The ideology of state intervention is has made government ever larger, building ever more excessive and bloated bureaucratic empires with fiefdoms and sinecures for every busybody and apparatchik more interested in monitoring change than making it, and more concerned with process than people.\n\nIt is not uncommon – indeed it is not even unusual - for private sector organisations to shed ten percent of their workforce when the judge themselves to have become uncompetitive, unprofitable or administratively unwieldy. Both the governments of France and Canada have done that in recent years and yet maintain high standards of government support [i] .\n\nFor average public sector wages to be out stripping those of the private sector (who ultimately pay them) is ridiculous. It becomes more worrying when preferential health and pension plans – where the public sector outstrips the private by nearly four to one are taken into account [ii] .\n\nThere is no question that it would be great if everybody could earn more, have more lucrative and more secure pensions, the world would be a nicer place. However, to penalise those who are making the money to subsidise those who aren’t simply makes no sense.\n\nTypically a government’s solution to an issue like child poverty is to establish a commission to discuss it – when it reports several years later it informs the waiting nation who paid for it that the solution might well be if their parents had a job. Most people could have figured this out in two minutes and at no cost [iii] .\n\n[i] \"Big government: Stop!\" The Economist. January 21st, 2010\n\n[ii] Dan Arnall. ABC News. Working in America: Public vs. Private Sector. 18 February 2011.\n\n[iii] Michael Cloud. “Why Not Big Government. Five Iron Laws.” The Centre for Small Government.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7c100b64d5484f89526260e447a3b5a1", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house Excessive regulation on the private sector puts burdens on free enterprise both in terms of administration and cost. By doing so it reduces consumer choice and acts as a drag on innovation and growth\n\nGovernment regulation assumes not only irresponsible companies but also stupid consumers. Although, realistically, very little regulation has any direct impact on the consumer but tends to involve time-consuming paperwork demonstrating compliance so that some civil servant can tick a box to prove that something that was already being done can be shown to have been be done.\n\nThe effect of this tends to fall hardest on smaller businesses that don’t have large financial or legal departments. As a result it not only takes up valuable time that could be spent developing the business itself but more importantly acts to discourage people from starting in the first place. This is particularly so when it’s considered that many people who start up a new company do so after many years of working for someone else within the same sector. As a result they see the pressure that needless and time-consuming regulation puts upon that company.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8c7e8eff39d1f8d4de9e61330b75d846", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house Government has a tendency to be inefficient as it has no need to compete in an open marketplace, and jobs in state institutions are safe because of the guarantees both of the tax base and government’s greater borrowing capacity.\n\nGovernments both as a whole and in terms of individual employees have a tendency towards astonishing inefficiency, because state institutions are not subject to any meaningful competitive pressures. Indeed, many government employees earn as much or more than those in comparable jobs in the private sector, have preferential pension and benefit plans, lower hours and longer vacations. It is of course unsurprising that anyone in possession of such a job would be reluctant to give it up but also suggests a lower level of competition for keeping it. In the private sector such preferential returns would suggest that a worker would be likely to work longer hours to keep them.\n\nEqually, because senior managers are not spending their own money and rarely have their salaries indexed to efficiency and effectiveness- in a way that is automatic for most companies- there is little pressure to find cost and operational efficiencies. As a result it is usually cheaper and more effective for services to be provided by the private sector wherever possible and appropriate. Although there are some areas which must be managed by the public sector, such as elections and the criminal justice system, it is difficult to see the benefits in other areas.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b6d3ff8bcf1295eae9539b58932c72ba", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house Government was required to drive through major changes such as drives for equality within society, universal education, and preservation of the environment. Mostly in the teeth of big business\n\nNobody would deny the role that remarkable individuals have played in the major social changes of history. They have, however, ultimately required the actions of government. Many of these have been achieved despite, rather than because of, the interests of business. Critically they have tended to be to the benefit of the weak, the vulnerable and the neglected.\n\nGovernments have been responsible for social reforms ranging from the abolition of slavery and child labor to the removal of conditions in factories and on farms that lead to injury and death, in addition to minimum wage regulations that meant that families could feed themselves. By contrast, the market was quite happy with cheap cotton sown by nimble young fingers.\n\nIn turn profit was given preference over any notion of job security or the right to a family life, the market was quite happy to see water poisoned and the air polluted – and in many cases is still happy with it. The logic of the market panders to slave-labor wages to migrant workers or exporting jobs where migrants are not available. Either way it costs the jobs of American citizens, pandering to racism and impoverishing workers at home and abroad. Although the prophets of the market suggest that the only thing standing between the average American and a suburban home - with a pool, 4x4 and an overflowing college-fund is the government, the reality could not be further from the truth.\n\nThe simple reality of the market is this: the profit motive that drives the system is the difference between the price of labor, plant and materials on one hand and the price that can be charged on the other. It makes sense to find the workers who demand the lowest wages, suppliers who can provide the cheapest materials and communities desperate enough to sell their air, water and family time. Whether those are at home or abroad. The market, by its nature has no compassion, no patriotism and no loyalty.\n\nThe only organization that can act as a restraint on that is, in the final reckoning, government which has legislative power to ensure that standards are maintained. It is easy to point to individual acts that have been beneficial but the reality is that the untrammeled market without government oversight has had a depressing tendency to chase the easiest buck, ditch the weakest, exploit where it can, pollute at will, corrupt where necessary and bend, break or ignore the rules.\n\nIt requires government as the agent of what the people consider acceptable to constrain the profit motive.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "042d27b3b4229e5d71024a13b6c79c0f", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house Big government can provide the stimulus the economy needs in the bad years as long as surpluses are not squandered during the boom years\n\nGovernment expenditure is the single biggest tool in times of economic difficulty. Those that are the quickest to complain about taxation and regulation during the good times are also the fastest to rush for a bailout during the lean times. Likewise, those that call for tax cuts in a boom also tend to be the first to criticize a deficit or public expenditure during a recession.\n\nThere is in all of this one simple economic reality: the government acts as the banker of last resort.\n\nThis only works, as Keynes understood, if the government holds on to reserves in the good years so that it can spend them in the tough ones to stimulate jobs and growth. On the other hand, where surpluses are blown on tax cuts- or expensive wars for that matter- then will be nothing left in the bank and government cannot fulfill its most useful role of using its own financial clout to balance the economy over the course of a financial cycle.\n\nSo-called small government Conservatives have been consistently profligate in recent history and have tended to leave fiscally cautious liberals to pick up the pieces. The party of small government never seems to find itself short of billions of dollars for expensive white elephants like the SDI missile shield or asserting American military power overseas in pursuit of yet another doomed cause – whether that’s’ propping up Latin American dictators or settling familial grudge matches in the Middle East.\n\nThe military adventurism of the Reagan presidency as well as those of both Bush senior and junior were conducted not just at the cost of domestic social stability, but also fiscal security.\n\nInstead of preserving a budget surplus from the Clinton presidency, the Bush administration spent it recklessly – not, as is widely declared, on the War Against Terror – on tax cuts for the wealthiest in society. As a result Bush, his cabinet and his backers robbed the country of the possibility of reserves when the economy was in a less positive situation.\n\nAs far as the War On Terror is concerned, the total cost of two international wars, $1.283tn, stands in stark contrast to the relatively cheap police-style operation that actually caught Osama Bin Laden. It is also worth noting that of that huge sum an entire 2%, according to the Congressional Research service, has been spent homeland security – anti-terror surveillance and enforcement within the USA’s borders [i] .\n\nSo called ‘Big Government’, withholding surpluses for a rainy day, provides financial security for American businesses and workers. So-called ‘small-government’ presidents spend trillions of dollars on free money to the super-rich and on military adventurism in other countries and, apparently, in space.\n\n[i] Amy Belasco. “The Cost of Iraq, Afghanistan, and Other Global War on Terror Operations Since 9/11”. Congressional Research Service. March 29 2011.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "dd42dc1355db935cf3c3a46de330b31e", "text": "economic policy tax philosophy political philosophy politics government house Ultimately government has a responsible to provide a level playing field to ensure that everybody gets a far start in life and can at least survive throughout it\n\nGovernment, especially in a developed nation and even more so in the wealthiest nation in the world, should be able to ensure that children are not hungry, the mentally ill are not living on the streets, borders are policed, veterans don’t live in squalor, the population can read, crime is controlled, the elderly don’t freeze to death and a million other markers of a civilized society.\n\nThis is particularly true of children but most people need a helping hand at one time or another in life. However, the obscenity of children destined to fail before their lives have even started- condemned to schools that offer no hope and communities that offer no safety- would be disturbing anywhere in the world.\n\nIn a nation that prides itself as having the highest standard of living on the planet- and is unquestionably the richest and most powerful- levels of poverty and despair that are seen nowhere else in the developed world are simply obscene. By every measure, infant mortality, life expectancy, educational standards, child poverty, percentage of incarcerated adults, homicides per thousand deaths and many more, America lags considerably behind Japan, Canada, Western Europe, Australia and the rest of the developed world [i] .\n\nAll of the indicators mentioned above have been adversely affect during the thirty year obsession with pushing the government back in the name of handing unfettered control over to big business and the vicissitudes of the market.\n\nAmericans pay lower taxes than Western Europe and get, as a result, a much worse return on their money [ii] .\n\n[i] Newsweeks Interactive Graphic of the World’s Best Countries. Hosted on the Daily Beast and elsewhere.\n\n[ii] Jeffrey Sachs. \"The Case for Bigger Government.\" Time. January 8th, 2009\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
001304895ed4aff55af91e408b55be62	Cost of hosting The Olympic games is an expensive thing to host. The 2012 games in London cost nearly £9bn [1] . This cost largely falls on the taxpayer. These large events are notoriously difficult to budget accurately, the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics having gone vastly over budget with suggestions that it could cost up to $50 billion [2] . It is too expensive to host for rich countries as it is – South Africa has a large problem with wealth inequality as it is, and is below the world average GDP per capita [3] . Although it is unlikely to reach such expense the $50 billion for the Sochi Olympics is twice the yearly South African health budget of ZAR 232.5bn. [4] South Africa would be better served using the money to combat HIV and poverty. [1] Gibson, Owen, ‘London 2012 Olympics will cost a total of £8.921bn, says minister’, The Guardian, 23 October 2012, http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2012/oct/23/london-2012-olympics-cost-total [2] Kollmeyer, Barbara, ‘Russia’s in-perspective price tag for four-times-overbudget Sochi Olympics: 18 Oprahs’, Marketwatch, 27 November 2013, http://blogs.marketwatch.com/themargin/2013/11/27/russias-in-perspective-price-tag-for-four-times-overbudget-sochi-olympics-18-oprahs/ [3] The World Bank, ‘GDP per capital, PPP (current international $)’, date.worldbank.org, accessed 24 January 2014, http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.PCAP.PP.CD?order=wbapi_data_value_2012+wbapi_data_value+wbapi_data_value-last&sort=desc [4] ‘Budget 2013’, PWC, 27 February 2013, http://www.pwc.co.za/en/assets/pdf/budget-speech-summary-2013.pdf	[ { "docid": "d6430999e1823f48c72d2eb2e28daf77", "text": "economic policy sport olympics sport general house believes south africa should Everything costs money. While the costs are significant, the money spent will regenerate parts of cities, create an image of the host country as a place for business, and create a long lasting legacy through the venues and infrastructure built.\n\nWhile South Africa is not rich as the UK, Greece or Australia, its GDP per capita is around that of Brazil, which is hosting the 2016 Games.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "b89db937b3f741b2cff8fa6ab0a9a788", "text": "economic policy sport olympics sport general house believes south africa should Some Olympic events are held outside the main city. The football tournament uses venues across other cities (in the London 2012 games, Coventry, Cardiff and Manchester were amongst the cities hosting matches), and, being landlocked, Johannesburg would have to host the sailing at another venue. Sailing being held in another city is not unusual, in 2012 the sailing was held in Weymouth and in 2008 in Qingdao.\n\nTraining camps are typically held across the whole nation, too.\n\nThe national morale boost typically permeates far wider than just the host city, including the impact in favour of a more sporting culture in the country.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0fcb7c16b02c6378b559e768b4c44b5e", "text": "economic policy sport olympics sport general house believes south africa should Football is also Brazil’s national sport, and Brazil was similarly placed (22nd) in the medal table in 2012. The Olympics need not be hosted just by the countries that are most competitive in the games.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b47991f2bc4d842c3bdf202b46e1fd29", "text": "economic policy sport olympics sport general house believes south africa should Hosting can have a significant cost – the 1976 Montreal games left the city vastly in debt which it did not finish paying off until 2006 [1] . Venues may be under-used after the events, with the 2004 Athens games seeing a large number of venues as unused “white elephants” after the event [2] .\n\n[1] Davenport, 2004\n\n[2] Smith, Helena, ‘Athens 2004 Olympics: what happened after the athletes went home’, The Guardian, 9 May 2012, http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2012/may/09/athens-2004-olympics-athletes-home\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "444ad0ce50bc577dd67b217e0cd05669", "text": "economic policy sport olympics sport general house believes south africa should The Athens games did not create such a buzz. Many seats were empty in the games. This was in part a result of the poor performance of the host nation as Greece underperformed for an Olympic host nation, not entering the top ten of the medals table (in a games when South Africa only won one gold medal, that of their men’s 4x100m freestyle relay swimming team). Clearly this is a risk any host nation would take; the feel good factor comes from the national team doing well, not simply hosting the games.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3cb608644e39bd0dba993f5be3d12a97", "text": "economic policy sport olympics sport general house believes south africa should South Africa has held events before, such as the World Cup – did that change perceptions of Africa? A well run games can change perceptions among those who visit but it can also damage perceptions. The South African world cup also involved slum clearance as part of a campaign of “beatification”, such actions hardly showcase a nation at its best. [1]\n\nDue to its unique history, an event in South Africa may not have a halo effect for the entire continent. A games in one city will not affect other countries, or people’s perceptions of other African countries.\n\n[1] McDougall, Dan, ‘Slum clearance, South Africa-style’, The Sunday Times, 25 April 2010, http://www.unhcr.org/cgi-bin/texis/vtx/refdaily?pass=463ef21123&id=4bd52eed5\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "939703f3d00b55d431059c46f9bc634a", "text": "economic policy sport olympics sport general house believes south africa should Hosting only affects one city and one country\n\nUnlike a World Cup, which spreads the benefits more evenly, an Olympic games is focused on one city, generally one which is a major international city. It was expected prior to the games that 90% of economic benefits to the UK of the 2012 games would go to London [1] .\n\nIt is dubious that there would be such big benefits for the continent. South Africa is seen by some in the outside world as somewhat aloof from the rest of Africa due to its particular history, its history of apartheid being rather different from the normal course of African decolonisation. It is doubtful that the 2010 World Cup boosted perceptions of the entire continent.\n\n[1] Grobel, William, ‘What are the London 2012 Olympics worth?’, Brand Valuation News, April 2010, http://www.intangiblebusiness.com/Brand-Services/Marketing-services/Press-coverage/What-are-the-London-2012-Olympics-worth~3072.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d6a33550a87847e2ecd789b9df26a6b5", "text": "economic policy sport olympics sport general house believes south africa should The Olympics are not South Africa’s ‘national sport’\n\nSouth Africa in part hosted the World Cup because football is the national sport of the country. Sports Minister Fikile Mabalula has declared “In African popularity, the Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) surpasses even that of a multi-sports event like the All Africa Games.” [1] While there is football in the Olympics other sports that South Africans support such as Rugby are not represented. In the 2012 Olympics South Africa was well down the medal table at 23rd. [2] While it makes sense to make a big investment for intangible benefits for a sport the country loves it makes less sense for the Olympics.\n\n[1] Mabalula, 2013, http://allafrica.com/stories/201301170342.html?page=2\n\n[2] ‘Medal Table’, BBC Sport, 13 August 2012, http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/olympics/2012/medals/countries\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ec14fb5c0c074e8ed408636b06aa3275", "text": "economic policy sport olympics sport general house believes south africa should Economic benefits\n\nWhile hosting a major sporting event is relatively expensive (although Cape Town and Johannesburg already have a number of appropriate venues for some of the events already), hosting major sporting events creates major economic benefits. London got a £10bn economic boost from hosting the 2012 Olympics [1] . This may be higher – many of these benefits are difficult to calculate; how much of a tourism boost is a result of a successful games? Barcelona however just like London had a large boost of tourism following the 1992 Barcelona Games [2] . It raises awareness of the city, and the country, and what it offers as a tourist destination.\n\n[1] Flanders, Stephanie, ‘London 2012 Olympics ‘have boosted UK economy by £9.9bn’’, BBC News, 19 July 2013, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-23370270\n\n[2] Davenport, Coral, ‘A post-Olympic hurdle for Greece: the whopping bill’, CSMonitor, 1 September 2004, http://www.csmonitor.com/layout/set/r14/2004/0901/p07s01-woeu.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "add849fa269e07f72c6b2e3724637e58", "text": "economic policy sport olympics sport general house believes south africa should National “feel-good factor”\n\nHosting very large sporting events is a great way to advertise a nation, and create a national feel-good factor. When London hosted the games in 2012, a successful event with a successful home team, there was a significant national “feel good factor” [1] . This can bring the benefit of bringing a nation together; particularly important for multi-ethnic countries such as South Africa, it will bring all ethnicities together in a shared experience helping to justify the label of ‘rainbow nation’. As Sports Minister Fikile Mbalula argues “Sport is said to be a national religion in South Africa. In recent years it transcends race, class, language and geographical location.” [2]\n\n[1] Hart, Simon, ‘Feelgood factor at London’s Anniversary Games next weekend as a new start for drug-tainted athletics’, The Telegraph, 20 July 2013, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/othersports/athletics/10192473/Feelgood-factor-at-Londons-Anniversary-Games-next-weekend-seen-as-a-new-start-for-drug-tainted-athletics.html\n\n[2] Mabalula, Fikile, ‘South Africa: Remarks By the Minister of Sport and Recreation, Honourable Mr Fikile Mbalula At the National Press Club Briefing On the 2013 Afcon At the Csir International Convention Centre’, AllAfrica, 16 January 2013, http://allafrica.com/stories/201301170342.html?page=3\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "58b2faf8f05f1cbf0466d8866f0b038a", "text": "economic policy sport olympics sport general house believes south africa should Showcase for a nation and continent\n\nA key reason why countries host the Olympic games is in order to boost their image abroad – China held the 2008 Games in Beijing as part of an exercise in national promotion [1] .\n\nThis would also be an opportunity to change the perceptions of Africa amongst some elements in the outside world, from an inaccurate picture of a “third world” continent with no features other than poverty and violence to a more accurate depiction of a continent which, while having challenges, is having economic growth and advancing human development. South Africa is the best nation to showcase the development of Africa; it is Africa’s biggest economy and one of its most developed.\n\n[1] Rabkin, April, ‘Olympic Games all about China, Chinese’, SFGate, 1 August 2008, http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Olympic-Games-all-about-China-Chinese-3274954.php\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
d6095df7d6786138c9eae2a2287edf00	Lack of trust The problem is that when it comes to privacy it is not really our personal physical security that we are worried about. Part of the problem is that we value our right to a private life and that we should have control over that to the extent of being able to decide how much information others know about us. To a large extent this is an issue of trust; we (sometimes wrongly) trust our friends and others with information about us. We often trust faceless entities; companies and governments too though usually to less of an extent. But a lot of that trust is as a result of their willingness to tell us what they know about us, to provide information in return, or to provide methods for us to restrict what they know. In cases like this that trust has not been earned; we were not asked, and not obviously given anything back, and there seems little change of us changing the terms of the relationship.	[ { "docid": "92ad7e74a86fe711093b20a6dd0af47e", "text": "free speech and privacy politics government digital freedoms privacy The intelligence agencies are not violating any right to privacy if they are not actually looking at the content of any emails, even less so as they in almost all cases won’t even be looking at the metadata. It is not possible for intelligence agencies to be asking the people before engaging in every surveillance policy as even knowing the broad outlines of what the surveillance involves could allow the targets of that surveillance to avoid that surveillance. While individual citizens are not asked this is where the people’s representatives should be trusted, it is ministers and members of parliament that allow surveillance and hold the agencies to account.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "8b52e403519f10b474ba024b3cd0f543", "text": "free speech and privacy politics government digital freedoms privacy Far from threatening democracy the intelligence agencies are using this information to protect democracy from terrorists who wish to overthrow the whole concept of democratic governance. Intelligence agencies are clearly under civilian control and have several layers of oversight to ensure that this kind of misuse does not take place. In the United States this means there is oversight from Congress and in the UK from Parliament. There is also judicial oversight in the form of the Interception of Communications Commissioner and Intelligence Services Commissioner in the UK [1] and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court in the US. [2]\n\n[1] ‘Judicial Oversight’, Security Service MI5, https://www.mi5.gov.uk/home/about-us/how-mi5-is-governed/oversight/judicial-oversight.html\n\n[2] ‘Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court’, Federal Judicial Center, http://www.fjc.gov/history/home.nsf/page/courts_special_fisc.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "986d533ab708f567edb66209c3002c73", "text": "free speech and privacy politics government digital freedoms privacy Metadata and data-mining are not new they are simply becoming more frequent, and more accurate as a result of more information. In the past there have been other ways of collecting data; tax records, voter registration, reverse telephone directories. [1] At the same time government and the intelligence agencies are not even those who make most use of this, there are whole private companies devoted to sifting this data. [2] There is little reason why we should particularly worry about this being done by intelligence agencies.\n\n[1] Gomez, David, ‘Hoovered’, Foreign Policy, 11 June 2013, http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/06/11/fbi_hoover_nsa_prism_verizon_metadata\n\n[2] See the debatabase debate ‘ This House would not allow companies to collect/sell the personal data of their clients ’.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "70371bf6713ff196430277bc9838467d", "text": "free speech and privacy politics government digital freedoms privacy The circumstances in the cold war were clearly different to today so this kind of abuse of power would be unlikely to happen. More broadly yes there is the potential for abuse in much the same way that there are people in banks who could steal large quantities of other people’s money. That there is a potential opportunity does not mean it is ever used. Abuse can never be totally avoided but if abuse is a concern then whether or not there is a program of surveillance is not the highest concern. Even if there were not wide ranging surveillance problems those in intelligence looking to abuse their position would be able to obtain the information because they have the technology to do so.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0198bb537b48d68b425b44f754f696e0", "text": "free speech and privacy politics government digital freedoms privacy Is it really an invasion of privacy if no one else knows about it even if that information is added to some giant computer database? The information we wish to keep secret remains a secret, in the unlikely event that some analyst reads the information they are never going to broadcast it to others as keeping secrets is a part of what intelligence agencies do.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e4f4667304bf5d3480fcc4834d96d178", "text": "free speech and privacy politics government digital freedoms privacy There have been wrongful arrests during the war against terror. Riwaan Sabir was wrongfully arrested under the terrorism act in 2008 for downloading an al-Qaida training manual despite the manual having been downloaded from a US government website and been for his master’s degree at the University of Nottingham. [1] Since the offence was online it is certainly possible that information from spying was a part of the cause for the arrest. It is true that we probably have less cause for concern when it is foreign governments doing the spying but this could still have consequences such as being denied entry if you wish to travel to or through the country.\n\n[1] Townsend, Mark, ‘Police ‘made up’ evidence against Muslim student’, The Guardian, 14 July 2012, http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2012/jul/14/police-evidence-muslim-student-rizwaan-sabir\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e18ce1c7c8aacb18850bf1258d13466d", "text": "free speech and privacy politics government digital freedoms privacy Clearly if no one ever actually looked at any information provided by surveillance then there would be no point in conducting it. Even if it were true that no one looks at any of the data being watched is still an intrusion that affects behaviour. It will affect decisions that are perfectly lawful because there will always be the slight worry that someone who you don’t want to have that information because they will think differently of you will obtain it. When the information is out of your hands you can no longer be certain who will obtain it. [1] Since people have been arrested for the information that has been conducted, clearly sometimes the information is checked and used.\n\n[1] Moore, Mica, and Stein, Bennett, ‘The Chilling Effects of License-Plate Location Tracking’, American Civil Liberties Union, 23 July 2013, http://www.aclu.org/blog/technology-and-liberty-national-security/chilling-effects-license-plate-location-tracking\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9b5c65e8b5593c91e37411772a95083f", "text": "free speech and privacy politics government digital freedoms privacy In the UK case this is not all it appears. The Intelligence Services Commissioner is comparatively toothless, and both it and the Interception of Communications Commissioner are immensely understaffed for monitoring all UK intelligence agencies. Some experts such as Professor Peter Sommer have even suggested “I am not sure that ministers or the ISC would know what questions to ask.” [1] Moreover this is trusting that ministers have the best interests of the people at heart, in the case of this conservative government which seems perfectly happy to introduce bills that erode freedoms such as the ‘snoopers charter’ this seems unlikely.\n\n[1] Hopkins, Nick, ‘William Hague on spying scandal: what he said … and what he didn't say’, guardian.co.uk, 10 June 2013, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/10/william-hague-spying-scandal-nsa-statement\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "659f81f399df3eb5c59088398bfe11e0", "text": "free speech and privacy politics government digital freedoms privacy Physical risk is not the only risk that people worry about. Denying someone their liberties such as privacy or freedom of expression does not pose a physical risk to them but that act is still wrong and it is still worth worrying about. Citizens have the right to go about their own business without their government spying on them. They should not have to concern themselves with what information the government does or does not have.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b258a8c8eea761b2c220ee08f775679c", "text": "free speech and privacy politics government digital freedoms privacy Loss of Privacy\n\nIt is wrong to state that we only have anything to ‘fear’ if we have done something wrong; a great many people want to keep things private where what they have done is morally perfectly right and justifiable. It is perfectly justified for a married couple to want to keep a video of them having sex private – even if it is sent from one partner to the other by email, or for someone to keep his/her sexual orientation secret even if they have told someone about it. [1] If we want such information to be kept private does the state have any business picking that information up from our emails? It may not go any further than the intelligence agency, it is possible no one there will look at it but it is still an invasion of privacy.\n\n[1] Phillipson, Gavin, ‘Q&A: The right to privacy’, BBC Religion, 14 June 2013, http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/0/22887499\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4b92728df0e0b9f898d3efe5d697cab1", "text": "free speech and privacy politics government digital freedoms privacy The use of meta data causes unintentional harm\n\nThe other possible harm is unintentional. The amount of data involved is huge and too much even for a vast organization like the NSA to actually physically look at. Instead it uses data mining. This is why the NSA wants data that may seem useless to others. The records of which phone numbers are phoning who, as the NSA was obtaining of Verizon, might seem useless but can tell them who you are contacting, and how much contact time they have. In turn they could look at who your contacts have been talking to and if it turns out that several of them talk regularly to suspected terrorists then even if you are innocent a finger of suspicion might be pointed. There has even been a study showing that individuals can be identified from just the time of call and nearest cell phone tower after just four calls. [1] PRISM gives the NSA even more ‘useless’ data to play with. The results of this data mining may usually be accurate but will not always be so and the result of being flagged like this can be problematic for individuals. It may mean additional airport security, having problems getting a visa, [2] or in the worst case finding its way onto a no fly list.\n\n[1] De Montjoye, Yves-Alexandre, et al., ‘Unique in the Crowd: The privacy bounds of human mobility’, Scientific Reports, 3, 25 March 2013, http://www.nature.com/srep/2013/130325/srep01376/full/srep01376.html\n\n[2] Brown, Ian, ‘Yes, NSA surveillance should worry the law-abiding’, guardian.co.uk, 10 June 2013, http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jun/10/nsa-snooping-law-abiding\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "63933a05f0bfabb74e2c2af5a1906bd9", "text": "free speech and privacy politics government digital freedoms privacy A threat to democracy\n\nYes the NSA is unlikely to look at individual’s personal information if the person in question is nobody of interest yet there are people who may be of interest to the state who are essentially innocent of anything except annoying the state. The ability for almost anyone in the intelligence apparatus to look up personal information has to worry anyone who might otherwise dissent, investigate the government, or turn whistleblower. Intelligence officials can hold the information as a weapon to ensure compliance and ruin careers if they don’t get their way. [1] This has happened before. In the US when diplomat Joseph C. Wilson published about the manipulation of intelligence on uranium from Niger being used as part of the justification for the invasion of Iraq his wife had her cover blown and career destroyed by people within the Department of Defense. [2] When we know that the Obama administration has been more determined than ever to prevent leaks and prosecute perpetrators can it really be said there is no damage to democracy if these courageous people are not coming forward?\n\n[1] Walt, Stephen M., ‘The real threat behind the NSA surveillance programs’, Foreign Policy, 10 June 2013, http://walt.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2013/06/10/what_me_worry_the_real_threat_behind_the_nsa\n\n[2] Wilson, Joseph C., ‘What I Didn’t Find in Africa’, The New York Times, 6 July 2003, http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/06/opinion/what-i-didn-t-find-in-africa.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm\n\nLewis, Neil A., ‘Source of C.I.A. Leak Said to Admit Role’, The New York Times, 30 August 2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/30/washington/30armitage.html?_r=0\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6075c1a0c6ebe47606cc8ca92df451dc", "text": "free speech and privacy politics government digital freedoms privacy Abuse of information and power by intelligence agencies\n\nEven when the government does not intend harm there are still cases where direct harms can occur as a result of surveillance. The most worrying are where the state abuses the information it holds. Abuse of power and of the information held by government is perhaps the main reason why it is difficult to trust in intelligence agencies. In one historical example from the 1950s FBI agents interviewed a Brooklyn liquor importer for repeating a rumor that the FBI Director J Edgar Hoover might be a “queer”. This clearly necessitated a reminder through questioning that Hoover’s “personal conduct is beyond reproach,” leading to the man quickly agreeing that “he thinks Mr. Hoover has done a wonderful job.” [1] Did this have anything to do with national security? No. Was it an abuse of power and surveillance? Yes. So far as we are aware the intelligence agencies don’t do things quite like this anymore but the revelations like PRISM, or the waterboarding a decade ago, show they are still happy to abuse their position from time to time. This is hardly a good way to build trust.\n\n[1] Gage, Beverly, ‘It’s Not About Your Cat Photos’, Slate, 10 June 2013, http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/history/2013/06/nsa_prism_program_can_we_trust_the_government_with_our_secrets_no.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d9d49e7dce08cef617fe38b3680e56c6", "text": "free speech and privacy politics government digital freedoms privacy You are not going to be arrested because the government has access to your communications\n\nClearly much of the time you really do have nothing to worry about when it comes to intelligence agencies having information about you. People are not regularly arrested without just cause and we have little evidence that democratic governments use this information to put pressure on their citizens. There have been no known cases of this happening since the start of the war on terror. [1] When it comes to foreign governments this is even less of a cause for concern; while your own government might be interested in various aspects of your life to help it with the services it provides foreign governments only have one motivation; their own national security. If you are not a threat to that national security the chances of them ever taking any action against you are essentially nonexistent.\n\n[1] Posner, Eric, ‘I Don’t See a Problem Here’, The New York Times Room for Debate, 10 June 2013, http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2013/06/09/is-the-nsa-surveillance-threat-real-or-imagined\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ad607bd169e82e473769ae5891d6f983", "text": "free speech and privacy politics government digital freedoms privacy There are safeguards to prevent misuse\n\nIn democracies there are numerous safeguards and levels of oversight to prevent abuse. In the UK for example there is a “strong framework of democratic accountability and oversight”. Agencies are required “to seek authorisation for their operations from a Secretary of State, normally the Foreign Secretary or Home Secretary.” The Secretary is given legal advice and comments from civil servants. Once the Secretary has given assent they are “subject to independent review by an Intelligence Services Commissioner and an Interception of Communications Commissioner… to ensure that they are fully compliant with the law”. [1]\n\n[1] Hague, William, ‘Prism statement in full’, politics.co.uk, 10 June 2013, http://www.politics.co.uk/comment-analysis/2013/06/10/william-hague-prism-statement-in-full\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b8be910fcdbe4c0fd2282b3143d04449", "text": "free speech and privacy politics government digital freedoms privacy There is no physical risk\n\nIn terms of physical risk it is almost certainly true that you have nothing to fear from government having loads of information. With the exception perhaps of the Russian FSB and despite the James Bond films intelligence agencies in democracies are not in the habit of bumping people off this mortal coil. In this sense it does not matter at all what information the intelligence services have on you; no matter how naughty you may have been it is not going to be worth some kind of physical retaliation. Essentially the argument here is that it does no harm, and even does some good, so why should it not continue?\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d341c8aa850bdee8a1f1639b522889b9", "text": "free speech and privacy politics government digital freedoms privacy No one will ever actually look at the information\n\nIf the concern is privacy then there really should be little concern at all because there is safety in numbers. The NSA and other intelligence services don’t have the time or motivation to be tracking down all of our foibles. [1] If the intelligence agencies are watching everyone then they clearly do not have the personnel to be watching the actual communications. Instead certain things or patterns will raise alarm bells and a tiny number will be investigated more closely.\n\n[1] Walt, Stephen M., ‘The real threat behind the NSA surveillance programs’, Foreign Policy, 10 June 2013, http://walt.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2013/06/10/what_me_worry_the_real_threat_behind_the_nsa\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
a0a328b3b69e2f201427bc0b335e2d3a	It sets a very dangerous precedent for controlling the output of the media – who is a celebrity? What and who else should the media not be allowed to cover. By the same logic as banning the coverage of the private lives of those celebs that make a living out of publicity, why not the financial lives of those bankers who make their living out of money? There’s no doubt that it caused embarrassment and inconvenience to those concerned and the collapse of banks could have been reported perfectly well without mentioning the tens of millions made by their directors and traders. When does someone become a celebrity and when do they cease to be. If a politician appears on “I’m a celebrity…” or “Celebrity Big Brother”, do they cease to be a politician? Are the Hamiltons public figures or celebrities? Is Portillo? Is Galloway? Nadine Dorries is the latest sitting member of Parliament to take part in a reality TV show; in this case I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here. [i] When actors become members of parliament is their previous life covered. Perhaps most obviously if a comedian like Jimmy Carr whose material is often political turns out not to be paying his taxes what happens? [ii] There are several differences between telling newspapers what they can and can’t cover in advance and establishing a regulatory framework for when they overstep the mark. An important one of those differences is that Leveson was asked to investigate the latter and not the former. [i] Mulholland, Hélène, ‘Nadine Dorries to go ahead with TV show after learning of Tory suspension’, guardian.co.uk, 9 November 2012, http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2012/nov/09/nadine-dorries-tory-party-suspension [ii] The Guardian. Rupert Sawyer. “Poor Jimmy Carr. Being a celebrity shouldn’t be taxing.” 22 June 2012.	[ { "docid": "47397eb7fed55eba6323827d36c2af36", "text": "free speech and privacy house would allow celebrities switch limelight There is a clear and demonstrable difference between the public right to know that their savings have been lost but the person who lost them walked off with £40m and seeing a picture that suggests an actress has put on five pounds. The first actually affects the real lives of real people, the second really doesn’t. As for blurred definitions, the NUJ’s own definition of a journalist would seem to work – wherever the person receives the majority of their earnings.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "a15864184d021b25a9261d2408fb8bbd", "text": "free speech and privacy house would allow celebrities switch limelight The response as simple as the point: Leveson wasn’t asked to create a regulatory framework for the Internet. The web is the papers’ problem, not Leveson’s.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a817701fe030afb3d700b66928c58b75", "text": "free speech and privacy house would allow celebrities switch limelight It would seem to be entirely up to the media if they chose to seek an interview with a celebrity about their latest movie – that is, after all, part of most actors’ job descriptions and part of the media’s duty to inform. That hardly seems relevant to whether it’s possible to publish a picture of them shouting at their kids.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a817701fe030afb3d700b66928c58b75", "text": "free speech and privacy house would allow celebrities switch limelight It would seem to be entirely up to the media if they chose to seek an interview with a celebrity about their latest movie – that is, after all, part of most actors’ job descriptions and part of the media’s duty to inform. That hardly seems relevant to whether it’s possible to publish a picture of them shouting at their kids.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "fb521362f99d4fc04d878088a560047c", "text": "free speech and privacy house would allow celebrities switch limelight It matters if celebrities have double standards when they present themselves as being whiter than white. Equally, as Prop points out, there are already laws on defamation, libel, slander, defamation, trespass and surveillance. It is difficult to see what the register would add to these. One of the points that Leveson has routinely ignored is that all of the issues that prompted the inquiry are already illegal; hence the arrest of the journalists and executives involved [i] .\n\n[i] BBCwebsite. Journalist arrested in computer hacking probe. 29 August 2012.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2b99d9b67bee8ced5c08fe20b70a0ead", "text": "free speech and privacy house would allow celebrities switch limelight If this is going to come down to professional judgement on what is and isn’t news then editors of successful magazines and newspapers would seem to have rather more relevant experience than a High Court judge. One of the ironies of the whole process has been that the one group who took no responsibility for the various crimes of newspapers are the people who bought them; papers follow the whims of their readers, whether the middle class like it or not.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ed73d5384c055e2b36bde816e18c750d", "text": "free speech and privacy house would allow celebrities switch limelight Article eight only applies to public bodies so, for the most part, the media are not affected. However, to tackle the more general point – celebrity, by its nature requires some surrender of privacy; presumably those who would sign such a register would still want the ‘good’ publicity but want approval over the ‘bad’ stuff. Once you start giving anyone copy approval over a supposedly free press, you might as shut it down. It has simply ceased to be free at that point.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2b1f5afcdd00a74ba8875917b6c0f89f", "text": "free speech and privacy house would allow celebrities switch limelight It would allow for an entirely false image to be created\n\nIf celebrities were, in fact simply hard-working entertainment professionals who finished rehearsals and then returned to their private lives then the idea of protecting that privacy might make sense. The reality is that it just isn’t so. It is routine for celebrities to use their status to express opinions on political or social matters on which they have no expertise whatsoever – and expect the media to cover it. Whether it’s the modest but routine endorsing of political parties in the build-up to elections [i] to Paul McCartney on animal rights to Matt Damon on virtually everything – why are we listening to their opinions rather than, say, a professor of economics or ethics?\n\nEqually, they expect coverage – and to be taken seriously – when announcing that the latest movie, or book or album is a masterpiece despite the panning it’s receiving from the critics.\n\nIt’s also questionable as to whether pop singer or movie star would count as quite the right career choice for someone looking for a quiet life [ii] .\n\nIt would be interesting to see how many would sign-up to Leveson’s proposed list if it was a blanket ban on publicity. No coverage of charity events that happened to get a celeb along, no interviews with actors on economics or pop musicians on ethics.\n\n[i] The Independent. Matilda Battersby and Thomas Mendelsohn. A who’s who of celebrity political endorsements.” 4 May 2010.\n\n[ii] The Guardian. Owen Bowcott. “Media interest in celebrities’ lives is legitimate, European court rules.” 7 February 2012.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "33f59e85b4509e935f981544c71a672a", "text": "free speech and privacy house would allow celebrities switch limelight It simply won’t work in an internet age\n\nWhatever one thinks about the morality of this idea – and Opposition believes it is an attack on free expression – the simple and compelling fact is that it won’t work. The super-injunctions [i] fiasco demonstrated that keeping information silent in an internet age is simply impossible when there is a keen public interest.\n\nWhether Prop likes it or not, the public is interested in celebrity news, requiring newspapers to ignore what is happening in the blogosphere is asking them not to do their job. It would mean that the only people on the planet who couldn’t tweet celebrity gossip would be those hired to do so.\n\nThis is important because it’s effectively impossible to sue a blog or a twitter account so they can publish any old nonsense. The press by contrast are subject to the law and, as a result, rumours remain the stuff of fantasy until they appear in the media. Without that arbiter between truth and fantasy, a curious public might as well believe what some fantasist has posted on their website.\n\n[i] Useful background on super-injunctions as the history leading up to them is here on the BBC site.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2b1f5afcdd00a74ba8875917b6c0f89f", "text": "free speech and privacy house would allow celebrities switch limelight It would allow for an entirely false image to be created\n\nIf celebrities were, in fact simply hard-working entertainment professionals who finished rehearsals and then returned to their private lives then the idea of protecting that privacy might make sense. The reality is that it just isn’t so. It is routine for celebrities to use their status to express opinions on political or social matters on which they have no expertise whatsoever – and expect the media to cover it. Whether it’s the modest but routine endorsing of political parties in the build-up to elections [i] to Paul McCartney on animal rights to Matt Damon on virtually everything – why are we listening to their opinions rather than, say, a professor of economics or ethics?\n\nEqually, they expect coverage – and to be taken seriously – when announcing that the latest movie, or book or album is a masterpiece despite the panning it’s receiving from the critics.\n\nIt’s also questionable as to whether pop singer or movie star would count as quite the right career choice for someone looking for a quiet life [ii] .\n\nIt would be interesting to see how many would sign-up to Leveson’s proposed list if it was a blanket ban on publicity. No coverage of charity events that happened to get a celeb along, no interviews with actors on economics or pop musicians on ethics.\n\n[i] The Independent. Matilda Battersby and Thomas Mendelsohn. A who’s who of celebrity political endorsements.” 4 May 2010.\n\n[ii] The Guardian. Owen Bowcott. “Media interest in celebrities’ lives is legitimate, European court rules.” 7 February 2012.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "62cb63df3adceb12be609fc21d9f90a6", "text": "free speech and privacy house would allow celebrities switch limelight Redressing the balance\n\nSuch a register would, presumably still allow reporting when there was a genuine public interest – just as is the case for any other member of the public [i] . Presumably in such a circumstance, judicial approval could be sought – a process considerably quicker and easier than grinding an apology out of a magazine or newspaper; let alone winning a libel case.\n\nPutting the burden on publications to demonstrate that something was news rather than gossip would be of huge benefit not only to celebrities themselves but to those long-suffering consumers of British news who, whilst hating it, have had to plough through this dross as it makes its way from the pages of magazines into the public consciousness [ii] .\n\nSo what if celebrities have double-standards? So do most people, none of who would appreciate that fact being pointed out on the front pages of the media.\n\n[i] The Telegraph. Matthew Holehouse. “Leveson Inquiry: Judge suggests a ‘celebrity privacy registry’”. 18 January 2012.\n\n[ii] The Guardian. Sam Delaney. “Will the Leveson inquiry kill celebrity magazines?” 26 December 2011.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "504aec69d5fa4dcce3256c13747aee60", "text": "free speech and privacy house would allow celebrities switch limelight Making editor’s think twice\n\nA paparazzo’s shot of a second or third rate celeb doing something stupid, or something perfectly sensible but just not in makeup – or clothes – makes for an easy page lead. Anything that makes editors pause and consider whether they have something that might actually pass for news might do a great deal to pull large chunks of the British media – along with the readers they claim to serve – out of the gutter.\n\nIn recent decades anything with ‘celebrity’ associations has been considered news as a sought of kneejerk reaction by editors. Even in the ‘quality’ press there’s still plenty of coverage of vacuous, self-absorbed, talentless individuals who are famous, mostly, for being famous.\n\nThe defence of many editors is that these individuals deliberately court the attention they receive, which is, no doubt, true. However, whether it’s a good idea to give it to them is something that ought to give editors pause for thought given the deforming impact it has on young people’s sense of ambition [i] . Anything that means that such a productive golden goose is just one signature away from being killed, might be enough to make them ask whether it is really worth it.\n\nNobody is suggesting that this will transform the media overnight but readers moving away from publications that focussed exclusively on celebrity gossip to publications that, while containing some, also have much more news and analysis of real world events and issues certainly couldn’t hurt levels of social and political engagement. The best way to encourage engagement is through education, which the media can provide.\n\n[i] The Telegraph. Lucy Cockcroft. “Cult of Celebrity ‘is harming children”. 14 March 2008.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1fb292970e28ed48c891a08786a5f5db", "text": "free speech and privacy house would allow celebrities switch limelight A right to privacy – even if you are famous\n\nJust because somebody chooses to be an actor, singer or an entertainer of any kind does not mean that they lose their right to a private life. In the context of the UK (the Scope of the Leveson Enquiry) it’s worth mentioning that this right is guaranteed under both the Human Rights Act of 1998, which in turn is predicated on the European Convention of Human Rights [i] .\n\nThe people who are having their private lives splayed over the tabloids and gossip magazines are not politicians or judges taking bribes, they are not police officers beating up suspects, they are not teachers offering grades in exchange for sexual favours or any other area of sensible journalistic investigation. They are people who happen to work in the entertainment industries and their lives are being interrupted for the sake of prurience and curiosity that has nothing to do with a meaningful news agenda.\n\nIf, as some of those mentioned in the introduction suggest, the worst that happens as a result of such a register is that celebrity magazines vanish, then the proposition is quite relaxed about that.\n\n[i] Article 8 of the ECHR and the UK HRA (1998). Outlined here .\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
c2fbff250b8872782bd23a58665a177c	The focus of their song was one of political dissent rather than religion Pussy Riot’s protest was politically focussed, the response seems politically driven and now they are prisoners. The name and chorus of the song performed was Virgin Mary, Chase Putin Out. [i] It is very hard to see what would be a better definition of the phrase ‘political prisoner’. Where any punishment required for this act – and Proposition contends that there was not – then it was at most a mild public order offence. Amnesty International and the overwhelming majority of the International media have reached that conclusion. The very fact that this has become a cause celebre shows the extent to which those who able to step back from the situation recognise this for what it is; a clear abuse of presidential power given the thinnest sheen of respectability by a compliant church. Such religious content as was contained in the protest fairly obviously relates to the setting and is not the main content of the song. It’s a fairly straightforward artistic device. It does, however, raise the question that if the intent of this song was to be blasphemous – a necessary component of proving it to be so – then why did they do such a bad job of it and spend so much their time going on about politics; it would suggest somewhat incompetent activists. [i] Elder, Miriam, ‘Pussy Riot trial: prosecutors call for three-year jail term’, guardian.co.uk, 7 August 2012	[ { "docid": "af3f70e625f3f3cdaa10c3e951664cd0", "text": "nothing sacred house believes imprisoned members pussy riot should be Their song may have gone on to discuss political themes but its basis was an appeal to Mary to rid Russia of Putin. All the rest was trappings after that initial statement – a sort of protracted “because”. It is quite routine for prayers to start with an appeal to diving authority before addressing secular themes just as this did; it was a mockery of a prayer and, therefore, profane.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "1c34450eb14d42b1af0642c8c29bb446", "text": "nothing sacred house believes imprisoned members pussy riot should be It is not just the hierarchy of the Church that have objected to the bands actions. There have also been popular protests from regular churchgoers who have been offended by Pussy Riot’s actions. Strangely this fact rarely gets more than a line – and often not even that – in the Western press. [i] This is not therefore a case of the Church ‘propping up’ the state rather it is speaking out for the outrage that many of its members feel.\n\n[i] BBC Website. Pussy Riot members jailed for two years for hooliganism. 17 August 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7c813479564cc2ce09fce6d630d395a1", "text": "nothing sacred house believes imprisoned members pussy riot should be What is extraordinary is that despite the liberal outrage of much of the Western press, the Russian court system has delivered an appropriate verdict. There can be little doubt that their actions showed a fantastic level of disrespect for the Church, this is the closest relevant charge. Rulings may be convenient or not for leaders of all political persuasions – neither proves bias within the courts.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "09051c0f644a8984262722e1c4e7f6d7", "text": "nothing sacred house believes imprisoned members pussy riot should be Firstly protesting in a Church clearly has served to draw maximum attention to the issue and so they appear to have been proven right to have done so. Secondly, it is the severity of the sentence that is the issue here, Tatchell’s actions were described by the magistrate as “a minor public order offence” and he was given a fine of under £20.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b9b9a4bea811ad8fcd9702a89445ad80", "text": "nothing sacred house believes imprisoned members pussy riot should be It’s a parody of a prayer; nobody has ever denied that. If that’s the form of protest to be used, where better than a church? No property was damaged although some feathers may have been ruffled – but fair enough. Protesting the increasingly totalitarian rule of one of the world’s most powerful nations would seem to justify a fairly minor disturbance on a Sunday morning.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8d8d2be4f27535a1bd9963054f3ca613", "text": "nothing sacred house believes imprisoned members pussy riot should be The protest was certainly intended to be noticed – there’s little point in protesting something if it isn’t. The very fact that they were willing to risk imprisonment suggests that this was something more than a media stunt. It’s also difficult to see how this is different from earlier generations of artists who have protested tyranny – the only significant difference seems to be that this tyrant gets on rather better with leaders of the West.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7dfcbe08b1325e92a088360d29b2a74e", "text": "nothing sacred house believes imprisoned members pussy riot should be History of the Orthodox Church and the Russian state\n\nThe Russian Orthodox Church has long been happy to prop up whichever strongman happens to be running the Kremlin, this was particularly the case in the time of the Tsars but was even the case under the Communists for all their supposed Atheism. [i] It certainly would not come as any surprise to Kremlin-watchers that, as Putin’s government shreds the last vestiges of democratic credibility in favour of the strong-arm tactics of earlier Russian leaders – Tsarist and Communist – that the Church would be only too happy to help out with such difficulties as this as the Church and Putin are particularly close.\n\nThe fact is that the long arm of the presidential office now reaches into all parts of Russian public life, including religious life, for example the FSB has harassed other Christian sects and proselytizing has been banned. [ii] The intrusion of the state has been demonstrated far more effectively by the response to the protest than could ever have been achieved through such an event on its own. Although that reality may be powerfully ironic, it does little to help these political prisoners held at presidential whim and nothing more than hollow and self-serving justification from the courts.\n\n[i] Miner, Steven Merritt, Stalin’s Holy War, The University of North Carolina Press, April 2003\n\n[ii] Levy, Clifford J., ‘At Expense of All Others, Putin Picks a Church’, The New York Times, 24 April 2008\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "273f688ea6b1578ef8e36955803285f0", "text": "nothing sacred house believes imprisoned members pussy riot should be The blasphemy charge looks suspiciously convenient for Putin\n\nThere seems to be little doubt in any one’s mind that Putin and his regime were the focus of the protest. It is, equally, no secret that Putin has a fairly brutal attitude towards political dissent; he has expelled even allies in parliament for criticism [i] , uses force to crush unsanctioned protests, [ii] and locks up potential opponents. [iii] Locking up Pussy Riot in order to stop their opposition therefore fits in with Putin’s previous actions against his opposition and seems likely to be the desired result. In the light of that, it seems an extraordinary coincidence that what he would have wanted is exactly what happened. Putin himself said after they were sentenced \"We have red lines beyond which starts the destruction of the moral foundations of our society… If people cross this line they should be made responsible in line with the law.\" [iv]\n\nPutin’s record is not one that suggests that he is happy to step back and allow events to take their course in the hope that what he wants to happen just chances to come along – quite the reverse. Suggesting that this is a happy coincidence for Putin would be a little like suggesting that the decision to have term limits for the presidency, just not for Putin, was just the happy outcome of an impartial process. [v] If this was just the Church and the courts happening to favour the interests of an over-mighty president, then Putin must be the luckiest man alive.\n\n[i] Vasilyeva, Nataliya, ‘Anti-Putin lawmaker ousted in Russia; who's next?’, guardian.co.uk, 14 September 2012\n\n[ii] Heritage, Timothy, ‘Vladimir Putin using force to crush protests, Russian opposition fears’, National Post, 6 March 2012\n\n[iii] Parfitt, Tom, ‘Mikhail Khodorkovsky sentenced to 14 years in prison’, The Guardian, 30 December 2010\n\n[iv] Stott, Michael, ‘Pussy Riot got what they deserved: Putin’, Reuters, 25 October 2012\n\n[v] Boudreaux, Richard, ‘Putin Accepts Term Limits in Principle, but Not for Him’, The Wall Street Journal, 11 April 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8ea1da56f096fa2fb6a07d86ab112007", "text": "nothing sacred house believes imprisoned members pussy riot should be Intention\n\nPerhaps more damning than the fact that the protest did cause offence or the fact that it was always likely to was the fact that it was clearly intended to do. At no point can the members of Pussy Riot been under the illusion that no offence would be caused; quite the reverse, they were counting on it. Counting not only on the outcry in the domestic media but also on the impact that would have on the international media in an effort to give themselves some cover.\n\nWhile the charge of ‘hooliganism’ might seem laughable this does meet the Russian definition “The flagrant violation of public order expressed by a clear disrespect for society.” [i] It is clear they did this in terms of their intrusion to areas reserved for priests, by manifestly contradicting common church rules, expressing their disrespect and using swear words, [ii] it is clear that profanity is a much greater offence within a church than outside even if it is a word used in ‘everyday speech’. [iii]\n\nIt is important to be clear that this is not Solzhenitsyn, because of the way this was staged it was intended from the outset to do nothing more than grab headlines. There is no denying that there are real political divisions in Moscow and that there are many people with very real issues with Putin’s style of leadership, it is difficult to see how this publicity grabbing stunt does anything to help that cause.\n\n[i] Taylor, Adam, ‘Why Russian Punks Pussy Riot Aren't Heroes’, Business Insider, 16 August 2012\n\n[ii] Whitmore, Brian, ‘Pussy Riot: The Punk Band That Isn't And The Concert That Wasn't’, Radio Free Europe, 30 July 2012\n\n[iii] Fraser, Giles, ‘Pussy Riot's crime was violating the sacred. That's what got Jesus in court’, The Guardian, 10 August 2010\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "13289bbe6a8e7efba5248706cc3125e2", "text": "nothing sacred house believes imprisoned members pussy riot should be If it was a purely political statement, then why stage it in a church?\n\nThere is no shortage of possible venues to stage a protest such as this one. A busy supermarket, a train station, a park, the middle of the street – all of them would have fulfilled the requirement for lots of people with attentions to be attracted. Since it was dubbed not a live concert the location would have been totally interchangeable. [i] Holding it in a church – in front of the high alter during mass – was calculated to cause maximum effect, maximum shock and maximum publicity. Causing intended offence during a religious ceremony is about as close to the definition of blasphemy as it would be possible to get.\n\nVladimir Putin has shrugged off challenges from much more serious critics than an attention-seeking group of musicians. This very act was calculated to cause the greatest possible offence to people of faith. Such a protest in St Peter’s in the same situation would have caused great offence even if the protest had been about Berlusconi. When British gay rights activist Peter Tatchell interrupted the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Easter service some years ago, he was widely thought of as having done his cause more harm than good because it offended so many and was subsequently convicted [ii] . This is no different, it was blasphemous and, under Russian law, there are punishments for blasphemy.\n\n[i] Whitmore, Brian, ‘Pussy Riot: The Punk Band That Isn't And The Concert That Wasn't’, Radio Free Europe, 30 July 2012\n\n[ii] BBC News Website. Tatchell fined £18.60 for pulpit protest.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "96a4a0edf69834e761c90316f2f8d433", "text": "nothing sacred house believes imprisoned members pussy riot should be Why use the form of a prayer and mention the Virgin in a political protest?\n\nThe members of Pussy Riot themselves seem to admit that the protest was at least in part religious, Sparrow, one of the members told the Guardian \"It was just a prayer. A very special prayer”. [i] When combined with the setting in the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour shows the intent. It would, in theory, be possible to imagine a protest in such a setting that did not cause offence – or at least sought to minimise it. However, the religious overtones and references seem designed purely to inflame it. They served no purpose in making the case about Putin’s policies but seem calculated to offend the congregation and clergy and, given the setting, the Orthodox Church as a whole.\n\nHowever, a quiet and dignified protest, while making the political point more powerfully and without offence would not have served the main purpose here; publicity through maximizing offence as a result of deliberate blasphemy.\n\nTo intend blasphemy, to commit blasphemy, in the full and wilful knowledge that it is blasphemous and then claim it is political dissent is offensive not only to the religious but to those who have genuinely suffered as a result of their political dissent [ii] .\n\n[i] Cadwalladr, Carole, ‘Pussy Riot: will Vladimir Putin regret taking on Russia's cool women punks?’, The Observer, 29 July 2012\n\n[ii] Daily Mail. Mark Dooley. “Am I the only person who thinks that pussy riot should have been jailed?” 24 August 2012.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
214b34aa103063a14bfabda82d4fc4b3	Transparency prevents public relations disasters Transparency is necessary to avoid public relations disasters; particularly in countries where the media has some freedom to investigate for themselves. It is clearly the best policy for the military to make sure all the information is released along with the reasons behind actions rather than having the media finding individual pieces of a whole and speculating to fill the gaps. A good example would be a collision on 16th January 1966 between a B-52 bomber and a KC-135 tanker while attempting to refuel that destroyed both planes. Accidents happen, and this one cost 11 lives, but could have been much worse as the B-52 had four nuclear bombs on board were not armed and did not detonate. In this case an initial lack of information rapidly turned into a public relations disaster that was stemmed by much more openness by the military and the US Ambassador in Spain. The release of the information reduces the room for the press to fill in the gaps with harmful speculation. [1] In this case there was never much chance of national security implications or a break with Spain as the country was ruled by the dictator Franco, someone who would hardly pay attention to public opinion. But in a democracy a slow and closed response could seriously damage relations. [1] Stiles, David, ‘A Fusion Bomb over Andalucia: U.S. Information Policy and the 1966 Palomares Incident’, Journal of War Studies, Vol.8, No.1, Winter 2006, pp.49-67, p.65	[ { "docid": "0302ec750821ac54bbca7bdb877920ce", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms This is clearly not always the case. Often transparency means that the public becomes aware when there is little need for them to know. There had been previous nuclear accidents that had caused no damage, and had not been noticed, such as in Goldsboro, N.C. in 1961. [1] If there had been a media frenzy fuelled by released information there would clearly have been much more of a public relations disaster than there was with no one noticing. Since there’re was no harm done there is little reason why such a media circus should have been encouraged. And even without media attention the incident lead to increase safeguards.\n\n[1] Stiles, David, ‘A Fusion Bomb over Andalucia: U.S. Information Policy and the 1966 Palomares Incident’, Journal of War Studies, Vol.8, No.1, Winter 2006, pp.49-67, p.51\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "b26d4f95e504aded795c00e6481236f6", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Being a citizen does not come with a right to know everything that the state does. In much the same way being a shareholder does not mean you get to know absolutely everything every person in a business does. Instead you get the headlines and a summary, most of the time the how the business goes about getting the results is left to the management. Ultimately the state’s purpose is to protect its citizens and this comes before letting them know everything about how that is done.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c3dfed7d492942c83054985799e6fd08", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Transparency may mean that mistakes or problems are found faster, but it does not mean they are going to be corrected faster. Waste in the defense budget has been known about for years yet it still keeps coming up. Transparency shines a light on the problem but that is not helpful if it does not result in action to solve the problem.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0454e56e64fae4dda043ac62bef1678d", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Transparency in situations of international tension is tricky; with complete transparency how do you engage in bluffing? The state that is completely transparent is tying one hand behind its back in international negotiations.\n\nIt is also wrong to assume that transparency will always reduce tensions. Sometimes two countries just have completely incompatible interests. In such instances complete transparency is simply going to set them on a collision course. It is then much better for there to be a bit less transparency so that both sides can fudge the issue and sign up to an agreement while interpreting it in different ways.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "55f6baea9185cc31e60c0a00c3ab28e6", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Trust goes two ways; the people have to trust that on some issues, such as security, the government is doing the right thing to protect them even when it cannot release all relevant information. But even if the military and security services do claim to be completely transparent then how is everyone to know that it really is being as transparent as they say? Unfortunately there are information asymmetry’s between members of the public and the government; the member of the public is unlikely to have the capability to find out if the government if hiding something from them. [1] Other countries too are likely to be suspicious of ‘complete transparency’ and simply believe that this is cover for doing something more nefarious. Trust then cannot only about being transparent in everything.\n\n[1] Stiglitz, Joseph, ‘Transparency in Government’, in Roumeen Islam, The right to tell: the roll of the mass media in economic development, World Bank Publications, 2002, p.28\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cc27b95740431e69b0bc1831aac88d34", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Drones are an unusual example (though not unique) because they are a new form of warfare over which there are few clear rules and norms. This means that making it transparent will create new norms. However in the vast majority of covert operations if made public they would clearly be illegal and would have to be ended. Drones are also unusual in that the public sees few downsides to the killing, this means there would be less public pressure than in most such operations.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5329bbec94a4045317409feb80500b55", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Coalitions can form behind expansionist policies regardless of whether there is transparency. If there is no transparency then it is simply an invitation for these groups to overestimate the strength of their own state compared to their opponents. Where there is transparency the figures will at least be available to counter their arguments. It should not be surprising that interest groups do not have as much influence in creating expansionist policy in democracies. [1]\n\nTransparency showing when a state is to be eclipsed is a greater concern but a lack of transparency in such a case is just as bad. No transparency will simply encourage the fears of the state that is to be eclipsed that the rising state is hostile and not to be trusted.\n\n[1] Snyder, Jack, Myths of Empire, Cornell University Press, 1991, p.18\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "febedd589ddf647906d58640062ac232", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms The public is rational and can make its own assessment of risk. The best course in such cases is transparency and education. If all relevant information is released, along with analysis as to the risk presented by the threat, then the public can be best informed about what kind of threats they need to be prepared for. Terrorism has been blown out of proportion because they are single deadly incidents that are simple to report and have a good narrative to provide 24/7 coverage that the public will lap up. [1] As a result there has been much more media coverage than other threats. It can then be no surprise that the public overestimate the threat posed by terrorism as the public are told what risks are relevant by the amount of media coverage. [2]\n\n[1] Engelhardt, Tom, ‘Casualties from Terrorism Are Minor Compared to Other Threats’, Gale Opposing Viewpoints, 2011\n\n[2] Singer, Eleanor, and Endreny, Phyllis Mildred, Reporting on Risk: How the Mass Media Portray Accidents, Diseases, Disasters and Other Hazards, Russell Sage Foundation, 1993\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "010210bf5cc31e89056365aaaf52aceb", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Transparency clearly does not have to extend to things like technical specifications of weapons. Such information would be a clear benefit to a competitor allowing them to build their own while being of little help in terms of transparency as most people could not understand it. On the other hand knowing what a weapons system does simply prevents misunderstanding and misjudgement.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "233e9b3bc0a8a255e9873e043871939a", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Clearly transparency in real time might cause some problems allowing the disruption of ongoing operations. However most of the time information could be released very shortly afterwards rather than being considered secret for 25-30 years. [1] A much shorter timeframe is needed if the transparency is to have any meaning or impact upon policy. In the case of WikiLeaks most of the information was already a couple of years old and WikiLeaks said it made sure that there was no information that could endanger lives released.\n\nWe should also remember that a lack of transparency can also endanger lives; this might be the case if it leads to purchases of equipment of shoddy equipment without the proper oversight to ensure everything works as it should. For example many countries purchased bomb detectors that are made out of novelty golf ball finders, just plastic, that do not work from a Briton looking to make a fast buck. It has for example been used to attempt to find car bombs in Iraq. A little transparency in testing and procurement could have gone a long way in protecting those who have to use the equipment. [2]\n\n[1] National Security Forum, No More Secrets, American Bar Association, March 2011, p.8\n\n[2] AFP, ‘Iraq still using phony bomb detectors at checkpoints’, globalpost, 3 May 2013\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a14b13bf8bc0f7c66db078a694948821", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Citizens have a right to know what is done in their name\n\nThe nation exits for its citizens; it depends on their consent to maintain order and to raise finances. The main purpose of the state is law and order, and national defence, both of which are covered by security. As an area that is so central to the role of the government it is vital that the stakeholders in that government, its citizens, know what it is the state is doing in their name for their security.\n\nThe Obama administration for example refuses to acknowledge that it is carrying out a campaign using drones while at the same time saying it is “the only game in town in terms of confronting and trying to disrupt the al-Qaeda leadership.” [1] If the US government is bombing another country then the US people have a right to know with much less ambiguity what exactly is being done, who is being hit, when and where. They also need to be informed of any possible consequences.\n\n[1] Kaufman, Brett, ‘In Court Today: Fighting the CIA’s Secrecy Claims on Drones’, ACLU, 20 September 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6e912d467095273ee0ff9cdf769e662a", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Transparency helps reduce international tension\n\nTransparency is necessary in international relations. States need to know what each other are doing to assess their actions. Without any transparency the hole is filled by suspicion and threat inflation that can easily lead to miscalculation and even war.\n\nThe Cuban missile crisis is a clear example where a lack of transparency on either side about what they were willing to accept and what they were doing almost lead to nuclear war. [1] It is notable that one of the responses to prevent a similar crisis was to install a hotline between the White House and Kremlin. A very small, but vital, step in terms of openness.\n\nToday this is still a problem; China currently worries about the US ‘pivot’ towards Asia complaining it “has aroused a great deal of suspicion in China.” “A huge deficit of strategic trust lies at the bottom of all problems between China and the United States.” The result would be an inevitable arms race and possible conflict. [2]\n\n[1] Frohwein, Ashley, ‘Embassy Moscow: A Diplomatic Perspective of the Cuban Missile Crisis’, Georgetown University School of Foreign Service, 7 May 2013\n\n[2] Yafei, He, ‘The Trust Deficit’, Foreign Policy, 13 May 2013\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "99c1824dc475da28e32b6bd46da57a3f", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Transparency is a good in and of itself\n\nThe most essential commodity within a state is trust. Trust is essential in all sorts of aspect of our lives; we trust that the paper money we have is actually worth more than a scrap of paper, that doctors performing surgery know what they are doing, that we won't be attacked in the street, and that the government is looking after our interests. In order to create that trust there needs to be transparency so that we know that our institutions are trustworthy. It is the ability to check the facts and the accountability that comes with transparency that creates trust. And this in turn is what makes them legitimate. [1]\n\nThe need for trust applies just as much to security as any other walk of life. Citizens need to trust that the security services really are keeping them safe, are spending taxpayers’ money wisely, and are acting in a fashion that is a credit to the country. Unfortunately if there is not transparency there is no way of knowing if this is the case and so often the intelligence services have turned out to be an embarrassment. As has been the case with the CIA and it’s the use of torture following 9/11, for which there are still calls for transparency on past actions. [2]\n\n[1] Ankersmit, Laurens, ‘The Irony of the international relations exception in the transparency regulation’, European Law Blog, 20 March 2013\n\n[2] Traub, James, ‘Out With It’, Foreign Policy, 10 May 2013\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "15361fc1d7df5c83d265640501a41209", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Transparency prevents, or corrects, mistakes\n\nTransparency is fundamental in making sure that mistakes don’t happen, or when they do that they are found and corrected quickly with appropriate accountability. This applies as much, if not more, to the security apparatus than other walks of life. In security mistakes are much more likely to be a matter of life and death than in most other walks of life. They are also likely to be costly; something the military and national security apparatus is particularly known for. [1] An audit of the Pentagon in 2011 found that the US Department of Defense wasted $70 billion over two years. [2] This kind of waste can only be corrected if it is found out about, and for that transparency is necessary.\n\n[1] Schneier, Bruce, ‘Transparency and Accountability Don’t Hurt Security – They’re Crucial to It’, The Atlantic, 8 May 2012\n\n[2] Schweizer, Peter, ‘Crony Capitalism Creeps Into the Defense Budget’, The Daily Beast, 22 May 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a796a5b3ac544c5791e365c93a702a87", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms In security too much transparency endangers lives\n\nTransparency is all very well when it comes to how much is being spent on a new tank, aircraft, or generals houses, but it is very different when it comes to operations. Transparency in operations can endanger lives. With intelligence services transparency would risk the lives of informants; it is similar with the case of interpreters for US forces in Iraq who were targeted after they were told they could not wear masks because they are considered to be traitors. [1]\n\nIn military operations being open about almost anything could be a benefit to the opposition. Most obviously things like the timing and numbers involved in operations need to be kept under wraps but all sorts of information could be damaging in one way or another. Simply because a state is not involved in a full scale war does not mean it can open up on these operations. This is why the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Admiral Mike Mullen in response to WikiLeaks said “Mr. Assange can say whatever he likes about the greater good he thinks he and his source are doing… But the truth is they might already have on their hands the blood of some young soldier or that of an Afghan family.” [2]\n\n[1] Londoño, Ernesto, ‘U.S. Ban on Masks Upsets Iraqui Interpreters’, Washington Post, 17 November 2008\n\n[2] Jaffe, Greg, and Partlow, Joshua, ‘Joint Chiefs Chairman Mullen: WikiLeaks release endangers troops, Afghans’, Washington Post, 30 July 2010\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e836f26811ab21d62006a7b65d9d475d", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Provides information to competitors\n\nWhere there is international competition transparency can be a problem if there is not transparency on both sides as one side is essentially giving its opponent an advantage. This is ultimately why countries keep national security secrets; they are in competition with other nations and the best way to ensure an advantage over those states is to keep capabilities secret. One side having information while the other does not allows the actor that has the information to act differently in response to that knowledge. Keeping things secret can therefore provide an advantage when making a decision, as the one with most information is most likely to react best. [1] Currently there is information asymmetry between the United States and China to the point where some analysts consider that the United States provides more authoritative information on China’s military than China itself does. [2]\n\n[1] National Security Forum, No More Secrets, American Bar Association, March 2011, p.7\n\n[2] Erickson, Andrew S., ‘Pentagon Report Reveals Chinese Military Developments’, The Diplomat, 8 May 2013\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5219d876deb9d0c533c0344ea65434f9", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Transparency can lead to conflict\n\nThe idea that transparency is good assumes that the people watching the government be transparent are likely to provide a moderating influence on policy. This is not always the case. Instead transparency can lead to more conflict.\n\nFirst a nationalist population may force the government into taking more action than it wants. One obvious way to quiet such sentiment is to show that the country is not ready for war; something that may not be possible if being transparent. Instead if it is transparent that the military could win then there is nothing to stop a march to war. It then becomes possible for multiple interest groups to form into coalitions each with differing reasons for conflict trading off with each other resulting in overstretch and conflict. [1]\n\nSecondly when there is a rapidly changing balance of power then transparency for the rising power may not be a good thing. Instead as Deng Xiaoping advised they should “Hide your strength, bide your time”. [2] Showing in the open how your military is expanding may simply force action from the current dominant power. Transparency, combined with domestic media worrying about the other’s build up can make the other side seem more and more of a threat that must be dealt with before it can get any more powerful. It is quite a common international relations theory that one way or another relative power and the quest for hegemony is the cause for war, [3] transparency simply encourages this. William C. Wohlforth points out when studying the cause of the First World War that it is perception of relative power that matters. Germany’s leaders believed it had to strike before it out of time as a result of Russia rapidly industrialising. [4] Transparency unfortunately reduces the ability of the government to manage perception.\n\n[1] Snyder, Jack, Myths of Empire, Cornell University Press, 1991, p.17\n\n[2] Allison, Graham, and Blackwill, Robert D., ‘Will China Ever Be No.1?’, YakeGlobal, 20 February 2013\n\n[3] Kaplan, Robert D., ‘Why John J. Mearsheimer Is Right (About Some Things)’, The Atlantic, 20 December 2011\n\n[4] Wohlforth, William C., ‘The Perception of Power: Russia in the Pre-1914 Balance’, World Politics, Vol.39, No.3, (April 1987), pp.353-381, p.362\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "347661c17e66451aee8b14cfa4137312", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Transparency can result in normalisation\n\nWhile something is secret it is clearly not a normal every day part of government, it is deniable and the assumption is that when it comes to light it has probably been wound up long ago. However making something transparent without winding it up can be a bad thing as it makes it normal which ultimately makes a bad policy much harder to end.\n\nThe use of drones by the CIA may turn out to be an example of this. At the moment we are told almost nothing about drones, not even how many strikes there are or how many are killed. There have however been recent suggestions that the drone program could be transferred to the Department of Defence. This would then make the targeted killing that is carried out seem a normal part of military conflict, somehting it clearly is not. [1] And the public reacts differently to covert and military action; already more Americans support military drones doing targeted killing (75%) than CIA ones (65%). [2]\n\n[1] Waxman, Matthew, ‘Going Clear’, Foreign Policy, 20 March 2013\n\n[2] Zenko, Micah, ‘U.S. Public Opinion on Drone Strikes’, Council on Foreign Relations, 18 March 2013\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8ca7d34ce798a4a7ea79ae0b30b50088", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Don’t panic!\n\nThe role of the security services is in part to deal with some very dangerous ideas and events. But the point is to deal with them in such a way that does not cause public disorder or even panic. We clearly don’t want every report detailing specific threats to be made public, especially if it is reporting something that could be devastating but there is a low risk of it actually occurring. If such information is taken the wrong way it can potentially cause panic, either over nothing, or else in such a way that it damages any possible response to the crisis. Unfortunately the media and the public often misunderstand risk. For example preventing terrorism has been regularly cited in polls as being the Americans top foreign policy goal with more than 80% thinking it very important in Gallup polls for over a decade [1] even when the chance of being killed by terrorism in Western countries is very low. If the public misunderstands the risk the response is unlikely to be proportionate and can be akin to yelling fire in a packed theatre.\n\nWhile it is not (usually) a security, but rather a public health issue, pandemics make a good example. The question of how much information to release is only slightly different than in security; officials want to release enough information that everyone is informed, but not so much that there is panic whenever there is an unusual death. [2] In 2009 the WHO declared swine flu to be a pandemic despite it being a relatively mild virus that did not cause many deaths, so causing an unnecessary scare and stockpiling of drugs. [3]\n\n[1] Jones, Jeffrey M., ‘Americans Say Preventing Terrorism Top Foreign Policy Goal’, Gallup Politics, 20 February 2013\n\n[2] Honigsbaum, Mark, ‘The coronavirus conundrum: when to press the panic button’, guardian.co.uk, 14 February 2013\n\n[3] Cheng, Maria, ‘WHO’s response to swine flu pandemic flawed’, Phys.org, 10 May 2011\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
05c33a5137e59c396e9adc0675cd6ccb	In security too much transparency endangers lives Transparency is all very well when it comes to how much is being spent on a new tank, aircraft, or generals houses, but it is very different when it comes to operations. Transparency in operations can endanger lives. With intelligence services transparency would risk the lives of informants; it is similar with the case of interpreters for US forces in Iraq who were targeted after they were told they could not wear masks because they are considered to be traitors. [1] In military operations being open about almost anything could be a benefit to the opposition. Most obviously things like the timing and numbers involved in operations need to be kept under wraps but all sorts of information could be damaging in one way or another. Simply because a state is not involved in a full scale war does not mean it can open up on these operations. This is why the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Admiral Mike Mullen in response to WikiLeaks said “Mr. Assange can say whatever he likes about the greater good he thinks he and his source are doing… But the truth is they might already have on their hands the blood of some young soldier or that of an Afghan family.” [2] [1] Londoño, Ernesto, ‘U.S. Ban on Masks Upsets Iraqui Interpreters’, Washington Post, 17 November 2008 [2] Jaffe, Greg, and Partlow, Joshua, ‘Joint Chiefs Chairman Mullen: WikiLeaks release endangers troops, Afghans’, Washington Post, 30 July 2010	[ { "docid": "233e9b3bc0a8a255e9873e043871939a", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Clearly transparency in real time might cause some problems allowing the disruption of ongoing operations. However most of the time information could be released very shortly afterwards rather than being considered secret for 25-30 years. [1] A much shorter timeframe is needed if the transparency is to have any meaning or impact upon policy. In the case of WikiLeaks most of the information was already a couple of years old and WikiLeaks said it made sure that there was no information that could endanger lives released.\n\nWe should also remember that a lack of transparency can also endanger lives; this might be the case if it leads to purchases of equipment of shoddy equipment without the proper oversight to ensure everything works as it should. For example many countries purchased bomb detectors that are made out of novelty golf ball finders, just plastic, that do not work from a Briton looking to make a fast buck. It has for example been used to attempt to find car bombs in Iraq. A little transparency in testing and procurement could have gone a long way in protecting those who have to use the equipment. [2]\n\n[1] National Security Forum, No More Secrets, American Bar Association, March 2011, p.8\n\n[2] AFP, ‘Iraq still using phony bomb detectors at checkpoints’, globalpost, 3 May 2013\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "cc27b95740431e69b0bc1831aac88d34", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Drones are an unusual example (though not unique) because they are a new form of warfare over which there are few clear rules and norms. This means that making it transparent will create new norms. However in the vast majority of covert operations if made public they would clearly be illegal and would have to be ended. Drones are also unusual in that the public sees few downsides to the killing, this means there would be less public pressure than in most such operations.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5329bbec94a4045317409feb80500b55", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Coalitions can form behind expansionist policies regardless of whether there is transparency. If there is no transparency then it is simply an invitation for these groups to overestimate the strength of their own state compared to their opponents. Where there is transparency the figures will at least be available to counter their arguments. It should not be surprising that interest groups do not have as much influence in creating expansionist policy in democracies. [1]\n\nTransparency showing when a state is to be eclipsed is a greater concern but a lack of transparency in such a case is just as bad. No transparency will simply encourage the fears of the state that is to be eclipsed that the rising state is hostile and not to be trusted.\n\n[1] Snyder, Jack, Myths of Empire, Cornell University Press, 1991, p.18\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "febedd589ddf647906d58640062ac232", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms The public is rational and can make its own assessment of risk. The best course in such cases is transparency and education. If all relevant information is released, along with analysis as to the risk presented by the threat, then the public can be best informed about what kind of threats they need to be prepared for. Terrorism has been blown out of proportion because they are single deadly incidents that are simple to report and have a good narrative to provide 24/7 coverage that the public will lap up. [1] As a result there has been much more media coverage than other threats. It can then be no surprise that the public overestimate the threat posed by terrorism as the public are told what risks are relevant by the amount of media coverage. [2]\n\n[1] Engelhardt, Tom, ‘Casualties from Terrorism Are Minor Compared to Other Threats’, Gale Opposing Viewpoints, 2011\n\n[2] Singer, Eleanor, and Endreny, Phyllis Mildred, Reporting on Risk: How the Mass Media Portray Accidents, Diseases, Disasters and Other Hazards, Russell Sage Foundation, 1993\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "010210bf5cc31e89056365aaaf52aceb", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Transparency clearly does not have to extend to things like technical specifications of weapons. Such information would be a clear benefit to a competitor allowing them to build their own while being of little help in terms of transparency as most people could not understand it. On the other hand knowing what a weapons system does simply prevents misunderstanding and misjudgement.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b26d4f95e504aded795c00e6481236f6", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Being a citizen does not come with a right to know everything that the state does. In much the same way being a shareholder does not mean you get to know absolutely everything every person in a business does. Instead you get the headlines and a summary, most of the time the how the business goes about getting the results is left to the management. Ultimately the state’s purpose is to protect its citizens and this comes before letting them know everything about how that is done.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0302ec750821ac54bbca7bdb877920ce", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms This is clearly not always the case. Often transparency means that the public becomes aware when there is little need for them to know. There had been previous nuclear accidents that had caused no damage, and had not been noticed, such as in Goldsboro, N.C. in 1961. [1] If there had been a media frenzy fuelled by released information there would clearly have been much more of a public relations disaster than there was with no one noticing. Since there’re was no harm done there is little reason why such a media circus should have been encouraged. And even without media attention the incident lead to increase safeguards.\n\n[1] Stiles, David, ‘A Fusion Bomb over Andalucia: U.S. Information Policy and the 1966 Palomares Incident’, Journal of War Studies, Vol.8, No.1, Winter 2006, pp.49-67, p.51\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c3dfed7d492942c83054985799e6fd08", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Transparency may mean that mistakes or problems are found faster, but it does not mean they are going to be corrected faster. Waste in the defense budget has been known about for years yet it still keeps coming up. Transparency shines a light on the problem but that is not helpful if it does not result in action to solve the problem.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0454e56e64fae4dda043ac62bef1678d", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Transparency in situations of international tension is tricky; with complete transparency how do you engage in bluffing? The state that is completely transparent is tying one hand behind its back in international negotiations.\n\nIt is also wrong to assume that transparency will always reduce tensions. Sometimes two countries just have completely incompatible interests. In such instances complete transparency is simply going to set them on a collision course. It is then much better for there to be a bit less transparency so that both sides can fudge the issue and sign up to an agreement while interpreting it in different ways.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "55f6baea9185cc31e60c0a00c3ab28e6", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Trust goes two ways; the people have to trust that on some issues, such as security, the government is doing the right thing to protect them even when it cannot release all relevant information. But even if the military and security services do claim to be completely transparent then how is everyone to know that it really is being as transparent as they say? Unfortunately there are information asymmetry’s between members of the public and the government; the member of the public is unlikely to have the capability to find out if the government if hiding something from them. [1] Other countries too are likely to be suspicious of ‘complete transparency’ and simply believe that this is cover for doing something more nefarious. Trust then cannot only about being transparent in everything.\n\n[1] Stiglitz, Joseph, ‘Transparency in Government’, in Roumeen Islam, The right to tell: the roll of the mass media in economic development, World Bank Publications, 2002, p.28\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e836f26811ab21d62006a7b65d9d475d", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Provides information to competitors\n\nWhere there is international competition transparency can be a problem if there is not transparency on both sides as one side is essentially giving its opponent an advantage. This is ultimately why countries keep national security secrets; they are in competition with other nations and the best way to ensure an advantage over those states is to keep capabilities secret. One side having information while the other does not allows the actor that has the information to act differently in response to that knowledge. Keeping things secret can therefore provide an advantage when making a decision, as the one with most information is most likely to react best. [1] Currently there is information asymmetry between the United States and China to the point where some analysts consider that the United States provides more authoritative information on China’s military than China itself does. [2]\n\n[1] National Security Forum, No More Secrets, American Bar Association, March 2011, p.7\n\n[2] Erickson, Andrew S., ‘Pentagon Report Reveals Chinese Military Developments’, The Diplomat, 8 May 2013\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5219d876deb9d0c533c0344ea65434f9", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Transparency can lead to conflict\n\nThe idea that transparency is good assumes that the people watching the government be transparent are likely to provide a moderating influence on policy. This is not always the case. Instead transparency can lead to more conflict.\n\nFirst a nationalist population may force the government into taking more action than it wants. One obvious way to quiet such sentiment is to show that the country is not ready for war; something that may not be possible if being transparent. Instead if it is transparent that the military could win then there is nothing to stop a march to war. It then becomes possible for multiple interest groups to form into coalitions each with differing reasons for conflict trading off with each other resulting in overstretch and conflict. [1]\n\nSecondly when there is a rapidly changing balance of power then transparency for the rising power may not be a good thing. Instead as Deng Xiaoping advised they should “Hide your strength, bide your time”. [2] Showing in the open how your military is expanding may simply force action from the current dominant power. Transparency, combined with domestic media worrying about the other’s build up can make the other side seem more and more of a threat that must be dealt with before it can get any more powerful. It is quite a common international relations theory that one way or another relative power and the quest for hegemony is the cause for war, [3] transparency simply encourages this. William C. Wohlforth points out when studying the cause of the First World War that it is perception of relative power that matters. Germany’s leaders believed it had to strike before it out of time as a result of Russia rapidly industrialising. [4] Transparency unfortunately reduces the ability of the government to manage perception.\n\n[1] Snyder, Jack, Myths of Empire, Cornell University Press, 1991, p.17\n\n[2] Allison, Graham, and Blackwill, Robert D., ‘Will China Ever Be No.1?’, YakeGlobal, 20 February 2013\n\n[3] Kaplan, Robert D., ‘Why John J. Mearsheimer Is Right (About Some Things)’, The Atlantic, 20 December 2011\n\n[4] Wohlforth, William C., ‘The Perception of Power: Russia in the Pre-1914 Balance’, World Politics, Vol.39, No.3, (April 1987), pp.353-381, p.362\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "347661c17e66451aee8b14cfa4137312", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Transparency can result in normalisation\n\nWhile something is secret it is clearly not a normal every day part of government, it is deniable and the assumption is that when it comes to light it has probably been wound up long ago. However making something transparent without winding it up can be a bad thing as it makes it normal which ultimately makes a bad policy much harder to end.\n\nThe use of drones by the CIA may turn out to be an example of this. At the moment we are told almost nothing about drones, not even how many strikes there are or how many are killed. There have however been recent suggestions that the drone program could be transferred to the Department of Defence. This would then make the targeted killing that is carried out seem a normal part of military conflict, somehting it clearly is not. [1] And the public reacts differently to covert and military action; already more Americans support military drones doing targeted killing (75%) than CIA ones (65%). [2]\n\n[1] Waxman, Matthew, ‘Going Clear’, Foreign Policy, 20 March 2013\n\n[2] Zenko, Micah, ‘U.S. Public Opinion on Drone Strikes’, Council on Foreign Relations, 18 March 2013\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8ca7d34ce798a4a7ea79ae0b30b50088", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Don’t panic!\n\nThe role of the security services is in part to deal with some very dangerous ideas and events. But the point is to deal with them in such a way that does not cause public disorder or even panic. We clearly don’t want every report detailing specific threats to be made public, especially if it is reporting something that could be devastating but there is a low risk of it actually occurring. If such information is taken the wrong way it can potentially cause panic, either over nothing, or else in such a way that it damages any possible response to the crisis. Unfortunately the media and the public often misunderstand risk. For example preventing terrorism has been regularly cited in polls as being the Americans top foreign policy goal with more than 80% thinking it very important in Gallup polls for over a decade [1] even when the chance of being killed by terrorism in Western countries is very low. If the public misunderstands the risk the response is unlikely to be proportionate and can be akin to yelling fire in a packed theatre.\n\nWhile it is not (usually) a security, but rather a public health issue, pandemics make a good example. The question of how much information to release is only slightly different than in security; officials want to release enough information that everyone is informed, but not so much that there is panic whenever there is an unusual death. [2] In 2009 the WHO declared swine flu to be a pandemic despite it being a relatively mild virus that did not cause many deaths, so causing an unnecessary scare and stockpiling of drugs. [3]\n\n[1] Jones, Jeffrey M., ‘Americans Say Preventing Terrorism Top Foreign Policy Goal’, Gallup Politics, 20 February 2013\n\n[2] Honigsbaum, Mark, ‘The coronavirus conundrum: when to press the panic button’, guardian.co.uk, 14 February 2013\n\n[3] Cheng, Maria, ‘WHO’s response to swine flu pandemic flawed’, Phys.org, 10 May 2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a14b13bf8bc0f7c66db078a694948821", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Citizens have a right to know what is done in their name\n\nThe nation exits for its citizens; it depends on their consent to maintain order and to raise finances. The main purpose of the state is law and order, and national defence, both of which are covered by security. As an area that is so central to the role of the government it is vital that the stakeholders in that government, its citizens, know what it is the state is doing in their name for their security.\n\nThe Obama administration for example refuses to acknowledge that it is carrying out a campaign using drones while at the same time saying it is “the only game in town in terms of confronting and trying to disrupt the al-Qaeda leadership.” [1] If the US government is bombing another country then the US people have a right to know with much less ambiguity what exactly is being done, who is being hit, when and where. They also need to be informed of any possible consequences.\n\n[1] Kaufman, Brett, ‘In Court Today: Fighting the CIA’s Secrecy Claims on Drones’, ACLU, 20 September 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ebfe986823148ce6d2b2e3e1922377f2", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Transparency prevents public relations disasters\n\nTransparency is necessary to avoid public relations disasters; particularly in countries where the media has some freedom to investigate for themselves. It is clearly the best policy for the military to make sure all the information is released along with the reasons behind actions rather than having the media finding individual pieces of a whole and speculating to fill the gaps.\n\nA good example would be a collision on 16th January 1966 between a B-52 bomber and a KC-135 tanker while attempting to refuel that destroyed both planes. Accidents happen, and this one cost 11 lives, but could have been much worse as the B-52 had four nuclear bombs on board were not armed and did not detonate. In this case an initial lack of information rapidly turned into a public relations disaster that was stemmed by much more openness by the military and the US Ambassador in Spain. The release of the information reduces the room for the press to fill in the gaps with harmful speculation. [1] In this case there was never much chance of national security implications or a break with Spain as the country was ruled by the dictator Franco, someone who would hardly pay attention to public opinion. But in a democracy a slow and closed response could seriously damage relations.\n\n[1] Stiles, David, ‘A Fusion Bomb over Andalucia: U.S. Information Policy and the 1966 Palomares Incident’, Journal of War Studies, Vol.8, No.1, Winter 2006, pp.49-67, p.65\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6e912d467095273ee0ff9cdf769e662a", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Transparency helps reduce international tension\n\nTransparency is necessary in international relations. States need to know what each other are doing to assess their actions. Without any transparency the hole is filled by suspicion and threat inflation that can easily lead to miscalculation and even war.\n\nThe Cuban missile crisis is a clear example where a lack of transparency on either side about what they were willing to accept and what they were doing almost lead to nuclear war. [1] It is notable that one of the responses to prevent a similar crisis was to install a hotline between the White House and Kremlin. A very small, but vital, step in terms of openness.\n\nToday this is still a problem; China currently worries about the US ‘pivot’ towards Asia complaining it “has aroused a great deal of suspicion in China.” “A huge deficit of strategic trust lies at the bottom of all problems between China and the United States.” The result would be an inevitable arms race and possible conflict. [2]\n\n[1] Frohwein, Ashley, ‘Embassy Moscow: A Diplomatic Perspective of the Cuban Missile Crisis’, Georgetown University School of Foreign Service, 7 May 2013\n\n[2] Yafei, He, ‘The Trust Deficit’, Foreign Policy, 13 May 2013\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "99c1824dc475da28e32b6bd46da57a3f", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Transparency is a good in and of itself\n\nThe most essential commodity within a state is trust. Trust is essential in all sorts of aspect of our lives; we trust that the paper money we have is actually worth more than a scrap of paper, that doctors performing surgery know what they are doing, that we won't be attacked in the street, and that the government is looking after our interests. In order to create that trust there needs to be transparency so that we know that our institutions are trustworthy. It is the ability to check the facts and the accountability that comes with transparency that creates trust. And this in turn is what makes them legitimate. [1]\n\nThe need for trust applies just as much to security as any other walk of life. Citizens need to trust that the security services really are keeping them safe, are spending taxpayers’ money wisely, and are acting in a fashion that is a credit to the country. Unfortunately if there is not transparency there is no way of knowing if this is the case and so often the intelligence services have turned out to be an embarrassment. As has been the case with the CIA and it’s the use of torture following 9/11, for which there are still calls for transparency on past actions. [2]\n\n[1] Ankersmit, Laurens, ‘The Irony of the international relations exception in the transparency regulation’, European Law Blog, 20 March 2013\n\n[2] Traub, James, ‘Out With It’, Foreign Policy, 10 May 2013\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "15361fc1d7df5c83d265640501a41209", "text": "media and good government politics defence government digital freedoms Transparency prevents, or corrects, mistakes\n\nTransparency is fundamental in making sure that mistakes don’t happen, or when they do that they are found and corrected quickly with appropriate accountability. This applies as much, if not more, to the security apparatus than other walks of life. In security mistakes are much more likely to be a matter of life and death than in most other walks of life. They are also likely to be costly; something the military and national security apparatus is particularly known for. [1] An audit of the Pentagon in 2011 found that the US Department of Defense wasted $70 billion over two years. [2] This kind of waste can only be corrected if it is found out about, and for that transparency is necessary.\n\n[1] Schneier, Bruce, ‘Transparency and Accountability Don’t Hurt Security – They’re Crucial to It’, The Atlantic, 8 May 2012\n\n[2] Schweizer, Peter, ‘Crony Capitalism Creeps Into the Defense Budget’, The Daily Beast, 22 May 2012\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
6508445c6bf5b9541a0735d341111698	Criminalisation creates more problems than it solves A law that punishes users of extremist websites would create a whole host of practical problems. Most obviously how are the authorities to monitor who are visiting extremist websites without a large expansion of a surveillance society that already exists? [1] There would need to be large scale monitoring of what websites everyone visits or at least the ability for governments to get records from internet service providers, potentially a grave breach of individual’s right to privacy. Laws are only effective if those who are subject to the law have some idea of what that law means and what they should not be doing. [2] A good law should define what exactly the criminality is and this law would almost certainly have many problems with definitions. What makes someone a regular or habitual visitor? A few visits too many sites, hundreds of visits, regular visits once a week? There will also be challenges working out which websites should be considered extremist and even then how is a user to know that a website they visit is considered an ‘extremist’ website? Any type of warning would be counterproductive as no one would ever be caught and extremists would keep changing websites. This would create a climate of fear on the internet due to ambiguity about what is acceptable and what might result in being thrown into prison. While itself a terrible infringement of freedom of expression at least blocking access to some websites has the advantage of showing what the state considers unacceptable. [1] Ball, Kirstie et al., ‘A Report on the Surveillance Society’, Surveillance Studies Network, September 2006, p.1. [2] Robinson, Paul, ‘The Role of Deterrence in the Formulation of Criminal Law Rules: At Its Worst When Doing Its Best’, Scholarship at Penn Law, Paper 51, p.31.	[ { "docid": "c490d4f5a1d96c2ea35b49e8111a6be0", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would This ‘climate of fear’ would only apply to those who know that what they are looking for is wrong. For these people if it does create a climate of fear then this is beneficial as it helps to create deterrence. Government would only be monitoring those it already suspects of extremism so ordinarily law abiding citizens need not be worried about surveillance as it will not affect them.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "d43422cb0a10a2b8505b3678536c6475", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would Criminalisation will prevent radicalisation by stopping users accessing the most extreme content. Sites such as YouTube and Facebook already police themselves and are unlikely to allow extremist materials to remain online for extended periods in the face of public pressure. [1] It is for extremist websites where public pressure can have no effect that needs the law to step in by punishing those who are regularly visiting those sites and being radicalised by them.\n\n[1] Google, ‘Our approach to free expression and controversial content’, googleblog, 9 March 2012.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7ddd4a7298dd9d0d6e6f13107a19a838", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would Freedom of expression carries with it duties and responsibilities which mean that this freedom may be subject to restrictions or penalties as the European Convention on Human Rights recognises. [1] In this case there is a national security interest and potentially a public safety interest to punish those who are accessing damaging information. Freedom of expression does not therefore apply to extremist websites that are inciting people to engage in acts of terrorism.\n\n[1] Council of Europe, ‘Article 10’, Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d72a86231a207914b7027c64f9f6a3a8", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would Many of the worries raised about who might be charged under such laws are irrelevant, judges and juries will be able to tell when someone is a journalist or intelligence official who does not have any criminal intent. Others who are visiting these extremist sites based upon ideology and yet are never going to engage in terrorist attacks themselves may well still provide financial or other support to those who do commit more violent acts. [1] A primary aim of the law is “to forbid and prevent conduct that unjustifiably and inexcusably inflicts or threatens substantial harm to individual or public interests” [2] something that this does by through preventing more major crimes by prosecuting for a minor crime. We should also remember that the punishment need not be disproportionate as it could simply mean restricting the guilty party’s internet access rather than prison.\n\n[1] Kroenig, Matthew and Pavel, Barry, ‘How to Deter Terrorism’, The Washington Quarterly, Vol.35, No.2, Spring 2012, pp.21-36, p.24.\n\n[2] Duff, Antony, \"Theories of Criminal Law\", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2008 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.).\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d5725dbc1610f140b38271334ba832e5", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would Punishing the users of these extremist websites will not force these extremists to confront their views either. Punishing them is likely to create a victim mentality, a belief that the state is out to get them because of their beliefs not because of any particular act they may have committed. This is similarly likely to confirm them in their resentments and cause more radicalisation.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "896fe77bf056bee658fce6f7ec86dfd3", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would The proposition is assuming that we know what effect visiting extremist websites will have, we don’t. For some regularly visiting websites that promote violence may end up sickening them and encouraging them to re-evaluate their views rather than further radicalising them. The best way to prevent heinous terrorist acts is not to lock people up on minor offenses but to amass evidence of the much larger offences they are planning and convict them for those offenses rather than a law that will catch many innocents as well as the guilty.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2a3f9130afef4e3d8e5a15871a07671d", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would There is no evidence that a deterrent like this works, we will never know who might have been radicalised but was not because they were deterred from visiting extremist websites. However if those visiting these websites really are terrorists then a spell in prison is not going to deter them. Moreover this is not a good way of preventing radicalisation as it does not get to the key issues. Instead of prosecuting those who visit extremist websites they must be shown how those views are wrong, something that can only be done through debate and discussion, [1] locking them up will not do this.\n\n[1] Rothschild, Nathalie, ‘How can debate challenge extremism?’, guardian.co.uk.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e6480feef0e3fdf85811a46eedc2cb70", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would Freedom of expression is a fundamental human right.\n\nFreedom of expression is a fundamental human right that is recognised universally as is shown by its inclusion in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. [1] This however should not just be taken as the freedom to have an opinion but also as the freedom to “seek and receive… information and ideas through any media”, being cut off from information that a person is seeking is as much an infringement of human rights as preventing them from voicing their opinion. [2] People are denied their voice as much by not having access to information as by not being allowed to speak because access to information is fundamental in the process of being able to form those opinions. Learning and opinion forming cannot exist within a vacuum access to information that enables this. This freedom includes the freedom to access extremist websites as often as you wish without being punished for this action, we cannot prejudge what opinion will be formed from access to this information let alone what actions may result from that opinion.\n\n[1] The General Assembly of the United Nations, ‘Article 19’, Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 10 December 1948.\n\n[2] Best, Michael L., ‘Can the Internet be a Human Right?’ Human Rights and Human Welfare, Vol.4 2004, p.24\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "857fc7c19bf34758659508e5df07ec94", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would Criminalisation will not stop radicalisation\n\nHow will criminalising visiting extremist websites prevent radicalisation? Those who know about the law will simply look for the same material that they used to find on extremist websites elsewhere on the internet either through social networks such as Facebook and twitter, where for example Muhammad al-Arefe a Saudi cleric who has issued a fatwa endorsing violence against non-Muslims has over a million followers, [1] or other immense sites such as youtube. Radicalisation over the internet will therefore not be stopped by punishing users of certain websites.\n\nIndeed such punishment of users of extremist websites may well end up creating more radical extremists than it prevents. Merah himself when talking to police negotiators before his death told them that it was being sent to prison for 18 months for driving without a licence that provoked his outrage against France and path to murder. This law would be putting more young men in prison and therefore potentially radicalising them through giving them something to be angry about, the opportunity to meet real extremists and demonstrating why the extremists believe the west should be attacked. [2]\n\n[1] Kessler, Oren, ‘Saudi clerics use social media to spread hate’, Jerusalem Post, 10 May 2012.\n\n[2] Lando, Barry, ‘New Laws Pushed by Nicolas Sarkozy After Toulouse Massacre Go Too Far’, The Daily Beast, 24 March 2012.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b4cef47084385e37c92bf56d0b554cc0", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would There is a lack of proportionality in punishing users of extremist websites\n\nIt is a basic principle of fairness that punishment should fit the crime. [1] In this case the crime is visiting a website, something that in itself may cause no harm at all so why should there be punishment? At best such a law would be punishing on the basis of future harm the accused would otherwise cause if not punished while at worst it would be an arbitrary punishment for people who would never have committed any harm at all.\n\nNot everyone who visits extremist websites is themselves an extremist or is going to be radicalised even after regular visits. Moreover not every person with extremist views is either themselves violent or intending to promote violence. Finally there are a large number of people who regularly visit extremist websites with the purpose of monitoring them; these may be members of the police, the intelligence services, those simply wanting to understand the other and journalists attempting to keep up with extremist trends. What such a law would be doing would be criminalising curiosity.\n\n[1] Hirsch, Andrew Vvon, ‘Proportionality in the Philosophy of Punishment’, Crime and Justice, Vol.16 (1992), pp.55-98.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "17fe31e2fef050e41584dfd9dc5a540b", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would The internet is an echo chamber that will confirm extremists in their views if not stopped\n\nThe internet may be a free for all where all ideas and viewpoints can be found but that does not mean that all users view all these views. Instead the internet acts as an echo chamber that encourages people to believe their own views are correct and so get more extreme rather than challenging them. Eli Pariser author of a book called The Filter Bubble argues that the internet forces us to consume a very narrow range of views as search engines have been personalised with the intention of letting users find what they like so two people searching for the same thing on google can get very different results, for example when googling ‘BP’ during the oil spill one person might be directed to information about the spill and its environmental consequences while another might get just investment information. [1] When this kind of filtering is added to people constantly interacting with extremists and on websites praise and incite terrorism it is clear that users of these sites will get caught in a confirmation bias and conformation bias tends to lead to people becoming more polarised. [2] It is therefore the right policy to punish users of extremist websites before they become too radicalised as it is only a very short step from believing an attack is praiseworthy to carrying out similar attacks.\n\n[1] Gross, Doug, ‘What the Internet is hiding from you’, CNN, 19 May 2011.\n\n[2] Lord, C., Ross, L., and Lepper, M., ‘Biased Assimilation and Attitude Polarization: The effects of Prior Theories on Subsequently Considered Evidence’. JPSP, 1979, no.37, pp.2098-2109. Summary from faculty.babson.edu.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "36207e37c95e2289aed49f38aeb4e5ad", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would Link between visiting extremist websites and being radicalised\n\nRegardless of whether as Sarkozy claims Mohammed Merah would himself have been stopped earlier had this law been in place at the time this law will catch some terrorists in the future and stop them before they can do large amounts of harm. Punishing users of extremist websites will mean that the government can stop those who are on a path to radicalisation through their access to the internet and as a result this will help neutralise a key tool used by extremists to radicalise others.\n\nThere have already been examples of people being inspired to carry out violent jihad through material online such as Roshonara Choudhry who after watching some of Anwar Al Awlaki’s sermons online attempted to murder Labour MP Stephen Timms. [1] This kind of legislation would mean that he could be punished for the lesser crime thereby preventing him from being able to engage in much more damaging criminal activities. Simply put if extremists are behind bars they are not engaging in terrorist attacks that could kill many people.\n\n[1] Dodd, Vikram, ‘YouTube urged to delete radical cleric’s sermons’, guardian.co.uk, 28 February 2011.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "aa4882acb15ea5c60a4cc8831afb737d", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would There needs to be a deterrent against those thinking of visiting extremist websites\n\nNational security concerns around terrorism mean that it is necessary to have a deterrent that will help prevent the recruitment of terrorists. Terrorism is one of the biggest threats to western countries today and this is potentially an effective way of dealing with it.\n\nTraditional military responses to terrorism do not work due to terrorists’ underground nature and decentralised cell structure that operates throughout the world. It is even questionable whether ‘al Qaeda’ as a group exists at all except as an identity for those wanting to attack the west to operate under. Efforts against terrorism therefore need to be aimed at preventing radicalisation and stopping individuals rather than attempting to destroy the whole group known as al Qaeda. This law not only deters people from becoming extremists through making them think twice about visiting extremist websites but it also helps to deter promoters of extremism through denying them an audience. [1]\n\nIf punishing users of extremist websites prevents even a few people who would otherwise have visited these websites from doing so and setting out on a part of radicalisation that leads to terrorism then it will have been a success.\n\n[1] Kroenig, Matthew and Pavel, Barry, ‘How to Deter Terrorism’, The Washington Quarterly, Vol.35, No.2, Spring 2012, pp.21-36, p.25.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
51836e868dc9aaee335e4cd753cbda54	There is a lack of proportionality in punishing users of extremist websites It is a basic principle of fairness that punishment should fit the crime. [1] In this case the crime is visiting a website, something that in itself may cause no harm at all so why should there be punishment? At best such a law would be punishing on the basis of future harm the accused would otherwise cause if not punished while at worst it would be an arbitrary punishment for people who would never have committed any harm at all. Not everyone who visits extremist websites is themselves an extremist or is going to be radicalised even after regular visits. Moreover not every person with extremist views is either themselves violent or intending to promote violence. Finally there are a large number of people who regularly visit extremist websites with the purpose of monitoring them; these may be members of the police, the intelligence services, those simply wanting to understand the other and journalists attempting to keep up with extremist trends. What such a law would be doing would be criminalising curiosity. [1] Hirsch, Andrew Vvon, ‘Proportionality in the Philosophy of Punishment’, Crime and Justice, Vol.16 (1992), pp.55-98.	[ { "docid": "d72a86231a207914b7027c64f9f6a3a8", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would Many of the worries raised about who might be charged under such laws are irrelevant, judges and juries will be able to tell when someone is a journalist or intelligence official who does not have any criminal intent. Others who are visiting these extremist sites based upon ideology and yet are never going to engage in terrorist attacks themselves may well still provide financial or other support to those who do commit more violent acts. [1] A primary aim of the law is “to forbid and prevent conduct that unjustifiably and inexcusably inflicts or threatens substantial harm to individual or public interests” [2] something that this does by through preventing more major crimes by prosecuting for a minor crime. We should also remember that the punishment need not be disproportionate as it could simply mean restricting the guilty party’s internet access rather than prison.\n\n[1] Kroenig, Matthew and Pavel, Barry, ‘How to Deter Terrorism’, The Washington Quarterly, Vol.35, No.2, Spring 2012, pp.21-36, p.24.\n\n[2] Duff, Antony, \"Theories of Criminal Law\", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2008 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.).\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "d43422cb0a10a2b8505b3678536c6475", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would Criminalisation will prevent radicalisation by stopping users accessing the most extreme content. Sites such as YouTube and Facebook already police themselves and are unlikely to allow extremist materials to remain online for extended periods in the face of public pressure. [1] It is for extremist websites where public pressure can have no effect that needs the law to step in by punishing those who are regularly visiting those sites and being radicalised by them.\n\n[1] Google, ‘Our approach to free expression and controversial content’, googleblog, 9 March 2012.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7ddd4a7298dd9d0d6e6f13107a19a838", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would Freedom of expression carries with it duties and responsibilities which mean that this freedom may be subject to restrictions or penalties as the European Convention on Human Rights recognises. [1] In this case there is a national security interest and potentially a public safety interest to punish those who are accessing damaging information. Freedom of expression does not therefore apply to extremist websites that are inciting people to engage in acts of terrorism.\n\n[1] Council of Europe, ‘Article 10’, Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c490d4f5a1d96c2ea35b49e8111a6be0", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would This ‘climate of fear’ would only apply to those who know that what they are looking for is wrong. For these people if it does create a climate of fear then this is beneficial as it helps to create deterrence. Government would only be monitoring those it already suspects of extremism so ordinarily law abiding citizens need not be worried about surveillance as it will not affect them.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d5725dbc1610f140b38271334ba832e5", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would Punishing the users of these extremist websites will not force these extremists to confront their views either. Punishing them is likely to create a victim mentality, a belief that the state is out to get them because of their beliefs not because of any particular act they may have committed. This is similarly likely to confirm them in their resentments and cause more radicalisation.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "896fe77bf056bee658fce6f7ec86dfd3", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would The proposition is assuming that we know what effect visiting extremist websites will have, we don’t. For some regularly visiting websites that promote violence may end up sickening them and encouraging them to re-evaluate their views rather than further radicalising them. The best way to prevent heinous terrorist acts is not to lock people up on minor offenses but to amass evidence of the much larger offences they are planning and convict them for those offenses rather than a law that will catch many innocents as well as the guilty.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2a3f9130afef4e3d8e5a15871a07671d", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would There is no evidence that a deterrent like this works, we will never know who might have been radicalised but was not because they were deterred from visiting extremist websites. However if those visiting these websites really are terrorists then a spell in prison is not going to deter them. Moreover this is not a good way of preventing radicalisation as it does not get to the key issues. Instead of prosecuting those who visit extremist websites they must be shown how those views are wrong, something that can only be done through debate and discussion, [1] locking them up will not do this.\n\n[1] Rothschild, Nathalie, ‘How can debate challenge extremism?’, guardian.co.uk.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e125ce45b691d52cf146605b61b90c1b", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would Criminalisation creates more problems than it solves\n\nA law that punishes users of extremist websites would create a whole host of practical problems. Most obviously how are the authorities to monitor who are visiting extremist websites without a large expansion of a surveillance society that already exists? [1] There would need to be large scale monitoring of what websites everyone visits or at least the ability for governments to get records from internet service providers, potentially a grave breach of individual’s right to privacy.\n\nLaws are only effective if those who are subject to the law have some idea of what that law means and what they should not be doing. [2] A good law should define what exactly the criminality is and this law would almost certainly have many problems with definitions. What makes someone a regular or habitual visitor? A few visits too many sites, hundreds of visits, regular visits once a week? There will also be challenges working out which websites should be considered extremist and even then how is a user to know that a website they visit is considered an ‘extremist’ website? Any type of warning would be counterproductive as no one would ever be caught and extremists would keep changing websites. This would create a climate of fear on the internet due to ambiguity about what is acceptable and what might result in being thrown into prison. While itself a terrible infringement of freedom of expression at least blocking access to some websites has the advantage of showing what the state considers unacceptable.\n\n[1] Ball, Kirstie et al., ‘A Report on the Surveillance Society’, Surveillance Studies Network, September 2006, p.1.\n\n[2] Robinson, Paul, ‘The Role of Deterrence in the Formulation of Criminal Law Rules: At Its Worst When Doing Its Best’, Scholarship at Penn Law, Paper 51, p.31.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e6480feef0e3fdf85811a46eedc2cb70", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would Freedom of expression is a fundamental human right.\n\nFreedom of expression is a fundamental human right that is recognised universally as is shown by its inclusion in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. [1] This however should not just be taken as the freedom to have an opinion but also as the freedom to “seek and receive… information and ideas through any media”, being cut off from information that a person is seeking is as much an infringement of human rights as preventing them from voicing their opinion. [2] People are denied their voice as much by not having access to information as by not being allowed to speak because access to information is fundamental in the process of being able to form those opinions. Learning and opinion forming cannot exist within a vacuum access to information that enables this. This freedom includes the freedom to access extremist websites as often as you wish without being punished for this action, we cannot prejudge what opinion will be formed from access to this information let alone what actions may result from that opinion.\n\n[1] The General Assembly of the United Nations, ‘Article 19’, Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 10 December 1948.\n\n[2] Best, Michael L., ‘Can the Internet be a Human Right?’ Human Rights and Human Welfare, Vol.4 2004, p.24\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "857fc7c19bf34758659508e5df07ec94", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would Criminalisation will not stop radicalisation\n\nHow will criminalising visiting extremist websites prevent radicalisation? Those who know about the law will simply look for the same material that they used to find on extremist websites elsewhere on the internet either through social networks such as Facebook and twitter, where for example Muhammad al-Arefe a Saudi cleric who has issued a fatwa endorsing violence against non-Muslims has over a million followers, [1] or other immense sites such as youtube. Radicalisation over the internet will therefore not be stopped by punishing users of certain websites.\n\nIndeed such punishment of users of extremist websites may well end up creating more radical extremists than it prevents. Merah himself when talking to police negotiators before his death told them that it was being sent to prison for 18 months for driving without a licence that provoked his outrage against France and path to murder. This law would be putting more young men in prison and therefore potentially radicalising them through giving them something to be angry about, the opportunity to meet real extremists and demonstrating why the extremists believe the west should be attacked. [2]\n\n[1] Kessler, Oren, ‘Saudi clerics use social media to spread hate’, Jerusalem Post, 10 May 2012.\n\n[2] Lando, Barry, ‘New Laws Pushed by Nicolas Sarkozy After Toulouse Massacre Go Too Far’, The Daily Beast, 24 March 2012.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "17fe31e2fef050e41584dfd9dc5a540b", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would The internet is an echo chamber that will confirm extremists in their views if not stopped\n\nThe internet may be a free for all where all ideas and viewpoints can be found but that does not mean that all users view all these views. Instead the internet acts as an echo chamber that encourages people to believe their own views are correct and so get more extreme rather than challenging them. Eli Pariser author of a book called The Filter Bubble argues that the internet forces us to consume a very narrow range of views as search engines have been personalised with the intention of letting users find what they like so two people searching for the same thing on google can get very different results, for example when googling ‘BP’ during the oil spill one person might be directed to information about the spill and its environmental consequences while another might get just investment information. [1] When this kind of filtering is added to people constantly interacting with extremists and on websites praise and incite terrorism it is clear that users of these sites will get caught in a confirmation bias and conformation bias tends to lead to people becoming more polarised. [2] It is therefore the right policy to punish users of extremist websites before they become too radicalised as it is only a very short step from believing an attack is praiseworthy to carrying out similar attacks.\n\n[1] Gross, Doug, ‘What the Internet is hiding from you’, CNN, 19 May 2011.\n\n[2] Lord, C., Ross, L., and Lepper, M., ‘Biased Assimilation and Attitude Polarization: The effects of Prior Theories on Subsequently Considered Evidence’. JPSP, 1979, no.37, pp.2098-2109. Summary from faculty.babson.edu.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "36207e37c95e2289aed49f38aeb4e5ad", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would Link between visiting extremist websites and being radicalised\n\nRegardless of whether as Sarkozy claims Mohammed Merah would himself have been stopped earlier had this law been in place at the time this law will catch some terrorists in the future and stop them before they can do large amounts of harm. Punishing users of extremist websites will mean that the government can stop those who are on a path to radicalisation through their access to the internet and as a result this will help neutralise a key tool used by extremists to radicalise others.\n\nThere have already been examples of people being inspired to carry out violent jihad through material online such as Roshonara Choudhry who after watching some of Anwar Al Awlaki’s sermons online attempted to murder Labour MP Stephen Timms. [1] This kind of legislation would mean that he could be punished for the lesser crime thereby preventing him from being able to engage in much more damaging criminal activities. Simply put if extremists are behind bars they are not engaging in terrorist attacks that could kill many people.\n\n[1] Dodd, Vikram, ‘YouTube urged to delete radical cleric’s sermons’, guardian.co.uk, 28 February 2011.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "aa4882acb15ea5c60a4cc8831afb737d", "text": "internet freedom digital freedoms freedom expression house would There needs to be a deterrent against those thinking of visiting extremist websites\n\nNational security concerns around terrorism mean that it is necessary to have a deterrent that will help prevent the recruitment of terrorists. Terrorism is one of the biggest threats to western countries today and this is potentially an effective way of dealing with it.\n\nTraditional military responses to terrorism do not work due to terrorists’ underground nature and decentralised cell structure that operates throughout the world. It is even questionable whether ‘al Qaeda’ as a group exists at all except as an identity for those wanting to attack the west to operate under. Efforts against terrorism therefore need to be aimed at preventing radicalisation and stopping individuals rather than attempting to destroy the whole group known as al Qaeda. This law not only deters people from becoming extremists through making them think twice about visiting extremist websites but it also helps to deter promoters of extremism through denying them an audience. [1]\n\nIf punishing users of extremist websites prevents even a few people who would otherwise have visited these websites from doing so and setting out on a part of radicalisation that leads to terrorism then it will have been a success.\n\n[1] Kroenig, Matthew and Pavel, Barry, ‘How to Deter Terrorism’, The Washington Quarterly, Vol.35, No.2, Spring 2012, pp.21-36, p.25.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
2fe971302b2c031cc2522beabc695e8a	The bill does not exclude evolution just allows room for other theories What this bill allows is for the facts to be taught and then seen through the lens of various theories. The bill requires that the schools within the state remain within the state science curriculum. It “protects the teaching of scientific information, and shall not be construed to promote any religious or non-religious doctrine”. [1] Evolution will therefore still have to be taught and won’t be replaced wholesale by any other theory. The result therefore is that this Tennessee law opens up academic enquiry and science rather than shutting it down as opponents claim. [1] Dunn, ‘House Bill 368 An Act to amend Tennessee Code Annotated, Title 49, Chapter 6, Part 10, relative to teaching scientific subjects in elementary schools’’, State of Tennessee, http://www.capitol.tn.gov/Bills/107/Bill/HB0368.pdf	[ { "docid": "e753ae4f88e6a78c2e8911d9c6846a34", "text": "free know house believes tennessee correct protect teachers who wish In practice allowing room for other theories is a “permission slip for teachers to bring creationism, climate-change denial and other non-science into science classrooms”. The singling out of these subjects in the bill shows that it is not about impartiality and objectivity in science. [1] Instead it is promoting a kind of science denial allowing anyone with some quack theory to demand to be allowed to teach it regardless of the evidence.\n\n[1] Thompson, Helen, ‘Tennessee ‘monkey bill’ becomes law’, nature, 11 April 2012, http://www.nature.com/news/tennessee-monkey-bill-becomes-law-1.10423\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "6096360bda35ebc566a6adafa4a9e6d3", "text": "free know house believes tennessee correct protect teachers who wish Teaching just evolution does not prevent teacher encouraging students to analyse how well evolution fits with the facts the students have learned. Similarly there can still be critical discourse in the classroom; analysing a fossil to decide what kind of animal it was and what its various parts of its anatomy were for would be just as rewarding for students. Moreover analysing on a smaller scale would mean having all the available evidence whereas students could never be expected to study all the evidence on creationism and evolution.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "712eadae1b793096ffbfbe273a63f40e", "text": "free know house believes tennessee correct protect teachers who wish This is not a freedom of speech issue. Teachers are already free to express their own views during their own free time. When teaching in a school however they are limited by the demands of what is necessary to teach their pupils. Freedom of speech does not give teachers qualified in one subject the wherewithal to teach their class a different subject which is effectively what teaching creationism means. Creationism should remain in religion classes and evolution should remain in science classes. Teachers are employed by the state in order to teach children facts, not spread personal ideology. It is therefore best to seperate facts and ideas into seperate subjects.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9ce10467977c0d79dc1eee6010bdbcfc", "text": "free know house believes tennessee correct protect teachers who wish It is never too early to teach students to question ideas and theories no matter how well grounded they may claim to be. Students are capable of realiseing that there is a difference between the theories that interpret the facts and the facts themselves so educating in the facts will not be more difficult. The result will be classes that are much more engaged in the subject because they have more input in the teaching, this can only be good for science education.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1a6578387f812e2afbe2365347c5f2ed", "text": "free know house believes tennessee correct protect teachers who wish We cannot yet fully test evolution either; we can't recreate evolution in the lab. Creationism provides a valid critique and so should be taught alongside.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ca8cd013fbd3c1ac5fe64beb35174b5a", "text": "free know house believes tennessee correct protect teachers who wish First the ‘don’t say gay’ bill has not been passed as it was dropped by its republican sponsor Joey Hensley. [1] That this bill is directed at only a few subjects does not mean that it is not about academic freedom and freedom of speech. The bill is simply targeting and highlighting areas where the assembly believes free speech is lacking and alternative views need to be presented.\n\n[1] ‘Tennessee ‘Don’t Say Gay’ Bill To Get Axed’, Huffington Post, 1 May 2012, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/01/tennessee-dont-say-gay-bill_n_1...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7b9cd6351132c951c20250b6735ac2a8", "text": "free know house believes tennessee correct protect teachers who wish It is unquestioningly taking the ‘consensus’ view on issues like evolution and climate change that is misleading children. Teaching only the one viewpoint misleads children into thinking that the issue is fact and settled so denying the ongoing controversies in each of these areas. [1]\n\n[1] Zabarenko, Deborah, ‘Tennessee teacher law could boost creationism, climate denial’, Reuters, 13 April 2012, http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/13/us-usa-education-tennessee-idUSBRE83C0JR20120413\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "67d40cf383788cf1dd5ce073b21a1756", "text": "free know house believes tennessee correct protect teachers who wish Teaching creationism as well as evolution gives students freedom to choose\n\nThis bill that opens the door to creationism is really about changing the way that teaching is done to make it more critical and analytical. This is an improvement in scientific education as it will help ensure that science is about critical, constructive discourse rather than just imbibing ‘facts’. [1] This bill aims to “inform students about scientific evidence and to help students develop critical thinking skills necessary to becoming intelligent, productive, and scientifically informed citizens”. [2] How can students be critical and learn to analyse if there is only one theory available to them through which to look at and analyse those facts? That would not be education, it would be indoctrination. [3]\n\n[1] Zimmer, Robin, ‘Critical Thinking, Analysis Foster Good Science’, The Tennessean, 11 March 2011, http://www.discovery.org/a/16591\n\n[2] Dunn, ‘House Bill 368 An Act to amend Tennessee Code Annotated, Title 49, Chapter 6, Part 10, relative to teaching scientific subjects in elementary schools’’, State of Tennessee, http://www.capitol.tn.gov/Bills/107/Bill/HB0368.pdf\n\n[3] ‘New Tennessee law: encouraging creationism or academic freedom’, Public Radio International, 23 April 2012, http://www.pri.org/stories/politics-society/new-tennessee-law-encouraging-creationism-or-academic-freedom-9548.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6e9e71f6050fffa0de7b9147f5fb9d53", "text": "free know house believes tennessee correct protect teachers who wish Freedom of speech should apply to teachers as much as anyone else\n\nFreedom of speech and expression are protected by the first amendment to the US constitution [1] and teachers are entitled to freedom of speech and their academic freedom as much as anyone else. If a science teacher does not believe that the evidence supports evolution then why should s/he have to teach evolution as fact rather than just as one of several competing theories? The Tennessee bill protects freedom of expression by freeing teachers to include whatever other angles on controversies such as evolution or climate change as they wish.\n\n[1] Legal Information Institute, ‘First Amendment: An overview’, Cornell University Law School, 19 August 2010, http://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/First_amendment\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "28230719027aafdd627dc5fdaa49cbca", "text": "free know house believes tennessee correct protect teachers who wish Children should have the freedom not to be misled\n\nPart of freedom of speech is the freedom to get accurate information. The students in school have this right not to be misled by their teachers [1] so teachers should have to concentrate on providing facts and evidence and what has been scientifically proven. Eugenie C. Scott of the National Center for Science Education argues “Telling students that evolution and climate change are scientifically controversial is miseducating them” because there is no controversy among scientists. [2] The law as it stands may attempt to sound balanced but preventing “discrimination for or against religion or non-religion” [3] opens the door to any theory seeking to explain the evidence no matter how flawed. This would be directly counter to the objective teaching the bill claims to promote. If there is to be objectivity schools must stick to the evidence and what it shows; evolution. The teachers may of course encourage the students to come up with their own interpretations of the evidence but should not be attempting to force their own views upon the students.\n\n[1] Zabarenko, Deborah, ‘Tennessee teacher law could boost creationism, climate denial’, Reuters, 13 April 2012, http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/13/us-usa-education-tennessee-idUSBRE83C0JR20120413\n\n[2] Strauss, Valerie, ‘Tennessee back to the future with new anti-evolution law’, Post Local, 11 April 2012, http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/tennessee-back-to-the-future-with-new-anti-evolution-law/2012/04/11/gIQAJb7g9S_blog.html\n\n[3] Dunn, ‘House Bill 368 An Act to amend Tennessee Code Annotated, Title 49, Chapter 6, Part 10, relative to teaching scientific subjects in elementary schools’’, State of Tennessee, http://www.capitol.tn.gov/Bills/107/Bill/HB0368.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c6608feb3d4fdebf8a03101b5a3ac9dc", "text": "free know house believes tennessee correct protect teachers who wish As it is not science creationism should not even be covered by the Tennessee law\n\nAs creationism does not fit the definition of \"science\", it is not even addressed by the law cited in the introduction to this discussion. The act specifically allows to discuss \"scientific strengths and scientific weaknesses of existing scientific theories\". It is a very false conclusion that because evolution is both scientific and a hypothesis, any other hypothesis must be scientific as well.\n\nCreationism is lacking the key point of anything that could even remotely be called science, namely testability and falsifiability. Evolution posesses this property: There may one day be actual evidence that the theory is incorrect, such as a modern human fossil being found in a layer of soil that dates back aeons. Given enough such incidents, one could reasonably claim that evolution has been disproved and that there must be a better model to approximate reality. This is what commonly happens in the world of science. As a prominent example one may cite our views on atoms: They have been refined from \"they are tiny multi-symmetrical grains\" to the detailled analysis of sub-atomic particles we see today. This took innumerable steps, and yet we know for sure that our theories will never be accurate enough to describe reality.\n\nHowever, such a process is impossible with creationism, as it is based on a belief. In theory, it could very well be true - God could have created C14 signatures in such a way that they would appear billions of years old to a modern researcher, and we could never know. This may be applied to each and every other aspect of research on the foundations of our universe. But excactly because we can never know, creationism can never be subjected to scientific analysis, and thus cannot qualify as scientific or science. It can only be subject to belief: You may well chose to believe that the creation happened excactly as described in the bible, as an omnipotent being would surely have the power to defy the laws of physics and just 'make things be'. Thus, in theory, any contradictory evidence such as the C14 signatures may be dismissed based on belief in an omnipotent being, whose non-existance may never be disproved either due to the laws of logic.\n\nFor this reason, creation may never be falsified, cannot be called a scientific theory and is not addressed by the law cited above. Hence, its discussion should not be supported by the state.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "20578f6287b717db705d61b6e1f45b15", "text": "free know house believes tennessee correct protect teachers who wish Teachers should not have freedom to teach whatever they wish as fact\n\nThere is a difference between a demand for freedom to teach what you like and freedom of speech. Freedom of speech does not apply in the classroom; students are not allowed to stand up and discuss whatever issues they want and neither should the teacher. Both have to stick to a syllabus that ensures that the children are taught the basics of each subject so that the student can move on to more advanced instruction.\n\nUltimately for students to be able to exercise their right to freedom of speech they need to have a well-rounded education that provides a grounding of knowledge and how to analyse that knowledge. The student is then perfectly free to challenge this teaching and exercise their freedom of expression and explore many more ideas and dismiss evolution if they wish.\n\nEssentially this bill is encouraging criticism of science at too early a stage, in elementary or even secondary school teachers are still teaching what science is, what it is for and how it works and it does not help to ‘muddy the waters’. [1]\n\n[1] ‘New Tennessee law: encouraging creationism or academic freedom’, Public Radio International, 23 April 2012, http://www.pri.org/stories/politics-society/new-tennessee-law-encouraging-creationism-or-academic-freedom-9548.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b1fc091818c57c8c1f776b85644fd7e2", "text": "free know house believes tennessee correct protect teachers who wish Tennessee is not seeking to protect freedom of speech\n\nWhile supporters of this bill justify it based upon ‘academic freedom’ this is clearly not a motivating factor for the Tennessee legislature. At almost the same time a bill that prevents teachers discussing homosexuality was passed through the state’s education committee, if freedom of speech has been a concern this would never have even been brought up. [1] Moreover if the bill was about freedom of speech there would be no need to highlight particular controversies or particularly pick out science as an area requiring more discussion and dissent. Students could learn much more about competing interpretations of historical events, competing ideas in geography such as alternative theories about how oil is created, [2] even the English language is not totally settled as new meanings are created and new words added.\n\n[1] Selwyn, Casey, ‘Teaching creationism in US schools’, Free Speech Debate, 2 May 2012, http://freespeechdebate.com/en/case/teaching-creationism-in-us-schools/\n\n[2] Glasby, Geoffrey P., ‘Abiogenic Origin of Hydrocarbons: An Historical Overview’, Resource Geology, vol.56, no.1, 2006, pp.85-98, http://static.scribd.com/docs/j79lhbgbjbqrb.pdf\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
8add5ef3bf6489c1bcf3c580d4a8a3a1	Popular history Who owns a nation’s history? The current government? Those living today? Scholars? There’s not really a satisfying answer as every group is interested in and uses different parts of history. It doesn’t sit happily into the usual structures, a defeated power may not get to write the history but it certainly has an interest in it. Within a relatively short period of time the nation that featured in historical events has ceased to exist regardless of what happens with borders and names. China may be the best example of all here; which nation is being protected. The China of the revolution? Of the Korean War? Of the Cultural Revolution? Of the Economic reforms of the seventies or the Economic super power of today? What about the Imperial China? Which dynasty? For any nation, the question can be asked, which class, which race, which generation, gender, political creed and so on have a claim to the collective history of the nation. [i] History must therefore be in the open so that everyone can investigate it and can build their own historical narratives. Secrecy by the government is an attempt to claim ownership of shared events that cannot be owned. As history is an essential part of the creation of an identity government attempts at ownership are a direct attack on an individual’s right to decide their own identity. [i] Berger, Stefan, ‘History and national identity: why they should remain divorced’, History & Policy, December 2007, http://www.historyandpolicy.org/papers/policy-paper-66.html	[ { "docid": "9f46a158c3522ab6a12e7120bec813cc", "text": "free challenge house believes nations history and mythology part its Ownership of the past, for the purposes of this debate, would seem all too evident. Governments determine what information is legitimate to publish both domestically and internationally and do so in the interests of the state. The recent outcry from Western governments about the Wikileaks publication of diplomatic cables dating back to the mid-sixties suggests that Western governments take a somewhat different attitude when it is their historical national security being broadcast. The ongoing detention of Bradley Manning in solitary confinement further suggests that they take a rather more supra-judicial approach than the Chinese [i] .\n\n[i] One of many sites to notice this double standard between the West commenting on other nations’ dissidents and dealing with its own is: Lankaweb. Hameed Abdul Karim. If Bradley Manning were Chinese... 16 June 2012.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "50416c00fcbf69412f644e4d4f24c9d0", "text": "free challenge house believes nations history and mythology part its Opposition is living in a fantasy world. They forget that people do not always have rational responses to history, while the outcome of the event in question may not be changed revealing awkward truths could have unpleasant results, so for example if the Chinese government were to suddenly accept responsibility for the killing of millions during the great leap forward riots or even revolution could very well occur. Governments regularly suppress information on the basis of national security and their citizens accept that as a reality. Indeed most accept it as a benefit.\n\nIt seems likely that the only reason Dr Xu’s case has achieved notoriety is that he studied in the west (Oxford) for ten years. The same is true of Dr. Gao Zhan (Syracuese) and Dr. Li Shaomin (Princeton) – the other two high-profile academic detainees. It does rather suggest that the spotlight on their cases has less to do with a genuine concern with free speech and more to do with having friends in the West who don’t think their associates should be treated under the same rules as other Chinese citizens. Western nations have their own rules on secrecy which can be used to prosecute those who break them. [i] It is hypocrisy to deny China the right to do the same.\n\n[i] ‘Official Secrets Act 1989’, legislation.gov.uk, 11 May 1989, http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1989/6/introduction\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "24b06f6167c19459b52f79b3e194412c", "text": "free challenge house believes nations history and mythology part its By definition, we don’t know what is suppressed by governments; who knows, maybe there are aliens at Roswell, Presley is alive and well and Nixon shot Kennedy. However, unofficial leaks as well as official reclassifications of secret data always excite interest, so it seems reasonable to assume that there is some information that remains classified with good reason. However old information such as military ciphers, designs for armaments and discussions that suggests more than usual levels of incompetence of mendacity among the political classes, they are likely to remain secret – for the excellent reason that confidence in the entire system depends on it. For better or worse, that process tends to be called national security.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5f9e7e0bbe6ca4a50ac7edcc6ad1ac99", "text": "free challenge house believes nations history and mythology part its This is an excellent reason why as much information as possible should be publically and internationally available [i] . China’s entry into the Korean war was justified on grounds of national security at the time and that line has been doggedly followed since. Truman thought it was “a bald attempt to blackmail the UN” [ii] at the time and the opinion of many has not changed since. The US and Korea have had to face some of their demons about the war since; why not China? It is also difficult to see what this has to do with the foundational myths of the Chinese state, which go back thousands of years, or even the Communist party which come from the long march and the second world war. And if indeed it is a ‘myth’ then is there not a duty to show that this historical record is wrong? National identity should be built on the basis of facts not manufactured mythologies.\n\n[i] Eurozine. Danuta Glondys, Arne Ruth. Breaking the Bonds of National Mythology. 14 March 2011.\n\n[ii] China intervenes (October – December 1950). Korean War. Wikipedia.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "fad8a44f5fedbb3bd69a1d55dac46601", "text": "free challenge house believes nations history and mythology part its In such instances, clearly nations will pursue their national interest but, just to take Prop’s example, the ICJ [i] spends most of its time dealing with disputes about maritime law, mostly ownership issues. They work on the basis of investigation and fact. Suppressing information would clearly only be an attempt to reduce the information available so as to prevent an unbiased judgement. To take the Senkaku/Daioyu example yes the China’s may have some documents conceding Japanese sovereignty but that does not end the dispute. Nor would losing the case in such a dispute be a real threat to the national security of either side; the territory and resources would be nice to have but are not vital for either’s economy or security. So Proposition has yet to give an example of where there would be a clear issue of national security – or even national interest in hiding history.\n\n[i] International Criminal Court of Justice website. Contentious Cases\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "262ee03c6ae5e483b456ede9503344f9", "text": "free challenge house believes nations history and mythology part its There is rarely anything to do with protecting the past in these decisions. It is all to do with the present and either manufacturing an image of a previous decision or covering up corruption or incompetence on the part of the party, faction or individual that happens to be in charge at the time. What Proposition so cheerily describes as ‘grubby minutiae’ would be more generally referred to as ‘facts’, proposition seems to think that history shouldn’t let these ‘grubby minutiae’ get in the way of a good story. If proposition is correct in its view that “It would be impossible to change those results” then there is no reason why historians should not be free to investigate and reinterpret the record as to how these results were arrived at.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4ee174e40cd6ab04004adc9b80490c86", "text": "free challenge house believes nations history and mythology part its Open expression\n\nIf ever there were a situation where free expression should be assumed, this is surely it. Where no harm can come of knowing something (Prop appears to accept this by saying the outcome can’t be changed) what possible reason could there be suppressing the information? [i] The only possible reason would seem to be that it is more convenient for that small group of people, those currently both living and powerful, that the true details of past events not emerge.\n\nIf this is the case then the other arguments for free speech come into play, particularly its role in holding the powerful to account.\n\nEither way, proposition loses; if it’s just the minutiae of bygone times, then why not release it, if it’s the stuff of modern day political discourse then the failure to publish it is tantamount to tyranny. To take oppositions own example will learning that Churchill wanted Hitler’s lieutenants executed without trial will this really affect people’s opinions of Churchill? It seems unlikely, many would have similar opinions in the same situation and will be able to understand Churchill’s position.\n\n[i] This principle – that all things being equal there should be a presumption in favour of publication – has been argued in different ways in different countries. A useful example is the US Supreme Court Ruling in the matter of the New York Times vs The United States.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7d6ba2c54baa0d32fdf230ae162fcc61", "text": "free challenge house believes nations history and mythology part its ‘It will come out eventually’\n\nJournalism is sometimes called the first draft of history. That does, of course, raise the issue of who writes the final draft. On the basis that historians still argue about the events of centuries and millennia ago, the notion of a final draft may be absurd; however conclusions will be drawn at some point. Politicians trying to hold back historical judgement is a little like trying to hold back the tide, even if the facts are not all available the void will be filled with speculation to explain the gap.\n\nUltimately information will emerge and will be assessed. The question seems to be when that should take place. Those states that make use of a ‘thirty year rule’ or something similar to protect particular documents such as cabinet minutes do so to allow the free exchange of ideas in the present. [i] Such a length of time seems sufficient to let politicians and civil servants operate without endlessly focussing on their legacies.\n\nHowever, beyond that trying to control the assessment of history seems to be an exercise in futility. Even the deepest, darkest secrets tend to be extrapolated when they’re not demonstrated. Imprisoning historians and banning things only tends to confirm the view that they were right and there is something damning being hidden. Ultimately, it’s self-defeating.\n\n[i] BBC News, ‘Secret papers face faster release’, 29 January 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7857370.stm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "310ed72c20a1bffac8873f2800e08789", "text": "free challenge house believes nations history and mythology part its Foundational Myths\n\nNations come from somewhere, or at least we tend to believe they do [i] . The fact that these foundational myths are usually either partially or completely untrue is mostly irrelevant. These myths – be they of glorious revolutions or long histories reaching back into antiquity are projections of the modern nation. However, they are only the most obvious example of national mythologies, we project our current-day identities onto all sorts of more recent histories as well. To take one fairly flippant example of this, ask a national of any country involved on the victorious side in WWII and ask them who won the war.\n\nStates have an interest in perpetuating these myths, not for particular or personal motives but because they add to a sense of national identity and the homogeneity of the whole. To that extent they are, quite literally, a matter of national security they confer and justify the notion of the nation as an entity or the concept of the nation state as a possibility. As national historian Spyridon Lambros said “next to military power, the pen of the historian is the most powerful weapon of national ambitions.” [ii]\n\n[i] Tambini, D. Ethnic and Racial studies, Vol 24 No. 2 March 2001 pp. 195 – 217. Post-national citizenship.\n\n[ii] Berger, Stefan, ‘History and national identity: why they should remain divorced’, History & Policy, December 2007\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "504f55150de22ccc26874a7ce47baf1d", "text": "free challenge house believes nations history and mythology part its Predicting and protecting the future nation\n\nIn a much more practical sense historical data may well breach national security. They may well be instances, such as in the case given in the introduction, where governments may even be unaware that there were issues of national security involved until they are brought to light. Data that was not significant fifty years ago may become of great significance later on.\n\nTo take a simple, hypothetical example. Laws relating to the ownership of the sea are relatively obscure and often based on ancient negotiations or treaties that are mostly about something else. They frequently involve custom and precedent and, for the most part, nobody really makes a fuss about the exact details. Until, of course, someone finds an oil field underneath that stretch of ocean or the fish supplies of a neighboring area become depleted [i] . At his point, the exact details of those negotiations and treaties become a source of great interest. Thus for example documents relating the Senkaku/Daioyu islets may have been uncontentious and irrelevant in the 1950 may now be of vital importance in an international dispute between China and Japan over the islands. [ii] [iii]\n\nIn a scenario such as this, there may well be vital national issues that were not predicted at the time of the negotiation or ratification of a treaty. Disputes of this nature – justifying industrial scale claims to mineral and fishing rights on the basis of historical claims are likely to boom over the next few years in relation to the poles as the icecaps recede [iv] .\n\n[i] There are islands around the world under disputed ownership for this reason. Senkaku /Diaoyu (China/Japan) and Dokdo/Takeshima (Japan/Korea)are two obvious examples.\n\n[ii] Lee, Joyman, ‘Senkaku/Diaoyu: Islands of Conflict’, History Today, Vol. 61 no.5, 2011\n\n[iii] Gertz, Bill, ‘China-Japan tensions’, The Washington Times, 15 September 2010\n\n[iv] Sea Shepherd Conservation Society. Captain Paul Watson. The Birth of a New Manchuria. 25 January 2008.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "fd3805daa6c302965d9cf13615c6e92f", "text": "free challenge house believes nations history and mythology part its Protecting the past\n\nThere is a simple case of natural justice in protecting the decisions and reputations of those who have served the state and can no longer speak for themselves [i] . The same applies to events, for better or worse political or military disputes that were settled fifty or a hundred years ago are best left like that, settled.\n\nAll nations have moments in their histories that are unlikely to reflect that country at its best but we judge our own nations and others on a balance of the broad sweep of history rather than the grubby minutiae of particular events.\n\nBy its nature the historical record will always be incomplete – silent on motivations of those involved or the particularities of individual decisions as we can never know everything and not all decision making processes are recorded. We already know the overall outcomes of, for example, wars or elections. It would be impossible to change those results by discovering that they were not handled as one might have wished. Neither is their much to be gained in despoiling the characters of those involved – national psyches need their heroes and villains, making either of them more human in both senses of the phrase adds little and could distract much. For example do we really need to know that Churchill opposed the Nuremburg trials instead favouring execution without trial for senior Nazi leaders? Does it diminish Churchill’s greatness or undermine the results of the Nuremburg trials? No. [ii]\n\n[i] BBC News Website. Secret papers face faster release. 29 January 2009.\n\n[ii] Cobain, Ian, ‘Britain favoured execution over Nuremberg trials for Nazi leaders’, The Guardian, 26 October 2012\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
5aa63cf1ec965eb09c142ea9ddf50815	Democratic states have an obligation to not bolster repression abroad It is common for Western democracies to make sweeping statements about the universality of certain rights, and that their system of government is the one that should be most sought after in the world, that democracy is the only legitimate form of government. As when Obama in Cairo proclaimed “These are not just American ideas; they are human rights. And that is why we will support them everywhere.” [1] They claim to work in the United Nations and other organizations toward the improvement of rights in other countries and clamour about the need for building governments accountability around the world, using their liberal-democratic paradigm as the model. Yet at the same time democratic governments and companies sell technologies to non-democratic allies that are used to systematically abuse the rights of citizens and to entrench the power of those avowedly illegitimate regimes. These hypocrisies read as a litany of shame. A telling example is the Blair government in the United Kingdom selling weapons to an oppressive regime in Indonesia for the sake of political expediency even after proclaiming an ‘ethical foreign policy’. [2] Even if democracies do not feel it is a defensible position to actively seek to subvert all non-democratic states, and that non-democracies should be considered semi-legitimate on the basis of nations’ right to self-determination, they should still feel morally obliged not to abet those regimes by providing the very tools of oppression on which they rely. [3] To continue dealing in these technologies serves only to make democratic countries’ statements hollow, and the rights they claim to uphold seem less absolute, a risk in itself to freedoms within democracies. Respect for rights begins at home, and actively eroding them elsewhere reduces respect for them by home governments. [1] Obama, Barack, “Remarks by the President on a new beginning”, Office of the Press Secretary, 4 June 2009, http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Remarks-by-the-President-at-Cairo-University-6-04-09 [2] Burrows, G. “No-Nonsense Guide to the Arms Trade”. New Internationalist. 2002, http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Weapons/Arms_Trade.html [3] Elgin, B. “House Bill May Ban US Surveillance Gear Sales”. Bloomberg. 9 December 2012. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-12-09/house-bill-would-ban-surveillance-gear-sales-by-american-firms.html	[ { "docid": "b584ad451b33d65761ca3f03be1e96a4", "text": "internet freedom censorship ip digital freedoms freedom expression A democracy, like any state, owes its first duty to its citizens, and its national interest is therefore in selling this equipment to help business at home. While it is convenient, perhaps even morally right at times, to stand publicly for the universality of democratic principles, such stands should not be taken at the expense of national security or influence. It should certainly not be considered an obligation. Sweeping policies like this will alienate valuable allies and make it more difficult for democracies to deal with the undemocratic world. With regard to domestic freedoms, states have long held different standards of action when dealing with their own citizens than those of other states, and that has never served to erode domestic freedoms.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "7dea8bf0b225b8b6e931b2d4c83c1f3b", "text": "internet freedom censorship ip digital freedoms freedom expression Is a minor ban really a good signal? The chances are the government will ignore it and those who it is meant to encourage will never hear about it. In the event that the regimes it is aimed at do take not far from weakening them, this policy serves only to alienate them. The lack of respect the policy is clearly aimed to show will galvanize the leaderships in undemocratic regimes to cut off various ties with democratic states, limiting the flow of ideas and democratic principles that natural adhere to activities like international trade. The result is non-democracies will be less willing to talk about reform in the international community because they see their very form of government as under threat by foreign agents seeking to discredit them. Ultimately, a boost in Western moral does little to promote democracy and human rights while a negative signal will result in regimes being more suspicious and obstinate.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d360b9678c0e659213c68211274bf918", "text": "internet freedom censorship ip digital freedoms freedom expression Corporations are bound to obey the laws of the societies in which they are based, but they are not so constrained in their foreign dealings, in which they are bound instead by foreign laws that are often much more lax. The nature of the international landscape, with its many incompatible and overlapping forms of government and regulatory frameworks, demands that corporations be flexible in order to survive. The constraints put upon the manufacturers of surveillance equipment put forward by this policy will make them less competitive in the international market, which is often the primary market for these businesses. Furthermore, if they feel constrained they may pull up stakes and move their operations abroad to a more accommodating jurisdiction. This would serve to harm domestic jobs and undermine the ability of democratic states to maintain their edge over others in essential surveillance technology development.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "50a4cbab15608ec4a67aa714d4342405", "text": "internet freedom censorship ip digital freedoms freedom expression Security services have managed to watch over and infiltrate the efforts of dissidents all through history. The visibility and tactics is all that has changed. The internet was never going to just be an arena that helps dissidents in authoritarian regimes but as with other technological advances, such as the telephone both increases communication and provides methods of monitoring that communication. If non-democratic states were to lose access to Western technology, they would either procure comparable replacements from other non-democracies, or they would pursue more traditional forms of surveillance, ones that tend to be more invasive and physically threatening.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b4294f36eddc2b29bdc837a65a7f2bbc", "text": "internet freedom censorship ip digital freedoms freedom expression Real politick is not the only consideration democracies should entertain when they engage in international relations. Indeed, the Western powers have sought since World War II to develop a system of international justice that recognizes the primacy of peoples’ rights irrespective of where they are born. This principle is constantly compromised as democracies jockey for influence with undemocratic regimes, bolstering those regimes and their repressive norms in the process. In order to be consistent, and to serve the true interests of justice, democracies must not aid undemocratic governments in the repression of their people.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d9552a55a0b39a1b3199d96d8ca5651d", "text": "internet freedom censorship ip digital freedoms freedom expression Oppressive regimes have turned to the use of advanced surveillance technology in response to activists’ learning to evade more conventional methods of surveillance, and by moving their organizations online. Western surveillance technology has filled a niche that was once open for dissidents. By placing this ban, even if the regimes turn back to old methods, they will still be hampered in the crushing of dissent. Furthermore, no regime has the resources or power to have physical surveillance as pervasive as the technology denied them would allow. Electronic surveillance therefore can cast a much broader net that would allow the government to repress many more people who would not be subject to more labour intensive physical surveillance.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "eaacd07c7ef793301e39aa56f43fc817", "text": "internet freedom censorship ip digital freedoms freedom expression Banning the sale of surveillance technology does not mean democracies are declaring all undemocratic regimes illegitimate. Rather, they are simply not allowing their technology to aid in the repression of people, which is the only use to which that technology is put in practice. Reform sometimes demands a firm hand, and while some regimes will be riled by what they perceive as an insult, the greater chance for dissidents to develop networks and voices is worth the cost.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "38e2fed1d3c125ed420eeb369afa7a2e", "text": "internet freedom censorship ip digital freedoms freedom expression While Western states are willing to use surveillance technology to restrict their citizens, they do so always with a democratic mandate. That is the key difference. Democracies use surveillance technology to provide their people with the safety and security they demand, a security over which the people always have the veto of the ballot box. The non-democracy is not checked by any such power, and thus its use of surveillance technology faces no constraint.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "25e78c13d591df8d9b0fc36b01d69e78", "text": "internet freedom censorship ip digital freedoms freedom expression The right of Western businesses to sell their services abroad can be curtailed when their actions stand counter to the interests of their home governments\n\nCorporations are private entities that have the right to sell their services and to deal with agents foreign and domestic, including governments. However, this right can be limited when those actions are oppositional to the aims of the home state in which they are incorporated. The sale of surveillance technology to undemocratic regimes stands against the avowed aims of democracies and against their strategic interests in bolstering democracy abroad and maintaining a reputation for fair dealing. For this reason it is perfectly legitimate for governments to ban the corporations within their borders from selling dangerous technologies to foreign governments. Such is already the case with many kinds of strategic technology, especially weapons technology. [1] The EU, for example, bans a range of arms sales to various oppressive states on these grounds, [2] China in particular is an example where it would potentially be very lucrative to overturn the ban. [3] Corporations benefit from the protection of democratic states, as they provide bases of operations that shield their right to property and ensure stability and the rule of law. If corporations wish to benefit from these provisions they must be willing to accept the instructions of the states that house them regarding what can and cannot be sold to foreign powers.\n\n[1] Elgin, B. “House Bill May Ban US Surveillance Gear Sales”. Bloomberg. 9 December 2012. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-12-09/house-bill-would-ban-surveillan...\n\n[2] Banks, M. “Senior MEP Calls for Freeze on Arms Sale to North Africa”. The Parliament.com. 7 July 2011. http://www.theparliament.com/latest-news/article/newsarticle/senior-mep-calls-for-freeze-on-arms-sale-to-north-africa/\n\n[3] See the debatabase debate ‘This House believes the European Union should lift its ban on member states selling arms to China’ http://idebate.org/debatabase/debates/international-affairs/european-union/house-believes-lift-arms-sales-ban-china\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9140af9fd9ade5aa5fa40b992993acf3", "text": "internet freedom censorship ip digital freedoms freedom expression Advanced surveillance technology prevents dissidents from being able to organize and sue for freedom\n\nHigh-tech surveillance technology has given repressive governments and police states a new lease on life. Now more than ever they can intrude into every aspect of people’s lives, ensuring that dissent is cowed for fear of the ever present threat of the security services. The vision of Orwell’s 1984 has become a living nightmare for people all over the world. Their power has made it extremely difficult for movements for reform, government accountability, and democracy, which have foundered when faced with these sophisticated security apparatuses (Valentino-Devries, 2011). [1] By dominating the flow of information states have the power to keep their people in check and prevent them from ever posing a threat to their repressive status quo. Thus China blocks access to the internet and to other forms of communications in Tibet to “ensure the absolute security of Tibet’s ideological and cultural realm”. It cuts the Tibetan people off from outside world so as to prevent any rerun of the instability that occurred in 2008, which China blamed on the influence of the Dalai Lama from outside. [2]\n\nOnly external help in alleviating this censorship could allow activists to organize effectively and perhaps to one day bring about genuine reform and justice to their societies. The surveillance equipment on which these regimes rely is often only available from firms and governments in the democratic world where, by and large, technology is generally far more advanced than in the non-democratic world. Without access to these technologies, the regimes would be far more hard-pressed to keep rigid tabs on their citizens, allowing for the seeds of dissent to take root. Only then can the forces clamouring for democracy hope to be able to organise networks of activists, and to have their views considered by the state.\n\n[1] Valentino-Devries, J. “US Firm Acknowledges Syria Uses its Gear to Block Web”. Wall Street Journal. 29 October 2011, http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203687504577001911398596328.html\n\n[2] Human Rights Watch, “China: Attempts to Seal Off Tibet from Outside Information”, 13 July 2012, http://www.hrw.org/news/2012/07/13/china-attempts-seal-tibet-outside-information\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7b7c81f5ec09ce24b328a37302d0d375", "text": "internet freedom censorship ip digital freedoms freedom expression This ban would have a powerful signalling effect expressing disapproval of non-democracies' system of government\n\nA ban on the sale of surveillance technology to non-democracies serves ultimately as a statement of disapproval. It shows that the undemocratic regimes cannot be trusted with the ability to spy on their people. This signal has several effects. An example of this international shaming affecting is the international bans on the use of landmines. Various states created a framework, the Ottawa Convention, [1] in which their condemnation pressured nearly every other state, including authoritarian regimes, to follow suit. [2] Domestically it serves to bolster people’s faith in the system of rights they value highly and enshrine in law. They can point to this ban as an example of their government’s desire to make a better world and not to increase repression for the sake of power or profit. In the undemocratic states themselves, the regime leaders will be faced with a significant public relations blow as they come under criticism. This serves to embolden and empower holders of dissenting opinions and to spark pro-democratic discourse. In the international community it makes an emphatic value judgement on the merit of certain systems of government, namely the superiority of democracy and government accountability to the people, principles most non-democracies still pay some form of lip-service to. Overall, this policy boosts the credibility of democracy, while undermining the influence of undemocratic states.\n\n[1] See the debatabase debate ‘This House (as the USA) would sign the Ottawa convention banning landmines’, http://idebate.org/debatabase/debates/international/house-usa-would-sign-ottawa-convention-banning-landmines\n\n[2] Wexler, L. “The International Deployment of Shame, Second-Best Responses, And Norm Entrepreneurship: The Campaign to Ban Landmine and the landmine Ban Treaty”. Arizona Journal of International and Comparative Law. 2003. http://www.ajicl.org/AJICL2003/vol203/wexlerarticle.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2dffd66d4acf91283261a49c3e7b8a4d", "text": "internet freedom censorship ip digital freedoms freedom expression It is hypocritical for democratic governments to utilize surveillance technology to watch their own people while denying that technology to others\n\nIt is a fatal conceit to consider democracies somehow above the influence of using their surveillance technology to curtail the freedoms of their own citizens. The biggest customers of Western surveillance technology companies are wealthy democracies. The United Kingdom, for example, has one of the most-watched populations in the world, with a saturation of CCTV cameras far in excess of any dictatorship. [1] The PATRIOT Act in America, also, has given the federal government enormous scope for domestic spying. These powers are no less simply because the government is composed in part of elected officials. The security establishment is appointed, not elected, and their servicemen are promoted from within. It is base hypocrisy to pretend that the security systems are inherently more just when employed in democratic states than in undemocratic ones. They are used for the same purpose, to ensure that the state is protected and the status quo maintained. Democracies have no moral basis on which to base this policy.\n\n[1] BBC News. “Britain is ‘Surveillance Society’”. 2 November 2006, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6108496.stm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c790ff698bfdfdc4ddc502dc617eeb05", "text": "internet freedom censorship ip digital freedoms freedom expression The inability to use advanced technologies merely forces non-democracies to utilize more unsavoury methods to achieve their aims\n\nIf it is the aim of an undemocratic regime to use advanced surveillance technology to gather intelligence on, and ultimately crush, dissent it will find other means of doing so. Their calculus of survival is not changed, only their available methods. Their first port of call will be the more advanced non-democracies that might be able to supply comparable surveillance equipment. China’s military and surveillance technology is fast catching up to that of the West, and makes an appealing alternative source for equipment. [1] The only difference is that the Chinese have no compunction at all about how the technology is used, meaning worse outcomes for pro-democracy groups who run afoul of them. When this strategy fails regimes can turn to the tried and tested models of past decades, using physical force and other less technological modes of coercion to cow dissent. Again, this form of repression is quite effective, but it is also much more painful to those on the receiving end. Given the options, democracies supplying surveillance technology may be the best option for dissidents in undemocratic countries.\n\n[1] Walton, G. “China’s Golden Shield: Corporations and the Development of Surveillance Technology in the People’s Republic of China”. International Centre for Human Rights and Democratic Development. 2001.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "93405f494adbf5d8e5c45ec41c313c21", "text": "internet freedom censorship ip digital freedoms freedom expression Presuming democracy is the only legitimate or worthwhile form of government is both inaccurate and unproductive\n\nAs much as the more liberal citizenry of many of the world’s democracies wish to believe otherwise, democracy as a system of government is not the only game in town. In fact, the growth of the strong-state/state-capitalism approach to government has gained much traction in developing countries that witness the incredible rise of China, which will before long be the world’s largest economy, flourish under an undemocratic model. [1] Chinas ruling communist party have legitimacy as a result of its performance and its historical role reunifying the country. [2] Democracies pretending they are the only meaningful or legitimate states only serve to antagonize their non-democratic neighbours. Such antagonism is doubly damaging, considering that all states, democracies included, rely on alliances and deals with other states to guarantee their security and prosperity. This has meant that through history democracies have had to deal with non-democracies as equal partners on the international stage, and this fact is no different today. States cannot always pick and choose their allies, and democracies best serve their citizens by furthering their genuine interests on the world stage. This policy serves as a wedge between democracies and their undemocratic allies that will only weaken their relations to the detriment of both. When the matter comes to surveillance technology, Western states’ unwillingness to share an important technology they are willing to use themselves causes tension between these states. Non-democracies have just as much right to security that surveillance technology can provide as the more advanced states that develop those technologies.\n\n[1] Acemoglu, D. and Robinson, J. “Is State Capitalism Winning?”. Project Syndicate. 31 December 2012. http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/why-china-s-growth-model-will-fail-by-daron-acemoglu-and-james-a--robinson\n\n[2] Li, Eric X, “The Life of the Party”, Foreign Affairs, January/February 2013, http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/138476/eric-x-li/the-life-of-the-party?page=4\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f5bfa5a9c8616ae65d5517378a40f104", "text": "internet freedom censorship ip digital freedoms freedom expression This ban will alienate non-democracies from discourse and stifle reform efforts\n\nWhen a state is declared illegitimate in the eyes of a large part of the international community, its natural reaction is one of upset and anger. A ban on the sale of surveillance technology to non-democracies would be seen as a brutal slap in the face to many regimes that consider themselves, and are often considered by their people, to be the legitimate government of their country. The ban will result in further tension between non-democracies and democracies, breaking down communication channels. Democracies are best able to effect change in regimes when they seek to engage them constructively, to galvanize them to make gradual connections to the development of civil society and to loosen restrictions on freedoms, such as reducing domestic spying. The ban makes it clear that the ultimate aim of democracies is to effectively overthrow the existing governments of non-democracies in favour of systems more like their own. The outcome of this conclusion is far less willingness on the part of these regimes to discuss reform, and makes it more likely that they will demonize pro-democracy activists within their borders as agents of foreign powers seeking to subvert and conquer them. This particular narrative has been used to great effect by many regimes throughout history, including North Korea and Zimbabwe, Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa for example denounced a travel and arms sales ban as attempting to “undermine the inclusive government”. [1] By treating non-democracies as responsible actors democracies do much more in effectively furthering their own aims.\n\n[1] BBC News, “Zimbabwean minister denounces EU”, 14 September 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/8254367.stm\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
65ea8d189995579150f281c858b910af	Promoting religious freedom exacerbates conflict Once a pluralistic religiously free society is created there may be less conflict, but how do we get to that stage? Promoting religious freedom itself creates diplomatic conflict between states because domestic religion is considered to be an area where states are sovereign so dislike interference. [1] Promoting religious tolerance is not as well received by the people as the promotion of political rights. This is because often the dominant religion is favoured while minorities are those who are not tolerated. Countries trying to promote religious freedom are therefore not likely to find as much support from civil society as would be the case when advocating that citizens be allowed to vote in free and fair elections. The country promoting this freedom is pushing an agenda that is often contrary to centuries of ingrained habits and prejudices. It should not be surprising that even as the Arab spring was occurring there were attacks on Coptic churches, [2] while the communities may have been united by a desire for political change in the form of the overthrow of Mubarak such unity will only come very slowly when it comes to religious divides. [1] Philpott, Dan, "Sovereignty", in Edward N. Zalta (ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2010 Edition) [2] Abiyzeud, Rania, ‘After the Egyptian Revolution: The Wars of Religion’, Time, 10 March 2011	[ { "docid": "18e663b600ce89e72cfd1961544d18e6", "text": "living difference international global religion religion general An objective being difficult does not mean it is not worthwhile pursuing it. In the case of Egypt it may now be a democracy but it is certainly not a tolerant society – it would therefore be wrong for supporters to say job done and stop supporting change. Yes there will be times when a dominant group objects to having to present their religious case in a free market place of ideas and so resort to violence but without such tolerance the country in question will never be a truly stable country that works for the benefit of all its citizens and plays a constructive role in global politics.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "2960d3196dc6421d15d5307f99b04c1c", "text": "living difference international global religion religion general That other nations foreign policies are not motivated either by religion or freedom of religion does not mean that ours should not be. Moreover our policy does not need to be motivated by religious freedom for us to recognise it as a worthwhile objective. The motivation for reaching the objective would be national security as is the case elsewhere. It would simply be based on the recognition that our security is best secured by having other countries that are equally tolerant towards all faiths with the attendant peaceful relations and cooperation this brings in their international relations.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a93111ed149aee8cef9436463338de40", "text": "living difference international global religion religion general It is not about the worth of promoting one thing rather than another. Resources are finite and no country can promote all its values, everywhere, and all the time. Choices need to be made and priorities in foreign policy set. That focus should be on promoting religious freedom. Promoting political rights has often resulted in regimes becoming less cooperative even when the policy is a success. For example the transition in Egypt has changed the country from being a key ally of the United States to a nation that is increasingly Islamist and potentially a threat to another key ally, Israel. Now 77% of Egyptians say \"The peace treaty with Israel is no longer useful and should be dissolved.\" [1]\n\n[1] Rogin, Josh, ‘New Poll: Egyptians turning toward Iran, want nuclear weapons’, The Cable Foreign Policy, 19 October 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a30d3479c7c733ac0eccdab12577039e", "text": "living difference international global religion religion general It is certainly true that restrictions on religious freedoms create internal conflict. It is however much more tenuous to argue this translates onto the international stage in such a way that countries need to tailor their foreign policy to respond to it.\n\nIf we go through the list of countries mentioned as states of concern in 1999 how many of their conflicts are the result of religious intolerance? Disagreements with China are over trade and general human rights and the same with Burma. With North Korea the conflict is a civil war that is a remnant of the cold war not a religious divide within Korea. The US did not invade Iraq because the Shiite or Christians were being persecuted but because of WMD officially or other reasons such as oil and democracy. In Iran similarly nuclear weapons are at the heat of the conflict and religious intolerance only enters into worries that these weapons may be used to destroy Israel. In Sudan the state was as brutal to Muslims in Darfur [1] as the Christians in the South and it was the former conflict that generated most attention from the west. In the Kosovo conflict there was certainly a religious element as that was part of the reason for Serbia attacking the Kosovars but it was more general human rights concerns that prompted NATO intervention – if Serbia had only been denying the right to practice Islam there would have been no intervention.\n\nThis leaves the Taliban and Saudi Arabia with the conflict as a result of 9/11 where religious intolerance can be said to be the primary cause. Should general policy hinge on religious tolerance based upon one conflict?\n\n[1] See our debate on Darfur: Berman, Daniel, ‘This House believes that the US should have done more for Darfur’, Debatabase, 2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "636e56d952c6b64c8ba72c3c9d1914ba", "text": "living difference international global religion religion general Religious pluralism is part of more general pluralism and tolerance. Where one occurs so it is likely that other forms of tolerance will also occur with the most religiously tolerant states being pluralistic democracies. The reason democratic peace has gained in popularity is the difficulty of finding conflicts where two democracies have fought each other. This is less difficult when considering two religiously tolerant societies. One difficulty would be working out when a society is tolerant when the UK and Argentina fought over the Falklands Argentina was certainly not a democracy but was it particularly intolerant? [1]\n\nIt is notable that Europe’s most tolerant period of history prior to the second half of the 20th century was the late 18th century when the enlightenment spread religious tolerance as far as Russia [2] but the French Revolution’s declaration “No one should be disturbed for his opinions, even in religion, provided that their manifestation does not trouble public order as established by law” certainly did not usher in an era of peace. [3]\n\nFinally while the spread of democracy can explain the increase in interstate peace in the modern era it does not have a long history through which it can fall down. However religious tolerance has often been a norm before the idea of an exclusive god came along; Buddhism merged with Shinto and Daoism in Japan and China, the Roman empire regularly added gods from its conquests, and some of the world’s greatest conquerors such as Akbar in India have been open to all religions.\n\n[1] ‘Religious intolerance in Argentina’, Report presented to the UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief on the occasion of his visit to Argentina, 6 April 2001\n\n[2] Corwin, Julie, ‘Russia: Catherine The Great’s Lessons On Religious Tolerance’, Radio Free Europe, 30 August 2006\n\n[3] Hunt, Lynn, ‘The enlightenment and the origins of religious toleration’, Burgerhart Lectures, Nummer 4, 2011, p.9\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ecb6d55cafb1a50ae6a0cdcd0ab67274", "text": "living difference international global religion religion general These countries are not specifically religiously intolerant they are simply intolerant full stop. Usually it is not religion that is particularly singled out for intolerance but all possible forms of organised opposition. This is the case in Burma where monks lead marches against the Junta but the political opposition was treated in the same way with beatings and arrests, it was the act of opposition the regime was opposed to not its religious affiliation. In China today it is the organisation that matters – the state is concerned with large organisations like the Catholic Church or Fulan Gong but is happy for its citizens to be Christian, atheist, or Confucian so long as they are not part of a large organisation. [1] With dictatorial regimes the primary concern is the survival of the regime, organised religion is a threat to this, so religion is suppressed and instead a personality cult manufactured. This is only not the case when the existing dominant religion can be coopted to buttress the state which often leads to repression of religious minorities because they become the ones that are a threat.\n\n[1] Gardam, Tim, ‘Christians in China: Is the country in spiritual crisis?’, BBC News, 12 September 2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "61f8ca0c12ab2a4f854fa37512fb1918", "text": "living difference international global religion religion general Religion does not motivate foreign policy\n\nReligion is very rarely a motivation in foreign policy, it is unusual for it even to be a supporting factor and this is true even of countries that are domestically very religious. Instead foreign policy is primarily motivated by realist concerns about what is best for the country’s security (so preventing conflict, trying to make sure you have allies abroad etc), and its power in the form of a healthy economy.\n\nNations do promote their own values in areas such as human rights but this is because they believe the end point of these values is beneficial – democracies believe that if other states become democracies not only will they not fight but there will be more trade and it will be economically good all round. It is notable that when these kind of issues conflict with security and issues of power then human rights don’t affect policy. This has been particularly notable recently in conflicts in Libya and Syria, there is just as much humanitarian cause for intervention in Syria as there was in Libya [1] yet because Syria is ‘complex’ and other countries like Russia have opposing interests there will not be any intervention almost no matter how much killing by Syria’s Bashar al Assad. [2]\n\nWith religion an even more marginal influence in foreign policy than broad human rights concerns for most nations it is difficult to see why a nation should make religious freedom a priority.\n\n[1] Crowley, Michael, ‘The Obama Doctrine: Syria vs. Libya Intervention’, Time, 1 June 2012\n\n[2] Rogin, Josh, ‘NATO chief: Intervention just won’t work in Syria’, The Cable Foreign Policy, 29 February 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "04b24818731a73c9c7dde5a54e1b9f1a", "text": "living difference international global religion religion general Concentrating on religious freedom is too narrow, instead human rights in general should be considered\n\nOf course religious freedom must be respected and democratic nations must try to encourage it but this is simply a part of much more general promotion of human rights rather than a priority in and of itself. It would be hypocritical to be highlighting the plight of the Copts in Egypt while ignoring gender equality in Saudi Arabia or the lack of political freedoms in Belarus. [1] All of these things are a part of the same agenda of encouraging human rights.\n\nMoreover why should promoting religious freedom in Saudi Arabia be placed above promoting gender rights or political rights? Are the Shiites of the country somehow more worthy than the women? Currently the promotion of religious freedom is within human rights, so for example The Office of International Religious Freedom in the State Department is a part of the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor. [2] Having religious freedom within promotion of human rights is the right approach to take as it means whichever human rights are most at risk can be promoted and aided in any given country and it encourages the linking of religious freedom with other freedoms. Egyptians may not be very receptive to religious freedom but obviously are to political freedom so religious freedom needs to be linked as a part of having political freedom.\n\n[1] Chapman, Annabelle, ‘When doing nothing is free expression’, FreeSpeechDebate, 10 February 2012\n\n[2] Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, ‘Religious Freedom’, U.S. Department of State\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ecd9ff337c25e602ac08cb0d04c46d09", "text": "living difference international global religion religion general Restrictions on religious freedom creates conflict\n\nWhile there are often worries about allowing too much religious freedom in pluralistic countries and concern about the extremist agitation this sometimes allows in practice restricting religious freedoms leads to much more conflict than openness and tolerance. Brian J. Grimm and Roger Finke show that from 2000 to 2007 of 143 countries with populations over 2 million 123 countries (86%) have documented cases of people being physically abused or displaced because of religious persecution. With more than 10,000 affected in 25 countries. [1] This is because countries with higher levels of government favouritism of religion have a much higher level of social hostilities. [2] It is notable that the propensity for civil war is very high where there is very little religious freedom, for example Afghanistan or Mali, and similarly terrorist groups predominantly come from the same countries. [3] While conflict in other countries may not be considered a problem for other countries in practice when a country falls into civil war, as Libya did in 2011 and Syria in 2012, they become the major foreign policy issues requiring reaction even from powers that are distant from the conflict.\n\n[1] Schirrmacher, ‘One of the most important Publications on the Topic of religious Freedom’, International Journal of Religious Freedom.\n\n[2] ‘Rising Tide of Restrictions on Religion’, The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, 20 September 2012, http://www.pewforum.org/Government/Rising-Tide-of-Restrictions-on-Religion-findings.aspx http://www.pewforum.org/Government/Rising-Tide-of-Restrictions-on-Religion-methodology.aspx\n\n[3] Schirrmacher, ‘One of the most important Publications on the Topic of religious Freedom’, International Journal of Religious Freedom\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d93dd9136872931e621b540c2406d02d", "text": "living difference international global religion religion general Religious pluralism creates a more tolerant and peaceful society\n\nDemocratic peace theory is the proposition that democratic states do not fight interstate wars against each other. And so far the empirical evidence is strong. [1] It has been suggested that ‘democratic peace’ is really liberal peace that relies less on simply having democracy (although that is likely to be a part) but upon liberal values such as rule of law, human rights, and free markets. [2] Inboden argues that this should include religious freedom creating a ‘religious-freedom peace’. [3] Essentially states that share these liberal values will be unwilling to go to war with each other precisely because they are tolerant of difference; if they are tolerant of difference internally then external tolerance with other countries that are tolerant even if they as a majority are a totally different religion. Tolerance means that religion can no longer be a point of anything more serious than diplomatic conflict.\n\n[1] Ray, James Lee, ‘Does Democracy Cause Peace?’, Annu. Rev. Polit. Sci. 1998.\n\n[2] Richmond, Oliver P, ‘Understanding the Liberal Peace’, University of St Andrews, p.1\n\n[3] Inboden, William, ‘Religious Freedom and National Security’, Policy Review, No.175, 2 October 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a88aa9e27b945566109afd24699d122f", "text": "living difference international global religion religion general It is religiously intolerant states that pose most threat\n\nThere is a strong correlation between states that are religiously intolerant and those that are a threat to other states and the international order. In 1999 Burma, China, Iran, Iraq, and Sudan were designated as countries of particular concern with regards to religious freedom. Also the Taliban and Serbia were also included and Saudi Arabia and North Korea were countries where “religious freedoms may be suppressed”. [1] All of these are countries are countries which over the next decade were to one way or another become major security concerns and several of them involved in conflicts with the United States and other countries. As William Inboden notes “Those actors with the most egregious religious-freedom violations are remarkably consonant with those that pose a potential threat to the United States and its interests... Stated simply: There is not a single nation in the world that both respects religious freedom and poses a security threat to the United States.” [2] Religious freedom therefore should be much higher up the priority list in terms of foreign policy.\n\n[1] Statement, Robert A. Seiple, Ambassador-at-Large for International Freedom, to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, regarding religious freedom, U.S. Department of State, 6 October 1999, (near the end)\n\n[2] Inboden, William, ‘Religious Freedom and National Security’, Policy Review, No.175, 2 October 2012\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
278174442bf9d41cc17d192f13c39e49	Trans fats are not uniquely unhealthy The issue with trans-fat is that there is no better substitute. The fact is that the substitutes are also as bad, if not worse, than trans-fat itself. By banning trans-fat, restaurants will have to adopt these substitute substances, thus undermining the work of the government. This process is a waste of our resources as the government will have to spend huge amount of money to bring about a ban on trans-fat without getting any positive outcome. The trans-fat ban would only have clear benefits if it were to cause a general reduction in the overconsumption of high-fat foods, but a restaurant ban on one ingredient will not achieve this. This will mean that money will be wasted as increased costs will be passed on to the consumer while there is no benefit.(8) Trans fats are not uniquely and excessively unhealthy. Sugar is unhealthy. Salt is unhealthy. Runny eggs, rare meat, processed flour, nearly anything consumed too frequently or excessively is potentially dangerous. We would not ban these foods because they are unhealthy so the same should apply to trans fats. The current obesity crisis within the US is not the result of regulatory failure and will not be solved by a ban on trans fats. Better choices, better parenting, exercise and personal restraint are the keys. None of these behavioural traits can be mandated by government.(9) Even if trans fats were eliminated from food products, overall a ban would do nothing to help individuals develop healthy lifestyles. While the ban would curtail consumption of onion rings (if they were cooked in trans fats), for example, it would remain perfectly legal to gorge oneself on Häagen-Dazs or chocolate, both unhealthy foods that contain no trans-fat.(10) The main alternatives to trans-fat is not even that much healthier. In most cases, food makers will move to saturated fat, which carries all of the same health risks, for example it has been linked to diabetes and cancer.(9) The ban is therefore unlikely to have a perceptible effect on public health. Trans-fats actually serve two useful purposes. Firstly, trans fats serve an important function of extending the shelf life of products.(1) This is necessary for both producers and consumers as it makes producing these foods cheaper and reduces waste. It also means that consumers are less likely to consume spoiled food and become sick as a result. Secondly, trans fats are tasty and offer enjoyment to consumers. Trans fats keep foods from turning rancid on store shelves; give croissants their flakiness, keep muffins moist and satisfy the sweet tooth. The enjoyment of such tasty foods has a qualitative value to one's emotions and happiness.(3) Therefore trans fats are not uniquely unhealthy and a ban would not improve general public health -it would simply remove a useful and tasty substance from the market. Thus a ban is unjustified.	[ { "docid": "96883c718c55c72e013bf3a6f35b0a7c", "text": "health general weight house would ban use trans fats food stuffs Health experts agree that banning trans fats would save thousands of lives specifically because the substance is dangerous even when consumed in very low quantities. They are simply a dangerous additive, which adds no extra value to food. 'Taste' considerations are simply a red herring, as switching to other fats would produce no meaningful change in taste, as has been demonstrated by several large food corporations who have made the shift without disappointing their customer base. The fact that other foodstuffs may be dangerous is an argument for better education or regulation regarding them, or -if merited -their own bans, but is not a case against banning trans fats. Trans-fats are significantly different to all the other unhealthy foods listed by side opposition, as trans fats are easily replaceable by less unhealthy substitutes, which things like sugar are not.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "38d15e42a45357842926eb4d9fbaff3a", "text": "health general weight house would ban use trans fats food stuffs Many large and small chains have already made the transition to alternatives to trans-fat, so it is entirely possible. These alternatives will get cheaper with time as they are used more frequently and as the companies that produce and distribute them increase their sales volumes and are able to sell them for lower prices, meaning that small and individual restaurants will indeed be able to afford them and survive. Moreover, the health concerns in this debate override purely economic concerns or the closure of small businesses, as lives are involved.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "49a2f3f2c5778008e22a00ee16769c69", "text": "health general weight house would ban use trans fats food stuffs Calling for an \"education campaign\" to inform consumers of what they are eating may sound sufficient, but this is very often just not enough. No matter what the government does, people will simply miss the \"instructional\" information provided by the government and will continue to consume trans fats without full information regarding its negative effects. In such circumstances, it is the government's job to step in a take action through a ban or other measures.\n\nMoreover, when a harmful trend such as the use of trans-fats becomes endemic and entrenched, it becomes increasingly difficult for citizens to always be aware of the fact that a food has trans fats in them and make the \"choice\" to eat or not to eat them.(15)\n\nProducers include trans fats into foods without adjusting labelling, further affecting consumers’ ability to purchase foods that do not include trans-fats. The trans fats hidden in many processed foods are worse for a person's health than saturated fats. In 2005, CHOICE, an Australian watchdog tested more than 50 processed foods and found many contained trans fats at unacceptably high levels. After re-tests it was still clear that, while the fast-food chains had reduced their levels of trans fats, and some of the foods tested previously had eliminated trans fats altogether, others now contained even more than before. Foods such as pies, cakes and doughnuts may contain trans fats without the consumer even knowing about it.(16)\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f0e3ffea8a48ec7854eee5963907c95f", "text": "health general weight house would ban use trans fats food stuffs A ban on trans fats will cause specific harms which cannot be fixed by switching to other fats or food preparation methods. Particularly hard hit would be small businesses, who would struggle to make the transition because they no not have the budgets to research alternative ways to make their products taste the same and so are likely to end up at a disadvantage compared to their bigger rivals. Moreover all businesses would suffer from reduced shelf life for their products.(7)\n\nSuch a ban does not make economic sense, and despite propositions claims trans fats cannot always be easily replaced. We use trans fats because they work well. For example they are needed in hydrogenation in order to convert liquid vegetable oils in to being solid, needed for example to make margarine, the amount of trans fats used for this can be reduced but not eliminated. Moreover, Michael Mason of The New York Times argues: \"for preparing certain kinds of foods, there are few alternatives besides the saturated fats that have long been high on the list of artery-clogging foods.”(18)\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1d17c396d3365d3f6a932dfd0ba19a97", "text": "health general weight house would ban use trans fats food stuffs The American FDA considers the use of trans fats to be 'generally safe'.(1) The British Food Standards Agency says the UK's low average consumption of trans fats makes a complete ban unnecessary.(6) These organisations are already supposed to regulate foodstuffs and monitor trans fats, if they agreed that they needed to act surely they would.\n\nFor individuals considered especially vulnerable to the effects of trans-fat consumption, such as the old or the poor, the government should consider education, not a ban. Moreover, the real issue here isn't about health, but about the right of a citizen of a free country to choose to eat whatever foods he wishes. The role of government is not to restrict the freedoms of its citizens but to protect individuals and to defend their right to act freely. Informed, adult individuals have every right to eat whatever fattening, caloric or artery-clogging meals they please. Government health boards have no right to restrict the foods law-abiding citizens choose to put into their own bodies.(10)\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1d17c396d3365d3f6a932dfd0ba19a97", "text": "health general weight house would ban use trans fats food stuffs The American FDA considers the use of trans fats to be 'generally safe'.(1) The British Food Standards Agency says the UK's low average consumption of trans fats makes a complete ban unnecessary.(6) These organisations are already supposed to regulate foodstuffs and monitor trans fats, if they agreed that they needed to act surely they would.\n\nFor individuals considered especially vulnerable to the effects of trans-fat consumption, such as the old or the poor, the government should consider education, not a ban. Moreover, the real issue here isn't about health, but about the right of a citizen of a free country to choose to eat whatever foods he wishes. The role of government is not to restrict the freedoms of its citizens but to protect individuals and to defend their right to act freely. Informed, adult individuals have every right to eat whatever fattening, caloric or artery-clogging meals they please. Government health boards have no right to restrict the foods law-abiding citizens choose to put into their own bodies.(10)\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "745c745e439ca7ad298c324df3f0c29b", "text": "health general weight house would ban use trans fats food stuffs The government should provide information to consumers, not restrict choice\n\nMilton Friedman argued in the 1980s: \"If we continue on this path, there is no doubt where it will end. If the government has the responsibility of protecting us from dangerous substances, the logic surely calls for prohibiting alcohol and tobacco. . . . Insofar as the government has information not generally available about the merits or demerits of the items we ingest or the activities we engage in, let it give us the information. But let it leave us free to choose what chances we want to take with our own lives.\"(11)\n\nGeorge Mason University economist Don Boudreaux asks what a trans-fat ban is a model for: \"Petty tyranny? Or perhaps for similarly inspired bans on other voluntary activities with health risks? Clerking in convenience stores? Walking in the rain?\"(12) Morally the government should be consistent when it bans things, the sale of an undeniably deadly products such as tobacco is sometimes allowed so far less dangerous substances should be allowed.(13)\n\nEducation should be considered an alternative to banning trans fats or other unhealthy food. There should be aggressive education campaigns to educate consumers as has been done with tobacco.. At the moment consumers are ignorant, they need to know what they are, the dangers and the consequences. Information on trans fats should also be part of a wider program of nutrition awareness which will put it in context. . Many people have rejected tobacco as a result of raised awareness; the same will occur with trans fats. The food industry would respond to consumer demand and reduce the use of trans fats and other ingredients considered ‘bad’.(13) Information on trans-fats is not hard to come by: the Centre for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), for example, is happy to inform about the dangers of dietary trans-fat, and has no trouble getting its declarations of doom on television and into newspapers.(11) This consumer pressure is already occurring. In the United States, for example, many fast-food chains and food manufacturers have already eliminated trans fats from their products or have pledged to phase them out. To pick one case, Wal-Mart is going to reduce its sugar, sodium content and remove all trans fats from its food.(14)\n\nLeft to its own devices, the market will solve this 'problem' in all areas which consumers consider it to be a problem, all without needing an unwieldy government ban. Therefore the government should educate its citizens regarding the health concerns surrounding trans fats, but leave it up to the citizens to choose what they eat.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0ee3690620845707dbbe2363a9632457", "text": "health general weight house would ban use trans fats food stuffs Banning trans fats in uneconomical\n\nA trans-fat ban would hurt small restaurants the most. Carlie Irwin argues: “Since most of the big chains have already started the process of eliminating trans-fat from their food, the ban would be no big deal to them. But small, independent restaurants are another story. The potential ban has small restaurant owners sweating and nervously eyeing their deep fryers. As the St. Louis Business Journal points out, many small restaurant owners don’t have the ability to effectively and efficiently reformulate their menu items. So banning trans fat could mean that your favorite independently-owned fried chicken joint down the street will be shuttering its doors.”(17)\n\nConsequently, a trans-fat ban would breed legal exceptions and inconsistencies. For example, in Illinois bakeries were exempted from their ban because lawmakers knew that it would drive up their costs and hurt the bakeries specialty items. Many other small businesses would be similarly affected Restaurants and other specialty vendors who use trans-fat products on site would also be affected. Lawmakers then have a choice of either reducing the effect of the ban and including lots of bureaucratic exemptions or punishing these businesses.(9) Tina Pantazis, the manager of Dino's Burgers, which operates two hamburger outlets in California, argues: \"The only effect [a ban on trans fat] is going to have on the consumer is that we are going to have to raise our prices.\"(19)\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9448e09b455bb862d1855d73ef3fc379", "text": "health general weight house would ban use trans fats food stuffs Healthier equivalents of trans fats exist\n\nIt is easy and inexpensive to replace trans fats with other, less harmful products without significantly altering the taste of the food. Kraft eliminated trans fats from its Oreo cookies, with little public perception of any change in taste.(1) Similarly, the Wendy's restaurant chain tested a new frying oil in 370 franchises, with customers not noticing a difference in taste. Denmark imposed a national ban on trans fats with which even McDonald's has complied.(1) Replacements for trans fats will get cheaper and cheaper with time, as they are used more frequently and as the companies that produce and distribute them increase their sales volumes and are able to sell them for lower prices.\n\nSince trans fats are not irreplaceable, objections for the sake of consumer freedom are also unconvincing. As with lead added to paint, trans fats are unnecessary additions to products that can cause significant harm. Most people remain ignorant of the presence of trans-fats in their food, and of their effects. In this area the ban on trans fats differs from restrictions placed on the sale of alcohol and tobacco and so the two kinds of bans are not comparable. Not only are trans fats easy to substitute in foodstuffs, without impairing quality or taste, the presence of trans-fats is hard to detect. It is all-but impossible for informed and conscientious consumers to avoid buying and eating trans-fats.\n\nWhile banning cigarettes and alcohol mean banning an entire product category, banning the ingredient of trans fats means no such thing. Rather, it simply means that readily available replacement ingredients must be used in the preparation of the same foods. And, since these fatty replacements are widespread and cheaply available, food makers and consumers should have little difficulty making the adjustment to making and consuming the same, albeit slightly modified, foods.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "11d917a1bf43787c91d3a2884628ba77", "text": "health general weight house would ban use trans fats food stuffs The state should ban trans fats to protect the public\n\nOne of the purposes of government is identify possible threats to health and protect the people from these threats. The fact that some government regulations seem 'silly' or misplaced, or cannot easily be understood by lay-people is not a compelling argument for having no regulations at all, or for not having regulations in the case of trans fat. The commentators who denounce the 'nanny state' do not indicate what, if any, regulations or styles of regulation they approve of. Do they think there should be no inspections of restaurants by health inspectors? No regulation at all of food or drug safety by the Food and Drug Administration? Some commentators think that people should be encouraged to study the dangers of trans fats and make their own judgements about what to eat. But people have limited time to do research on such matters. It makes sense to delegate the research to a central authority, so that instead of 300 million people trying to learn about trans fats and every other lurking menace, a handful of experts can make recommendations based on the likely responses and desires of the average, informed citizen.\n\nNon-specialists’ capacity to absorb information on complex chemical and biological subjects is quite limited. The majority of us are reliant on the research of others for most of what we know.(5) The opinion of the experts on the dangers of trans fats is conclusive: trans fats are unsafe.\n\nThe American Food and Drug Administration (FDA) considers all uses of trans fats to be 'generally regarded as safe.' This allows the use of trans fats in whatever way food producers desire. ’Safe’ for the FDA means 'a reasonable certainty in the minds of competent scientists that the substance is not harmful under its intended conditions of use', which no longer applies to trans fats. This 'generally regarded as safe' status should be revoked which in turn would greatly restrict its use in food.\n\nThe other option would be to allow local jurisdictions to regulate trans fats, but this would be more costly and lead to a patchwork of regulations.(1) The most effective method of controlling the use of trans-fats is through centralised, nationally applicable policy making. The poor and young are particularly vulnerable to the negative health effects of trans fats; at the very least, the threat posed to these groups justifies the use of informed regulation. Professor Alan Maryon-Davis, president of the UK Faculty of Public Health said in 2010: \"There are great differences in the amount of trans-fats consumed by different people and we are particularly concerned about young people and those with little disposable income who eat a lot of this type of food. This is a major health inequalities issue.”(6)\n\nThe government has a legitimate interest in protecting its citizens from harms that they are not best placed to understand or avoid themselves, and so a ban on trans fats would not only save lives but would also be legitimate under the government's role to protect when citizens cannot reasonably protect themselves.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6395578c9e7d993164a89311df49fb83", "text": "health general weight house would ban use trans fats food stuffs Trans fats are uniquely unhealthy\n\nOne of the purposes of government is identify possible threats to health and protect the people from these threats. The fact that some government regulations seem 'silly' or misplaced, or cannot easily be understood by lay-people is not a compelling argument for having no regulations at all, or for not having regulations in the case of trans fat. The commentators who denounce the 'nanny state' do not indicate what, if any, regulations or styles of regulation they approve of. Do they think there should be no inspections of restaurants by health inspectors? No regulation at all of food or drug safety by the Food and Drug Administration? Some commentators think that people should be encouraged to study the dangers of trans fats and make their own judgements about what to eat. But people have limited time to do research on such matters. It makes sense to delegate the research to a central authority, so that instead of 300 million people trying to learn about trans fats and every other lurking menace, a handful of experts can make recommendations based on the likely responses and desires of the average, informed citizen.\n\nNon-specialists’ capacity to absorb information on complex chemical and biological subjects is quite limited. The majority of us are reliant on the research of others for most of what we know.(5) The opinion of the experts on the dangers of trans fats is conclusive: trans fats are unsafe.\n\nThe American Food and Drug Administration (FDA) considers all uses of trans fats to be 'generally regarded as safe.' This allows the use of trans fats in whatever way food producers desire. ’Safe’ for the FDA means 'a reasonable certainty in the minds of competent scientists that the substance is not harmful under its intended conditions of use', which no longer applies to trans fats. This 'generally regarded as safe' status should be revoked which in turn would greatly restrict its use in food.\n\nThe other option would be to allow local jurisdictions to regulate trans fats, but this would be more costly and lead to a patchwork of regulations.(1) The most effective method of controlling the use of trans-fats is through centralised, nationally applicable policy making. The poor and young are particularly vulnerable to the negative health effects of trans fats; at the very least, the threat posed to these groups justifies the use of informed regulation. Professor Alan Maryon-Davis, president of the UK Faculty of Public Health said in 2010: \"There are great differences in the amount of trans-fats consumed by different people and we are particularly concerned about young people and those with little disposable income who eat a lot of this type of food. This is a major health inequalities issue.”(6)\n\nThe government has a legitimate interest in protecting its citizens from harms that they are not best placed to understand or avoid themselves, and so a ban on trans fats would not only save lives but would also be legitimate under the government's role to protect when citizens cannot reasonably protect themselves.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
b73da8ae0ab5b5147448b53d8b5ccc52	Marketing aimed at children should be subject to strict regulations. Unlike adults, children are not able to make healthy decisions for themselves. They don’t understand what calories, sodium content, or saturated fats are. They are unable to comprehend the long-term effects that fast food might have on their health and development. On the other hand, a toy is instantly appealing to them and offers a straightforward incentive to opt for such a meal. As long as the negative consequences cannot be explained to kids in a clear and compelling manner, we should not make unhealthy food even more desirable for them. We should not allow children to make bad choices based on information they don’t understand [1] . [1] Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity. “Fast Food FACTS: Evaluating Fast Food Nutrition and Marketing to Youth.” Yale University. November 2010. http://www.fastfoodmarketing.org/media/FastFoodFACTS_Report.pdf	[ { "docid": "d0fdfcded2f46be5d824cea03a1863b6", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast Children may have a strong preference for a certain type of meal over another, but young kids don’t buy their own food. Parents do. And if kids might not understand that fast food is bad for them, their parents should. If a child is eating too much fast food, that is not a marketing success, it’s a parenting failure.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "643ba6c53da4df5f1f0c409ca553443a", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast If a parent gives into pressure from a young child so easily, even when she knows it’s the wrong thing to do, then she has bigger parenting problems to worry about than the presence of toys in fast food meals. The government cannot possibly step in to eliminate all temptations and negative influences on children’s choices. Parents need to be firm and provide their kids with the guidance necessary to choose what is best.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5082c51300c5808c668328d12ac696e2", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast Even if we were to accept that the government has a role in combatting the so-called ‘obesity epidemic’, that does not justify it taking any measures it deems appropriate. The government should at the very least be able to prove that there is some link between the toys sold with the fast food meals and the rise in obesity. After all, the toys have been around since the late 70s. The ‘obesity epidemic’ is a far more recent phenomenon.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a1db9f42d1bc0071af74f8ab0d71d609", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast It is important to instil good habits in children at an early age. But the manner in which it is done is equally important. Kids should be taught to make choices based on what is best for them, through information and appropriate explanations, rather than just being shielded from potential dangers. That kind of behaviour, predicated on reason and understanding, will have a far more lasting impact on the way they make choices, than just protecting them from temptation, with which they will inevitably have to cope later in life.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a1aa713c09b645f4ecf6cc7ef6c26e88", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast This is not exactly a ban on the sale of fast food to children. This ban does not affect the options of bad foods that parents can continue to feed to their young children if they choose to do so. They will even be able to continue buying happy meals – simply without the toy. It merely alters the incentives slightly toward promoting better, healthier choices by making fast food less appealing.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a65d39dd2bbb6f9bae9bd13b4ad3c295", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast While McDonald’s may have found a way to circumvent the ban, the significant pressure that was applied to them in the process led the company to improve the quality of the Happy Meal, by providing clients with fresh fruit and healthier drink options. Therefore, the ban could be considered a success.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9d87dce892ce4f646d6b834105cf8a3e", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast Of course there is no such thing as a silver bullet solution to a problem as complex as childhood obesity. This ban would need to be part of a bigger push to regulate the fast food industry’s marketing to children and to provide kids and parents with better choices and information. That doesn’t mean the ban has no merit or that it would not play a beneficial role in the fight against obesity.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "da96ea7ff5de59741a319d3c611fa2d3", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast Making it easier for parents to raise their children well.\n\nAs well meaning as parents may be in trying to guide their kids toward better nutritional choices, they face a formidable opponent: the fast food marketing machine that spends over 4 billion dollars on advertising a year, much of it targeted directly at kids [1] . This can create enough ‘pester power’ [2] from the kids themselves, seduced by the toy that comes with the meal, that it can persuade parents to make bad choices they wouldn’t otherwise make. By eliminating at least one layer of negative pressure, this law would help parents make those healthy choices that they already know are best.\n\n[1] Philpott, Tom. “The fast-food industry’s 4.2 billion marketing blitz.” Grist. November 10. 2010. http://www.grist.org/article/food-2010-11-09-the-fast-food-industrys-4.2...\n\n[2] “San Francisco Happy meal Toy Ban Takes Effect, Sidestepped by McDonald’s.” Huffington Post. November 2011. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/30/san-francisco-happy-meal-ban_n_...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ff23c9beb3bd5c809f7fd2fd3107b91a", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast Bad nutrition habits start during childhood.\n\nGiving away toys with meals that are calorie laden and of poor nutritional quality creates an emotional attachment between the child and fast food [1] . This bond will then follow that child into adulthood, making it harder for her to make better nutritional choices in order to become a healthy individual. This ban would break that bond and make it easier for children to grow up to be healthier adults.\n\n[1] Storm, Stephanie. “McDonald’s Trims Its Happy Meal.” The New York Times. July 26, 2011. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/27/business/mcdonalds-happy-meal-to-get-h...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e54fff8cca78d725e22604a09c6f07f7", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast Obesity is a public health issue .\n\nAll around the world, obesity has become a serious threat to public health. And the problem starts early on. In the US, for example, 17% of youth are obese4. Obesity itself has many consequences; most obviously on health such as increasing the risk of numerous diseases like heart disease, there are however economic costs both for treatment of these diseases, lost working days and due to less obvious costs such safety on transport and its resulting fuel cost. [1] Tackling obesity is therefore well within the purview of government policy. A failure to act might seriously affect the economic productivity of the nation, and even bankrupt healthcare systems [2] . A measure like the toy ban would be a first step to tackling the problem at the root, preventing children from growing up into obese adults.\n\n[1] Zahn, Theron, “Obesity epidemic forcing ferries to lighten their loads”, seattlepi, 20 December 2011, http://www.seattlepi.com/local/komo/article/Obesity-epidemic-forcing-fer...\n\n[2] “Obesity ‘could bankrupt the NHS’”. BBC. 15 December 2006. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/6180991.stm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f1e4a174c6a7e45e5fd4cdc595e9d674", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast The ban is ineffective in addressing the problem of obesity.\n\nStudies have shown that only a very small amount of the calories consumed by children come from foods like the Happy Meal. And while kids are eating at fast food restaurants at an alarming rate, it is their parents who make the decision to take them there 93% of the time. Of the kids who do want to go to McDonald’s, only 8% cite the toy as the primary reason. Therefore, this piece of legislation seems to tackle a perceived problem rather than a real one. Legislators would be better off focusing their attention where it matters: providing information to parents about making better choices for their kids, and improving the quality of school lunches, which are actually provided by the government and are eaten by kids every single day, often as their main meal [1] .\n\n[1] Eskenazi, Joe, and Wachs, Benjamin. “How the Happy Meal ban explains San Francisco.” San Francisco Weekly. January 19, 2011. http://www.sfweekly.com/content/printVersion/2330057/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f825dc9e3804acbacbb345759ed7d568", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast This ban constitutes serious governmental intrusion into parental responsibilities and private choices.\n\nParents, not politicians, should be responsible for guiding the choices their children make and the food they eat, especially when they pay for it with their own money. Parents may have other reasons for wanting their children to have the meal with a toy, for example the toy is a useful distraction for the child. Governments should not try to impose their own idea of what constitutes appropriate food choices for children on parents and on businesses. Governments may aim to promote and educate, but imposing bans on private businesses goes too far [1] .\n\n[1] Martinez, Michael. “Mayor vetoes San Francisco ban on Happy Meals with toys.” CNN. November 13 2010. http://edition.cnn.com/2010/US/11/12/california.fast.food.ban/index.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "501735f412fe9ff746bd667c4a3006ce", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast Such bans are easy to side step.\n\nThe San Francisco ban has already been circumvented by McDonalds who has started selling their Happy Meals without the toys and then selling the toys separately for a nominal price [1] . Banning the sale of any toys in fast food restaurants would be difficult without prompting legal action from the companies. The steep legal costs of defending such a law would waste public resources that could easily be put to better use.\n\n[1] Eskenazi, Joe. “Happy Meal Ban. McDonlad’s Outsmarts San Francisco.” San Francisco Weekly. November 29, 2011. http://blogs.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/2011/11/happy_meal_ban_mcdonalds_out...\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
53dbcbe2225a66bab51a1a3ee918cb93	Obesity is a public health issue . All around the world, obesity has become a serious threat to public health. And the problem starts early on. In the US, for example, 17% of youth are obese4. Obesity itself has many consequences; most obviously on health such as increasing the risk of numerous diseases like heart disease, there are however economic costs both for treatment of these diseases, lost working days and due to less obvious costs such safety on transport and its resulting fuel cost. [1] Tackling obesity is therefore well within the purview of government policy. A failure to act might seriously affect the economic productivity of the nation, and even bankrupt healthcare systems [2] . A measure like the toy ban would be a first step to tackling the problem at the root, preventing children from growing up into obese adults. [1] Zahn, Theron, “Obesity epidemic forcing ferries to lighten their loads”, seattlepi, 20 December 2011, http://www.seattlepi.com/local/komo/article/Obesity-epidemic-forcing-fer... [2] “Obesity ‘could bankrupt the NHS’”. BBC. 15 December 2006. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/6180991.stm	[ { "docid": "5082c51300c5808c668328d12ac696e2", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast Even if we were to accept that the government has a role in combatting the so-called ‘obesity epidemic’, that does not justify it taking any measures it deems appropriate. The government should at the very least be able to prove that there is some link between the toys sold with the fast food meals and the rise in obesity. After all, the toys have been around since the late 70s. The ‘obesity epidemic’ is a far more recent phenomenon.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "643ba6c53da4df5f1f0c409ca553443a", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast If a parent gives into pressure from a young child so easily, even when she knows it’s the wrong thing to do, then she has bigger parenting problems to worry about than the presence of toys in fast food meals. The government cannot possibly step in to eliminate all temptations and negative influences on children’s choices. Parents need to be firm and provide their kids with the guidance necessary to choose what is best.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a1db9f42d1bc0071af74f8ab0d71d609", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast It is important to instil good habits in children at an early age. But the manner in which it is done is equally important. Kids should be taught to make choices based on what is best for them, through information and appropriate explanations, rather than just being shielded from potential dangers. That kind of behaviour, predicated on reason and understanding, will have a far more lasting impact on the way they make choices, than just protecting them from temptation, with which they will inevitably have to cope later in life.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d0fdfcded2f46be5d824cea03a1863b6", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast Children may have a strong preference for a certain type of meal over another, but young kids don’t buy their own food. Parents do. And if kids might not understand that fast food is bad for them, their parents should. If a child is eating too much fast food, that is not a marketing success, it’s a parenting failure.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a1aa713c09b645f4ecf6cc7ef6c26e88", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast This is not exactly a ban on the sale of fast food to children. This ban does not affect the options of bad foods that parents can continue to feed to their young children if they choose to do so. They will even be able to continue buying happy meals – simply without the toy. It merely alters the incentives slightly toward promoting better, healthier choices by making fast food less appealing.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a65d39dd2bbb6f9bae9bd13b4ad3c295", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast While McDonald’s may have found a way to circumvent the ban, the significant pressure that was applied to them in the process led the company to improve the quality of the Happy Meal, by providing clients with fresh fruit and healthier drink options. Therefore, the ban could be considered a success.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9d87dce892ce4f646d6b834105cf8a3e", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast Of course there is no such thing as a silver bullet solution to a problem as complex as childhood obesity. This ban would need to be part of a bigger push to regulate the fast food industry’s marketing to children and to provide kids and parents with better choices and information. That doesn’t mean the ban has no merit or that it would not play a beneficial role in the fight against obesity.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "da96ea7ff5de59741a319d3c611fa2d3", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast Making it easier for parents to raise their children well.\n\nAs well meaning as parents may be in trying to guide their kids toward better nutritional choices, they face a formidable opponent: the fast food marketing machine that spends over 4 billion dollars on advertising a year, much of it targeted directly at kids [1] . This can create enough ‘pester power’ [2] from the kids themselves, seduced by the toy that comes with the meal, that it can persuade parents to make bad choices they wouldn’t otherwise make. By eliminating at least one layer of negative pressure, this law would help parents make those healthy choices that they already know are best.\n\n[1] Philpott, Tom. “The fast-food industry’s 4.2 billion marketing blitz.” Grist. November 10. 2010. http://www.grist.org/article/food-2010-11-09-the-fast-food-industrys-4.2...\n\n[2] “San Francisco Happy meal Toy Ban Takes Effect, Sidestepped by McDonald’s.” Huffington Post. November 2011. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/30/san-francisco-happy-meal-ban_n_...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ff23c9beb3bd5c809f7fd2fd3107b91a", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast Bad nutrition habits start during childhood.\n\nGiving away toys with meals that are calorie laden and of poor nutritional quality creates an emotional attachment between the child and fast food [1] . This bond will then follow that child into adulthood, making it harder for her to make better nutritional choices in order to become a healthy individual. This ban would break that bond and make it easier for children to grow up to be healthier adults.\n\n[1] Storm, Stephanie. “McDonald’s Trims Its Happy Meal.” The New York Times. July 26, 2011. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/27/business/mcdonalds-happy-meal-to-get-h...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ce839477f5cf442998e173ccd772277b", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast Marketing aimed at children should be subject to strict regulations.\n\nUnlike adults, children are not able to make healthy decisions for themselves. They don’t understand what calories, sodium content, or saturated fats are. They are unable to comprehend the long-term effects that fast food might have on their health and development. On the other hand, a toy is instantly appealing to them and offers a straightforward incentive to opt for such a meal. As long as the negative consequences cannot be explained to kids in a clear and compelling manner, we should not make unhealthy food even more desirable for them. We should not allow children to make bad choices based on information they don’t understand [1] .\n\n[1] Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity. “Fast Food FACTS: Evaluating Fast Food Nutrition and Marketing to Youth.” Yale University. November 2010. http://www.fastfoodmarketing.org/media/FastFoodFACTS_Report.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f1e4a174c6a7e45e5fd4cdc595e9d674", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast The ban is ineffective in addressing the problem of obesity.\n\nStudies have shown that only a very small amount of the calories consumed by children come from foods like the Happy Meal. And while kids are eating at fast food restaurants at an alarming rate, it is their parents who make the decision to take them there 93% of the time. Of the kids who do want to go to McDonald’s, only 8% cite the toy as the primary reason. Therefore, this piece of legislation seems to tackle a perceived problem rather than a real one. Legislators would be better off focusing their attention where it matters: providing information to parents about making better choices for their kids, and improving the quality of school lunches, which are actually provided by the government and are eaten by kids every single day, often as their main meal [1] .\n\n[1] Eskenazi, Joe, and Wachs, Benjamin. “How the Happy Meal ban explains San Francisco.” San Francisco Weekly. January 19, 2011. http://www.sfweekly.com/content/printVersion/2330057/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f825dc9e3804acbacbb345759ed7d568", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast This ban constitutes serious governmental intrusion into parental responsibilities and private choices.\n\nParents, not politicians, should be responsible for guiding the choices their children make and the food they eat, especially when they pay for it with their own money. Parents may have other reasons for wanting their children to have the meal with a toy, for example the toy is a useful distraction for the child. Governments should not try to impose their own idea of what constitutes appropriate food choices for children on parents and on businesses. Governments may aim to promote and educate, but imposing bans on private businesses goes too far [1] .\n\n[1] Martinez, Michael. “Mayor vetoes San Francisco ban on Happy Meals with toys.” CNN. November 13 2010. http://edition.cnn.com/2010/US/11/12/california.fast.food.ban/index.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "501735f412fe9ff746bd667c4a3006ce", "text": "health general weight society youth tthw prohibit sale childrens toys part fast Such bans are easy to side step.\n\nThe San Francisco ban has already been circumvented by McDonalds who has started selling their Happy Meals without the toys and then selling the toys separately for a nominal price [1] . Banning the sale of any toys in fast food restaurants would be difficult without prompting legal action from the companies. The steep legal costs of defending such a law would waste public resources that could easily be put to better use.\n\n[1] Eskenazi, Joe. “Happy Meal Ban. McDonlad’s Outsmarts San Francisco.” San Francisco Weekly. November 29, 2011. http://blogs.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/2011/11/happy_meal_ban_mcdonalds_out...\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
20f6ab56e04f66ec20cc27af48766b0c	Anorexics need to be able to trust their doctors. The most successful policies are where anorectic patients feel safe and trust their doctors so are willing to go to clinics voluntarily as they feel that they are in control of the situation. [1] Conversely an anorectic patient’s fear of weight gain, especially forced weight gain in hospital is an obstacle to treatment. If an anorexia nervosa sufferer thinks that they will be force- fed they may be less likely to seek treatment or advice. [1] Susic, Paul, ‘Anorexia Treatment and the Unwilling Patient’, http://www.psychtreatment.com/anorexia_treatment.htm , accessed 07/21/2011	[ { "docid": "baa63d94abdbf0264f7f6d93f05ec79d", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed In 1997 the Mental Health Act Commission opened the door to allowing force feeding of anorexic patients in the UK by allowing the compulsory admission of anorexics to hospital. This change of policy did not reduce the number of patients being admitted for treatment which has gone up from 419 in 1996-7 to 620 in 2005-6. [1]\n\n[1] Disordered eating, Anorexia Nervosa Statistics (Uk), http://www.disordered-eating.co.uk/eating-disorders-statistics/anorexia-nervosa-statistics-uk.html , accessed 07/22/2011\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "e4107fd174e6bedf5b27fd2ca9d49034", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Short term success is all that is necessary to save a life. Once the anorectic patient is out of danger then more long term treatments can be explored. This means working out how to reduce the fear of food and of weight and if the patient has become worried about going to hospital then at least there is time to sort that out as well. While emergency force feeding has to be within a hospital not all treatment has to take place in such an environment and ongoing psychological treatment can take place elsewhere.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "deca9e9494435fb554eb95e7380b23e5", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Palliative care is defeatist and does not attempt to cure the problem. Recovery is always a possibility and that is what doctors should be striving for “In a 10 year follow up of 76 severely ill women with anorexia, Eckert et al found that 18 (24%) had fully recovered, about half had a benign outcome, and only five (7%) had died.” [1] Doctors do not often have to deal with severe or chronic anorexia. Just because it is a very long treatment schedule that can be harrowing for a doctor, this not a reason to settle for palliative care. Better support structures ought to be put in place to enable the doctor to fulfil their obligation to the patient.\n\n[1] Williams, Christopher J. et al., ‘We should strive to keep patients alive’, 1998, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1113542/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "660de51944223047d50eb4238d3c2fc6", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Yes there will be negative consequences to such a step as force feeding however this is only done when it is absolutely necessary and the negative consequences of not doing so are much worse. Doctors will only force feed if they are convinced that doing so is for the good of the patient, indeed they are prohibited from taking such a step if it is not absolutely necessary.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "acf694b01308564d831a4f6e837ed335", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Force feeding is undignified. The World Medical Association considers “Even if intended to benefit, feeding accompanied by threats, coercion, force or use of physical restraints is a form of inhuman and degrading treatment.” [1] This is treatment which the European Convention on Human Rights prohibits in Article 3 on the prohibition of torture. [2] The patient’s right to refuse treatment should be respected even if they are mentally ill. (N.B. Anorexia is not recognised as a mental illness in every country).\n\n[1] World Medical Association, ‘WMA Declaration of Malta on Hunger Strikers’, 2006\n\n[2] European Court of Human Rights, Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms’, 2010, P.4\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "611b7e2de0e5aa93625bf2cf740ebc65", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed When it comes to hunger strikes the World Medical Association says that “Forcible feeding is never ethically acceptable.” [1] While there are obviously differences in terms of the objective when it comes to the consent of the patient there is no difference. In both cases the patient does not want to be force fed and understand what the consequences may be.\n\n[1] World Medical Association, ‘WMA Declaration of Malta on Hunger Strikers’, 2006\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a9a9a1f786d8a5bcdb84fd9b78afad6b", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Far from helping solve the patient’s psychological problems force feeding is just as likely to exacerbate the problems and make them much less willing to seek out treatment, something that they are often already unwilling to do. [1] While it may be the case that when starved people over-estimate their own size those who are anorexic in the developed world did not start out starved so there must have been a different initial cause of the anorexia that will need to be found and solved, there are numerous different types of psychological treatment that can help do this. [2]\n\n[1] Jimerson, Shane R. et al., ‘Eating Disorders: Treatment’, 2002, http://education.ucsb.edu/jimerson/eatingdisorders.html\n\n[2] NHS Choices, ‘Treating anorexia’, 2010, http://www.nhs.uk/Conditions/Anorexia-nervosa/Pages/Treatment.aspx\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4e5e59934b641972a11a99f074ba792c", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Life is more important than dignity. None the less there is a significant difference between someone who is in an emergency condition being treated without their consent and someone who has previously refused treatment being forced to have treatment. Patients are allowed to make decisions doctors believe are unwise. [1]\n\n[1] Patients.co.uk, ‘Consent To Treatment (Mental Capacity and Mental Helth Legislation)’ 2009, http://www.patient.co.uk/doctor/Consent-To-Treatment-%28Mental-Capacity-...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6e85ed02454a718ba3f1836d1486d134", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed The focus should be on palliative care.\n\nSome doctors advocate focusing on palliative care (relief of pain but not treatment of cause) due to the low full recovery rates of anorexia sufferers. Research Studies show that over 10 years only approximately 20% of patients recover. Those patients who are sufferers for more than 12 years are unlikely to ever recover.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "459cf5b61f42eb187e1331e778044440", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Compulsory treatment is not a long term solution.\n\nCompulsory treatment may only be successful in the short term. In the long term it does nothing to reduce the fear of food, weight and hospital felt by the patient and is a barrier to treatment. Hospital admission often has a worse outcome for the patient; there are increased mortality rates which are then even higher for those who are admitted against their will. [1] Suicide accounts for 27% of anorexia deaths. [2] Compulsory treatment may make the patient more depressed and at greater risk from harm.\n\n[1] Fedyszyn & Sullivan, ‘Ethical re-evaluation of contemporary treatments for anorexia nervosa’, 2007, http://leedsmet.academia.edu/GavinSullivan/Papers/255145/Ethical_Re-Evaluation_of_Contemporary_Treatments_for_Anorexia_Nervosa_Is_An_Aspirational_Stance_Possible_In_Practice , p.201\n\n[2] BBC News, ‘Compulsory treatment ‘helps anorexics’’, 1999 http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/408362.stm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8bcb2031fde9d9ae3073480613cc59a2", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Force feeding strategies may cause physical harm\n\nForce-feeding has negative consequences. If the patient is dangerously thin and is then force-fed, it can led to Hypophosphataemia (reduction of phosphates in the blood) which causes heart failure. Anorexics are characterised by self-denial and often do not come forward voluntarily. Indeed it according to Dr Sacker anorexia is often not even about food rather \"By stopping food from going into the body, what they really feel is they can be in control of their body.” [1] This desire is actively harmed by force feeding as a result they are even less likely to come forward voluntarily if they are faced with the possibility of force- feeding.\n\n[1] CBS, ‘A very thin line’, 02/11/2009, http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/1999/05/20/48hours/main47832.shtml , accessed 07/22/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5f1426ddeca153006319304d2163383c", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Anorectic patients are not able to make the decision for themselves.\n\nAnorectic patients are typically treated under mental health legislation (e.g. the UK 1983 Act). They do not make a free choice because they are not rationally able to weigh up decisions and consequences, they ‘feel’ fat when they obviously are not and are irrational as they are willing to starve themselves to the point of death when suicide is not their intent. [1] The patient is not “capable of forming unimpaired and rational judgements concerning the consequences” (British Medical Association 1992). There have been court cases that have confirmed that force feeding should be allowed when a patient is considered mentally ill. For example the case of “B vs. Croydon Health Authority” in 1994 it was judged, that B (a borderline personality disorder patient, which involves suffering from an irresistible desire to inflict-self-harm) can be force fed, even though she did not give consent to the treatment.\n\nThe court explained that because she was not aware of the seriousness of her condition and she had found it difficult to break out of the cycle of self-punishment, she was deemed unfit to make decisions about her nutrition. [2]\n\n[1] Fedyszyn & Sullivan, ‘Ethical re-evaluation of contemporary treatments for anorexia nervosa’, 2007, http://leedsmet.academia.edu/GavinSullivan/Papers/255145/Ethical_Re-Evaluation_of_Contemporary_Treatments_for_Anorexia_Nervosa_Is_An_Aspirational_Stance_Possible_In_Practice , p.202\n\n[2] Keywood K., B v Croydon Health Authority 1994, CA: Force-Feeding the Hunger-Striker under the Mental Health Act 1983., University of Liverpool, http://webjcli.ncl.ac.uk/articles3/keywood3.html , accessed 07/22/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d0a5324cf0d3a31bb0cc7e87380acd30", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Force feeding can help psychologically.\n\nA healthier body weight is necessary to be able to treat the patient’s psychological problems. Studies in Minnesota show that when normal volunteers were starved, they began to development anorectic patterns. They over-estimated the sizes of their own faces by approximately 50%. This shows the impact of starvation on the brain. [1]\n\n[1] Fedyszyn & Sullivan, ‘Ethical re-evaluation of contemporary treatments for anorexia nervosa’, 2007, http://leedsmet.academia.edu/GavinSullivan/Papers/255145/Ethical_Re-Evaluation_of_Contemporary_Treatments_for_Anorexia_Nervosa_Is_An_Aspirational_Stance_Possible_In_Practice , P.202\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4cb00ad9dca11b6207464fb17163950f", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Life is more important than dignity\n\nLife is more important than dignity, many medical treatments are unpleasant or painful but they are necessary to preserve life. Without force feeding the anorectic patient will often die. In Australia about 80 per cent of all anorexic children required hospital admission (from 101 cases), and of those, 50 per cent required tube feeding as a life-saving measure to manage starvation. [1] When a patient requires emergency treatment doctors should do what is necessary to save the patient’s life. Psychological problems can only be treated if the person is alive. Treatment for the psychological problem should be considered to go hand in hand with saving the patient’s life as in the B vs. Croydon Health Authority where force feeding was ruled to be complemented the use of other methods to treat her psychiatric problems. [2]\n\n[1] McLean T., Half of anorexic kids need force feeding, 2008, http://news.theage.com.au/national/half-of-anorexic-kids-need-force-feeding-20080528-2itg.html , accessed 07/22/2011\n\n[2] Keywood K., B v Croydon Health Authority 1994, CA: Force-Feeding the Hunger-Striker under the Mental Health Act 1983., University of Liverpool, http://www.ncl.ac.uk/~nlawwww/articles3/keywood3.html , accessed 07/22/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a1ef0e934e0f36ef10c48fa039a06bbf", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed In the first instance, doctors should always act to keep a patient alive\n\nMedical ethics say that a doctor has a responsibility to keep the patient alive to administer treatment. In the UK Diana Pretty was denied the right to die by the House of Lords even though she consistently requested it. The Israeli Courts ordered the force- feeding of political hunger strikers arguing that in a conflict between life and dignity, life wins. India prosecuted a physician who allowed a hunger striker to die. The medical profession take their responsibility for life very seriously on a global level.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
d2011797011387006710d3ab72513374	The focus should be on palliative care. Some doctors advocate focusing on palliative care (relief of pain but not treatment of cause) due to the low full recovery rates of anorexia sufferers. Research Studies show that over 10 years only approximately 20% of patients recover. Those patients who are sufferers for more than 12 years are unlikely to ever recover.	[ { "docid": "deca9e9494435fb554eb95e7380b23e5", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Palliative care is defeatist and does not attempt to cure the problem. Recovery is always a possibility and that is what doctors should be striving for “In a 10 year follow up of 76 severely ill women with anorexia, Eckert et al found that 18 (24%) had fully recovered, about half had a benign outcome, and only five (7%) had died.” [1] Doctors do not often have to deal with severe or chronic anorexia. Just because it is a very long treatment schedule that can be harrowing for a doctor, this not a reason to settle for palliative care. Better support structures ought to be put in place to enable the doctor to fulfil their obligation to the patient.\n\n[1] Williams, Christopher J. et al., ‘We should strive to keep patients alive’, 1998, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1113542/\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "e4107fd174e6bedf5b27fd2ca9d49034", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Short term success is all that is necessary to save a life. Once the anorectic patient is out of danger then more long term treatments can be explored. This means working out how to reduce the fear of food and of weight and if the patient has become worried about going to hospital then at least there is time to sort that out as well. While emergency force feeding has to be within a hospital not all treatment has to take place in such an environment and ongoing psychological treatment can take place elsewhere.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "660de51944223047d50eb4238d3c2fc6", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Yes there will be negative consequences to such a step as force feeding however this is only done when it is absolutely necessary and the negative consequences of not doing so are much worse. Doctors will only force feed if they are convinced that doing so is for the good of the patient, indeed they are prohibited from taking such a step if it is not absolutely necessary.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "baa63d94abdbf0264f7f6d93f05ec79d", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed In 1997 the Mental Health Act Commission opened the door to allowing force feeding of anorexic patients in the UK by allowing the compulsory admission of anorexics to hospital. This change of policy did not reduce the number of patients being admitted for treatment which has gone up from 419 in 1996-7 to 620 in 2005-6. [1]\n\n[1] Disordered eating, Anorexia Nervosa Statistics (Uk), http://www.disordered-eating.co.uk/eating-disorders-statistics/anorexia-nervosa-statistics-uk.html , accessed 07/22/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "acf694b01308564d831a4f6e837ed335", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Force feeding is undignified. The World Medical Association considers “Even if intended to benefit, feeding accompanied by threats, coercion, force or use of physical restraints is a form of inhuman and degrading treatment.” [1] This is treatment which the European Convention on Human Rights prohibits in Article 3 on the prohibition of torture. [2] The patient’s right to refuse treatment should be respected even if they are mentally ill. (N.B. Anorexia is not recognised as a mental illness in every country).\n\n[1] World Medical Association, ‘WMA Declaration of Malta on Hunger Strikers’, 2006\n\n[2] European Court of Human Rights, Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms’, 2010, P.4\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "611b7e2de0e5aa93625bf2cf740ebc65", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed When it comes to hunger strikes the World Medical Association says that “Forcible feeding is never ethically acceptable.” [1] While there are obviously differences in terms of the objective when it comes to the consent of the patient there is no difference. In both cases the patient does not want to be force fed and understand what the consequences may be.\n\n[1] World Medical Association, ‘WMA Declaration of Malta on Hunger Strikers’, 2006\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a9a9a1f786d8a5bcdb84fd9b78afad6b", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Far from helping solve the patient’s psychological problems force feeding is just as likely to exacerbate the problems and make them much less willing to seek out treatment, something that they are often already unwilling to do. [1] While it may be the case that when starved people over-estimate their own size those who are anorexic in the developed world did not start out starved so there must have been a different initial cause of the anorexia that will need to be found and solved, there are numerous different types of psychological treatment that can help do this. [2]\n\n[1] Jimerson, Shane R. et al., ‘Eating Disorders: Treatment’, 2002, http://education.ucsb.edu/jimerson/eatingdisorders.html\n\n[2] NHS Choices, ‘Treating anorexia’, 2010, http://www.nhs.uk/Conditions/Anorexia-nervosa/Pages/Treatment.aspx\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4e5e59934b641972a11a99f074ba792c", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Life is more important than dignity. None the less there is a significant difference between someone who is in an emergency condition being treated without their consent and someone who has previously refused treatment being forced to have treatment. Patients are allowed to make decisions doctors believe are unwise. [1]\n\n[1] Patients.co.uk, ‘Consent To Treatment (Mental Capacity and Mental Helth Legislation)’ 2009, http://www.patient.co.uk/doctor/Consent-To-Treatment-%28Mental-Capacity-...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "749668a231244ad1fdc486bc1a1aa552", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Anorexics need to be able to trust their doctors.\n\nThe most successful policies are where anorectic patients feel safe and trust their doctors so are willing to go to clinics voluntarily as they feel that they are in control of the situation. [1] Conversely an anorectic patient’s fear of weight gain, especially forced weight gain in hospital is an obstacle to treatment. If an anorexia nervosa sufferer thinks that they will be force- fed they may be less likely to seek treatment or advice.\n\n[1] Susic, Paul, ‘Anorexia Treatment and the Unwilling Patient’, http://www.psychtreatment.com/anorexia_treatment.htm , accessed 07/21/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "459cf5b61f42eb187e1331e778044440", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Compulsory treatment is not a long term solution.\n\nCompulsory treatment may only be successful in the short term. In the long term it does nothing to reduce the fear of food, weight and hospital felt by the patient and is a barrier to treatment. Hospital admission often has a worse outcome for the patient; there are increased mortality rates which are then even higher for those who are admitted against their will. [1] Suicide accounts for 27% of anorexia deaths. [2] Compulsory treatment may make the patient more depressed and at greater risk from harm.\n\n[1] Fedyszyn & Sullivan, ‘Ethical re-evaluation of contemporary treatments for anorexia nervosa’, 2007, http://leedsmet.academia.edu/GavinSullivan/Papers/255145/Ethical_Re-Evaluation_of_Contemporary_Treatments_for_Anorexia_Nervosa_Is_An_Aspirational_Stance_Possible_In_Practice , p.201\n\n[2] BBC News, ‘Compulsory treatment ‘helps anorexics’’, 1999 http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/408362.stm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8bcb2031fde9d9ae3073480613cc59a2", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Force feeding strategies may cause physical harm\n\nForce-feeding has negative consequences. If the patient is dangerously thin and is then force-fed, it can led to Hypophosphataemia (reduction of phosphates in the blood) which causes heart failure. Anorexics are characterised by self-denial and often do not come forward voluntarily. Indeed it according to Dr Sacker anorexia is often not even about food rather \"By stopping food from going into the body, what they really feel is they can be in control of their body.” [1] This desire is actively harmed by force feeding as a result they are even less likely to come forward voluntarily if they are faced with the possibility of force- feeding.\n\n[1] CBS, ‘A very thin line’, 02/11/2009, http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/1999/05/20/48hours/main47832.shtml , accessed 07/22/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5f1426ddeca153006319304d2163383c", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Anorectic patients are not able to make the decision for themselves.\n\nAnorectic patients are typically treated under mental health legislation (e.g. the UK 1983 Act). They do not make a free choice because they are not rationally able to weigh up decisions and consequences, they ‘feel’ fat when they obviously are not and are irrational as they are willing to starve themselves to the point of death when suicide is not their intent. [1] The patient is not “capable of forming unimpaired and rational judgements concerning the consequences” (British Medical Association 1992). There have been court cases that have confirmed that force feeding should be allowed when a patient is considered mentally ill. For example the case of “B vs. Croydon Health Authority” in 1994 it was judged, that B (a borderline personality disorder patient, which involves suffering from an irresistible desire to inflict-self-harm) can be force fed, even though she did not give consent to the treatment.\n\nThe court explained that because she was not aware of the seriousness of her condition and she had found it difficult to break out of the cycle of self-punishment, she was deemed unfit to make decisions about her nutrition. [2]\n\n[1] Fedyszyn & Sullivan, ‘Ethical re-evaluation of contemporary treatments for anorexia nervosa’, 2007, http://leedsmet.academia.edu/GavinSullivan/Papers/255145/Ethical_Re-Evaluation_of_Contemporary_Treatments_for_Anorexia_Nervosa_Is_An_Aspirational_Stance_Possible_In_Practice , p.202\n\n[2] Keywood K., B v Croydon Health Authority 1994, CA: Force-Feeding the Hunger-Striker under the Mental Health Act 1983., University of Liverpool, http://webjcli.ncl.ac.uk/articles3/keywood3.html , accessed 07/22/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d0a5324cf0d3a31bb0cc7e87380acd30", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Force feeding can help psychologically.\n\nA healthier body weight is necessary to be able to treat the patient’s psychological problems. Studies in Minnesota show that when normal volunteers were starved, they began to development anorectic patterns. They over-estimated the sizes of their own faces by approximately 50%. This shows the impact of starvation on the brain. [1]\n\n[1] Fedyszyn & Sullivan, ‘Ethical re-evaluation of contemporary treatments for anorexia nervosa’, 2007, http://leedsmet.academia.edu/GavinSullivan/Papers/255145/Ethical_Re-Evaluation_of_Contemporary_Treatments_for_Anorexia_Nervosa_Is_An_Aspirational_Stance_Possible_In_Practice , P.202\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4cb00ad9dca11b6207464fb17163950f", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed Life is more important than dignity\n\nLife is more important than dignity, many medical treatments are unpleasant or painful but they are necessary to preserve life. Without force feeding the anorectic patient will often die. In Australia about 80 per cent of all anorexic children required hospital admission (from 101 cases), and of those, 50 per cent required tube feeding as a life-saving measure to manage starvation. [1] When a patient requires emergency treatment doctors should do what is necessary to save the patient’s life. Psychological problems can only be treated if the person is alive. Treatment for the psychological problem should be considered to go hand in hand with saving the patient’s life as in the B vs. Croydon Health Authority where force feeding was ruled to be complemented the use of other methods to treat her psychiatric problems. [2]\n\n[1] McLean T., Half of anorexic kids need force feeding, 2008, http://news.theage.com.au/national/half-of-anorexic-kids-need-force-feeding-20080528-2itg.html , accessed 07/22/2011\n\n[2] Keywood K., B v Croydon Health Authority 1994, CA: Force-Feeding the Hunger-Striker under the Mental Health Act 1983., University of Liverpool, http://www.ncl.ac.uk/~nlawwww/articles3/keywood3.html , accessed 07/22/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a1ef0e934e0f36ef10c48fa039a06bbf", "text": " modern culture health disease health general weight house would force feed In the first instance, doctors should always act to keep a patient alive\n\nMedical ethics say that a doctor has a responsibility to keep the patient alive to administer treatment. In the UK Diana Pretty was denied the right to die by the House of Lords even though she consistently requested it. The Israeli Courts ordered the force- feeding of political hunger strikers arguing that in a conflict between life and dignity, life wins. India prosecuted a physician who allowed a hunger striker to die. The medical profession take their responsibility for life very seriously on a global level.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
267d740ac5f1dd672be4221c5c4a088f	The Ban Would Be a Barrier to Free Enterprise The proposal for this ban on large sodas would only affect businesses regulated by the NYC Board of Health. Restaurants, delis, food carts, and concession stands at theaters and stadiums would be affected because they are considered Food Service Establishments (FSEs). The ban would exclude grocery stores, 7-Eleven’s, and other establishments that are not considered FSE’s but are regulated by the State. Consequently, the ban cause the FSE to face repercussions as they would have to serve less soda (the goal of the ban), but also this selective, non-universal ban could encourage consumers to patronize other establishments where they would not be affected by the ban. There is currently a level of demand for large sodas in the market, but the ban would place a barrier on that whole sector of the market. It would be the government directly impeding free enterprise by providing different sets of rules for competing stores. In addition, New Yorkers would be encouraged to report violating establishments that would receive $200 fines. [1] It would be unfortunate to hurt businesses for a ban that wouldn’t necessarily be effective in its main goal to curb obesity because of the multiple blatant loopholes. [1] ‘From Supersized to Human-Sized: Reintroducing Reasonable Portions of Sugary Drinks in New York City’, NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene Briefing, 12 June 2012.	[ { "docid": "dffb52febc491e35e418c6b8894c9381", "text": " business health health general weight thbt new york city has right regulate size There are only slight price differences between 34 and 18-ounce sodas. McDonalds and Coca-Cola corporations were pushing independent franchises to lower the price of sodas to one dollar. [1] While the goal of the ban is to cut down the consumption of soda, the government has the right to put their citizens’ health needs above free enterprise. The non-universality of the ban is unfortunate but this ban is merely a small step in the direction of curbing obesity rates. The fact that restaurants will not be able to serve gigantic portions of soda will not push New Yorkers from eating at those restaurants to eating their meals at 7-Elevens. These are clearly two separate markets; one for purchasing drinks the other for consuming them with meals. It is therefore wrong to conclude that this is any kind of barrier to free enterprise.\n\n[1] Ziobro, Paul, ‘McDonald's Bets Pricing Drinks At $1 Will Heat Up Summer Sales’, The Wall Street Journal, 18 March 2012.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "9b4ad4d255afd1b1ab86410f34c6df6b", "text": " business health health general weight thbt new york city has right regulate size Freedom of choice is not absolute; it does not mean the consumer should be free to buy whatever they want from wherever they want. For example there is no expectation for restaurants and stores to always have both Pepsi and Coca Cola. In this instance freedom of choice in terms of size is not absolute; there is the freedom to have as much soda as the consumer desires they simply have to buy it in smaller portions. Arguing that representatives’ not being able to choose whether to enact this legislation is also restriction of choice ignores that Bloomberg himself is an elected politician that was chosen by the people.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b55117f752e49a9a0882b36c1ce704b9", "text": " business health health general weight thbt new york city has right regulate size First how democratic the governance of the city is does not detract from the right of the city government to restrict the size of soda drinks. The system of government has not been changed in order enact this particular regulation. Second it must be remembered that Mayor Bloomberg himself was elected. He was elected to a third term with 51% of the vote compared to 46% for his Democratic rival. [1] To be elected for a third time in a Democrat stronghold gives him a good deal of electoral legitimacy.\n\n[1] Goldman, Henry, ‘Bloomberg Wins Third NYC Mayor Term Beats Comptroller Thompson’, Bloomberg, 4 November 2009.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3577ffe80796ec6752931ef2439addd0", "text": " business health health general weight thbt new york city has right regulate size The ban is unnecessary because it will prove to be useless. Although the Bloomberg-appointed Board of Health gave their rubber stamp of approval to Mayor Bloomberg’s proposal, several board members voiced their apprehension of the ban and its effectiveness. Board member, Dr. Michael Phillips brought up the fact that the ban unfairly targeted establishments regulated by the city because those regulated by the state—7-Elevens and grocery stores—would continue selling larger sodas. The ban also focuses on sugary drinks alone. [1] \"We're really looking at restricting portion size, so the argument could be…what about the size of a hamburger or the jumbo fries, and all that kind of stuff?” The mayor himself said in the MSNBC interview that the goal was to target portion size. [2] Yet, somebody can easily buy four 16-ounce drinks and be worse for it. The people could also pass the deli and patronize the grocery store for large sodas, affecting the Deli’s business while still maintaining high sugar intake. The ban would be useless in fighting obesity because there are too many easily accessed loopholes and as it stands now, would just be a major inconvenience.\n\n[1] Saul, Michael Howard, ‘City Drinks Plan Questioned’, The Wall Street Journal, 12 June 2012.\n\n[2] Briggs, Bill, and Flam, Lisa, ‘Bloomberg defends soda ban plan: We’re not taking away your freedoms’, Health on Today, 1 July 2012.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "096cd8e70862219f658af1a8ef1c80ba", "text": " business health health general weight thbt new york city has right regulate size There is no obligation on the city to protect citizens from their own choices. Citizens are responsible for their own bodies including what they eat and drink. Making any part of government responsible for this would mean a need for much more regulation on almost anything that would protect lives. In this case it would require a much tougher response than simply a partial ban that only affects large drinks. Moreover if there is such an obligation why is it the obligation of the city while the state does not have such an obligation with regards to 7-11s?\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8cd0c68c8e76d168ca3659d24feb2af3", "text": " business health health general weight thbt new york city has right regulate size The ethical implications of paternalism are that the government is taking away personal freedoms because the government presumes that it “knows best” for the population. Paternalism inherently assumes that individuals cannot be trusted to make its own decisions. Personal freedom, however, is a cornerstone of the United States; The Constitution and the Bill of Rights guarantee individual’s freedoms, limit the role of government, and reserve power to the people. [1] A competent person’s freedoms should never be infringed upon, even for that person’s own good. John Stuart Mill wrote, “. . . the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant. He cannot rightfully be compelled to do or forbear because it will be better for him to do so, because it will make him happier, because in the opinion of others, to do so would be wise, or even right.... The only part of the conduct of anyone, for which he is amenable to society, is that which concerns others. In the part which merely concerns himself, his independence is of right, absolute, over himself. Over his own body-mind, the individual is sovereign”. [2] The paternalistic policies cited by the proposition that apparently set a precedent for this ban on soda are not good comparisons. Smoking bans for example are paternalistic in nature yet are morally acceptable because smoking not only harms the person but also those surrounding the smoker through passive smoking. Henry David Thoreau was quoted in saying \"[If] . . . a man was coming to my house with the conscious design of doing me good, I should run for my life\". [3] No government can be sure that their policies are what are universally right for its people; this should be left for the individual to decide.\n\n[1] McAffee, Thomas B., and Bybee, Jay S., ‘Powers reserved for the people and the states: a history of the Ninth and Tenth Amendments’, Praeger Publishers, Westport, 2006, P.2\n\n[2] Mill, John Stuart, On Liberty, 1859.\n\n[3] Andre, Claire, and Velasquez, Manuel, ‘For Your Own Good’, Issues in Ethics, Vol.4, No.2, Fall 1991.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cd72abf63babdde0d496c1520fe2eb49", "text": " business health health general weight thbt new york city has right regulate size The Soda Ban is an infringement upon the personal right to choose\n\nAlthough the soda ban is not a blanket prohibition of sugary drinks, the proposed ban impedes the public’s right to choose. ‘Big Government’ has become an important issue to many who view the extensive array of government regulations and laws as excessively interventionist and intruding. [1] By Mayor Bloomberg proposing this ban, he continues a trend of the government curbing citizens’ rights to choose, and interfering in the personal lives of its citizenry. The government has no right to be restricting the size of someone’s portions, this is the government regulating one’s diet. This ban inherently affects the consumer’s right to choose because it is prevents the choice of a larger size of soda. The Mayor hopes to influence New Yorkers’ choices toward better nutrition.\n\nMoreover Mayor Bloomberg’s method is not through a representative legislative body but through his personally appointed Board of Health (2), [2] the people have therefore been denied their right to choose, through their representatives, whether this legislation should be allowed.\n\n[1] ‘big government’, British & World English dictionary, Oxford university Press.\n\n[2] ‘Board of Health’, New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, 2012.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "05e11268678e562f3f98d34054a44189", "text": " business health health general weight thbt new york city has right regulate size It is undemocratic to have the law pass through the board of health.\n\nWhile the City has the right to exercise its abilities within the law to protect and aid New Yorkers, it must do so as a democratic body representing its constituents. The soda ban, whether it would actually do anything to curb obesity, is wrong because it isn’t representative of the people. Councilman Dan Halloran spoke at the ‘Million Gulp March’ in protest of the ban: “Mr. Mayor, if you want to make a law, go through your legislature, and make the law. Do not try to backdoor it through an administrative agency that is unaccountable to the people.” [1] Mayor Bloomberg’s attempt to pass this ban without the input or approval of the people is undemocratic. The New York City Health Department is an eleven-person committee appointed by the Mayor. [2] Thus, there is a large risk of Mayor Bloomberg exercising his personal will through this branch without any regulation. The proposed soda ban would be a fiat with the rubber stamp of approval from the Board of Health, but no citizen input.\n\n[1] Arkin. James, ‘Councilman Halloran: Bloomberg ‘Missing Boat About Liberty’ With Soda Ban’, The Daily News, 11 July 2012.\n\n[2] ‘Board of Health’, New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, 2012.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "58aec85314fc093fffced8026b61cb7f", "text": " business health health general weight thbt new york city has right regulate size The ban is necessary to confront the growing problem of obesity in NYC.\n\nAlthough rising obesity levels in the city have been a major issue in New York City recently, any measures already enacted have failed to curb the growing numbers of obese New Yorkers. The Bronx has the largest percentage of overweight adults, a staggering 70 percent; the other four boroughs also have seen increases in the past decade. Sixty-two percent of Staten Island adults are overweight; followed by Brooklyn, at 60 percent; Queens, at 57 percent; and Manhattan, at 47 percent, according to city health data. [1] The New York City Department of Health has enacted several programs promoting healthier living such as health fares in low-income areas and the Adopt A Bodega initiative, through which local bodegas or small delis and groceries agree to sell produce from family-owned, local farms, providing healthier foods to New Yorkers for reasonable prices. But the results, or rather lack of them, show that education and access are not enough. [2] As Mayor Bloomberg has argued, the ban will have an effect because it follows the principle that if some people have smaller portions given to them, they will consequently drink less. The Mayor doesn’t hope to prevent all people from drinking soda. In fact he emphasizes that this ban wouldn’t come close to restricting personal freedoms because people would still be free to order however much soda they would like. The customers would simply have to be served multiple containers. [3] This is not going to eradicate excessive sugar-intake, however a study by Dr. Brian Elbel, an assistant professor of population health and health policy at NYU Langone School of Medicine in New York City, determined that 62% of drinks bought at restaurants were over the size limit and the result would be that the average consumer would take in 63 fewer calories per trip to a fast-food restaurant [4] .\n\n[1] Hu, Winnie, ‘Obesity Ills That Won’t Budge Fuel Soda Battle by Bloomberg’, The New York Times, 11 June 2012.\n\n[2] ’New York City Healthy Bodegas Initiative 2010 Report’, NYC Department of Health & Mental Hygiene and NYC Center for Economic Opportunity.\n\n[3] Briggs, Bill, and Flam, Lisa, ‘Bloomberg defends soda ban plan: We’re not taking away your freedoms’, Health on Today, 1 July 2012.\n\n[4] Jaslow, Ryan, ‘Research finds NYC soda ban would cut 63 calories per fast food trip: Would that have any impact?’, CBS News, 24 July 2012.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "786fdc511fafc004f7bf407d06e3213b", "text": " business health health general weight thbt new york city has right regulate size The City has the obligation to protect its citizenry\n\nThomas Jefferson said “the purpose of government is to enable the people of a nation to live in safety and happiness”. [1] As an elected government led by Mayor Bloomberg, the government of New York City is obligated to lead the city in a positive direction. In Bloomberg’s case it was among his campaign promises “To achieve the biggest public health gains in the nation” and given his record with the smoking ban this kind of proposal is the obvious way to achieve such a goal. [2] as the Soda ban is not an infringement upon personal rights but a necessary public health measure. The ban on large sodas does not prohibit the consumption of soda, it simply impedes negative choices for poor nutrition. [3] The City has an obligation to promote healthy living as a form of keeping its citizenry safe and the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene clearly states ‘Ourmission is to protect and promote the health of all New Yorkers’. [4] “Obesity is a nationwide problem, and all over the United States, public health officials are wringing their hands saying, ‘Oh, this is terrible,’” but Mayor Bloomberg said, “New York City is not about wringing your hands; it's about doing something.” The mayor continued by including how he viewed his duty: \"I think that's what the public wants the mayor to do.” [5]\n\n[1] Thomas Jefferson quoted by Hughes, David, ‘Ed Miliband doesn’t seem to know what government is for’, The Telegraph, 17 March 2010.\n\n[2] Paybarah, Azi, ‘Bloomberg Envisions 2013, Thompson Sees Empty Promises’, The New York Observer, 26 October 2009.\n\n[3] Park, Alice, ‘The New York City Soda Ban, and a Brief History of Bloomberg’s Nudges’, Time, 31 May 2012.\n\n[4] ‘About the NYC DOHMH’, New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.\n\n[5] Grynbaum, Michael M., ‘New York Plans to Ban Sale of Big Sizes of Sugary Drinks’, The New York Times, 30 May 2012.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "98359a4f726db7c5c38f81b7db02f1dc", "text": " business health health general weight thbt new york city has right regulate size There is precedent of paternalistic government policies in NYC.\n\nThe principle of paternalism, that the state may interfere with another person, against their will, with the motivation of protecting that person from harm, [1] underlines a wide range of policies and laws across the United States, and there is already a precedent for such paternalistic laws particularly within New York City. New York City, under the leadership of Mayor Bloomberg, has enacted regulations on smoking, restaurants’ use of salt and trans fats. Laws prohibiting marijuana, cocaine, and other potentially harmful drugs are made with the goal to protect citizens. Seatbelt laws and the prohibition of cell phone use while driving all infringe upon a person’s freedom of choice but have been accepted for their inherent positive causation meaning there will be less deaths and injuries in accidents. Paternalistic policies are made to maintain the public’s safety and well-being with the assumption that the government “knows best.” Mayor Bloomberg’s proposed ban on soda sold in containers larger than 16 ounces targets the growing problem of obesity in New York City. Although obesity has been a popular topic of discussion in the City, there has been negligible advancement in weight-loss. This growing problem shows that education is not enough to incentivize people to control themselves. Dr. Donald Klein writes, “A fleeting, short-term self that enjoys chocolate, nicotine, or heroin is working his will on an enduring self that pays the cost. Although we may fancy ourself a fully integrated and consistent being, it might make more sense to describe ourself as a bundle of multiple selves, selves that overlap, intermingle, and sometimes conflict”. [2] That more than 50% of New Yorkers are overweight shows the people do not recognize their own long term interests. [3] Mayor Bloomberg’s goal is to limit soda consumption of the population. He has the wellbeing of New Yorkers in mind and he is following a precedent that people need guidance in personal choices.\n\n[1] Dworkin, Gerald, ‘Paternalism’, in Edward N. Zalta e., The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Summer 2010.\n\n[2] Klein, Daniel B., ‘The Moral Consequences of Paternalism’, Ideas on Liberty, May 1994.\n\n[3] Hu, Winnie, ‘Obesity Ills That Won’t Budge Fuel Soda Battle by Bloomberg’, The New York Times, 11 June 2012.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
5f908ebaf6a0effa2603dfb91fa67132	Penalizing a non-act is unconstitutional It is unconstitutional to require individuals to buy private insurance, and penalize them for not doing so (that is, penalizing their non-act, their omission to purchase insurance). As David B. Rivkin Jr. and Lee A. Casey argue: “… Can Congress require every American to buy health insurance? In short, no. The Constitution assigns only limited, enumerated powers to Congress and none, including the power to regulate interstate commerce or to impose taxes, would support a federal mandate requiring anyone who is otherwise without health insurance to buy it.”(1) The Congressional Budget Office believes “a mandate requiring all individuals to purchase health insurance would be an unprecedented form of federal action. The government has never required people to buy any good or service as a condition of lawful residence in the United States.”(2) An individual mandate would have two features that, in combination, would make it unique. First, it imposes a duty on individuals due to them being members of society. Second, it requires the purchase of a specific service on pain of tax penalties if that product is not purchased. (2) As noted by Sen. John Ensign, a Nevada Republican: "Anything we have ever done, somebody actually had to have an action before we could tax or regulate it."(3) As Robert A. Levy and Michael F. Cannon of the CATO Institute argue: “Congress' attempt to punish a non-act that harms no one is an intolerable affront to the Constitution, liberty, and personal autonomy. That shameful fact cannot be altered by calling it health-care reform.”(4) The individual healthcare insurance mandate would, for the first time, mean the government setting uo a monopoly or a cartel with which every citizen of the US would be compelled- by a statutory power- to do business. This destroys any pretence of individual market freedom, individuals would be required to contribute money out of each and every pay check they earned to either a government entity which would be staffed and/or controlled by political appointees or to a cartel made up of companies that would owe their continued existence on the cartel list to the acquiescence of political overseers. Either way, the reduction in individual autonomy and freedom over health care choices would be dramatically decreased and inevitably politicized. This has obvious worrying possibilities for corruption, the party in power would favour those who donate to the party.(5) Enforcing the mandate may also intrude on Constitutional rights. Sherry Glied, Ph.D., Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has warned, “[d]eveloping a system to promptly identify and penalize scofflaws [people who flout the law] will take effort and ingenuity, particularly in our diverse and mobile country. It may require a degree of intrusiveness and bureaucracy that some will find unpalatable.”(6)This is likely to mean much more intrusive inspection, for example hospitals having to report to the government patients they have who don’t have health insursnce..(6) This is why a majority of the states, and numerous organizations and individual persons, have filed actions in federal court challenging the constitutionality of the individual mandate, and several courts have already struck it down on constitutional grounds.(7) For all these reasons it is clear that for Congress to try to penalize a non-act is an unprecedented and unconstitutional power grab, and so the individual mandate is unconstitutional.	[ { "docid": "c6caf20ce3565ca628453e870aef8cf7", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states The federal government mandates positive activities all the time, and this is why several courts have also upheld the constitutionality of the individual mandate.(7)\n\nRegarding the charge that the individual mandate penalizes a 'non-action', Stephanie Cutter, an adviser to President Barack Obama, has argued: \"Individuals who choose to go without health insurance are making an economic decision that affects all of us—when people without insurance obtain health care they cannot pay for, those with insurance and taxpayers are often left to pick up the tab.\"(7) Thus these people are not engaging in a 'non-action' but rather in an economic choice which has negative implications for other Americans, something Congress has the constitutional power to regulate under the commerce clause and the constitution's provision that Congress should promote the general welfare.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "5d170205b7cb05c78026e4a873bd7c07", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states A refusal to purchase healthcare insurance can have an effect on interstate commerce, because in shrinking the risk pool of insured the premiums would incrementally rise. In 2007, healthcare expenditures amounted to $2.2 trillion, or $7,421 a person, and accounted for 16.2% of the gross domestic product. These statistics leave no doubt that regulating health insurance is synonymous with regulating interstate commerce.(10)\n\nNot engaging in economic transactions is a form of commercial behaviour that Congress can regulate. The Supreme Court held that Congress could require that hotels and restaurants provide services to African-Americans. Their refusal to engage in commerce still was deemed to be within the scope of Congress's commerce clause power.(10)\n\nThe likelihood is that everyone will require medical care at some point. An uninsured person in a car accident will be taken to the emergency room for treatment. An uninsured person with a communicable disease will be treated; indeed, it is necessary for the health and welfare of the general population to provide treatment to individuals suffering from infectious diseases. Congress can ensure that there is an adequate fund to pay for everyone's medical needs.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1cce15b5fcce98edee01502971f3e9d1", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states The healthcare insurance can be unprecedented but still be constitutional as Erwin Chemerinsky argues: “Anything that has never been done before is literally unprecedented, which means it lacks any precedent. So the question is, will the Supreme Court want to authorize this new extension of congressional power in light of the fact that it violates the first principles it affirmed in Lopez and Morrison? Or, to the contrary, will it want to take the opportunity reaffirm that these principles still apply, notwithstanding Raich, in a case with no further implications beyond the statute in question?”(10)\n\nRegarding the argument that the healthcare mandate will allow Congress to regulate everything and everyone, such hyperbole and apocalyptic predictions are familiar in this area. In 1918, in Hammer v. Dagenhart, the Supreme Court declared unconstitutional a federal law that prohibited the shipment in interstate commerce of goods made by child labour. The Court concluded its opinion by declaring: \"[I]f Congress can thus regulate matters entrusted to local authority by prohibition of the movement of commodities in interstate commerce, all freedom of commerce will be at an end, and the power of the states over local matters may be eliminated, and thus our system of government practically destroyed.\" For more than 70 years Congress has prohibited child labour and none of these dire predictions have come to pass. Nor would allowing Congress to mandate the purchase of health insurance mean that Congress could regulate who people invite to their homes for dinner or end our system of federalism.(10)\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "16d309ab59cae0d177cad86080467a51", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states Insurance mandates are not a tax and therefore are outside of constitutional powers. Randy Barnett, a Georgetown University law professor, claims that health insurance mandates are not a tax, and therefore falls outside congressional power. “You're fining people for failing to enter a private insurance contract.”(3)\n\nMoreover, as Peter Urbanowicz and Dennis G. Smith argue: “the question of whether the compelled purchase of health insurance constitutes the 'taking' of private property under the Fifth Amendment. Given the novel nature of the individual health insurance mandate, a Fifth Amendment challenge can be expected. Requiring a citizen to devote a per-cent of his or her income for a purpose for which he or she otherwise might not choose based on individual circumstances could be considered an arbitrary and capricious “taking” no matter how many hardship exemptions the federal government might dispense.”(6)\n\nRegarding the “general welfare” arguments adduced by side opposition: The words 'general Welfare' show up in the first line of Article I, Section 8: 'The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States'. Significantly, Notice the Constitution does not say the 'general welfare of the citizens of the United States.' It says \"general Welfare of the United States.' This clause only gives the Congress the power to raise money to defend the country and pay for the day-to-day operations of the government. It says nothing at all about building bridges to nowhere, or paving bike paths, or spending money on any other kind of pork barrel project, including health care.(13)\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cee3804fdf205604ec008580dcc34214", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states Mandatory health insurance is not analogous to car insurance. Car insurance requirements impose a condition on the voluntary activity of driving; a health insurance mandate imposes a condition on life itself.\n\nStates do not require non-drivers, including passengers in cars with potentially bad drivers, to buy auto insurance liability policies -- even though such a requirement undoubtedly would lower the auto insurance premiums for those who do drive. The auto insurance requirement is linked to driving and to the possibility that bad driving may cause injuries to others, including passengers in the driver's car, not to those who benefit from roads generally.(2) The primary purpose of the auto insurance mandate was to provide financial protection for people that a driver may harm, and not necessarily for the driver himself. And the auto insurance mandate is a quid pro quo for having the state issuing a privilege: in this case a driver’s license.(6)\n\nRegarding the claim that Medicare tax provides a justifying precedent for the individual healthcare mandate, it is worth noting that the architects of Medicare harboured grave doubts about its constitutionality, which was ultimately settled on the taxing power of the United States government. However, in contrast to an individual mandate, federal benefits are attached to Medicare taxes and there is a specific “contract” involved between the current payment of taxes and future government benefits. No such relationship would exist with the individual health insurance mandate. Additionally, while one can “opt-out” of receiving Social Security and Medicare benefits, although one must still pay Social Security and Medicare taxes, none of the individual mandate proposals provide for an “opt out”, other than for yet undefined religious objections. Interestingly, a suit being led by former House Majority Leader Richard Armey is challenging a federal regulation that suggests that opting out of Medicare will put a person’s Social Security benefits at risk.(6)\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b25f5da442fa975ccccd8334027e2ac1", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states These arguments overlook the existence of two major cases – United States v. Lopez and United States v. Morrison – in which the Supreme Court has specifically rejected the notion that Congress can regulate non-commercial behaviour merely because, arguably, such behaviour can have an impact on Commerce. The Court's overarching reason for doing so was its compellingly articulated belief that the Commerce Clause is a limited grant of power and one that cannot be infinitely capacious. This reasoning is unassailable, and demonstrated that the individual mandate is not a reasonable application of the commerce clause.(8) Rather, this interpretation of the commerce clause could potentially America's constitutional structure. Every single decision made by individual Americans, be it buying health insurance, a car, health club memberships or any other good or service, has some impact on the economy. Such decisions could therefore be subject to regulation by Congress. Indeed, Congress would be able to determine how individuals would dispose of every penny of whatever monies they have left after paying taxes.\n\nMeanwhile, the Supremacy Clause- which ensures that any constitutional federal legislation trumps exercises of state power- would all but guarantee that an infinitely capacious Commerce Clause would rob States of any remaining authority. This point was ably articulated by Justice Kennedy in his concurring opinion in Lopez.(8) Accordingly, there is a great deal at stake here. No matter how important the cause of health care reform might be, it is not consequential enough to destroy the very sinews of America’s constitutional system.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f39519cf19475c1378c2f740758e468a", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states The mandate is not constitutional under the commerce clause\n\nMany attorneys general have fought constitutionality of mandates. Since the passage of the legislation in March of 2010, many state governments, governors, and attorney generals have pressed forward with lawsuits centred on the idea that the individual mandate in the legislation is unconstitutional.(7) Underlying these legal challenges is a debate about the basis of the national Congress’s lawmaking powers. In order for laws passed by Congress to be considered legitimate and enforceable, those laws must be based on a power conferred on congress by the Constitution. On those areas of law and public life where the Constitution is silent, legislative power rests not in the hands of Congress, but rather is “reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”(9)\n\nIt has been argued that the individual healthcare mandate is authorised by the Constitution's empowerment of Congress to “regulate interstate commerce” (known as the “commerce clause”), however this is not true and the commerce clause does not authorize health insurance mandates. As the Congressional Research Service has written: \"Despite the breadth of powers that have been exercised under the Commerce Clause, it is unclear whether the clause would provide a solid constitutional foundation for legislation containing a requirement to have health insurance. Whether such a requirement would be constitutional under the Commerce Clause is perhaps the most challenging question posed by such a proposal, as it is a novel issue whether Congress may use this clause to require an individual to purchase a good or a service.”(2) The most obvious reason for this is that an omission to buy health insurance can in no way be termed 'interstate commerce', as there is no activity or commerce going on. This is not in keeping with the commerce clause, unlike other previous federal healthcare laws.\n\nThere is no doubt that Congress can regulate an entire array of economic activities, large and small, inter- and intra-state. Thus, for example, there is no problem, Constitution-wise with having Congress regulate health care insurance purchase transactions. The problem with an individual insurance purchase mandate, however, is that it does not regulate any transactions at all; it regulates human beings, simply because they exist, and orders them to engage in certain types of economic transactions.(8)\n\nWhile most health care insurers and health care providers may engage in interstate commerce and may be regulated accordingly under the Commerce Clause, it is a different matter to find a basis for imposing Commerce Clause related regulation on an individual citizen who chooses not to undertake a commercial transaction. The decision not to engage in affirmative conduct is arguably distinguishable from cases in which Commerce Clause regulatory authority was recognized over intra-state activity: growing wheat, for example, (Wickard v. Filmore) or, more recently, growing marijuana (Gonzales v. Raich).(6)\n\nIf Congress were to invoke its Commerce Clause authority to support legislation mandating individual health insurance coverage, such an action would have to contend with recent Supreme Court precedent limiting unfettered use of Commerce Clause authority to police individual behaviour that does not constitute interstate commerce: United States v. Lopez, invalidating the application of the Gun Free School Zones Act of 1990 to individuals, and United States v. Morrison, invalidating certain portions of the Violence Against Women Act.\n\nIn the case of a mandate to purchase health insurance or face a tax or penalty, Congress would have to explain how not doing something – not buying insurance and not seeking health care services – implicated interstate commerce.(6) Therefore, it is clear that Congress is not empowered to regulate the choice not to buy healthcare, as it lacks constitutional authorisation to interfere in this aspect of individual Americans’ private lives.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ceb11eeb00b004b5f582d0bf0a97feaf", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states The individual mandate gives too much power to the Federal Government\n\nThe vertical separation of powers, under which the federal government possesses limited and enumerated powers, while the States wield general powers (including the right to operate their own police forces), is a key part of America's constitutional architecture. Far from being an 18th century affectation, these structural limitations on government powers were designed to protect individual liberty. In the Framers' view, limiting the ability of the federal government to exercise authority was core to ensuring that no single government entity would grow too powerful. This is because, under the Supremacy Clause, any constitutionally compliant federal legislation trumps exercises of individual state’s powers. Therefore, an infinitely capacious Commerce Clause (which would be produced if the mandating of healthcare were to be allowed) would rob States of any remaining authority.(8)\n\nWhen any choice or non-action which has economic impacts becomes termed as “economic”, every aspect of consumer behaviour, or, for that matter, any aspect of individual behaviour, would become an economic activity, and thus nothing would fall outside of Congress' power to regulate under the commerce clause.(8)\n\nThe individual health insurance mandate would set dangerous precedents for federal power. The Congressional Budget Office acknowledged the unprecedented nature of an individual mandate when assessing the Clinton health care reform proposal of 1993: “A mandate requiring all individuals to purchase health insurance would be an unprecedented form of federal action. The government has never required people to buy any good or service as a condition of lawful residence in the United States. An individual mandate has two features that, in combination, make it unique. First, it would impose a duty on individuals as members of society. Second, it would require people to purchase a specific service that would have to be heavily regulated by the federal government.\"(2)\n\nThe 'commerce clause on steroids', as imagined by supporters of the healthcare mandate, would fundamentally warp America's constitutional architecture. Because every single decision by individual Americans, be it buying health insurance, cars, health club memberships or any other good or service, has some impact on the economy, it could be subject to regulation by Congress. Indeed, Congress would be able to dictate how individuals would dispose of every penny of whatever monies they have left after paying taxes, transforming Americans into virtual serfs.(8) For all these reasons the individual healthcare mandate would give too much power to the federal government, in ways which are antithetical to the Constitution as the Founders envisioned it and set it out (with restricted and separate powers), and so it should be deemed unconstitutional.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0f0dad6d4e3d1bfb5ac767d8415a1681", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states The mandate is constitutional under the commerce clause\n\nCongress has ample power and precedent through the Constitution’s “Commerce Clause” to regulate just about any aspect of the national economy.\n\nHealth insurance is quintessentially an economic good. The only possible objection is that mandating its purchase is not the same as “regulating” its purchase, but a mandate is just a stronger form of regulation. Where a Congressional power exists, nothing in law says that ”strong” and potentially more intrusive forms of action are less supported than weaker ones.(11)\n\nCritics of an individual mandate cite recent Supreme Court cases in which the Court has limited the commerce clause’s power. However, those cases (Lopez and Morrison) involved regulation of non-economic activity. The individual mandate regulates the relationship between sellers and buyers of health care insurance. Moreover, the Court was concerned in Lopez and Morrison with efforts by Congress to intrude into areas that are properly regulated by state governments and thereby to upset the balance of power between the federal and state governments. By contrast, congressional regulation of the health care industry does not violate state prerogatives.\n\nTo be sure, much regulation of insurance occurs at the state level, but that is because Congress has chosen by statute to defer to state regulation. The Constitution does not prevent Congress from revoking its statutory grants to state governments.(12) Those who argue that this is unconstitutional maintain that those not purchasing health insurance, by definition, are not part of interstate commerce. There are numerous flaws with this argument.\n\nFirst, Congress can regulate activities that themselves are not part of interstate commerce if they have a substantial effect on interstate commerce. For example, in Wickard v. Filburn, the Supreme Court held that Congress could regulate wheat that farmers grew for their own home consumption. More recently in Gonzales v. Raich, the Court ruled that Congress could prohibit cultivating and possessing small amounts of marijuana for personal medicinal use. Even though the individuals were not personally engaged in commerce, the matter still fit within the commerce power.(10)\n\nSecond, the decision to abstain from particular economic transactions is a form of commercial behaviour that Congress can regulate. The Supreme Court held that Congress could require that hotels and restaurants provide services to African-Americans. Their refusal to engage in commerce still was deemed to be within the scope of Congress's commerce clause power.(10) This is made more significant by the fact that the decision to remain uninsured can affect commerce- both within and between states- by raising health insurance premiums. This is because insurance premiums tend to rise in response to reductions in the size of the pool of individuals to whom financial risk can be distributed.(14)\n\nCitizens who forego health insurance are forcing other Americans to cover their costs if they are sent to hospital for emergency treatment. They are also forcing others to pay higher insurance rates, now that insurance companies can no longer legally exclude those with pre-existing conditions.(15)\n\nThird, the likelihood is that everyone will require medical care at some point. An uninsured person in a car accident will be taken to the emergency room for treatment. An uninsured person with a communicable disease will be treated. Congress can ensure that there is an adequate fund to pay for everyone's medical needs. In other words, the health care system is part of interstate commerce. Providing care for all unquestionably has a substantial economic effect. Congress, then, can use its authority under the necessary and proper clause to make sure that the system that it is creating is viable and capable of providing health care for all.(10)\n\nTherefore the individual healthcare mandate is constitutional because it is authorized under the commerce clause of the constitution.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "26f150bb91a9692dcd641ba35240f15f", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states The mandate falls under taxation and general welfare powers\n\nAn insurance mandate would be enforced through income tax laws, so even if a simple mandate were not a valid 'regulation,' it still could fall easily within Congress’s plenary power to tax income. For instance, anyone purchasing insurance could be given an income tax credit, and those not purchasing could be assessed an income tax penalty.\n\nThe only possible constitutional restriction is an archaic provision saying that if Congress imposes anything that amounts to a 'head tax' or 'poll tax' (that is, taxing people simply as people rather than taxing their income), then it must do so uniformly (that is, the same amount per person). This technical restriction is easily avoided by using income tax laws.\n\nPurists complain that taxes should be proportional to actual income and should not be used mainly to regulate economic behaviour, but our tax code, for better or worse, is riddled with such regulatory provisions and so they are clearly constitutional. (11) In many ways, the 'mandate' could be considered a tax, but a tax which people would not have to pay if they purchased health insurance. The House bill imposes a tax of 2.5% on adjusted gross income if a taxpayer is not part of a qualified health insurance program. The Senate bill imposes what is called an “excise tax”, a tax on transactions or events, or a “penalty tax”, a tax for failing to do something (e.g., filing your tax return promptly). The tax is levied for each month that an individual fails to pay premiums into a qualified health plan. Taxing uninsured people helps to pay for the costs of the new regulations. The tax gives uninsured people a choice. If they stay out of the risk pool, they effectively raise other people’s insurance costs, and Congress taxes them to recoup some of the costs. If they join the risk pool, they do not have to pay the tax. A good analogy would be a tax on polluters who fail to install pollution-control equipment: they can pay the tax or install the equipment.(17)\n\nHealth insurance mandates incentivize behaviour like many other laws. At one time, the Supreme Court restricted the ability of Congress to use its taxing power to regulate people's activities. In the early part of the 20th Century, the Court drew a distinction between taxes designed to raise revenue, which were permissible, and taxes designed to regulate behaviour, which might not be permissible. However, this distinction was jettisoned by 1937, and the taxing power is now recognized as a broad congressional power.(12) Moreover, Congress has the power to make laws which promote the general welfare. As Democratic House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer argued in November of 2009: “Well, in promoting the general welfare the Constitution obviously gives broad authority to Congress to effect that end. The end that we're trying to effect is to make health care affordable, so I think clearly this is within our constitutional responsibility.\" The words \"general Welfare\" show up in the first line of Article I, Section 8 of the US Constitution: \"The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States.”(12)\n\nThe power to promote the general welfare becomes crucial when it is considered that it is impossible to create a national health insurance system and help the current 30 million uninsured is to mandate everyone to buy health insurance. You cannot have universal health insurance without a mandate. Every country in the world that has a universal health-insurance system either requires its citizens to buy health insurance, or includes its citizens in a default insurance programme automatically and taxes them for it (which is effectively the same thing). The reasons for this are simple, and have been covered hundreds of times since the current debate over universal health insurance began during the Democratic presidential primaries in late 2007. If citizens within a state are not obliged to participate in a healthcare scheme (whether privately of publicly organised), then many young and healthy people will bet on not needing insurance, and will decline to buy it. Such behaviour will alter the composition of the risk pool, such that it is made up of older, sicker people with higher medical costs, and thus premiums will rise. That in turn will cause more healthy people to leave the system. This is the phenomenon of \"adverse selection\". Ultimately you're left only with rich old sick people, and nobody else can afford insurance. This is known- somewhat histrionically- as an “insurance death spiral”.\n\nStates that wish to pursue the goal of creating an affordable, universally available system of healthcare, must ensure that the majority of their citizens buy into such a scheme.(13) Because there is a compelling benefit to the \"general welfare\" in instituting a national welfare program, the federal government may rely on Constitutional authority to impose a health insurance mandate. If the States were left to do this, with some instituting a mandate and some not, many would be left uninsured and the risk pool would not be adequately spread. The difference in benefits to the country clearly justifies federal action to create this individual mandate under the Constitution.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "49168ea58794b3e838fffa6d9467c80b", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states Mandatory health insurance is analogous to constitutional mandates\n\nFederal mandates are a cornerstone of the American legal system and the everyday life of every American. As Ohio Attorney General Richard Cordray and Iowa's attorney general Tom Miller, argued in 2010: \"We live under mandates every day. Without them, society as we know it would disintegrate. Every criminal law tells us what we cannot do. And sometimes the law tells us what we must do. Congress can require young Americans to register for the draft to serve in the military, for example, or can require us all to pay taxes for programs like Social Security and Medicare. We can- and do- argue about what shape these laws should take, without claiming that our leaders are constitutionally barred from dealing with our most pressing problems.\"(16)\n\nCar insurance is mandatory, so why not health insurance too? If the government requires that individuals buy car insurance, why should it not also be allowed to require that individuals buy health insurance? Some say that there is no mandate to buy car insurance because if you don't want to buy that car insurance, you simply don't have to drive. Yet, for the majority of families and workers, driving is a necessity and not a choice. So, the mandate on drivers to buy insurance is, therefore, directly analogous to a mandate on individuals to buy health insurance.\n\nMedicare tax also sets an important justifying precedent for the individual healthcare mandate. The Medicare program imposes a payroll tax on Americans as a way to fund coverage of their hospital costs once they reach age 65. People cannot opt out of Medicare; it is an obligatory system of health care insurance for one's senior years. Similarly, Congress can use a payroll tax to implement a mandate for individuals to purchase health insurance before they reach age 65. Under the House bill, for example, people will pay a 2.5 percent tax on their income unless they have health care coverage.(12)\n\nIt is significant here that there is no fundamental right to go without insurance under the Constitution; no core constitutional rights are violated by the individual mandate. Under both liberal and conservative jurisprudence, the Constitution protects individual autonomy strongly only when “fundamental rights” are involved. There may be fundamental rights to decide about medical treatments, but having insurance does not require anyone to undergo treatment. It only requires them to have a means to pay for any treatment they might choose to receive, alongside treatment that they might not be able to consent to (by reason of infirmity), but that doctors and hospitals may be ethically obliged to provide.\n\nThe “liberties” that are modified by the individual mandate are purely economic and have none of the strong elements of personal or bodily integrity that are normally used to invoke Constitutional protection.\n\nIn short, there is no fundamental right to be uninsured, and so various arguments based on the Bill of Rights fall flat. The closest plausible argument is one based on a federal statute protecting religious liberty, but Congress is Constitutionally free to override one statute with another.(11) This means that the healthcare mandate is no different to the many other mandates the federal government imposes on the American people to support the general welfare, and as such should be upheld as constitutional.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
81a65201cfc285a34ff0c382a59ca789	The mandate falls under taxation and general welfare powers An insurance mandate would be enforced through income tax laws, so even if a simple mandate were not a valid 'regulation,' it still could fall easily within Congress’s plenary power to tax income. For instance, anyone purchasing insurance could be given an income tax credit, and those not purchasing could be assessed an income tax penalty. The only possible constitutional restriction is an archaic provision saying that if Congress imposes anything that amounts to a 'head tax' or 'poll tax' (that is, taxing people simply as people rather than taxing their income), then it must do so uniformly (that is, the same amount per person). This technical restriction is easily avoided by using income tax laws. Purists complain that taxes should be proportional to actual income and should not be used mainly to regulate economic behaviour, but our tax code, for better or worse, is riddled with such regulatory provisions and so they are clearly constitutional. (11) In many ways, the 'mandate' could be considered a tax, but a tax which people would not have to pay if they purchased health insurance. The House bill imposes a tax of 2.5% on adjusted gross income if a taxpayer is not part of a qualified health insurance program. The Senate bill imposes what is called an “excise tax”, a tax on transactions or events, or a “penalty tax”, a tax for failing to do something (e.g., filing your tax return promptly). The tax is levied for each month that an individual fails to pay premiums into a qualified health plan. Taxing uninsured people helps to pay for the costs of the new regulations. The tax gives uninsured people a choice. If they stay out of the risk pool, they effectively raise other people’s insurance costs, and Congress taxes them to recoup some of the costs. If they join the risk pool, they do not have to pay the tax. A good analogy would be a tax on polluters who fail to install pollution-control equipment: they can pay the tax or install the equipment.(17) Health insurance mandates incentivize behaviour like many other laws. At one time, the Supreme Court restricted the ability of Congress to use its taxing power to regulate people's activities. In the early part of the 20th Century, the Court drew a distinction between taxes designed to raise revenue, which were permissible, and taxes designed to regulate behaviour, which might not be permissible. However, this distinction was jettisoned by 1937, and the taxing power is now recognized as a broad congressional power.(12) Moreover, Congress has the power to make laws which promote the general welfare. As Democratic House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer argued in November of 2009: “Well, in promoting the general welfare the Constitution obviously gives broad authority to Congress to effect that end. The end that we're trying to effect is to make health care affordable, so I think clearly this is within our constitutional responsibility." The words "general Welfare" show up in the first line of Article I, Section 8 of the US Constitution: "The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States.”(12) The power to promote the general welfare becomes crucial when it is considered that it is impossible to create a national health insurance system and help the current 30 million uninsured is to mandate everyone to buy health insurance. You cannot have universal health insurance without a mandate. Every country in the world that has a universal health-insurance system either requires its citizens to buy health insurance, or includes its citizens in a default insurance programme automatically and taxes them for it (which is effectively the same thing). The reasons for this are simple, and have been covered hundreds of times since the current debate over universal health insurance began during the Democratic presidential primaries in late 2007. If citizens within a state are not obliged to participate in a healthcare scheme (whether privately of publicly organised), then many young and healthy people will bet on not needing insurance, and will decline to buy it. Such behaviour will alter the composition of the risk pool, such that it is made up of older, sicker people with higher medical costs, and thus premiums will rise. That in turn will cause more healthy people to leave the system. This is the phenomenon of "adverse selection". Ultimately you're left only with rich old sick people, and nobody else can afford insurance. This is known- somewhat histrionically- as an “insurance death spiral”. States that wish to pursue the goal of creating an affordable, universally available system of healthcare, must ensure that the majority of their citizens buy into such a scheme.(13) Because there is a compelling benefit to the "general welfare" in instituting a national welfare program, the federal government may rely on Constitutional authority to impose a health insurance mandate. If the States were left to do this, with some instituting a mandate and some not, many would be left uninsured and the risk pool would not be adequately spread. The difference in benefits to the country clearly justifies federal action to create this individual mandate under the Constitution.	[ { "docid": "16d309ab59cae0d177cad86080467a51", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states Insurance mandates are not a tax and therefore are outside of constitutional powers. Randy Barnett, a Georgetown University law professor, claims that health insurance mandates are not a tax, and therefore falls outside congressional power. “You're fining people for failing to enter a private insurance contract.”(3)\n\nMoreover, as Peter Urbanowicz and Dennis G. Smith argue: “the question of whether the compelled purchase of health insurance constitutes the 'taking' of private property under the Fifth Amendment. Given the novel nature of the individual health insurance mandate, a Fifth Amendment challenge can be expected. Requiring a citizen to devote a per-cent of his or her income for a purpose for which he or she otherwise might not choose based on individual circumstances could be considered an arbitrary and capricious “taking” no matter how many hardship exemptions the federal government might dispense.”(6)\n\nRegarding the “general welfare” arguments adduced by side opposition: The words 'general Welfare' show up in the first line of Article I, Section 8: 'The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States'. Significantly, Notice the Constitution does not say the 'general welfare of the citizens of the United States.' It says \"general Welfare of the United States.' This clause only gives the Congress the power to raise money to defend the country and pay for the day-to-day operations of the government. It says nothing at all about building bridges to nowhere, or paving bike paths, or spending money on any other kind of pork barrel project, including health care.(13)\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "cee3804fdf205604ec008580dcc34214", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states Mandatory health insurance is not analogous to car insurance. Car insurance requirements impose a condition on the voluntary activity of driving; a health insurance mandate imposes a condition on life itself.\n\nStates do not require non-drivers, including passengers in cars with potentially bad drivers, to buy auto insurance liability policies -- even though such a requirement undoubtedly would lower the auto insurance premiums for those who do drive. The auto insurance requirement is linked to driving and to the possibility that bad driving may cause injuries to others, including passengers in the driver's car, not to those who benefit from roads generally.(2) The primary purpose of the auto insurance mandate was to provide financial protection for people that a driver may harm, and not necessarily for the driver himself. And the auto insurance mandate is a quid pro quo for having the state issuing a privilege: in this case a driver’s license.(6)\n\nRegarding the claim that Medicare tax provides a justifying precedent for the individual healthcare mandate, it is worth noting that the architects of Medicare harboured grave doubts about its constitutionality, which was ultimately settled on the taxing power of the United States government. However, in contrast to an individual mandate, federal benefits are attached to Medicare taxes and there is a specific “contract” involved between the current payment of taxes and future government benefits. No such relationship would exist with the individual health insurance mandate. Additionally, while one can “opt-out” of receiving Social Security and Medicare benefits, although one must still pay Social Security and Medicare taxes, none of the individual mandate proposals provide for an “opt out”, other than for yet undefined religious objections. Interestingly, a suit being led by former House Majority Leader Richard Armey is challenging a federal regulation that suggests that opting out of Medicare will put a person’s Social Security benefits at risk.(6)\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b25f5da442fa975ccccd8334027e2ac1", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states These arguments overlook the existence of two major cases – United States v. Lopez and United States v. Morrison – in which the Supreme Court has specifically rejected the notion that Congress can regulate non-commercial behaviour merely because, arguably, such behaviour can have an impact on Commerce. The Court's overarching reason for doing so was its compellingly articulated belief that the Commerce Clause is a limited grant of power and one that cannot be infinitely capacious. This reasoning is unassailable, and demonstrated that the individual mandate is not a reasonable application of the commerce clause.(8) Rather, this interpretation of the commerce clause could potentially America's constitutional structure. Every single decision made by individual Americans, be it buying health insurance, a car, health club memberships or any other good or service, has some impact on the economy. Such decisions could therefore be subject to regulation by Congress. Indeed, Congress would be able to determine how individuals would dispose of every penny of whatever monies they have left after paying taxes.\n\nMeanwhile, the Supremacy Clause- which ensures that any constitutional federal legislation trumps exercises of state power- would all but guarantee that an infinitely capacious Commerce Clause would rob States of any remaining authority. This point was ably articulated by Justice Kennedy in his concurring opinion in Lopez.(8) Accordingly, there is a great deal at stake here. No matter how important the cause of health care reform might be, it is not consequential enough to destroy the very sinews of America’s constitutional system.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5d170205b7cb05c78026e4a873bd7c07", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states A refusal to purchase healthcare insurance can have an effect on interstate commerce, because in shrinking the risk pool of insured the premiums would incrementally rise. In 2007, healthcare expenditures amounted to $2.2 trillion, or $7,421 a person, and accounted for 16.2% of the gross domestic product. These statistics leave no doubt that regulating health insurance is synonymous with regulating interstate commerce.(10)\n\nNot engaging in economic transactions is a form of commercial behaviour that Congress can regulate. The Supreme Court held that Congress could require that hotels and restaurants provide services to African-Americans. Their refusal to engage in commerce still was deemed to be within the scope of Congress's commerce clause power.(10)\n\nThe likelihood is that everyone will require medical care at some point. An uninsured person in a car accident will be taken to the emergency room for treatment. An uninsured person with a communicable disease will be treated; indeed, it is necessary for the health and welfare of the general population to provide treatment to individuals suffering from infectious diseases. Congress can ensure that there is an adequate fund to pay for everyone's medical needs.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1cce15b5fcce98edee01502971f3e9d1", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states The healthcare insurance can be unprecedented but still be constitutional as Erwin Chemerinsky argues: “Anything that has never been done before is literally unprecedented, which means it lacks any precedent. So the question is, will the Supreme Court want to authorize this new extension of congressional power in light of the fact that it violates the first principles it affirmed in Lopez and Morrison? Or, to the contrary, will it want to take the opportunity reaffirm that these principles still apply, notwithstanding Raich, in a case with no further implications beyond the statute in question?”(10)\n\nRegarding the argument that the healthcare mandate will allow Congress to regulate everything and everyone, such hyperbole and apocalyptic predictions are familiar in this area. In 1918, in Hammer v. Dagenhart, the Supreme Court declared unconstitutional a federal law that prohibited the shipment in interstate commerce of goods made by child labour. The Court concluded its opinion by declaring: \"[I]f Congress can thus regulate matters entrusted to local authority by prohibition of the movement of commodities in interstate commerce, all freedom of commerce will be at an end, and the power of the states over local matters may be eliminated, and thus our system of government practically destroyed.\" For more than 70 years Congress has prohibited child labour and none of these dire predictions have come to pass. Nor would allowing Congress to mandate the purchase of health insurance mean that Congress could regulate who people invite to their homes for dinner or end our system of federalism.(10)\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c6caf20ce3565ca628453e870aef8cf7", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states The federal government mandates positive activities all the time, and this is why several courts have also upheld the constitutionality of the individual mandate.(7)\n\nRegarding the charge that the individual mandate penalizes a 'non-action', Stephanie Cutter, an adviser to President Barack Obama, has argued: \"Individuals who choose to go without health insurance are making an economic decision that affects all of us—when people without insurance obtain health care they cannot pay for, those with insurance and taxpayers are often left to pick up the tab.\"(7) Thus these people are not engaging in a 'non-action' but rather in an economic choice which has negative implications for other Americans, something Congress has the constitutional power to regulate under the commerce clause and the constitution's provision that Congress should promote the general welfare.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0f0dad6d4e3d1bfb5ac767d8415a1681", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states The mandate is constitutional under the commerce clause\n\nCongress has ample power and precedent through the Constitution’s “Commerce Clause” to regulate just about any aspect of the national economy.\n\nHealth insurance is quintessentially an economic good. The only possible objection is that mandating its purchase is not the same as “regulating” its purchase, but a mandate is just a stronger form of regulation. Where a Congressional power exists, nothing in law says that ”strong” and potentially more intrusive forms of action are less supported than weaker ones.(11)\n\nCritics of an individual mandate cite recent Supreme Court cases in which the Court has limited the commerce clause’s power. However, those cases (Lopez and Morrison) involved regulation of non-economic activity. The individual mandate regulates the relationship between sellers and buyers of health care insurance. Moreover, the Court was concerned in Lopez and Morrison with efforts by Congress to intrude into areas that are properly regulated by state governments and thereby to upset the balance of power between the federal and state governments. By contrast, congressional regulation of the health care industry does not violate state prerogatives.\n\nTo be sure, much regulation of insurance occurs at the state level, but that is because Congress has chosen by statute to defer to state regulation. The Constitution does not prevent Congress from revoking its statutory grants to state governments.(12) Those who argue that this is unconstitutional maintain that those not purchasing health insurance, by definition, are not part of interstate commerce. There are numerous flaws with this argument.\n\nFirst, Congress can regulate activities that themselves are not part of interstate commerce if they have a substantial effect on interstate commerce. For example, in Wickard v. Filburn, the Supreme Court held that Congress could regulate wheat that farmers grew for their own home consumption. More recently in Gonzales v. Raich, the Court ruled that Congress could prohibit cultivating and possessing small amounts of marijuana for personal medicinal use. Even though the individuals were not personally engaged in commerce, the matter still fit within the commerce power.(10)\n\nSecond, the decision to abstain from particular economic transactions is a form of commercial behaviour that Congress can regulate. The Supreme Court held that Congress could require that hotels and restaurants provide services to African-Americans. Their refusal to engage in commerce still was deemed to be within the scope of Congress's commerce clause power.(10) This is made more significant by the fact that the decision to remain uninsured can affect commerce- both within and between states- by raising health insurance premiums. This is because insurance premiums tend to rise in response to reductions in the size of the pool of individuals to whom financial risk can be distributed.(14)\n\nCitizens who forego health insurance are forcing other Americans to cover their costs if they are sent to hospital for emergency treatment. They are also forcing others to pay higher insurance rates, now that insurance companies can no longer legally exclude those with pre-existing conditions.(15)\n\nThird, the likelihood is that everyone will require medical care at some point. An uninsured person in a car accident will be taken to the emergency room for treatment. An uninsured person with a communicable disease will be treated. Congress can ensure that there is an adequate fund to pay for everyone's medical needs. In other words, the health care system is part of interstate commerce. Providing care for all unquestionably has a substantial economic effect. Congress, then, can use its authority under the necessary and proper clause to make sure that the system that it is creating is viable and capable of providing health care for all.(10)\n\nTherefore the individual healthcare mandate is constitutional because it is authorized under the commerce clause of the constitution.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "49168ea58794b3e838fffa6d9467c80b", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states Mandatory health insurance is analogous to constitutional mandates\n\nFederal mandates are a cornerstone of the American legal system and the everyday life of every American. As Ohio Attorney General Richard Cordray and Iowa's attorney general Tom Miller, argued in 2010: \"We live under mandates every day. Without them, society as we know it would disintegrate. Every criminal law tells us what we cannot do. And sometimes the law tells us what we must do. Congress can require young Americans to register for the draft to serve in the military, for example, or can require us all to pay taxes for programs like Social Security and Medicare. We can- and do- argue about what shape these laws should take, without claiming that our leaders are constitutionally barred from dealing with our most pressing problems.\"(16)\n\nCar insurance is mandatory, so why not health insurance too? If the government requires that individuals buy car insurance, why should it not also be allowed to require that individuals buy health insurance? Some say that there is no mandate to buy car insurance because if you don't want to buy that car insurance, you simply don't have to drive. Yet, for the majority of families and workers, driving is a necessity and not a choice. So, the mandate on drivers to buy insurance is, therefore, directly analogous to a mandate on individuals to buy health insurance.\n\nMedicare tax also sets an important justifying precedent for the individual healthcare mandate. The Medicare program imposes a payroll tax on Americans as a way to fund coverage of their hospital costs once they reach age 65. People cannot opt out of Medicare; it is an obligatory system of health care insurance for one's senior years. Similarly, Congress can use a payroll tax to implement a mandate for individuals to purchase health insurance before they reach age 65. Under the House bill, for example, people will pay a 2.5 percent tax on their income unless they have health care coverage.(12)\n\nIt is significant here that there is no fundamental right to go without insurance under the Constitution; no core constitutional rights are violated by the individual mandate. Under both liberal and conservative jurisprudence, the Constitution protects individual autonomy strongly only when “fundamental rights” are involved. There may be fundamental rights to decide about medical treatments, but having insurance does not require anyone to undergo treatment. It only requires them to have a means to pay for any treatment they might choose to receive, alongside treatment that they might not be able to consent to (by reason of infirmity), but that doctors and hospitals may be ethically obliged to provide.\n\nThe “liberties” that are modified by the individual mandate are purely economic and have none of the strong elements of personal or bodily integrity that are normally used to invoke Constitutional protection.\n\nIn short, there is no fundamental right to be uninsured, and so various arguments based on the Bill of Rights fall flat. The closest plausible argument is one based on a federal statute protecting religious liberty, but Congress is Constitutionally free to override one statute with another.(11) This means that the healthcare mandate is no different to the many other mandates the federal government imposes on the American people to support the general welfare, and as such should be upheld as constitutional.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f39519cf19475c1378c2f740758e468a", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states The mandate is not constitutional under the commerce clause\n\nMany attorneys general have fought constitutionality of mandates. Since the passage of the legislation in March of 2010, many state governments, governors, and attorney generals have pressed forward with lawsuits centred on the idea that the individual mandate in the legislation is unconstitutional.(7) Underlying these legal challenges is a debate about the basis of the national Congress’s lawmaking powers. In order for laws passed by Congress to be considered legitimate and enforceable, those laws must be based on a power conferred on congress by the Constitution. On those areas of law and public life where the Constitution is silent, legislative power rests not in the hands of Congress, but rather is “reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”(9)\n\nIt has been argued that the individual healthcare mandate is authorised by the Constitution's empowerment of Congress to “regulate interstate commerce” (known as the “commerce clause”), however this is not true and the commerce clause does not authorize health insurance mandates. As the Congressional Research Service has written: \"Despite the breadth of powers that have been exercised under the Commerce Clause, it is unclear whether the clause would provide a solid constitutional foundation for legislation containing a requirement to have health insurance. Whether such a requirement would be constitutional under the Commerce Clause is perhaps the most challenging question posed by such a proposal, as it is a novel issue whether Congress may use this clause to require an individual to purchase a good or a service.”(2) The most obvious reason for this is that an omission to buy health insurance can in no way be termed 'interstate commerce', as there is no activity or commerce going on. This is not in keeping with the commerce clause, unlike other previous federal healthcare laws.\n\nThere is no doubt that Congress can regulate an entire array of economic activities, large and small, inter- and intra-state. Thus, for example, there is no problem, Constitution-wise with having Congress regulate health care insurance purchase transactions. The problem with an individual insurance purchase mandate, however, is that it does not regulate any transactions at all; it regulates human beings, simply because they exist, and orders them to engage in certain types of economic transactions.(8)\n\nWhile most health care insurers and health care providers may engage in interstate commerce and may be regulated accordingly under the Commerce Clause, it is a different matter to find a basis for imposing Commerce Clause related regulation on an individual citizen who chooses not to undertake a commercial transaction. The decision not to engage in affirmative conduct is arguably distinguishable from cases in which Commerce Clause regulatory authority was recognized over intra-state activity: growing wheat, for example, (Wickard v. Filmore) or, more recently, growing marijuana (Gonzales v. Raich).(6)\n\nIf Congress were to invoke its Commerce Clause authority to support legislation mandating individual health insurance coverage, such an action would have to contend with recent Supreme Court precedent limiting unfettered use of Commerce Clause authority to police individual behaviour that does not constitute interstate commerce: United States v. Lopez, invalidating the application of the Gun Free School Zones Act of 1990 to individuals, and United States v. Morrison, invalidating certain portions of the Violence Against Women Act.\n\nIn the case of a mandate to purchase health insurance or face a tax or penalty, Congress would have to explain how not doing something – not buying insurance and not seeking health care services – implicated interstate commerce.(6) Therefore, it is clear that Congress is not empowered to regulate the choice not to buy healthcare, as it lacks constitutional authorisation to interfere in this aspect of individual Americans’ private lives.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ceb11eeb00b004b5f582d0bf0a97feaf", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states The individual mandate gives too much power to the Federal Government\n\nThe vertical separation of powers, under which the federal government possesses limited and enumerated powers, while the States wield general powers (including the right to operate their own police forces), is a key part of America's constitutional architecture. Far from being an 18th century affectation, these structural limitations on government powers were designed to protect individual liberty. In the Framers' view, limiting the ability of the federal government to exercise authority was core to ensuring that no single government entity would grow too powerful. This is because, under the Supremacy Clause, any constitutionally compliant federal legislation trumps exercises of individual state’s powers. Therefore, an infinitely capacious Commerce Clause (which would be produced if the mandating of healthcare were to be allowed) would rob States of any remaining authority.(8)\n\nWhen any choice or non-action which has economic impacts becomes termed as “economic”, every aspect of consumer behaviour, or, for that matter, any aspect of individual behaviour, would become an economic activity, and thus nothing would fall outside of Congress' power to regulate under the commerce clause.(8)\n\nThe individual health insurance mandate would set dangerous precedents for federal power. The Congressional Budget Office acknowledged the unprecedented nature of an individual mandate when assessing the Clinton health care reform proposal of 1993: “A mandate requiring all individuals to purchase health insurance would be an unprecedented form of federal action. The government has never required people to buy any good or service as a condition of lawful residence in the United States. An individual mandate has two features that, in combination, make it unique. First, it would impose a duty on individuals as members of society. Second, it would require people to purchase a specific service that would have to be heavily regulated by the federal government.\"(2)\n\nThe 'commerce clause on steroids', as imagined by supporters of the healthcare mandate, would fundamentally warp America's constitutional architecture. Because every single decision by individual Americans, be it buying health insurance, cars, health club memberships or any other good or service, has some impact on the economy, it could be subject to regulation by Congress. Indeed, Congress would be able to dictate how individuals would dispose of every penny of whatever monies they have left after paying taxes, transforming Americans into virtual serfs.(8) For all these reasons the individual healthcare mandate would give too much power to the federal government, in ways which are antithetical to the Constitution as the Founders envisioned it and set it out (with restricted and separate powers), and so it should be deemed unconstitutional.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e59187a8c79798a288c986ff787c1379", "text": "health general healthcare politics government house believes united states Penalizing a non-act is unconstitutional\n\nIt is unconstitutional to require individuals to buy private insurance, and penalize them for not doing so (that is, penalizing their non-act, their omission to purchase insurance). As David B. Rivkin Jr. and Lee A. Casey argue: “… Can Congress require every American to buy health insurance? In short, no. The Constitution assigns only limited, enumerated powers to Congress and none, including the power to regulate interstate commerce or to impose taxes, would support a federal mandate requiring anyone who is otherwise without health insurance to buy it.”(1)\n\nThe Congressional Budget Office believes “a mandate requiring all individuals to purchase health insurance would be an unprecedented form of federal action. The government has never required people to buy any good or service as a condition of lawful residence in the United States.”(2) An individual mandate would have two features that, in combination, would make it unique. First, it imposes a duty on individuals due to them being members of society. Second, it requires the purchase of a specific service on pain of tax penalties if that product is not purchased. (2)\n\nAs noted by Sen. John Ensign, a Nevada Republican: \"Anything we have ever done, somebody actually had to have an action before we could tax or regulate it.\"(3) As Robert A. Levy and Michael F. Cannon of the CATO Institute argue: “Congress' attempt to punish a non-act that harms no one is an intolerable affront to the Constitution, liberty, and personal autonomy. That shameful fact cannot be altered by calling it health-care reform.”(4) The individual healthcare insurance mandate would, for the first time, mean the government setting uo a monopoly or a cartel with which every citizen of the US would be compelled- by a statutory power- to do business. This destroys any pretence of individual market freedom, individuals would be required to contribute money out of each and every pay check they earned to either a government entity which would be staffed and/or controlled by political appointees or to a cartel made up of companies that would owe their continued existence on the cartel list to the acquiescence of political overseers. Either way, the reduction in individual autonomy and freedom over health care choices would be dramatically decreased and inevitably politicized. This has obvious worrying possibilities for corruption, the party in power would favour those who donate to the party.(5)\n\nEnforcing the mandate may also intrude on Constitutional rights. Sherry Glied, Ph.D., Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has warned, “[d]eveloping a system to promptly identify and penalize scofflaws [people who flout the law] will take effort and ingenuity, particularly in our diverse and mobile country. It may require a degree of intrusiveness and bureaucracy that some will find unpalatable.”(6)This is likely to mean much more intrusive inspection, for example hospitals having to report to the government patients they have who don’t have health insursnce..(6) This is why a majority of the states, and numerous organizations and individual persons, have filed actions in federal court challenging the constitutionality of the individual mandate, and several courts have already struck it down on constitutional grounds.(7)\n\nFor all these reasons it is clear that for Congress to try to penalize a non-act is an unprecedented and unconstitutional power grab, and so the individual mandate is unconstitutional.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
2f9816938bbeaed50fb23edb67c780af	Alcohol and tobacco are more harmful drugs, yet remain legal. Although cannabis can have some harmful effects, it is not nearly as harmful as tobacco or alcohol. Research by the British Medical Association shows that nicotine is more addictive. In England and Wales, cannabis was said to have helped cause 17 deaths, compared to 6627 for alcohol and 86,500 for tobacco1. A study, published by The Lancet, that scores drugs out of 100 for the harm they cause the user and others, gave alcohol 72, tobacco 27 and cannabis 202. Given that tobacco and alcohol are more likely to harm the user and other people, it seems ludicrous that they should be legal and cannabis should not be. The legalization of cannabis would remove an anomaly from the law. 1 TDPF. (n.d.). Drug Related Deaths. Retrieved July 20, 2011, from Transform Drug Policy Foundation: 2 The Economist. (2010, November 2). Scoring Drugs. Retrieved July 20, 2011, from The Economist:	[ { "docid": "d0033c15ef43f24dfb920135e92fa5e1", "text": "addiction health general society house believes cannabis should be legalised It is difficult to assess the true harm caused by cannabis. There are limits to the scope for information on its effects because of its illegal nature1. However, it is widely acknowledged that there are links between cannabis use and mental and physical health problems2. It is also widely acknowledged that excessive cannabis use can harm relationships and prevent people from acting as functional members of society. Cannabis is generally smoked with tobacco and cannabis users are more likely to drink alcohol. Regardless of whether cannabis itself is worse for you than tobacco or alcohol, it is still bad for you and therefore it should remain illegal.\n\nThe reason alcohol and tobacco are legal is not related to their effect on our health. They (alcohol and tobacco) are legal as they have existed in this country since long before laws were passed in relation to health and were far more popular than cannabis so it would have been much harder to ban them. Cannabis is illegal not because it supposedley is worse but because it is was less commonly consumed. That said, alcohol and tobacco are irerelvent in this debate.\n\n1 Wolff , J. (2009, December 1). The art and science of evidence about drugs. Retrieved July 20, 2011, from Guardian:\n\n2 Frank. (n.d.). Cannabis. Retrieved July 20, 2011, from Talk to Frank:\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "fcd7bd462e2463896fd971fad6e6fc72", "text": "addiction health general society house believes cannabis should be legalised Cannabis does not open the mind. Rather, it harms it. Many researchers have concluded that cannabis impairs short-term memory, cognition and motivation. It has also proven to be highly addictive for some users and has damaged people's mental capabilities and abilities to function in society1. 2 Mabry, C. D. (2001, October). Physicians and the war on drugs: the case against legalization. Retrieved July 20, 2011, from Qualified Surgeons:\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a63f081ee13013cb9dd784fcdd2b7e43", "text": "addiction health general society house believes cannabis should be legalised Legalizing cannabis would not stop the criminals who currently sell it from continuing to commit crimes. They could simply diversify their activities. Many of them would already be dealing other drugs or involved in other criminal activities. The legalization of cannabis could simply give them a legitimate base from which they may operate.\n\nIn order to end the \"war on drugs\" and the problems of violence associated with it, all drugs would have to be legalized. While some debate the harmful effects which cannabis may have, few argue that drugs like heroin and crack cocaine do not present a serious threat to people. To sell these kinds of drugs legally would be irresponsible and would ruin lives, families and communities.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4ecfc2123f438de82b8c784cb1cf8407", "text": "addiction health general society house believes cannabis should be legalised While individual liberty is an important good, there are cases in which a Government can be justified in behaving in a paternalistic manner, even to prevent individuals harming themselves. Few people debate the law that you must wear a seatbelt in cars, for example.\n\nMoreover, cannabis can harm others and many of the ways in which it does so would not be possible to counter with regulation. In the words of philosopher George Sher, \"Drug use harms strangers by involving them in the collisions, shootouts and other catastrophes to which the impaired and overly aggressive drug users are prone. It harms family members by depriving them of the companionship and income of their addicted partners. It harms fetuses by exposing them to a toxic and permanently damaging prenatural environment. It harms children by subjecting them to the abuse of their drug-addled parents\"1. 1 Wolff, J. (n.d.). Regulation of Recreational Drugs. Retrieved July 20, 2011, from University College London:\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5c26c4ffd4c994c729ad70a4c7dc60d3", "text": "addiction health general society house believes cannabis should be legalised There is little evidence of cannabis being a gateway drug. In fact, there is a higher correlation between cigarette smoking and hard drugs. If anything, the only way in which cannabis could be said to be a gateway drug is that it is illegal and people may be inclined to buy other illegal drugs after they have bought cannabis, particularly as some dealers will sell other drugs. This problem, however, would be immediately eradicated if cannabis were legalized.\n\nFurthermore, the people who refer cannabis as a \"gateway drug\" don't take into consideration the prerequisites and situations people are in prior to ones marijuana use. The people who use it as an additive to relaxation occasionally and are in a relaxed environment, maybe with a few friends over to hang out aren’t using it as an escape from reality but at an additive to their relaxation and fun. When cannabis is referred to as a “gateway drug” people are generally and unknowingly referring to the people who use marijuana as an escape from a much less than pleasant reality and “smoke themselves sober” therefore requiring a harder drug to get the same high and escape that cannabis once provided for them.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a4242699a667dd88e164068fde65fd4d", "text": "addiction health general society house believes cannabis should be legalised While there are studies that argue that cannabis is harmful, there is no substantial proof of many of the harmful effects it is accused of having. Indeed, there are many studies that claim it does not have these harmful effects. For example, a 15-year John Hopkins University study published in May 1999 found \"no significant differences in cognitive decline between heavy users, light users, and non-users of cannabis.\"1 It is also claimed by many researchers that while cannabis has some potentially harmful effects, it is far less harmful then tobacco and alcohol2. Cannabis is also known to have medicinal qualities, such as in relieving pain for MS sufferers. In California, for example, it is possible to obtain a \"medical marijuana\" card. 1 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10221315 2 The Economist. (2010, November 2). Scoring Drugs. Retrieved July 20, 2011, from The Economist:\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "91aa354feda33c72101e6f4f7ec68690", "text": "addiction health general society house believes cannabis should be legalised First, it is not necessarily a bad thing for cannabis use to increase. Countries with the highest usage rates include some of the most prosperous in the world – Canada, Australia and New Zealand for example.\n\nSecondly, even if increased cannabis use is a bad thing, there is little evidence to prove usage would necessarily go up if cannabis were legalized. Usage may have risen slightly in the Netherlands but cannabis was depenalized in 1976 and usage rates remain lower than in the US today. Moreover, there are other reasons why usage rose. According to Dirk Korf of the Institute of Criminology at the University of Amsterdam, \"There is no appreciable causal connection between the Dutch decriminalization of cannabis and the rate at which cannabis use has evolved\" 1.Portugal decriminalized drug use in 2001 and, a decade later, drug usage and drug related crime rates have fallen and cannabis use remains below the European average2 .\n\n1. Griffin, 2011, http://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/wellbeing/cannabis-a-gateway-to-other-drugs-20110718-1hlor.html\n\n2. Hari, 2009, http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/johann-hari/johann-har...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7ef9335971c3749c9d81119fd5f4300d", "text": "addiction health general society house believes cannabis should be legalised Legalization of cannabis would make it easier for scientific studies to take place, thereby providing a more accurate picture of the physical, psychological, spiritual and sociological effects of the drug. Just as the lift of the taboo on discussions of a sexual nature in schools around the world has resulted in people being more informed as to the dangers of unprotected sex, so would the increased availability and accuracy of scientific data on cannabis serve to reduce the ratio of abuse to responsible use.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f674ac34f2577170be55a8008261bf45", "text": "addiction health general society house believes cannabis should be legalised If cannabis was legalized, it could be regulated\n\nMany of the problems associated with cannabis use arise from the fact that it is illegal. Cannabis is the world’s most widely used illegal drug – 23% of Canadians admit to having smoked it and up to 7 million people in the UK are estimated to do so.\n\nIn 2009, the UN estimated that the market for illegal drugs was worth $320 billion. This market is run by criminals and is often blighted by violence. It has cost thousands of innocent lives, particularly in supplier countries such as Mexico and Afghanistan 1. In the US, Milton Friedman estimated that 10,000 people die every year as a result of drug dealers fighting over territory 2. Many of the victims are innocent people, caught in crossfire. By legalizing cannabis, the size of this market for illegal drugs would be significantly reduced and so, effectively, would the number of crimes and unnecessary deaths that come with it.\n\nAnother way of seeing the problems of prohibition is to look at the failed attempt at alcohol prohibition in the 1920s. People continued to consume alcohol, only it became 150 per cent stronger, was as easy to obtain for minors as for adults, and was sold by murderous gangsters like Al Capone 3.\n\nGiven all of the problems associated with prohibiting cannabis, it seems nonsensical to spend billions fighting a drugs war when instead governments could reduce crime and make money by selling cannabis in a regulated manner. They could spend some of the profit on treating people who did experience any harmful effects.\n\n1.United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, 2010, http://www.unodc.org/documents/wdr/WDR_2010/World_Drug_Report_2010_lo-res.pdf\n\n2.Hari, 2009, http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/com\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8c53c0ea56fea912cfd36bacfa9d22e3", "text": "addiction health general society house believes cannabis should be legalised People should be allowed to do whatever they want to their own bodies\n\nIt is important that we have the liberty to do what we want to our own bodies. People are allowed to eat or drink to their detriment. In many countries it is legal to take one's life. Why then, should people not be allowed to harm themselves through cannabis use? (Assuming that cannabis use is harmful. In most cases, this is highly debatable.)\n\nSmoking cannabis may have effects on others, such as through the effects of passive smoking. However, regulation has been brought in to minimize the effects on others for alcohol and cigarettes, such as bans on smoking in public places, and the same thing could be done for cannabis.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "10268af765f78ac8ac1559771233a74a", "text": "addiction health general society house believes cannabis should be legalised Cannabis opens the mind in a positive and beneficial manner\n\nCannabis use can alter one's perception of reality or consciousness. The alteration need not be thought of as spiritual or religious to be respected for what it is; a fresh look on a reality that we are programmed as humans to perceive only in a particular manner. Cannabis can help humans perceive that complex reality from simply a different perspective, which can benefit our appreciation for that reality and our unique and limited perceptions of it. With this more intelligent approach to cannabis consumption, it is easy to argue that mental, perceptual, and societal benefits exist1. 1 Harris, S. (2011, July 6). Drugs and the Meaning of Life. Retrieved July 20, 2011, from Huffington Post:\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a45abda7271f37cc361c64c09b3e33d2", "text": "addiction health general society house believes cannabis should be legalised Uncertainty over the effects of cannabis means it is best to be prudent\n\nThe debate over the effects of cannabis is based largely upon conflicting evidence. For example, some argue it can cause psychosis while others argue it only has positive effects on the mind. The effect of any illegal drug is a very difficult area to study 1. Most drug users use more than one drug and researchers are often limited to studying those who admit themselves into clinics with a crisis – something of a skewed sample.\n\nGiven that Governments cannot accurately predict what the effects of legalizing cannabis would be, it is prudent to maintain illegality. What if, for example, a state decided to legalize cannabis, to only discover five years later that it has a dramatically more negative impact on human cognition than previously thought, or that it substantially increased the risks of psychosis?\n\n1.Wolff, 2009, http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2009/dec/01/drugs-health-effects-jonathan-wolff\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "288bdd7ac941fcaece2edc0dc3291fdf", "text": "addiction health general society house believes cannabis should be legalised Cannabis is harmful\n\nStudies have shown that cannabis may cause a number of physical and mental problems. It can cause respiratory problems, increase one's heart rate and lower one's sperm count. Cannabis use is also associated with causing or worsening some forms of psychosis. It has also been found to increase tiredness, depression and paranoia, impair short-term memory and hormone production and cause general cognitive decline1. As for cannabis' medicinal qualities, safer, more effective drugs are available. They include a synthetic version of THC, cannabis' primary active ingredient, which is marketed in the United States under the name Marinol. 1 Frank. (n.d.). Cannabis. Retrieved July 20, 2011, from Talk to Frank:\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "89397ff10dad267a55ec89ebf98f381c", "text": "addiction health general society house believes cannabis should be legalised Cannabis is a gateway drug\n\nPeople who use cannabis will be more likely to move on to harder drugs. While the bad effects of cannabis may be disputed, the harmful effects of hard drugs cannot – they seriously damage people’s health. A major study in 2011 found that ‘smoking cannabis daily sets users up for a lifetime of multiple drug use’ 1. Heavy users are more likely to resort to crime to fund their addiction. Their habit often harms their relationships with friends, colleagues and family. State money then has to be spent on benefits, on policing, and on rehabilitation programs.\n\n1. Griffin, 2011, http://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/wellbeing/cannabis-a-gateway-to-other-dr...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f885fc2e410473ac05a2a193ecb05eac", "text": "addiction health general society house believes cannabis should be legalised More people will use cannabis if legalized\n\nIf cannabis is legalized, it will become socially acceptable and more people will smoke it. It will also become more readily available. In the Netherlands, cannabis usage went up after it was legalized1. With more people smoking, more people will experience the adverse physical and mental health effects - more people will be harmed. Furthermore, as Dr. David Murray has noted, 'marijuana use is the leading cause of treatment need for those abusing or dependent on illegal drugs'2; therefore not only will more people use cannabis, more of them will be addicted.\n\n1 Mackenzie, D. (1998, February 21). New Scientists Marijuana Special Report. Retrieved July 20, 2011, from UKCIA: 2 Dubner, Stephen J., 'On the Legalization - or not - of Marijuana', Freakonomics, 30 October 2007\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
fb59632bde3ea995792f91db193b670f	As smokers have a higher chance of harm from surgery due to complications arising from their habit, it is more efficient to prioritize non-smokers Failure to quit smoking before surgical procedures increases cardiac and pulmonary complications, impairs tissue healing, and is associated with more infections and other complications at the surgical site. For example, in a study of wound and other complications after hip or knee surgery, no smoker who quit beforehand developed a wound infection compared with 26% of ongoing smokers and 27% of those who only reduced tobacco use. Overall complications were reduced to 10% in those who quit smoking compared with 44% in those who continued1. This means that surgery costs more on average for smokers and is also less likely to be effective. Treating more smokers means devoting more resources for lower results. Therefore, prioritizing non-smokers, at least in certain areas of healthcare, would be beneficial to society as a whole. 1http Peters, M.J. (2007) Should smokers be refused surgery? British Medical Journal,	[ { "docid": "1fcbe7e534da646540aba7e0aa61943b", "text": "addiction health general healthcare house would deny smokers access state Smokers may have a higher chance of harm from surgery due to complications arising from their habit, but this is not a phenomenon specific to them. Cardiovascular disease, or heart disease to most people, is the number one killer of men and women in the United States1. It is caused by the build-up of fatty deposits that clog the vessels - those at risk are often smokers, but can just as often be those who are overweight, have diabetes or simply high blood pressure. As such, it is not justified to single out smokers when those with unhealthy diets can just as easily cause complications in their surgeries.\n\n1. Daily News, 13 Jul 11, Cardiovascular disease: Defend yourself by lowering the risks.Accessed 14 Jul 11.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "9a9a0755afb2599934034667db66d6c0", "text": "addiction health general healthcare house would deny smokers access state The added cost to public healthcare that comes as a result of diseases brought upon by smoking is vastly outweighed by the amount of money governments around the world receive in taxes on tobacco. The UK currently takes around 60% of the cost of a pack of cigarettes in tax duty. In 2008, the US took over $16 billion in tobacco tax revenue1. Such high tax duties and revenues can hardly be justified if smokers are not even to get healthcare for their money. And without the taxes, cigarettes would be much cheaper, encouraging more people to smoke. Moreover, because smokers tend to die earlier than non-smokers, per head the average health care costs are lower than those of non-smokers2. 1 Tax Policy Centre, US Tobacco Revenue Statistics, 2 USA Today, 15 Jul 11, Do smokers cost society money.. Accessed 15 Jul 11.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "eaab7464d25fb7fdc87e050f89295e3d", "text": "addiction health general healthcare house would deny smokers access state There is no evidence that limiting access to healthcare would act as a deterrent. In fact, in the developing world, where a smoker would on average have worse access to healthcare, tobacco consumption has increased significantly over the last decade.1 Furthermore, governments have indeed acted to discourage smoking through a variety of methods. These have included advertising campaigns and banning smoking in public places and they seem to have worked. Cigarette use in the developed world has declined over the last 50 years. In the UK, smoking rates have dropped by half between 1974 and 2009, from 45% down to 21%2. A majority 59% have never taken up the habit3. 1 World Health Organization, The Tobacco Atlas, 2 Daily Telegraph, 22 Jan 09, Lowest ever number of smokers after public ban and health campaigns.Accessed 14 Jul 2011. 3 Daily Telegraph, 22 Jan 09, Lowest ever number of smokers after public ban and health campaigns.Accessed 14 Jul 2011.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "00d656b63953173c7b841617bb4de70c", "text": "addiction health general healthcare house would deny smokers access state Many smokers do not choose to harm themselves, they simply can't help it. The 1988 US Surgeon General's report on the addictive nature of cigarette smoking provides proof of what is now widely accepted – smoking cigarettes is highly addictive. Moreover, there are high correlations between people smoking and being under stress or having parents that smoke. All of this suggests that people do not necessarily choose to smoke and may not be able to choose to give up. Given that smokers can therefore be portrayed as suffering from involuntary addiction, it would seem sensible to tackle this addiction alongside physical health issues, as oppose to dismissing smokers altogether.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "754bb4e53e723505a328cdc5fff1d05b", "text": "addiction health general healthcare house would deny smokers access state Denying, or even reducing, access to healthcare for smokers is impractical, and therefore an unrealistic policy goal. First, the extent to which care is denied is questionable. Does the proposition model include denying palliative care? If it does, this literally means leaving people to suffer agonising pain in emergencies while they try to locate private prescription painkillers, if they can afford them. Further, does it include denying emergency procedures such as resuscitation in the case of a heart attack? If it does, where are patients supposed to go? Private emergency rooms are few and far between, or non-existent, in many countries – never mind private ambulances. Second, in order to encourage smokers to stop smoking, the process needs to involve reactivating access to healthcare if smokers quit. But any cut-off point at which the right is re-activated will necessarily be arbitrary. Some studies have suggested that, for instance, teenagers do irreparable damage to their respiratory systems even if they stop smoking young. If all citizens make an informed decision to smoke, as the proposition argues, isn’t it the case that teenagers make an informed decision to do inordinate damage to their bodies? If it is, then why should there be an absolute cut-off point at which one reassumes healthcare rights? Should there be a relative scale? Wouldn’t this be impossible to construct on a scientific basis?\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "db2ea2034c05c8e56add51961a5a7c16", "text": "addiction health general healthcare house would deny smokers access state There are realistic and practical ways in which the policy of denying healthcare to smokers could be carried out. Smoking is a habit that has clear and demonstrable physical effects, which often correlate with the regularity and longevity of the habit; doctors are trained to recognize such symptoms and do not need patient confirmation. Furthermore, if the bill made it quite clear that healthcare was to be denied to present smokers, the hypothetical presented by the opposition is easily negated. The goal of such a bill would to be to ensure that both smokers gave up the habit and non-smokers did not take up the habit. In this case, the man taking up smoking is in the wrong and is acting contrary to the law. He would have little room for complaint.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "279fb6e529cf9e655389994b038b480e", "text": "addiction health general healthcare house would deny smokers access state In practice, it is both viable and beneficial, in certain cases, to prioritize non-smokers for healthcare. Where there is more chance of a transplant being successful in a non-smoker for example. It is true that people can knowingly damage their health in other ways, such as drug taking or alcohol abuse and it may well be viable to limit access to healthcare in these cases also. This does not mean that every factor in a patient's life must be scrutinized in order to decide where they are placed on a doctor's waiting list. In public policy, the line must be drawn somewhere. Prioritizing non-smokers can mean that more people can be helped with same amount of resources and, where this is the case, it should be practiced.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7dd9c538632f9e13ef96e1f1baa6faa7", "text": "addiction health general healthcare house would deny smokers access state Denying access to healthcare for smokers will not hurt the economy, for the health care costs of smokers are substantially larger than those of non-smokers. In fact, 'health care costs for smokers at a given age are as much as 40 percent higher than those for non-smokers' . Furthermore, though the opposition points out that because smokers die younger, average health costs are in fact lower than non-smokers, denying access to healthcare will have two effects which will cancel each other out: more people will give up smoking, increasing gross medical costs for the state, but those who don't will die younger for they won't get treatment, which will offset the previous rise.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b408eb9831fb17e181c2f7ce2ccd9e98", "text": "addiction health general healthcare house would deny smokers access state The opposition fails to recognize the impact that such a policy will have on smokers. Access will only be denied to smokers who continue to smoke once the bill is in place, if it is proven that they have given up, they will be free to access healthcare. Therefore, the only smokers who will be turned away, and who will potentially die from preventable illnesses are those who place their habit above that of their life.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "30d025e9652aaa2ff6cef0875cab7bc9", "text": "addiction health general healthcare house would deny smokers access state Goods provided by the state, like healthcare, are often, and necessarily, subject to certain provisions. For example, in order to get unemployment benefits, a person must prove that they are regularly looking for a job and a means to get themselves off benefits. Denying access to healthcare for smokers does not mean denying them healthcare access forever; they can regain unlimited access if they stop smoking. Therefore, prioritizing non-smokers for healthcare in certain cases is not impeding upon smokers' basic liberties but a recognition that those who care about their own health enough to not smoke should be prioritized.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "68190747cb9fde7887a947dfab30192a", "text": "addiction health general healthcare house would deny smokers access state Smokers are a drain on economic resources\n\nSmokers contribute a disproportionately large amount to the cost of healthcare. They are a drain on resources. In the UK it is estimated that up to 9,500 beds are blocked daily by smokers, and that up to eight million doctor consultations are required on their behalf each year. A well-informed smoker, unable or unwilling to quit, might assume an increased risk for himself but he would also be indirectly increasing the likelihood of others being unable to access necessary healthcare and this is not fair. Allowing smokers to take scarce beds or organs needed for transplants - that could otherwise go to those suffering from genuine misfortunes - is an unjust allocation of resources.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e14c293a346e90352fa4779bc70d9cbf", "text": "addiction health general healthcare house would deny smokers access state The added cost to public healthcare that comes as a result of diseases brought upon by smoking is vastly outweighed by the amount of money governments around the world receive in taxes on tobacco. The UK currently takes around 60% of the cost of a pack of\n\nMany people have to wait for surgery when they have fallen ill or gotten injured through no fault of their own. Many of the people they are waiting behind have fallen ill out of choice. This includes smokers who have contracted diseases as a result of their habit. There is a vast array of information, easily available to smokers, on the dangers of cigarettes. If despite this, a person chooses to smoke anyway then it is unfair that others who have fallen ill out of genuine misfortune should have to wait in line behind them for healthcare. This problem is particularly in acute in states that have universal healthcare, where non-smokers are forced to wait in a queue for treatment behind those who have negligently made themselves ill smoking. In Britain for example, they have attempted to avoid this by establishing standards under which surgery is denied to obese patients1. Thomas Condliff, the patient, was denied gastric band surgery due to having a body mass index lower than the threshold under which they believed the surgery would be effective2. The priority in such cases is and should be with those who have made a conscious decision to develop an unhealthy habit. 1 BBC News, 11 Jul 11, Man appeals for NHS gastric bypass surgery. Accessed 14 Jul 11.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "da0363cf7152b85aeca47972e8450927", "text": "addiction health general healthcare house would deny smokers access state The law would act as a deterrent against attempts to conceal a smoking habit to procure healthcare\n\nThere are realistic ways a policy of denying healthcare access to smokers could be carried out. Insurance companies already ask lots of health-related questions, often including whether their client is a smoker, when assessing life insurance premiums. In these cases, you are required to give details of your lifestyle by law. Of course, some people do not, however this is to be expected since no law is one hundred per cent effective. Sanctions exist to discourage dishonest behaviour. A similar model could be put in place requiring a declaration of smoker status to the health authority. Indeed, many doctors already enquire about their patients' smoking statuses on an informal basis. It is also particularly hard to lie about being a smoker for two reasons. First, other people inevitably see you smoking. This means an abundance of witnesses in the case of a dispute, and thus a disincentive to lie. Second, people require doctors to undertake detailed examinations for treatment purposes, thereby allowing them to see obvious outward signs of smoking: tar deposits, tar in cough, yellowed fingernails, etc.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "47dcc7b2e635ceaba104c5caaac1052c", "text": "addiction health general healthcare house would deny smokers access state Denying access to healthcare for smokers would act as a deterrent, discouraging smokers\n\nGovernments should do everything they can to discourage smoking. They already attempt to do so in a number of ways, such as through ensuring graphic health warnings are present on all tobacco packaging. Many states have also introduced legislation banning smoking indoors in an attempt to discourage the habit. However, smoking is still a massive problem - millions of people still do it. The refusal of medical treatment to smokers would surely be a massive deterrent to current/potential smokers from continuing/starting the habit. The safety net of modern healthcare being pulled from underneath them would be a powerful incentive to give up the habit, and reduce the estimated $100 billion that the White House believes smokers cost the economy annually through loss of productivity1. 1 USA Today, 15 Jul 11, Do smokers cost society money.. Accessed 15 Jul 11.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "113c73f0e21ce0293f5e6362cffb8754", "text": "addiction health general healthcare house would deny smokers access state Denying healthcare to smokers is a restriction on people's liberties\n\nWhether or not you believe it should be, smoking tobacco is legal. At the same time, healthcare is regarded as a fundamental human right, alongside rights to education, food and water. Denying someone healthcare is to impede upon his/her basic liberties and this cannot be justified when, in the eyes of the law, they have done nothing wrong. Criminals have the right to healthcare – it is often that you hear that the trial of a war criminal is being delayed while they receive treatment. Take the cases of Ratko Mladic or Slobodan Milosevic for example 1. If healthcare is given to men who have committed genocide then surely it should be given to smokers. Also, if a Government adopts the line that one's behavior determines the kind of health service one receives then what is to stop that Government applying such a mantra beyond smoking and controlling the practices of those they govern in any number of ways?\n\n1. http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/06/02/us-mladic-tribunal-idUSTRE7516HM20110602 and http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/1403054.stm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "638ed2a70f5b92f9a468dabe16aed4b2", "text": "addiction health general healthcare house would deny smokers access state Denying access to healthcare for smokers will lead to thousands of people being turned away and potentially dying from preventable illnesses\n\nThe denial of access to healthcare for smokers is a policy that will directly lead to the turning away of millions of people, merely for making one perfectly legal, if ill-advised lifestyle choice. In a state like France, where 20 per cent of the population, 12 million people, are smokers, such a policy would leave a large minority unable to access basic healthcare for issues that may be unrelated to their smoking habit . Furthermore, it may lead to the ridiculous situation whereby smokers are dying from preventable diseases despite hospitals being under-utilized, as a fifth of the population is no longer allowed in.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3faa39ae9fa79aaa747a3aaedf4b06d7", "text": "addiction health general healthcare house would deny smokers access state Denying healthcare to smokers alone is victimization\n\nThe denial of healthcare, an established right, without the citizen doing anything either immoral or wrong is pure and simple victimization. Suppose you are a doctor and you have two patients waiting for a heart transplant. Patient A is 65. He does not exercise, has never had a job and has committed a series of crimes throughout his life. Patient B is in his 20s, with a first class degree from a good university. He is a trained doctor himself and wants to go and work in the developing world, to help people suffering from leprosy. But Patient B is a heavy smoker. Should you therefore prioritize patient A? It seems problematic to victimize smokers, particularly considering smoking is legal. If you are going to discriminate against smokers then surely you should discriminate against alcohol drinkers and people who do extreme sports as they are also knowingly endangering themselves. Smoking reduces life expectancy by 2.5 years for men, but obesity reduces life expectancy by 1.3 years and if high blood pressure is added to that by a total of 2.8 years all are preventable so why should only smoking be discriminated against?1 Maybe you should discriminate against people who choose to live in polluted cities. And then there are drug users. What about people who could afford private health care? Should age, occupation and past convictions be taken into account? It seems arbitrary and unfair to single out smokers. Yet, if we start to take into account all the factors that determine who \"deserves\" to be prioritized for healthcare, then we are left with the unsavory, illiberal practice of Social Darwinism. 1 Harvard School of Public Health, \"Four Preventable Risk Factors Reduce Life Expectancy in U.S. and Lead to Health Disparities\", 22 March 2010, accessed 24 August 2010.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "30b51d71ab2d5cee3fa19db0d518983c", "text": "addiction health general healthcare house would deny smokers access state Denying healthcare to smokers is impractical\n\nThere are several reasons why limiting access to healthcare for smokers could prove impractical. Ultimately they surround the issue of how you define who is a smoker. One man might have chain smoked for 20 years but given up for a year, since a bill limiting access to healthcare for smokers was passed. Meanwhile, another might have been smoking cigarettes now and again just for the past year. Who would be prioritized if the two were on a waiting list for the same operation? If the law penalizes anyone who has ever smoked then it would not provide nearly as strong an incentive to stop smoking. But, if the law does not penalize anyone who has smoked, then choosing whom to punish would seem quite arbitrary. Furthermore, what is stopping people from simply lying about how much/whether they smoke? They might not show any obvious signs of being a smoker. Even if they do, they could claim to have given up, work around fumes or be a victim of passive smoking.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "26cb535345a6c346b0d3a1476b8705f1", "text": "addiction health general healthcare house would deny smokers access state Denying access to healthcare for smokers will hurt the economy\n\nEconomically, the healthcare of the nation is important for maintaining a productive workforce. Do we really want to lose otherwise functional members of the workforce the first time they contract an aggravated throat infection and cannot afford, or delay for financial reasons, a simple course of antibiotics? Quite apart from productivity, as The Guardian notes, smokers in the United Kingdom also contribute over £10 billion to government coffers through the tobacco tax 1. To lose this source of revenue will do more to hurt national health services than the occasional complication in surgery granted to a smoker. Lastly, because smokers die younger than non-smokers, though they cost more per year, over their lifetime their average health costs are lower than those of longer-living, non-smokers.\n\n1. http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/joepublic/2010/nov/30/smokers-forced-o...\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
fdb2ee1a9c0200c0c14e45e09c42ccc4	Children are bad decision makers Sex education informs children about sex, and then invites them to make a choice. But as demonstrated all the time, children are bad decision-makers, often choosing what is bad for them. That is why adult society often needs to decide for them – what they should eat, what they should watch on T.V., when they are mature enough to be able to choose whether or not to drink or smoke. Surely sex is just as important as those things – just as dangerous, just as potentially destructive. The abdication of our responsibility in the sexual arena is shameful; we should be unafraid to simply tell children this is something they cannot do, aren’t mature enough to consent to yet – a responsibility we seem to shrink from even though it is reflected by the stated aim of society enshrined in the law of the age of consent. Lessons implicitly lauding the pleasures of intercourse are entirely contrary to that aim.	[ { "docid": "8e569e00db962985914fc818a8977066", "text": "on education general health sex sexuality house would promote safe sex through That logic might sound impressive – but it’s the same one that fails to control underage drinking, underage smoking, the watching of rated movies by those forbidden to do so, the eating of bad food – and underage sex. It’s the same poor parental logic that has seen a generation of children grow up divorced from the society around them, children who die from drugs overdoses and whose parents say (honestly), ‘I just had no idea.’ It’s time to talk to our young people about what they do – honestly, frankly, without frightening them into dishonesty and deception. To do otherwise perpetuates the cycle of ignorance about youth society, and perpetuates the status quo of being able to do nothing to change it.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "2ab03e13ceb3791cc37dff8992bfff6e", "text": "on education general health sex sexuality house would promote safe sex through Our children are sexually active. They are making decisions that can affect the rest of their lives. They should be able to choose responsibly and be well-informed about the likely outcomes. They should know about sources of free or cheap contraception, who to turn to when pregnant or if they suspect they have a venereal disease, how to use contraception to avoid both, and, contrary to the impression of abolitionists, they should be told the benefits of abstinence. How can you tell people about that if you refuse to discuss sex? How can you imagine they will take you seriously if you turn a blind eye to something so many of their peers are doing?\n\nThey need an external source of support to resist peer pressure, and have sex later rather than sooner: lamentably, it is presumed amongst many young people that having unprotected sex with many partners at an early age is the norm and they encourage others to do it (and attempt to humiliate those that don’t). We need mechanisms to support those that want to resist that pressure: sex education is such a mechanism. Sex education is part of a package of provisions needed to help our teenagers avoid the terrible pitfalls of unwanted pregnancy and venereal disease. This problem is here – pretending that it isn’t won’t make it go away. How else do opponents of sex education propose to deal with the huge problems of STDs and teen pregnancy? Effective and widely supported sex education programs can achieve real results. For example, in the Netherlands, amongst people having intercourse for the first time, 85% used contraception – compared to 50% in the UK.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f5132a6328b1607d4da1c6cc5f669927", "text": "on education general health sex sexuality house would promote safe sex through Well taught sex education does no such thing. Sex and responsibility classes must tread a fine line, first stressing the importance of waiting until ready before having sex, and pointing to the physical benefits of fewer partners and starting sex later – but must then move on to the reality of modern Britain’s sex-ridden teen culture, without applauding it, and try to decrease the very high levels of STDs and pregnancy. Yes, that’s hard to do – but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t do it. On the contrary – it’s one of the most important duties society faces today. Arguments about poor teaching apply equally to maths. We often have to try to recruit teachers in unpopular fields – true, difficult, but hardly unique. The answer is to improve teacher training, both for new graduates and for practising teachers, and to bring in outside consultants from the health and social welfare sectors, who have deep experience in this area.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ea958a2cb66ee1af4bcd75a465da4819", "text": "on education general health sex sexuality house would promote safe sex through Parents often know nothing (or worse, are armed with dangerously naive delusions) of the sexual state of their children. The picture painted by abolitionists is inaccurate – the process of deciding what is taught in schools involves parents’ groups and school governing bodies on a school-by-school basis, so parents do have a role in deciding what is taught. But ultimately, the state should be involved in educating the whole child, not just in doling out academic ideas – and should work hard to safeguard sexual health of youngsters, a field near-impossible to separate from sex education.\n\nThis is a subject just as important for the development of young people as the conventional subjects such as maths and English. The role of ‘teacher’ has to change with time. Once, teachers only instructed the children of the well-off or acted as a branch of the church, now they teach everyone in a secular society. As their role changes, they must remain responsible and obey the law: thus, the scaremongering of suggesting teachers will abuse their students or lure them into relationships is irrelevant, as both sides believe that is wrong, and should be prosecuted.\n\nRules banning discussions of sex in schools can deny teachers the ability to deal with real problems. When an individual student comes to a teacher with a problem, a rule against discussing such things in the classroom will probably mean that this outlet of help the troubled adolescent has sought out, often because he feels the family isn’t the place to get help, will be denied to him, will turn its back on him. Like it or not, in today’s fractured society teachers have taken on the role of counsellor, and this rule will indirectly curtail their ability to fulfil it. The result of that will be appalling.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5979a8505e3679268961bf8ffee98a4b", "text": "on education general health sex sexuality house would promote safe sex through To not promote abstinence is not a neutral position, it is a position the implicitly encourages sexual promiscuity. Children are at risk of severe psychological and physical harm from having sex too young, and should be encouraged not to do so. Promoting ‘safe sex’ is implicitly encouraging sex by implying that it is safe and a normal thing to be doing. This will encourage young people to believe that there is no risk when this is not the case even if they do follow the prescriptions they have been taught about sex.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "448d56bd03ab213bc83a2ad7a727dd0f", "text": "on education general health sex sexuality house would promote safe sex through True, but nor does it make sense to make the classes mandatory once the child reaches an age where it is legally able to decide whether it wants to partake of them. Nor does this mean that these classes need to be promoting safe sex rather than simply teaching the facts and encouraging abstinence.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "375efd133e09a45d947bad080f0e7f99", "text": "on education general health sex sexuality house would promote safe sex through The problem with mandatory sex education is precisely that it presents that information in an organised fashion – by the state. In doing so the right of the parents to raise their children in accordance with their structure of beliefs is usurped.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6bc44b5da66104ac0f3a56ac0815f943", "text": "on education general health sex sexuality house would promote safe sex through While a serious disease, AIDS transmission makes up only a tiny proportion of sexually transmitted infections each year. [1]\n\nFirstly the harm of these infections has always been satisfactorily low before public Sex Education, and secondly even if mandatory public education did have a substantive benefit it would not outweigh the infringement on the moral freedom of the parents.\n\n[1] Health Protection Agency, STI Annual Data Tables http://www.hpa.org.uk/web/HPAweb&Page&HPAwebAutoListName/Page/1201094610372\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ac9d6444798e1bc09bd20cdf35f8b228", "text": "on education general health sex sexuality house would promote safe sex through Sex education for underage children undermines the law\n\nSex education classes for those under the age of consent undermines the law. It says, ‘don’t do this – but given that you are, do this, this and this.’ This sends a terrible message about the law – that breaking it isn’t serious, that authority (as represented by teachers) tacitly approves of that illegality, will tolerate it and even encourage it.\n\nSex education fails to tell our children clearly what is right and what is wrong. And remember that these are children, who need clear boundaries to guide their behaviour, and who may not understand the subtleties appreciated by liberal educationalists. In any case, so few teachers want to teach this subject that the quality of teaching is awful. Those that do end up teaching it are often the oddest characters in the teaching establishment. Many teachers happy to ‘cover’ other subjects are uniquely embarrassed by this one, or object to it on moral grounds and will not do so, leaving it to the most liberal members of staff.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "344c9f3a06595a6a5efa51a8651f41bd", "text": "on education general health sex sexuality house would promote safe sex through Sex education leads to experimentation and early intercourse, and indirectly encourages promiscuity\n\nSex education leads to experimentation and early intercourse, and indirectly encourages promiscuity. The most moral form of Sex Education says ‘you shouldn’t do this, but we know you are,’ thus pushing children to consider their sexual existence before they need to or indeed should. Thus sex education’s message is invariably confused – on the one hand, by saying ‘here are the perils of teen sex – so don’t do it,’ and on the other hand, ‘here is how to have teen sex safely.’\n\nLess moral forms start by saying, ‘the best form of a relationship is a loving, constant relationship’ and then say, here are the ways to use protection if you’re not in such a relationship’ – a logic which presumes children are in sexual relationships to begin with. The justification for this is that ‘adolescents know all about sex’ – an idea pushed in our permissive society so much it’s almost a truism – but contrary to that bland generalisation, many children don’t do these things early, don’t think about these things – they actually have childhoods, and these lessons stir up confusion, misplaced embarrassment or even shame at slower development. They also encourage children to view their peers in a sexualised context.\n\nThe openness with which education tells students to treat sex encourages them to ask one another the most personal questions (have you lost your virginity? – how embarrassing, how uncool, to have to say no), and to transgress personal boundaries – all with the teacher’s approval. Inhibitions are broken down not just by peer pressure, but by the classroom. As pro-sex education people love to point out, children develop in their own time – but that means that some are learning about this too early, as well as ‘too late.’ We in society are guilty of breaking the innocence of childhood, earlier and earlier – and these lessons are a weapon in the forefront of that awful attack on decent life.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6756dd5ddb356fb20bdeffa48a8b0b2d", "text": "on education general health sex sexuality house would promote safe sex through Responsibility for children's moral and sexual upbringing is not the responsibility of schools\n\nThis is none of the state’s business. Teaching this subject en masse in a classroom reduces it to biological notions, group embarrassment and crude jokes. Furthermore, children have never needed this from the state: left alone, they learn from their family and surroundings and grow naturally into adults without the state’s involvement. Few things are responsible for parental disaffection with education more than the teaching of sex and sexuality in ways contrary to their wishes.\n\nParents have a right to determine the moral environment in which their children develop and this is a huge intrusion into that right. That moral environment has been manipulated again and again over the last forty years by a liberal teaching establishment set on undermining traditional values and beliefs. Sex education has been a prime weapon in that social engineering. That tool should be taken away from teachers, who as a body have proven themselves undeserving of it. As for the tedious idea that children somehow need the nanny state to look after their sexuality – who knows children and their needs better than parents? Schools are responsible for so much that is wrong with our children, and by giving them free licence to delve into students’ sexuality, things become so much worse, blurring the line between teacher, adviser, confidante, and sometimes in extremes, between teacher and lover – an abuse of power that bringing sex into the classroom makes so much easier.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2ffe48714b24483e371e60a68c6b9369", "text": "on education general health sex sexuality house would promote safe sex through Abstinence is an outdated view, based on religious teaching, which may be a personal choice but is not to be expected as the norm for everyone\n\nYoung people express their sexuality as part of their development to adulthood. It is not having sex that is a problem, but having unsafe sex or hurting people through sexual choices. Refusing to promote safe sex would mean not moving with the times. Just because schools do not promote safe sex does not mean that adolescents will not experiment with sex. They will already be exposed to sexual imagery and ideas of sex so it is necessary that they are taught properly how to remain safe.\n\nSchools may also want to talk about abstinence at the same time; it is a way of keeping sexually safe. However schools have to recognise that the majority of pupils are unlikely to stick to abstinence regardless of how much the school promotes it. It is therefore necessary for the school to also promote and educate about safe sex.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "71d5dbe2d820a41404f511bd6c41791f", "text": "on education general health sex sexuality house would promote safe sex through The information age makes attempting to hide information on sex impossible\n\nThe internet provides a vast amount of easily accessible information about sex, of varying degrees of quality. Most children in the west now have access to the internet and are therefore likely to have access to this information on sex, or at least educational materials on sex even if the child’s access to the internet is controlled.\n\nGiven that it is impossible to prevent children from accessing this information if they really want to, it makes sense to present it to them in an organised and accurate fashion. Rather than allowing children to find information on their own through what may well be unreliable resources it is necessary that they should get good reliable information. That this information when there is safe sex education comes from the school means that the children know that they information is reliable. They can then use this information to help them decide how reliable any further information they may find from other sources is.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "422be8d8beab1545c54e7ae754e708c5", "text": "on education general health sex sexuality house would promote safe sex through Ignorance about sex is the primary cause of the spread of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs)\n\nThe spread of AIDS in the 80s and 90s showed that education and information is more important than ever as exemplified by the slogan in the British 1980’s advertising campaign to prevent AIDS ‘AIDS: Don’t Die of Ignorance’. The campaigns were credited with credited with changing behaviour through warnings on adverts and informing through an information leaflet. [1] This shows that education can work even when starting from scratch. Giving sex education in schools is crucial to the spread of information to each successive generation, and may be supplemented by frank discussion at home.\n\n[1] Kelly, Jon, ‘HIV/Aids: Why were the campaigns successful in the West?’, BBC News Magazine, 28 November 2011, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-15886670\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ebaa38238c250a1a62551f767c3886ec", "text": "on education general health sex sexuality house would promote safe sex through Restricting information to children is inconsistent with the age of consent\n\nWith the age of consent being 16 and with young people being able to vote at 18, it does not make sense for parents to have control over whether their children attended sex education classes right up until the age of 19 or whenever they finish full time schooling.\n\nThe age of consent means that there is clearly a need to be taught about sex from that age of consent. This is something that cannot be guaranteed to happen in all individual households if left to the parents whereas it can be ensured in schools.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
3eed93a6e19471287cb5f6bb37043041	It is unethical to force a ‘volunteer’ to take the chance of being randomised onto the placebo arm of a trial Under the status quo, someone with a terminal illness is offered two choices: death, or to join a trial (where such trials exist). However, when they join a trial they face the possibility that they will be given a placebo, not the drug. Whilst this is probably in the best interest of future patients (a good clinical trial will determine the efficacy of the new treatment), it rides roughshod over the rights of the current patients (not to be sacrificed for future generations) and the duty of physicians to act in the best interests of their present patients. There are two consequences here: the first is that it is morally dubious to use the present patients as mere means to an end, rather than acting in their own best interests, especially where, if randomized to the placebo arm the outcome of death is a certainty. The second consequence is a practical one: compliance with the trial is lessened at the point at which patients can take alternative measures to increase their chance of survival. This was best documented during the early stages of the AIDS crisis in the 1980s, where there was evidence of ‘cheating’ during the trials1. People lied or bribed their way into clinical studies; and shared drugs to dilute the ‘risk’ of being on placebo. This has the obvious impact of casting doubt on the scientific results of the trials: you can no longer be sure who has taken what, and what other conditions they may have. 1 Schüklenk, Udo, and Lowry, Christopher, ‘Terminal illness and access to Phase 1 experimental agents, surgeries and devices: reviewing the ethical arguments’, British Medical Bulletin, Vol.89, 2009, pp.7-22, http://bmb.oxfordjournals.org/content/89/1/7.full.pdf?keytype=ref&ijkey=Ip64J5FUXThKvP0	[ { "docid": "e9eb1eb422b3a131aff6be6678a9bb49", "text": "healthcare philosophy ethics science science general house would grant those First, note that the reason for the existence of the placebo arm is to determine if the drug is more effective than placebo, so in some cases the drug will not be, and nothing will have been lost!\n\nSecond, for this point to stand, it has to be shown why the present generation should be prioritised above all future ones: the consequences of giving the present patients a slightly increased chance of survival is to negatively impact patients in the future in a myriad ways (see opposition arguments).\n\nThird, there are a number of reasons to doubt that this is, in fact in the present patient’s best interest: it is not the case that terminally ill people have ‘nothing to lose’ and can therefore be used as human guinea pigs (providing there is an, as yet unspecified, probability of survival). The large-scale provision of un-trialled drugs may well result in side-effects denigrating the quality of the patient’s remaining years.\n\nFinally, the practical consequence considered can be sidestepped through a) better supervision of trials and b) improved doctor-patient relationships (a particular problem during the AIDS crisis). Further, note that the case of AIDS is something of an anomalous one: AIDS patients were more numerous and politicised than any other group before or since, thus enabling this sort of trial-breaking behaviour.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "81a3d9a8b3bab2756141c4f8e0c73696", "text": "healthcare philosophy ethics science science general house would grant those It is not cruel if it can be shown that this restriction is in the patient’s own interest. The status quo prevents patients from living out their last days on a stream of experimental drugs. We prevent drug companies from using them as risk-free testing (under your policy drug companies would presumably be able to shrug off any responsibility for adverse consequences by saying that it was the patient’s choice to try an experimental drug), and allow them instead to receive the appropriate support for someone at the end of their life, and come to terms with that.\n\nFurther, it is important to remember that drugs at this stage are not necessarily miracle cures! If someone is refused access to a trial this is normally to reduce the risk of adverse consequences: it is wrong to give someone an experimental drug that could negatively impact the quality of their final days.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "536fae014004ff62426e6a9044abc224", "text": "healthcare philosophy ethics science science general house would grant those It is not the case that this is a policy with no harms other than to the person with a terminal illness (see opposition arguments).\n\nSecond, it seems unreasonable to suggest people are making a free and informed choice in this instance: no-one has sufficient information for taking the drug to represent anything but a gamble; this is why there is a need for tests.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "765c2fc1f419536c52f6d6d7d1ee132a", "text": "healthcare philosophy ethics science science general house would grant those First, this may well be overridden by the individual rights of present patients (see proposition arguments).\n\nSecond, the greater time taken to recruit is one that may be offset by greater numbers: whilst the trial will be of a lower quality (no control group, etc.) there will nevertheless be a greater number of people willing to take the drug (people who wouldn’t have wanted to be part of a trial, but are willing to try the new treatment). Consequently, it may well be possible to compensate for the other problems with the trial. Further, alternative trialling models can be employed, for example using patients who choose not to take the drug as the control group. Whilst you lose the benefit here of having a double-blind trial (as under the status quo), you gain in terms of the benefits to current patients.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4a65b31a0678b57b686c8c1827883fcd", "text": "healthcare philosophy ethics science science general house would grant those Drugs that are still undergoing clinical trials do not have a complete void of information about them. Presumably this policy covers drugs that have completed at least some testing in humans (say, phase one of the trials), and therefore at least some information would be available on which doctors and patients could base their decisions.\n\nFurther, it is implausible to suggest that doctors are entirely under the sway of advertisers: whilst drug reps under the status quo have some influence in getting a doctor to use one drug rather than another, this is in instances where there is little to choose between those products, and (importantly!) both are licensed, safe and effective. They would clearly not be so reckless as to blindly follow a drugs rep and prescribe an untested product to their patient.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "64cec3f44fbadbc636ce8e1bbffbedb9", "text": "healthcare philosophy ethics science science general house would grant those There is no reason why, under this model, you could not retain suitable precautions to ensure that this doesn’t happen.\n\nFor example, you could continue the obligation for companies to sell the drug at cost (they would, naturally, continue to be incentivised by the huge profits they expect to make when the drug is licensed). Further, you could impose financial sanctions on companies that refused to take appropriate action towards completing testing.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "435460090e0d35a1963535c2328cae49", "text": "healthcare philosophy ethics science science general house would grant those Doctors are trained in the presentation of news to their patients. This includes the delivery of bad news, and the dispelling of media-myths. Patients with terminal illnesses are often well-informed about their disease, and (in particular those with chronic conditions) often gain a good understanding of the possibilities of future treatments.\n\nThe risk that they may all get carried away on a wave of false hope is, consequently, minimal. Patients in this circumstance are more than capable of reaching, in conjunction with their physician, an informed decision regarding experimental drugs, and make a choice accordingly. The moderate risk of someone making an error in no way outweighs the chance of giving someone some more time with their family.\n\nCountries that already allow access to treatments that have not completed trials do not just allow the doctor to simply proscribe the drug as with any other. Rather the doctor will need to apply for access to the drug.1 In addition the drugs company will also have to give its approval.2 As a result it is unlikely that the patient will consider this the same way as they do normal drugs.\n\n1 ‘Special Access Programme – Drugs’, Health Canada, 15 August 2005, http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/dhp-mps/acces/drugs-drogues/sapfs_pasfd_2002-eng.php\n\n2 ‘Compassionate Use of Unapproved Investigational Product’, Pfizer, http://www.pfizer.com/research/research_clinical_trials/compassionate_use_policy.jsp\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "bd651f09904a09eaf6c7ebf6539e82b1", "text": "healthcare philosophy ethics science science general house would grant those It is cruel to deny people the last hope\n\nAt a point when all ordinary medical avenues have been expended, and the outcome appears bleak, new treatments still undergoing trials can be seen as the last hope.\n\nPeople are often aware of the existence of currently experimental drugs, they are likely to research into possible cures, and indeed there may have been attempts by their doctor to get the patient onto the trial.\n\nHowever, not everyone who could benefit from treatment is accepted onto a clinical trial: some trials, at some stages, restrict their recruitment to, for example, patients with no complicating factors or other illnesses.\n\nIt is unethical and cruel to make people live out their last days knowing that there was something that could have helped, but to which access was restricted through no fault of their own: thus, you should allow anyone with a terminal illness access to such treatments.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3c08dd068a03cdb72a1aa4d573a41407", "text": "healthcare philosophy ethics science science general house would grant those Freedom of Choice\n\nWe live in a free society, and accept that people have the right to do as they please; including exposing themselves to risk, as long as in so doing they do not harm others (Mill’s harm principle).1\n\nTo deny people the right to choose to take drugs that are still undergoing testing that, whilst they are risky, may save their lives, is a violation of this principle: in choosing to expose themselves to that risk, no-one else is harmed and indeed in the long run others may be saved as a result of the tests. Further, with the assistance of medical professionals and other support, the decision to take this risk can easily be well-informed and consensual.\n\n1 Wilson, Fred, \"John Stuart Mill\", in Edward N. Zalta (ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2012 Edition), http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2012/entries/mill/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0cca671ce0f38c7f47362cbe650a7a1b", "text": "healthcare philosophy ethics science science general house would grant those This gives people false hope\n\nIf these drugs are made available, you risk giving many people false hope in the last days of their lives. People, particularly when in desperate situations, tend to overestimate a treatment’s efficacy.\n\nGiven that these treatments are still undergoing the trial process, it is possible that they are ineffective, or have side-effects that outweigh any benefits.\n\nThus, to allow such drugs and treatments to be handed out during the testing process, there is a great risk of giving people false hope. This is especially the case given the compromised role of the physician in this scenario: ordinarily, if a patient wants an experimental drug, they can have a discussion with their physician that stresses the ‘in trial’ nature of the drug, and thus the uncertainty of it working. Subsequent experiences (the inconveniences of trials; filling in forms and receiving expenses) reinforce the idea that these drugs were experimental, and that the bulk of the benefit from the trial accrues for future patients.\n\nConsequently, in that scenario it is easier for the physician to help the patient to come to terms with the end of life; to deal with this and to realise that any trial drugs give only a slim chance of improvement. In the scenario envisaged by this proposition, experimental drugs can be acquired as easily as licensed ones, and therefore there is no longer that clear distinction for the patient between ‘doing all you can’ in the ordinary sense, (trying every treatment that is known to be effective) and trying ‘one more (experimental) drug’.\n\nTherefore, the patient is less likely to be able to come to terms with their own condition, and therefore less likely to be able to deal with the emotional trauma inflicted not only upon them, but on close family and loved ones.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "52942c2978660c8b74014caa8be0685f", "text": "healthcare philosophy ethics science science general house would grant those This policy enhances the role of drug reps and advertising, at the cost of evidence-based medicine\n\nBy allowing anyone who is critically ill to use experimental drugs you enhance the already dubious role of drug company reps: especially in the USA, (where doctors do not operate under the NHS guidance found in the UK), there is already a problem of patterns of prescription being altered by the techniques of drug reps, rather than by evidence1. Where drugs are for sale before they have completed testing, there is even less evidence available, and therefore less ability for physicians to contest the claims of either reps or their own patients (who may have heard of the drug during their own research). Hence you magnify the problem of potentially ineffective of even harmful prescription.\n\n1 Harris, Gwyn, ‘Pharmaceutical representatives do influence physician behaviour’, Family Practice, Vol.26 2009, pp.169-70, http://fampra.oxfordjournals.org/content/26/3/169.full\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "68e5c13503bc5d890c9f91ec820e5e11", "text": "healthcare philosophy ethics science science general house would grant those Disastrous impact on medical trials\n\nWe need medical trials. It is important to have large groups of recruits, which can often be very difficult: a problem with the speed at which new treatments for rare diseases is the rate of recruitment (and therefore the length of time taken to complete the trial)1.\n\nIf you pass this motion, trials will face large problems with recruitment, an area where there are already sometimes shortages2: if people can get access to the drug without a) the possibility of being placed in the placebo arm or b) inconveniences of being part of a trial, there is a reduced chance of them choosing to enter the trial.\n\nConsequently, the sample size in trials will be decreased. This will have a couple of outcomes:\n\nFirst trials will take a longer time to be completed as a result of fewer volunteers and this is bad for patients currently taking the new drug as well as for future patients. This is because it will take longer to determine the safety of the drug meaning if it is dangerous those taking the drug will be taking it for longer before the danger is fully appreciated and if safe then the drug will have taken longer to get to the market than it could have. The longer the trials take to complete, the more people are forced to decide whether to take the drug in the absence of reliable information. This means that, at such a stressful time, people are effectively forced to gamble the quality of their remaining years with the hope of gaining a few more (new drugs are unlikely to be ‘miracle cures’. Rather, they are likely to extend life by driving the disease into remission).\n\nIt is important to remember that, at this stage, it has yet to be determined whether new drugs are more effective than old ones, and second, that the sorts of drugs used to treat terminal illnesses tend to come with substantial side effects. As a consequence, if many people are using a new treatment before trialling has been completed, they may be using something that is not effective and has side-effects that significantly impact the quality of the last years of their life.\n\nFinally, the longer trials are delayed, the greater the chance that future trials will be biased by media hype ad speculation. It is both easy and profitable for media outlets to exaggerate early successes of a drug with claims and headlines such as “wonder drug”.\n\nThis is problematic because of the tendency towards confirmation bias on the part of researchers: the greater their expectation of a positive result, the more likely they are to alter data to receive that result. Note that this is not as a result of deliberate fraud or deception, but rather, the result of any number of small decisions that, cumulatively, create a large result.\n\n1 Jenkins, John, ‘Considerations for Clinical Trial Designs’, U.S. Food and Drug Administration, https://rarediseases.info.nih.gov/files/Jenkins.pdf\n\n2 ‘Volunteer for research at UNClinicalStudies.org’, University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center, http://www.cancer.med.umich.edu/living/clinical-trials.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "098d4c5d616be2754b283a882e4318d9", "text": "healthcare philosophy ethics science science general house would grant those This reduces the incentive for pharmaceutical companies to complete the testing process\n\nTesting new drugs is a very expensive process, in 2000 the average cost was estimated at around 86 million for the large scale phase III tests1 however this is contested and it could be much higher it represents 40% of pharmaceutical companies R&D expenditures, which since a recent estimated the development cost of a drug can be up to $5.8billion (due to including failures) the cost of trials would in some cases then be $2billion,2 which is currently funded by pharmaceutical companies. They fund these tests because it is either impossible, very difficult or very risky to access large markets before testing has been completed (e.g. in the USA companies are only allowed to sell new drugs “off-study”, i.e. during trials, at cost3)\n\nIf you allow all terminally ill patients access to experimental drugs, you reduce the incentive for companies to continue testing their products: they will have access to a large market prior to the completion of testing, and will therefore have no incentive to complete trials, which are expensive and risk finding the product ineffective.\n\n1 DiMasi, Joseph A. et al., ‘The price of innovation: new estimates of drug development costs’, Journal of Health Economics, Vol.22, 2003, pp.151-185, p.162 http://moglen.law.columbia.edu/twiki/pub/LawNetSoc/BahradSokhansanjFirstPaper/22JHealthEcon151_drug_development_costs_2003.pdf\n\n2 Roy, Avik S. A., ‘Stifling New Cures: The True Cost of Lengthy Clinical Drug Trials’, Project FDA Report, No. 5, April 2012, http://www.manhattan-institute.org/html/fda_05.htm\n\n3 Schüklenk, Udo, and Lowry, Christopher, ‘Terminal illness and access to Phase 1 experimental agents, surgeries and devices: reviewing the ethical arguments’, British Medical Bulletin, Vol.89, 2009, pp.7-22, http://bmb.oxfordjournals.org/content/89/1/7.full.pdf?keytype=ref&ijkey=Ip64J5FUXThKvP0\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
b7ed9a7f09b61a048e7b226832e4b177	Legal drugs would increase tax revenue In 2009-2010, the tax revenue from tobacco in the UK was £10.5 billion. [1] If the state legalizes drugs, it can tax them and use the revenue from this practise to fund treatment. At the moment such treatment is difficult to justify as it appears to be spending ordinary taxpayers’ money on junkies. [1] Tobacco Manufacturers’ Association, ‘Tax Revenue From Tobacco’, accessed 16th June 2011 - http://www.the-tma.org.uk/tma-publications-research/facts-figures/tax-re...	[ { "docid": "14145bc3e4fb8dd4203ea44012ec3985", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs If the state is to make money from taxing drugs, this undercuts the (supposed) advantages of lower-priced drugs and will just encourage a black market to continue. In the UK, there is large black market for tobacco; it is suspected that tax has not been paid on 21% of cigarettes and 58% of hand rolling tobacco consumed. [1] Furthermore, for the state to take revenue from this practise is morally wrong, whatever use the money is put to. The point of drug treatment is to help abusers off drugs, but under the proposition’s system the state would have a financial interest in prolonging addiction.\n\n[1] Tobacco Manufacturers’ Association, ‘Tobacco Smuggling and Crossborder Shopping’, http://www.the-tma.org.uk/policy-legislation/tobacco-smuggling-crossbord...\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "452cb8a6321bde256241575b92b8f36a", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Prohibition may not be working in the UK but that does not mean that prohibition is not working everywhere. In the US, the Drug Enforcement Agency states that “Overall drug use in the United States is down by more than a third since the late 1970s. That’s 9.5 million people fewer using illegal drugs. We’ve reduced cocaine use by an astounding 70% during the last 15 years.” [1]\n\n[1] U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, ‘Fact 1: We have made significant progress in fighting drug use and drug trafficking in America. Now is not the time to abandon our efforts’, http://www.justice.gov/dea/demand/speakout/01so.htm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f1229d409b02277de94d85970e00b3bb", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Whether legal or illegal, drugs will still be a source of income for warlords and terrorist groups. Instead of starving them off, the dealers become more competitive and lower their prices. The only way to stop these people using drugs as a source of income is to remove poppies from Afghan fields, to destroy coca plantations.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "886ce84eb218c3f2e07aacaed3cbb077", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Drugs affect how people think, and they take away their ability to control their actions rationally, and so people on drugs are more likely to commit crimes. The US Drug Enforcement Administration states, “Crime, violence and drug use go hand in hand. Six times as many homicides are committed by people under the influence of drugs, as by those who are looking for money to buy drugs. Most drug crimes aren’t committed by people trying to pay for drugs; they’re committed by people on drugs.” [1]\n\n[1] U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, ‘Summary of the Top Ten Facts on Legalization’, 2010, http://www.justice.gov/dea/demand/speakout/index.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "76b40033fb7b21b07ded4642ce0b83d4", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Part of the reason that drugs are illegal is because of the health ramifications, which exist even if a drug is pure.\n\nTo give a brief summary of some health harms that come from unadulterated drugs:\n\n“Cocaine can cause such long-term problems as tremors, seizures, psychosis, and heart or respiratory failure.\n\nMarijuana and hashish can cause rapid heart rate and memory impairment soon after use. Long-term effects include cognitive problems, infertility, weakened immune system, and possible lung damage.\n\nNarcotics such as heroin can bring on respiratory and circulatory depression, dizziness, impotence, constipation, and withdrawal sickness. Overdoses can lead to seizures and death.” [1]\n\n[1] Bowles Center for Alcohol Studies, ‘Effects of Alcohol and Drugs on your Health’, University of North Carolina, http://www.med.unc.edu/alcohol/prevention/health.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "67203f40c652783f044799d82be0f293", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs This point makes the assumption that drug use only affects the individual concerned; in reality, drug usage can have a significant effect on people close to the user, as well as wider society. People who can be affected include family who have to care for a user and victims of drug-related crimes. In addition, in countries with welfare states, there is an additional significant societal cost as many drug users cannot hold down jobs. [1] Studies in the USA have shown that parents often put their need for drugs above the wellbeing of their children. [2]\n\nThis being the case, it is clear that the harms of drugs far outweigh governmental duty to protect individual freedoms.\n\nFurthermore, doing drugs may be a free choice at first, but after a certain period the drug user is no longer to choose for himself/herself because addiction overruns their judgement.\n\n[1] BBC News, ‘Drugs cost society £18.8bn’, 12 February 2002, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/1816215.stm\n\n[2] National Drug Intelligence Center, ‘The Impact of Drugs on Society’, National Drug Threat Assessment 2006, January 2006, http://www.justice.gov/ndic/pubs11/18862/impact.htm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d2ca74724c44bb91dc12253553a75619", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Perhaps alcohol and tobacco should also be illegal. However, one of the reasons why alcohol ranks so badly in such studies is because of its legality; if other drugs were legal, we would see their usage go up and therefore the negative social effects they produce rise as well.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5d9999eb7130f43a163a2411bd28589e", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Many things that can be dangerous are legal, from drugs such as alcohol, to activities such as skydiving, or even rugby. However, millions of people are able to drink or play sports without harming themselves or society. It would seem draconian and extremely paternalistic for the government to ban everything that has the potential to be dangerous; instead, they should educate people about the dangers, but trust them to make decisions about their own lives.\n\nThe State has no authority to force its own morality on the general populace unless these drugs can be proven to harm others. The State is the facilitator of the voters’ desires in a democracy. So, a State enforced, morality goes against the obligations of the State to its people.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ec6a7d273cb73a71d41a5f061ff85281", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs In a capitalist system reliant on supply and demand, the cost of a particular drug will always correspond to what people are willing to pay for them. So, there is no reason why a black market should spring up under a legalised system of drug sale.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0e4646fce08e9364ff7802056baf1b12", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs When drugs are illegal, this does not stop people from using them. A Canadian report on the matter concluded, \"The licit or illicit status of substances has little impact on their use.\" [1] In addition, even though drugs are illegal, it is not hard to access them. In a Spanish survey, 92.9% of Spanish students said that it was very easy to access illegal drugs – even though only 11.6% used cannabis, which was the most used. [2] Even using the survey quoted by opposition, it is clear that the majority of people surveyed did not view the illegality of cannabis as a reason not to use it.\n\n[1] Parliament of Canada House of Commons, Special Committee on Non-Medical Use of Drugs, report issued November, 2002, http://www.parl.gc.ca/committeebusiness/StudyActivityHome.aspx?Cmte=SNUD&Language=E&Mode=1&Parl=37&Ses=2&Stac=626199\n\n[2] Eurocare, ‘92.9 % of Spanish students say that access to drugs is very easy’, 26 March 2010, http://www.eurocare.org/library/latest_news/92_9_of_spanish_students_say...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c1f3a99f29d025076023eeac2357ac20", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Prohibition does not work; instead, it glamorizes drugs\n\nThose who want to use drugs will take them whether they are legal or not – and more are doing so than ever before. In 1970 there was something like 1,000 problematic drug users in the UK, now there are over 250,000. [1] Legalization will also remove the glamour which surrounds an underground activity and so make drug use less attractive to impressionable teenagers. For example, statistics suggest that cannabis use in the UK declined after its classification was lowered from ‘B’ to ‘C’. [2]\n\n[1] Home Affairs Select Committee, ‘The Government’s Drug Policy: Is It Working?’, parliament.uk, 22 May 2002, http://www.parliament.the-stationery-office.co.uk/pa/cm200102/cmselect/c...\n\n[2] Travis, Alan, ‘Cannabis use down since legal change’, The Guardian, 26th October 2007, http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2007/oct/26/drugsandalcohol.homeaffairs\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "648ed48f307bd169b20868a7e1f312c5", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Drugs currently fund terrorism and regional instability\n\nThe Taliban gets most of its revenue from poppies, which provide the opium for heroin. They do this by intimidating local farmers who would otherwise sell their harvest at market. They then demand “protection money” as well, or else either another local warlord or the ‘protectors’ themselves would rob the farmer. Something like 22,700 people have died in Mexico since January 2007 from gangsters who want to protect their revenue and almost the entire continent of South America, from Brazil to Colombia, has had their governments destabilised by drug lords. [1] The hugely-costly but unsuccessful war on drugs could be ended, starving terrorists of the profits of drug production. As a result peace and development could be brought to unstable drug-producing states such as Colombia and Afghanistan.\n\n[1] Mexico under siege, The drug war on our doorstep, Los Angeles Times , 27 September 2011, http://projects.latimes.com/mexico-drug-war/#/its-a-war\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "555de188cfdb2145e81506d7e09631ab", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Drugs are safer when legal\n\nCurrently in the UK, purity of illegal Amphetamine is normally under 5%, and some tablets sold as ecstasy contain no MDMA at all. Instead, drugs are adulterated (“cut”) with substances from chalk and talcum powder to completely different drugs. [1]\n\nAt least when drugs are legalised the state can regulate their sale to make sure that they are clean and not cut with other dangerous substances. This will minimise the risk to users.\n\n[1] Drugscope, ‘How Pure Are Street Drugs?’, updated January 2005, http://www.drugscope.org.uk/resources/faqs/faqpages/how-pure-are-street-...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2fbc227952f0b13f9e4205878af0d5bf", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs The law is hypocritical\n\nIn most countries where drugs are illegal, tobacco and alcohol, which arguably have equally devastating consequences in society, are legal. In a UK study, alcohol was shown to have the worst effects of any drug, yet the current law recognises that people should be able to choose whether they drink or not. [1] The same should be true of drugs.\n\n[1] Professor David Nutt, ‘Drug Harms in the UK: a multicriteria decision analysis’, The Lancet, Vol 376, Issue 9752, pp. 1558-1565, 6th November 2010, http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2810%2961...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0eee0c316f423d9af7cebdcc64cd5ca2", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs People should be free to take drugs\n\nIndividuals are sovereign over their own bodies, and should be free to make choices which affect them and not other individuals. Since the pleasure gained from drugs and the extent to which this weighs against potential risks is fundamentally subjective, it is not up to the state to legislate in this area. Rather than pouring wasted resources into attempting to suppress drug use, the state would be better off running information campaigns to educate people about the risks and consequences of taking different types of drugs.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "57255469a8f61a59734a14a90868233e", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Legalisation reduces crime\n\nThe illegality of drugs fuels a huge amount of crime that could be eliminated if drugs were legalised. Price controls would mean that addicts would no longer have to steal to fund their habits, and a state-provided drug services would put dealers out of business, starving criminal gangs of their main source of funding. For example, an Italian Mafia family were making around $44bn a year from cocaine smuggling. [1] This represents something like 3% of Italy’s entire GDP – and that from only one crime syndicate.\n\n[1] Kington, Tom, ‘Italian police raids reveal how an 80-year-old gangster held sway over the feared Calabrian mafia’, The Observer, 18 July 2010, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jul/18/ndrangheta-mafia-italy-police\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "59ff991405684130e8c583c8b06a9bd6", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs More people will take drugs if they are legal\n\nConsidering that drug use has so many negative consequences, it would be disastrous to have it increase. However, the free availability of drugs once they are legal will make it far easier for individuals to buy and use them. In most cases, under 1% of the population of OECD countries regularly use illegal drugs; many more drink alcohol or smoke tobacco. [1] This must at least partly to do with the illegality. Indeed, in an Australian survey, 29% of those who had never used cannabis cited the illegality of the substance as their reason for never using the drug, while 19% of those who had ceased use of cannabis cited its illegality as their reason. [2]\n\n[1] UN Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2009, http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/data-and-analysis/WDR-2009.html?ref=menutop\n\n[2] NSW Bureau of Crime and Statistics, ‘Does Prohibition Deter Cannabis use?’, 23 August 2001, http://www.lawlink.nsw.gov.au/lawlink/bocsar/ll_bocsar.nsf/vwFiles/mr_cj... $file/mr_cjb58.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "94863ce2c02fc73290ac14dff9733016", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Drugs are dangerous, and the governement should discourage its use\n\nThe government has a responsibility to protect its citizens; if a substance will do people and society significant harm, then that substance should be banned. There is no such thing as a safe form of a drug. Legalization can only make drugs purer, and therefore perhaps more deadly and addictive. Many illegal drugs are closely related to potentially dangerous medicines, whose prescription is tightly restricted to trained professionals, but the proposition would effectively be allowing anyone to take anything they wished regardless of the known medical dangers.\n\nHowever entrenched in modern culture drugs may be, legalising them will only make them appear more acceptable. The state has a duty to send out the right message, and its health campaigns will be fundamentally undermined by the suggestion that drugs are harmless, which is what will be understood from their legalisation – just like when cannabis was downgraded in the UK.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a5f30d174b26a5547fe03662eec9a691", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Drugs will either be too cheap or too expensive\n\nLow prices for drugs will hugely increase consumption of drugs, amongst all groups - addicts, previously casual users, and those who were not previously users. If drug provision is strictly regulated, an illegal black market may remain.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
a46375c3aa1c81d0191145f971e0d898	Prohibition does not work; instead, it glamorizes drugs Those who want to use drugs will take them whether they are legal or not – and more are doing so than ever before. In 1970 there was something like 1,000 problematic drug users in the UK, now there are over 250,000. [1] Legalization will also remove the glamour which surrounds an underground activity and so make drug use less attractive to impressionable teenagers. For example, statistics suggest that cannabis use in the UK declined after its classification was lowered from ‘B’ to ‘C’. [2] [1] Home Affairs Select Committee, ‘The Government’s Drug Policy: Is It Working?’, parliament.uk, 22 May 2002, http://www.parliament.the-stationery-office.co.uk/pa/cm200102/cmselect/c... [2] Travis, Alan, ‘Cannabis use down since legal change’, The Guardian, 26th October 2007, http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2007/oct/26/drugsandalcohol.homeaffairs	[ { "docid": "452cb8a6321bde256241575b92b8f36a", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Prohibition may not be working in the UK but that does not mean that prohibition is not working everywhere. In the US, the Drug Enforcement Agency states that “Overall drug use in the United States is down by more than a third since the late 1970s. That’s 9.5 million people fewer using illegal drugs. We’ve reduced cocaine use by an astounding 70% during the last 15 years.” [1]\n\n[1] U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, ‘Fact 1: We have made significant progress in fighting drug use and drug trafficking in America. Now is not the time to abandon our efforts’, http://www.justice.gov/dea/demand/speakout/01so.htm\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "f1229d409b02277de94d85970e00b3bb", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Whether legal or illegal, drugs will still be a source of income for warlords and terrorist groups. Instead of starving them off, the dealers become more competitive and lower their prices. The only way to stop these people using drugs as a source of income is to remove poppies from Afghan fields, to destroy coca plantations.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "886ce84eb218c3f2e07aacaed3cbb077", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Drugs affect how people think, and they take away their ability to control their actions rationally, and so people on drugs are more likely to commit crimes. The US Drug Enforcement Administration states, “Crime, violence and drug use go hand in hand. Six times as many homicides are committed by people under the influence of drugs, as by those who are looking for money to buy drugs. Most drug crimes aren’t committed by people trying to pay for drugs; they’re committed by people on drugs.” [1]\n\n[1] U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, ‘Summary of the Top Ten Facts on Legalization’, 2010, http://www.justice.gov/dea/demand/speakout/index.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "76b40033fb7b21b07ded4642ce0b83d4", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Part of the reason that drugs are illegal is because of the health ramifications, which exist even if a drug is pure.\n\nTo give a brief summary of some health harms that come from unadulterated drugs:\n\n“Cocaine can cause such long-term problems as tremors, seizures, psychosis, and heart or respiratory failure.\n\nMarijuana and hashish can cause rapid heart rate and memory impairment soon after use. Long-term effects include cognitive problems, infertility, weakened immune system, and possible lung damage.\n\nNarcotics such as heroin can bring on respiratory and circulatory depression, dizziness, impotence, constipation, and withdrawal sickness. Overdoses can lead to seizures and death.” [1]\n\n[1] Bowles Center for Alcohol Studies, ‘Effects of Alcohol and Drugs on your Health’, University of North Carolina, http://www.med.unc.edu/alcohol/prevention/health.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "67203f40c652783f044799d82be0f293", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs This point makes the assumption that drug use only affects the individual concerned; in reality, drug usage can have a significant effect on people close to the user, as well as wider society. People who can be affected include family who have to care for a user and victims of drug-related crimes. In addition, in countries with welfare states, there is an additional significant societal cost as many drug users cannot hold down jobs. [1] Studies in the USA have shown that parents often put their need for drugs above the wellbeing of their children. [2]\n\nThis being the case, it is clear that the harms of drugs far outweigh governmental duty to protect individual freedoms.\n\nFurthermore, doing drugs may be a free choice at first, but after a certain period the drug user is no longer to choose for himself/herself because addiction overruns their judgement.\n\n[1] BBC News, ‘Drugs cost society £18.8bn’, 12 February 2002, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/1816215.stm\n\n[2] National Drug Intelligence Center, ‘The Impact of Drugs on Society’, National Drug Threat Assessment 2006, January 2006, http://www.justice.gov/ndic/pubs11/18862/impact.htm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d2ca74724c44bb91dc12253553a75619", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Perhaps alcohol and tobacco should also be illegal. However, one of the reasons why alcohol ranks so badly in such studies is because of its legality; if other drugs were legal, we would see their usage go up and therefore the negative social effects they produce rise as well.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "14145bc3e4fb8dd4203ea44012ec3985", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs If the state is to make money from taxing drugs, this undercuts the (supposed) advantages of lower-priced drugs and will just encourage a black market to continue. In the UK, there is large black market for tobacco; it is suspected that tax has not been paid on 21% of cigarettes and 58% of hand rolling tobacco consumed. [1] Furthermore, for the state to take revenue from this practise is morally wrong, whatever use the money is put to. The point of drug treatment is to help abusers off drugs, but under the proposition’s system the state would have a financial interest in prolonging addiction.\n\n[1] Tobacco Manufacturers’ Association, ‘Tobacco Smuggling and Crossborder Shopping’, http://www.the-tma.org.uk/policy-legislation/tobacco-smuggling-crossbord...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5d9999eb7130f43a163a2411bd28589e", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Many things that can be dangerous are legal, from drugs such as alcohol, to activities such as skydiving, or even rugby. However, millions of people are able to drink or play sports without harming themselves or society. It would seem draconian and extremely paternalistic for the government to ban everything that has the potential to be dangerous; instead, they should educate people about the dangers, but trust them to make decisions about their own lives.\n\nThe State has no authority to force its own morality on the general populace unless these drugs can be proven to harm others. The State is the facilitator of the voters’ desires in a democracy. So, a State enforced, morality goes against the obligations of the State to its people.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ec6a7d273cb73a71d41a5f061ff85281", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs In a capitalist system reliant on supply and demand, the cost of a particular drug will always correspond to what people are willing to pay for them. So, there is no reason why a black market should spring up under a legalised system of drug sale.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0e4646fce08e9364ff7802056baf1b12", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs When drugs are illegal, this does not stop people from using them. A Canadian report on the matter concluded, \"The licit or illicit status of substances has little impact on their use.\" [1] In addition, even though drugs are illegal, it is not hard to access them. In a Spanish survey, 92.9% of Spanish students said that it was very easy to access illegal drugs – even though only 11.6% used cannabis, which was the most used. [2] Even using the survey quoted by opposition, it is clear that the majority of people surveyed did not view the illegality of cannabis as a reason not to use it.\n\n[1] Parliament of Canada House of Commons, Special Committee on Non-Medical Use of Drugs, report issued November, 2002, http://www.parl.gc.ca/committeebusiness/StudyActivityHome.aspx?Cmte=SNUD&Language=E&Mode=1&Parl=37&Ses=2&Stac=626199\n\n[2] Eurocare, ‘92.9 % of Spanish students say that access to drugs is very easy’, 26 March 2010, http://www.eurocare.org/library/latest_news/92_9_of_spanish_students_say...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2eba0733be61b3ca8f3180b97e693228", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Legal drugs would increase tax revenue\n\nIn 2009-2010, the tax revenue from tobacco in the UK was £10.5 billion. [1] If the state legalizes drugs, it can tax them and use the revenue from this practise to fund treatment. At the moment such treatment is difficult to justify as it appears to be spending ordinary taxpayers’ money on junkies.\n\n[1] Tobacco Manufacturers’ Association, ‘Tax Revenue From Tobacco’, accessed 16th June 2011 - http://www.the-tma.org.uk/tma-publications-research/facts-figures/tax-re...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "648ed48f307bd169b20868a7e1f312c5", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Drugs currently fund terrorism and regional instability\n\nThe Taliban gets most of its revenue from poppies, which provide the opium for heroin. They do this by intimidating local farmers who would otherwise sell their harvest at market. They then demand “protection money” as well, or else either another local warlord or the ‘protectors’ themselves would rob the farmer. Something like 22,700 people have died in Mexico since January 2007 from gangsters who want to protect their revenue and almost the entire continent of South America, from Brazil to Colombia, has had their governments destabilised by drug lords. [1] The hugely-costly but unsuccessful war on drugs could be ended, starving terrorists of the profits of drug production. As a result peace and development could be brought to unstable drug-producing states such as Colombia and Afghanistan.\n\n[1] Mexico under siege, The drug war on our doorstep, Los Angeles Times , 27 September 2011, http://projects.latimes.com/mexico-drug-war/#/its-a-war\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "555de188cfdb2145e81506d7e09631ab", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Drugs are safer when legal\n\nCurrently in the UK, purity of illegal Amphetamine is normally under 5%, and some tablets sold as ecstasy contain no MDMA at all. Instead, drugs are adulterated (“cut”) with substances from chalk and talcum powder to completely different drugs. [1]\n\nAt least when drugs are legalised the state can regulate their sale to make sure that they are clean and not cut with other dangerous substances. This will minimise the risk to users.\n\n[1] Drugscope, ‘How Pure Are Street Drugs?’, updated January 2005, http://www.drugscope.org.uk/resources/faqs/faqpages/how-pure-are-street-...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2fbc227952f0b13f9e4205878af0d5bf", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs The law is hypocritical\n\nIn most countries where drugs are illegal, tobacco and alcohol, which arguably have equally devastating consequences in society, are legal. In a UK study, alcohol was shown to have the worst effects of any drug, yet the current law recognises that people should be able to choose whether they drink or not. [1] The same should be true of drugs.\n\n[1] Professor David Nutt, ‘Drug Harms in the UK: a multicriteria decision analysis’, The Lancet, Vol 376, Issue 9752, pp. 1558-1565, 6th November 2010, http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2810%2961...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0eee0c316f423d9af7cebdcc64cd5ca2", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs People should be free to take drugs\n\nIndividuals are sovereign over their own bodies, and should be free to make choices which affect them and not other individuals. Since the pleasure gained from drugs and the extent to which this weighs against potential risks is fundamentally subjective, it is not up to the state to legislate in this area. Rather than pouring wasted resources into attempting to suppress drug use, the state would be better off running information campaigns to educate people about the risks and consequences of taking different types of drugs.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "57255469a8f61a59734a14a90868233e", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Legalisation reduces crime\n\nThe illegality of drugs fuels a huge amount of crime that could be eliminated if drugs were legalised. Price controls would mean that addicts would no longer have to steal to fund their habits, and a state-provided drug services would put dealers out of business, starving criminal gangs of their main source of funding. For example, an Italian Mafia family were making around $44bn a year from cocaine smuggling. [1] This represents something like 3% of Italy’s entire GDP – and that from only one crime syndicate.\n\n[1] Kington, Tom, ‘Italian police raids reveal how an 80-year-old gangster held sway over the feared Calabrian mafia’, The Observer, 18 July 2010, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jul/18/ndrangheta-mafia-italy-police\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "59ff991405684130e8c583c8b06a9bd6", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs More people will take drugs if they are legal\n\nConsidering that drug use has so many negative consequences, it would be disastrous to have it increase. However, the free availability of drugs once they are legal will make it far easier for individuals to buy and use them. In most cases, under 1% of the population of OECD countries regularly use illegal drugs; many more drink alcohol or smoke tobacco. [1] This must at least partly to do with the illegality. Indeed, in an Australian survey, 29% of those who had never used cannabis cited the illegality of the substance as their reason for never using the drug, while 19% of those who had ceased use of cannabis cited its illegality as their reason. [2]\n\n[1] UN Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2009, http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/data-and-analysis/WDR-2009.html?ref=menutop\n\n[2] NSW Bureau of Crime and Statistics, ‘Does Prohibition Deter Cannabis use?’, 23 August 2001, http://www.lawlink.nsw.gov.au/lawlink/bocsar/ll_bocsar.nsf/vwFiles/mr_cj... $file/mr_cjb58.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "94863ce2c02fc73290ac14dff9733016", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Drugs are dangerous, and the governement should discourage its use\n\nThe government has a responsibility to protect its citizens; if a substance will do people and society significant harm, then that substance should be banned. There is no such thing as a safe form of a drug. Legalization can only make drugs purer, and therefore perhaps more deadly and addictive. Many illegal drugs are closely related to potentially dangerous medicines, whose prescription is tightly restricted to trained professionals, but the proposition would effectively be allowing anyone to take anything they wished regardless of the known medical dangers.\n\nHowever entrenched in modern culture drugs may be, legalising them will only make them appear more acceptable. The state has a duty to send out the right message, and its health campaigns will be fundamentally undermined by the suggestion that drugs are harmless, which is what will be understood from their legalisation – just like when cannabis was downgraded in the UK.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a5f30d174b26a5547fe03662eec9a691", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Drugs will either be too cheap or too expensive\n\nLow prices for drugs will hugely increase consumption of drugs, amongst all groups - addicts, previously casual users, and those who were not previously users. If drug provision is strictly regulated, an illegal black market may remain.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
7b1c92d1f5a2dfcd658119aad1ff266e	More people will take drugs if they are legal Considering that drug use has so many negative consequences, it would be disastrous to have it increase. However, the free availability of drugs once they are legal will make it far easier for individuals to buy and use them. In most cases, under 1% of the population of OECD countries regularly use illegal drugs; many more drink alcohol or smoke tobacco. [1] This must at least partly to do with the illegality. Indeed, in an Australian survey, 29% of those who had never used cannabis cited the illegality of the substance as their reason for never using the drug, while 19% of those who had ceased use of cannabis cited its illegality as their reason. [2] [1] UN Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2009, http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/data-and-analysis/WDR-2009.html?ref=menutop [2] NSW Bureau of Crime and Statistics, ‘Does Prohibition Deter Cannabis use?’, 23 August 2001, http://www.lawlink.nsw.gov.au/lawlink/bocsar/ll_bocsar.nsf/vwFiles/mr_cj... $file/mr_cjb58.pdf	[ { "docid": "0e4646fce08e9364ff7802056baf1b12", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs When drugs are illegal, this does not stop people from using them. A Canadian report on the matter concluded, \"The licit or illicit status of substances has little impact on their use.\" [1] In addition, even though drugs are illegal, it is not hard to access them. In a Spanish survey, 92.9% of Spanish students said that it was very easy to access illegal drugs – even though only 11.6% used cannabis, which was the most used. [2] Even using the survey quoted by opposition, it is clear that the majority of people surveyed did not view the illegality of cannabis as a reason not to use it.\n\n[1] Parliament of Canada House of Commons, Special Committee on Non-Medical Use of Drugs, report issued November, 2002, http://www.parl.gc.ca/committeebusiness/StudyActivityHome.aspx?Cmte=SNUD&Language=E&Mode=1&Parl=37&Ses=2&Stac=626199\n\n[2] Eurocare, ‘92.9 % of Spanish students say that access to drugs is very easy’, 26 March 2010, http://www.eurocare.org/library/latest_news/92_9_of_spanish_students_say...\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "5d9999eb7130f43a163a2411bd28589e", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Many things that can be dangerous are legal, from drugs such as alcohol, to activities such as skydiving, or even rugby. However, millions of people are able to drink or play sports without harming themselves or society. It would seem draconian and extremely paternalistic for the government to ban everything that has the potential to be dangerous; instead, they should educate people about the dangers, but trust them to make decisions about their own lives.\n\nThe State has no authority to force its own morality on the general populace unless these drugs can be proven to harm others. The State is the facilitator of the voters’ desires in a democracy. So, a State enforced, morality goes against the obligations of the State to its people.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ec6a7d273cb73a71d41a5f061ff85281", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs In a capitalist system reliant on supply and demand, the cost of a particular drug will always correspond to what people are willing to pay for them. So, there is no reason why a black market should spring up under a legalised system of drug sale.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "452cb8a6321bde256241575b92b8f36a", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Prohibition may not be working in the UK but that does not mean that prohibition is not working everywhere. In the US, the Drug Enforcement Agency states that “Overall drug use in the United States is down by more than a third since the late 1970s. That’s 9.5 million people fewer using illegal drugs. We’ve reduced cocaine use by an astounding 70% during the last 15 years.” [1]\n\n[1] U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, ‘Fact 1: We have made significant progress in fighting drug use and drug trafficking in America. Now is not the time to abandon our efforts’, http://www.justice.gov/dea/demand/speakout/01so.htm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f1229d409b02277de94d85970e00b3bb", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Whether legal or illegal, drugs will still be a source of income for warlords and terrorist groups. Instead of starving them off, the dealers become more competitive and lower their prices. The only way to stop these people using drugs as a source of income is to remove poppies from Afghan fields, to destroy coca plantations.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "886ce84eb218c3f2e07aacaed3cbb077", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Drugs affect how people think, and they take away their ability to control their actions rationally, and so people on drugs are more likely to commit crimes. The US Drug Enforcement Administration states, “Crime, violence and drug use go hand in hand. Six times as many homicides are committed by people under the influence of drugs, as by those who are looking for money to buy drugs. Most drug crimes aren’t committed by people trying to pay for drugs; they’re committed by people on drugs.” [1]\n\n[1] U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, ‘Summary of the Top Ten Facts on Legalization’, 2010, http://www.justice.gov/dea/demand/speakout/index.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "76b40033fb7b21b07ded4642ce0b83d4", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Part of the reason that drugs are illegal is because of the health ramifications, which exist even if a drug is pure.\n\nTo give a brief summary of some health harms that come from unadulterated drugs:\n\n“Cocaine can cause such long-term problems as tremors, seizures, psychosis, and heart or respiratory failure.\n\nMarijuana and hashish can cause rapid heart rate and memory impairment soon after use. Long-term effects include cognitive problems, infertility, weakened immune system, and possible lung damage.\n\nNarcotics such as heroin can bring on respiratory and circulatory depression, dizziness, impotence, constipation, and withdrawal sickness. Overdoses can lead to seizures and death.” [1]\n\n[1] Bowles Center for Alcohol Studies, ‘Effects of Alcohol and Drugs on your Health’, University of North Carolina, http://www.med.unc.edu/alcohol/prevention/health.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "67203f40c652783f044799d82be0f293", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs This point makes the assumption that drug use only affects the individual concerned; in reality, drug usage can have a significant effect on people close to the user, as well as wider society. People who can be affected include family who have to care for a user and victims of drug-related crimes. In addition, in countries with welfare states, there is an additional significant societal cost as many drug users cannot hold down jobs. [1] Studies in the USA have shown that parents often put their need for drugs above the wellbeing of their children. [2]\n\nThis being the case, it is clear that the harms of drugs far outweigh governmental duty to protect individual freedoms.\n\nFurthermore, doing drugs may be a free choice at first, but after a certain period the drug user is no longer to choose for himself/herself because addiction overruns their judgement.\n\n[1] BBC News, ‘Drugs cost society £18.8bn’, 12 February 2002, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/1816215.stm\n\n[2] National Drug Intelligence Center, ‘The Impact of Drugs on Society’, National Drug Threat Assessment 2006, January 2006, http://www.justice.gov/ndic/pubs11/18862/impact.htm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d2ca74724c44bb91dc12253553a75619", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Perhaps alcohol and tobacco should also be illegal. However, one of the reasons why alcohol ranks so badly in such studies is because of its legality; if other drugs were legal, we would see their usage go up and therefore the negative social effects they produce rise as well.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "14145bc3e4fb8dd4203ea44012ec3985", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs If the state is to make money from taxing drugs, this undercuts the (supposed) advantages of lower-priced drugs and will just encourage a black market to continue. In the UK, there is large black market for tobacco; it is suspected that tax has not been paid on 21% of cigarettes and 58% of hand rolling tobacco consumed. [1] Furthermore, for the state to take revenue from this practise is morally wrong, whatever use the money is put to. The point of drug treatment is to help abusers off drugs, but under the proposition’s system the state would have a financial interest in prolonging addiction.\n\n[1] Tobacco Manufacturers’ Association, ‘Tobacco Smuggling and Crossborder Shopping’, http://www.the-tma.org.uk/policy-legislation/tobacco-smuggling-crossbord...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "94863ce2c02fc73290ac14dff9733016", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Drugs are dangerous, and the governement should discourage its use\n\nThe government has a responsibility to protect its citizens; if a substance will do people and society significant harm, then that substance should be banned. There is no such thing as a safe form of a drug. Legalization can only make drugs purer, and therefore perhaps more deadly and addictive. Many illegal drugs are closely related to potentially dangerous medicines, whose prescription is tightly restricted to trained professionals, but the proposition would effectively be allowing anyone to take anything they wished regardless of the known medical dangers.\n\nHowever entrenched in modern culture drugs may be, legalising them will only make them appear more acceptable. The state has a duty to send out the right message, and its health campaigns will be fundamentally undermined by the suggestion that drugs are harmless, which is what will be understood from their legalisation – just like when cannabis was downgraded in the UK.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a5f30d174b26a5547fe03662eec9a691", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Drugs will either be too cheap or too expensive\n\nLow prices for drugs will hugely increase consumption of drugs, amongst all groups - addicts, previously casual users, and those who were not previously users. If drug provision is strictly regulated, an illegal black market may remain.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2eba0733be61b3ca8f3180b97e693228", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Legal drugs would increase tax revenue\n\nIn 2009-2010, the tax revenue from tobacco in the UK was £10.5 billion. [1] If the state legalizes drugs, it can tax them and use the revenue from this practise to fund treatment. At the moment such treatment is difficult to justify as it appears to be spending ordinary taxpayers’ money on junkies.\n\n[1] Tobacco Manufacturers’ Association, ‘Tax Revenue From Tobacco’, accessed 16th June 2011 - http://www.the-tma.org.uk/tma-publications-research/facts-figures/tax-re...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c1f3a99f29d025076023eeac2357ac20", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Prohibition does not work; instead, it glamorizes drugs\n\nThose who want to use drugs will take them whether they are legal or not – and more are doing so than ever before. In 1970 there was something like 1,000 problematic drug users in the UK, now there are over 250,000. [1] Legalization will also remove the glamour which surrounds an underground activity and so make drug use less attractive to impressionable teenagers. For example, statistics suggest that cannabis use in the UK declined after its classification was lowered from ‘B’ to ‘C’. [2]\n\n[1] Home Affairs Select Committee, ‘The Government’s Drug Policy: Is It Working?’, parliament.uk, 22 May 2002, http://www.parliament.the-stationery-office.co.uk/pa/cm200102/cmselect/c...\n\n[2] Travis, Alan, ‘Cannabis use down since legal change’, The Guardian, 26th October 2007, http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2007/oct/26/drugsandalcohol.homeaffairs\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "648ed48f307bd169b20868a7e1f312c5", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Drugs currently fund terrorism and regional instability\n\nThe Taliban gets most of its revenue from poppies, which provide the opium for heroin. They do this by intimidating local farmers who would otherwise sell their harvest at market. They then demand “protection money” as well, or else either another local warlord or the ‘protectors’ themselves would rob the farmer. Something like 22,700 people have died in Mexico since January 2007 from gangsters who want to protect their revenue and almost the entire continent of South America, from Brazil to Colombia, has had their governments destabilised by drug lords. [1] The hugely-costly but unsuccessful war on drugs could be ended, starving terrorists of the profits of drug production. As a result peace and development could be brought to unstable drug-producing states such as Colombia and Afghanistan.\n\n[1] Mexico under siege, The drug war on our doorstep, Los Angeles Times , 27 September 2011, http://projects.latimes.com/mexico-drug-war/#/its-a-war\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "555de188cfdb2145e81506d7e09631ab", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Drugs are safer when legal\n\nCurrently in the UK, purity of illegal Amphetamine is normally under 5%, and some tablets sold as ecstasy contain no MDMA at all. Instead, drugs are adulterated (“cut”) with substances from chalk and talcum powder to completely different drugs. [1]\n\nAt least when drugs are legalised the state can regulate their sale to make sure that they are clean and not cut with other dangerous substances. This will minimise the risk to users.\n\n[1] Drugscope, ‘How Pure Are Street Drugs?’, updated January 2005, http://www.drugscope.org.uk/resources/faqs/faqpages/how-pure-are-street-...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2fbc227952f0b13f9e4205878af0d5bf", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs The law is hypocritical\n\nIn most countries where drugs are illegal, tobacco and alcohol, which arguably have equally devastating consequences in society, are legal. In a UK study, alcohol was shown to have the worst effects of any drug, yet the current law recognises that people should be able to choose whether they drink or not. [1] The same should be true of drugs.\n\n[1] Professor David Nutt, ‘Drug Harms in the UK: a multicriteria decision analysis’, The Lancet, Vol 376, Issue 9752, pp. 1558-1565, 6th November 2010, http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2810%2961...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0eee0c316f423d9af7cebdcc64cd5ca2", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs People should be free to take drugs\n\nIndividuals are sovereign over their own bodies, and should be free to make choices which affect them and not other individuals. Since the pleasure gained from drugs and the extent to which this weighs against potential risks is fundamentally subjective, it is not up to the state to legislate in this area. Rather than pouring wasted resources into attempting to suppress drug use, the state would be better off running information campaigns to educate people about the risks and consequences of taking different types of drugs.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "57255469a8f61a59734a14a90868233e", "text": "addiction health general law crime policing house supports legalisation drugs Legalisation reduces crime\n\nThe illegality of drugs fuels a huge amount of crime that could be eliminated if drugs were legalised. Price controls would mean that addicts would no longer have to steal to fund their habits, and a state-provided drug services would put dealers out of business, starving criminal gangs of their main source of funding. For example, an Italian Mafia family were making around $44bn a year from cocaine smuggling. [1] This represents something like 3% of Italy’s entire GDP – and that from only one crime syndicate.\n\n[1] Kington, Tom, ‘Italian police raids reveal how an 80-year-old gangster held sway over the feared Calabrian mafia’, The Observer, 18 July 2010, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jul/18/ndrangheta-mafia-italy-police\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
a5da56015285a7c527369e4e4d4eb8fe	The network approach: promoting learning The use of ICT and creating a network of professional experts enables learning and knowledge transfer between health workers and academics. In addition to the brain-drain, whereby skilled health professionals continue to emigrate from Zambia, Zambia also shows a slow rate of training of new health workers. Therefore the VDP provides a vital learning tool. VDP provides practical skills by healthcare workers to learn from first-hand experience while having access to a field of experts, or advisers, able to answer any questions. The quality of healthcare will be improved as workers in remote locations are given access to information and correct answers for diagnosis. A global pool of skills can be drawn upon, and utilised, when required.	[ { "docid": "6f4c6779b5fc121bad1d819d85aefbf1", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Although the use of virtual networks and doctors may provide solutions to share knowledge it creates other difficulties. The use of VDP as an educational tool clearly has downsides. First it is not designed for training; if it were why not use a tool specifically for training? As the VDP is not any educational benefits have to be considered secondary. Unlike with a specifically educational tool there is no way for the experts to test that the knowledge they are passing on is being learnt or that their advice is being followed.\n\nAdditionally, if the use of virtual doctors is educating medical officers on the ground does it ensure the newly trained professional will stay in Zambia? The bigger picture of what the officers do, and whether the government implement competitive labour policies, requires consideration.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "e4d02e4f12b30ebe5e60561087b768c8", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Can the VDP go beyond basic needs and rights when the scale, and scope, of basic need is so large? Figures show a negative image not only of physical health, also the environment in which people live in. The maternal mortality ratio is calculated at around 590 per 100,000 and infant mortality (under 1) stands at 53 per 1,000 live births. However, only 61% of the population have access to improved drinking water; and 48% are able to access improved sanitation facilities (UNICEF, 2013).\n\nCan we rely on NGO’s providing the VDP to fulfil basic needs when the challenges are so large?\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7ccb96c09bf650328f1db00d32ba1e71", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project A study carried out by Masiye (2007) indicates only around 40% of Zambia’s hospitals can be defined as efficient. There remains a significant problem of resource wastage in Zambia’s hospitals and the hospitals are technically inefficient in producing, and delivering, services. Health goals cannot be achieved in Zambia if hospitals continue to function inefficiently. This raises concern as to how the hospitals cope once referrals are sent? Is the wider health system adequate?\n\nOutsourcing of medical professions into rural areas, and making improvements in the speed and quality of referrals does not resolve the issue of hospital quality. Although VDP’s can act to significantly reduce the number of inappropriate referrals investment, training, and improved management, is still required within Zambia’s hospital system. Additionally, improved access to drugs is needed. Drug shortages have been reported due to corruption scandals - funding provided to supply drugs in the health sector have previously gone missing [1] . Generic drugs are in short-supply, and high demand. Without doctors being able to access vital drugs, whether they are located in hospitals or remote areas, treatment cannot be provided.\n\n[1] See further readings: IRIN, 2011.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e52cc180121c66b9af6b6f92f10b35e8", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Mobility remains a key issue across Africa. The WDR (2009) identifies three key sources for effective integration: institutions, infrastructure, and interventions. Infrastructure includes systems that facilitate the geographical movement of goods, services, people, and ideas - such as roads. The reality of a mobile clinic therefore relies heavily on having the infrastructure to support flexibility, mobility, and frequent movement.\n\nMobile clinics still won’t be able to reach all patients that need their help; public investment is required into infrastructure such as roads and railways first. The project can only work if mobile clinics are able to be mobile. Further, even if they are mobile it doesn’t necessarily ensure people become ill when the medical officer happens to be visiting.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "581892d79f82d6a12669db2a543f4269", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Zambia needs to improve its health care system in general, not work on implementing a virtual programme. Physical contact is still necessary for diagnosis and treatment.\n\nAlternative schemes are being used to meet health needs and improve the structure of Zambia’s health system. For example, the Clinton Foundation and DFID [1] have invested in the provision of community health workers. These programmes invest in training community health workers across Zambia’s rural regions. The health workers trained are therefore physically located within the regions. This is much more important than having virtual doctors on call.\n\n[1] See further readings: Clinton Foundation, 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4c1fff7e206b69dc64535989fc140382", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Today the inclusion of private stakeholders in providing access to health is proving to be a sustainable approach. To achieve developmental impact the public sector is no longer the key source or actor. Although increased support by the government - both financial and political - may be required in the future it is not fundamental for the implementation stage. The VDP can continue to grow and be sustainable through the work of private organisations and funders. The state can later step in and expand the system nationwide when it is fully demonstrated. Private partnerships are changing how health-care is provided and its sustainability.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0c08b423c67209e21c24c04b6c7541dd", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Figures showcasing the popular use of traditional practices, and medicine, do not show the reasons behind use. It fails to recognise the degree of choice and the nature of treatment provided. If people don’t have access to modern medicine then they will go to that which is available. The answer then is to increase access to modern medicine to provide the alternative.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d052578807fc82fc408d47e4e0adea35", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Technology will only be required within the mobile clinics, to enable the VDP networks to be used. It is a key component, but not the only foundation of which the VDP is based on. This means that the clinics can carry equipment to ensure access to the internet remains – such as a satellite connection. Furthermore, significant developments have been made in Zambia’s technological revolution. Internet connectivity has improved in rural areas; and pioneering movements across rural areas - such as the implementation of solar-powered internet - means connectivity is spreading into rural, remote, Zambia.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0eacd8f1d2471bf994eaaa497a2169d5", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project The VDP is providing a number a solution to the lack of human resources within Zambia’s health sector. VDP is enabling the growth of local jobs, for Zambian nationals. Although there are no current figures to estimate the amount of jobs that will be provided within the health sector, the VDP has currently been rolled out into six sites and continues to expand. New clinics will be set-up across Zambia, as well as Tanzania, Malawi and Kenya. A growing body of health workers will be required to maintain the VDP network; reducing the doctor to population disparity in Zambia.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "565e687e2638bccfa4eed33428fadc9f", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Taking healthcare beyond basic needs\n\nNot only does VDP improve access to primary health care but the networks developed between different health advisers mean changing health demands can be met. Across Africa there is now a shift in the type of diseases prevalent. Increasing rates of non-communicable disease are being recorded - for which advisers can provide ongoing support. Additionally, there remains a need to improve understanding and treatment of mental health issues within rural areas in particular. Concern with mental health requires greater recognition across Africa. Finally, data can be collected on health issues affecting rural areas for targeted intervention.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e25ee0a00605f907fe7d4f4d5e747111", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Flexibility of mobile clinics\n\nThe use of mobile clinics and ICT in health not only tackles issues around location accessibility to health, by travelling into remote areas, but also the flexibility provided through the clinics mobility means a larger population can be seen and treated.\n\nVirtual doctors are flexible; one doctor can be providing his or her expertise through numerous local doctors and nurses at any time. They can help staff with much less training make the correct decisions. By using mobile clinics the location is flexible - and can be altered depending on variations in social need and seasons -, and the time individuals can access the clinic is flexible. Mobile clinics are more responsive to demand.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8c5d96e3b52a46e21d5f93074c8d77a7", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Tackling access: working in rural areas\n\nZambia’s human resource crisis in healthcare is most prominent in rural areas. Poverty remains widespread and despite Zambia’s high economic fortune as a result of copper during the 1960s it has become a heavily-indebted poor country. The World Bank (2013) classifies 76% of Zambia’s poor as residing in rural areas. With disparities in access to health prevalent, Zambia needs to train new doctors and nurses to ensure the population can access health care. The VDP is therefore tackling the issue of access within rural, and remote, areas.\n\nAccess to health is a human right, and the VDP is ensuring such rights are become a reality in rural areas and rural populations. Mortality and morbidity can be reduced as rural health workers are able to diagnose and treat a wider range of conditions.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "252f0fed78e18d7492f79c84af75d7ed", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Speeding up referral\n\nEach mobile clinic will be equipped with vital tools and equipment, and staffed with a medical assistant, a midwife/nurse, and project officer. Furthermore, the presence of a medical staff team means a number of services can be provided for women, men, and children. The team are able to carry out tests on the ground, and if required refer the patient to a hospital. Referrals are made by the staff, with all required information passed on to the hospital and an appropriate appointment made.\n\nThe VDP makes each actor within the referral and treatment process aware of their position and role. The VDP appropriately delegates jobs; thus improving the system of hospital referrals and minimising unnecessary costs from inappropriate referrals.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "266e22df79f5b680dde81bca63304ed2", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Resolving the health service crisis?\n\nTo what extent does the VDP resolve the lack of health service professionals in Zambia? Two caveats emerge.\n\nFirstly, the project shows how intervention from international organisations can work against trade union demands and employment issues. The project is introducing a model of outsourcing. The medical staff do not need to be based in hospitals so reducing government costs and decentralising employees. Recent strikes by nurses [1] shows dissatisfaction with work conditions and overwork. It raises concern over the motives of the VDP. Is the VDP encouraging social protection and an ethical work environment for all medical professionals? Or is the VDP an escape mechanism to keep wages low and neglect demands made by working nurses? A majority of the expert ‘virtual doctors’ employed are volunteers. Ultimately then the government might consider the VDP a good excuse not to invest in training Zambian doctors.\n\nSecondly, does the VDP resolve the issue of brain drain? Improved incentives and increased salaries are required for trained medical professionals, to motivate them to stay. The VDP may help educated doctors but it does not provide them with reasons to remain in Zambia, rather it gives them contacts with outside healthcare systems where their skills will be much better rewarded.\n\n[1] See further readings: Kunda, 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "83b8cdc0aa6842dd130fc1e5005be712", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Will virtual doctors be used?\n\nEven if VDPs do improve access to health services we cannot assume the health services will be used. The use of traditional healers, and practices, remains popular across rural Zambia [1] . If the population is unwilling to use modern medicine then providing better access to that medicine will be of little benefit. If formally trained doctors and medicines are not accepted, or trusted, by communities then the resources being spent on VDPs would be much better spent on education to encourage people to make better use of the facilities they already have than introducing new technology based solutions that will simply be more likely to be rejected.\n\n[1] See further readings: Bansal, 2012.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5e11f21c083a872c66c3b08742bba48c", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project How sustainable?\n\nA key issue that needs to be raised is funding. Currently the VDP is funded by a range of corporate partners - including Microsoft and Google. However, for the project to be sustainable in the long-run investment is required from a wider range of bodies, and further partnerships need to be formed with the public sector. The government needs to be included as a funder and supporter. The neglect, and exclusion, of the government within discussion on health projects - such as VDP - only acts to remove their responsibility and obligation to tackle the social dilemma. Healthcare is the responsibility of government, not the NGOs and private firms that are providing VDP.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b9a477f5ba9be4097772a0035019772c", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project A dangerous reliance on technology?\n\nICT is providing innovative solutions to resolve many social problems across Africa. However, is there now a dangerous reliance on technology? Not everyone has access to mobiles and signal remains precarious. When answers, diagnosis, and treatment, are reliant on using technology in the field it needs to be ensured that the service fitted in mobile clinics will remain reliable for field health workers. Additionally, it needs to be ensured that the network of global professionals frequently check messages for updates and respond as quickly as possible. The quality of health service cannot be improved if the response time remains low due to insufficient technology or connectivity. The scheme requires partnerships to telephone and information technology companies.\n\nThe reliance on technology is also danger when we consider what information the technology used is actually providing. The VDP will mainly involve text-based emails and messages to provide patient information. Expanding to use images and videos - such as through Skype - will ensure the virtual doctor is more involved in the process, reducing error.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
44243f75c50f4417b68effc720a7b9db	Tackling access: working in rural areas Zambia’s human resource crisis in healthcare is most prominent in rural areas. Poverty remains widespread and despite Zambia’s high economic fortune as a result of copper during the 1960s it has become a heavily-indebted poor country. The World Bank (2013) classifies 76% of Zambia’s poor as residing in rural areas. With disparities in access to health prevalent, Zambia needs to train new doctors and nurses to ensure the population can access health care. The VDP is therefore tackling the issue of access within rural, and remote, areas. Access to health is a human right, and the VDP is ensuring such rights are become a reality in rural areas and rural populations. Mortality and morbidity can be reduced as rural health workers are able to diagnose and treat a wider range of conditions.	[ { "docid": "581892d79f82d6a12669db2a543f4269", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Zambia needs to improve its health care system in general, not work on implementing a virtual programme. Physical contact is still necessary for diagnosis and treatment.\n\nAlternative schemes are being used to meet health needs and improve the structure of Zambia’s health system. For example, the Clinton Foundation and DFID [1] have invested in the provision of community health workers. These programmes invest in training community health workers across Zambia’s rural regions. The health workers trained are therefore physically located within the regions. This is much more important than having virtual doctors on call.\n\n[1] See further readings: Clinton Foundation, 2013.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "6f4c6779b5fc121bad1d819d85aefbf1", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Although the use of virtual networks and doctors may provide solutions to share knowledge it creates other difficulties. The use of VDP as an educational tool clearly has downsides. First it is not designed for training; if it were why not use a tool specifically for training? As the VDP is not any educational benefits have to be considered secondary. Unlike with a specifically educational tool there is no way for the experts to test that the knowledge they are passing on is being learnt or that their advice is being followed.\n\nAdditionally, if the use of virtual doctors is educating medical officers on the ground does it ensure the newly trained professional will stay in Zambia? The bigger picture of what the officers do, and whether the government implement competitive labour policies, requires consideration.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e4d02e4f12b30ebe5e60561087b768c8", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Can the VDP go beyond basic needs and rights when the scale, and scope, of basic need is so large? Figures show a negative image not only of physical health, also the environment in which people live in. The maternal mortality ratio is calculated at around 590 per 100,000 and infant mortality (under 1) stands at 53 per 1,000 live births. However, only 61% of the population have access to improved drinking water; and 48% are able to access improved sanitation facilities (UNICEF, 2013).\n\nCan we rely on NGO’s providing the VDP to fulfil basic needs when the challenges are so large?\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7ccb96c09bf650328f1db00d32ba1e71", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project A study carried out by Masiye (2007) indicates only around 40% of Zambia’s hospitals can be defined as efficient. There remains a significant problem of resource wastage in Zambia’s hospitals and the hospitals are technically inefficient in producing, and delivering, services. Health goals cannot be achieved in Zambia if hospitals continue to function inefficiently. This raises concern as to how the hospitals cope once referrals are sent? Is the wider health system adequate?\n\nOutsourcing of medical professions into rural areas, and making improvements in the speed and quality of referrals does not resolve the issue of hospital quality. Although VDP’s can act to significantly reduce the number of inappropriate referrals investment, training, and improved management, is still required within Zambia’s hospital system. Additionally, improved access to drugs is needed. Drug shortages have been reported due to corruption scandals - funding provided to supply drugs in the health sector have previously gone missing [1] . Generic drugs are in short-supply, and high demand. Without doctors being able to access vital drugs, whether they are located in hospitals or remote areas, treatment cannot be provided.\n\n[1] See further readings: IRIN, 2011.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e52cc180121c66b9af6b6f92f10b35e8", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Mobility remains a key issue across Africa. The WDR (2009) identifies three key sources for effective integration: institutions, infrastructure, and interventions. Infrastructure includes systems that facilitate the geographical movement of goods, services, people, and ideas - such as roads. The reality of a mobile clinic therefore relies heavily on having the infrastructure to support flexibility, mobility, and frequent movement.\n\nMobile clinics still won’t be able to reach all patients that need their help; public investment is required into infrastructure such as roads and railways first. The project can only work if mobile clinics are able to be mobile. Further, even if they are mobile it doesn’t necessarily ensure people become ill when the medical officer happens to be visiting.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4c1fff7e206b69dc64535989fc140382", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Today the inclusion of private stakeholders in providing access to health is proving to be a sustainable approach. To achieve developmental impact the public sector is no longer the key source or actor. Although increased support by the government - both financial and political - may be required in the future it is not fundamental for the implementation stage. The VDP can continue to grow and be sustainable through the work of private organisations and funders. The state can later step in and expand the system nationwide when it is fully demonstrated. Private partnerships are changing how health-care is provided and its sustainability.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0c08b423c67209e21c24c04b6c7541dd", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Figures showcasing the popular use of traditional practices, and medicine, do not show the reasons behind use. It fails to recognise the degree of choice and the nature of treatment provided. If people don’t have access to modern medicine then they will go to that which is available. The answer then is to increase access to modern medicine to provide the alternative.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d052578807fc82fc408d47e4e0adea35", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Technology will only be required within the mobile clinics, to enable the VDP networks to be used. It is a key component, but not the only foundation of which the VDP is based on. This means that the clinics can carry equipment to ensure access to the internet remains – such as a satellite connection. Furthermore, significant developments have been made in Zambia’s technological revolution. Internet connectivity has improved in rural areas; and pioneering movements across rural areas - such as the implementation of solar-powered internet - means connectivity is spreading into rural, remote, Zambia.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0eacd8f1d2471bf994eaaa497a2169d5", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project The VDP is providing a number a solution to the lack of human resources within Zambia’s health sector. VDP is enabling the growth of local jobs, for Zambian nationals. Although there are no current figures to estimate the amount of jobs that will be provided within the health sector, the VDP has currently been rolled out into six sites and continues to expand. New clinics will be set-up across Zambia, as well as Tanzania, Malawi and Kenya. A growing body of health workers will be required to maintain the VDP network; reducing the doctor to population disparity in Zambia.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5424e09256fd050cb973b64e2a1dd3cd", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project The network approach: promoting learning\n\nThe use of ICT and creating a network of professional experts enables learning and knowledge transfer between health workers and academics. In addition to the brain-drain, whereby skilled health professionals continue to emigrate from Zambia, Zambia also shows a slow rate of training of new health workers. Therefore the VDP provides a vital learning tool. VDP provides practical skills by healthcare workers to learn from first-hand experience while having access to a field of experts, or advisers, able to answer any questions. The quality of healthcare will be improved as workers in remote locations are given access to information and correct answers for diagnosis. A global pool of skills can be drawn upon, and utilised, when required.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "565e687e2638bccfa4eed33428fadc9f", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Taking healthcare beyond basic needs\n\nNot only does VDP improve access to primary health care but the networks developed between different health advisers mean changing health demands can be met. Across Africa there is now a shift in the type of diseases prevalent. Increasing rates of non-communicable disease are being recorded - for which advisers can provide ongoing support. Additionally, there remains a need to improve understanding and treatment of mental health issues within rural areas in particular. Concern with mental health requires greater recognition across Africa. Finally, data can be collected on health issues affecting rural areas for targeted intervention.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e25ee0a00605f907fe7d4f4d5e747111", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Flexibility of mobile clinics\n\nThe use of mobile clinics and ICT in health not only tackles issues around location accessibility to health, by travelling into remote areas, but also the flexibility provided through the clinics mobility means a larger population can be seen and treated.\n\nVirtual doctors are flexible; one doctor can be providing his or her expertise through numerous local doctors and nurses at any time. They can help staff with much less training make the correct decisions. By using mobile clinics the location is flexible - and can be altered depending on variations in social need and seasons -, and the time individuals can access the clinic is flexible. Mobile clinics are more responsive to demand.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "252f0fed78e18d7492f79c84af75d7ed", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Speeding up referral\n\nEach mobile clinic will be equipped with vital tools and equipment, and staffed with a medical assistant, a midwife/nurse, and project officer. Furthermore, the presence of a medical staff team means a number of services can be provided for women, men, and children. The team are able to carry out tests on the ground, and if required refer the patient to a hospital. Referrals are made by the staff, with all required information passed on to the hospital and an appropriate appointment made.\n\nThe VDP makes each actor within the referral and treatment process aware of their position and role. The VDP appropriately delegates jobs; thus improving the system of hospital referrals and minimising unnecessary costs from inappropriate referrals.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "266e22df79f5b680dde81bca63304ed2", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Resolving the health service crisis?\n\nTo what extent does the VDP resolve the lack of health service professionals in Zambia? Two caveats emerge.\n\nFirstly, the project shows how intervention from international organisations can work against trade union demands and employment issues. The project is introducing a model of outsourcing. The medical staff do not need to be based in hospitals so reducing government costs and decentralising employees. Recent strikes by nurses [1] shows dissatisfaction with work conditions and overwork. It raises concern over the motives of the VDP. Is the VDP encouraging social protection and an ethical work environment for all medical professionals? Or is the VDP an escape mechanism to keep wages low and neglect demands made by working nurses? A majority of the expert ‘virtual doctors’ employed are volunteers. Ultimately then the government might consider the VDP a good excuse not to invest in training Zambian doctors.\n\nSecondly, does the VDP resolve the issue of brain drain? Improved incentives and increased salaries are required for trained medical professionals, to motivate them to stay. The VDP may help educated doctors but it does not provide them with reasons to remain in Zambia, rather it gives them contacts with outside healthcare systems where their skills will be much better rewarded.\n\n[1] See further readings: Kunda, 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "83b8cdc0aa6842dd130fc1e5005be712", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project Will virtual doctors be used?\n\nEven if VDPs do improve access to health services we cannot assume the health services will be used. The use of traditional healers, and practices, remains popular across rural Zambia [1] . If the population is unwilling to use modern medicine then providing better access to that medicine will be of little benefit. If formally trained doctors and medicines are not accepted, or trusted, by communities then the resources being spent on VDPs would be much better spent on education to encourage people to make better use of the facilities they already have than introducing new technology based solutions that will simply be more likely to be rejected.\n\n[1] See further readings: Bansal, 2012.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5e11f21c083a872c66c3b08742bba48c", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project How sustainable?\n\nA key issue that needs to be raised is funding. Currently the VDP is funded by a range of corporate partners - including Microsoft and Google. However, for the project to be sustainable in the long-run investment is required from a wider range of bodies, and further partnerships need to be formed with the public sector. The government needs to be included as a funder and supporter. The neglect, and exclusion, of the government within discussion on health projects - such as VDP - only acts to remove their responsibility and obligation to tackle the social dilemma. Healthcare is the responsibility of government, not the NGOs and private firms that are providing VDP.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b9a477f5ba9be4097772a0035019772c", "text": "disease healthcare international africa house would implent virtual doctor project A dangerous reliance on technology?\n\nICT is providing innovative solutions to resolve many social problems across Africa. However, is there now a dangerous reliance on technology? Not everyone has access to mobiles and signal remains precarious. When answers, diagnosis, and treatment, are reliant on using technology in the field it needs to be ensured that the service fitted in mobile clinics will remain reliable for field health workers. Additionally, it needs to be ensured that the network of global professionals frequently check messages for updates and respond as quickly as possible. The quality of health service cannot be improved if the response time remains low due to insufficient technology or connectivity. The scheme requires partnerships to telephone and information technology companies.\n\nThe reliance on technology is also danger when we consider what information the technology used is actually providing. The VDP will mainly involve text-based emails and messages to provide patient information. Expanding to use images and videos - such as through Skype - will ensure the virtual doctor is more involved in the process, reducing error.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
f500ecf414ccba8ca204b9d949241935	Medical concerns Dieting is a medical choice and should be treated as such; advertising the available options rather than discussing this with a doctor means that people do not have all of the available information and cannot make their decision in a safe environment. In comparable areas such as giving up smoking, controlling drinking, making decisions about exercise, knowledge about inoculations before travel and so forth, we prize medical expertise. The diet industry in the UK is worth £2bn [1] (it's $61bn in the US) and is marked out by allowing the same people to tell us that we are sick in the first place and then tell us the cure and then do it all again when the solution didn't work. Generally accepted medical opinion is that this is a slow process with miracle cures both unlikely to work in the first place and, where they do, more unlikely to last. In some cases the dieting may even threaten health. For example French doctors have criticised the Dukan diet, Dr Boris Hansel for example says "There are real risks … infertility, sleep apnoea, high blood pressure, type-two diabetes, liver disease or cardiovascular problems. Following this diet is not harmless; it could cause real health problems" but its endorsement by celebrities mean that many will ignore such warnings or never even hear of them. [2] Most ridiculously, the solution that does work – moderate eating and regular exercise is absolutely free and available to all. [1] Arabella Weir. Try it – don't diet. The Guardian. 31 December 2010, http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/dec/31/hungry-wisdom-diet-g... [2] Kim Willsher, ‘Dukan diet divides French doctors over effect on health’, The Guardian, 30 May 2011, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/may/30/dukan-diet-france-health-affect	[ { "docid": "5572eee07d559190b7365a4d867525a6", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets People often wish to change their appearance for cosmetic rather than medical reasons. As with other cosmetic changes, from a new wardrobe to surgery, this can be expensive, and may even have some risks, but it is accepted because we know that it makes people feel better. It's a lifestyle choice and is no more the business of government than choosing a new jacket or deciding to get an earring.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "114c4c2e4f65e40bdedfe68e69048eb8", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets Surely the fact that what is healthy is also considered sexy should be embraced. Any motivation to lose a few pounds in a country where more than a quarter of people are obese [1] is surely a good thing for public health. Prop bemoans that diet advertising is targeted at the young and yet this is the group that policy makers routinely target with legislation to encourage healthy living and an early acceptance of the need for good health.\n\n[1] Jeremy Laurance, ‘Britain is the fattest nation in Europe’, The Independent, 17 November 2012, http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/britain-is-the-fattest-nation-in-europe-8324262.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "78c9bf1d9b820b9b1485cdfa6407fec4", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets There is no doubt that weight is not purely a medical issue but that a positive appearance helps self-confidence and opens lifestyle opportunities. Different people approach losing a few pounds in different ways, some have the time for the meticulous dietary exercise and training regime Prop is suggesting but most don't. Promotion of other option is simply meeting that need.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "59c73a36b67700a759dbfafcfcbc0f21", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets It's simply not true to say that people automatically take their adverts with a pinch of salt. Research in the US suggests that 1 in five young adults trust advertising to always tell the truth and a clear majority think it does “most of the time” [1] , as this is exactly the group that is primarily of concern it can't be taken for granted that they will use caution or undertake further research.\n\n[1] Harris poll. Young adults more trusting of advertising. 5 November 2010. http://www.harrisinteractive.com/NewsRoom/HarrisPolls/tabid/447/ctl/ReadCustom%20Default/mid/1508/ArticleId/612/Default.aspx\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9c7b0b855f933d6efcabb868b7e2795b", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets There is an enormous difference here. Even fast food chains themselves accept that their product should not be eaten all day everyday. Supermarkets have taken on board healthy messages about people's five a day or low fat brands. They've built these messages into their wider marketing strategy. Diet ads, by contrast, do claim to be a panacea that will instantly make you sexy, healthy, popular and, apparently successful. They are 21st century snake oil merchants and should simply be run out of town.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2e0f4afb1853fc0c3fa5122f6c1cdc73", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets The fact that it is difficult to do everything is no reason not to do something. At the very least articles and books have to go through an editorial process and are open to challenge by other articles and books. That's not true for bought space.\n\nIn the same way that we regulate the claims that can be made about cars, gambling websites and dating agencies to protect consumers without banning discussion of transport, money or love, advertising and journalism are treated differently.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b0af42a3ca7badb7d25ba80de04379e9", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets Selling to the vulnerable\n\nDiets are predominantly targeted at those who feel desperate. It has nothing to do with medical need, a constant round of being told that there is only one way to look attractive inevitably encourages people to adopt a mindset that 'thin' equals 'attractive'. This has nothing to do with a medical need nor do diets represent a medical solution; at least not in the meaning of 'diet' at the focus of this debate.\n\nThe pressure on people, especially young people, to conform to a certain stereotype of physical perfection is astonishing and comes from many sources – music, magazines and the celebrity culture endemic in the media. It is notable that there is a well studied correlation between mass media consumption and eating disorders and fears of poor body image. [1]\n\nDiet programmes sell the dream that as long as you look like a given ideal you will come to be like them. This is nearly always untrue. [2] However, it is particularly attractive to those who are most susceptible to peer pressure; primarily the young but really anyone with a desire to fit in. The advertising picks up on this, pictures of happy, smiling, thin people with successful personal lives. It's simply an illusion and has little to do with the realities of medical need.\n\n[1] Kristen Harrison and Veronica Hefner, ‘Media Exposure, Current and Future Body Ideals, and Disordered Eating Among Preadolescent Girls: A Longitudinal Panel Study’, Journal of Youth and Adolescence, Vol.35 No.2, April 2006, pp.153-163, p.153 http://www.kristenharrison.org/uploads/8/7/1/3/8713266/harrisonhefnerjoyo.pdf\n\n[2] Federal Trade Commission, ‘Weighing the Evidence in Diet Ads’, November 2004, http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/pubs/consumer/health/hea03.shtm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0dc3ae9f10632fd7d30039bf63904cfc", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets Inventing the idea of fat\n\nThere's a lot to be said for eating well and being generally healthy. It's not just a matter of weight but the effect that bad nutrition has in contributing to heart conditions, blood pressure, energy levels and other health indicators. [1] None of these things are helped by trying to drop three stone in a couple of months by filling your body with one thing regardless of what it needs at the time as many of these diets do\n\nOur physical appearance should be an indicator of our lifestyle not an accessory to it.\n\nThe diet industry has poured considerable time and effort, with help from Holywood and the publishing industry, in to promoting the idea that thin and emaciated are the same thing.\n\nFad diets are, for many, less healthy than being a little overweight.\n\n[1] BMJ, ‘Obesity – how to lose weight’, 31 October 2012, p.3, http://bestpractice.bmj.com/best-practice/pdf/patient-summaries/556120.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "da29af37de8e3549ccf48f7d3b0ebbc1", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets Banning advertising won't work\n\nHow exactly is a ban on promoting diets supposed to work? Proposition isn't talking about tackling advertising online, presumably because it's difficult to do, nor is prop tackling the issue of books promoting certain techniques. So this ban would have failed to catch the largest craze of recent years, the Atkins diet.\n\nEqually diets are a mainstay of teen and women's magazines and a fairly central pillar of lifestyle sections of newspapers. Even so called 'quality' papers endlessly talk about lifestyles issues such as how they don't work and everyone would be better off retiring to a country manor in Shropshire for Swedish massage and a diet of organic barley.\n\nUnless prop is talking about starting to ban books or shut down entire sections (and profitable sections at that) of publishing companies then it is difficult to see how this measure will have any real affect.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "60219a5d161948396cbcf95513c0f4f8", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets It's my body and I'll starve if I want to\n\nThe main problem facing Prop's entire case is that this is simply none of the government's business. What people eat or don't eat is a private matter and the intervention of the nanny state would have us all on a diet of compulsory cabbage and nut roast.\n\nPeople can be grown up about this, and where they're children, their parents can be grown up about this. The entire health and education system already exists to tell us to eat our greens and cycle to work; for those people who chose not to do so, they have a range of diet option and advertising tell them what those options are. The government regularly runs healthy eating advertising campaigns, and they often focus on obesity such as the Change4Life campaign, so there is plenty of opportunity to get the other side across. [1]\n\nIt's free speech, it's a free choice for the consumer, it's called the market.\n\nProp seems to think that consumers are idiots, nobody believes that a diet for a couple of weeks will make them look like a super model any more than buying a pair of speedos will. However, they can assess the different products, decide which one they trust more, do further research if they want to and then choose.\n\n[1] Politics.co.uk Staff, ‘Anti-obesity campaign launched’, Politics.co.uk, 2 January 2009, http://www.politics.co.uk/news/2009/01/02/anti-obesity-campaign-launched\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8091f62952206841d91eeb5d2a0abca9", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets Countercase; Tackling food advertising\n\nIf the Proposition is so keen to tackle obesity then regulating then it should tackle food advertising rather than the advertising of diets. [1] Banning the promotion of dieting ads while people are sitting in front of the TV munching on the take away food or complaining that the remote is 'all the way' on the other side of the room, smacks of shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted.\n\nDiets are a response, one of many as Prop is keen to point out, to a serious problem that only government can begin to address.\n\nFrom before we are old enough to walk most people in the developed world are hooked on a fat-, sugar- and salt-rich diet. [2] Going after dieting ads is simply an effort by governments to be seen as doing something in a way that has little electoral impact. People will still use diets because of the gaps, such as the web, already mentioned however it doesn't require government to say anything as risky as “You're fat because you eat rubbish and don't move around much” to the electorate – or worse still, “Your children are fat because you can't put your foot down and tell them they can't have another choc-ice or more chips”.\n\nProp's entire case is tokenism of the highest order.\n\n[1] Denis Campbell, ‘Call for ban on TV junk food ads before 9pm watershed’, The Guardian, 4 September 2012, http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/sep/04/obesity-tv-junk-food-ads\n\n[2] AP, ‘Study: Bad Eating Habits Start Near Age 2’, InteliHealth, 27 October 2003, http://www.intelihealth.com/IH/ihtIH/WSIHW000/20722/8895/371041.html\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
8262d858562fd59a202620efca5ff2c8	Banning advertising won't work How exactly is a ban on promoting diets supposed to work? Proposition isn't talking about tackling advertising online, presumably because it's difficult to do, nor is prop tackling the issue of books promoting certain techniques. So this ban would have failed to catch the largest craze of recent years, the Atkins diet. Equally diets are a mainstay of teen and women's magazines and a fairly central pillar of lifestyle sections of newspapers. Even so called 'quality' papers endlessly talk about lifestyles issues such as how they don't work and everyone would be better off retiring to a country manor in Shropshire for Swedish massage and a diet of organic barley. Unless prop is talking about starting to ban books or shut down entire sections (and profitable sections at that) of publishing companies then it is difficult to see how this measure will have any real affect.	[ { "docid": "2e0f4afb1853fc0c3fa5122f6c1cdc73", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets The fact that it is difficult to do everything is no reason not to do something. At the very least articles and books have to go through an editorial process and are open to challenge by other articles and books. That's not true for bought space.\n\nIn the same way that we regulate the claims that can be made about cars, gambling websites and dating agencies to protect consumers without banning discussion of transport, money or love, advertising and journalism are treated differently.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "59c73a36b67700a759dbfafcfcbc0f21", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets It's simply not true to say that people automatically take their adverts with a pinch of salt. Research in the US suggests that 1 in five young adults trust advertising to always tell the truth and a clear majority think it does “most of the time” [1] , as this is exactly the group that is primarily of concern it can't be taken for granted that they will use caution or undertake further research.\n\n[1] Harris poll. Young adults more trusting of advertising. 5 November 2010. http://www.harrisinteractive.com/NewsRoom/HarrisPolls/tabid/447/ctl/ReadCustom%20Default/mid/1508/ArticleId/612/Default.aspx\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9c7b0b855f933d6efcabb868b7e2795b", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets There is an enormous difference here. Even fast food chains themselves accept that their product should not be eaten all day everyday. Supermarkets have taken on board healthy messages about people's five a day or low fat brands. They've built these messages into their wider marketing strategy. Diet ads, by contrast, do claim to be a panacea that will instantly make you sexy, healthy, popular and, apparently successful. They are 21st century snake oil merchants and should simply be run out of town.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "114c4c2e4f65e40bdedfe68e69048eb8", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets Surely the fact that what is healthy is also considered sexy should be embraced. Any motivation to lose a few pounds in a country where more than a quarter of people are obese [1] is surely a good thing for public health. Prop bemoans that diet advertising is targeted at the young and yet this is the group that policy makers routinely target with legislation to encourage healthy living and an early acceptance of the need for good health.\n\n[1] Jeremy Laurance, ‘Britain is the fattest nation in Europe’, The Independent, 17 November 2012, http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/britain-is-the-fattest-nation-in-europe-8324262.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "78c9bf1d9b820b9b1485cdfa6407fec4", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets There is no doubt that weight is not purely a medical issue but that a positive appearance helps self-confidence and opens lifestyle opportunities. Different people approach losing a few pounds in different ways, some have the time for the meticulous dietary exercise and training regime Prop is suggesting but most don't. Promotion of other option is simply meeting that need.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5572eee07d559190b7365a4d867525a6", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets People often wish to change their appearance for cosmetic rather than medical reasons. As with other cosmetic changes, from a new wardrobe to surgery, this can be expensive, and may even have some risks, but it is accepted because we know that it makes people feel better. It's a lifestyle choice and is no more the business of government than choosing a new jacket or deciding to get an earring.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "60219a5d161948396cbcf95513c0f4f8", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets It's my body and I'll starve if I want to\n\nThe main problem facing Prop's entire case is that this is simply none of the government's business. What people eat or don't eat is a private matter and the intervention of the nanny state would have us all on a diet of compulsory cabbage and nut roast.\n\nPeople can be grown up about this, and where they're children, their parents can be grown up about this. The entire health and education system already exists to tell us to eat our greens and cycle to work; for those people who chose not to do so, they have a range of diet option and advertising tell them what those options are. The government regularly runs healthy eating advertising campaigns, and they often focus on obesity such as the Change4Life campaign, so there is plenty of opportunity to get the other side across. [1]\n\nIt's free speech, it's a free choice for the consumer, it's called the market.\n\nProp seems to think that consumers are idiots, nobody believes that a diet for a couple of weeks will make them look like a super model any more than buying a pair of speedos will. However, they can assess the different products, decide which one they trust more, do further research if they want to and then choose.\n\n[1] Politics.co.uk Staff, ‘Anti-obesity campaign launched’, Politics.co.uk, 2 January 2009, http://www.politics.co.uk/news/2009/01/02/anti-obesity-campaign-launched\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8091f62952206841d91eeb5d2a0abca9", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets Countercase; Tackling food advertising\n\nIf the Proposition is so keen to tackle obesity then regulating then it should tackle food advertising rather than the advertising of diets. [1] Banning the promotion of dieting ads while people are sitting in front of the TV munching on the take away food or complaining that the remote is 'all the way' on the other side of the room, smacks of shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted.\n\nDiets are a response, one of many as Prop is keen to point out, to a serious problem that only government can begin to address.\n\nFrom before we are old enough to walk most people in the developed world are hooked on a fat-, sugar- and salt-rich diet. [2] Going after dieting ads is simply an effort by governments to be seen as doing something in a way that has little electoral impact. People will still use diets because of the gaps, such as the web, already mentioned however it doesn't require government to say anything as risky as “You're fat because you eat rubbish and don't move around much” to the electorate – or worse still, “Your children are fat because you can't put your foot down and tell them they can't have another choc-ice or more chips”.\n\nProp's entire case is tokenism of the highest order.\n\n[1] Denis Campbell, ‘Call for ban on TV junk food ads before 9pm watershed’, The Guardian, 4 September 2012, http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/sep/04/obesity-tv-junk-food-ads\n\n[2] AP, ‘Study: Bad Eating Habits Start Near Age 2’, InteliHealth, 27 October 2003, http://www.intelihealth.com/IH/ihtIH/WSIHW000/20722/8895/371041.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b0af42a3ca7badb7d25ba80de04379e9", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets Selling to the vulnerable\n\nDiets are predominantly targeted at those who feel desperate. It has nothing to do with medical need, a constant round of being told that there is only one way to look attractive inevitably encourages people to adopt a mindset that 'thin' equals 'attractive'. This has nothing to do with a medical need nor do diets represent a medical solution; at least not in the meaning of 'diet' at the focus of this debate.\n\nThe pressure on people, especially young people, to conform to a certain stereotype of physical perfection is astonishing and comes from many sources – music, magazines and the celebrity culture endemic in the media. It is notable that there is a well studied correlation between mass media consumption and eating disorders and fears of poor body image. [1]\n\nDiet programmes sell the dream that as long as you look like a given ideal you will come to be like them. This is nearly always untrue. [2] However, it is particularly attractive to those who are most susceptible to peer pressure; primarily the young but really anyone with a desire to fit in. The advertising picks up on this, pictures of happy, smiling, thin people with successful personal lives. It's simply an illusion and has little to do with the realities of medical need.\n\n[1] Kristen Harrison and Veronica Hefner, ‘Media Exposure, Current and Future Body Ideals, and Disordered Eating Among Preadolescent Girls: A Longitudinal Panel Study’, Journal of Youth and Adolescence, Vol.35 No.2, April 2006, pp.153-163, p.153 http://www.kristenharrison.org/uploads/8/7/1/3/8713266/harrisonhefnerjoyo.pdf\n\n[2] Federal Trade Commission, ‘Weighing the Evidence in Diet Ads’, November 2004, http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/pubs/consumer/health/hea03.shtm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0dc3ae9f10632fd7d30039bf63904cfc", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets Inventing the idea of fat\n\nThere's a lot to be said for eating well and being generally healthy. It's not just a matter of weight but the effect that bad nutrition has in contributing to heart conditions, blood pressure, energy levels and other health indicators. [1] None of these things are helped by trying to drop three stone in a couple of months by filling your body with one thing regardless of what it needs at the time as many of these diets do\n\nOur physical appearance should be an indicator of our lifestyle not an accessory to it.\n\nThe diet industry has poured considerable time and effort, with help from Holywood and the publishing industry, in to promoting the idea that thin and emaciated are the same thing.\n\nFad diets are, for many, less healthy than being a little overweight.\n\n[1] BMJ, ‘Obesity – how to lose weight’, 31 October 2012, p.3, http://bestpractice.bmj.com/best-practice/pdf/patient-summaries/556120.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8b9d10da892b6ca48f79bac4ff53efb4", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets Medical concerns\n\nDieting is a medical choice and should be treated as such; advertising the available options rather than discussing this with a doctor means that people do not have all of the available information and cannot make their decision in a safe environment.\n\nIn comparable areas such as giving up smoking, controlling drinking, making decisions about exercise, knowledge about inoculations before travel and so forth, we prize medical expertise. The diet industry in the UK is worth £2bn [1] (it's $61bn in the US) and is marked out by allowing the same people to tell us that we are sick in the first place and then tell us the cure and then do it all again when the solution didn't work.\n\nGenerally accepted medical opinion is that this is a slow process with miracle cures both unlikely to work in the first place and, where they do, more unlikely to last. In some cases the dieting may even threaten health. For example French doctors have criticised the Dukan diet, Dr Boris Hansel for example says \"There are real risks … infertility, sleep apnoea, high blood pressure, type-two diabetes, liver disease or cardiovascular problems. Following this diet is not harmless; it could cause real health problems\" but its endorsement by celebrities mean that many will ignore such warnings or never even hear of them. [2]\n\nMost ridiculously, the solution that does work – moderate eating and regular exercise is absolutely free and available to all.\n\n[1] Arabella Weir. Try it – don't diet. The Guardian. 31 December 2010, http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/dec/31/hungry-wisdom-diet-g...\n\n[2] Kim Willsher, ‘Dukan diet divides French doctors over effect on health’, The Guardian, 30 May 2011, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/may/30/dukan-diet-france-health-affect\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
86555ea1c2bc9eec18058050e3fe960e	It's my body and I'll starve if I want to The main problem facing Prop's entire case is that this is simply none of the government's business. What people eat or don't eat is a private matter and the intervention of the nanny state would have us all on a diet of compulsory cabbage and nut roast. People can be grown up about this, and where they're children, their parents can be grown up about this. The entire health and education system already exists to tell us to eat our greens and cycle to work; for those people who chose not to do so, they have a range of diet option and advertising tell them what those options are. The government regularly runs healthy eating advertising campaigns, and they often focus on obesity such as the Change4Life campaign, so there is plenty of opportunity to get the other side across. [1] It's free speech, it's a free choice for the consumer, it's called the market. Prop seems to think that consumers are idiots, nobody believes that a diet for a couple of weeks will make them look like a super model any more than buying a pair of speedos will. However, they can assess the different products, decide which one they trust more, do further research if they want to and then choose. [1] Politics.co.uk Staff, ‘Anti-obesity campaign launched’, Politics.co.uk, 2 January 2009, http://www.politics.co.uk/news/2009/01/02/anti-obesity-campaign-launched	[ { "docid": "59c73a36b67700a759dbfafcfcbc0f21", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets It's simply not true to say that people automatically take their adverts with a pinch of salt. Research in the US suggests that 1 in five young adults trust advertising to always tell the truth and a clear majority think it does “most of the time” [1] , as this is exactly the group that is primarily of concern it can't be taken for granted that they will use caution or undertake further research.\n\n[1] Harris poll. Young adults more trusting of advertising. 5 November 2010. http://www.harrisinteractive.com/NewsRoom/HarrisPolls/tabid/447/ctl/ReadCustom%20Default/mid/1508/ArticleId/612/Default.aspx\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "9c7b0b855f933d6efcabb868b7e2795b", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets There is an enormous difference here. Even fast food chains themselves accept that their product should not be eaten all day everyday. Supermarkets have taken on board healthy messages about people's five a day or low fat brands. They've built these messages into their wider marketing strategy. Diet ads, by contrast, do claim to be a panacea that will instantly make you sexy, healthy, popular and, apparently successful. They are 21st century snake oil merchants and should simply be run out of town.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2e0f4afb1853fc0c3fa5122f6c1cdc73", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets The fact that it is difficult to do everything is no reason not to do something. At the very least articles and books have to go through an editorial process and are open to challenge by other articles and books. That's not true for bought space.\n\nIn the same way that we regulate the claims that can be made about cars, gambling websites and dating agencies to protect consumers without banning discussion of transport, money or love, advertising and journalism are treated differently.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "114c4c2e4f65e40bdedfe68e69048eb8", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets Surely the fact that what is healthy is also considered sexy should be embraced. Any motivation to lose a few pounds in a country where more than a quarter of people are obese [1] is surely a good thing for public health. Prop bemoans that diet advertising is targeted at the young and yet this is the group that policy makers routinely target with legislation to encourage healthy living and an early acceptance of the need for good health.\n\n[1] Jeremy Laurance, ‘Britain is the fattest nation in Europe’, The Independent, 17 November 2012, http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/britain-is-the-fattest-nation-in-europe-8324262.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "78c9bf1d9b820b9b1485cdfa6407fec4", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets There is no doubt that weight is not purely a medical issue but that a positive appearance helps self-confidence and opens lifestyle opportunities. Different people approach losing a few pounds in different ways, some have the time for the meticulous dietary exercise and training regime Prop is suggesting but most don't. Promotion of other option is simply meeting that need.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5572eee07d559190b7365a4d867525a6", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets People often wish to change their appearance for cosmetic rather than medical reasons. As with other cosmetic changes, from a new wardrobe to surgery, this can be expensive, and may even have some risks, but it is accepted because we know that it makes people feel better. It's a lifestyle choice and is no more the business of government than choosing a new jacket or deciding to get an earring.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "da29af37de8e3549ccf48f7d3b0ebbc1", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets Banning advertising won't work\n\nHow exactly is a ban on promoting diets supposed to work? Proposition isn't talking about tackling advertising online, presumably because it's difficult to do, nor is prop tackling the issue of books promoting certain techniques. So this ban would have failed to catch the largest craze of recent years, the Atkins diet.\n\nEqually diets are a mainstay of teen and women's magazines and a fairly central pillar of lifestyle sections of newspapers. Even so called 'quality' papers endlessly talk about lifestyles issues such as how they don't work and everyone would be better off retiring to a country manor in Shropshire for Swedish massage and a diet of organic barley.\n\nUnless prop is talking about starting to ban books or shut down entire sections (and profitable sections at that) of publishing companies then it is difficult to see how this measure will have any real affect.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8091f62952206841d91eeb5d2a0abca9", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets Countercase; Tackling food advertising\n\nIf the Proposition is so keen to tackle obesity then regulating then it should tackle food advertising rather than the advertising of diets. [1] Banning the promotion of dieting ads while people are sitting in front of the TV munching on the take away food or complaining that the remote is 'all the way' on the other side of the room, smacks of shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted.\n\nDiets are a response, one of many as Prop is keen to point out, to a serious problem that only government can begin to address.\n\nFrom before we are old enough to walk most people in the developed world are hooked on a fat-, sugar- and salt-rich diet. [2] Going after dieting ads is simply an effort by governments to be seen as doing something in a way that has little electoral impact. People will still use diets because of the gaps, such as the web, already mentioned however it doesn't require government to say anything as risky as “You're fat because you eat rubbish and don't move around much” to the electorate – or worse still, “Your children are fat because you can't put your foot down and tell them they can't have another choc-ice or more chips”.\n\nProp's entire case is tokenism of the highest order.\n\n[1] Denis Campbell, ‘Call for ban on TV junk food ads before 9pm watershed’, The Guardian, 4 September 2012, http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/sep/04/obesity-tv-junk-food-ads\n\n[2] AP, ‘Study: Bad Eating Habits Start Near Age 2’, InteliHealth, 27 October 2003, http://www.intelihealth.com/IH/ihtIH/WSIHW000/20722/8895/371041.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b0af42a3ca7badb7d25ba80de04379e9", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets Selling to the vulnerable\n\nDiets are predominantly targeted at those who feel desperate. It has nothing to do with medical need, a constant round of being told that there is only one way to look attractive inevitably encourages people to adopt a mindset that 'thin' equals 'attractive'. This has nothing to do with a medical need nor do diets represent a medical solution; at least not in the meaning of 'diet' at the focus of this debate.\n\nThe pressure on people, especially young people, to conform to a certain stereotype of physical perfection is astonishing and comes from many sources – music, magazines and the celebrity culture endemic in the media. It is notable that there is a well studied correlation between mass media consumption and eating disorders and fears of poor body image. [1]\n\nDiet programmes sell the dream that as long as you look like a given ideal you will come to be like them. This is nearly always untrue. [2] However, it is particularly attractive to those who are most susceptible to peer pressure; primarily the young but really anyone with a desire to fit in. The advertising picks up on this, pictures of happy, smiling, thin people with successful personal lives. It's simply an illusion and has little to do with the realities of medical need.\n\n[1] Kristen Harrison and Veronica Hefner, ‘Media Exposure, Current and Future Body Ideals, and Disordered Eating Among Preadolescent Girls: A Longitudinal Panel Study’, Journal of Youth and Adolescence, Vol.35 No.2, April 2006, pp.153-163, p.153 http://www.kristenharrison.org/uploads/8/7/1/3/8713266/harrisonhefnerjoyo.pdf\n\n[2] Federal Trade Commission, ‘Weighing the Evidence in Diet Ads’, November 2004, http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/pubs/consumer/health/hea03.shtm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0dc3ae9f10632fd7d30039bf63904cfc", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets Inventing the idea of fat\n\nThere's a lot to be said for eating well and being generally healthy. It's not just a matter of weight but the effect that bad nutrition has in contributing to heart conditions, blood pressure, energy levels and other health indicators. [1] None of these things are helped by trying to drop three stone in a couple of months by filling your body with one thing regardless of what it needs at the time as many of these diets do\n\nOur physical appearance should be an indicator of our lifestyle not an accessory to it.\n\nThe diet industry has poured considerable time and effort, with help from Holywood and the publishing industry, in to promoting the idea that thin and emaciated are the same thing.\n\nFad diets are, for many, less healthy than being a little overweight.\n\n[1] BMJ, ‘Obesity – how to lose weight’, 31 October 2012, p.3, http://bestpractice.bmj.com/best-practice/pdf/patient-summaries/556120.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8b9d10da892b6ca48f79bac4ff53efb4", "text": " media television health weight house would ban promotion diets Medical concerns\n\nDieting is a medical choice and should be treated as such; advertising the available options rather than discussing this with a doctor means that people do not have all of the available information and cannot make their decision in a safe environment.\n\nIn comparable areas such as giving up smoking, controlling drinking, making decisions about exercise, knowledge about inoculations before travel and so forth, we prize medical expertise. The diet industry in the UK is worth £2bn [1] (it's $61bn in the US) and is marked out by allowing the same people to tell us that we are sick in the first place and then tell us the cure and then do it all again when the solution didn't work.\n\nGenerally accepted medical opinion is that this is a slow process with miracle cures both unlikely to work in the first place and, where they do, more unlikely to last. In some cases the dieting may even threaten health. For example French doctors have criticised the Dukan diet, Dr Boris Hansel for example says \"There are real risks … infertility, sleep apnoea, high blood pressure, type-two diabetes, liver disease or cardiovascular problems. Following this diet is not harmless; it could cause real health problems\" but its endorsement by celebrities mean that many will ignore such warnings or never even hear of them. [2]\n\nMost ridiculously, the solution that does work – moderate eating and regular exercise is absolutely free and available to all.\n\n[1] Arabella Weir. Try it – don't diet. The Guardian. 31 December 2010, http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/dec/31/hungry-wisdom-diet-g...\n\n[2] Kim Willsher, ‘Dukan diet divides French doctors over effect on health’, The Guardian, 30 May 2011, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/may/30/dukan-diet-france-health-affect\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
d90453ad2023d3cde2fc4bd082e84c65	Banning alcohol protects third parties (family members) from harm. Alcohol is a contributory factor to a huge proportion of disputes and distress in society. It also contributes to the psychological problems of the alcohol consumer children. While the problem might not be connected to one individual in society, it is important that laws protect those, who might abuse their rights and with this hurt others. Currently in the US alone, there is an estimated 6.6 million children under 18, which live in households with at least one alcoholic parent. [1] It was never the fault of these children that others started to drink and harm them. According to psychological studies many of the children coming from alcohol abuse families have problems such as low self-esteem, loneliness, guilt, feelings of helplessness, fears of abandonment, and chronic depression. Children of alcoholics in some cases even feel responsible for the problems of the alcoholic and may think they created the problem. [2] Alcohol is also a great contributor not only to psychological, but also to physical damage. Many times, alcohol is an easy excuse for domestic abusers. The incidence of domestic abuse in households, where there is alcohol abuse is a lot higher and the abusers name the effects of alcohol as their main cause of violence. [3] With taking away alcohol we take away the fuel of many of the abusers, thus protecting third involved parties. [1] Alcohol Information, Alcohol Statistics, http://www.alcohol-information.com/Alcohol_Statistics.html , accessed 08/14/2011 [2] Parsons T., Alcoholism and it’s effects on the Family, AllPsych Journal, published 12/14/2003, http://allpsych.com/journal/alcoholism.html , accessed 08/16/2011 [3] University of Minnesota, Alcohol and Domestic Violence, http://www1.umn.edu/humanrts/svaw/domestic/link/alcohol.htm , accessed 08/17/2011	[ { "docid": "6f6008e55debdc824cf74e433de39136", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol Human beings are naturally inclined towards violence and conflict. Sex and violence are primal parts of our genetic make-up and we do not need alcohol to bring them to the surface.\n\nA study conducted by the University of Osnabrück (Germany) explains that individuals who are the cause of domestic violence usually have very little or no capacity for empathy from the early stages of their development. It states, that the domestic violence is deeply rooted in their psychology. Thus, nothing to do with alcohol as the cause of third party harm. [1] Alcohol, at worst, may slightly exaggerate these tendencies - but that makes it the occasion not the underlying cause of violent crimes. The underlying causes are biological and social and abuse would happen anyway, even without alcohol. [2]\n\nMaking rape and murder illegal does not eradicate rape and murder, so it is unlikely that making drinking alcohol illegal will do so either.\n\n[1] European Council of Europen - Human Rights, Explaining the inclination to use violence against women, October 1999, http://www.europrofem.org/contri/2_04_en/en-viol/66l-en_vio.htm , accessed 08/17/2011\n\n[2] Hanson D., Drinking Alcohol and Domestic Abuse, State University of New York, http://www2.potsdam.edu/hansondj/Controversies/1090863351.html , accessed 08/17/2011\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "6f0c949149f5eb91f5526dffb96ce630", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol First of all alcohol abuse (excessive amounts of alcohol) contribute only to a small percentage of all alcohol use in society. Even in Germany, where prices of beer are very low in comparison to other beverages, the data shows, that only 1.7 million (in a country of more than 80 million) use alcohol in a harmful way. [1] So why force people to give up something, just because a minority is not sure how to use it.\n\nFurther on, even if it was a concerning amount of people whose health is impacted by alcohol abuse, campaigns and information have very effectively reduced the death rate for cirrhosis. During a 22-year period, death from cirrhosis: dropped 29.8% among black men, 15.3% among white men, 47.9% among black women and 33.3% among white women [2]\n\n[1] Ryan R., The Highs and Lows of Germany's Drinking Culture, published 11/18/2006, http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,2226609,00.html , accessed 08/18/2011\n\n[2] Hanson D., Alcohol – Problems and Solutions, State University of New York, http://www2.potsdam.edu/hansondj/AlcoholAbuse.html , accessed 08/18/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0a850c6838dddcb60c824036ceeac326", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol Individuals are sovereign over their own bodies, and should be free to make choices which affect them and no other individual.\n\nSince the pleasure gained from alcohol and the extent to which this weighs against potential risks is fundamentally subjective, it is not up to the state to legislate in this area. Rather than pouring wasted resources into attempting to suppress alcohol use, the state would be better off running information campaigns to educate people about the risks and consequences of alcohol abuse.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "45379e238c77379d96c4b746ab532825", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol The state is obligated, when the health of citizens is on the line, to pass laws and regulations that protect them. The precedent has already been established in most countries with most forms of drugs. Citizens’ rights in this case are not a right to have drugs, but a right to be protected from the harmful effects of the substances, not merely on their own bodies but society as a whole. Governments would be derelict in their duty if they did not act to remove such harmful substances from society.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c4a842324309dcdee84815f45f941404", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol It is true that currently thousands of people are employed by the alcoholic drinks industry. However the fact that an immoral industry employs a lot of people is never a good argument to keep that immoral industry going (similar arguments apply to the cases of prostitution, arms dealing, fox hunting, battery farming, etc.) Instead, a gradual process would have to be implemented, which would include governments providing funding for training for alternative careers.\n\nAlso it is true that tax revenues would be lost if alcohol were banned. However, again, this is not a principled reason to reject the proposition, simply a practical problem. It should be pointed out that governments would save a huge amount of money on police and health spending (through the reduction in crime and alcohol-related illness) which would go at least some of the way to offsetting the decreased tax revenues.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cd4efa43236778c8e8668fc958cae33b", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol Laws change attitudes. Many times laws are the first step towards more approval of a certain new societal value and even lead the step to a quicker mentality change.\n\nThis was seen with the legalizing of gay marriages in many countries, among them also in some states in the US. In 2010 the approval among US citizens reached more than half of the population, which is a drastic improve from the past. [1] In the beginning there was very little approval of the policy and same-sex marriages in general, an open discussion about the law, the first actual practical implications of the law and consequences have over time gained more acceptances in most Western countries towards gay marriage.\n\nThe same principle will apply to an alcohol ban. While in the beginning there will probably be a lot of protest, there will probably also be a change of mentality later on.\n\n[1] Gallup, Americans acceptance of gay relations crosses 50 % http://www.gallup.com/poll/135764/americans-acceptance-gay-relations-crosses-threshold.aspx , accessed 08/13/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f3838af6abe03230ac698c87efb9469a", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol In any single law, that prohibits substances there is going to be the danger of a black market. In Canada, a black market for alcohol developed despite the legal status of alcohol (it was due to high taxation). The Association of Canadian Distillers actually estimated that 25 % of all spirits in Ontario are consumed illegally (without paying taxes). [1]\n\nThe problem therefore is not going to lay in the ban itself, but in the enforcement of legislation and thorough control of the markets.\n\n[1] Mackenzie Institute, Prohibition’s Hangover – Ontario’s Black Market and Alcohol, http://www.mackenzieinstitute.com/1997/1997_10_Sex_Alcohol.html , accessed 08/17/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "024cbc20a16bd251869436749920cd49", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol Banning alcohol would lead to healthier individuals.\n\nA ban of alcohol would have a great impact on the health of every individual.\n\nAlcohol and especially alcohol abuse are very common problems in today’s society. Long lasting abuse of substances leads to many chronic diseases such as liver cirrhosis (damage to liver cells); pancreatitis (inflammation of the pancreas); various cancers, including liver, mouth, throat, larynx (the voice box), and esophagus; high blood pressure; and psychological disorders. [1]\n\nWith a ban of alcohol we would very much lower the rates of consumption, as already current drug laws show. Even though drugs have a similar effect as alcohol, because of the risk of consequences when using those substances.\n\nTherefore in general the number of alcohol addiction would sink and cause also less of a financial health burden. According to the US alone, the economic cost of alcohol abuse in 1998 was 184.6 billion dollars. [2] This is a burden which many state budgets have to bear.\n\nTherefore if this cost can be prevented, the lives of people improved (by not getting the chronic diseases) we should do so.\n\n[1] Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Alcohol and Public Health, http://www.cdc.gov/alcohol/faqs.htm#healthProb , accessed 08/17/2011\n\n[2] Harwood, H.; The Economic Costs of Alcohol and Drug Abuse in the United States, 1992. Report prepared for the\n\nNational Institute on Drug Abuse and the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, http://faceproject.org/topics/pdfs/Chap06C.pdf , accessed 08/17/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2ba56ad95e7f6d2ce46102cbb610cea6", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol Governments have the obligation to protect citizens from harmful substances\n\nAlcohol is a mind altering drug, which can cause individuals to take actions they would have not done otherwise. This does not refer to loosened inhibitions, but also extends to harmful acts against themselves and others.\n\nDemocracy is based on the principle that the majority of people are to elect leaders and trust them with a term, where their duty is solely to look after the wellbeing of the country and its citizens. The politicians, having the resources and time which they have to use, to get well equipped to make more informed decision on activities dangerous to the individual, others and the society. One of the principles in society therefore is that elected representatives have to make sure their citizens get the best possible protection in society. Even if this infringes on some of their rights. Alcohol for a long time has been kept because the government trusted the people; they would make responsible decisions regarding alcohol. However, each year, the society loses, on a 30 year based average, more than 75,000 individuals to alcohol related diseases or accidents. [1] Thus the citizens proved not to be responsible; even though they had information available they did not make the choice that would keep them alive.\n\nThe government has a duty to protect those irresponsible citizens, because otherwise they will not be able to contribute to society to the extent they could without alcohol. And because the government does not know who is the one that will make a stupid decision that will engender their lives in the long run, for the sake of few individuals’, alcohol has to be banned for all.\n\nTherefore, because the government has been trusted with the duty to make informed decisions instead of the individuals and to protect the individual, it is right to allow them to ban alcohol if they believe it is very harmful.\n\n[1] msnbc.com, Alcohol linked to 75,000 U.S. deaths a year, published 06/25/2005, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6089353/ns/health-addictions/t/alcohol-linked-us-deaths-year/ , accessed 08/13/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "834456417d5f81b9d853d53a37111f53", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol Prohibition would be impractical and serve only to create an enormous black market\n\nIn comparison to any other drug, alcohol is very easy to produce (hence the great amount of vineyards) and very much engraved in the culture of especially European countries.\n\nTherefore a ban would be very ineffective, as the people would do it due to the ease of producing alcohol and the cultural acceptance. A ban would bring just more deregulation and loss of taxes through the black market.\n\nWe might acknowledge that the legal implications will scare away some people from drinking alcohol, but the main part of population will want more. Because there is a strong inelastic demand and the illegal supply will flourish.\n\nThis can be seen already with both and illegal drugs. It is also the lesson of Prohibition in the USA in the 1920s. Smuggled alcohol brought in from much cheaper continental countries will undercut both pubs and law-abiding retailers, and will circumvent the normal regulations which ensure consumer safety, such as proof-of-age or quality controls. In Saudi Arabia, a country with an alcohol ban, the Saudi police had seized over 100,000 bottles of eau-de-cologne with an expired expiration date. The methanol in cologne recently led to the deaths of over 20 people who drank it and many others were blinded. Earlier, over 130,000 bottles were confiscated. [1] Because people wanted alcohol so badly and could not get it. While in Europe there might not be much of poisoning going on, a great amount of alcohol because of the different wine regions. Only Spain has already 2.9 million acres of land devoted entirely to the planting of wine grapes. However, it is only number 3 when it comes to the amount of wine actually produced. [2] So in comparison to the Arabic countries, there is a lot of ground where easily to produce alcohol and therefore making it hard to control.\n\nWorse, criminals will find a market for cheap, home-brewed alcohol, of the kind which kills or blinds hundreds of people a year in countries like Russia. [3] Overall criminality will flourish, with the gang violence associated with Prohibition or the drugs trade.\n\nAn alcohol ban has worked mainly in countries where it is very tight tied to religion and to the religious practices. Especially in countries that are secular and more multicultural, the ban would be impossible to enforce. The harms associated with black market alcohol are too great for us to risk introducing this proposal.\n\n[1] Hanson D., Alcohol – Problems and Solutions, State University of New York, http://www2.potsdam.edu/hansondj/AlcoholAbuse.html , accessed 08/18/2011\n\n[2] A Beginners Guide to Spanish Wine, http://www.eventswholesale.com/article/spanish-wine.htm , accessed 08/18/2011\n\n[3] Sodertorns Hogskola, The Alcohol Use in Russia and the Baltic Sea Region, published April 2000, http://webappl.sh.se/C1256C930076231F/0/17B99CCA2C0854EAC1256D130035BA03/$file/12.pdf , accessed 08/18/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f14edbfca32ca1a6a076eebffd67bcd7", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol Banning alcohol harms the economy.\n\nNot only would banning alcohol infringe people’s civil liberties to an unacceptable degree, it would also put thousands of people out of work. The drinks industry is an enormous global industry.\n\nIn 2007, it was a $970 billion global market for alcoholic beverages, experiencing a period of unprecedented change. While about 60 percent of the market was still in the hands of small, local enterprises, truly global players are steadily emerging and creating an even greater market. There are not good enough reasons for wreaking this havoc on the world economy. [1]\n\nA point further on is that currently governments raise large amounts of revenue from taxes and duties payable on alcoholic drinks. To ban alcohol would take away a major source of funding for public services. In addition, the effect of banning alcohol would call for additional policing on a huge scale, if the prohibition were to be enforced effectively. If would create a new class of illegal drug-users, traffickers, and dealers on an unprecedented scale.\n\n[1] Jackson J., Spirited performance, published May 2007, http://www.accenture.com/us-en/outlook/pages/outlook-journal-2007-alcoholic-beverages-industry-report.aspx , accessed 08/17/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5a976814a3e16e392253cf7c89664f97", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol The state should keep alcohol legal in order to maximize citizens’ rights.\n\nGovernments are not there to be the mothers of citizens, but should allow people to freely live their lives as long as they do not hurt others.\n\nA government might have the wish to build a society that is obedient, productive and without flaws. This may also mean a society without alcohol, cigarettes, drugs or any other addictive substances. Such a society might have its benefits in a short term, but seen long term it has more unsatisfied individuals.\n\nWith drinking alcohol responsibly no one is getting harmed; in many cases not even the individual, as it is actually beneficial for the health. A glass of wine per day is good for decreasing the risk of cancer and heart disease, scientists say. [1]\n\nSo if someone in society has decided that it is good for them for whatever reason possible to use a substance that impacts only them, the state should not prevent them from doing so. This is because the society has been made from the different individuals, which lead different lifestyles and therefore have very opposing opinions views on what freedom is. A society that is free and where individuals are happy is a society where individuals engage more and also give more back to the society. So if alcohol will make the people happy and then more productive, we should maintain status quo.\n\n[1] Bauer J., Is wine good for you ?, published 6/4/2008, http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/21478144/ns/today-today_health/t/wine-good-you/ , accessed 08/14/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8b653b5798b4b443830a6e3d85ffd847", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol Banning alcohol is a quick fix to a wider societal problem.\n\nBy banning alcohol the government is searching for a quick way out of the problem of people excessively drinking, making bad decisions when under the influence of alcohol.\n\nAlcoholism and also drunk driving is a problem in many countries over the world. It has taken governments for over 30 years to decrease the number of drunk driver accidents, to decrease the number of drinkers in certain regions. This is a hard campaign battle, the government has to battle. According to a recent study, by the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, campaigns contribute to approximately 13 % of decrease in drinking through time. This is a number with which many governments are not satisfied as they are pouring a lot of money in the campaigns. [1] In Scotland alone, the annual expenditure for the “drink driving campaign was £141000. [2] Because of quite high expenditure on campaigns, countries may see a ban as an easy way out of these expenditures. Therefore for the government it seems maybe reasonable to prevent just all citizens from drinking. With this the government might be saying that the problem is fixed (because no one is allowed to drink alcohol anymore), but mainly it is just superficially solving it.\n\nAs people’s mentality has not changed just through a law passing, they have created only more problematic users, they cannot target with campaigns and so do not impact the society. A quick public message that they fixed the superficial problem, while leaving citizens in their misery.\n\n[1] Elder R., Effectiveness of Mass Media Campaigns for Reducing Drinking and Driving and Alcohol-Involved Crashes, American Journal of Preventive Medicine, published 2004, http://meagherlab.tamu.edu/M-Meagher/%20Health%20Psyc%20630/Readings%20630/Healthcompro/mass%20media%20drink%2004.pdf , accessed 08/13/2011\n\n[2] Institute of Alcoholic Studies, Economic cost and benefits, http://www.ias.org.uk/resources/factsheets/economic_costs_benefits.pdf , accessed 08/13/2011\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
35c44490de77a62e8467995448604925	Prohibition would be impractical and serve only to create an enormous black market In comparison to any other drug, alcohol is very easy to produce (hence the great amount of vineyards) and very much engraved in the culture of especially European countries. Therefore a ban would be very ineffective, as the people would do it due to the ease of producing alcohol and the cultural acceptance. A ban would bring just more deregulation and loss of taxes through the black market. We might acknowledge that the legal implications will scare away some people from drinking alcohol, but the main part of population will want more. Because there is a strong inelastic demand and the illegal supply will flourish. This can be seen already with both and illegal drugs. It is also the lesson of Prohibition in the USA in the 1920s. Smuggled alcohol brought in from much cheaper continental countries will undercut both pubs and law-abiding retailers, and will circumvent the normal regulations which ensure consumer safety, such as proof-of-age or quality controls. In Saudi Arabia, a country with an alcohol ban, the Saudi police had seized over 100,000 bottles of eau-de-cologne with an expired expiration date. The methanol in cologne recently led to the deaths of over 20 people who drank it and many others were blinded. Earlier, over 130,000 bottles were confiscated. [1] Because people wanted alcohol so badly and could not get it. While in Europe there might not be much of poisoning going on, a great amount of alcohol because of the different wine regions. Only Spain has already 2.9 million acres of land devoted entirely to the planting of wine grapes. However, it is only number 3 when it comes to the amount of wine actually produced. [2] So in comparison to the Arabic countries, there is a lot of ground where easily to produce alcohol and therefore making it hard to control. Worse, criminals will find a market for cheap, home-brewed alcohol, of the kind which kills or blinds hundreds of people a year in countries like Russia. [3] Overall criminality will flourish, with the gang violence associated with Prohibition or the drugs trade. An alcohol ban has worked mainly in countries where it is very tight tied to religion and to the religious practices. Especially in countries that are secular and more multicultural, the ban would be impossible to enforce. The harms associated with black market alcohol are too great for us to risk introducing this proposal. [1] Hanson D., Alcohol – Problems and Solutions, State University of New York, http://www2.potsdam.edu/hansondj/AlcoholAbuse.html , accessed 08/18/2011 [2] A Beginners Guide to Spanish Wine, http://www.eventswholesale.com/article/spanish-wine.htm , accessed 08/18/2011 [3] Sodertorns Hogskola, The Alcohol Use in Russia and the Baltic Sea Region, published April 2000, http://webappl.sh.se/C1256C930076231F/0/17B99CCA2C0854EAC1256D130035BA03/$file/12.pdf , accessed 08/18/2011	[ { "docid": "f3838af6abe03230ac698c87efb9469a", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol In any single law, that prohibits substances there is going to be the danger of a black market. In Canada, a black market for alcohol developed despite the legal status of alcohol (it was due to high taxation). The Association of Canadian Distillers actually estimated that 25 % of all spirits in Ontario are consumed illegally (without paying taxes). [1]\n\nThe problem therefore is not going to lay in the ban itself, but in the enforcement of legislation and thorough control of the markets.\n\n[1] Mackenzie Institute, Prohibition’s Hangover – Ontario’s Black Market and Alcohol, http://www.mackenzieinstitute.com/1997/1997_10_Sex_Alcohol.html , accessed 08/17/2011\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "45379e238c77379d96c4b746ab532825", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol The state is obligated, when the health of citizens is on the line, to pass laws and regulations that protect them. The precedent has already been established in most countries with most forms of drugs. Citizens’ rights in this case are not a right to have drugs, but a right to be protected from the harmful effects of the substances, not merely on their own bodies but society as a whole. Governments would be derelict in their duty if they did not act to remove such harmful substances from society.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c4a842324309dcdee84815f45f941404", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol It is true that currently thousands of people are employed by the alcoholic drinks industry. However the fact that an immoral industry employs a lot of people is never a good argument to keep that immoral industry going (similar arguments apply to the cases of prostitution, arms dealing, fox hunting, battery farming, etc.) Instead, a gradual process would have to be implemented, which would include governments providing funding for training for alternative careers.\n\nAlso it is true that tax revenues would be lost if alcohol were banned. However, again, this is not a principled reason to reject the proposition, simply a practical problem. It should be pointed out that governments would save a huge amount of money on police and health spending (through the reduction in crime and alcohol-related illness) which would go at least some of the way to offsetting the decreased tax revenues.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cd4efa43236778c8e8668fc958cae33b", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol Laws change attitudes. Many times laws are the first step towards more approval of a certain new societal value and even lead the step to a quicker mentality change.\n\nThis was seen with the legalizing of gay marriages in many countries, among them also in some states in the US. In 2010 the approval among US citizens reached more than half of the population, which is a drastic improve from the past. [1] In the beginning there was very little approval of the policy and same-sex marriages in general, an open discussion about the law, the first actual practical implications of the law and consequences have over time gained more acceptances in most Western countries towards gay marriage.\n\nThe same principle will apply to an alcohol ban. While in the beginning there will probably be a lot of protest, there will probably also be a change of mentality later on.\n\n[1] Gallup, Americans acceptance of gay relations crosses 50 % http://www.gallup.com/poll/135764/americans-acceptance-gay-relations-crosses-threshold.aspx , accessed 08/13/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6f6008e55debdc824cf74e433de39136", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol Human beings are naturally inclined towards violence and conflict. Sex and violence are primal parts of our genetic make-up and we do not need alcohol to bring them to the surface.\n\nA study conducted by the University of Osnabrück (Germany) explains that individuals who are the cause of domestic violence usually have very little or no capacity for empathy from the early stages of their development. It states, that the domestic violence is deeply rooted in their psychology. Thus, nothing to do with alcohol as the cause of third party harm. [1] Alcohol, at worst, may slightly exaggerate these tendencies - but that makes it the occasion not the underlying cause of violent crimes. The underlying causes are biological and social and abuse would happen anyway, even without alcohol. [2]\n\nMaking rape and murder illegal does not eradicate rape and murder, so it is unlikely that making drinking alcohol illegal will do so either.\n\n[1] European Council of Europen - Human Rights, Explaining the inclination to use violence against women, October 1999, http://www.europrofem.org/contri/2_04_en/en-viol/66l-en_vio.htm , accessed 08/17/2011\n\n[2] Hanson D., Drinking Alcohol and Domestic Abuse, State University of New York, http://www2.potsdam.edu/hansondj/Controversies/1090863351.html , accessed 08/17/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6f0c949149f5eb91f5526dffb96ce630", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol First of all alcohol abuse (excessive amounts of alcohol) contribute only to a small percentage of all alcohol use in society. Even in Germany, where prices of beer are very low in comparison to other beverages, the data shows, that only 1.7 million (in a country of more than 80 million) use alcohol in a harmful way. [1] So why force people to give up something, just because a minority is not sure how to use it.\n\nFurther on, even if it was a concerning amount of people whose health is impacted by alcohol abuse, campaigns and information have very effectively reduced the death rate for cirrhosis. During a 22-year period, death from cirrhosis: dropped 29.8% among black men, 15.3% among white men, 47.9% among black women and 33.3% among white women [2]\n\n[1] Ryan R., The Highs and Lows of Germany's Drinking Culture, published 11/18/2006, http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,2226609,00.html , accessed 08/18/2011\n\n[2] Hanson D., Alcohol – Problems and Solutions, State University of New York, http://www2.potsdam.edu/hansondj/AlcoholAbuse.html , accessed 08/18/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0a850c6838dddcb60c824036ceeac326", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol Individuals are sovereign over their own bodies, and should be free to make choices which affect them and no other individual.\n\nSince the pleasure gained from alcohol and the extent to which this weighs against potential risks is fundamentally subjective, it is not up to the state to legislate in this area. Rather than pouring wasted resources into attempting to suppress alcohol use, the state would be better off running information campaigns to educate people about the risks and consequences of alcohol abuse.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f14edbfca32ca1a6a076eebffd67bcd7", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol Banning alcohol harms the economy.\n\nNot only would banning alcohol infringe people’s civil liberties to an unacceptable degree, it would also put thousands of people out of work. The drinks industry is an enormous global industry.\n\nIn 2007, it was a $970 billion global market for alcoholic beverages, experiencing a period of unprecedented change. While about 60 percent of the market was still in the hands of small, local enterprises, truly global players are steadily emerging and creating an even greater market. There are not good enough reasons for wreaking this havoc on the world economy. [1]\n\nA point further on is that currently governments raise large amounts of revenue from taxes and duties payable on alcoholic drinks. To ban alcohol would take away a major source of funding for public services. In addition, the effect of banning alcohol would call for additional policing on a huge scale, if the prohibition were to be enforced effectively. If would create a new class of illegal drug-users, traffickers, and dealers on an unprecedented scale.\n\n[1] Jackson J., Spirited performance, published May 2007, http://www.accenture.com/us-en/outlook/pages/outlook-journal-2007-alcoholic-beverages-industry-report.aspx , accessed 08/17/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5a976814a3e16e392253cf7c89664f97", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol The state should keep alcohol legal in order to maximize citizens’ rights.\n\nGovernments are not there to be the mothers of citizens, but should allow people to freely live their lives as long as they do not hurt others.\n\nA government might have the wish to build a society that is obedient, productive and without flaws. This may also mean a society without alcohol, cigarettes, drugs or any other addictive substances. Such a society might have its benefits in a short term, but seen long term it has more unsatisfied individuals.\n\nWith drinking alcohol responsibly no one is getting harmed; in many cases not even the individual, as it is actually beneficial for the health. A glass of wine per day is good for decreasing the risk of cancer and heart disease, scientists say. [1]\n\nSo if someone in society has decided that it is good for them for whatever reason possible to use a substance that impacts only them, the state should not prevent them from doing so. This is because the society has been made from the different individuals, which lead different lifestyles and therefore have very opposing opinions views on what freedom is. A society that is free and where individuals are happy is a society where individuals engage more and also give more back to the society. So if alcohol will make the people happy and then more productive, we should maintain status quo.\n\n[1] Bauer J., Is wine good for you ?, published 6/4/2008, http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/21478144/ns/today-today_health/t/wine-good-you/ , accessed 08/14/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8b653b5798b4b443830a6e3d85ffd847", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol Banning alcohol is a quick fix to a wider societal problem.\n\nBy banning alcohol the government is searching for a quick way out of the problem of people excessively drinking, making bad decisions when under the influence of alcohol.\n\nAlcoholism and also drunk driving is a problem in many countries over the world. It has taken governments for over 30 years to decrease the number of drunk driver accidents, to decrease the number of drinkers in certain regions. This is a hard campaign battle, the government has to battle. According to a recent study, by the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, campaigns contribute to approximately 13 % of decrease in drinking through time. This is a number with which many governments are not satisfied as they are pouring a lot of money in the campaigns. [1] In Scotland alone, the annual expenditure for the “drink driving campaign was £141000. [2] Because of quite high expenditure on campaigns, countries may see a ban as an easy way out of these expenditures. Therefore for the government it seems maybe reasonable to prevent just all citizens from drinking. With this the government might be saying that the problem is fixed (because no one is allowed to drink alcohol anymore), but mainly it is just superficially solving it.\n\nAs people’s mentality has not changed just through a law passing, they have created only more problematic users, they cannot target with campaigns and so do not impact the society. A quick public message that they fixed the superficial problem, while leaving citizens in their misery.\n\n[1] Elder R., Effectiveness of Mass Media Campaigns for Reducing Drinking and Driving and Alcohol-Involved Crashes, American Journal of Preventive Medicine, published 2004, http://meagherlab.tamu.edu/M-Meagher/%20Health%20Psyc%20630/Readings%20630/Healthcompro/mass%20media%20drink%2004.pdf , accessed 08/13/2011\n\n[2] Institute of Alcoholic Studies, Economic cost and benefits, http://www.ias.org.uk/resources/factsheets/economic_costs_benefits.pdf , accessed 08/13/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ee9809b32095e6178323dbd80c071c4e", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol Banning alcohol protects third parties (family members) from harm.\n\nAlcohol is a contributory factor to a huge proportion of disputes and distress in society. It also contributes to the psychological problems of the alcohol consumer children. While the problem might not be connected to one individual in society, it is important that laws protect those, who might abuse their rights and with this hurt others.\n\nCurrently in the US alone, there is an estimated 6.6 million children under 18, which live in households with at least one alcoholic parent. [1] It was never the fault of these children that others started to drink and harm them. According to psychological studies many of the children coming from alcohol abuse families have problems such as low self-esteem, loneliness, guilt, feelings of helplessness, fears of abandonment, and chronic depression. Children of alcoholics in some cases even feel responsible for the problems of the alcoholic and may think they created the problem. [2]\n\nAlcohol is also a great contributor not only to psychological, but also to physical damage. Many times, alcohol is an easy excuse for domestic abusers. The incidence of domestic abuse in households, where there is alcohol abuse is a lot higher and the abusers name the effects of alcohol as their main cause of violence. [3]\n\nWith taking away alcohol we take away the fuel of many of the abusers, thus protecting third involved parties.\n\n[1] Alcohol Information, Alcohol Statistics, http://www.alcohol-information.com/Alcohol_Statistics.html , accessed 08/14/2011\n\n[2] Parsons T., Alcoholism and it’s effects on the Family, AllPsych Journal, published 12/14/2003, http://allpsych.com/journal/alcoholism.html , accessed 08/16/2011\n\n[3] University of Minnesota, Alcohol and Domestic Violence, http://www1.umn.edu/humanrts/svaw/domestic/link/alcohol.htm , accessed 08/17/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "024cbc20a16bd251869436749920cd49", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol Banning alcohol would lead to healthier individuals.\n\nA ban of alcohol would have a great impact on the health of every individual.\n\nAlcohol and especially alcohol abuse are very common problems in today’s society. Long lasting abuse of substances leads to many chronic diseases such as liver cirrhosis (damage to liver cells); pancreatitis (inflammation of the pancreas); various cancers, including liver, mouth, throat, larynx (the voice box), and esophagus; high blood pressure; and psychological disorders. [1]\n\nWith a ban of alcohol we would very much lower the rates of consumption, as already current drug laws show. Even though drugs have a similar effect as alcohol, because of the risk of consequences when using those substances.\n\nTherefore in general the number of alcohol addiction would sink and cause also less of a financial health burden. According to the US alone, the economic cost of alcohol abuse in 1998 was 184.6 billion dollars. [2] This is a burden which many state budgets have to bear.\n\nTherefore if this cost can be prevented, the lives of people improved (by not getting the chronic diseases) we should do so.\n\n[1] Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Alcohol and Public Health, http://www.cdc.gov/alcohol/faqs.htm#healthProb , accessed 08/17/2011\n\n[2] Harwood, H.; The Economic Costs of Alcohol and Drug Abuse in the United States, 1992. Report prepared for the\n\nNational Institute on Drug Abuse and the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, http://faceproject.org/topics/pdfs/Chap06C.pdf , accessed 08/17/2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2ba56ad95e7f6d2ce46102cbb610cea6", "text": "addiction house would ban alcohol Governments have the obligation to protect citizens from harmful substances\n\nAlcohol is a mind altering drug, which can cause individuals to take actions they would have not done otherwise. This does not refer to loosened inhibitions, but also extends to harmful acts against themselves and others.\n\nDemocracy is based on the principle that the majority of people are to elect leaders and trust them with a term, where their duty is solely to look after the wellbeing of the country and its citizens. The politicians, having the resources and time which they have to use, to get well equipped to make more informed decision on activities dangerous to the individual, others and the society. One of the principles in society therefore is that elected representatives have to make sure their citizens get the best possible protection in society. Even if this infringes on some of their rights. Alcohol for a long time has been kept because the government trusted the people; they would make responsible decisions regarding alcohol. However, each year, the society loses, on a 30 year based average, more than 75,000 individuals to alcohol related diseases or accidents. [1] Thus the citizens proved not to be responsible; even though they had information available they did not make the choice that would keep them alive.\n\nThe government has a duty to protect those irresponsible citizens, because otherwise they will not be able to contribute to society to the extent they could without alcohol. And because the government does not know who is the one that will make a stupid decision that will engender their lives in the long run, for the sake of few individuals’, alcohol has to be banned for all.\n\nTherefore, because the government has been trusted with the duty to make informed decisions instead of the individuals and to protect the individual, it is right to allow them to ban alcohol if they believe it is very harmful.\n\n[1] msnbc.com, Alcohol linked to 75,000 U.S. deaths a year, published 06/25/2005, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6089353/ns/health-addictions/t/alcohol-linked-us-deaths-year/ , accessed 08/13/2011\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
28231f4c8b2268a16ad8026411ff46b4	Coca chewing is not equivalent to the consumption of hard drugs. It is no more harmful than drinking coffee. The coca leaf, in its natural state, is not even a narcotic, even though the 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs considers the natural leaf to be so. However it only truly becomes a narcotic when the paste or the concentrate is extracted from the leaf to form cocaine. [1] The simple coca leaf, by contrast, only has very mild effects when chewed and is different from cocaine. In 1995 the World Health Organisation found that the “use of coca leaves appears to have no negative health effects and has positive therapeutic, sacred and social functions for indigenous Andean populations.” [2] It may even be useful in combating obesity, and there is no evidence that coca use is addictive. At worst, it is comparable to caffeine in terms of its effect on its consumer. [3] Therefore there are no significant health reasons behind this ban on the cultivation of coca leaves for their chewed consumption in its traditional form. [1] Morales, Evo. “Let Me Chew My Coca Leaves”. New York Times. March 13, 2009. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/14/opinion/14morales.html [2] Jelsma, Martin. “Lifting the Ban on Coca Chewing”. Transnational Institute, Series on Legislative Reform of Drug Policies Nr. 11. March 2011. [3] Morales, Evo. “Let Me Chew My Coca Leaves”. New York Times. March 13, 2009. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/14/opinion/14morales.html	[ { "docid": "beec181ca89d7bd752c3915018e497e5", "text": "health general global law crime policing law general punishment house would Compulsive Coca chewing may compromise oral health. The wider cultivation of coca plants may make cocaine itself more readily available, and cocaine has clear health risks to its consumption. This debate must be seen in terms of the wider health risks and problems that actually occur if cultivation is legalized, not just a narrow understanding of the health risks in a theoretical vacuum.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "f69724b2c73b207123239abe2efc2179", "text": "health general global law crime policing law general punishment house would Simply arguing that because something is a 'tradition' that it should be legalized is a nonsensical argument. Traditions need to stand on their own merits, beyond the simple fact that people have done it in the past, as anyone would recognise that a great many things done in the past were not desirable, and therefore longevity does not equal desirability. Moreover, substances have never been legalized simply because some religions place spiritual connotations upon their use. For example, many members of the Rastafarian Movement and some Muslim Sufi groups claim that using cannabis has spiritual value and is important to understanding mystic truths, but cannabis has not been legalized as a result. [1] This is because, on balance, the harms of legalization outweigh our perception of its claimed benefits, and the same is true of the coca leaf. It is also important to note that the prized position of coca in Andean culture owes much to the lucrative nature of the international cocaine market, and thus this cultural value cannot be entirely 'unbundled' from cocaine use in the West. [2]\n\n[1] Ernest, Abel. “A Comprehensive Guide to Cannabis Literature”. Greenwood Press. 1979.;\n\n[2] Transnational Institute Debate Papers. “Coca yes, cocaine, no?”. Transnational Institute. No. 2006/2. No. 13. May 2006. http://www.kdrink.com/fitxers/debate13.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7b66b37911c9a3b820aad6ebfd25fdc9", "text": "health general global law crime policing law general punishment house would Medical uses of the coca leaf are already legal under the 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs. [1] . The coca plant has also never been proven to be a better ingredient in these varied domestic products than other plants, and other plants may even perform even better as ingredients. [2] There is therefore no compelling reason to believe that its global cultivation would result in any meaningful economic boost or better products on the market. Saving lives from being ruined by cocaine is more important than nay minor boost we might get from other coca products.\n\n[1] United Nations. “Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, 1961”. United Nations. 1961, amended 1972. http://www.incb.org/pdf/e/conv/convention_1961_en.pdf\n\n[2] Transnational Institute Debate Papers. “Coca yes, cocaine, no?”. Transnational Institute. No. 2006/2. No. 13. May 2006. http://www.kdrink.com/fitxers/debate13.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f9318c10a4e46713b5a954e6d5e28d24", "text": "health general global law crime policing law general punishment house would If coca cultivation were legalized, there would probably be mechanisms and policies to allow the plant and its derivatives to co-exist without this necessarily signifying an increase in harmful consumption, and to limit it being grown in the huge amounts needed for cocaine production. [1] The legalizing of coca cultivation for non-cocaine use could also undermine the supply basis of cocaine itself, as farmer would shift their production of coca from cocaine-purposed coca to open market coca production, as legal production would be much more secure from government action. Therefore legalizing coca production could actually help make cocaine less readily available.\n\n[1] Transnational Institute Debate Papers. “Coca yes, cocaine, no?”. Transnational Institute. No. 2006/2. No. 13. May 2006. http://www.kdrink.com/fitxers/debate13.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "828995537defceff610461ff5f6e121a", "text": "health general global law crime policing law general punishment house would The burden of evidence lies on the side trying to prove its harm, not on the side asserting that it is not harmful, and so the lack of categorical proof of its harm is in itself an argument for legalizing its cultivation and chewing. If proof of health risks arise then they can be addressed, but until then the ban is inappropriate and should be lifted.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cfb0ef8042f4b530e010e68e39082ade", "text": "health general global law crime policing law general punishment house would With no other narcotic drug are the components parts of that drug banned in of themselves. For example, the raw component parts of crystal meth are not banned. These components are a variety of household cleaning compounds. [1] It is wrong therefore to suggest that it is impossible to have an effective anti-narcotics effort unless the component parts are banned, as this exact approach is successful taken in other areas.\n\n[1] Associated Press. “New 'shake-and-bake' method for making crystal meth gets around drug laws but is no less dangerous”. NYDaily News. Tuesday, August 25th 2009. http://www.nydailynews.com/lifestyle/health/2009/08/25/2009-08-25_new_me...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d667e481e95c327f4e6c316f695a7680", "text": "health general global law crime policing law general punishment house would Coca production can be justified on cultural grounds\n\nCoca chewing is hugely prevalent amongst the peoples of the Andes, and their social relationship with it is akin to that of ours with coffee in Western nations. This is why so many nations in this region cannot and simply will not ever conform to any international ban that calls for phasing it out. The custom of chewing coca leaves may date back as far as 3000 BC in the region, and so hugely pre-dates cocaine consumption, and thus shouldn't be bundled with it or banned on the grounds that cocaine is banned. [1] Coca has also been a vital part of the religious traditions of the Andean peoples from the pre-Inca period through to the present, being used 'to communicate with the supernatural world and obtain its protection, especially with offerings to the Pachamama, the personification and spiritual form of the earth.' [2] All South American countries have signed several declarations by the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR) that acknowledged that the chewing of coca leaves is an ancestral cultural expression that should be respected by the international community. [3] The international discouragement of the practice of chewing coca leaves and the prohibition on its use by Andeans when they travel or reside abroad can thus be seen as a violation of their indigenous religious and traditional rights, and therefore is not acceptable on a moral level.\n\n[1] Morales, Evo. “Let Me Chew My Coca Leaves”. New York Times. March 13, 2009. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/14/opinion/14morales.html\n\n[2] Transnational Institute Debate Papers. “Coca yes, cocaine, no?”. Transnational Institute. No. 2006/2. No. 13. May 2006. http://www.kdrink.com/fitxers/debate13.pdf\n\n[3] Jelsma, Martin. “Lifting the Ban on Coca Chewing”. Transnational Institute, Series on Legislative Reform of Drug Policies Nr. 11. March 2011.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c9108e33d0b8ac57e12bb7451123d0fd", "text": "health general global law crime policing law general punishment house would Legal coca cultivation would enhance economic growth in developing states\n\nMillions of people in South America chew coca leaves, so this practice cannot simply be wished away. [1] Moreover, it currently acts as a vital income source in many impoverished areas of the Andes. Pasquale Quispe, 53, owner of a 7.4-acre Bolivian coca farm, explained to the New York Times in 2006: “Coca is our daily bread, what gives us work, what gives us our livelihood.” [2] Previous attempts to eradicate coca cultivation in Bolivia harmed the poorest farmers there and led to significant social unrest. [3] When it is allowed, however, coca cultivation can actually have economic benefits. Peasant cultivators in the Andes have indicated their belief that coca chewing helps increase production in agriculture, fisheries and mining. [4] The legalization of coca cultivation globally would allow for the expansion of these economic benefits. The coca leaf may have uses as a stimulant and flavouring agent in drinks (in which it is currently used to a limited extent in the West), but also in the expansion of the many domestic products currently in use in the Andes, including syrups, teas, shampoo and toothpaste. It may also have a use as a general anaesthetic. [5] Only the legalization of its cultivation globally will allow these product and economic potentials to be fully realized and allow humanity to reap the full rewards of the coca plant, rather than simply being limited by the fear and stigma surrounding its illegal use in cocaine.\n\n[1] Morales, Evo. “Let Me Chew My Coca Leaves”. New York Times. March 13, 2009. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/14/opinion/14morales.html\n\n[2] Forero, Juan. “Bolivia's Knot: No to Cocaine, but Yes to Coca”. New York Times. February 12, 2006. http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/12/international/americas/12bolivia.html?...\n\n[3] Forero, Juan. “Bolivia's Knot: No to Cocaine, but Yes to Coca”. New York Times. February 12, 2006. http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/12/international/americas/12bolivia.html?...\n\n[4] Transnational Institute Debate Papers. “Coca yes, cocaine, no?”. Transnational Institute. No. 2006/2. No. 13. May 2006. http://www.kdrink.com/fitxers/debate13.pdf\n\n[5] Transnational Institute Debate Papers. “Coca yes, cocaine, no?”. Transnational Institute. No. 2006/2. No. 13. May 2006. http://www.kdrink.com/fitxers/debate13.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f87373b667419999ebb792d413271132", "text": "health general global law crime policing law general punishment house would Legalising coca production would undemine the wider war on the drugs economy\n\nThe UN International Narcotics Control Board (INCB) said in 2011 that exceptions for Bolivia would undermine international narcotics control efforts: “[Allowing coca] would undermine the integrity of the global drug control system, undoing the good work of governments over many years.” [1] A US official said in January of 2011: “there is evidence to suggest that a substantial percentage” of the increased coca production in Bolivia over the past several years, registered in U.N. surveys, “has indeed gone into the network and the marketplace for cocaine.” [2] These examples thus show that legalizing coca cultivation would undermine the wider war on drugs, because it shifts the policy away from one of eradicating crops which could be turned into narcotics and instead turns towards making them acceptable on the global market. It encourages countries to take eradication efforts less seriously, and seemingly undermines the commitment of the international community to the war on drugs, once it gives in on this narcotic. This will make not just cocaine but many other drugs more widely available, leading to even more ruined lives through drug abuse.\n\n[1] M&C News. “Bolivia undermines global anti-drug efforts, UN warns”. M&C News. Jul 5, 2011. http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/americas/news/article_1649362.php...\n\n[2] Associated Press. “U.S. to fight Bolivia on allowing coca-leaf chewing”. The Portland Press Herald. January 19 2011. http://www.pressherald.com/news/nationworld/u_s_-to-fight-bolivia-on-all...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "21ba52e80aa0322575fb5f28e42b9e5f", "text": "health general global law crime policing law general punishment house would Unrestricted Coca production would increase the availability of cocaine\n\nCocaine can be readily extracted from the coca leaf. In 1992 the World Health Organization’s Expert Committee on Drug Dependence (ECDD) undertook a ‘prereview’ of coca leaf at its 28th meeting. The 28th ECDD report concluded that, “the coca leaf is appropriately scheduled [as a narcotic] under the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, 1961, since cocaine is readily extractable from the leaf.” [1] The active ingredient in coca leaf is the same as in cocaine, just more concentrated. Because the raw material of coca and its more potent relative cocaine are so closely aligned, it is impossible to disassociate the two, and so any attempt to consider cocaine a narcotic and stop its spread must also forbid coca. Globally, cocaine is also most produced where coca is legal, and this is a clear correlation. In Bolivia, coca eradication efforts in the 1980s and 90s helped reduce cocaine production. However, as Evo Morales took power and legalized coca production and consumption, cocaine production has shot up, despite his efforts to fight cocaine production. [2] Thus legalizing coca makes it easier for cocaine producers to operate. Legalizing the cultivation of the coca leaf would therefore simply make cocaine more readily available, thus increasing all the harms that come with widespread cocaine use in society.\n\n[1] Jelsma, Martin. “Lifting the Ban on Coca Chewing”. Transnational Institute, Series on Legislative Reform of Drug Policies Nr. 11. March 2011.\n\n[2] Forero, Juan. “Bolivia's Knot: No to Cocaine, but Yes to Coca”. New York Times. February 12, 2006. http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/12/international/americas/12bolivia.html?...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "bcb290e8954b7a4118c23fb6f114516e", "text": "health general global law crime policing law general punishment house would Coca chewing is harmful and should be proscribed\n\nThe original decision to ban coca chewing was based on evidence that this was indeed harmful to human health. A 1950 report elaborated by the UN Commission of Inquiry on the Coca Leaf with a mandate from ECOSOC states that: \"We believe that the daily, inveterate use of coca leaves by chewing ... is thoroughly noxious and therefore detrimental.\" [1] Therefore the risk of health harms should not be dismissed or undermined. Coca is also different to caffeine and other similar products in in its capacity to be diverted to highly potent, dangerous, and damaging use in cocaine. Therefore it has unique health considerations which make its prohibition acceptable.\n\n[1] Jelsma, Martin. “Lifting the Ban on Coca Chewing”. Transnational Institute, Series on Legislative Reform of Drug Policies Nr. 11. March 2011.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
9a01d38a43ac2aafe05f732dcc87cfae	Cannabis has many medical properties, notably the alleviation of suffering in chronic diseases. It should therefore be freely available Cannabis has been used for medicinal purposes for at least 5,000 years most frequently as an analgesic, that is to say it reduces pain. It also stimulates hunger and can be used as an anti-emetic to control nausea and vomiting. As the DEA Administrative Law Judge Francis L. Young noted in a 1988 ruling [i] , there is no evidence of a fatality resulting from the misuse of cannabis. Indeed the Dutch government currently permits doctors regulated by its Ministry of Health and Welfare to prescribe cannabis to their patients. Further, the Dutch state has licensed a pharmaceutical firm to provide cannabis of a guaranteed level of purity to pharmacies and medical professionals. [ii] There are accounts and studies of its successful application to treat the effects of chemotherapy as well as its palliative [iii] use in MS and AIDS [iv] . For governments to turn their backs on a perfectly useful drug simply to prove a point is confusing at best and petulant at worst. [i] Docket No. 86-22. “OPINION AND RECOMMENDED RULING, FINDINGS OF FACT, CONCLUSIONS OF LAW AND DECISION OF Administrative LAW JUDGE.” FRANCIS L. YOUNG, Administrative Law Judge. 6 September 1988. [ii] Bedrocan BV home page, 15 November 2011. http://www.bedrocan.nl/ [iii] “Cannabinoids as antioxidants and neuroprotectants.” Espacenet patent search. 07 October 2003. http://worldwide.espacenet.com/publicationDetails/biblio?CC=US&NR=6630507&KC=&FT=E&locale=en_EP [iv] “Cannabinoids as antioxidants and neuroprotectants.” Patentstorm. 07 October 2003. http://www.patentstorm.us/patents/6630507/fulltext.html	[ { "docid": "baa4797d45dd633c5029eb5861e6fb70", "text": "addiction health general healthcare thw require provision cannabis any state Government has a role in establishing what is an acceptable level of behaviour within society. Full in the knowledge that some people will use any substance responsibly and others less so, governments make decisions to protect their citizens and to show a lead. It is the settled will of most people in most countries that cannabis is not a drug they consider acceptable for use in a modern society. Furthermore, there are plenty of other drugs that can be used for all of the uses Proposition has identified. Legalizing cannabis for medical use would send out the message that it is safe to use when all practical evidence suggests that the social, if not the medical, ramifications are anything but safe. Proposition need to demonstrate a medical use for cannabis that cannot be met by existing pharmaceuticals.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "b559df83a5859628aa60b459120a781f", "text": "addiction health general healthcare thw require provision cannabis any state Of course all drugs can be abused but introducing one into the system full in the knowledge that it will be abused is an entirely different matter. On the basis of the balance of probabilities, the moment any government says that cannabis is safe to use and, more than that, beneficial to health then every pothead in that jurisdiction has an excuse.\n\nThe only way the War on Drugs can work is if prohibition is applied universally. We expect doctors to work within the law and the government, along with medical governing bodies, has a role in determining what it is appropriate to prescribe and what is not [i] .\n\nThere are no situations where society simply stands back and leaves it to individual clinicians to act without guidance. They act within a framework that gives primacy to clinical need but does not ignore the wider social implications. Society regulates when a doctor can rules that someone is incapable of work or needs surgery at the expense of the state. In this particular regard, governments feel that society is best served by not adding cannabis to the pharmaceutical melting pot.\n\n[i] Comment. “Kent Doctor Richard Scott Warned Over Faith Discussion”. BBC. 23 May 2011.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2eac643d16e1f677a94ba7a62a480104", "text": "addiction health general healthcare thw require provision cannabis any state Ultimately, in most countries where this is even under discussion, politicians run away from this issue because there are no votes in it. The people don’t want it and that view must be respected.\n\nDrugs policy is, ultimately driven by a standard of what the people in a democratic nation consider appropriate; a couple of drinks after work on a Friday is okay, getting stoned on a regular basis isn’t.\n\nGovernments have a responsibility to set out a moral code that is acceptable to the broadest possible spectrum of the society they represent. If they accept that cannabis can be used to alleviate suffering in patients then why not accept that it is okay to drink at work. Both substances have a similar pain relieving effect, both have similar negative effects. It is easy to envisage, on the basis of the proposition side argument given above, that an individual may claim that alcohol does more to address his various aches and pains than aspirin or codeine. Society works because there are limits.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8f168b203913d9f38c133922ae370382", "text": "addiction health general healthcare thw require provision cannabis any state There is compelling evidence that people are more than capable of making the distinction between the use of a drug for recreational and medical use [i] . The long term effects of using alcohol or nicotine recreationally have been demonstrated to be fatal; the same cannot be said for cannabis. Further this is about using the drug in a medical setting under the supervision of medical professionals.\n\nAs Opposition has conceded, this is something that already happens. As societies, we condone the use of far more powerful drugs on a daily basis. This is a clear example of a situation where politics is ignoring reality out of expediency. This is not a proposal for vending machines to sell crack but for the medicinal use of a drug with a proven track record.\n\n[i] Gary Langer. “High Support for Medical Marijuana”. ABC News. 18 January 2010.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cc4641bc6bbb1e747ee47e19eb8dfb59", "text": "addiction health general healthcare thw require provision cannabis any state Government policy on this issue has long been confused. When it is perfectly acceptable for politicians, celebrities and other public figures to admit that they have broken the law and face no sanction, it is time for the law to change. Virtually all of the societal problems caused by its usage are directly as a result of its illegality. None of those problems speak to its role in a medical setting.\n\nWhen not under the threat of tabloid headlines, opinion leaders from across the political spectrum accept that this makes sense [i] . The difficulty is that policy makers only accept the fact after they’re in office, not while they’re facing election. The use of the word ‘Former’ in pronouncements on this subject is noticeable\n\n[i] Lyn Nofziger, former Press Secretary to Ronald Reagan, wrote the following in the foreword to the 1999 book Marijuana RX: The Patients' Fight for Medicinal Pot, by Robert C. Randall and Alice M. O'Leary\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d72d0280a606e0ce0618580760ceb1bb", "text": "addiction health general healthcare thw require provision cannabis any state Ultimately there is a clear difference between the medical use of a drug, the banning of which is both harming patients and is against the wishes of many societies and allowing a free-for-all. As a society we regulate the use of other products to ensure that they are not available to minors or open to abuse.\n\nClearly there would need to be regulations and, equally clearly, sometime those regulations would fail. However, that is true of all regulated product and the blanket ban isn’t producing terribly impressive results at the moment.\n\nThere is compelling evidence of the palliative effects of cannabis as well as popular support for its medicinal use; good policy should not be bound by a reactionary response to the simple mention of the word. There are side-effects to the use of almost any drug but they are relatively benign in this instance compared to many alternatives.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "59c12396547e588e9337899efd258cfb", "text": "addiction health general healthcare thw require provision cannabis any state All drugs can be used for a variety of purposes some appropriate some inappropriate that’s a matter of choice, treatment should be based on medical reality\n\nAny drug, legal or illegal, can be used sensibly or it can be abused. If society bases its decisions on the medical provision of drugs on the presumption of abuse the shelves of most drugstores would be empty. The idea that the burden of proof should be set at demonstrating that nothing else can achieve the same results is absurd – let’s ban Codeine because Aspirin works just fine. Drugs that have similar effects are distinguished according to the speed, duration and efficacy of those effects, in addition to the drug’s side-effects. Different individuals experience the pain-relieving effects of aspirin in different ways. A wider range of individuals may experience a longer lasting reduction in pain if taking codeine. Similarly, an even larger number of individuals respond positively to cannabis.\n\nThe reality is that we trust doctors to make judgments on what is a sensible course of treatment, not politicians and certainly not a hysterical media.\n\nAs the law currently stands, politicians are stopping medical professionals from making decisions in the best interest of their patients because nobody wants to be seen to blink first. California and Nebraska already blinked, as have Austria, Canada, Spain and Germany as well as other nations. A failure to recognize this fact is simple political cowardice [i] .\n\n[i] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_cannabis#National_and_international_regulations\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5eafe38ae819a3df8cd64f06ca1611c3", "text": "addiction health general healthcare thw require provision cannabis any state For governments to refuse treatment on the basis of an unreasonable assertion is cruel and blindly ideological\n\nThe current legislation on drug use in most countries was delivered without canvassing medical opinion and under the influence of public hysteria and moral panic. Seemingly logical but flawed theories linking the use of “soft” drugs to later use of “harder” varieties (cocain, amphetamins) have often been used both to justify and to promote drugs legislation. The apparent sense of these arguments belies the fact that they have been repeatedly disproven [i] .\n\nLurid, prurient portrayals of the catastrophic consequences of narcotics use in the mass media are frequently used to back up arguments that drugs- even cannabis- are so dangerous that even carefully controlled medical applications are unacceptably risky.\n\nIt is clearly the case that when any substance has a proven medical benefit it should be available for prescription. Legislation already exists in most countries to contain the possibility of misuse of prescribed drugs.\n\nHowever, it is clearly the case that politicians are avoiding this issue not because there is medical doubt on the matter but because they are incapable of reaching a logical conclusion for fear of hysterical – and easy – headlines. To withhold treatment from patients who need it on the basis that a tabloid will run a ‘Soft on Drugs’ story the following morning is the height of irresponsibility.\n\n[i] Degenhardt, L, et al. “Whoare the new amphetamine users? A ten year prospective study of young Australians. Adiction, volume 102, 8, p1269-1279. August 2007. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1360-0443.2007.01906.x/abstract;jsessionid=90232042DE3BB4456F9DE6F41F29BFBF.d03t03\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "af5854afbb8b4f623d38ceae4b0d7e6b", "text": "addiction health general healthcare thw require provision cannabis any state By expanding the legal use of the drug, it simply makes the illegal, recreational use easier as there’s a greater supply\n\nIf the drug were made available, it would need to be grown somewhere, stored somewhere and sold somewhere. Increased supervision of pharmacies and users would be required, in order to guard against the possibility that medical cannabis might be sold on for recreational purposes. Although other pharmaceuticals have narcotics effects, none has the marketability, or market share of cannabis. Many legal types of pharmaceuticals already form the basis of criminal empires and this move would exacerbate that.\n\nMoreover, the increased visibility and mobility of cannabis within the economy will make it easier for determined criminals to hide or obscure the origins of cannabis produced illegally. Individual citizens will be less likely to consider cannabis use that they are victim to as being illegal. It will become harder and more expensive for the police to enforce restrictions on the use and production of cannabis for recreational purposes.\n\nIt has been well argued that “drugs are not a threat to society because they are illegal; they are illegal because they are a threat to society” [i] . Legalization in any form will be misconstrued and the health effects will be damaging [ii] . Even if side proposition can demonstrate that the health effects of cannabis are negligible, the risk of incentivizing increased production of cannabis in foreign territories and increased trade and transfer of cannabis at home is simply too high for the state to accept.\n\n[i] Charles D. Mabry, MD, FACS, Pine Bluff, AR. “Physicians and the War on Drugs: The Case Against Legalization”. Bulletin of the American College of Surgeons. October 2001.\n\n[ii] Hillary Rodham Clinton, JD, US Secretary of State and US Senator (D-NY) at the time of the quote, stated the following during an Oct. 11, 2007 town hall meeting at Plymouth State College\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "13499f47e19ec41d3bf326863bc5cd8c", "text": "addiction health general healthcare thw require provision cannabis any state In most countries where there is an acceptance of the medical value of cannabis it is fairly easily available, this would simply condone its recreational use\n\nAt a time when governments, along with health professionals, are trying to restrict the use of legal drugs such as alcohol and nicotine, giving the use of cannabis the sanction of government approval would take health policy in a direction that most people do not wish to contemplate.\n\nEffectively, such a change in policy would announce, ‘We’d rather you didn’t drink or smoke but it’s okay to get high’.\n\nIn most nations where this discussion is even happening the personal use of mild narcotics is ignored by law enforcement. However, legalizing the use of drugs in any way says to the world at large, ‘this isn’t a problem, do what you like’.\n\nThe production of drugs ruins lives and communities. Any attempt to fully legalise marijuana for medical use would only be effective in western liberal democracies. There is a high probability that it would incentivise increased production of the drug in states where it remains illegal. For the reasons given above, legitimatizing cannabis’ use as a medicine would increase or entrench its use as a recreational drug Restrictions on cannabis production would place the market under the control of criminal gangs. As a result, cannabis growing would continue to be defined by organized violence, corruption, smuggling and adulteration of the drug itself.\n\nLegitimatising cannabis use via state legislation ignores and conceals the human suffering caused by the production of drugs in both developed and developing states. .\n\nMoreover, many organized crime networks prefer to grow and sell cannabis over other, more strictly regulated drugs. It remains highly likely that the legal market for cannabis that the state proposes to create would become a target for organisations attempting to launder the proceeds of crime, or pass off tainted marijuana as medical grade forms of the drug.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "bd3652bf0239d528a6b75d446089c502", "text": "addiction health general healthcare thw require provision cannabis any state By promoting the use of soft drugs in any context, encourages young people down a slippery slope toward harder drugs\n\nPart of the attraction of cannabis, especially among younger users is its appeal as a ‘forbidden fruit’. Removing that would mean that other, harder drugs would be sought out to fulfill the same need to rebel.\n\nA government sanction on a drug with a proven tendency to effect memory and other neurological functions would still hold open the door to other, more dangerous, drugs as a form of rebellion. In this regard the continued ban on cannabis – and the relative tolerance of the breach of that ban – sends out a clear message of ‘this far and no further’.\n\nAny signal that this narcotic is acceptable simply increases the stakes.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
def30a4aad0739db578ffc4eff27df17	Rivals could misuse the opportunity While the leader suffers from an illness, rivals can use the opportunity to ease the leader out of office. A period of illness is a period of vulnerability in which the government is less able to respond to external and internal threats. Not telling the public about the leader's health during an illness helps prevent such attempts. The same is the case with a leader's death; a few days of secrecy allows for smooth succession as the appointed successor has the time to ensure the loyalty of the government, army and other vital institutions. In 2008 when General Lansana Conte of Guinea died power should have been transferred to the president of the National Assembly Aboubacar Sompare with an election within 90 days. Instead a group of junior military officers took advantage of the quick announcement to launch a coup. 1 1 Yusuf, Huma, ‘Military coup follows death of Guinea’s President’, The Christian Science Monitor, 23 December 2008, http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Africa/2008/1223/p99s01-woaf.html	[ { "docid": "ef433f27432acb0f77b740524a17d4fd", "text": "eech debate free speech and privacy health general international africa politics Transparency is still better than secrecy. There are several reasons why the opportunity of instability is as present when keeping the leader's health a secret. The first is that it is likely that at least some of the leader's rivals are in government so are likely to be in the loop on any illness. In this case secrecy simply gives these individuals more opportunity to do as they wish. Secondly a lack of transparency creates uncertainty which can be filled by a rival wanting to seize power; if the leader is just ill and there is a void of information it is simply for rivals to seize the narrative and claim he is dead enabling their takeover.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "6ec4846ed1147b5d1a1b0560506dc878", "text": "eech debate free speech and privacy health general international africa politics When leaders choose to serve the country they should be ready to sacrifice their privacy for the country. There is clearly a different standard for those who are in government and should be publicly accountable to those who are not. Even more minor illnesses can damage the running of the country through either affecting the judgment of the leader or limiting the amount of time he can work. The people have the right to demand their leader has his full attention of the issues affecting the nation. If he can't do that then he should resign.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "defaa9666c4c9d6bf1da943eb1c04b49", "text": "eech debate free speech and privacy health general international africa politics If the leader in-charge is in illness, to avoid any repudiation, the representative from the other side could meet the leader in order to confirm or even have a video conference with the leader in charge. The leader only needs to set the overall policy, not negotiate the fine details. When Nixon went to China the Americans knew Mao was ill but realised that he still set the overall direction of policy.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "43c882778b04d592f8cddd5df6d6afd7", "text": "eech debate free speech and privacy health general international africa politics Deputy leaders are appointed and they are well versed with how the leader is managing issues and are capable of taking up the role immediately after the leader resigns or dies. Being open and transparent about a leader being ill simply creates the lack of stability. If he lives it is best if the illness is not revealed as everything will carry on as before. If the leader dies then it is best nothing is known until his successor is announced so reducing the period of uncertainty.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "08b1e0166d7a7ef5a6d35545eff51f70", "text": "eech debate free speech and privacy health general international africa politics The media always want a good story; they are interested in the health of celebrities when there is no clear reason why they should have any right to this private information. The health of the leader is not something that the press or public needs to know about unless it is an illness that is likely to affect the president’s capacity to make decisions. A government’s decision should not be based upon the possibility that information on the leader’s health will leak and should take a consistent line that it is a private matter or provide a bare minimum of information.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8d8e7e9f52205e2142910716584cc30a", "text": "eech debate free speech and privacy health general international africa politics All of these procedures could be put in place even if there is secrecy. Doctors are already committed to patient-doctor confidentiality so are unlikely to tell the press if they are told beforehand to be ready to receive the President.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "18cad8e4e113f951f3f9104e1bd175d1", "text": "eech debate free speech and privacy health general international africa politics Administrative capabilities should not be compared to health. Unhealthy leaders may perform better than the healthy ones, people could be misled to choose inappropriate leaders while taking health as a black spot while the leader could actually have a better potential than the rest. If the electorate had just elected on the basis of health, or had been fully informed about presidents health then it is plausible that neither FD Roosevelt of JF Kennedy would have been elected. Neither completely hid their illnesses but they were not discussed and did not become election issues as they would have in a modern election. 1\n\n1 Berish, Amy, ‘FDR and Polio’, Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum, http://www.fdrlibrary.marist.edu/aboutfdr/polio.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "bfd5b9b1fa80c0053932072876007818", "text": "eech debate free speech and privacy health general international africa politics If a candidate has a condition during an election campaign then there is a clear right to know when the electorate is making the decision. But does such a right to know apply at other times when it will make no difference to the people? There can only be a right to know if it is going to affect the people, something that many illnesses won’t do.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "80e4107fc51e15a5e62f1ef8c19194c1", "text": "eech debate free speech and privacy health general international africa politics Damages diplomacy to be too open\n\nDiplomacy can be very personal; diplomatic initiatives are often the result of a single person, and the individual leader is necessary to conclude negotiations. Transparency about a leader's health may therefore prevent deals being done; Nixon went to China despite Mao's ill heath meaning the supreme Chinese leader contributed little to the historic change in diplomatic alinements. 1 Would such a momentous change in alignment have been possible if both the Chinese and American public knew about Mao's ill health? The Americans would have considered any deal unreliable as they could not be sure it was Mao who made the decision, while opponents in China could have argued that it was advisers like Zhou Enlai who made the deal not Mao himself potentially enabling them to repudiate or undermine the deal.\n\n1 Macmillan, Margaret, Seize the Hour When Nixon met Mao, John Murray, London, 2006, p.76\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e947b6540bc7c47591911bc47a308484", "text": "eech debate free speech and privacy health general international africa politics Denial of privacy to the leaders\n\nThe leaders of states deserve privacy in exactly the same way as anyone else. Just like their citizens leaders want and deserve privacy and it would be unfair for everyone to know about their health. Leaders may suffer from diseases such AIDS/HIV or embarrassing illnesses which could damage a leader.\n\nThe people only a need for the people to know when the illness significantly damages the running of the government. The government can function on its own without its leader for several days; only if the illness incapacitates the leader for a long period is there any need to tell the people. Clearly if the President is working from his bed he is still doing the job and his government is functioning. William Pitt the Younger, Prime Minister of Great Britain was toasted as 'the Saviour of Europe' while he was seriously ill but still running the country during the height of the Napoleonic Wars. 1\n\n1 Bloy, Marjie, 'William Pitt the Younger (1759-1806)', Victorian Web, 4 January 2006, http://www.victorianweb.org/history/pms/pitt.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "56f36edc94826cb7af81a459e64eeff8", "text": "eech debate free speech and privacy health general international africa politics Markets like stability\n\nBusiness and the markets prize political stability. Clearly when the leader of a country is ill this stability is damaged but the damage can be mitigated by being transparent. The markets will want to know how ill the leader is, and that the succession is secure so that they know what the future holds. Secrecy and the consequent spread of rumour is the worst option as businesses can have no idea what the future holds so cant make investment decisions that will be influenced by the political environment.\n\nLeaders do matter to the economy; they set the parameters of the business environment, the taxes, subsidies, how much bureaucracy. They also influence other areas like the price of energy, the availability of transport links etc. It has been estimated that “a one standard deviation change in leader quality leads to a growth change of 1.5 percentage points”. 1 The leader who follows may be of the same quality in which case there will be little difference but equally it could mean a large change.\n\n1 Jones, Benjjamin F., and Olken, Benjamin A., 'Do Leaders Matter? National Leadership and Growth Since World War II', Quarterly Journal of Economics, February 2005, http://economics.mit.edu/files/2915\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "940cca908bdaeee4ee193b3ad2d3c3f8", "text": "eech debate free speech and privacy health general international africa politics The people are interested in the health of their leader\n\nThe health of the leader of the state is an issue that the people and the media inevitably want to know about. There will always be a lot of interest in it. Occasionally this can be played by the administration as with Kissinger saying he was ill and using time to fly to Beijing to arrange for Nixon’s visit without press attention. But most of the time keeping things from the press is purely negative; it drives rumors.\n\nThis was the case of John Atta Mills, people were not allowed to know about his health. The presidential staff and communication members constantly lied about his health but there were two reports that he had died. Mills spent time in a US hospital, on returning to Ghana, he was made to jog around the airport to show the media that he was healthy. 1\n\n1 Committee for Social Advocacy, 'Who and what killed President John Evans Atta Mills?', Modern Ghana, 13 August 2012, http://www.modernghana.com/news/411220/1/who-and-what-killed-president-john-evans-atta-mill.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "eebc8531e702fcc53cf537590cfeb04e", "text": "eech debate free speech and privacy health general international africa politics Transparency allows citizens to choose for a healthy leader as to ensure proper functioning\n\nThe health and fitness of a leader is a vital issue when choosing a leader; the electorate deserves to know if they are likely to serve out their term. When health conditions are hidden from the people they may mistakenly elect a leader who is unable to serve a full term or is at times not in control of the country. There would be little point in voting for a leader who will often not truely be in charge of the country, if voters are told it becomes their choice whether this is a problem. Transparency in terms of clear, accurate and up-to-date information is necessary for the electorate to judge the fitness of a leader which is a necessary precondition for election. In a democracy a leader needs to be accountable, he can only be accountable if the elctorate knows such vital information.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e461ea08845ba768f5a66433bc0c3d28", "text": "eech debate free speech and privacy health general international africa politics The head of state/government must be accountable to the people\n\nSecrecy in relation to the leader’s health shows a distrust or distain of the electorate. Not being open about health issues almost invariably means that the administration is lying to those who elected them, those who they are accountable to. A couple of days before John Atta Mills died Nii Lantey Vanderpuye a candidate for Mills’ party stated “He [Mills] is stronger and healthier than any presidential candidate”, information that in retrospect was clearly untrue. 1\n\n1 Takyi-Boadu, Charles, ‘Confusion Hits Mills’, Modern Ghana, 21 July 2012, http://www.modernghana.com/news/407375/1/confusion-hits-mills.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8b3c1d589805644e685cc8a180abc033", "text": "eech debate free speech and privacy health general international africa politics A lack of transparency can endanger the leader\n\nA person is most likely to survive when they have an accident, a heart attack, or some other condition if they get prompt treatment and doctors are aware of any underlying conditions. Mills may well have lived, or lived longer if there had been more transparency about his death. There had been no prior warning that the president might be rushed to hospital despite the doctors having been called in the previous day. For the same reason his outriders were not available leading to indecision over whether to send off the ambulance. And finally he was initially turned away from the emergency ward because they did not know it was the President they were being asked to treat. 1 Transparency would allow procedures to be in place and advance notice given possibly gaining a few minutes and enabling survival.\n\n1 Daily Guide, ‘How Mills died: Sister tells it all’, My Joy Online, 31 August 2012, http://edition.myjoyonline.com/pages/news/201207/91359.php\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
a07d1f884074cca9e844a44fa76373bc	Sex work is legitimate work. Sex work is employment, and therefore requires legal protection. It remains the government responsibility to provide security for their productive workforce and enable them to organise, and unionise. Sex work empowers women and men by providing a means of income, independence and control over sexual practices, and flexible employment. A legal framework will enable sex workers to be able to unionise. Unions remain a source of power in politics. Recognising sex work as legitimate work enables positive intervention. Firstly, taxes can be collected by the state; and social security schemes established. Pensions can be set up and a safety-net for if workers become ill and or infected provided. Sex workers will be recognised as citizens, contributing to national wealth. Secondly, labour laws - such as minimal wages, hours, and safety, can be implemented. Labour laws are a means of regulating conditions of employment and workplaces preventing exploitation [1] . [1] ILO (2013) defines ‘decent work’ as productive work; work whereby rights are guaranteed and social protection provided; and work that promotes social organisations.	[ { "docid": "9215b5ea2bae929242f9bf50695535e2", "text": "disease sex sexuality international africa house would legalize sex work order Legalising sex work means legalising the trading of bodies as a commodity. The practice is disempowering and undermining human rights, not vice-versa. It remains immoral that the state should grant such transactions and introduce prostitution as a career path. By legalising sex work to control HIV, the state becomes an active agent in illegitimate practices. Further, the state makes money while no gains are made for workers. Who really benefits from legalisation?\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "38931cdbba521d0ad5f204a353a5f703", "text": "disease sex sexuality international africa house would legalize sex work order Gender inequality, hierarchies and violence, will become legalised [1] . Across Africa, women account for a higher proportion of the population living with HIV - gender inequalities are a key driver of the epidemic. For example, patriarchal structures encourage polygamy in marriage; and women’s roles in the reproductive sphere forces them into the caregiver role when someone in the household gets HIV/AIDS.\n\nThe legalisation of sex work will ensure the epidemic continues to ‘feminise’. Women will become commodified, meeting male demands and desires, within a unequal gender society.\n\n[1] Further readings on the debate of gender and sex work see: Richter, 2012.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a53da10be86cdc239180a13789145dfd", "text": "disease sex sexuality international africa house would legalize sex work order The inclusion of youths and children misses out a crucial component - poverty. Busza (2006) identifies three forms of ‘sexual exchange’: sex work, transactional sex, and survival sex. Children are often recruited into the sex trade as a result of poverty, desires for consumption, and a lack of social support.\n\nThe ”sugar daddy” phenomenon across Africa is a case in point. Older men are able to entice young women, and children, through false promises and material products [1] .\n\nWithout providing key necessities, and alternatives to meet needs, practices will be driven further underground and youngsters placed at greater risk.\n\n[1] For examples see: IRIN, 2013a; 2013b.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2cee6883c7f39bb453161ab20b07d887", "text": "disease sex sexuality international africa house would legalize sex work order Introducing new ‘good’ laws can drive sex work activities underground, and contradictorily reduce access to necessary health care services. Legislation does not ensure universal access: legalising sex work does not stop unequal politics.\n\nFirst, the provision of HIV/AIDS treatment and care is dependent on the global-economy and influenced by investor faiths, ethics, and motives [1] . Therefore access to ART (Antiretroviral treatment) among sex workers is controlled by who is providing aid and distributing resources. Second, the most effective prevention strategy is believed to be ABC (Abstinence, Be faithful, and use a Condom). Such mottos exclude sex workers, and directly place the burden of HIV/AIDS to the individual. Such mottos are founded on strong Christian beliefs - legalising sex work cannot easily change traditional structures.\n\n[1] A decline in global AID funding has been noted with the global economic downturn (World Bank, 2011). Further, the impact of faith-based institutions, and PEPFAR’s ‘anti-prostitution pledge’, on HIV/AIDS has been discussed (NSWP, 2011 Avert, 2013).\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "aebc3c5badd8a5a2658d8ccdb4d3c90b", "text": "disease sex sexuality international africa house would legalize sex work order The reality of a causal relation between legalising sex work and decriminalisation remains questionable. Accepting sex work within the legal framework does not ensure the practice is de-stigmatised or becomes regulated. Such contradictions indicate the depth of social stigmatisation towards sex work.\n\nTaking the case of Senegal, where prostitution has been legalised, police abuse continues and sex workers actively choose to work in unregulated environments. In Senegal’s booming sex trade industry, prostitutes are required to register with the police and granted a identity card confirming health requirements have been met. However, their identification places sex workers open to discrimination by the police and social stigma [1] . Further, the legalisation of the industry in Senegal has attracted immigrants and refugees to work within the industry. They lack citizenship rights; therefore legal protection is limited and abused. Clandestine sex work remains prevalent. Sex workers represent around 18% of HIV prevalence, particularly higher amongst women (Aids Alliance, 2013).\n\nSex workers rights will only emerge once sex work is de-stigmatised, the act of selling sex is no longer taboo, and corrupt laws changed to provide sex workers with respect and protection beyond the law. The stigma of sex work is the basis of illegality and criminalisation.\n\n[1] Senegal has a predominantly muslim population.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a6b291d1ce3dbfdde1303af7aa6d5749", "text": "disease sex sexuality international africa house would legalize sex work order Legalising sex work means control and regulation can be imposed on all aspects of the industry. Legalization ensures the sex workers are recognised as citizens, and workers, with rights. It does not preclude similar action relating to the demand aspect.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2022489d2c24fc7976d9c839d3bda15b", "text": "disease sex sexuality international africa house would legalize sex work order By legalising sex work the duty, and ethics, of care are granted to national bodies. The state is able to intervene and act when the rights of sex workers are identified as being breached. The individual self becomes empowered, and integrated into, a legal framework.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "80d73e51a4f805a4747a712fd94e48a1", "text": "disease sex sexuality international africa house would legalize sex work order Criminalising HIV transmission puts human rights in greater jeopardy. The stigmatisation of HIV/AIDS will remain prominent. The acceptance, and inclusion, of sex workers will become further marginalised as they become symbols of risk, disease, and transmission. This is something no sex worker would want. Countless articles from Ghana, Zimbabwe, and South Africa suggest public support legalising sex work (i.e. see Ghana Web, 2013).\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a9a00457fae6422310e8114228e29c31", "text": "disease sex sexuality international africa house would legalize sex work order Gender equality.\n\nEngaging in sex work is a choice; a reflection of individual agency, whereby control is granted over their own body. One has the right to choose how they use their body; therefore legalising sex work legitimising a woman’s, or man’s, right over their body and sexuality.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e579ce3be5a71941e9a2c55d4659ffb8", "text": "disease sex sexuality international africa house would legalize sex work order Legalising ensures health care and safe sex.\n\nLegalising sex work will enable regulation. Responsive laws can promote safe sex practices and enable access to health services [1] .\n\nFirstly, sex workers fear asking for health assistance, and treatment in public services, due to the illegal and criminalised nature of sex work. WHO (2011) predicted 1 in 3 sex workers received adequate HIV prevention; and less are able to access additional health services. Access is limited due to the criminalised status, but also cost of treatment and transport, inconvenient opening hours, and humiliation [2] . Secondly, the illegal nature of sex work has been attached to safe-practice tools. In Namibia, where prostitution remains commonly practiced but illegal, the criminalisation of accessing condoms enhances vulnerabilities. Following stop and searches by the police 50% of sex workers reported their condoms were destroyed (OSF, 2012). Within the 50%, 75% subsequently had unprotected sex. Being defined as illegal puts workers at greater risk.\n\nThrough legalisation sex workers can access tests and openly seek treatment, care and support.\n\n[1] ICASA, 2013, has argued national responses need to enable inclusive, and universal, access to health care treatment to combat HIV/AIDS.\n\n[2] See further readings: Mtewwa et al, 2013.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6256016f20fff1d8c82590200fc5ceea", "text": "disease sex sexuality international africa house would legalize sex work order Decriminalising increses sex workers’ rights.\n\nSex workers remain stigmatised across Africa. Legalising sex work enables the practice to be decriminalised, and rights provided.\n\nBeing a sex worker where it is illegal creates additional risks and vulnerabilities. Reports from South Africa show that criminalizing sex workers makes them more likely to be victims of inhuman police action [1] . Sex workers are raped, abused, and harassed. The risk of unsafe sex is therefore practiced outside of their occupation as no legal rights are provided. Legalising, and subsequently decriminalising, sex work will first, tackle corrupt police soliciting sex. Secondly, a new rights framework is provided. Sex workers are able to fight exploitation and claim rights for protection by prosecuting perpetrators if raped or abused.\n\nSex work will continue either way - but legalising it means legal safety, protection, and negotiation, is provided.\n\n[1] The legalisation of sex work has been introduced by the ANC Women's League (ANCWL) in South Africa. See further readings: BBC, 2012; Daily News, 2013)\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4fb5157d7ec0d91e4c63145016c147d9", "text": "disease sex sexuality international africa house would legalize sex work order Monitoring who enters the sex trade.\n\nBy including sex workers under a legal framework regulatory rules can be imposed on who enters the profession, such as is found in Senegal. The introduction of Senegal’s Identity Card means frequent health checks are required upon registration to be a prostitute. Additionally, the use of children and youths within the sex industry can be controlled.\n\nGlobal estimations of HIV/AIDS show young people are at highest risk. The UNDP (2013) called for a legal framework able to ensure the protection of children and youths. Regulation and monitoring is the only way to do so.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e61dd49af14125b1b228414e07dbabf2", "text": "disease sex sexuality international africa house would legalize sex work order The causality is wrong.\n\nLegalisation doesn’t prevent HIV/AIDS transmission, safe sex, or effective regulation. Workers need to be taught about safe sex; safe sex needs to be legalised; and HIV transmission criminalised. National governments need to concentrate on providing access to prevention tools - such as condoms.\n\nLegalisation should not suddenly be announced by government but only done if it is what sex workers want and is the best option for them, this can be done through consolations with groups such as the Global Network of Sex Workers Projects(see NSWP, 2013), to help formulate policy that will work for everyone\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "bf1f572db24838b177af79c13722d280", "text": "disease sex sexuality international africa house would legalize sex work order The market framework: sex work is an industry.\n\nSex work needs to be understood as a market-based industry. Sex workers are influenced by supply and demand [1] . It needs to be questioned both who, what, and why sex workers are forced into sexual exchanges and alternatively, why demand is found.\n\nThe legalisation of sex work focuses on the supply-side - potentially ensuring safer, and just, practices for sex workers. However, demand is not resolved. First, legalization does not ensure customers are tested for HIV/AIDS and take precautions. Legalisation may not change behaviour or attitudes. Second, legalization may increase demand through sex tourism, commercial trafficking or exploitation. What drives the sex industry? Legalisation will result in expanding the sex industry, as seen in the 25% increase in the Netherlands following legalisation (Daley, 2001). In Uganda, condom use declines with more regular customers (Morris et al, 2009).\n\nWe need to ask what should be included within a legal framework - supply, demand; brothels, customers, or sex workers?\n\n[1] The ‘Swedish model’ rolled out in Europe is based on tackling demand. The legal reforms have been set to target the demand for prostitution through its criminalisation.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "41330f3caae68b6b8824bc6f6efc9ecc", "text": "disease sex sexuality international africa house would legalize sex work order Legalization leaves ‘risk’ in the hands of the worker.\n\nLegalising sex as work, puts the burden of risk to the sex workers themselves; and having its basis from European law models raises questions over applicability across Africa. Although, in theory, a legal framework will enhance a duty of rights and a voice for workers, it also becomes the individual who need to be aware of rights, safe practices, and security risks. Legalisation means individuals become responsible. However, when considering how youths are lured into cities, and workers enter the profession following promised opportunities, is that ‘just’? Before legalising the profession individuals need to be granted choices to not engage in such practices. The family relations forcing migration and prostitution need evaluation. How much power can national legislation have when traditional, local, and family power relations limit choices to enter sex work? Will state actors follow laws when sex work remains culturally unacceptable? Further, legalization needs to be met with opportunities to exit the industry.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
65c602721f917190f7b592032b5365ff	DNA evidence would reduce the risk of wrongful conviction The increased use of DNA evidence will minimize the risk of future wrongful convictions. An FBI study indicates that since 1989 DNA evidence has excluded the primary candidate in 25% of sexual assault cases1. This not only saves valuable police time, but ensures suspects are not called in for unnecessary and stressful questioning. Moreover, forensically valuable DNA can be found on evidence that has existed for decades, and thus assist in reversing previous miscarriages of justice. There have been a number of recent, high-profile cases of death row inmates being released on the grounds of DNA evidence, unavailable when they were first convicted. A DNA database would not merely render wrong verdicts right, but prevent such verdicts ever being made. 1 U.S. Department of Justice. (1996, June). Convicted by Juries, Exonerated by Science. Retrieved May 19, 2011, from U.S. Department of Justice:	[ { "docid": "2e2b7e1a0394014eed276186b00cbb92", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database The database is immaterial to the acquittal or exclusion of non-offenders. Where a primary suspect has been identified, a DNA profile ought to be created and compared to the crime scene data. Likewise, where suspicions persist concerning the guilt or innocence of a convicted individual, a sample of DNA can be taken. The database has predominant application in 'non-suspect' cases, and not the circumstances where the suspect or felon is already identified. It is also important to keep claims regarding the efficacy of DNA matching in context, Chief Constable Sims of the British Metropolitan Police stated that of '4.9 million crimes reported each year, of which 1.3 million are 'detected' (lead to charges)' only 33,000 involve DNA matching1. 1 Home Affairs Committee. (2010, March 4). The National DNA Database. Retrieved May 19, 2011, from UK Parliament:\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "81e99b7da3b327c19aa310d348619914", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database There is no such guarantee that a DNA database would have such an effect. In fact, there is a serious risk that genetic evidence will be used to the exclusion of material that might prove the innocence of the suspect. It is further likely that more crimes will be prosecuted on account of largely circumstantial evidence. Moreover, there is the possibility that not only the police, but also the jury, will be blinded by science. It seems unlikely that juries will be able to comprehend, or more importantly, to question, the genetic information that is yielded by the database. The irony is that forensic evidence has been instrumental in establishing the miscarriages of British justice in the 1970s, but might now serve to create miscarriages of its own.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "08eda125090570ed2624435121541b81", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database The most serious violent crimes, notably the offences of rape and murder, are most commonly committed by individuals known to the victim. When the suspects for the commission of a crime are obvious, DNA detection is superfluous. Moreover, it is invidious to propagate the belief in the public that crimes can be solved, or criminals deterred, by computer wizardry; evidence collected by a UK Parliamentary Commission suggests DNA matching led to crime detection in as little as 0.3% of cases1. Ultimately, unless the DNA is used to identify a genetic cause for aggression, violent crimes will continue to be committed 1 Home Affairs Committee. (2010, March 4). The National DNA Database. Retrieved May 19, 2011, from UK Parliament:\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "eb3061050bce900857256b03039f4dfb", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database Retaining the DNA of unconvicted suspects is not unlawful, only retaining it indefinitely. New British proposals to meet the requirements of the European Court of Human Rights' judgment are to ensure the DNA of the unconvicted remains on the database for just 6 years. The law has to be laid down in a set manner rather than imprecise terms. Loopholes are often found but in the long run, they are what create a fair and just legal system. We cannot have loose laws, everything must turn on the wording. The ruling stated that the DNA of the innocent could not be saved indefinitely, so the British government is proposing that this DNA only be kept on the system for 6 years. They have done what the Court has asked them to do, to take away the permanency; a DNA database remains.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4529bd0a5e07f2e48f39e81fd62c6bbd", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database The use of a DNA fingerprint can scarcely be regarded as an affront to civil liberties and therefore requiring consent. Firstly, as a British Home Office spokeswoman noted, 'before a person's profile can be added to (the database), the person must have been arrested for a recordable offence. That is a significant threshold'2. Furthermore, the procedure for taking a sample of DNA is less invasive than that required for the removal of blood. The police already possess a vast volume of information relating to the citizenry. The National Crime Information Center Computer in the United States contains files relating to fifteen million Americans and receives approximately seven million queries each day2. The availability of a DNA fingerprint to the police should be seen in the context of the personal information that is already held by outside agencies. Insurance brokers commonly require an extensive medical history of their clients. Employers subject their employees to random urine tests for drug and alcohol consumption. If we are prepared to place our personal information in the private sector, why can we not trust it to the public authority of the police? The DNA will only be utilised in the detection of crime. In short, the innocent citizen should have nothing to fear. 1 Doward, J. (2009, August 9). 'Racist bias' blamed for disparity in police DNA database. Retrieved May 18, 2011, from The Observer: 2 National Crime Information Center. (2009). About Us. Retrieved May 19, 2011, from Federal Bureau of Investigation:\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1da9a348c0849b50657797041f26c560", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database DNA fingerprinting has considerable advantages over conventional means of forensic crime detection, advantages that render any slight fallibility irrelevant. Conventional fingerprints attach only to hard surfaces, can be smeared, or avoided by the use of gloves. Even a clear print requires a significant degree of interpretation by investigating officers. The standard technique of comparing fourteen points between the print taken at the crime scene and the print of the accused has been subject to severe criticism. The novel 'polymerase chain reaction' (PCR) amplification technique facilitates an accurate DNA profile from very small amounts of genetic data. The fingerprint can be constructed notwithstanding contamination from oil, water or acid in the crime scene environment. The innocent and the accused should appreciate a novel fingerprinting technique that is both objective and accurate. Lastly, fears of wrongful conviction are misguided, a 2002 study found only 'two cases worldwide'1. 1 Phillipson, G. (2009, November 19). The case for a complete DNA database. Retrieved May 18, 2011, from Guardian:\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "85e135b148dad45387f558088771248f", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database A DNA database would reduce the time spent tracking down suspects\n\nA DNA database is not intended to replace conventional criminal investigation. The database ought to identify the potential suspects, each of whom can then be investigated by more conventional means. During 2008/09 in the United Kingdom, 'almost 6 in 10 crime scene profiles loaded to the National DNA Database were matched to a subject profile'1. There is no possibility of escaping the provision of technical evidence before a court. Doctors, ballistics experts, forensic scientists are already a common feature of the large criminal trial. The jury system is actually a bastion against conviction on account of complicated scientific facts. The British jury is instructed to acquit a defendant where they find reasonable doubt. If the genetic data and associated evidence is insufficiently conclusive, or presented without sufficient clarity, the jury is obliged to find the defendant not guilty. 1 NDNAD. (2009). National DNA Database: Annual Report 2007-09. Retrieved May 19, 2011, from\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9481b3f9e77b9f9668c61d125598068f", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database A DNA database would lead to more convictions, particularly in cases of violent crime\n\nAlthough overall levels of crime in England and Wales have decreased over the previous decade, the number of violent crimes against the person has markedly increased. These are the offences which raise most grave public concern and which are unlikely to leave conventional fingerprints. The National Commission on the Future of DNA Evidence estimates that thirty per cent of crime scenes contain the blood, semen, or saliva of the perpetrator1. DNA detection will be best equipped to identify the guilty. A full database ought to allow the use of DNA as an investigative tool where no suspect has yet been identified. Studies support this assertion; 'the overall detection rate for crimes of 23.5% rises to 38% where DNA is successfully recovered'2. Furthermore, in the United States, the number of reported rapes dropped to its lowest level in two decades due in large part to the use of DNA evidence3 1 Weathersbee, F. (1999, March 1). National Commission on the Future of DNA Evidence. Retrieved May 19, 2011, from National Institute of Justice: 2 Phillipson, G. (2009, November 19). The case for a complete DNA database. Retrieved May 18, 2011, from Guardian: 3 McGreal, C. (2009, October 8). Number of reported rapes in US drops to lowest level in two decades. Retrieved May 18, 2011, from Guardian:\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a6a7024027236b2720c861bd0098a5e5", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database DNA testing is fallible, and therefore should not be used as the basis of convictions\n\nAlthough DNA detection might have advantages over fingerprint dusting, the test is nevertheless fallible. Environmental factors at the crime scene such as heat, sunlight, or bacteria can corrupt any genetic data. Any DNA evidence must be stored in sterile and temperature controlled conditions. Criminals have been suspected of contaminating samples by swapping saliva. There is room for human error or fraud in comparing samples taken from suspects with those removed from a crime scene. The accuracy of any genetic profile is dependent upon the number of genes examined. Where less than four or five genes can be investigated, the PCR technique serves only to exaggerate any defects or omissions in the sample. In 1995 an 18 month investigation was launched into allegations that the FBI Crime Lab was 'dry-labbing' or faking results of DNA comparisons1. Furthermore, in the United Kingdom, the company used by police to analyse its DNA samples was shown to have secretly kept the genetic samples and personal details of 'hundreds of thousands' of arrested people, stoking fears that, if lost, they could be planted as evidence2. The mere creation of a database cannot be the panacea for crime detection. 1 Johnston, D. (1997, April 16). Report criticizes scientific testing at F.B.I Crime Lab. Retrieved May 19, 2011, from New York Times: 2 Barnett, A. (2006, July 16). Police DNA database 'is spiralling out of control'. Retrieved May 18, 2011, from Guardian:\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d945b1c52d1545163fd662c9138e7b91", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database Retaining the DNA of unconvicted suspects is unlawful\n\nThe European Court of Human Rights was quite clear when it stated that retaining indefinitely the DNA and fingerprint records of unconvicted suspects is unlawful1. The Strasbourg court made a unanimous decision that the UK keeping the DNA of the unconvicted on a database permanently was contrary to human rights and therefore illegal. They stated that due to the high level of disruption to human rights, on this issue the court would not have much \"margin of appreciation\" or leeway. Subsequent attempts to justify the database have been dismissed by the Commission as failing to provide 'clear, justifiable reasons for holding on to the DNA data from people who had not been convicted of a crime'2. The Commission also felt the retention of DNA profiles 'failed to recognise there were a disproportionate number of young black men, vulnerable people and children on the database'2 1 BBC News. (2007, September 5). All UK 'must be on DNA database'. Retrieved May 20, 2011, from BBC News: 2 Doward, J. (2009, August 9). 'Racist bias' blamed for disparity in police DNA database. Retrieved May 18, 2011, from The Observer:\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c93f02c86ace4bf520adc59fdf78a2cc", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database Having a DNA database should require individual consent\n\nThe invasiveness of the database resides in the information being maintained on file, rather than in the procedure for obtaining the genetic data. The decision to pass personal information to mortgage or insurance agencies is governed by individual consent. When the citizen releases information to outside agencies he receives a service in return. In being compelled to give a sample of DNA the innocent citizen would receive the scant benefit of being eliminated from a police investigation. Moreover, medical records are already subject to a significant degree of statutory protection from investigation. The use of genetic tests by insurance companies remains highly controversial. There is considerable potential for abuse of information that is so private, the person giving the sample will probably not know its contents and they will certainly not know the possible ways the information may be used1. Finally, there is a subtle yet significant difference in the attitude of government towards the citizen that is conveyed by the creation of a database. Every citizen, some from the moment of their birth, would be treated as a potential criminal. 1 BBC News. (2007, September 5). All UK 'must be on DNA database'. Retrieved May 20, 2011, from BBC News:\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
7075d4fdb46e217751078dc1d61ebabe	A DNA database would reduce the time spent tracking down suspects A DNA database is not intended to replace conventional criminal investigation. The database ought to identify the potential suspects, each of whom can then be investigated by more conventional means. During 2008/09 in the United Kingdom, 'almost 6 in 10 crime scene profiles loaded to the National DNA Database were matched to a subject profile'1. There is no possibility of escaping the provision of technical evidence before a court. Doctors, ballistics experts, forensic scientists are already a common feature of the large criminal trial. The jury system is actually a bastion against conviction on account of complicated scientific facts. The British jury is instructed to acquit a defendant where they find reasonable doubt. If the genetic data and associated evidence is insufficiently conclusive, or presented without sufficient clarity, the jury is obliged to find the defendant not guilty. 1 NDNAD. (2009). National DNA Database: Annual Report 2007-09. Retrieved May 19, 2011, from	[ { "docid": "81e99b7da3b327c19aa310d348619914", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database There is no such guarantee that a DNA database would have such an effect. In fact, there is a serious risk that genetic evidence will be used to the exclusion of material that might prove the innocence of the suspect. It is further likely that more crimes will be prosecuted on account of largely circumstantial evidence. Moreover, there is the possibility that not only the police, but also the jury, will be blinded by science. It seems unlikely that juries will be able to comprehend, or more importantly, to question, the genetic information that is yielded by the database. The irony is that forensic evidence has been instrumental in establishing the miscarriages of British justice in the 1970s, but might now serve to create miscarriages of its own.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "2e2b7e1a0394014eed276186b00cbb92", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database The database is immaterial to the acquittal or exclusion of non-offenders. Where a primary suspect has been identified, a DNA profile ought to be created and compared to the crime scene data. Likewise, where suspicions persist concerning the guilt or innocence of a convicted individual, a sample of DNA can be taken. The database has predominant application in 'non-suspect' cases, and not the circumstances where the suspect or felon is already identified. It is also important to keep claims regarding the efficacy of DNA matching in context, Chief Constable Sims of the British Metropolitan Police stated that of '4.9 million crimes reported each year, of which 1.3 million are 'detected' (lead to charges)' only 33,000 involve DNA matching1. 1 Home Affairs Committee. (2010, March 4). The National DNA Database. Retrieved May 19, 2011, from UK Parliament:\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "08eda125090570ed2624435121541b81", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database The most serious violent crimes, notably the offences of rape and murder, are most commonly committed by individuals known to the victim. When the suspects for the commission of a crime are obvious, DNA detection is superfluous. Moreover, it is invidious to propagate the belief in the public that crimes can be solved, or criminals deterred, by computer wizardry; evidence collected by a UK Parliamentary Commission suggests DNA matching led to crime detection in as little as 0.3% of cases1. Ultimately, unless the DNA is used to identify a genetic cause for aggression, violent crimes will continue to be committed 1 Home Affairs Committee. (2010, March 4). The National DNA Database. Retrieved May 19, 2011, from UK Parliament:\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "eb3061050bce900857256b03039f4dfb", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database Retaining the DNA of unconvicted suspects is not unlawful, only retaining it indefinitely. New British proposals to meet the requirements of the European Court of Human Rights' judgment are to ensure the DNA of the unconvicted remains on the database for just 6 years. The law has to be laid down in a set manner rather than imprecise terms. Loopholes are often found but in the long run, they are what create a fair and just legal system. We cannot have loose laws, everything must turn on the wording. The ruling stated that the DNA of the innocent could not be saved indefinitely, so the British government is proposing that this DNA only be kept on the system for 6 years. They have done what the Court has asked them to do, to take away the permanency; a DNA database remains.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4529bd0a5e07f2e48f39e81fd62c6bbd", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database The use of a DNA fingerprint can scarcely be regarded as an affront to civil liberties and therefore requiring consent. Firstly, as a British Home Office spokeswoman noted, 'before a person's profile can be added to (the database), the person must have been arrested for a recordable offence. That is a significant threshold'2. Furthermore, the procedure for taking a sample of DNA is less invasive than that required for the removal of blood. The police already possess a vast volume of information relating to the citizenry. The National Crime Information Center Computer in the United States contains files relating to fifteen million Americans and receives approximately seven million queries each day2. The availability of a DNA fingerprint to the police should be seen in the context of the personal information that is already held by outside agencies. Insurance brokers commonly require an extensive medical history of their clients. Employers subject their employees to random urine tests for drug and alcohol consumption. If we are prepared to place our personal information in the private sector, why can we not trust it to the public authority of the police? The DNA will only be utilised in the detection of crime. In short, the innocent citizen should have nothing to fear. 1 Doward, J. (2009, August 9). 'Racist bias' blamed for disparity in police DNA database. Retrieved May 18, 2011, from The Observer: 2 National Crime Information Center. (2009). About Us. Retrieved May 19, 2011, from Federal Bureau of Investigation:\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1da9a348c0849b50657797041f26c560", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database DNA fingerprinting has considerable advantages over conventional means of forensic crime detection, advantages that render any slight fallibility irrelevant. Conventional fingerprints attach only to hard surfaces, can be smeared, or avoided by the use of gloves. Even a clear print requires a significant degree of interpretation by investigating officers. The standard technique of comparing fourteen points between the print taken at the crime scene and the print of the accused has been subject to severe criticism. The novel 'polymerase chain reaction' (PCR) amplification technique facilitates an accurate DNA profile from very small amounts of genetic data. The fingerprint can be constructed notwithstanding contamination from oil, water or acid in the crime scene environment. The innocent and the accused should appreciate a novel fingerprinting technique that is both objective and accurate. Lastly, fears of wrongful conviction are misguided, a 2002 study found only 'two cases worldwide'1. 1 Phillipson, G. (2009, November 19). The case for a complete DNA database. Retrieved May 18, 2011, from Guardian:\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "330412eb3ec1ca607f5a923276e44f32", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database DNA evidence would reduce the risk of wrongful conviction\n\nThe increased use of DNA evidence will minimize the risk of future wrongful convictions. An FBI study indicates that since 1989 DNA evidence has excluded the primary candidate in 25% of sexual assault cases1. This not only saves valuable police time, but ensures suspects are not called in for unnecessary and stressful questioning. Moreover, forensically valuable DNA can be found on evidence that has existed for decades, and thus assist in reversing previous miscarriages of justice. There have been a number of recent, high-profile cases of death row inmates being released on the grounds of DNA evidence, unavailable when they were first convicted. A DNA database would not merely render wrong verdicts right, but prevent such verdicts ever being made. 1 U.S. Department of Justice. (1996, June). Convicted by Juries, Exonerated by Science. Retrieved May 19, 2011, from U.S. Department of Justice:\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9481b3f9e77b9f9668c61d125598068f", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database A DNA database would lead to more convictions, particularly in cases of violent crime\n\nAlthough overall levels of crime in England and Wales have decreased over the previous decade, the number of violent crimes against the person has markedly increased. These are the offences which raise most grave public concern and which are unlikely to leave conventional fingerprints. The National Commission on the Future of DNA Evidence estimates that thirty per cent of crime scenes contain the blood, semen, or saliva of the perpetrator1. DNA detection will be best equipped to identify the guilty. A full database ought to allow the use of DNA as an investigative tool where no suspect has yet been identified. Studies support this assertion; 'the overall detection rate for crimes of 23.5% rises to 38% where DNA is successfully recovered'2. Furthermore, in the United States, the number of reported rapes dropped to its lowest level in two decades due in large part to the use of DNA evidence3 1 Weathersbee, F. (1999, March 1). National Commission on the Future of DNA Evidence. Retrieved May 19, 2011, from National Institute of Justice: 2 Phillipson, G. (2009, November 19). The case for a complete DNA database. Retrieved May 18, 2011, from Guardian: 3 McGreal, C. (2009, October 8). Number of reported rapes in US drops to lowest level in two decades. Retrieved May 18, 2011, from Guardian:\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a6a7024027236b2720c861bd0098a5e5", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database DNA testing is fallible, and therefore should not be used as the basis of convictions\n\nAlthough DNA detection might have advantages over fingerprint dusting, the test is nevertheless fallible. Environmental factors at the crime scene such as heat, sunlight, or bacteria can corrupt any genetic data. Any DNA evidence must be stored in sterile and temperature controlled conditions. Criminals have been suspected of contaminating samples by swapping saliva. There is room for human error or fraud in comparing samples taken from suspects with those removed from a crime scene. The accuracy of any genetic profile is dependent upon the number of genes examined. Where less than four or five genes can be investigated, the PCR technique serves only to exaggerate any defects or omissions in the sample. In 1995 an 18 month investigation was launched into allegations that the FBI Crime Lab was 'dry-labbing' or faking results of DNA comparisons1. Furthermore, in the United Kingdom, the company used by police to analyse its DNA samples was shown to have secretly kept the genetic samples and personal details of 'hundreds of thousands' of arrested people, stoking fears that, if lost, they could be planted as evidence2. The mere creation of a database cannot be the panacea for crime detection. 1 Johnston, D. (1997, April 16). Report criticizes scientific testing at F.B.I Crime Lab. Retrieved May 19, 2011, from New York Times: 2 Barnett, A. (2006, July 16). Police DNA database 'is spiralling out of control'. Retrieved May 18, 2011, from Guardian:\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d945b1c52d1545163fd662c9138e7b91", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database Retaining the DNA of unconvicted suspects is unlawful\n\nThe European Court of Human Rights was quite clear when it stated that retaining indefinitely the DNA and fingerprint records of unconvicted suspects is unlawful1. The Strasbourg court made a unanimous decision that the UK keeping the DNA of the unconvicted on a database permanently was contrary to human rights and therefore illegal. They stated that due to the high level of disruption to human rights, on this issue the court would not have much \"margin of appreciation\" or leeway. Subsequent attempts to justify the database have been dismissed by the Commission as failing to provide 'clear, justifiable reasons for holding on to the DNA data from people who had not been convicted of a crime'2. The Commission also felt the retention of DNA profiles 'failed to recognise there were a disproportionate number of young black men, vulnerable people and children on the database'2 1 BBC News. (2007, September 5). All UK 'must be on DNA database'. Retrieved May 20, 2011, from BBC News: 2 Doward, J. (2009, August 9). 'Racist bias' blamed for disparity in police DNA database. Retrieved May 18, 2011, from The Observer:\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c93f02c86ace4bf520adc59fdf78a2cc", "text": "crime policing law general house would have criminal dna database Having a DNA database should require individual consent\n\nThe invasiveness of the database resides in the information being maintained on file, rather than in the procedure for obtaining the genetic data. The decision to pass personal information to mortgage or insurance agencies is governed by individual consent. When the citizen releases information to outside agencies he receives a service in return. In being compelled to give a sample of DNA the innocent citizen would receive the scant benefit of being eliminated from a police investigation. Moreover, medical records are already subject to a significant degree of statutory protection from investigation. The use of genetic tests by insurance companies remains highly controversial. There is considerable potential for abuse of information that is so private, the person giving the sample will probably not know its contents and they will certainly not know the possible ways the information may be used1. Finally, there is a subtle yet significant difference in the attitude of government towards the citizen that is conveyed by the creation of a database. Every citizen, some from the moment of their birth, would be treated as a potential criminal. 1 BBC News. (2007, September 5). All UK 'must be on DNA database'. Retrieved May 20, 2011, from BBC News:\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
596f0fd9dcd47ff39dad5bb7bc1eb984	Intercept evidence deals particularly well with cases of conspiracy and criminal gangs which have a widespread network. Intercept evidence can be very useful for showing associations between groups of people [1] , which can be incredibly helpful in cases such as conspiracies to link people and events together. It can also expose inconsistencies or falsity in an individual’s alibi [2] or personal character if they deny contact with a certain party where intercept evidence proves that they had communicated [3] . However, under the status quo the defence lawyer may not be authorised to intercept evidence which would prove their client’s innocence [4] . Allowing such techniques would help to equalise the prosecution and defence; after all, the aim of court is not to blindly prosecute the defendant, but to ascertain whether he or she is in fact guilty before any prosecution occurs. Widening the array of tools which can be used by both prosecution and defence helps to encourage a wider view of the case and arrive at a more accurate verdict. [1] http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704889404576277341101995436.html , accessed 30/08/11 [2] http://www.totalcriminaldefense.com/news/articles/criminal-evidence/wiretap-legality.aspx , accessed 30/08/11 [3] http://www.totalcriminaldefense.com/news/articles/criminal-evidence/wiretap-legality.aspx , accessed 30/08/11 [4] http://chicagoist.com/2011/04/14/blagojevich_live_presser.php , accessed 30/08/11	[ { "docid": "9311e92cf48e44abafebd46465f79608", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted While intercept evidence may well show links between people, it does not necessarily accurately show what they were doing. In this way, intercepts make good intelligence, but poor evidence. There is no guarantee that intercept evidence will ‘prove’ anything in court rather than simply creating unfounded implications which could actually serve to confuse, rather than clear, the case in question. Until intercept intelligence can prove itself reliable enough to be routinely used as genuine evidence – and it is unclear that it ever will [1] – it certainly should not become an established part of the wider legal system.\n\n[1] http://www.lrb.co.uk/v27/n06/conor-gearty/short-cuts , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "4a2f756fe5cd53b3b8f226585965ab34", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted For every expert who advocates the use of intercept evidence there is another who fiercely warns against it, particularly those who are experts in law [1] . Despite the use of wiretapping in the USA, many people advocate against intercept evidence by pointing out its past failures [2] and questionable authorisation [3] [4] . In the UK, MI5, MI6 and GCHQ have voiced concerns that wire-tapping would expose the methods used by intelligence services [5] . This is not purely a debate about whether wire-tapping works, but whether it is in line with the legal principles held by those countries and states who currently do not allow it to be used in court. Just because it could be used does not make it legitimate – in fact, there is often heavy criticism against wiretapping within the legal profession itself [6] [7] .\n\n[1] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/17/AR2006081700650.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/Wiretap-evidence-fails-in-New-York-drug-case-against-Jamaican_8024001 , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[3] http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11027207/ns/politics/t/sen-clinton-criticizes-bush-wiretap-rationale/ , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[4] http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/Politics/story?id=1420233 , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[5] http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/feb/06/uk.ukcrime , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[6] http://fortunaty.net/org/wikileaks/CRS/wikileaks-crs-reports/98-251.pdf , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[7] http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14393611/ns/us_news-security/t/feds-appeal-ruling-against-wiretap-program/ , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9517d1561242770a3565e3718d4fccb7", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted The more obvious solution to this problem (from the opposition’s view) would be to maintain a clear policy where no intercept evidence is admissible in court. However, this particular case becomes an anomaly for good reason. Individual countries – in this case Britain – cannot dictate whether foreign intelligence services – the Dutch – choose to reveal their intelligence-gathering methods or not. In this case, the crossover between national policies on information intelligence [1] led to this anomaly.\n\n[1] http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2002/sep/08/ukcrime1 , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1960113628ee68248da7ae14788560e9", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted If the use of wiretapping and intercept evidence was as simple as proposition makes out, undoubtedly it would be a common tool. However, there are also serious flaws in how this intelligence is gathered and interpreted. For example, a phone call might seem unduly incriminating when taken out of context and heard in a court of law which has already projected suspicions upon a particular individual [1] . Focusing only on one form of communications as is normal when authorisation is given for these interceptions fails to take in the wider picture and continues to be heard without the context [2] . Whether this unfairly incriminates somebody who has not acted in a crime, or falsely ‘proves’ the innocence of somebody who is not in fact innocent, intercept evidence is limited in its scope and as such should not be admissible in court.\n\n[1] http://www.fiercefinance.com/story/rajaratnam-jury-listens-more-wiretaps/2011-04-28 , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://www.fiercefinance.com/story/rajaratnam-jury-listens-more-wiretaps/2011-04-28 , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "dd7a42683c7b5babc41136bdd152ceaa", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted As criminals and terrorists adapt to modern times, so should the law. If the principles of law are responsible for a failure to act which ultimately leads to criminals walking free and crimes being repeatedly committed, then the law has failed to serve the society it was built for [1] . The principles of law are meant to uphold justice [2] , but in this case they become an obstacle to it. Considering that the law in countries like Britain has already acknowledged intercept evidence as a tool in specific cases [3] , it cannot oppose the underlying principle of intercept evidence – rather, the practicalities. This undermines the opposition’s argument that intercept evidence is fundamentally out of joint with legal practice. Problematic practicalities will be better regulated [4] [5] and monitored if this motion is granted, but until then we risk allowing crime to go unhindered because of an imaginary obligation to the past.\n\n[1] http://sixthsense.osfc.ac.uk/citizenship/distinction_crim_civil/distinction_crim_civil.asp , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://www.gsdrc.org/go/display&type=Document&id=4054 , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[3] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/8437978/BT-and-Phorm-escape-prosecution-for-secret-wiretaps.html ,, accessed 30/08/11\n\n[4] Regulations in American states: http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=jLnBeSbJiCUC&pg=PA542&lpg=PA542&dq=regulation+of+wiretapping&source=bl&ots=rvb5mnIUm0&sig=2vJFtD1c_ZN1F6P6FIfw-SuFmAs&hl=en&ei=Ru5cToXnI5DA8QPC0IjTAw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=5&ved=0CCsQ6AEwBDgK#v=onepage&q=regulation%20of%20wiretapping&f=false , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[5] Regulation of wiretapping in Australia: http://www.caslon.com.au/privacyguide3.htm , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a14255a464f2355e2fb571fc5fe2eefd", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted If wiretapping and intercept evidence can stop large-scale conspiracies [1] and potentially stop terrorist actions [2] , as it has done and has the potential to do, then price becomes irrelevant. The price of preventing perhaps hundred of people from being harmed in terrorist action should and will always outweigh a financial argument. Wiretapping could in fact lift the burden on over-stretched police forces as they do not have to physically apprehend criminals to attain evidence of their guilt. Wiretapping and intercept evidence is a step towards greater efficiency in our justice system.\n\n[1] http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2002/sep/08/ukcrime1 ,, accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] www.parliament.uk/briefing-papers/SN05249.pdf , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4458b008c41ab6b6e5df53bb6b37b774", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted More established forms of evidence – even those as sophisticated as DNA testing – also have their weaknesses. Following the death of British student Meredith Kercher, her supposed killer Amanda Knox was imprisoned after DNA evidence proved that Knox’s DNA was found on the handle of the murder weapon (a kitchen knife) while Meredith’s blood was on the blade [1] . However, an appeal has declared that the DNA evidence ‘was so small it should have been considered “inadmissible”’ [2] , and the original forensic team have been branded as incompetent [3] . This is an example of an extremely high-profile case which hinged a conviction on the use of ‘reliable’ DNA evidence, and may potentially be proved wrong – the appeal is currently ongoing. There is no evidence which is utterly, 100% certain; it is always open to interpretation. However, allowing intercept evidence in court gives another chance at finding out the truth. Given that intercept evidence would work in combination with expert cross-examination, there is no proof that intercept evidence cannot be as effective as any other form of evidence – or perhaps even more so.\n\n[1] http://news.sky.com/home/article/16040314 , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://news.sky.com/home/article/16040314 , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[3] http://news.sky.com/home/article/16040314 , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e5d768b201e8a9c20043ba752ed4e541", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted This argument is made irrelevant by the fact that the UK and other jurisdictions have rules of evidence which prevent the release of sensitive information from intelligence services [1] . There is no reason why playing a few minutes of recorded conversation in a courtroom automatically means that criminals and terrorists know the exact mechanisms used to record that information. Furthermore, if a trial is being held anyway, then the suspects involved already know that they have been monitored by intelligence services – otherwise they would not have been brought to trial. Similarly, high-risk terrorist cells already protect their communication by using things like encrypted messages [2] and disposable mobile phones [3] . Dangerous criminals and terrorists are already one step ahead of our current justice system; implementing this motion is the only way to have a genuine chance at apprehending them.\n\n[1] The Official Secrets Act of 1989: https://www.sis.gov.uk/glossary.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2001-02-05-binladen.htm , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[3] http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/Investigation/story?id=1499905 , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "73096dbc002d5f5f8eeb0d1dab6094d0", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted Intercepted evidence could be incredibly useful for both prosecution and defence cases in many trials.\n\nIntercept evidence offers the opportunity to speed up court trials and stop wasting time and money by providing information which could lead to a faster, more accurate verdict. Other western democracies who use wire-tap evidence believe that is has or will help to achieve criminal convictions [1] [2] [3] , which demonstrates popular support for it as an effective and swift method of justice. Given that the UK has allowed wire-tapping in some specific cases [4] , it seems to be that it is not the principle of intercept evidence itself which is viewed as unacceptable by these countries, but perhaps a need to set up a formalised system of the conditions when and where intercept evidence can be used. David Bickford, the former chief legal adviser to MI5, has stated ‘I know we have lost cases as a result of not using such evidence’ [5] and other experts have called for the wide use of intercept evidence in court [6] . Allowing the use of intercept evidence in the first place may well ensure that wire-taps are better carried out in a standardised, regulated manner\n\n[1] In Sweden: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/7463333.stm , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] Widely in the USA: http://www.justice.gov/archive/ll/highlights.htm , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[3] In Australia: http://www.thenewsmanual.net/Resources/medialaw_in_australia_06.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[4] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/8437978/BT-and-Phorm-escape-prosecution-for-secret-wiretaps.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[5] http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2005/jan/28/september11.humanrights , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[6] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/7732242/Intercept-evidence-should-be-admitted-in-court-officials-believe.html , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c835d4b6167d83c3203e9788ff475357", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted Countries which do not allow intercept evidence have created a contradictory, rather than transparent, set of legal boundaries.\n\nBritain in particular seems to hold a paradoxical set of values in relation to intercept evidence. For example, British courts have allowed intercept material which has been lawfully obtained by foreign police forces. One notable example of this was the conviction of the Merseyside drugs squad chief Elmore Davies when it was discovered that he had a corrupt relationship with drug baron Curtis Warren [1] . The information which led to his conviction was collected on Dutch mobile phones by the Dutch police force, despite the fact that some of the conversations took place wholly within the UK. However this – bizarrely – was allowed as evidence in a British court [2] , despite the systematic rejection of intercept evidence in other cases. When a country seems to recognise and even capitalise on the potential of intercept evidence in some cases but simultaneously reject it in others, the result is inconsistent legal standards which damage accountability and transparency of the entire state.\n\n[1] http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2002/sep/08/ukcrime1 , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2002/sep/08/ukcrime1 , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f434d9bbc5176d806f8543eb8cd07955", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted Wiretapping is a highly effective method which helps to prevent serious crime and secure convictions for criminals.\n\nWiretapping helps to make society safer; we have the opportunity to prevent serious crime and to uphold the principle of prosecution in the justice system [1] by catching criminals and convicting them. For example, in the UK in 2003, intercepts led to the seizure of 26 tonnes of drugs and also detected wide-scale fraud and money laundering, resulting in 1680 arrests [2] . Without this evidence, these criminals may have escaped the justice system and remained free in society to commit other crimes. It is nonsensical to reject evidence which clearly implicates this individuals who would otherwise be released without charge. As the threat of terrorism escalates and had already damaged many countries [3] [4] [5] [6] , refusal to use this evidence in court puts the public at serious risk and fails to act in the defence of the country in question. For example, if the Norwegian authorities had kept closer tabs on information passed through eBay, they might well have been able to apprehend Anders Breivik before he committed the massacre on Utoya island [7] . Wiretapping is unique in the variety of information it can provide; it can show locations [8] , times [9] , the relationships between those involved [10] and even record specific details of conspiracies [11] . Accordingly, it can also be used to prove the innocence of somebody who might otherwise be wrongly accused or even wrongly imprisoned [12] [13] . The obvious benefits to this motion demand that intercept evidence and wiretapping should be held as legitimate evidence in court.\n\n[1] Page 65: http://vac.wvasiapacific.org/downloads/SAVE5.pdf , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://www.newlawjournal.co.uk/nlj/content/surveillance-and-privacy—where-boundaries-blur , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[3] In the UK: https://www.mi5.gov.uk/output/international-terrorism-and-the-uk.html\n\n[4] In Norway: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/norway/8673118/Norway-massacre-British-traders-helped-supply-Breiviks-arsenal-of-weapons.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[5] In the USA: http://www.army.mil/terrorism/ , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[6] In Europe and Belgium: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/belgium/8154475/Europe-wide-terrorism-arrests-after-plans-for-attack-on-Belgium.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[7] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/norway/8673118/Norway-massacre-British-traders-helped-supply-Breiviks-arsenal-of-weapons.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[8] http://www.eavesdropping-news.com/news-subjects/cell-phones-eavesdroppin... , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[9] http://www.eavesdropping-news.com/news-subjects/cell-phones-eavesdropping-wiretapping/cell-phone-syping.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[10] http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704889404576277341101995436.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[11] http://www.npr.org/2011/05/12/136230882/wiretaps-help-prosecutors-get-hedge-fund-manager-convicted , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[12] http://chicagoist.com/2011/04/14/blagojevich_live_presser.php , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[13] http://articles.latimes.com/1992-02-14/news/mn-2239_1_top-gotti , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "19b62b684c80f9846d353649169e2577", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted Wiretapping can actually threaten the success of intelligence services in preventing crime and helping to prove criminals guilty.\n\nRegular use of wiretap and intercept evidence poses a danger to the evidence-gathering capabilities of intelligence agencies. There are concerns among experts that terrorists, far from being apprehended, will simply learn new techniques for ‘listening in to calls made over the internet’ [1] and know exactly who and what the intelligence services are monitoring. In this way, they could actually evade intelligence services and the police by using different forms of communication, such as encrypting messages or using disposable mobile phones. Revealing the capabilities of our intelligence agencies could create harms which far outweigh any potential benefits of intercept evidence [2] . This makes intercept evidence self-negating; if it is used, the very revelation of its use will alert criminals to it and make it vulnerable to manipulation and tampering – therefore, the evidence actually becomes less reliable and less effective [3] . Ultimately, it does not provide a tangible benefit.\n\n[1] http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article2806756.ece , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article2806756.ece , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[3] http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article2806756.ece , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3ce2d124c9ea76ac891ad11e5d6a00aa", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted Common authorisation for wiretapping would result in misallocation of resources.\n\nWiretaps are not only unreliable, but incredibly expensive [1] [2] . Intelligence agents also often find themselves inadvertently listening in on ‘irrelevant, non-incriminating aspects of the target’s life’ [3] which not only breaches the privacy of innocent people but is an obvious waste of time and money for all involved. Given that many countries are considering or have cut their funding for police forces because of the recession [4] [5] [6] , this money could be put to a better use: preventing crime and terrorist activity by a stronger police presence.\n\n[1] http://www.tscm.com/wiretaprobin.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2008/03/fbis-500-millio/ , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[3] http://cdt.org/wiretap/wiretap_overview.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[4] In the UK: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/aug/11/nick-clegg-police-funding-cuts-riots , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[5] In the USA: http://www.businessinsider.com/newark-carjackings-2011-1 , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[6] In New Zealand: http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA1104/S00010/cuts-to-police-budget-endanger-progress.htm , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c06c88a60f3814548041a3ae46352b73", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted The controversy which surrounds intercept evidence is far-reaching and very complex.\n\nThis debate is not contained within the courtroom but also spans wider principles of legal justice and the rules which uphold democratic law. Even countries which currently allow this evidence, such as certain US states [1] , have noted that it can be difficult to use successfully and without violating past Acts and wider legal principles [2] . Bodies such as MI5, MI6 and GCHQ argue that revealing the ‘evidence’ necessitates revealing how that evidence was garnered; as such, intercept evidence can compromise the security status of intelligence services and their techniques [3] . This kind of method should be reserved, if used at all, for singular, extreme cases such as terrorist activity where all other possibilities for collecting evidence have truly been exhausted. Finally, wiretapping and intercept evidence has been criticised or deemed illegitimate by many legal professionals [4] [5] . For this kind of evidence to be admissible in court, it needs to follow legal principles which have already been set up. There is little evidence that it can do so.\n\n[1] http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=416586 , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data/constitution/amendment04/05.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[3] http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/feb/06/uk.ukcrime , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[4] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/17/AR2006081700650.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[5] http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14393611/ns/us_news-security/t/feds-appeal-ruling-against-wiretap-program/ , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "914a6e5369a87746f5a65c1480273b1b", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted Intercept evidence is simply not reliable enough to be effective evidence in court.\n\nWiretap evidence is not as reliable as other forms of evidence which we currently have at our disposal, such as DNA evidence which has ‘sent thousands of people to prison and . . . has played a vital role in exonerating men who were falsely convicted’ [1] . Many potential aspects of intercept evidence lack this reliability. Voice analysis, for example, has been shown to be unreliable in exploring messages supposedly spoken by Osama Bin Laden [2] . Video intercept evidence notably failed when a video which purported to show Morgan Tsvangirai (the Zimbabwean opposition leader) conspiring against the government, when in fact he was somewhere else at the time [3] . The poor quality of intercept evidence is a threat within an individual trial, but also more widely; reliance on intercept evidence by prosecutors might lead to more cases collapsing after the evidence is proved unreliable, and wasting time and money for all involved.\n\n[1] http://www.bioforensics.com/articles/champion1/champion1.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/11/13/tech/main529273.shtml , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[3] http://www.swradioafrica.com/Documents/TheStateversusMorganTsvangirai.htm , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
f92457ec812dc8f34d0a993202ca1ccd	The controversy which surrounds intercept evidence is far-reaching and very complex. This debate is not contained within the courtroom but also spans wider principles of legal justice and the rules which uphold democratic law. Even countries which currently allow this evidence, such as certain US states [1] , have noted that it can be difficult to use successfully and without violating past Acts and wider legal principles [2] . Bodies such as MI5, MI6 and GCHQ argue that revealing the ‘evidence’ necessitates revealing how that evidence was garnered; as such, intercept evidence can compromise the security status of intelligence services and their techniques [3] . This kind of method should be reserved, if used at all, for singular, extreme cases such as terrorist activity where all other possibilities for collecting evidence have truly been exhausted. Finally, wiretapping and intercept evidence has been criticised or deemed illegitimate by many legal professionals [4] [5] . For this kind of evidence to be admissible in court, it needs to follow legal principles which have already been set up. There is little evidence that it can do so. [1] http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=416586 , accessed 30/08/11 [2] http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data/constitution/amendment04/05.html , accessed 30/08/11 [3] http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/feb/06/uk.ukcrime , accessed 30/08/11 [4] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/17/AR2006081700650.html , accessed 30/08/11 [5] http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14393611/ns/us_news-security/t/feds-appeal-ruling-against-wiretap-program/ , accessed 30/08/11	[ { "docid": "dd7a42683c7b5babc41136bdd152ceaa", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted As criminals and terrorists adapt to modern times, so should the law. If the principles of law are responsible for a failure to act which ultimately leads to criminals walking free and crimes being repeatedly committed, then the law has failed to serve the society it was built for [1] . The principles of law are meant to uphold justice [2] , but in this case they become an obstacle to it. Considering that the law in countries like Britain has already acknowledged intercept evidence as a tool in specific cases [3] , it cannot oppose the underlying principle of intercept evidence – rather, the practicalities. This undermines the opposition’s argument that intercept evidence is fundamentally out of joint with legal practice. Problematic practicalities will be better regulated [4] [5] and monitored if this motion is granted, but until then we risk allowing crime to go unhindered because of an imaginary obligation to the past.\n\n[1] http://sixthsense.osfc.ac.uk/citizenship/distinction_crim_civil/distinction_crim_civil.asp , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://www.gsdrc.org/go/display&type=Document&id=4054 , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[3] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/8437978/BT-and-Phorm-escape-prosecution-for-secret-wiretaps.html ,, accessed 30/08/11\n\n[4] Regulations in American states: http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=jLnBeSbJiCUC&pg=PA542&lpg=PA542&dq=regulation+of+wiretapping&source=bl&ots=rvb5mnIUm0&sig=2vJFtD1c_ZN1F6P6FIfw-SuFmAs&hl=en&ei=Ru5cToXnI5DA8QPC0IjTAw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=5&ved=0CCsQ6AEwBDgK#v=onepage&q=regulation%20of%20wiretapping&f=false , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[5] Regulation of wiretapping in Australia: http://www.caslon.com.au/privacyguide3.htm , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "a14255a464f2355e2fb571fc5fe2eefd", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted If wiretapping and intercept evidence can stop large-scale conspiracies [1] and potentially stop terrorist actions [2] , as it has done and has the potential to do, then price becomes irrelevant. The price of preventing perhaps hundred of people from being harmed in terrorist action should and will always outweigh a financial argument. Wiretapping could in fact lift the burden on over-stretched police forces as they do not have to physically apprehend criminals to attain evidence of their guilt. Wiretapping and intercept evidence is a step towards greater efficiency in our justice system.\n\n[1] http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2002/sep/08/ukcrime1 ,, accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] www.parliament.uk/briefing-papers/SN05249.pdf , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4458b008c41ab6b6e5df53bb6b37b774", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted More established forms of evidence – even those as sophisticated as DNA testing – also have their weaknesses. Following the death of British student Meredith Kercher, her supposed killer Amanda Knox was imprisoned after DNA evidence proved that Knox’s DNA was found on the handle of the murder weapon (a kitchen knife) while Meredith’s blood was on the blade [1] . However, an appeal has declared that the DNA evidence ‘was so small it should have been considered “inadmissible”’ [2] , and the original forensic team have been branded as incompetent [3] . This is an example of an extremely high-profile case which hinged a conviction on the use of ‘reliable’ DNA evidence, and may potentially be proved wrong – the appeal is currently ongoing. There is no evidence which is utterly, 100% certain; it is always open to interpretation. However, allowing intercept evidence in court gives another chance at finding out the truth. Given that intercept evidence would work in combination with expert cross-examination, there is no proof that intercept evidence cannot be as effective as any other form of evidence – or perhaps even more so.\n\n[1] http://news.sky.com/home/article/16040314 , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://news.sky.com/home/article/16040314 , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[3] http://news.sky.com/home/article/16040314 , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e5d768b201e8a9c20043ba752ed4e541", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted This argument is made irrelevant by the fact that the UK and other jurisdictions have rules of evidence which prevent the release of sensitive information from intelligence services [1] . There is no reason why playing a few minutes of recorded conversation in a courtroom automatically means that criminals and terrorists know the exact mechanisms used to record that information. Furthermore, if a trial is being held anyway, then the suspects involved already know that they have been monitored by intelligence services – otherwise they would not have been brought to trial. Similarly, high-risk terrorist cells already protect their communication by using things like encrypted messages [2] and disposable mobile phones [3] . Dangerous criminals and terrorists are already one step ahead of our current justice system; implementing this motion is the only way to have a genuine chance at apprehending them.\n\n[1] The Official Secrets Act of 1989: https://www.sis.gov.uk/glossary.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2001-02-05-binladen.htm , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[3] http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/Investigation/story?id=1499905 , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4a2f756fe5cd53b3b8f226585965ab34", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted For every expert who advocates the use of intercept evidence there is another who fiercely warns against it, particularly those who are experts in law [1] . Despite the use of wiretapping in the USA, many people advocate against intercept evidence by pointing out its past failures [2] and questionable authorisation [3] [4] . In the UK, MI5, MI6 and GCHQ have voiced concerns that wire-tapping would expose the methods used by intelligence services [5] . This is not purely a debate about whether wire-tapping works, but whether it is in line with the legal principles held by those countries and states who currently do not allow it to be used in court. Just because it could be used does not make it legitimate – in fact, there is often heavy criticism against wiretapping within the legal profession itself [6] [7] .\n\n[1] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/17/AR2006081700650.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/Wiretap-evidence-fails-in-New-York-drug-case-against-Jamaican_8024001 , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[3] http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11027207/ns/politics/t/sen-clinton-criticizes-bush-wiretap-rationale/ , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[4] http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/Politics/story?id=1420233 , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[5] http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/feb/06/uk.ukcrime , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[6] http://fortunaty.net/org/wikileaks/CRS/wikileaks-crs-reports/98-251.pdf , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[7] http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14393611/ns/us_news-security/t/feds-appeal-ruling-against-wiretap-program/ , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9311e92cf48e44abafebd46465f79608", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted While intercept evidence may well show links between people, it does not necessarily accurately show what they were doing. In this way, intercepts make good intelligence, but poor evidence. There is no guarantee that intercept evidence will ‘prove’ anything in court rather than simply creating unfounded implications which could actually serve to confuse, rather than clear, the case in question. Until intercept intelligence can prove itself reliable enough to be routinely used as genuine evidence – and it is unclear that it ever will [1] – it certainly should not become an established part of the wider legal system.\n\n[1] http://www.lrb.co.uk/v27/n06/conor-gearty/short-cuts , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9517d1561242770a3565e3718d4fccb7", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted The more obvious solution to this problem (from the opposition’s view) would be to maintain a clear policy where no intercept evidence is admissible in court. However, this particular case becomes an anomaly for good reason. Individual countries – in this case Britain – cannot dictate whether foreign intelligence services – the Dutch – choose to reveal their intelligence-gathering methods or not. In this case, the crossover between national policies on information intelligence [1] led to this anomaly.\n\n[1] http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2002/sep/08/ukcrime1 , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1960113628ee68248da7ae14788560e9", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted If the use of wiretapping and intercept evidence was as simple as proposition makes out, undoubtedly it would be a common tool. However, there are also serious flaws in how this intelligence is gathered and interpreted. For example, a phone call might seem unduly incriminating when taken out of context and heard in a court of law which has already projected suspicions upon a particular individual [1] . Focusing only on one form of communications as is normal when authorisation is given for these interceptions fails to take in the wider picture and continues to be heard without the context [2] . Whether this unfairly incriminates somebody who has not acted in a crime, or falsely ‘proves’ the innocence of somebody who is not in fact innocent, intercept evidence is limited in its scope and as such should not be admissible in court.\n\n[1] http://www.fiercefinance.com/story/rajaratnam-jury-listens-more-wiretaps/2011-04-28 , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://www.fiercefinance.com/story/rajaratnam-jury-listens-more-wiretaps/2011-04-28 , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "19b62b684c80f9846d353649169e2577", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted Wiretapping can actually threaten the success of intelligence services in preventing crime and helping to prove criminals guilty.\n\nRegular use of wiretap and intercept evidence poses a danger to the evidence-gathering capabilities of intelligence agencies. There are concerns among experts that terrorists, far from being apprehended, will simply learn new techniques for ‘listening in to calls made over the internet’ [1] and know exactly who and what the intelligence services are monitoring. In this way, they could actually evade intelligence services and the police by using different forms of communication, such as encrypting messages or using disposable mobile phones. Revealing the capabilities of our intelligence agencies could create harms which far outweigh any potential benefits of intercept evidence [2] . This makes intercept evidence self-negating; if it is used, the very revelation of its use will alert criminals to it and make it vulnerable to manipulation and tampering – therefore, the evidence actually becomes less reliable and less effective [3] . Ultimately, it does not provide a tangible benefit.\n\n[1] http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article2806756.ece , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article2806756.ece , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[3] http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article2806756.ece , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3ce2d124c9ea76ac891ad11e5d6a00aa", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted Common authorisation for wiretapping would result in misallocation of resources.\n\nWiretaps are not only unreliable, but incredibly expensive [1] [2] . Intelligence agents also often find themselves inadvertently listening in on ‘irrelevant, non-incriminating aspects of the target’s life’ [3] which not only breaches the privacy of innocent people but is an obvious waste of time and money for all involved. Given that many countries are considering or have cut their funding for police forces because of the recession [4] [5] [6] , this money could be put to a better use: preventing crime and terrorist activity by a stronger police presence.\n\n[1] http://www.tscm.com/wiretaprobin.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2008/03/fbis-500-millio/ , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[3] http://cdt.org/wiretap/wiretap_overview.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[4] In the UK: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/aug/11/nick-clegg-police-funding-cuts-riots , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[5] In the USA: http://www.businessinsider.com/newark-carjackings-2011-1 , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[6] In New Zealand: http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA1104/S00010/cuts-to-police-budget-endanger-progress.htm , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "914a6e5369a87746f5a65c1480273b1b", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted Intercept evidence is simply not reliable enough to be effective evidence in court.\n\nWiretap evidence is not as reliable as other forms of evidence which we currently have at our disposal, such as DNA evidence which has ‘sent thousands of people to prison and . . . has played a vital role in exonerating men who were falsely convicted’ [1] . Many potential aspects of intercept evidence lack this reliability. Voice analysis, for example, has been shown to be unreliable in exploring messages supposedly spoken by Osama Bin Laden [2] . Video intercept evidence notably failed when a video which purported to show Morgan Tsvangirai (the Zimbabwean opposition leader) conspiring against the government, when in fact he was somewhere else at the time [3] . The poor quality of intercept evidence is a threat within an individual trial, but also more widely; reliance on intercept evidence by prosecutors might lead to more cases collapsing after the evidence is proved unreliable, and wasting time and money for all involved.\n\n[1] http://www.bioforensics.com/articles/champion1/champion1.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/11/13/tech/main529273.shtml , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[3] http://www.swradioafrica.com/Documents/TheStateversusMorganTsvangirai.htm , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "73096dbc002d5f5f8eeb0d1dab6094d0", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted Intercepted evidence could be incredibly useful for both prosecution and defence cases in many trials.\n\nIntercept evidence offers the opportunity to speed up court trials and stop wasting time and money by providing information which could lead to a faster, more accurate verdict. Other western democracies who use wire-tap evidence believe that is has or will help to achieve criminal convictions [1] [2] [3] , which demonstrates popular support for it as an effective and swift method of justice. Given that the UK has allowed wire-tapping in some specific cases [4] , it seems to be that it is not the principle of intercept evidence itself which is viewed as unacceptable by these countries, but perhaps a need to set up a formalised system of the conditions when and where intercept evidence can be used. David Bickford, the former chief legal adviser to MI5, has stated ‘I know we have lost cases as a result of not using such evidence’ [5] and other experts have called for the wide use of intercept evidence in court [6] . Allowing the use of intercept evidence in the first place may well ensure that wire-taps are better carried out in a standardised, regulated manner\n\n[1] In Sweden: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/7463333.stm , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] Widely in the USA: http://www.justice.gov/archive/ll/highlights.htm , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[3] In Australia: http://www.thenewsmanual.net/Resources/medialaw_in_australia_06.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[4] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/8437978/BT-and-Phorm-escape-prosecution-for-secret-wiretaps.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[5] http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2005/jan/28/september11.humanrights , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[6] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/7732242/Intercept-evidence-should-be-admitted-in-court-officials-believe.html , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c835d4b6167d83c3203e9788ff475357", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted Countries which do not allow intercept evidence have created a contradictory, rather than transparent, set of legal boundaries.\n\nBritain in particular seems to hold a paradoxical set of values in relation to intercept evidence. For example, British courts have allowed intercept material which has been lawfully obtained by foreign police forces. One notable example of this was the conviction of the Merseyside drugs squad chief Elmore Davies when it was discovered that he had a corrupt relationship with drug baron Curtis Warren [1] . The information which led to his conviction was collected on Dutch mobile phones by the Dutch police force, despite the fact that some of the conversations took place wholly within the UK. However this – bizarrely – was allowed as evidence in a British court [2] , despite the systematic rejection of intercept evidence in other cases. When a country seems to recognise and even capitalise on the potential of intercept evidence in some cases but simultaneously reject it in others, the result is inconsistent legal standards which damage accountability and transparency of the entire state.\n\n[1] http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2002/sep/08/ukcrime1 , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2002/sep/08/ukcrime1 , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f434d9bbc5176d806f8543eb8cd07955", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted Wiretapping is a highly effective method which helps to prevent serious crime and secure convictions for criminals.\n\nWiretapping helps to make society safer; we have the opportunity to prevent serious crime and to uphold the principle of prosecution in the justice system [1] by catching criminals and convicting them. For example, in the UK in 2003, intercepts led to the seizure of 26 tonnes of drugs and also detected wide-scale fraud and money laundering, resulting in 1680 arrests [2] . Without this evidence, these criminals may have escaped the justice system and remained free in society to commit other crimes. It is nonsensical to reject evidence which clearly implicates this individuals who would otherwise be released without charge. As the threat of terrorism escalates and had already damaged many countries [3] [4] [5] [6] , refusal to use this evidence in court puts the public at serious risk and fails to act in the defence of the country in question. For example, if the Norwegian authorities had kept closer tabs on information passed through eBay, they might well have been able to apprehend Anders Breivik before he committed the massacre on Utoya island [7] . Wiretapping is unique in the variety of information it can provide; it can show locations [8] , times [9] , the relationships between those involved [10] and even record specific details of conspiracies [11] . Accordingly, it can also be used to prove the innocence of somebody who might otherwise be wrongly accused or even wrongly imprisoned [12] [13] . The obvious benefits to this motion demand that intercept evidence and wiretapping should be held as legitimate evidence in court.\n\n[1] Page 65: http://vac.wvasiapacific.org/downloads/SAVE5.pdf , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://www.newlawjournal.co.uk/nlj/content/surveillance-and-privacy—where-boundaries-blur , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[3] In the UK: https://www.mi5.gov.uk/output/international-terrorism-and-the-uk.html\n\n[4] In Norway: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/norway/8673118/Norway-massacre-British-traders-helped-supply-Breiviks-arsenal-of-weapons.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[5] In the USA: http://www.army.mil/terrorism/ , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[6] In Europe and Belgium: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/belgium/8154475/Europe-wide-terrorism-arrests-after-plans-for-attack-on-Belgium.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[7] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/norway/8673118/Norway-massacre-British-traders-helped-supply-Breiviks-arsenal-of-weapons.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[8] http://www.eavesdropping-news.com/news-subjects/cell-phones-eavesdroppin... , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[9] http://www.eavesdropping-news.com/news-subjects/cell-phones-eavesdropping-wiretapping/cell-phone-syping.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[10] http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704889404576277341101995436.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[11] http://www.npr.org/2011/05/12/136230882/wiretaps-help-prosecutors-get-hedge-fund-manager-convicted , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[12] http://chicagoist.com/2011/04/14/blagojevich_live_presser.php , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[13] http://articles.latimes.com/1992-02-14/news/mn-2239_1_top-gotti , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3a0bc4fd49192ed2c56daea28c372a29", "text": "law general punishment computers phones house would allow wire tapped and intercepted Intercept evidence deals particularly well with cases of conspiracy and criminal gangs which have a widespread network.\n\nIntercept evidence can be very useful for showing associations between groups of people [1] , which can be incredibly helpful in cases such as conspiracies to link people and events together. It can also expose inconsistencies or falsity in an individual’s alibi [2] or personal character if they deny contact with a certain party where intercept evidence proves that they had communicated [3] . However, under the status quo the defence lawyer may not be authorised to intercept evidence which would prove their client’s innocence [4] . Allowing such techniques would help to equalise the prosecution and defence; after all, the aim of court is not to blindly prosecute the defendant, but to ascertain whether he or she is in fact guilty before any prosecution occurs. Widening the array of tools which can be used by both prosecution and defence helps to encourage a wider view of the case and arrive at a more accurate verdict.\n\n[1] http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704889404576277341101995436.html , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[2] http://www.totalcriminaldefense.com/news/articles/criminal-evidence/wiretap-legality.aspx , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[3] http://www.totalcriminaldefense.com/news/articles/criminal-evidence/wiretap-legality.aspx , accessed 30/08/11\n\n[4] http://chicagoist.com/2011/04/14/blagojevich_live_presser.php , accessed 30/08/11\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
186af877986f531ac4f3f5f616cf892b	Mandatory minimum sentences remove undue judicial discretion. Discretion allows for both intentional and unintentional bias. The U.S. Supreme Court recently heard a case concerning alleged corruption when a West Virginia judge ruled in favor of a plaintiff that had donated over $3 million to the judge’s election campaign. [1] Though this case is not directly linked to minimum sentences, it demonstrates that judicial corruption is an issue in the legal system today; mandatory sentencing reduces the discretion that allows unethical judicial action. Furthermore, judges may attempt to be impartial, but data shows that humans are inclined to be more sympathetic towards particular groups. For example, female defendants are less likely to receive a death sentence than male defendants, while defendants in general are seven times more likely to receive the death penalty if the victim is female; scholars suggest that these disparities are caused by societal perceptions that women need greater protection rather than any actual difference in the severity of the crime. [2] Thus even decisions that seem impartial are often not. Strict sentencing mandates are more likely to yield just decisions because they are less vulnerable to individual bias. [1] Dahlia Lithwick, “The Great Caperton Caper: The Supreme Court Talks About Judicial Bias. Kinda,” Slate, June 8, 2009. [2] “Studies: Gender Bias in Death Sentencing,” Death Penalty Information Center, 2011.	[ { "docid": "abadc60715850921cf49b6200cbf23ef", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory sentences do not eliminate undue discretion; they merely shift the power from judges to prosecutors. Prosecutors may decide whether or not to charge defendants for violations other than the main charge. For example, a prosecutor may add weapons possession to a charge for drug sales- this additional count can drastically increase the defendant’s sentence. In the United States, defendants often cooperate with prosecutors and provide information in order to avoid such hefty sentences. Michael Simmons explains, “[…] A cooperation departure is usually the only significant sentencing factor over which a defendant has any control and– because the average cooperation departure cuts a defendant’s sentence in half- it is often a defendant’s only hope for a reduced sentence. Thus, it is not surprising that cooperation departures have fundamentally changed federal prosecutions.” [1] Prosecutors may wield this power to coerce defendants into accepting a plea bargain in cases where they might reasonably be acquitted at trial. Because prosecutors are part of the executive branch, they are more susceptible to political influence than federal judges, who are often appointed, not elected. Thus for a balance of power, it is better to allow judges to have discretion.\n\nDebaters might instead argue that mandatory sentences are not an effective means of subduing corrupt judges, as a judge has many venues for disrupting a trial.\n\n[1] Michael A. Simons, “Departing Ways: Uniformity, Disparity, and Cooperation in Federal Drug Sentences,” Villanova Law Review, Vol. 47, Issue 2, 2002, 935.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "180da8fceb5d1ecc8d96889dc51aa6f9", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Minimum sentences have only a theoretical impact on crime rates; in reality they make no difference. The pro makes two major assumptions; first, that criminals have reasonably accurate perceptions of the legal code. Second, the pro assumes that harsh penalties have a psychological impact on potential criminals. Interviews with convicted felons found that a mere 22% even thought they knew what the punishment would be. Another 18% did not know at all, and more than a third reported that they had not thought about punishment at all at the time of the crime. [1] Thus minimum sentences are not sufficiently well publicized to have a significant deterrent effect. Furthermore, substantial evidence demonstrates that additional severity has a relatively small deterrent effect. Criminals respond much more to the chance of getting caught rather than the consequences that occur if they get caught; if a criminal’s chance of getting caught is 10%, the deterrent effect is virtually zero. [2] Thus mandatory sentences do not have a substantial deterrent effect.\n\n[1] Bruce Western, Punishment and Inequality in America, Russell Sage Foundation, NY, 2006, 178.\n\n[2] Western, 179.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "72a47e03a624061507a4cfef4be79ce4", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Judges are capable of delivering consistency. Judges are trained professionals and must demonstrate competence in order to be appointed- they are unlikely to administer completely random sentences. In order to further reduce inconsistency, the Con supports government-issued sentencing guidelines so that judges are aware of the precedent concerning sentencing for a particular crime, so long as these guidelines are not compulsory. In the unusual occurrence that a judge administers an unjustly harsh sentence, defendants may appeal their case to a higher court. Thus judicial discretion is unlikely to result in widespread inconsistent sentencing.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6db1326c8e638ad19691519cc10e5524", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Imprisonment only yields the benefits of incapacitation if the offenders are a likely threat to society. If the criminal that is given an extensive prison sentence was unlikely to commit another crime, then his/her incapacitation did not actually protect society. Studies within prison populations demonstrate that most offenders commit relatively little crime, while a core group commits a large portion of the crime. For example, a Rand Corporation survey found that half of all burglars committed fewer than six crimes per year, while the top 10% committed over two hundred. [1] Thus society is not particularly well serve when the bottom half of burglars face long prison sentences; few burglaries are avoided, and these criminals will now have more difficulty rejoining society.\n\n[1] Bruce Western, Punishment and Inequality in America, Russell Sage Foundation, NY, 2006, 178.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1f6ece2a74ce0b9ec55fb4a4785b4b60", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Safety valves are simply a reflection of the problem with mandatory sentencing. Safety valves are proof that the inflexibility of minimum sentencing leads to injustice. Safety valves are a step in the right direction, but are themselves an inflexible form of relief. For example, safety valves often do not apply if the defendant has a history of more than one very minor offense, such as passing a bad check. [1] The better way to reduce the injustice of mandatory minimum sentences would be to eliminate the system and allow judicial discretion.\n\n[1] “Federal Mandatory Minimum Reforms: Improve and Expand the Federal ‘Safety Valve,’” Smart on Crime: Recommendations for the Next Administration and Congress, 2008. [ http://2009transition.org/criminaljustice/index.php?option=com_content&v...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "70539ec3255a5a876b59b9f0dda81274", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory sentencing does not provide prosecutors any additional power to do anything unethical. “Stacking charges” is another way of saying the prosecutor charges the defendant for each crime he/she committed, meaning that the defendant is being held accountable for all of his/her actions. The Con fails to demonstrate why this is problematic. Furthermore, having democratic checks ensures that the prosecution will not bring trumped-up charges. First, a jury will dismiss such charges, and possibly dismiss all charges if they feel the prosecutor is being abusive. Second, the public is unlikely to respond positively to a district attorney that wastes time and resources on putting low-level criminals in prison for long sentences rather than focusing on serious threats to public safety. Thus the ability to “stack charges” is unlikely to have an adverse impact on justice.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ef3d726756b2c5961ddbafc95e98fe23", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Minimum mandatory sentences increase the chance of rehabilitation. If a person receives a light punishment for his/her action, he/she sees that the action has a low cost. Conversely, if a person has firsthand experience with strong punishment for an action, they will be more reluctant to take that action in the future. Furthermore, prisons have literacy and work training programs to benefit criminals; the majority of (American) prisoners are functionally illiterate. [1] If these criminals are in prison for a short period of time, they will not be able to reap the benefits of these rehabilitating programs. Thus longer sentences (within reason) can actually be beneficial to inmates.\n\n[1] Craig Haney, “Prison Overcrowding: Harmful Consequences and Dysfunctional Reactions,” Vera Institute of Justice, 85. http://www.veradc.org/statements/haney_craig.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d300885fc4fe1d91da98ea49835665e9", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory sentences need not be excessively harsh. The Pro supports mandatory sentences that account for a criminal’s prior history and the severity of the crime; mandatory sentences can be proportionate to the scope of the crime. A crime such as murder, which poses a serious threat to public safety, should have a greater minimum punishment than petty theft. But by arguing that we should not have minimum sentences for low-level criminals, the con is essentially arguing that we should not imprison offenders unless they singlehandedly pose a dire threat to society at large. All crimes are violations of the law; if the government ignores crime on the basis that the offense is “not that serious,” it signals that laws against such offenses are not legitimate and may be ignored. Thus mandatory minimum sentences are relevant and beneficial to reducing low-level crime.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "17e8c0122dd544b1ac0204106d435281", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing 1) There are checks against jury nullification. The judicial system can reduce the impact of jury nullification by explaining to juries that their responsibility is to determine the guilt of the defendant. The judge can explain that nullification is not a legally acceptable form of dissenting from a law that one perceives as unjust. While King makes the observations noted by the Pro, she also notes that prosecutors may dismiss potential jurors that admit they will consider the severity of the punishment. [1]\n\n(2) A careful jury is a good jury. When juries are reluctant to convict because of the death penalty, they are often asking themselves, “am I so sure that this person committed this crime that I am willing to bet their life on it?” Such hesitation is beneficial to the justice system- it reduces the number of wrongful convictions. Similarly, mandatory minimum sentences make juries realize the significance of their decisions. While this may allow some lucky criminals to evade justice, it also prevents innocent civilians from suffering punishments they do not deserve.\n\n[1] Nancy King, “Silencing Nullification Advocacy Inside the Jury Room and Outside the Courtroom,” The University of Chicago Law Review, Vol. 65, No. 2, 1998,435.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8d80d6c74beb71ef2d84e41fc936feb0", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory sentences are fairer than judicial discretion. The Con assumes that individual judges will deliver fair and proportionate punishment. However, as is discussed in the Pro arguments, judges are susceptible to many forms of implicit and explicit bias. For example, studies consistently show that minorities receive longer sentences than whites in the U.S. for comparable offenses. Mandatory sentencing eliminates the danger of individual partiality and replaces it with consistent standards. The Pro advocates a well-defined set of sentencing standards that account for factors such as prior history and cooperation so as to avoid the injustices discussed in the Con’s argument. The Pro acknowledges that sentencing standards may be imperfect, however, the flaws of these imperfections are outweighed by the elimination of personal judicial bias.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0b89dca26d0d5abadd65c56c08716c3b", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory minimum sentences increase deterrence.\n\nDeterrence works through several mechanisms; likelihood of getting caught, severity of punishment, and perceived public disapproval. Mandatory minimum sentences increase the effectiveness of severity as a deterrent. If potential criminals know a mild sentence is possible, they are more likely to commit crime in the hopes that they may charm a judge into sympathetically lowering their sentence. By establishing a set minimum punishment, a potential criminal with any knowledge of the penal code knows that, if caught, he/she will face a substantial punishment for his/her crime. The pro need not demonstrate that every, or even a strong majority, of would-be criminals will be deterred by mandatory minimum sentences; so long as the mandate has a reasonable deterrent effect, it will reduce crime and therefore improve the overall standard of living.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "96cfce11d9248930bc109c0b9241d7b8", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory sentencing increases consistency in the justice system.\n\nFormer Supreme Justice Sandra Day O’Connor once said, “liberty finds no refuge in a jurisprudence of doubt.” [1] Without mandates, judges may have radically different ideas of just sentences. Michael Simons gives the example of Mutt and Jim- two criminals of identical background who commit the same crime. Judge Lenient sentences Mutt, while Judge Harsh sentences Jeff. Mutt might receive one day in prison while Jeff receives a sentence of twenty-five years. [2] While such an extreme is unlikely, it is noteworthy that the legal system emphasizes the importance of consistency. Consistent precedent is essential because citizens need to be able to make decisions knowing the legal consequences of their actions. Mandatory sentencing need not be overly harsh, but there should be some sort of rigidity to establish reliability in the legal system.\n\n[1] Planned Parenthood v. Casey, 505 U.S. 83, (1992). http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/91-744.ZS.html\n\n[2] Michael A. Simons, “Departing Ways: Uniformity, Disparity, and Cooperation in Federal Drug Sentences,” Villanova Law Review, Vol. 47, Issue 2, 2002, 926.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7f6af883d42278fc78d2c54e02154bd8", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory minimum sentencing can be designed to avoid injustices.\n\nThe negative side effects of minimum sentencing guidelines can be avoided via “safety valves.” The U.S. federal government introduced safety valves in 1994; mandatory sentencing is suspended if the defendant meets certain criteria, such as being a low-level participant or having no prior criminal history. The safety valve allows flexibility so that low-risk offenders do not receive excessively harsh punishment. Thus mandatory sentencing guidelines have enough flexibility to recognize varying circumstances, while retaining enough rigidity to deliver consistent punishment.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f52daed350900ada6d15e0e805b95b6b", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Minimum sentences increase the effectiveness of incapacitation.\n\nIncapacitation is one of the 4 basic reasons for punishment. Mandatory minimum sentences keep criminals out of society for a longer period of time than they might otherwise be in jail, thereby reducing their window of opportunity to commit crime. The criminal justice system is obligated to refrain from cruel or unusual punishment, but its main purpose is to protect society from law-breakers through various means of preventing and punishing illegal activity. Mandatory minimum sentences should be proportionate to the severity of the crime, thus satisfying the requirement of humane punishment. Thus mandatory minimum sentencing is a just method of protecting the public.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8a430e8ba33b9d434ab0b8fdaa2c615a", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Minimum mandatory sentences are unjust.\n\nIn the United States, federal minimum sentences for narcotics-related offences have forced judges on countless occasions to deliver sentences of 20 year, 30 years, or even life imprisonment to offenders that were tangentially connected to the offense. Often, such offenders are low-income young adults that turn to drug sales for a month or two out of desperation. [1] Sometimes defendants find themselves entangled in drug busts because they are living with family members that are involved in the drug trade. [2] In a well-publicized case, Weldon Angelos was sentenced to 55 years in prison for selling marijuana because he was also in possession of a firearm. [3] All criminals are not the same; there are significant differences in the level of threat that individuals pose to society, as well as the likelihood of rehabilitation. Rigid mandatory sentences are unjust because they inevitably lead to numerous cases of disproportionate punishment. These harsh punishments consequently have disastrous impacts on the individuals, as well as their family and community.\n\n[1] “DeJarion Echols,” Profiles of Injustice, Families Against Mandatory Minimums.\n\n[2] “Hamedah Hasan,” Profiles of Injustice, Families Against Mandatory Minimums.\n\n[3] “Weldon Angelos,” Profiles of Injustice, Families Against Mandatory Minimums.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "543ba454c1594c62318df4ce66b7dc2b", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory minimum sentences make juries reluctant to convict guilty defendants.\n\nThe most publicized form of jury nullification is in the case of the death penalty, wherein jurors are reluctant to sentence a person to death. However, Nancy King of the University of Chicago finds that juries are increasingly likely to acquit if a defendant might receive an unduly harsh sentence under mandatory sentencing laws or “three-strike” laws. [1] This kind of jury nullification has two implications. First, it is harmful because defendants that are guilty and ought to go to prison (albeit not for the term demanded by sentencing laws) are not held accountable for their actions at all. Second, jury nullification (a contested practice in and of itself) is a signal in a democratic society that the public considers current legislation to be unjust. Thus the jury nullification demonstrates public opposition to the unintentionally unjust consequences of mandatory sentencing.\n\n[1] Nancy King, “Silencing Nullification Advocacy Inside the Jury Room and Outside the Courtroom,” The University of Chicago Law Review, Vol. 65, No. 2, 1998, 438.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "01663d4ce4a27707f03b48259e53f22b", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Minimum mandatory sentences reduce the chance of rehabilitation.\n\nMinimum sentences force minor criminals to spend more time in prison, thereby increasing their exposure to more hardened criminals. This exposure reduces their chance of rehabilitation- other inmates act as a “bad influence.” [1] Furthermore, studies of labor market participation demonstrate that the more time a person spends outside the labor force, the more their human capital (i.e. marketable skills) deteriorate; their chance of finding well-paid work decreases with more time outside the labor force. [2] Longer prison sentences keep people from working, thereby keeping them in a cycle of unemployment that leads them back into crime.\n\n[1] Craig Haney, “Prison Overcrowding: Harmful Consequences and Dysfunctional Reactions,” Vera Institute of Justice, 8. http://www.veradc.org/statements/haney_craig.pdf\n\n[2] Francine Blau, Mariannne Ferber, and Anne Winkler, The Economics of Women, Men, and Work, 5th Edition, Pearson, NJ, 2006.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c660d904560342d400eb4c53d8d7a53f", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory sentencing gives prosecutors undue power.\n\nProsecutors can stack charges, which they can use to scare a defendant into accepting a plea bargain. Prosecutors are part of the executive branch; they are directly answerable to elected officials (and are often elected themselves), whereas judges are generally more removed from political influence. Politicians often promote themselves as being “tough on crime.” [1] In order to make good on this claim, they may pressure prosecutors to increase conviction rates, get longer sentences, etc. Thus political pressure may lead prosecutors to handle cases in a way that makes them more popular with the public, rather than one which gives the criminal their fair due. Because judges are less susceptible to public pressure, it is safer to entrust discretion to them.\n\n[1] Michael A. Simons, “Departing Ways: Uniformity, Disparity, and Cooperation in Federal Drug Sentences,” Villanova Law Review, Vol. 47, Issue 2, 2002, 923.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0f108206434e54e2ef4f07e8182bdb79", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory sentencing fills the system with “small fish.”\n\nAs noted above in response to the Pro, most convicts are not high-repeat criminals; a study similar to the one mentioned above found that in a sample of a cohort of teenage boys in Philadelphia, 33% had engaged in delinquent behavior at some point, but 60% of the crime was committed by a group of recidivists that made up only 7% of the population. [1] Harsh punishments for all offenders have led to an overcrowded prison system; overcrowding decreases safety within prisons and reduces the chance of rehabilitation because prisons have fewer resources per prisoner to provide educational and work training. [2] By filling the system with “small fish,” the Pro reduce the prison system’s ability to address serious threats to society.\n\n[1] Bruce Western, Punishment and Inequality in America, Russell Sage Foundation, NY, 2006, 176.\n\n[2] Craig Haney, “Prison Overcrowding: Harmful Consequences and Dysfunctional Reactions,” Vera Institute of Justice, 6. [ http://www.veradc.org/statements/haney_craig.pdf]\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
3481015cd89b20299fe19f43c63e3ba9	Minimum sentences increase the effectiveness of incapacitation. Incapacitation is one of the 4 basic reasons for punishment. Mandatory minimum sentences keep criminals out of society for a longer period of time than they might otherwise be in jail, thereby reducing their window of opportunity to commit crime. The criminal justice system is obligated to refrain from cruel or unusual punishment, but its main purpose is to protect society from law-breakers through various means of preventing and punishing illegal activity. Mandatory minimum sentences should be proportionate to the severity of the crime, thus satisfying the requirement of humane punishment. Thus mandatory minimum sentencing is a just method of protecting the public.	[ { "docid": "6db1326c8e638ad19691519cc10e5524", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Imprisonment only yields the benefits of incapacitation if the offenders are a likely threat to society. If the criminal that is given an extensive prison sentence was unlikely to commit another crime, then his/her incapacitation did not actually protect society. Studies within prison populations demonstrate that most offenders commit relatively little crime, while a core group commits a large portion of the crime. For example, a Rand Corporation survey found that half of all burglars committed fewer than six crimes per year, while the top 10% committed over two hundred. [1] Thus society is not particularly well serve when the bottom half of burglars face long prison sentences; few burglaries are avoided, and these criminals will now have more difficulty rejoining society.\n\n[1] Bruce Western, Punishment and Inequality in America, Russell Sage Foundation, NY, 2006, 178.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "180da8fceb5d1ecc8d96889dc51aa6f9", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Minimum sentences have only a theoretical impact on crime rates; in reality they make no difference. The pro makes two major assumptions; first, that criminals have reasonably accurate perceptions of the legal code. Second, the pro assumes that harsh penalties have a psychological impact on potential criminals. Interviews with convicted felons found that a mere 22% even thought they knew what the punishment would be. Another 18% did not know at all, and more than a third reported that they had not thought about punishment at all at the time of the crime. [1] Thus minimum sentences are not sufficiently well publicized to have a significant deterrent effect. Furthermore, substantial evidence demonstrates that additional severity has a relatively small deterrent effect. Criminals respond much more to the chance of getting caught rather than the consequences that occur if they get caught; if a criminal’s chance of getting caught is 10%, the deterrent effect is virtually zero. [2] Thus mandatory sentences do not have a substantial deterrent effect.\n\n[1] Bruce Western, Punishment and Inequality in America, Russell Sage Foundation, NY, 2006, 178.\n\n[2] Western, 179.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "72a47e03a624061507a4cfef4be79ce4", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Judges are capable of delivering consistency. Judges are trained professionals and must demonstrate competence in order to be appointed- they are unlikely to administer completely random sentences. In order to further reduce inconsistency, the Con supports government-issued sentencing guidelines so that judges are aware of the precedent concerning sentencing for a particular crime, so long as these guidelines are not compulsory. In the unusual occurrence that a judge administers an unjustly harsh sentence, defendants may appeal their case to a higher court. Thus judicial discretion is unlikely to result in widespread inconsistent sentencing.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1f6ece2a74ce0b9ec55fb4a4785b4b60", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Safety valves are simply a reflection of the problem with mandatory sentencing. Safety valves are proof that the inflexibility of minimum sentencing leads to injustice. Safety valves are a step in the right direction, but are themselves an inflexible form of relief. For example, safety valves often do not apply if the defendant has a history of more than one very minor offense, such as passing a bad check. [1] The better way to reduce the injustice of mandatory minimum sentences would be to eliminate the system and allow judicial discretion.\n\n[1] “Federal Mandatory Minimum Reforms: Improve and Expand the Federal ‘Safety Valve,’” Smart on Crime: Recommendations for the Next Administration and Congress, 2008. [ http://2009transition.org/criminaljustice/index.php?option=com_content&v...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "abadc60715850921cf49b6200cbf23ef", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory sentences do not eliminate undue discretion; they merely shift the power from judges to prosecutors. Prosecutors may decide whether or not to charge defendants for violations other than the main charge. For example, a prosecutor may add weapons possession to a charge for drug sales- this additional count can drastically increase the defendant’s sentence. In the United States, defendants often cooperate with prosecutors and provide information in order to avoid such hefty sentences. Michael Simmons explains, “[…] A cooperation departure is usually the only significant sentencing factor over which a defendant has any control and– because the average cooperation departure cuts a defendant’s sentence in half- it is often a defendant’s only hope for a reduced sentence. Thus, it is not surprising that cooperation departures have fundamentally changed federal prosecutions.” [1] Prosecutors may wield this power to coerce defendants into accepting a plea bargain in cases where they might reasonably be acquitted at trial. Because prosecutors are part of the executive branch, they are more susceptible to political influence than federal judges, who are often appointed, not elected. Thus for a balance of power, it is better to allow judges to have discretion.\n\nDebaters might instead argue that mandatory sentences are not an effective means of subduing corrupt judges, as a judge has many venues for disrupting a trial.\n\n[1] Michael A. Simons, “Departing Ways: Uniformity, Disparity, and Cooperation in Federal Drug Sentences,” Villanova Law Review, Vol. 47, Issue 2, 2002, 935.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "70539ec3255a5a876b59b9f0dda81274", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory sentencing does not provide prosecutors any additional power to do anything unethical. “Stacking charges” is another way of saying the prosecutor charges the defendant for each crime he/she committed, meaning that the defendant is being held accountable for all of his/her actions. The Con fails to demonstrate why this is problematic. Furthermore, having democratic checks ensures that the prosecution will not bring trumped-up charges. First, a jury will dismiss such charges, and possibly dismiss all charges if they feel the prosecutor is being abusive. Second, the public is unlikely to respond positively to a district attorney that wastes time and resources on putting low-level criminals in prison for long sentences rather than focusing on serious threats to public safety. Thus the ability to “stack charges” is unlikely to have an adverse impact on justice.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ef3d726756b2c5961ddbafc95e98fe23", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Minimum mandatory sentences increase the chance of rehabilitation. If a person receives a light punishment for his/her action, he/she sees that the action has a low cost. Conversely, if a person has firsthand experience with strong punishment for an action, they will be more reluctant to take that action in the future. Furthermore, prisons have literacy and work training programs to benefit criminals; the majority of (American) prisoners are functionally illiterate. [1] If these criminals are in prison for a short period of time, they will not be able to reap the benefits of these rehabilitating programs. Thus longer sentences (within reason) can actually be beneficial to inmates.\n\n[1] Craig Haney, “Prison Overcrowding: Harmful Consequences and Dysfunctional Reactions,” Vera Institute of Justice, 85. http://www.veradc.org/statements/haney_craig.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d300885fc4fe1d91da98ea49835665e9", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory sentences need not be excessively harsh. The Pro supports mandatory sentences that account for a criminal’s prior history and the severity of the crime; mandatory sentences can be proportionate to the scope of the crime. A crime such as murder, which poses a serious threat to public safety, should have a greater minimum punishment than petty theft. But by arguing that we should not have minimum sentences for low-level criminals, the con is essentially arguing that we should not imprison offenders unless they singlehandedly pose a dire threat to society at large. All crimes are violations of the law; if the government ignores crime on the basis that the offense is “not that serious,” it signals that laws against such offenses are not legitimate and may be ignored. Thus mandatory minimum sentences are relevant and beneficial to reducing low-level crime.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "17e8c0122dd544b1ac0204106d435281", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing 1) There are checks against jury nullification. The judicial system can reduce the impact of jury nullification by explaining to juries that their responsibility is to determine the guilt of the defendant. The judge can explain that nullification is not a legally acceptable form of dissenting from a law that one perceives as unjust. While King makes the observations noted by the Pro, she also notes that prosecutors may dismiss potential jurors that admit they will consider the severity of the punishment. [1]\n\n(2) A careful jury is a good jury. When juries are reluctant to convict because of the death penalty, they are often asking themselves, “am I so sure that this person committed this crime that I am willing to bet their life on it?” Such hesitation is beneficial to the justice system- it reduces the number of wrongful convictions. Similarly, mandatory minimum sentences make juries realize the significance of their decisions. While this may allow some lucky criminals to evade justice, it also prevents innocent civilians from suffering punishments they do not deserve.\n\n[1] Nancy King, “Silencing Nullification Advocacy Inside the Jury Room and Outside the Courtroom,” The University of Chicago Law Review, Vol. 65, No. 2, 1998,435.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8d80d6c74beb71ef2d84e41fc936feb0", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory sentences are fairer than judicial discretion. The Con assumes that individual judges will deliver fair and proportionate punishment. However, as is discussed in the Pro arguments, judges are susceptible to many forms of implicit and explicit bias. For example, studies consistently show that minorities receive longer sentences than whites in the U.S. for comparable offenses. Mandatory sentencing eliminates the danger of individual partiality and replaces it with consistent standards. The Pro advocates a well-defined set of sentencing standards that account for factors such as prior history and cooperation so as to avoid the injustices discussed in the Con’s argument. The Pro acknowledges that sentencing standards may be imperfect, however, the flaws of these imperfections are outweighed by the elimination of personal judicial bias.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0b89dca26d0d5abadd65c56c08716c3b", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory minimum sentences increase deterrence.\n\nDeterrence works through several mechanisms; likelihood of getting caught, severity of punishment, and perceived public disapproval. Mandatory minimum sentences increase the effectiveness of severity as a deterrent. If potential criminals know a mild sentence is possible, they are more likely to commit crime in the hopes that they may charm a judge into sympathetically lowering their sentence. By establishing a set minimum punishment, a potential criminal with any knowledge of the penal code knows that, if caught, he/she will face a substantial punishment for his/her crime. The pro need not demonstrate that every, or even a strong majority, of would-be criminals will be deterred by mandatory minimum sentences; so long as the mandate has a reasonable deterrent effect, it will reduce crime and therefore improve the overall standard of living.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "96cfce11d9248930bc109c0b9241d7b8", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory sentencing increases consistency in the justice system.\n\nFormer Supreme Justice Sandra Day O’Connor once said, “liberty finds no refuge in a jurisprudence of doubt.” [1] Without mandates, judges may have radically different ideas of just sentences. Michael Simons gives the example of Mutt and Jim- two criminals of identical background who commit the same crime. Judge Lenient sentences Mutt, while Judge Harsh sentences Jeff. Mutt might receive one day in prison while Jeff receives a sentence of twenty-five years. [2] While such an extreme is unlikely, it is noteworthy that the legal system emphasizes the importance of consistency. Consistent precedent is essential because citizens need to be able to make decisions knowing the legal consequences of their actions. Mandatory sentencing need not be overly harsh, but there should be some sort of rigidity to establish reliability in the legal system.\n\n[1] Planned Parenthood v. Casey, 505 U.S. 83, (1992). http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/91-744.ZS.html\n\n[2] Michael A. Simons, “Departing Ways: Uniformity, Disparity, and Cooperation in Federal Drug Sentences,” Villanova Law Review, Vol. 47, Issue 2, 2002, 926.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7f6af883d42278fc78d2c54e02154bd8", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory minimum sentencing can be designed to avoid injustices.\n\nThe negative side effects of minimum sentencing guidelines can be avoided via “safety valves.” The U.S. federal government introduced safety valves in 1994; mandatory sentencing is suspended if the defendant meets certain criteria, such as being a low-level participant or having no prior criminal history. The safety valve allows flexibility so that low-risk offenders do not receive excessively harsh punishment. Thus mandatory sentencing guidelines have enough flexibility to recognize varying circumstances, while retaining enough rigidity to deliver consistent punishment.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6c00fed3fbfb3d51c9596c9e1bef7ac2", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory minimum sentences remove undue judicial discretion.\n\nDiscretion allows for both intentional and unintentional bias. The U.S. Supreme Court recently heard a case concerning alleged corruption when a West Virginia judge ruled in favor of a plaintiff that had donated over $3 million to the judge’s election campaign. [1] Though this case is not directly linked to minimum sentences, it demonstrates that judicial corruption is an issue in the legal system today; mandatory sentencing reduces the discretion that allows unethical judicial action. Furthermore, judges may attempt to be impartial, but data shows that humans are inclined to be more sympathetic towards particular groups. For example, female defendants are less likely to receive a death sentence than male defendants, while defendants in general are seven times more likely to receive the death penalty if the victim is female; scholars suggest that these disparities are caused by societal perceptions that women need greater protection rather than any actual difference in the severity of the crime. [2] Thus even decisions that seem impartial are often not. Strict sentencing mandates are more likely to yield just decisions because they are less vulnerable to individual bias.\n\n[1] Dahlia Lithwick, “The Great Caperton Caper: The Supreme Court Talks About Judicial Bias. Kinda,” Slate, June 8, 2009.\n\n[2] “Studies: Gender Bias in Death Sentencing,” Death Penalty Information Center, 2011.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8a430e8ba33b9d434ab0b8fdaa2c615a", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Minimum mandatory sentences are unjust.\n\nIn the United States, federal minimum sentences for narcotics-related offences have forced judges on countless occasions to deliver sentences of 20 year, 30 years, or even life imprisonment to offenders that were tangentially connected to the offense. Often, such offenders are low-income young adults that turn to drug sales for a month or two out of desperation. [1] Sometimes defendants find themselves entangled in drug busts because they are living with family members that are involved in the drug trade. [2] In a well-publicized case, Weldon Angelos was sentenced to 55 years in prison for selling marijuana because he was also in possession of a firearm. [3] All criminals are not the same; there are significant differences in the level of threat that individuals pose to society, as well as the likelihood of rehabilitation. Rigid mandatory sentences are unjust because they inevitably lead to numerous cases of disproportionate punishment. These harsh punishments consequently have disastrous impacts on the individuals, as well as their family and community.\n\n[1] “DeJarion Echols,” Profiles of Injustice, Families Against Mandatory Minimums.\n\n[2] “Hamedah Hasan,” Profiles of Injustice, Families Against Mandatory Minimums.\n\n[3] “Weldon Angelos,” Profiles of Injustice, Families Against Mandatory Minimums.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "543ba454c1594c62318df4ce66b7dc2b", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory minimum sentences make juries reluctant to convict guilty defendants.\n\nThe most publicized form of jury nullification is in the case of the death penalty, wherein jurors are reluctant to sentence a person to death. However, Nancy King of the University of Chicago finds that juries are increasingly likely to acquit if a defendant might receive an unduly harsh sentence under mandatory sentencing laws or “three-strike” laws. [1] This kind of jury nullification has two implications. First, it is harmful because defendants that are guilty and ought to go to prison (albeit not for the term demanded by sentencing laws) are not held accountable for their actions at all. Second, jury nullification (a contested practice in and of itself) is a signal in a democratic society that the public considers current legislation to be unjust. Thus the jury nullification demonstrates public opposition to the unintentionally unjust consequences of mandatory sentencing.\n\n[1] Nancy King, “Silencing Nullification Advocacy Inside the Jury Room and Outside the Courtroom,” The University of Chicago Law Review, Vol. 65, No. 2, 1998, 438.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "01663d4ce4a27707f03b48259e53f22b", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Minimum mandatory sentences reduce the chance of rehabilitation.\n\nMinimum sentences force minor criminals to spend more time in prison, thereby increasing their exposure to more hardened criminals. This exposure reduces their chance of rehabilitation- other inmates act as a “bad influence.” [1] Furthermore, studies of labor market participation demonstrate that the more time a person spends outside the labor force, the more their human capital (i.e. marketable skills) deteriorate; their chance of finding well-paid work decreases with more time outside the labor force. [2] Longer prison sentences keep people from working, thereby keeping them in a cycle of unemployment that leads them back into crime.\n\n[1] Craig Haney, “Prison Overcrowding: Harmful Consequences and Dysfunctional Reactions,” Vera Institute of Justice, 8. http://www.veradc.org/statements/haney_craig.pdf\n\n[2] Francine Blau, Mariannne Ferber, and Anne Winkler, The Economics of Women, Men, and Work, 5th Edition, Pearson, NJ, 2006.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c660d904560342d400eb4c53d8d7a53f", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory sentencing gives prosecutors undue power.\n\nProsecutors can stack charges, which they can use to scare a defendant into accepting a plea bargain. Prosecutors are part of the executive branch; they are directly answerable to elected officials (and are often elected themselves), whereas judges are generally more removed from political influence. Politicians often promote themselves as being “tough on crime.” [1] In order to make good on this claim, they may pressure prosecutors to increase conviction rates, get longer sentences, etc. Thus political pressure may lead prosecutors to handle cases in a way that makes them more popular with the public, rather than one which gives the criminal their fair due. Because judges are less susceptible to public pressure, it is safer to entrust discretion to them.\n\n[1] Michael A. Simons, “Departing Ways: Uniformity, Disparity, and Cooperation in Federal Drug Sentences,” Villanova Law Review, Vol. 47, Issue 2, 2002, 923.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0f108206434e54e2ef4f07e8182bdb79", "text": "punishment house supports mandatory sentencing Mandatory sentencing fills the system with “small fish.”\n\nAs noted above in response to the Pro, most convicts are not high-repeat criminals; a study similar to the one mentioned above found that in a sample of a cohort of teenage boys in Philadelphia, 33% had engaged in delinquent behavior at some point, but 60% of the crime was committed by a group of recidivists that made up only 7% of the population. [1] Harsh punishments for all offenders have led to an overcrowded prison system; overcrowding decreases safety within prisons and reduces the chance of rehabilitation because prisons have fewer resources per prisoner to provide educational and work training. [2] By filling the system with “small fish,” the Pro reduce the prison system’s ability to address serious threats to society.\n\n[1] Bruce Western, Punishment and Inequality in America, Russell Sage Foundation, NY, 2006, 176.\n\n[2] Craig Haney, “Prison Overcrowding: Harmful Consequences and Dysfunctional Reactions,” Vera Institute of Justice, 6. [ http://www.veradc.org/statements/haney_craig.pdf]\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
5f33e8d0dc3d9cce6342601a5b86c218	There is no respect among the population for ASBOS Newspapers are full of examples of absurd ASBOs. They make an ass of the law and show that the nanny state is overreaching. People trying to kill themselves really aren’t going to be put off by the prospect of breaching their ASBO. [1] Other examples include a prostitute who was prohibited from carrying condoms in an area that included her drug clinic, a prohibition on mobile soup vans that fed the homeless and a deaf girl who was banned from spitting in public. [2] [1] BBC News, ‘Suicide woman banned from river’, 25 February 2005, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/somerset/4297695.stm [2] Select Committee on Home Affairs, ‘Anti-Social Behaviour Orders – Analysis of the First Six Years’ http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200405/cmselect/cmhaff/80/80we20.htm	[ { "docid": "e6075b0683caa8b120ce48a3e5f1b40a", "text": "crime policing law general punishment society youth house would scrap anti social The wackier examples of ASBOs are actually demonstrations of what the order can do and other laws cannot. The woman who has an ASBO restraining her from jumping into rivers shows that the order can help with the thorny problem of actions that aren’t illegal, but place huge burdens on the emergency services and place the police and other citizens at risk.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "d65c3397d59ddd9e01bf7b5e3369d237", "text": "crime policing law general punishment society youth house would scrap anti social ASBOs offer a wide flexibility to the sentencing authority as they are not only a punishment for past actions but also a form of restraint to prevent future misbehaviour. They permit the judge or magistrate to forbid the offender to go to a certain place, avoid a certain person, and ban them from participating in a particular activity. Without such powers, our courts will never be able to deal with the rising tide of yobbish behaviour that is, whilst not criminal, hugely damaging our communities.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f76a6507c2cba231e47ed547d21e5fed", "text": "crime policing law general punishment society youth house would scrap anti social The problem of service and enforcement of ASBOs is identical that of all other court orders and can be solved the same way – in the proposition example the obvious solution would be to ensure that the youth in question had had the order fully explained to him on service.\n\nAn ASBO can only be made after a court hearing where both sides have the opportunity to have their say. The burden of proof remains on the person seeking the order to show why it is necessary. An impartial magistrate oversees the hearing. People subject to ASBOs are typically allowed to breach it several times before serious enforcement action is taken against them.\n\nThe fact is that the system of ASBOs is perfectly just and a much more liberal alternative to simply criminalising minor anti-social behaviour altogether\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "bdb596ac5dc204417f52606319dcd0ac", "text": "crime policing law general punishment society youth house would scrap anti social Something meaningful has to exist to punish actions that don’t merit criminal punishment, but damage the quality of life of others, especially through constant repetition. The ASBO is such a tool. It is intended to be the primary weapon in a ‘zero tolerance’ environment. ASBOs allow communities to take back their streets and estates from intimidating and out of control youths, and to establish proper norms of behaviour. In this way a slide into more serious lawlessness and criminality can be prevented, and the rights of the law-abiding majority to walk the streets and live peacefully with their neighbours can be secured.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8bced5c04d6d0201cf27f66af72ab941", "text": "crime policing law general punishment society youth house would scrap anti social Sentencing shouldn’t be affected by such considerations. If we need more prisons, we should build them. The point is that offenders should get the punishment they deserve. If they only need light punishment, fine – but don’t argue that those who should otherwise go to prison must get ASBOs for economic reasons – this is an affront to victims and to society and dilutes the disincentive to offend.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "36d9ae44e7dedfd2c753d401d1ea7367", "text": "crime policing law general punishment society youth house would scrap anti social Criminal behaviour ought to be dealt with by the ordinary criminal law – not through various forms of civil order.\n\nWhile much discussed, criminality is criminality, and non-criminal anti-social behaviour, while anti-social, should not be criminalized directly or indirectly.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "54d67de8413010d0203f6024177cbd11", "text": "crime policing law general punishment society youth house would scrap anti social 58% of ASBOs have been breached, [1] with little resulting punishment. Only 2% of those who breach their ASBO are currently punished with a prison sentence. [2] This brings the justice system into disrepute. It doesn’t seem to matter if they’re breached – so people don’t care about getting them. Furthermore, they’re not granted in anything like the proportions needed to have an effect: 5,000 were supposed to be imposed every year, but instead only 3,800 were used in the first five years.\n\n[1] ‘Statistical Notice: Anti-Social Behaviour Order (ASBO) Statistics - England and Wales 2012’, gov.uk, 2013, https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/253535/Anti-Social_Behaviour_Order_Statistical_Notice_2012.pdf\n\n[2] ‘No prison for Asbo-breaching yobs’, Metro, http://www.metro.co.uk/news/61949-no-prison-for-asbo-breaching-yobs\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9f00521df6f02ca7b1c16d0a84990c7e", "text": "crime policing law general punishment society youth house would scrap anti social ASBOS encourage antisocial behavour\n\nASBOs are explicitly intended to deal with bad juvenile behaviour. But they encourage rather than deal with such problems. They are viewed as badges of honour that boosts street credibility amongst young gangs – the ‘naming and shaming’ just increases this. [1] They push people that could be helped by social work or proper attention into an unenviable category of ‘offender’ – they criminalise people for behaviour that isn’t criminal.\n\n[1] BBC News, ‘Asbos viewed as ‘badge of honour’, 2 November 2006, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/6107028.stm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4c4576dff9a9ee54e81707dd96bc3787", "text": "crime policing law general punishment society youth house would scrap anti social ASBOS breach basic principles of justice\n\n“A youth recently appeared in Court in Manchester for breach of his ASBO. The Order had been made in the youth's absence without his being able to give his side of the story (one of the main concerns about ASBOs and one that can lead to misuse). The day after the Order was made someone came to his house to \"serve\" it on him. This consisted of his being handed a copy of what was a fairly bulky document running to several dozen pages with no attempt to explain it or even to ascertain if he was literate enough to read it. The Order included an restriction preventing him entering a particular estate nearby and another preventing him from associating with certain others. Unfortunately, he went out before reading the Order and beached it twice that day. The next day he went out again and breached it three times by mistake as he had not read the part covering the particular restriction. He now faces possibly custody although he has never been convicted of a criminal offence.” [1]\n\nThe issuing of ASBOs is inconsistent and almost amounts to a geographical lottery. People can be jailed for breaching an ASBO where the original offence was itself non-imprisonable – i.e. A civil procedure is being used to create and expand criminal sanctions. ASBOs have also been imposed on people with mental health problems where treatment would have been more appropriate.\n\n[1] Select Committee on Home Affairs, ‘Anti-Social Behaviour Orders – Analysis of the First Six Years’ http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200405/cmselect/cmhaff/80/80we20.htm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "eb393fffe2ddbca341b2a097a2589fcc", "text": "crime policing law general punishment society youth house would scrap anti social ASBOs do not address the real problem\n\nASBOs address the symptom, not the condition. Their powers are wide and undefined – too wide, meaning that Judges and magistrates can do pretty much whatever they like. Certainly there are problems in the way people conduct themselves – but if such behaviour isn’t criminal, then it’s up to families and communities to fix it. The ASBO is the latest example of excessive state interference in the lives of citizens. Either conduct is criminal, or it is not. The law of nuisance exists. Restraining orders exist. ASBOs aren’t intended to deal with that kind of problem: they’re the tool of the state controlling behaviour. Just because a problem exists, doesn’t mean it’s the job of the state to try and fix it. The powers granted to the state in its efforts are disproportionate to the problems concerned.\n\nIndeed, the current trend is against such interference both as shown by the potential replacement of ASBOs and by court decisions such as one that people should not be punished for hurling obscenities. [1]\n\n[1] Kelly, Jon, ‘Should swearing be against the law?’, BBC News Magazine, 21 November 2011, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-15816761\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5cdda43ae18952f34719e77face0eba3", "text": "crime policing law general punishment society youth house would scrap anti social No system is perfect\n\nOf course, some ASBOs fail. But no aspect of the justice system has a 100% success rate, and by their nature ASBOs are more likely to be abused because (unlike prison) the offender remains in his own environment. Should more in breach of ASBOs be punished? Sure. That’s not an argument against ASBOs though, is it? Neither is the fact that not enough are handed down. Although the use of ASBOs around the country is still patchy, some authorities have made very effective use of them to improve life in many local communities.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9bbf258259c93efcb994211e0ab246e6", "text": "crime policing law general punishment society youth house would scrap anti social We need to imprison fewer people\n\nThe prison population is soaring, to 87749 on 5th November 2011 in England and Wales, and we have to find ways to keep it down, or at least slow the speed of its rise. Talking about crushing sentences for all may arouse the passions of a certain type of voter but we have to have a pragmatic look at the pressures on the system. The UK has the second highest incarceration rate in western Europe and 63% of prisons overcrowded in September 2011 and several times over the few years the prison population has come close to going over the capacity of the prison service resulting in having to use cells in police stations. [1] ASBOs are one way to punish offenders while still ensuring they have continuing access to education, family support, job opportunities, etc., and they are much cheaper than the alternative of prison.\n\n[1] Berman, Gavin, ‘Prison population statistics’, House of Commons Library, 7 November 2011, www.parliament.uk/briefing-papers/SN04334.pdf\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ebfbfb0e4b4019f58115c24456089bf5", "text": "crime policing law general punishment society youth house would scrap anti social Useful tool to combat anti-social behaviour\n\nASBOs are a useful tool in the armoury in order to combat anti-social behaviour. Anti-social behaviour is a serious problem in the wider community (76% thinking it is a moderate or big problem in 2006 [1] ) – abolishing them would send out a message that such behaviour is acceptable.\n\n[1] Weaver, Matt, ‘UK ‘has worst behaviour problem in Europe’’, theguardian.com, 9 May 2006, http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2006/may/09/ukcrime.britishidentity\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
ee3564d114c93f663c0467dfb0d06181	Gambling is bad for you. Gamblers may win money from time to time, but in the long run, the House always wins. Why should governments allow an activity that helps their citizens lose the money they have worked so hard to earn? The harm is not just the loss of money and possible bankruptcy; it causes depression, insomnia, and other stress related disorders [4]. The internet has made gambling so much easier to do and encouraged lots of new people to place bets so dramatically multiplying the harm.	[ { "docid": "8216916e9a3e8410c13c73a649d570f3", "text": "omy business economic policy law crime policing digital freedoms freedom expression Every leisure industry attracts a few troubled individuals who take the activity to harmful extremes. For every thousand drinkers there are a few alcoholics. Similarly some sports fans are hooligans. Those who gamble enough to harm themselves would be those who would gamble in casinos if the internet option was not available.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "2f08dcebe6a69d716aeb84341890c7d7", "text": "omy business economic policy law crime policing digital freedoms freedom expression There is no evidence that gambling prevents people from caring for their family. The vast majority who gamble do so responsibly. It isn’t right to ban something that millions of people enjoy just because a few cause problems. And banning gambling, whether online or in the real world will not stop these problems. Sadly, even if it is illegal, people with problems will still find a way to hurt those around them – just look at drugs.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5708330b27d71fc54d4bccb16a346895", "text": "omy business economic policy law crime policing digital freedoms freedom expression Criminals will always try to exploit any system, but if governments allow legal online gambling they can regulate it. It is in the interest of gambling companies to build trustworthy brands and cooperate with the authorities on stopping any crime. Cheats in several sports have been caught because legal websites reported strange betting patterns. Betfair for example provides the authorities with an early warning system ‘BetMon’ to watch betting patterns.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a7ea9c3aa2e7aa96b4bf307f33fa101f", "text": "omy business economic policy law crime policing digital freedoms freedom expression Unlike drugs, gambling is not physically or metabolically addictive. Most gamblers are not addicts, simply ordinary people who enjoy the excitement of a bet on a sporting event or card game. The large majority of people who gamble online keep to clear limits and stop when they reach them. The few people with a problem with being addicted will still find ways to gamble if gambling is illegal either through a casino, or else still online but in a black market that offers no help and that may use criminal violence to enforce payment.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "dc3071e18a1eb0c5acaf68574cd585ca", "text": "omy business economic policy law crime policing digital freedoms freedom expression People are not free to do whatever they want whenever they want. When their activities harm society it is the government’s role to step in to prevent that harm. Online gambling simply provides the freedom for more people to get into debt, not a freedom that should be encouraged.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d6924ffbf7a5c0eede21e753486fcc44", "text": "omy business economic policy law crime policing digital freedoms freedom expression Gambling is quite different from buying stocks and shares. With the stock market investors are buying a stake in an actual company. This share may rise or fall in value, but so can a house or artwork. In each case there is a real asset that is likely to hold its value in the long term, which isn’t the case with gambling. Company shares and bonds can even produce a regular income through dividend and interest payments. It is true that some forms of financial speculation are more like gambling – for example the derivatives market or short-selling, where the investor does not actually own the asset being traded. But these are not types of investment that ordinary people have much to do with. They are also the kinds of financial activity most to blame for the financial crisis, which suggests we need more government control, not less.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "fd1028be7102382a512cb70f346ce532", "text": "omy business economic policy law crime policing digital freedoms freedom expression It is only in the interests of big gambling sites that aim to create a long term business to go along with tough regulation. Online gambling sites can get around government regulations that limit the dangers of betting. Because they can be legally sited anywhere in the world, they can pick countries with no rules to protect customers. In the real world governments can ban bets being taken from children and drunks. They can make sure that the odds are not changed to suit the House. And they can check that people running betting operations don’t have criminal records. In online gambling on the other hand 50% of players believe that internet casino’s cheat [14].\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "342af02f07b46aea1237720572608838", "text": "omy business economic policy law crime policing digital freedoms freedom expression Governments have the power to ban online gambling in their own country. Even if citizens could use foreign websites, most will not choose to break the law. When the United States introduced its Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act in 2006 gambling among those of college-age fell from 5.8% to 1.5% [12]. Blocking the leading websites will also be effective, as it makes it very hard for them to build a trusted brand. And governments can stop their banks handling payments to foreign gambling companies, cutting off their business.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f2dda83ef1d8bd47c5f6a757e49726ca", "text": "omy business economic policy law crime policing digital freedoms freedom expression Because people will gamble anyway, the best that governments can do is make sure that their people gamble in safe circumstances. This means real world that casinos and other betting places that can easily be monitored.\n\nThe examples of government using gambling for their own purposes are really the government turning gambling into a benefit for the country. Physical casinos benefit the economy and encourage investment, and lotteries can be used to raise money for good causes. Online gambling undermines all this, as it can be sited anywhere in the world but can still compete with, and undercut organised national betting operations.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9145047f8ab841c91c3758caa935a47f", "text": "omy business economic policy law crime policing digital freedoms freedom expression Online gambling affects families\n\nA parent who gambles can quickly lose the money their family depends on for food and rent. It is a common cause of family break-up and homelessness, so governments should get involved to protect innocent children from getting hurt [5]. Each problem gambler harmfully impacts 10-15 other people [6]. The internet makes it easy for gamblers to bet secretly, without even leaving the house, so people become addicted to gambling without their families realising what is going on until too late.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1ba6c6770de03b55d728fa4b01d80cf0", "text": "omy business economic policy law crime policing digital freedoms freedom expression Gambling is addictive.\n\nHumans get a buzz from taking a risk and the hope that this time their luck will be in, this is similar to drug addicts [7]. The more people bet, the more they want to bet, so they become hooked on gambling which can wreck their lives. Internet gambling is worse because it is not a social activity. Unlike a casino or race track, you don’t have to go anywhere to do it, which can put a brake on the activity. The websites never shut. There won’t be people around you to talk you out of risky bets. There is nothing to stop you gambling your savings away while drunk.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4aa46c4b05d7dae9fdcfe16a89956bfc", "text": "omy business economic policy law crime policing digital freedoms freedom expression Online gambling encourages crime\n\nHuman trafficking, forced prostitution and drugs provide $2.1 billion a year for the Mafia but they need some way through which to put this money into circulation. Online gambling is that way in. They put dirty money in and win clean money back [8]. Because it is so international and outside normal laws, it makes criminal cash hard to track. There is a whole array of other crime associated with online gambling; hacking, phishing, extortion, and identity fraud, all of which can occur on a large scale unconstrained by physical proximity [9]. Online gambling also encourages corruption in sport. By allowing huge sums of money to be bet internationally on the outcome of a game or race, it draws in criminals who can try to bribe or threaten sportsmen.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "90f8b0653d66c675035b208c0ee1745b", "text": "omy business economic policy law crime policing digital freedoms freedom expression Government only objects to online gambling because they dont benefit\n\nGovernments are hypocritical about gambling. They say they don’t like it but they often use it for their own purposes. Sometimes they only allow gambling in certain places in order to boost a local economy. Sometimes they profit themselves by running the only legal gambling business, such as a National Lottery [15] or public racecourse betting. This is bad for the public who want to gamble. Online gambling firms can break through government control by offering better odds and attractive new games.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d8831bdeef85619662d7621231eaf40f", "text": "omy business economic policy law crime policing digital freedoms freedom expression Cant enforce an online gambling ban\n\nGovernments can’t actually do anything to enforce a ban on the world wide web. Domestic laws can only stop internet companies using servers and offices in their own country. They cannot stop their citizens going online to gamble using sites based elsewhere. Governments can try to block sites they disapprove of, but new ones will keep springing up and their citizens will find ways around the ban. So practically there is little the government can do to stop people gambling online. Despite it being illegal the American Gambling Association has found that 4% of Americans already engage in online gambling [11].\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "49f8bfab4148ca07ed071beb87230716", "text": "omy business economic policy law crime policing digital freedoms freedom expression Other forms of online gambling\n\nWhat is the difference between gambling and playing the stock market? In each case people are putting money at risk in the hope of a particular outcome. Gambling on horse-racing or games involves knowledge and expertise that can improve your chances of success. In the same way, trading in bonds, shares, currency or derivatives is a bet that your understanding of the economy is better than that of other investors. Why should one kind of online risk-taking be legal and the other not?\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4b21dd9e2b4c1a6d739225d693dec0d2", "text": "omy business economic policy law crime policing digital freedoms freedom expression Personal freedom\n\nGambling is a leisure activity enjoyed by many millions of people. Governments should not tell people what they can do with their own money. Those who don’t like gambling should be free to buy adverts warning people against it, but they should not be able to use the law to impose their own beliefs. Online gambling has got rid of the rules that in the past made it hard to gamble for pleasure and allowed many more ordinary people to enjoy a bet from time to time. It provides the freedom to gamble, whenever and wherever and with whatever method the individual prefers.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "50b2a12ff1a26e5fda02c65e89e8bdd6", "text": "omy business economic policy law crime policing digital freedoms freedom expression Only regulation can mitigate harms\n\nIt is where the sites operate, not where they are set up that matters for regulation. It is in gambling sites interest to run a trustworthy, responsible business. Whatever they are looking for online, internet users choose trusted brands that have been around for a while. If a gambling site acts badly, for example by changing its odds unfairly, word will soon get around and no one will want to use it. Regulation will mean that sites will have to verify the age of their users and prevent problem gamblers from accessing their site. When there is regulation consumers will go to the sites that are verified by their government and are providing a legal, safe service [13].\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
004bc7728a9453f3db75c3db9545eb63	Sacrifice of sovereignty Guinea-Bissau would have to sacrifice its autonomy if it became the new front for the war on drugs. In order to receive assistance from the US, a state must adhere to US policy on drugs. If it fails to do so, like Bolivia did in 2009, then aid is severed under the certification system1. This restricts the recipient state’s ability to respond to the drug threat in a way that they deem suitable to their own circumstances. As a state should be free to form domestic policy without influence by external actors, the USA’s certification process is a violation of national sovereignty. 1) Walsh,J. ‘U.S. Decertification of Bolivia: A Blast from the Past’, Washington Office on Latin America, 17 September 2009	[ { "docid": "0b2917cceb4bc965965c0626cfa5ff57", "text": "rnational africa law crime policing house believes guinea bissau should not let It is only fair that the US should have some say on domestic drug policy considering the extent of their military assistance. The offers of assistance are optional and the conditions of compliance are known by both parties. The US gave $6,495 million in military assistance to the Columbian government between 1998 and 2008 to counter the narcotics trade and the rebels who were reliant on the business1. Since this funding comes from the USA’s federal budget, the US should be able to dictate how the money is spent.\n\n1) Acevedo,B. ‘Ten Years of Plan Colombia: An Analytical Assessment’, The Beckley Foundation Drug Policy Programme, September 2008\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "41dd092e66b7c8ffce8dc9d64dc9c398", "text": "rnational africa law crime policing house believes guinea bissau should not let There is a stronger focus on alternative development in drugs policy compared to the beginning of the drug war. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), historically influenced by US drug policy, has taken an increasingly alternative development-orientated stance. The UNODC has committed itself to effective alternative incomes, gender mainstreaming and community participation which demonstrates a global shift towards beneficial development1.\n\n1) United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime ‘Making a difference through Alternative Development’ data accessed 30 January 2014\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "bb709d393bd40c5bc30c957459cd71c4", "text": "rnational africa law crime policing house believes guinea bissau should not let The judicial system is not capable of handling narcotics cases fairly. Corruption and civil war have left Guinea-Bissau’s judicial system broken. Military leader General Antonio Indaj, who has alleged links to the drugs trade, has vetted all political and judicial appointments1. Considering that Guinea-Bissau has no prison, it is unlikely that those in the drug trade will be properly prosecuted. The US’ judicial system is seen as far more impartial and is, therefore, a more logical choice.\n\n1) Reitano,T. & Shaw,M. ‘Arrest of Guinea-Bissau’s Drug Lords Just the First Step in the Battle Against Trafficking’, Institute for Security Studies, 12 August 2013\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "df5e6cca7dbc9e2c844000ba6d4e2f46", "text": "rnational africa law crime policing house believes guinea bissau should not let Part of the financial assistance received by countries on the front line of the drug war is a fund for ‘strengthening of democratic institutions’. Plan Columbia, the USA’s attempt to reduce drug cultivation, saw 27% of all funding going towards democratic initiatives1. In a review by the Congressional Research Service of US drug control policy, the strengthening of the rule of law and democratic institutions is a priority for the US2. If the US drug war was brought to Guinea-Bissau then funding would most likely go towards promoting democratic institutions and a transition of power from the military to the civilians.\n\n1) Acevedo,B. ‘Ten Years of Plan Colombia: An Analytical Assessment’, The Beckley Foundation Drug Policy Programme, September 2008\n\n2) Wyler,L. ‘International Drug Control Policy: Background and U.S. Responses’, Congressional Research Service, 13 August 2013\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "69fb006da53cbb9897ed6fab6688088a", "text": "rnational africa law crime policing house believes guinea bissau should not let Interdiction rarely works. If Guinea-Bissau were to remove illicit drug operations from within its territories then the cartels would move elsewhere. Known as the hydra effect, once one potential drug route is cut off then another one is found and the trade continues1. This was the case for interdiction efforts between the US and Mexico. Initial government operations were successful at interdicting drugs being shipped between South American and Florida. In retaliation, traffickers began to use the US-Mexico border. The border witnesses large volumes of trade and interdicting the drugs proved to be nearly impossible2. It is logical to conclude that traffickers would find a new way to ensure drugs reached the Western markets if Guinea-Bissau sought US assistance.\n\n1) Boaz,D. ‘The Hydra-Headed Drug Business’, CATO institute, 30 June 1998\n\n2) Morton,D. ‘The War on Drugs in Mexico: a failed state?’, Third World Quarterly,39:3, pg.1639\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2f2fcc410849177816e307a507bb1b41", "text": "rnational africa law crime policing house believes guinea bissau should not let Considering that many of the military leaders have an invested interest in the drug trade, it is unlikely that Guinea-Bissau will seek help on these grounds. Antonio Indaj, the army’s Chief of Staff, was accused in 2013 of acting as a middle man in transactions between the South American cartels and the Western markets1. Not only has he been involved in drugs transactions, but Indaj has also been accessed of supplying weaponry to the FARC. This makes it unlikely that these leaders would want US assistance which would disrupt their profits and possibly leave them open to prosecution.\n\n1) Hoffman,M. ‘Guinea-Bissau and the South Atlantic Cocaine Trade’, Centre for American Progress, 22 August 2013\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "bfd4adf91ca3470918ec2309ee165b24", "text": "rnational africa law crime policing house believes guinea bissau should not let Corruption is still present in many states which have joined the US drug war. The war on drugs has done little, and perhaps exacerbated, Columbia’s corruption despite US assistance. In 2011, Columbian ex-government ministers were jailed and prosecuted for corruption and co-operation with paramilitaries.1Judicial reforms have also met with varied success. The Merida Initiative in Mexico, designed at removing the corruption of the cartels, has failed to address corruption in the judicial system which is still rampant. 2\n\n1) Bogota,S. ‘Closer and closer to the top’, The Economist, 29 July 2011\n\n2) Corcoran,P. ‘Mexico Judicial Reforms Go Easy On Corrupt Judges’, In Sight Crime, 16 February 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5548e4674ebbda94d9567f8ba404c671", "text": "rnational africa law crime policing house believes guinea bissau should not let US assistance does not guarantee success against illicit drug organisations. Despite the militarisation of the drug war in the Reagan-era, armed gangs are still prominent throughout the drug world. In Columbia, the left wing FARC still remains despite decades of war against the Columbian and USA governments1. The FARC, who use drugs for much of its income, still control large territories in the South Eastern territories. The effectiveness of military aid is consequently uncertain.\n\n1) Acosta,N. ‘Colombia’s FARC rebels end holiday ceasefire’, Reuters, 15 January 2014\n\n2) Vulliamy,E. ‘How a tiny West African country became the world’s first narco state’, The Guardian, 9 March 2008\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "586b1b0fc59f4404080b4ba0b5e6d347", "text": "rnational africa law crime policing house believes guinea bissau should not let Judiciary are undermined\n\nShould Guinea-Bissau become the new front of the US drug war then their judiciary will be furthered undermined. The US has frequently tried offenders from other countries in the US, superseding the local judiciary1. While this is usually due to formal agreements between states, extradition can cause indignation amongst the local population. Guinea-Bissau’s ex Naval chief Na Tchuto was arrested by American forces and, rather than allowing his home state to prosecute him, was tried by the New York District Court. This caused resentment in Guinea-Bissau towards the US2.\n\n1) Aronofsky,D. & Qin,J. ‘U.S. International Narcotics Extradition Cases’\n\n2) Reitano,T. & Shaw,M. ‘Arrest of Guinea-Bissau’s Drug Lords Just the First Step in the Battle Against Trafficking’, Institute for Security Studies, 12 August 2013\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "78dd9d7a0a4b38734731a6127b778491", "text": "rnational africa law crime policing house believes guinea bissau should not let Gives power to military coup leaders\n\nAssistance from the US would ensure that the coup leaders of Guinea Bissau remain in power. The securitisation of issues such as drugs and ‘terror’ is encouraged by the United States. A major problem with this policy is that it provides undue power and legitimacy to those countering the threat1. In early 2014, the military were still unconstitutionally ruling over the country. The drug war provides an external threat for the military to justify their leadership position. Considering the military has refused to allow democratic elections to occur and has regularly committed coups2, the US drug war could be a perfect excuse for to remain in power until the ‘threat’ subsides.\n\n1) Crick,E. ‘Drugs as an existential threat: An analysis of the international securitization of drugs’, International Journal of Drug Policy, 2012\n\n2) BBC, ‘Guinea-Bissau drug trade ‘rises since coup’, 31 June 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1cc7628f15afe230ef78efebd87cf356", "text": "rnational africa law crime policing house believes guinea bissau should not let War on the poor\n\nThe war on drugs has turned in to a war on the poorest in society. Through heavy handed techniques of enforcement and militarisation, the American war on drugs has failed to identify to key motivating factor for many of those involved in the trade; poverty1. Guinea-Bissau is the 5th poorest nation in the world, and other primary exports such as cashew nuts are starting to fail1. Due to lucrative profits, many of the poorer in society turn to the drug trade. US policy does not put enough of a focus on alternative development projects which can provide a livelihood through licit means. Instead they are treated as criminals and, in turn, are pushed further away from reconciliation.\n\n1) Falco,M. ‘Foreign Drugs, Foreign Wars’, Daedalus, 121:2, 2007, pg4\n\n2) The Guardian, ‘Guinea-Bissau’s dwindling cashew nut exports leave farmers facing hardship’, 23 August 2012\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "640dbebc74dd854280743a48fa76bf6d", "text": "rnational africa law crime policing house believes guinea bissau should not let US will provide equipment\n\nGuinea-Bissau should join the US drug war as they do not have the means to fight the war themselves. The local law enforcement is underfunded and ill-equipped to deal with the international threat. Guinea Bissau has one ship which patrols 350km of coastline, their officers have little in the way of land transport, petrol, phones or hand cuffs1. The limited reach of the law has allowed the cartels and gangs to prosper which, in turn, further damages law and order in Guinea Bissau. US military assistance will therefore help restore law and order to Guinea Bissau.\n\n1) Parkinson,C. ‘LatAm Drug Traffickers Set Up in Guinea-Bissau, Expand in Africa’, In Sight Crime, 29 August 2013\n\n2) Acevedo,B. ‘Ten Years of Plan Colombia: An Analytical Assessment’, The Beckley Foundation Drug Policy Programme, September 2008Shirk,D. ‘The Drug War in Mexico’, Council of Foreign Relations, March 2011\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "36fa782210010c6d4a0be499542359c8", "text": "rnational africa law crime policing house believes guinea bissau should not let Becoming a narco-state\n\nGuinea-Bissau’s social fabric is being destroyed by the presence of the drug trade and requires international support. Guinea-Bissau has been named as Africa’s first Narco-state; a country controlled by drug cartels and gangs. Violence committed by these gangs has escalated since the arrival of the Columbian cartels in 20071. Addiction, a consequence of the cocaine and heroin use, is prevalent throughout much of the country. It was estimated in 2012 that around 20-30% of the population use crack, an extremely addictive form of cocaine, and there is only one clinic in the country2. The only people who are visibly profiting from the presence of drugs are the Columbian drug lords who have extravagant mansions and modern cars3. Guinea-Bissau cannot hope to fight the prominence of these gangs by themselves and require aid.\n\n1) Time, ‘Guinea-Bissau: World’s First Narco-State’, data accessed 28 January 2014\n\n2) Hatcher,J. ‘Guinea-Bissau: How Cocaine Transformed a Tiny African Nation’, Time, 15 October 2012\n\n3) Vulliamy,E. ‘How a tiny West African country became the world’s first narco state’, The Guardian, 9 March 2008\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "bf9338817353327e0bd90c0606b04a6e", "text": "rnational africa law crime policing house believes guinea bissau should not let Prevent drugs from reaching Western markets\n\nBy joining the war on drugs, Guinea-Bissau will be in a better position to thwart the transportation of cheap cocaine and heroin to Europe and North America. Guinea-Bissau’s position makes it ideal for the cocaine trade, where drugs can be unloaded from Latin America and then distributed more easily to the West1. Around 18 tons of cocaine (worth $1.25 billion) passes through West Africa annually, most of it travelling through the state2. US assistance and interdiction operations would help prevent illicit drugs from reaching the profitable Western markets.\n\n1) Smoltczyk,A. ‘Africa’s Cocaine Hub: Guinea-Bissau a “Drug Trafficker’s Dream”, Spiegel, 8 March 2013\n\n2) Hoffman,M. ‘Guinea-Bissau and the South Atlantic Cocaine Trade’, Centre for American Progress, 22 August 2013\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3e64f5990df4259d3a07cc87996562c3", "text": "rnational africa law crime policing house believes guinea bissau should not let Deal with Corruption\n\nGuinea-Bissau’s institutions have become too corrupt to deal with the drug problem and require support. The police, army and judiciary have all been implicated in the drug trade. The involvement of state officials in drug trafficking means that criminals are not prosecuted against. When two soldiers and a civilian were apprehended with 635kg (worth £25.4 million in 2013), they were detained and then immediately released with Colonel Arsenio Blade claiming ‘They were on the road hitching a ride’1. Judges are often bribed or sent death threats when faced with sentencing those involved in the drug trade. The USA has provided restructuring assistance to institutions which have reduced corruption, such as in the Mexico Merida Initiative, and could do the same with Guinea Bissau.\n\n1) Vulliamy,E. ‘How a tiny West African country became the world’s first narco state’, The Guardian, 9 March 2008\n\n2) Corcoran,P. ‘Mexico Judicial Reforms Go Easy On Corrupt Judges’, In Sight Crime, 16 February 2012\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
b5ae81e014d365eb47d8cfbb02ad2957	Reporting on violent crimes compromises the integrity and fairness of law Judges and juries have to be neutral when they preside in court, and no bias can enter the court’s discourse and deliberation if justice is to be done. This is especially true of violent crime, for two reasons. First, in such cases, the court is dealing with people’s lives, as violent crime convictions yield high sentences, and the court’s decisions often have a lasting effect on the physical wellbeing of both victims and perpetrators of such crimes. Second, the visceral nature of violent crime naturally causes an emotive response from people hearing about it, which can cause them to act less rationally. [1] Opinion is thus more easily colored in deliberations over violent crime than with any other kind. In light of these facts it is necessary to analyze the behavior of the media when it reports on violent crimes. The media is a commercial enterprise. It prioritizes sales over truth, and always wants to sell the good story and to get the scoop. For this reason the media relishes the opportunity to sell the “blood and guts” of violent crime to its audience. Furthermore, the race to get stories first causes reporters and media outlets to jump to conclusions, which can result in the vilification of suspects who are in fact innocent. The media sensationalizes the extent of crime through its extreme emphasis on the violence; it builds its stories on moving imagery, emotive language, and by focusing on victims and their families. At the same time the media seeks to portray itself as being of the highest journalistic quality. [2] This behavior on the part of the media is tremendously bad for the legal process. The media circus surrounding violent crime necessarily affects potential jurors, judges, lawyers, and the general public. This has been observed on many occasions; for example, after the OJ Simpson trial some jurors admitted that the pressure generated by the media added significantly to the difficulties of deliberation. The inescapable consequence of the media reporting on violent crimes is that people cannot help internalizing the public opinion when it stands against a person on trial. Thus court judgments in the presence of a media circus must be held suspect. By restricting reporting on violent crime, however, the pressure can be relieved and the legal process can function justly. [1] Tyagi, Himanshu. “Emotional Responses Usually Take Over Rational Responses in Decision-Making”. RxPG News. 16 February 2007, http://www.rxpgnews.com/cognitivescience/Emotional-responses-usually-tak... [2] Lee, Martin and Norman Solomon. Unreliable Sources. New York: Lyle Stuart. 1990.	[ { "docid": "216c94fb65312099f79c78d5486b26c4", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes Law should be just and unbiased. That is not a controversial position. However, it seems difficult to imagine that reporting on violent crimes has so tremendous an effect on the public that judges and jurors cannot be unbiased in their deliberations. Rather, the process of jury selection as it stands is designed to guarantee that there is no bias with both prosecution and defence being allowed to examine and object to a juror. Furthermore, most reporting on violent crime is about simple facts rather than any attempt to influence opinion on specific crimes. This is the essence of what news is, people have a right to know what is going on in their society, even if what is going on is brutally violent.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "ec03955d243b002bedc9b5b30da06845", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes It is better that people be afraid of what is really happening than to be blissfully ignorant and thus vulnerable. Crime can be frightening, but people need to know about it so they can prepare themselves to deal with it. Furthermore, if violence is growing within communities, there may well be a need for better policing, so calling for such provisions is not necessarily just treating the symptoms of social illness, but rather is holding society together and maintaining necessary order. [1] Fear may cause people to do irrational things, but so too can ignorance.\n\n[1] Jones, Stephen. Understanding Violent Crime. London: Open University Press. 2000.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "df59d37905e766043d974ccdfb73cdb6", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes Terrorists and serial killers make up a tiny proportion of murders and violent criminals in Western countries. In the United Kingdom for example there have been less deaths due to terrorism between 2000 and 2010 than due to bee stings. [1] As a result the very few copycat attacks are not really the issue at all when the question of reporting on violent crimes in the media is under discussion. Talk about these rarities serves only to distract people from the reality that most violent crime is not so bizarre as these cases. [2] Rather, the need to report on violent crime stands for all the violent crimes committed in every society, and fears of terrorists and serial killers can do little to challenge that need.\n\n[1] Anderson, David, ‘The Terrorism acts in 2011’ Report of the Independent Reviewer on the Operation of the Terrorism Act 2000 and Part 1 of the Terrorism Act 2006, June 2012, http://terrorismlegislationreviewer.independent.gov.uk/publications/report-terrorism-acts-2011?view=Binary\n\n[2] Morton, Robert. “Serial Murder”. National Center for the Analysis of Violent Crime. 2005. http://www.fbi.gov/stats-services/publications/serial-murder\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "65a37c40462b65dd75f8f9734d2e8439", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes Some journalists and media outlets are despicable in the way they treat people. Preying upon victims and their families is absolutely wrong, but a ban is not the way to solve this problem as it would simply move the media frenzy to whenever the ban on a case is removed and the details become public. Instead better regulation of the press is needed in such emotional cases in order to make sure that the media is respectful of families and also to make sure that those accused are seen to be innocent until proven guilty.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "780ba3bc19ff765d1e98ea0f10a233f9", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes It is not necessary for people to know the extent of criminal activity in order to be able to take precautions, everyone regardless of whether they know the amount of crime in an area should take what precautions against being attacked that they can. For example they should stick to walking on well-lit streets at night. Local groups on the other hand do not need to be informed by the newspapers if there is crime in the area, they will already know because they live there how safe the area is. The police will certainly give residents the information if there is a threat to them even if they are not giving that information to the media.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b6fe5b197a3c823e09996ce15e34d4b8", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes Bans and restrictions on the old media would equally affect the ‘new’ media of the internet age. Bloggers could just as easily be taken to court for their reporting as conventional journalists so the news would still be restricted. While individuals may still report crimes this would become limited to the local area where people do have a genuine interest in the crime rather than it being reported nationally.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f9f49f0dc3ed92ecc964f3c76088c06b", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes Political will to affect change in areas riddled with violent crime is not generated by media reporting on the violence. Rather, the way the media reports, prioritizing the sensational, blood and guts, aspects of crimes, results in frightened voters clamoring for something to be done. This usually just results in more policing and more draconian sentencing laws. Neither of which solve the underlying problems of poverty and poor provision of essential state services. Rather, they serve merely as stand-ins for real action, resulting in no efforts to genuinely reclaim troubled communities. By excluding media reporting on the most visceral goings on in these areas, namely violent crimes, politicians and the people affected can enter into rational dialogue that is not perverted by media sensationalism.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b336c1bd4dc5be7f9f128a6c0b96fbad", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes There is no such thing as these two duties that the opposition asserts for the media. The media is a business like any other, because its business is information and news it will report on violent crime as it is something that the people care about so will purchase news about it, but it does not have a duty to do such reporting. Similarly there is no duty to report on things that influence the lives of the citizens of the state, again the media does so but only because it sells. Indeed large amounts of media do not report things that are either things that most people care about or things that seriously influence society. There are lots of magazines and newspapers on things like hobbies, such as toy models, but it is absurd to suggest that this is what most people care about or that the issues that affect toy model hobbyists influence the rest of society. It would be equally absurd to suggest that such a magazine or newspaper should have a section devoted to violent crime because that is what is important.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5d4b324d17212507b616e5d856b7d398", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes Reporting generates a constant iteration of fear in the public, and precipitates a ratchet effect toward crime\n\nConstant reporting on violent crime makes people more fearful. This not a deliberate effort on the part of the media to keep people afraid, but rather is a corrosive negative externality; violence sells, so media provides, resulting in the scaring of audiences. The result of the media’s reporting on violent crimes is a constant iteration of fear, which makes people wary of each other, and of the world. [1] Furthermore, such reporting creates a feeling in people of other individuals and groups most often reported as committing crimes as being “other” from themselves. For example, reporting on extensive crimes in inner-city areas in the United States has caused middle class suburbanites to develop wariness toward African-Americans, who are constantly reported in the media as criminals. This is socially destructive in the extreme. The heightened senses of insecurity people feel leads to vigilance in excess. This is bad for people’s rationality. All these problems yield very negative social consequences.\n\nThe constant reporting on violence leads to people demanding immediate law enforcement, and politicians quick to oblige, which leads to a ratchet effect, a precipitous increase in punishments for crimes. This results in a severe misallocation of resources; first in terms of irrationally high spending on extra policing, and second in terms of the excessive allocation of resources and authority to the state to solve the problems of crime through force. This is observed, for example, in the enactment of the PATRIOT Act, which was acclaimed in a state of fear after 9/11, and which gave extensive, even draconian powers to the state in the name of security. The media fuels this hysteria. Without its influence, cooler heads can prevail. The end result of all this is a treating of symptoms rather than the cause. Putting more police on the streets, and getting tough on crime fail to address underlying issues, which are often poverty and the social ills arising from it. [2] Citizens and governments should instead face the actual problem instead of choosing flashy option.\n\n[1] Rogers, Tom. “Towards an Analytical Framework on Fear of Crime and its Relationship to Print Media Reportage”. University of Sheffield. http://www.shef.ac.uk/content/1/c6/10/39/11/8rogers.pdf\n\n[2] Amy, Douglas J. “More Government Does Not Mean Less Freedom”. Government is Good. 2007, http://governmentisgood.com/articles.php?aid=18&print=1\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2dedbc9dae9129511d00d07200ecc2ca", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes The state owes a duty of protection to victims, victims’ families, and those accused of committing crimes\n\nVictims of violent crimes and their families face an emotional and vulnerable time in the wake of such crimes. People need time to recover, or mourn. The media’s fixation on violent crimes subjects these vulnerable people to the assault of reporters. In fact, there exists a perverse incentive for the media to badger families until they break down, as tears sell. Such exploitation must be stopped, and the best way to do that is to deny the media the ability to report on such things. The media does not care about hurting feelings, and bad behavior on the part of reporters never hurts readership of media outlets, as is indicative of such tabloids as the National Enquirer. Outlets can always deflect any backlash that might occur for their excesses by cutting loose “rogue reporters”.\n\nFurthermore, families and victims usually do not want the media's, and the nation’s eyes upon them. Rather they tend to seek support from family and community, not the faceless masses. [1] People generally want to mourn in their own way. They may not want to become part of a media-driven narrative, and certainly not to become symbols for a new social crusade to reform communities. Removing violent reporting removes these perverse incentives to irritate victims and families, and instead leads to more respectful and considerate treatment.\n\nAs for those accused of crimes, it can be hard for someone acquitted after a trial or accusation to get on with life. Some people may find themselves roundly accused by the media and public, even portrayed as monster, making it very hard to move on, even when their names are officially cleared. This is completely contrary to how the legal system should function, where acquittal is meant to deliver absolution. Allowing the media to construct narratives of guilt in the absence of evidence undermines the very fabric of justice. The media’s incessant coverage of violent crimes and its alacrity to make accusations and jump to conclusions can destroy someone’s life, more than even having to stand trial does. Justice must prevail and be fair to those to whom it judges in court, and this can only be done by not allowing the media to turn the mob against people even after their names are cleared.\n\n[1] Canadian Resource Centre for Victims of Crime. “Victims and the Media”. 2011, http://www.crcvc.ca/en/media-guide/part-1/victims-and-media/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b14a07a375d371de6c2d97b1c7bb751a", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes The contagion effect of reporting on violence leads to increased impetus for terrorist attacks and serial killings\n\nThe media has been consistently demonstrated through empirical evidence to aid in the exacerbation of premeditated violence. There is an observable contagion effect, as the media serves to spread the virus of violence. Studies have shown that the greater the level of media coverage, the shorter the lag time between initial crime and emulations of them. In the case of terrorism, there is a demonstrable clustering effect. The 1970s embassy takeovers in Middle East, for example, show how media coverage can encourage terrorists to emulate past actions that gained attention in the past. [1] People see success of certain kinds of attacks and seek to repeat them. For example, the successes of Fatah in Israel led to the formation of the German Red Army Faction that would be responsible for many terrorist activities.\n\nIn the case of serial killers and mass murders, the media generates the “hot death story” of the moment, leading to an observable clustering effect, much as occurs with terrorism. For example, the Virginia Tech shooter cited the Columbine shooters as his inspiration. Serials killers are often attention-seeking individuals who crave media attention, which they are obligingly given. An example of this is the Unabomber, who ramped up his parcel-bombing campaign as a result of the media attention given to Timothy McVeigh’s mass murder in Oklahoma City. The media not reporting on violent crimes means eliminating the problem of emulation, and stops feeding killers’ pathologies.\n\n[1] Nacos, Brigitte. “Revisiting the Contagion Hypothesis: Terrorism, News Coverage, and Copycat Attacks”. Perspectives on Terrorism 3(3). 2009.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a1e04ec6558e4954c33b76a6bc1280da", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes To not promote the truth of events is contrary to the duty, and to the right of free speech, of a responsible media\n\nThe media has two jobs; first, it has a duty to report on what people care about, and second, it has a duty to report on things that seriously influence society. Muzzling the media’s ability to disseminate information by preventing reporting on violent crimes can only do harm to society. The media has a fundamental duty to report on anything that may influence the lives of the citizens it reaches. This is particularly true of the state-run media, which is meant to be free of political influence and is not as dependent upon ad revenues and thus not as prone to sensationalist reporting. Beyond its duty to inform, the media, like all bodies and individuals in society have a right to freedom of speech. This must extend to the right to report on things that are ugly and that frighten people. It is better that people be informed of the truth by a free media and be terrified than to leave people without knowledge of the real seriousness of criminality. Fundamentally, the right to freedom of speech and of expression must be protected. If the media should give way on the issue of violent crimes it loses all credibility as a genuine font of truth. [1] To protect the basic rights of citizens, the right of the media to report on violent crimes must be upheld.\n\n[1] PUCL Bulletin. “Freedom of the Press”. People’s Union for Civil Liberties. July 1982. http://www.pucl.org/from-archives/Media/freedom-press.htm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c2aa9dfda8e8a49841922cb6c254c53b", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes The mainstream media is essential for the accurate reporting of information; without it reporting on violent crimes, they would simply be reported by less accountable, less accurate freelance reporters and blogs\n\nThe media is regularly accused of being sensationalist and of hyping up the extent and gruesomeness of violent crimes. In some cases this may be true, but the media generally reports facts in a sober and informative, if also exciting, way. Without the mainstream media, however, news about violent crimes will still spread. The news will be disseminated within local communities and across the Internet via email and blogs. The result is lessening of journalistic quality, as bloggers are not bound by any exacting requirements in terms of the need for factual bases of stories. [1] The mainstream media provides a largely credible source of news that new media still lacks. In the absence of mainstream reporting, especially on such a hot button issue as violent crime, will only serve to spread disinformation, leading people to draw inaccurate conclusions and make decisions based on inaccurate knowledge.\n\n[1] Rouse, Darren. “Is New Media a Threat to Journalism?”. ProBlogger. 15 October 2007, http://www.problogger.net/archives/2007/10/15/is-new-media-a-threat-to-j...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4c7895391b3d2f7a0edf0c58fb57eaa5", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes It is necessary for people to understand the extent of criminal activity in order for them to coordinate an effective response\n\nPeople have a right to know, for the sake of their own safety, about violent crimes being committed. Otherwise they will be unable to prepare themselves adequately for the possibility of being attacked. However people cannot make rational decisions about how to react and respond to violence in society if they do not have an accurate picture of not only the frequency of crime, but also their nature. Everyone should take necessary precautions to prevent themselves being victims of crime, as part of this they should know what areas are for example safe to walk through at night. If there is little or no reporting of where and when crime occurs the public will not have this necessary knowledge to keep themselves safe. Local groups will also be less able to protect their neighborhoods. For example in Pimlico, London, local groups have set up patrols in order to deal with an increase in muggings, if these muggings were not reported such local action would not have been possible. [1]\n\n[1] Davenport, Justin, and Moore-Bridger, Benedict, ‘Vigilante patrols set up to beat Pimlico prowlers’, London Evening Standard, 8 December 2011, http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-24019324-vigilante-patrol...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "03bb77e83ebc9cb0585adff5bb29da87", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes The media’s reporting and investigating acts as a check on the behavior of the justice system\n\nThe state often does not want to deal with serious social issues in politically disenfranchised areas, where crime rates tend to be higher and the populations poorer This is because such areas cannot be counted on for electoral support as they often have low turnout rates and can be too complicated to be worth dealing with from a political perspective. Without the media, no one will report on criminal activity in these areas, meaning there will be no political will to reform them. This gives the police the opportunity to abrogate their responsibility to these communities.\n\nIn the absence of media reporting, authorities would also be able to hide the true extent of crime in misleading statistics. For example, police in parts of the United States have been caught publishing deliberately false crime statistics, often understating levels of violent crime in poorer communities. [1] The media has served to uncover the truth of these police abuses of the facts. Only with a free media can people truly be informed about what is happening in society, and that extends to information about violent crimes.\n\n[1] Thompson, Steve and Tanya Eiserer. “Experts: Dallas Undercount of Assaults Builds ‘Artificial Image’”. Dallas Morning News. 15 December 2009. http://www.dallasnews.com/news/community-news/dallas/headlines/20091214-...\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
afc7187733c625e543f26f30a7004274	To not promote the truth of events is contrary to the duty, and to the right of free speech, of a responsible media The media has two jobs; first, it has a duty to report on what people care about, and second, it has a duty to report on things that seriously influence society. Muzzling the media’s ability to disseminate information by preventing reporting on violent crimes can only do harm to society. The media has a fundamental duty to report on anything that may influence the lives of the citizens it reaches. This is particularly true of the state-run media, which is meant to be free of political influence and is not as dependent upon ad revenues and thus not as prone to sensationalist reporting. Beyond its duty to inform, the media, like all bodies and individuals in society have a right to freedom of speech. This must extend to the right to report on things that are ugly and that frighten people. It is better that people be informed of the truth by a free media and be terrified than to leave people without knowledge of the real seriousness of criminality. Fundamentally, the right to freedom of speech and of expression must be protected. If the media should give way on the issue of violent crimes it loses all credibility as a genuine font of truth. [1] To protect the basic rights of citizens, the right of the media to report on violent crimes must be upheld. [1] PUCL Bulletin. “Freedom of the Press”. People’s Union for Civil Liberties. July 1982. http://www.pucl.org/from-archives/Media/freedom-press.htm	[ { "docid": "b336c1bd4dc5be7f9f128a6c0b96fbad", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes There is no such thing as these two duties that the opposition asserts for the media. The media is a business like any other, because its business is information and news it will report on violent crime as it is something that the people care about so will purchase news about it, but it does not have a duty to do such reporting. Similarly there is no duty to report on things that influence the lives of the citizens of the state, again the media does so but only because it sells. Indeed large amounts of media do not report things that are either things that most people care about or things that seriously influence society. There are lots of magazines and newspapers on things like hobbies, such as toy models, but it is absurd to suggest that this is what most people care about or that the issues that affect toy model hobbyists influence the rest of society. It would be equally absurd to suggest that such a magazine or newspaper should have a section devoted to violent crime because that is what is important.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "780ba3bc19ff765d1e98ea0f10a233f9", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes It is not necessary for people to know the extent of criminal activity in order to be able to take precautions, everyone regardless of whether they know the amount of crime in an area should take what precautions against being attacked that they can. For example they should stick to walking on well-lit streets at night. Local groups on the other hand do not need to be informed by the newspapers if there is crime in the area, they will already know because they live there how safe the area is. The police will certainly give residents the information if there is a threat to them even if they are not giving that information to the media.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b6fe5b197a3c823e09996ce15e34d4b8", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes Bans and restrictions on the old media would equally affect the ‘new’ media of the internet age. Bloggers could just as easily be taken to court for their reporting as conventional journalists so the news would still be restricted. While individuals may still report crimes this would become limited to the local area where people do have a genuine interest in the crime rather than it being reported nationally.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f9f49f0dc3ed92ecc964f3c76088c06b", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes Political will to affect change in areas riddled with violent crime is not generated by media reporting on the violence. Rather, the way the media reports, prioritizing the sensational, blood and guts, aspects of crimes, results in frightened voters clamoring for something to be done. This usually just results in more policing and more draconian sentencing laws. Neither of which solve the underlying problems of poverty and poor provision of essential state services. Rather, they serve merely as stand-ins for real action, resulting in no efforts to genuinely reclaim troubled communities. By excluding media reporting on the most visceral goings on in these areas, namely violent crimes, politicians and the people affected can enter into rational dialogue that is not perverted by media sensationalism.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ec03955d243b002bedc9b5b30da06845", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes It is better that people be afraid of what is really happening than to be blissfully ignorant and thus vulnerable. Crime can be frightening, but people need to know about it so they can prepare themselves to deal with it. Furthermore, if violence is growing within communities, there may well be a need for better policing, so calling for such provisions is not necessarily just treating the symptoms of social illness, but rather is holding society together and maintaining necessary order. [1] Fear may cause people to do irrational things, but so too can ignorance.\n\n[1] Jones, Stephen. Understanding Violent Crime. London: Open University Press. 2000.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "df59d37905e766043d974ccdfb73cdb6", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes Terrorists and serial killers make up a tiny proportion of murders and violent criminals in Western countries. In the United Kingdom for example there have been less deaths due to terrorism between 2000 and 2010 than due to bee stings. [1] As a result the very few copycat attacks are not really the issue at all when the question of reporting on violent crimes in the media is under discussion. Talk about these rarities serves only to distract people from the reality that most violent crime is not so bizarre as these cases. [2] Rather, the need to report on violent crime stands for all the violent crimes committed in every society, and fears of terrorists and serial killers can do little to challenge that need.\n\n[1] Anderson, David, ‘The Terrorism acts in 2011’ Report of the Independent Reviewer on the Operation of the Terrorism Act 2000 and Part 1 of the Terrorism Act 2006, June 2012, http://terrorismlegislationreviewer.independent.gov.uk/publications/report-terrorism-acts-2011?view=Binary\n\n[2] Morton, Robert. “Serial Murder”. National Center for the Analysis of Violent Crime. 2005. http://www.fbi.gov/stats-services/publications/serial-murder\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "65a37c40462b65dd75f8f9734d2e8439", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes Some journalists and media outlets are despicable in the way they treat people. Preying upon victims and their families is absolutely wrong, but a ban is not the way to solve this problem as it would simply move the media frenzy to whenever the ban on a case is removed and the details become public. Instead better regulation of the press is needed in such emotional cases in order to make sure that the media is respectful of families and also to make sure that those accused are seen to be innocent until proven guilty.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "216c94fb65312099f79c78d5486b26c4", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes Law should be just and unbiased. That is not a controversial position. However, it seems difficult to imagine that reporting on violent crimes has so tremendous an effect on the public that judges and jurors cannot be unbiased in their deliberations. Rather, the process of jury selection as it stands is designed to guarantee that there is no bias with both prosecution and defence being allowed to examine and object to a juror. Furthermore, most reporting on violent crime is about simple facts rather than any attempt to influence opinion on specific crimes. This is the essence of what news is, people have a right to know what is going on in their society, even if what is going on is brutally violent.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c2aa9dfda8e8a49841922cb6c254c53b", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes The mainstream media is essential for the accurate reporting of information; without it reporting on violent crimes, they would simply be reported by less accountable, less accurate freelance reporters and blogs\n\nThe media is regularly accused of being sensationalist and of hyping up the extent and gruesomeness of violent crimes. In some cases this may be true, but the media generally reports facts in a sober and informative, if also exciting, way. Without the mainstream media, however, news about violent crimes will still spread. The news will be disseminated within local communities and across the Internet via email and blogs. The result is lessening of journalistic quality, as bloggers are not bound by any exacting requirements in terms of the need for factual bases of stories. [1] The mainstream media provides a largely credible source of news that new media still lacks. In the absence of mainstream reporting, especially on such a hot button issue as violent crime, will only serve to spread disinformation, leading people to draw inaccurate conclusions and make decisions based on inaccurate knowledge.\n\n[1] Rouse, Darren. “Is New Media a Threat to Journalism?”. ProBlogger. 15 October 2007, http://www.problogger.net/archives/2007/10/15/is-new-media-a-threat-to-j...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4c7895391b3d2f7a0edf0c58fb57eaa5", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes It is necessary for people to understand the extent of criminal activity in order for them to coordinate an effective response\n\nPeople have a right to know, for the sake of their own safety, about violent crimes being committed. Otherwise they will be unable to prepare themselves adequately for the possibility of being attacked. However people cannot make rational decisions about how to react and respond to violence in society if they do not have an accurate picture of not only the frequency of crime, but also their nature. Everyone should take necessary precautions to prevent themselves being victims of crime, as part of this they should know what areas are for example safe to walk through at night. If there is little or no reporting of where and when crime occurs the public will not have this necessary knowledge to keep themselves safe. Local groups will also be less able to protect their neighborhoods. For example in Pimlico, London, local groups have set up patrols in order to deal with an increase in muggings, if these muggings were not reported such local action would not have been possible. [1]\n\n[1] Davenport, Justin, and Moore-Bridger, Benedict, ‘Vigilante patrols set up to beat Pimlico prowlers’, London Evening Standard, 8 December 2011, http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-24019324-vigilante-patrol...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "03bb77e83ebc9cb0585adff5bb29da87", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes The media’s reporting and investigating acts as a check on the behavior of the justice system\n\nThe state often does not want to deal with serious social issues in politically disenfranchised areas, where crime rates tend to be higher and the populations poorer This is because such areas cannot be counted on for electoral support as they often have low turnout rates and can be too complicated to be worth dealing with from a political perspective. Without the media, no one will report on criminal activity in these areas, meaning there will be no political will to reform them. This gives the police the opportunity to abrogate their responsibility to these communities.\n\nIn the absence of media reporting, authorities would also be able to hide the true extent of crime in misleading statistics. For example, police in parts of the United States have been caught publishing deliberately false crime statistics, often understating levels of violent crime in poorer communities. [1] The media has served to uncover the truth of these police abuses of the facts. Only with a free media can people truly be informed about what is happening in society, and that extends to information about violent crimes.\n\n[1] Thompson, Steve and Tanya Eiserer. “Experts: Dallas Undercount of Assaults Builds ‘Artificial Image’”. Dallas Morning News. 15 December 2009. http://www.dallasnews.com/news/community-news/dallas/headlines/20091214-...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5d4b324d17212507b616e5d856b7d398", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes Reporting generates a constant iteration of fear in the public, and precipitates a ratchet effect toward crime\n\nConstant reporting on violent crime makes people more fearful. This not a deliberate effort on the part of the media to keep people afraid, but rather is a corrosive negative externality; violence sells, so media provides, resulting in the scaring of audiences. The result of the media’s reporting on violent crimes is a constant iteration of fear, which makes people wary of each other, and of the world. [1] Furthermore, such reporting creates a feeling in people of other individuals and groups most often reported as committing crimes as being “other” from themselves. For example, reporting on extensive crimes in inner-city areas in the United States has caused middle class suburbanites to develop wariness toward African-Americans, who are constantly reported in the media as criminals. This is socially destructive in the extreme. The heightened senses of insecurity people feel leads to vigilance in excess. This is bad for people’s rationality. All these problems yield very negative social consequences.\n\nThe constant reporting on violence leads to people demanding immediate law enforcement, and politicians quick to oblige, which leads to a ratchet effect, a precipitous increase in punishments for crimes. This results in a severe misallocation of resources; first in terms of irrationally high spending on extra policing, and second in terms of the excessive allocation of resources and authority to the state to solve the problems of crime through force. This is observed, for example, in the enactment of the PATRIOT Act, which was acclaimed in a state of fear after 9/11, and which gave extensive, even draconian powers to the state in the name of security. The media fuels this hysteria. Without its influence, cooler heads can prevail. The end result of all this is a treating of symptoms rather than the cause. Putting more police on the streets, and getting tough on crime fail to address underlying issues, which are often poverty and the social ills arising from it. [2] Citizens and governments should instead face the actual problem instead of choosing flashy option.\n\n[1] Rogers, Tom. “Towards an Analytical Framework on Fear of Crime and its Relationship to Print Media Reportage”. University of Sheffield. http://www.shef.ac.uk/content/1/c6/10/39/11/8rogers.pdf\n\n[2] Amy, Douglas J. “More Government Does Not Mean Less Freedom”. Government is Good. 2007, http://governmentisgood.com/articles.php?aid=18&print=1\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2dedbc9dae9129511d00d07200ecc2ca", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes The state owes a duty of protection to victims, victims’ families, and those accused of committing crimes\n\nVictims of violent crimes and their families face an emotional and vulnerable time in the wake of such crimes. People need time to recover, or mourn. The media’s fixation on violent crimes subjects these vulnerable people to the assault of reporters. In fact, there exists a perverse incentive for the media to badger families until they break down, as tears sell. Such exploitation must be stopped, and the best way to do that is to deny the media the ability to report on such things. The media does not care about hurting feelings, and bad behavior on the part of reporters never hurts readership of media outlets, as is indicative of such tabloids as the National Enquirer. Outlets can always deflect any backlash that might occur for their excesses by cutting loose “rogue reporters”.\n\nFurthermore, families and victims usually do not want the media's, and the nation’s eyes upon them. Rather they tend to seek support from family and community, not the faceless masses. [1] People generally want to mourn in their own way. They may not want to become part of a media-driven narrative, and certainly not to become symbols for a new social crusade to reform communities. Removing violent reporting removes these perverse incentives to irritate victims and families, and instead leads to more respectful and considerate treatment.\n\nAs for those accused of crimes, it can be hard for someone acquitted after a trial or accusation to get on with life. Some people may find themselves roundly accused by the media and public, even portrayed as monster, making it very hard to move on, even when their names are officially cleared. This is completely contrary to how the legal system should function, where acquittal is meant to deliver absolution. Allowing the media to construct narratives of guilt in the absence of evidence undermines the very fabric of justice. The media’s incessant coverage of violent crimes and its alacrity to make accusations and jump to conclusions can destroy someone’s life, more than even having to stand trial does. Justice must prevail and be fair to those to whom it judges in court, and this can only be done by not allowing the media to turn the mob against people even after their names are cleared.\n\n[1] Canadian Resource Centre for Victims of Crime. “Victims and the Media”. 2011, http://www.crcvc.ca/en/media-guide/part-1/victims-and-media/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "448d07eb99e893f57a38d7e198027102", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes Reporting on violent crimes compromises the integrity and fairness of law\n\nJudges and juries have to be neutral when they preside in court, and no bias can enter the court’s discourse and deliberation if justice is to be done. This is especially true of violent crime, for two reasons. First, in such cases, the court is dealing with people’s lives, as violent crime convictions yield high sentences, and the court’s decisions often have a lasting effect on the physical wellbeing of both victims and perpetrators of such crimes. Second, the visceral nature of violent crime naturally causes an emotive response from people hearing about it, which can cause them to act less rationally. [1]\n\nOpinion is thus more easily colored in deliberations over violent crime than with any other kind. In light of these facts it is necessary to analyze the behavior of the media when it reports on violent crimes. The media is a commercial enterprise. It prioritizes sales over truth, and always wants to sell the good story and to get the scoop. For this reason the media relishes the opportunity to sell the “blood and guts” of violent crime to its audience. Furthermore, the race to get stories first causes reporters and media outlets to jump to conclusions, which can result in the vilification of suspects who are in fact innocent. The media sensationalizes the extent of crime through its extreme emphasis on the violence; it builds its stories on moving imagery, emotive language, and by focusing on victims and their families. At the same time the media seeks to portray itself as being of the highest journalistic quality. [2]\n\nThis behavior on the part of the media is tremendously bad for the legal process. The media circus surrounding violent crime necessarily affects potential jurors, judges, lawyers, and the general public. This has been observed on many occasions; for example, after the OJ Simpson trial some jurors admitted that the pressure generated by the media added significantly to the difficulties of deliberation. The inescapable consequence of the media reporting on violent crimes is that people cannot help internalizing the public opinion when it stands against a person on trial. Thus court judgments in the presence of a media circus must be held suspect. By restricting reporting on violent crime, however, the pressure can be relieved and the legal process can function justly.\n\n[1] Tyagi, Himanshu. “Emotional Responses Usually Take Over Rational Responses in Decision-Making”. RxPG News. 16 February 2007, http://www.rxpgnews.com/cognitivescience/Emotional-responses-usually-tak...\n\n[2] Lee, Martin and Norman Solomon. Unreliable Sources. New York: Lyle Stuart. 1990.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b14a07a375d371de6c2d97b1c7bb751a", "text": "ure media law crime policing house would restrict media reporting violent crimes The contagion effect of reporting on violence leads to increased impetus for terrorist attacks and serial killings\n\nThe media has been consistently demonstrated through empirical evidence to aid in the exacerbation of premeditated violence. There is an observable contagion effect, as the media serves to spread the virus of violence. Studies have shown that the greater the level of media coverage, the shorter the lag time between initial crime and emulations of them. In the case of terrorism, there is a demonstrable clustering effect. The 1970s embassy takeovers in Middle East, for example, show how media coverage can encourage terrorists to emulate past actions that gained attention in the past. [1] People see success of certain kinds of attacks and seek to repeat them. For example, the successes of Fatah in Israel led to the formation of the German Red Army Faction that would be responsible for many terrorist activities.\n\nIn the case of serial killers and mass murders, the media generates the “hot death story” of the moment, leading to an observable clustering effect, much as occurs with terrorism. For example, the Virginia Tech shooter cited the Columbine shooters as his inspiration. Serials killers are often attention-seeking individuals who crave media attention, which they are obligingly given. An example of this is the Unabomber, who ramped up his parcel-bombing campaign as a result of the media attention given to Timothy McVeigh’s mass murder in Oklahoma City. The media not reporting on violent crimes means eliminating the problem of emulation, and stops feeding killers’ pathologies.\n\n[1] Nacos, Brigitte. “Revisiting the Contagion Hypothesis: Terrorism, News Coverage, and Copycat Attacks”. Perspectives on Terrorism 3(3). 2009.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
d8388a756e49edbff9b0ba6d65922cef	The response will be to impose more control over the movement of women. While it is cliché that every action has an equal and opposite reaction in this case the reaction is likely to be bad. If the European Union wants to open up to women from countries that discriminate against women then the clear recourse for those countries is to make sure their women can’t leave. More government and family control will mean more rights will be infringed and leaving the country will be impossible even for tourism. If men are worried about their wives claiming asylum when on holiday why would they give them the opportunity? The state could respond by taking away, or regulating the possibility for women to leave the country. If in the present day, where the EU is not offering asylum, countries in the Middle East and Africa have the certainty that women will come back after their visa expires, this certainty will no longer be in place after we approve the motion. It is in no interest for national governments to lose population and therefore they will act towards infringing this right and many others to keep women at home.	[ { "docid": "e3cdda7c64696a846a1bcbfcff26bb78", "text": "human rights international law society gender immigration house believes eu should It is wrong to suggest that the EU should not take an action because some countries might use it as an excuse to clamp down on women’s rights. Europe needs to respond to its own problem that in the Status Quo women who get to the European Union are denied asylum even when they have every reason not to wish to return home. The UK asylum system represents an example of a system that regularly denies women asylum even when they have been persecuted. Second of all, it is absurd to believe that countries like Saudi Arabia or Yemen will definitely close their borders for women to leave as to do so would likely bring retaliation from the EU, these countries if proposing such a move clearly don’t think much of the value of their women so why would they wish to lock them in when to do so will result in less trade. Second refugees are for the most part those fleeing persecution – not those leaving under a passport. Many are already travelling without the permission of their state. If their state revokes their right to leave it will simply demonstrate the appropriateness of the EU letting them in.\n\nWomen for Refugee Women, ‘Refused: the experiences of women denied asylum in the UK’, refugeewomen.com, 2012, http://www.refugeewomen.com/index.php/what-we-do/research\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "198abe1ecfdea11ef289284f5ce6fa2a", "text": "human rights international law society gender immigration house believes eu should At a first glance this might be true but let’s take a deeper view upon these societies. The example of Saudi Arabia where women are slowly being given the vote is true but this is not much of a gain in a country where the parliament has almost no power. In a culture where it is normal that they require the approval of their husband or father in order to be able to vote or do anything the result is simply another vote for the man. More than that, in countries like Saudi Arabia, basic rights like the right of movement are denied to women who cannot get a driving license. That there is progress in some areas does not mean that there is no reason for a policy of welcoming women asylum seekers. Far from it, such a policy would increase the pressure on these countries to step up their reforms. We should also remember that progress can go into reverse – thus the trend towards more governments that are less secular in the Middle East should be a worrying reminder of why the EU needs to let these women in.\n\nGoss, Crystal, ’10 of the World’s Worst Countries to Live in as a Woman’, Take Part, 20 August 2012, http://www.takepart.com/photos/worst-countries-women/pakistan\n\nShane, Daniel, ‘Saudi in new crackdown on female drivers’, Arabian Business.com, 25 August 2013, http://www.arabianbusiness.com/saudi-in-new-crackdown-on-female-drivers-514912.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c1c73478865361b95ba1a1eec205b857", "text": "human rights international law society gender immigration house believes eu should Women will chose to remain in their country because they have a family, a husband, friends and most likely a place to live. Not every woman who is a leader will simply think of helping themselves, many will want to stay and help their country overcome its discrimination. And we should not suggest that those who do go to start a new life in the EU will not benefit the cause of women’s rights at home. They can learn from the example of the state they end up in, learn to lead organisations and mobilise people so that they can be more effective at promoting social change at home.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2f08424f5f319da78fb56b8b2b9dd94e", "text": "human rights international law society gender immigration house believes eu should No violence or incitement to violence can be justified by changes in legislation. It is not a cultural attack of any kind towards the Islamic religion or a certain culture. We must acknowledge that even the Quran clearly states, “Both men and women should be equal”. Implementing such a measure is simply highlighting that these nations are not living up to their obligations and applying rights that they themselves have accepted are universal by signing up to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It is a reminder that every country has the duty to respect its citizens and offer equal opportunities disregarding sex, religion, skin color etc. The intention of the European Union is simple and clear: you have to respect the international law and common sense. Furthermore with the example of South Park there is a fundamental difference in that portraying Mohammed is a fundamental attack on a religion where encouraging equality for women is simply encouraging change in a country’s legislation. The latter is considerably less inflammatory.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0f734474318eafce4ed506e759d15ff9", "text": "human rights international law society gender immigration house believes eu should It is not true that the human rights situation for women is deteriorating. The Social Institutions and Gender Index has found between 2009 and 2012 there has generally been improvement for example “The number of countries with speciﬁc legislation to combat domestic violence\n\nhas more than doubled from 21 in 2009 to 53 in 2012”. Women rights can be improved through the United Nations. This has the legitimacy to convince governments to change their policies and liberalize them. Also, the power of the United Nations comes form the number of countries involved, adding besides the EU, the powerful US, China, Russia, and South Africa etc. More than that, the UN has a lot of experience in dealing with these kind of cases. A perfect example is the economic and diplomatic sanctions imposed on the South African government in order to convince them to leave behind the apartheid regime. Moreover one of the reasons for the United Nations is the promotion of universal human rights, and this applies to women as well as anyone else; there are 187 states that are a party to the convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women.\n\nSIGI, '2012 SIGI', OECD, 2012, http://genderindex.org/sites/default/files/2012SIGIsummaryresults.pdf\n\nReddy, Enuga S., ‘The United Nations: Partner in the Struggle against Apartheid’, un.org, http://www.un.org/en/events/mandeladay/apartheid.shtml\n\nUnited Nations, ‘Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women’, United Nations Treaty Collection, Status at 9 October 2013, http://treaties.un.org/Pages/ViewDetails.aspx?src=TREATY&mtdsg_no=IV-8&chapter=4&lang=en\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "93a6995c301679f5eefab24c2bba59bd", "text": "human rights international law society gender immigration house believes eu should Rather than being selfish and wanting for these women only to be able to achieve their full potential in the European Union, we should consider doing something in order to change the way they are treated at home. Most women are not able to run away from home, or travel hundreds of miles in order to get into Europe to apply for asylum and have this opportunity for development. Even if they were the EU could not take every woman in. The European Union needs to look at the bigger picture and encourage those countries that discriminate against women to become much more liberal in their attitudes to women. This can be done by aid, sanctions, and diplomacy. The EU simply needs to persuade these countries of the massive loss they are sustaining by not allowing half of their population to realize their potential.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2fc6e42b5d8093031249133207fb15d4", "text": "human rights international law society gender immigration house believes eu should The image of the European Union, even on human rights, does not result from how they treat the foreign citizens of some distant country but more on how they treat their own citizens. As with any nation or union of countries the EU’s primary responsibility is to fulfill its duties towards its own citizens. More than that, the social balance and economic stability are much more important factors in the European Union’s image abroad than how the union is treating women in faraway countries. So if we decide to talk about image, granting asylum will not improve nor damage the unions. On the other hand, its duty is to protect the European citizens and many things can still be done in this direction. There is no reason in wanting to help people abroad when you can do so much for your own.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5c99df0a26cbc290d927048e4d375e44", "text": "human rights international law society gender immigration house believes eu should With regards to a life threatening situation under which women might face severe consequences upon their return, it should be noted that the European Union will not send someone back if it is believed their life is at risk if they are sent back. They will not be forced to leave the country even if asylum is not granted as they will be granted humanitarian protection or discretionary leave to remain which will allow them to remain until the threat is lifted. If the country in question wishes to return the asylum seeker then it will take steps to negotiate with the asylum seeker's country of origin in order to obtain guarantees that the asylum seeker will not be harmed upon their return.\n\nUNHCR, ‘The Facts: Asylum in the UK’, unhcr.org.uk, June 2013, http://www.unhcr.org.uk/about-us/the-uk-and-asylum.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "de92e19b29e526a29013d42281342b37", "text": "human rights international law society gender immigration house believes eu should The EU is responsible for its own citizens and not for those that live in other countries or regions. Its burden is to protect human rights for European citizens and not for the entire world. At the moment, because of the economic crisis and austerity measures imposed, all the EU attention should be focused on delivering basic human rights (in terms of basic necessities such as food, shelter and employment) for people in Greece, Spain, Italy and other countries in distress. The burden lies here because the government of a country serves the people of that country and as a union each country accepts some of the burden for others in that union. Others that are outwith that union are not giving any direct benefits for the European Union and therefore should they not be our focus. Any more egregious violations of human rights in these countries would already be sufficient cause for granting asylum without a further offer presented to women who are discriminated against.\n\nDouglas-Scott, Sionaidh, ‘The European union and Human Rights after the Treaty of Lisbon’, Human Rights Law Review, Vol.11, No.4, 2011, http://hrlr.oxfordjournals.org/content/11/4/645.abstract\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8be050791a86d0ba374048dcc2cc6588", "text": "human rights international law society gender immigration house believes eu should Allowing women asylum will damage feminist movements\n\nIn order to drive social change, these regions need women who are open-minded and want to be part of feminist movements. By giving them the “easy way-out”, social change will be delayed in countries with a legal system that discriminate against women. Females will have two options. First of all, they can leave the country and come in the European Union where the situation is already better. Second, they can choose to remain in their national country and fight for their rights. It is only human to take the easy way out. Movements for women’s rights will therefore lose many of those who want to change something and are willing to take action and as a result a lot of power. Those who migrate will be those who are more independent, more willing to do something to change their situation. Their energies will be directed outwards to leaving their home rather than to improving their situation where they are which would help millions of other women as well as themselves. This is the case with emigration more generally those who leave are those who are more entrepreneurial and are more likely to be leaders – in the United States 18% of small businesses were owned by immigrants, higher than the 13% share of the total population that are immigrants. As such movements for women’s rights will not only be deprived of numbers, but they will lose the leadership of the women who would be most likely to push for change.\n\nEditorial, ‘Immigrants and Small Businesses’, The New York Times, 30 June 2012, http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/01/opinion/sunday/immigrants-and-small-bu...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7636f6da8141ba6113263c08acc60dda", "text": "human rights international law society gender immigration house believes eu should The situation in these countries is improving, no need for a new policy.\n\nSuch an extreme measure as granting asylum to all women from these countries is not required as the situation in countries that discriminate against women is improving. Moreover, such an approach might be seen as an attack and make Middle Eastern and African countries react badly. Most of these countries are moving towards a more liberal approach and starting to promote the rights of women and reduce legislated discrimination. They already have an interest in aligning with western conditions in order to increase their international reputation. More than that, people in these societies are becoming more liberal demanding more and more rights as we see in the Arab Spring. In Kuwait, female suffrage has been allowed since 2005, whereas Saudi Arabia permitted women to vote and participate in municipal election from 2011. The right for national election will follow in 2015, with King Abdullah changing his country’s ultraconservative approach. The wind of change has left Europe and is heading toward the Middle East and Africa, promoting social reform and equality between men and women. If practices like female genitalia mutilation were widely used ten years ago, now they are enforced only in tribal parts of Africa, affecting less and less women. In conclusion, there is no need to worry about female that have residence in these countries because they are becoming more liberal and along with that, the whole country is changing. Diplomacy is working, there is no need for a new asylum policy.\n\nAjami, Fouad, ‘The Arab Spring at One’, Foreign Affairs, March/April 2012, http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/137053/fouad-ajami/the-arab-spring-at-one\n\nBBC News, ‘Kuwaiti women win right to vote’, BBC News, 17 May 2005, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4552749.stm\n\nBBC News, ‘Women in Saudi Arabia to vote and run in elections’, 25 September 2011, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-15052030\n\nStewart, Catrina, ‘Saudi women gain vote for the first time’, The Independent, 26 September 2011, http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/saudi-women-gain-vote-for-the-first-time-2360883.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b1758bc989e1cc88204327a36fd87385", "text": "human rights international law society gender immigration house believes eu should Offering asylum for women will be seen as a case of cultural imperialism\n\nOffering asylum to women who live under Sharia Law or other forms of discriminatory systems will be seen as a cultural attack made by the West against Islamic and Africa values. The European Union’s actions will be seen as neo-colonialism meant to influence foreign states population. Ultraconservative Islamic countries are already suspicious of the west of social and cultural issues; this will simply show that they are correct in their concerns. Let’s take the example of South Park, an American comedy TV-Show that portrayed Muhammad as a bear during one of its episodes. A website known for supporting jihad against the West published a warning against the creator, threatening to kill them if they don’t remove the episode. Despite being a cartoon for a western audience it was seen as an attack on Islam. A policy which would appear to be in large part directed at Islamic states would be needlessly inflammatory.\n\nThe European Union would be showing that they do not care for the cultural values of others. Instead it would be promoting an imperial notion that western values are superior to those of other cultures. This is then legitimizing any notion that there is some kind of clash of cultures as it draws a line between the European Union and these states, a notion that would then be used by extremists on both sides as a propaganda tool and justification for violence.\n\nLeo, Alex, ‘South Park’s Depiction of Muhammad Censored AGAIN’, Huffington Post, 22 April 2010, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/04/22/south-park-mohammed-censo_n_547484.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "94a1440d9f2985d1b4f9edd597cebd7f", "text": "human rights international law society gender immigration house believes eu should Asylum is the only way to protect women\n\nThe European Union is not able to protect women in other countries that are not a part of the union. Countries that have legislation discriminating against women are clearly not listening to European urgings on human rights. They will not respond to these urgings social and cultural traditions are deeply ingrained and only slowly change. Where women are seen as second-tier citizens it is seen as a natural part of the society can barely walk to the corner of the street without the consent of their husband. Moreover, the situation in countries with legislated discrimination against women is not improving, in countries which were previously secular there is increasingly a challenge from Islamism as in Libya and Egypt during the 'Arab Spring'. Moreover the influence of the European Union is declining; it has always been primarily financial, through aid which is declining, and through investment which, at least in the MENA, region has reversed as a result of those same revolutions. By granting asylum we can help them escape a legal system that clearly is against them and replace it with a European Union legal system that grants them those rights they never had.\n\nKausch, Kristina, 'If Europe is to preserve influence in the Middle East and North Africa, it must move on from technocratic policies towards more flexible cooperation.' LSE European politics and Policy, 21 December 2012, http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/europpblog/2012/12/21/europe-middle-east-north-africa-cooperation/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e815a5339c2fb850f80fbc23ee52bcaa", "text": "human rights international law society gender immigration house believes eu should We would allow discriminated women to reach their full potential\n\nWomen who are constantly threatened by their husbands or who are in societies where they are considered to represent less than a man will most certainly lack ambition to achieve their full potential – or even if they do have the ambition will be restrained from fulfilling it. When you live under a system that considers you inferior to the other gender and denies you opportunities on the basis of gender – sometimes including education the individual is clearly never going to have a chance to make their life worthwhile for its own sake. They won’t be able to take up jobs that will have an impact on the world, they won’t control their own economic circumstances as their husband is the only breadwinner, and they will be denied the opportunity to express their ideas and views. By giving them asylum in a place where women and men are treated equally, we give them the opportunity to do whatever they wanted to do before. Besides the security that they will gain, they will be able to go to school or get a job more easily than in their native country. There is no reason for which we don’t want these women to be a part of our European cultural identity. It is shameful to give this opportunity only to your citizens when women from countries that discriminate against them might be able to contribute so much more than they are able to under their circumstances in their native country.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "345f52d78137e276f55bd317dd8b2e3b", "text": "human rights international law society gender immigration house believes eu should The status quo involves sending women back to the threat of persecution\n\nSometimes, women who are persecuted by their government end up running from their country just to be sent back from the EU when their asylum application is rejected. Under the current legal system, the problems of women from countries that implement Sharia Law and other forms of discrimination are often not considered sufficient grounds for asylum. This is because refugees are only considered to be refugees ‘owing to well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion’, so it does not include persecution for gender. The consequences can be of two kinds. The first and the worst is sending them back home where to face harsh punishment for trying to leave. This was the case with two women who applied for asylum in Great Britain in 1997 and were denied this right even though they faced death by stoning upon return.\n\nEven if the women are not sent home immediately due to a prolonged appeals process they are left in detention centers, in uncomfortable conditions and unable to get a job or do anything while they wait. Those who are denied entry are left with nothing only a long depressing wait to be returned to the horrible conditions from which they thought they had escaped.\n\nCleaver, Olivia F., ‘Women Who Defy Social Norms: Female Refugees Who Flee Islamic States and Their Fight to Fit into American Immigration Law’, Rutgers Journal of Law & Religion, http://lawandreligion.com/sites/lawandreligion.com/files/Cleaver.pdf\n\nWomen for Refugee Women, ‘Refused: the experiences of women denied asylum in the UK’, refugeewomen.com, 2012, http://www.refugeewomen.com/index.php/what-we-do/research\n\nThe United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, ‘Convention and Protocol relating to the status of refugees’, unhcr.org, 1951, http://www.unhcr.org/3b66c2aa10.html p.14\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9cb0106c68a94d2e29b5cf4ff479cb48", "text": "human rights international law society gender immigration house believes eu should The EU needs to help those suffering from human rights abuses\n\nEveryone is equal. Women who live under legal system that permits discrimination against them are being denied of basic human rights whether this is the right to vote, to a fair trial, or bodily integrity. Sharia Law, for example, clearly denies them human rights like equality before the law, a basic human need according to Universal Declaration of Human Rights. \"All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law.\" Under Sharia a woman’s testimony is worth half a man’s and she gets half the inheritance of her male siblings. Second of all, bodily integrity is affected when women are stoned to death or beaten by their husbands without them even being punished. The importance of self-determination and autonomy are neglected in Saudi Arabia where women are not allowed to drive or go alone in public. Female genital mutilation, which causes bleeding, infections and infertility, and is almost always done without the girl's consent, is a big problem in many African countries. Asylum given by the EU shall be the only way for these women to leave the system that persecutes them and be able to have their human needs respected and therefore creating a healthier, safer and better environment.\n\nKaitlin, ‘Women’s Rights Under Islamic Law’, Inside Islam: Dialogues & Debates, 25 November 2008, http://insideislam.wisc.edu/2008/11/womens-rights-under-islamic-law/\n\nPizano, Pedro, ‘Where Driving Is a Crime and Speaking About It Leads to Death Threats’, Huffington Post, 6 June 2012, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/pedro-pizano/saudi-women-driving_b_1575969.html\n\nUnited Nations, ‘The Universal Declaration of Human Rights’, un.org, 10 December 2948, http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/\n\nWorld Health Organisation,’ Female genital mutilation’, WHO Fact sheet, no.241, February 2013, http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs241/en/\n\nMahmoud, Nahla, ‘Here is why Sharia Law has no place in Britain or elsewhere’, National Secular Society, 6 February 2013, http://www.secularism.org.uk/blog/2013/02/here-is-why-sharia-law-has-no-...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f51f1f7102b1f3a2c7ef2870c40c6719", "text": "human rights international law society gender immigration house believes eu should The EU’s reputation can only benefit from a strong policy on women’s rights\n\nThere is a moral obligation for such a powerful and diverse group of nations to protect not only their own citizens but also people in desperate need all around the world. All the countries in the EU have signed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and therefore stand behind its principles. As the world biggest economic power the EU is fully capable of doing so. The Union is wealthy enough that it can take in the extra migrants that would occur as a result of taking in women from countries where they face discriminatory legislation.\n\nThe European Union’s international image is not based on its military might but upon its economy and on being upstanding in its promotion of a human rights agenda. Granting asylum to women that live under discriminatory legal system reinforces this image of being concerned for human rights. The European Union has signed up to the United Nations’ Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women by which signatories “agree to pursue by all appropriate means and without delay a policy of eliminating discrimination against women” while the convention is calling for the elimination of discrimination internally it is fully in the spirit of the convention to undertake actions that encourage others to fulfill the Convention. By being willing to grant asylum to women from countries that have not lived up to the standards of the convention – which includes “To adopt appropriate legislative and other measures, including sanctions where appropriate, prohibiting all discrimination against women” – the European Union will put pressure on these regimes, helping to highlight their unequal systems.\n\n‘Article 2’, Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, UN Women, 1979, http://www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/cedaw/text/econvention.htm\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
1f7647ed84d06f4b08a7f8a17d65de22	It is best for children to be at home in the evening. There is no good reason for children to be out unaccompanied late at night, so a curfew is not really a restriction upon their liberty. Where the child does have good reasons to be out they can be covered by the exceptions. They would be better off at home doing schoolwork, schools often set more than an hour a night which the children should be doing. The time would also be better spent interacting with the rest of their family.	[ { "docid": "6333b9dde9e44ee3d48469ab3d0fa8e6", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Children in their mid-teens have many legitimate reasons to be out at night without adults. Many will have part-time jobs, for example in fast-food restaurants or delivering newspapers. Others will wish to participate in activities such as church groups, youth clubs or school trip. Whilst there are clauses for allowing such activity, the fear of not being believed would be a serious chilling effect on uptake. Requiring adults always to take them to and from such activities is unreasonable and will ensure that many never take place in the first place, either because adults are unwilling, or are unable to do so.1\n\n1. NYRA,\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "adadb8002a888363a55f82d9deb5b9bf", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Although protecting children domestic abuse is of vital importance curfews are not the most appropriate way of doing so. Problems at home may be the reason the young person spends so much time out on the streets in the first place. If that is the case, it could be dangerous to force them to stay where they may be at risk of abuse. Also, curfews infringe upon the rights of parents to bring up their children as they choose. Simply because we dislike the way some parents treat their children should not mean that we intervene to stop it; should we intervene in families where conservative religious beliefs are preached? 1\n\n1 Hidden Hurt\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0f292b604b8c93f2380fcf13342eeba6", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews A number of alternative strategies exist which are likely to do more to reduce youth crime. For example, rather than a blanket curfew covering all young people, individual curfews could be imposed upon particular trouble-makers, perhaps involving electronic tagging, breaking up gangs without labelling an entire age-group as criminal. A Scottish scheme puts plenty of police officers on the streets at night with a brief to engage with young people, deterring crime while steering them towards a range of youth activities available at clubs set up by the local council.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "fd86b418b1d2d8174329fa6517edc8cc", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews are not enforceable even if they are well known by residents and anyone can report those breaking curfew. It simply means that young people are trying to avoid the police so that they do not get fined. The police are only ever likely to catch a small number of those who are violating the curfew resulting in there being little deterrence.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ec77f50bea5562839029b1062c2ef678", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews are largely ineffective in preventing crime. Curfews do not target the right times of day as most juvenile crime appears to take place between 3 p.m. and 8 p.m., after the end of school and before working parents return home, rather than in the hours covered by curfews. There are many reports providing evidence that juvenile curfews do not have a significant effect upon crime figures.\n\nIn addition, although society does have a problem with youth behaviour, although it is not as bad as the newspapers make out. What is often labelled anti-social behaviour today was considered normal for kids in the past – things like playing football in the street, going around in groups without an adult in charge, making a bit of noise sometimes, etc. We need to be careful to draw a line between things that some people don’t like, and actual crime.1\n\n1 Adams, 2010.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d114ec557c5feb2aea2fd4d2b3a652a8", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews are easy to police compared to other forms of crime prevention, and are therefore effective. Child curfews can help to the police to establish a climate of zero tolerance and to create a safer community for everyone.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cf9db026302ac44aeb474dbbdb3374ed", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Child curfews can help to change a negative youth culture in which challenging the law is seen as desirable and gang membership an aspiration. Impressionable youngsters would be kept away from gang activity on the streets at night and a cycle of admiration and recruitment would be broken ‘in the hope that we can stop them from getting so far into trouble that they end up in the criminal justice system.1’ By spending more time with their families and in more positive activities, such as sports and youth clubs, which curfews make a more attractive option for bored youngsters, greater self-esteem and discipline can be developed.\n\n1. BBC News, 2009,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3baa13250834f314df04cdae94a51c88", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Child curfews are an important form of zero tolerance policing, showing that a community will not allow an atmosphere of lawlessness to develop. Paul McKeever, Chairman of the Police Federation in England and Wales, argues that: ‘“It would send out the message that we are serious that the criminal justice system has the power to impose immediate sanctions for bad behaviour and that “no” will mean “no”. At the moment no is negotiable.1”The idea of zero tolerance comes from the theory that if low-level crimes, like graffiti-spraying, window breaking and drug-dealing (all common juvenile offences) are not acted against swiftly and effectively by the police, then a permissive atmosphere is created where violence and other serious crimes flourish and law and order breaks down entirely.\n\n1. McKeever, 2009\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "377801e9e533311069f886b41731179b", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews do not harmfully restrict childrens’ rights to participation in activities and actually supports their right to a safe home and neighbourhood environment: ‘The curfew law has several exceptions. Youths can be out after hours if they are with a parent or guardian or doing errands at a parent or guardian's direction. They also can be at work or attending an official school, religious or recreational activity.’ 1If family breakdown means parents lose control, and in cases where parents can’t be bothered, then the police should step in. If the state has the right to take children away from cruel parents to protect them, then it also has the right to protect everyone else from dangerous youths. Most importantly, we can trust the police not to abuse this power. Our police are sworn to uphold the law and protect people, and trained to respect everyone’s rights.\n\n1. Dvorak and Greenwell, 2006\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4a09be21e0dca46d41e6f9c569d6394b", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews also have an important role in the protection of vulnerable children\n\nThe use of child curfews can help to protect vulnerable children. Although responsible parents do not let young children out in the streets after dark, not all parents are responsible and inevitably their children suffer, both from crime and in accidents, and are likely to fall into bad habits. Sir Ian Blair former chief commissioner of the Metropolitan police argued that curfews were aimed at safeguarding youngsters and stopping gangs causing trouble.1 Society should ensure that such neglected children are returned home safely and that their parents are made to face up to their responsibilities.2\n\n1. Rosie Cowan, 2004,\n\n2. Ward, 2000,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "807effead8461f2a2ff4cffbe672f874", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews A curfew is practical.\n\nVery few children are going to be out late at night without an adult or very good reason. This helps make curfews enforceable as the police will be patrolling anyway, and any responsible adult can report children who are out after curfew. The curfew could therefore be for all young people, defined as those under the age of 18, beginning at 10pm on both weeknights and weekends and ending at sunrise, with the exceptions like those noted in the introduction. Curfew violations are punishable by fines and penalty assessments. In Los Angeles these total $675, and violations may also result in community service and driver's license restrictions. The amount can vary with Philadelphia only having a $250 fine. 1\n\n1. Findlaw\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e68723047d1976fbe1245ef0789bcd08", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews The main objective of curfews is usually crime prevention.\n\nYouth crime is a major and growing problem, often involving both drugs and violence. Particularly worrying is the rise of youth gangs who can terrorise urban areas and create a social climate in which criminality becomes a norm. Imposing youth curfews can help to solve these problems, as they keep young people off the street, and therefore out of trouble, and prevent them from congregating in the hours of darkness. Police in Philadelphia have found curfews effective in the prevention of gang violence: ‘the measure has been successful in helping to curb violent attacks by teen mobs that had severely injured several people in recent months, city officials said.’ 1\n\n1. Associated Press, 2011,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ab91af64a96c131e5f21a778767e5665", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews are most effective when used a short-term aid to other policing measures.\n\nOther schemes aimed at reducing youth crime are highly effective but work best in conjunction with curfews. As the National Crime Prevention Council states: ‘A curfew alone won’t stop crime. More preventive measures, including recreational activities and job opportunities, are needed to reach out to young people and keep them from committing crimes.’ 1 In areas with a whole culture of lawlessness a curfew takes the basically law-abiding majority off the streets, allowing the police to engage with the most difficult element. Curfews are a tool in the struggle to improve lives in run-down areas; they often used for relatively short periods of a few weeks or months in order to bring a situation under control so that other measures can be put in place and given a chance to work.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e1be80d0392adbcaf2f3b28f8898e79f", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews compromise children's rights.\n\nYouth curfews infringe upon individual rights and liberties. Children have a right to freedom of movement and assembly which curfews directly undermine, by criminalising their simple presence in a public space. They are also subject to blanket discrimination on the grounds of age and the underlying assumption that all young people are potential law-breakers. It has been established in US law in the 1976 case of Missouri v Danforth that everyone has full constitutional rights regardless of age. Thus, curfews violate the fifth amendment which guarantees a right to free movement and due process. Comparable legal principles exist in most liberal states, and there is no reason to treat children as having less substantive rights to free movement. 1\n\nYouth curfews have great potential for abuse, raising civil rights issues. Evidence from U.S. cities suggests that police arrest far more black children than white for curfew violations. Curfews will tend to be imposed upon poor areas in inner cities with few places for children to amuse themselves safely and within the law, compounding social exclusion with physical exclusion from public spaces. These problems will also be made worse by the inevitable deterioration in relations between the police and the young people subject to the curfew.\n\n1. Vissing, Y. (2011). Curfews. In: Chambliss, W., eds. Juvenile Crime and Justice. London, SAGE publications, Ch. 5. P.62\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cd432a2d4a3d9cc72dacf18786c57288", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Positive engagement would be more effective than curfews.\n\nOther successful schemes aim to work individually with young troublemakers, in order to cut their reoffending rate, for example by requiring them to meet with victims of crime so that they understand the consequences of their actions, and by pairing them with trained mentors. Overall, governments need to ensure good educational opportunities and employment prospects in order to bring optimism to communities where youngsters feel that their futures are pretty hopeless.\n\nRather than trying to scare kids into good behaviour, why don’t we offer them a better life? Most areas with anti-social behaviour problems are poor, with bad schools, few jobs and little for kids to do with themselves. With little hope for the future, no wonder some kids go off the rails. So instead of threatening punishment, we should invest in better schools, places for kids to play and socialise, and the chance of a job.1\n\n1. The Observer, 2004\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "23dc4ab55891ca68e2410da6b67ebdf8", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews are ineffective.\n\nCurfews are not an effective solution to the problem of youth crime; research in the USA suggests that there is no link between areas that achieved a reduction in juvenile crime and areas with youth curfews. Paul McKeever, Chairman of the Police Federation in England and Wales points out that curfews are an unrealistic scheme: ‘It is fantasy to believe the police could impose an immediate sanction for somebody to stay in their home for four weeks without any kind of due process.’ 1Although some places did see a reduction in youth crime, this often had more to do with other strategies, such as zero-tolerance policing.\n\n1. McKeever, 2009\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6c08cfc59fd4085e42ec805711fd16e6", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews are counter-productive.\n\nImposing child curfews would actually be counter-productive, as it would increase juvenile offending by turning millions of generally law-abiding young people into criminals. The Executive director of D.C. Alliance of Youth Advocates argues that ‘\"This tells young people they're the problem, not part of the solution\".’ 1Already in the USA, more children are charged with curfew offences than with any other crime. Yet once children acquire a criminal record they cross a psychological boundary, making it much more likely that they will perceive themselves as criminal and have much less respect for the law in general, leading to more serious forms of offending. At the same time a criminal record harms their opportunities in employment and so increases the social deprivation and desperation which breed crime.\n\n1. Dvorak and Greenwell, 2006\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
d909f37a5dd3e7f5e2b1e469a91b9d08	Curfews are most effective when used a short-term aid to other policing measures. Other schemes aimed at reducing youth crime are highly effective but work best in conjunction with curfews. As the National Crime Prevention Council states: ‘A curfew alone won’t stop crime. More preventive measures, including recreational activities and job opportunities, are needed to reach out to young people and keep them from committing crimes.’ 1 In areas with a whole culture of lawlessness a curfew takes the basically law-abiding majority off the streets, allowing the police to engage with the most difficult element. Curfews are a tool in the struggle to improve lives in run-down areas; they often used for relatively short periods of a few weeks or months in order to bring a situation under control so that other measures can be put in place and given a chance to work.	[ { "docid": "0f292b604b8c93f2380fcf13342eeba6", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews A number of alternative strategies exist which are likely to do more to reduce youth crime. For example, rather than a blanket curfew covering all young people, individual curfews could be imposed upon particular trouble-makers, perhaps involving electronic tagging, breaking up gangs without labelling an entire age-group as criminal. A Scottish scheme puts plenty of police officers on the streets at night with a brief to engage with young people, deterring crime while steering them towards a range of youth activities available at clubs set up by the local council.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "adadb8002a888363a55f82d9deb5b9bf", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Although protecting children domestic abuse is of vital importance curfews are not the most appropriate way of doing so. Problems at home may be the reason the young person spends so much time out on the streets in the first place. If that is the case, it could be dangerous to force them to stay where they may be at risk of abuse. Also, curfews infringe upon the rights of parents to bring up their children as they choose. Simply because we dislike the way some parents treat their children should not mean that we intervene to stop it; should we intervene in families where conservative religious beliefs are preached? 1\n\n1 Hidden Hurt\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6333b9dde9e44ee3d48469ab3d0fa8e6", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Children in their mid-teens have many legitimate reasons to be out at night without adults. Many will have part-time jobs, for example in fast-food restaurants or delivering newspapers. Others will wish to participate in activities such as church groups, youth clubs or school trip. Whilst there are clauses for allowing such activity, the fear of not being believed would be a serious chilling effect on uptake. Requiring adults always to take them to and from such activities is unreasonable and will ensure that many never take place in the first place, either because adults are unwilling, or are unable to do so.1\n\n1. NYRA,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "fd86b418b1d2d8174329fa6517edc8cc", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews are not enforceable even if they are well known by residents and anyone can report those breaking curfew. It simply means that young people are trying to avoid the police so that they do not get fined. The police are only ever likely to catch a small number of those who are violating the curfew resulting in there being little deterrence.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ec77f50bea5562839029b1062c2ef678", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews are largely ineffective in preventing crime. Curfews do not target the right times of day as most juvenile crime appears to take place between 3 p.m. and 8 p.m., after the end of school and before working parents return home, rather than in the hours covered by curfews. There are many reports providing evidence that juvenile curfews do not have a significant effect upon crime figures.\n\nIn addition, although society does have a problem with youth behaviour, although it is not as bad as the newspapers make out. What is often labelled anti-social behaviour today was considered normal for kids in the past – things like playing football in the street, going around in groups without an adult in charge, making a bit of noise sometimes, etc. We need to be careful to draw a line between things that some people don’t like, and actual crime.1\n\n1 Adams, 2010.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d114ec557c5feb2aea2fd4d2b3a652a8", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews are easy to police compared to other forms of crime prevention, and are therefore effective. Child curfews can help to the police to establish a climate of zero tolerance and to create a safer community for everyone.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cf9db026302ac44aeb474dbbdb3374ed", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Child curfews can help to change a negative youth culture in which challenging the law is seen as desirable and gang membership an aspiration. Impressionable youngsters would be kept away from gang activity on the streets at night and a cycle of admiration and recruitment would be broken ‘in the hope that we can stop them from getting so far into trouble that they end up in the criminal justice system.1’ By spending more time with their families and in more positive activities, such as sports and youth clubs, which curfews make a more attractive option for bored youngsters, greater self-esteem and discipline can be developed.\n\n1. BBC News, 2009,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3baa13250834f314df04cdae94a51c88", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Child curfews are an important form of zero tolerance policing, showing that a community will not allow an atmosphere of lawlessness to develop. Paul McKeever, Chairman of the Police Federation in England and Wales, argues that: ‘“It would send out the message that we are serious that the criminal justice system has the power to impose immediate sanctions for bad behaviour and that “no” will mean “no”. At the moment no is negotiable.1”The idea of zero tolerance comes from the theory that if low-level crimes, like graffiti-spraying, window breaking and drug-dealing (all common juvenile offences) are not acted against swiftly and effectively by the police, then a permissive atmosphere is created where violence and other serious crimes flourish and law and order breaks down entirely.\n\n1. McKeever, 2009\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "377801e9e533311069f886b41731179b", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews do not harmfully restrict childrens’ rights to participation in activities and actually supports their right to a safe home and neighbourhood environment: ‘The curfew law has several exceptions. Youths can be out after hours if they are with a parent or guardian or doing errands at a parent or guardian's direction. They also can be at work or attending an official school, religious or recreational activity.’ 1If family breakdown means parents lose control, and in cases where parents can’t be bothered, then the police should step in. If the state has the right to take children away from cruel parents to protect them, then it also has the right to protect everyone else from dangerous youths. Most importantly, we can trust the police not to abuse this power. Our police are sworn to uphold the law and protect people, and trained to respect everyone’s rights.\n\n1. Dvorak and Greenwell, 2006\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4a09be21e0dca46d41e6f9c569d6394b", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews also have an important role in the protection of vulnerable children\n\nThe use of child curfews can help to protect vulnerable children. Although responsible parents do not let young children out in the streets after dark, not all parents are responsible and inevitably their children suffer, both from crime and in accidents, and are likely to fall into bad habits. Sir Ian Blair former chief commissioner of the Metropolitan police argued that curfews were aimed at safeguarding youngsters and stopping gangs causing trouble.1 Society should ensure that such neglected children are returned home safely and that their parents are made to face up to their responsibilities.2\n\n1. Rosie Cowan, 2004,\n\n2. Ward, 2000,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3f42a7822a8076014ddc8b594403a723", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews It is best for children to be at home in the evening.\n\nThere is no good reason for children to be out unaccompanied late at night, so a curfew is not really a restriction upon their liberty. Where the child does have good reasons to be out they can be covered by the exceptions. They would be better off at home doing schoolwork, schools often set more than an hour a night which the children should be doing. The time would also be better spent interacting with the rest of their family.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "807effead8461f2a2ff4cffbe672f874", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews A curfew is practical.\n\nVery few children are going to be out late at night without an adult or very good reason. This helps make curfews enforceable as the police will be patrolling anyway, and any responsible adult can report children who are out after curfew. The curfew could therefore be for all young people, defined as those under the age of 18, beginning at 10pm on both weeknights and weekends and ending at sunrise, with the exceptions like those noted in the introduction. Curfew violations are punishable by fines and penalty assessments. In Los Angeles these total $675, and violations may also result in community service and driver's license restrictions. The amount can vary with Philadelphia only having a $250 fine. 1\n\n1. Findlaw\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e68723047d1976fbe1245ef0789bcd08", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews The main objective of curfews is usually crime prevention.\n\nYouth crime is a major and growing problem, often involving both drugs and violence. Particularly worrying is the rise of youth gangs who can terrorise urban areas and create a social climate in which criminality becomes a norm. Imposing youth curfews can help to solve these problems, as they keep young people off the street, and therefore out of trouble, and prevent them from congregating in the hours of darkness. Police in Philadelphia have found curfews effective in the prevention of gang violence: ‘the measure has been successful in helping to curb violent attacks by teen mobs that had severely injured several people in recent months, city officials said.’ 1\n\n1. Associated Press, 2011,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e1be80d0392adbcaf2f3b28f8898e79f", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews compromise children's rights.\n\nYouth curfews infringe upon individual rights and liberties. Children have a right to freedom of movement and assembly which curfews directly undermine, by criminalising their simple presence in a public space. They are also subject to blanket discrimination on the grounds of age and the underlying assumption that all young people are potential law-breakers. It has been established in US law in the 1976 case of Missouri v Danforth that everyone has full constitutional rights regardless of age. Thus, curfews violate the fifth amendment which guarantees a right to free movement and due process. Comparable legal principles exist in most liberal states, and there is no reason to treat children as having less substantive rights to free movement. 1\n\nYouth curfews have great potential for abuse, raising civil rights issues. Evidence from U.S. cities suggests that police arrest far more black children than white for curfew violations. Curfews will tend to be imposed upon poor areas in inner cities with few places for children to amuse themselves safely and within the law, compounding social exclusion with physical exclusion from public spaces. These problems will also be made worse by the inevitable deterioration in relations between the police and the young people subject to the curfew.\n\n1. Vissing, Y. (2011). Curfews. In: Chambliss, W., eds. Juvenile Crime and Justice. London, SAGE publications, Ch. 5. P.62\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cd432a2d4a3d9cc72dacf18786c57288", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Positive engagement would be more effective than curfews.\n\nOther successful schemes aim to work individually with young troublemakers, in order to cut their reoffending rate, for example by requiring them to meet with victims of crime so that they understand the consequences of their actions, and by pairing them with trained mentors. Overall, governments need to ensure good educational opportunities and employment prospects in order to bring optimism to communities where youngsters feel that their futures are pretty hopeless.\n\nRather than trying to scare kids into good behaviour, why don’t we offer them a better life? Most areas with anti-social behaviour problems are poor, with bad schools, few jobs and little for kids to do with themselves. With little hope for the future, no wonder some kids go off the rails. So instead of threatening punishment, we should invest in better schools, places for kids to play and socialise, and the chance of a job.1\n\n1. The Observer, 2004\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "23dc4ab55891ca68e2410da6b67ebdf8", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews are ineffective.\n\nCurfews are not an effective solution to the problem of youth crime; research in the USA suggests that there is no link between areas that achieved a reduction in juvenile crime and areas with youth curfews. Paul McKeever, Chairman of the Police Federation in England and Wales points out that curfews are an unrealistic scheme: ‘It is fantasy to believe the police could impose an immediate sanction for somebody to stay in their home for four weeks without any kind of due process.’ 1Although some places did see a reduction in youth crime, this often had more to do with other strategies, such as zero-tolerance policing.\n\n1. McKeever, 2009\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6c08cfc59fd4085e42ec805711fd16e6", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews are counter-productive.\n\nImposing child curfews would actually be counter-productive, as it would increase juvenile offending by turning millions of generally law-abiding young people into criminals. The Executive director of D.C. Alliance of Youth Advocates argues that ‘\"This tells young people they're the problem, not part of the solution\".’ 1Already in the USA, more children are charged with curfew offences than with any other crime. Yet once children acquire a criminal record they cross a psychological boundary, making it much more likely that they will perceive themselves as criminal and have much less respect for the law in general, leading to more serious forms of offending. At the same time a criminal record harms their opportunities in employment and so increases the social deprivation and desperation which breed crime.\n\n1. Dvorak and Greenwell, 2006\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
d3350310b1896e83cdbbb1a3d70ed8ea	Curfews compromise children's rights. Youth curfews infringe upon individual rights and liberties. Children have a right to freedom of movement and assembly which curfews directly undermine, by criminalising their simple presence in a public space. They are also subject to blanket discrimination on the grounds of age and the underlying assumption that all young people are potential law-breakers. It has been established in US law in the 1976 case of Missouri v Danforth that everyone has full constitutional rights regardless of age. Thus, curfews violate the fifth amendment which guarantees a right to free movement and due process. Comparable legal principles exist in most liberal states, and there is no reason to treat children as having less substantive rights to free movement. 1 Youth curfews have great potential for abuse, raising civil rights issues. Evidence from U.S. cities suggests that police arrest far more black children than white for curfew violations. Curfews will tend to be imposed upon poor areas in inner cities with few places for children to amuse themselves safely and within the law, compounding social exclusion with physical exclusion from public spaces. These problems will also be made worse by the inevitable deterioration in relations between the police and the young people subject to the curfew. 1. Vissing, Y. (2011). Curfews. In: Chambliss, W., eds. Juvenile Crime and Justice. London, SAGE publications, Ch. 5. P.62	[ { "docid": "377801e9e533311069f886b41731179b", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews do not harmfully restrict childrens’ rights to participation in activities and actually supports their right to a safe home and neighbourhood environment: ‘The curfew law has several exceptions. Youths can be out after hours if they are with a parent or guardian or doing errands at a parent or guardian's direction. They also can be at work or attending an official school, religious or recreational activity.’ 1If family breakdown means parents lose control, and in cases where parents can’t be bothered, then the police should step in. If the state has the right to take children away from cruel parents to protect them, then it also has the right to protect everyone else from dangerous youths. Most importantly, we can trust the police not to abuse this power. Our police are sworn to uphold the law and protect people, and trained to respect everyone’s rights.\n\n1. Dvorak and Greenwell, 2006\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "d114ec557c5feb2aea2fd4d2b3a652a8", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews are easy to police compared to other forms of crime prevention, and are therefore effective. Child curfews can help to the police to establish a climate of zero tolerance and to create a safer community for everyone.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cf9db026302ac44aeb474dbbdb3374ed", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Child curfews can help to change a negative youth culture in which challenging the law is seen as desirable and gang membership an aspiration. Impressionable youngsters would be kept away from gang activity on the streets at night and a cycle of admiration and recruitment would be broken ‘in the hope that we can stop them from getting so far into trouble that they end up in the criminal justice system.1’ By spending more time with their families and in more positive activities, such as sports and youth clubs, which curfews make a more attractive option for bored youngsters, greater self-esteem and discipline can be developed.\n\n1. BBC News, 2009,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3baa13250834f314df04cdae94a51c88", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Child curfews are an important form of zero tolerance policing, showing that a community will not allow an atmosphere of lawlessness to develop. Paul McKeever, Chairman of the Police Federation in England and Wales, argues that: ‘“It would send out the message that we are serious that the criminal justice system has the power to impose immediate sanctions for bad behaviour and that “no” will mean “no”. At the moment no is negotiable.1”The idea of zero tolerance comes from the theory that if low-level crimes, like graffiti-spraying, window breaking and drug-dealing (all common juvenile offences) are not acted against swiftly and effectively by the police, then a permissive atmosphere is created where violence and other serious crimes flourish and law and order breaks down entirely.\n\n1. McKeever, 2009\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "adadb8002a888363a55f82d9deb5b9bf", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Although protecting children domestic abuse is of vital importance curfews are not the most appropriate way of doing so. Problems at home may be the reason the young person spends so much time out on the streets in the first place. If that is the case, it could be dangerous to force them to stay where they may be at risk of abuse. Also, curfews infringe upon the rights of parents to bring up their children as they choose. Simply because we dislike the way some parents treat their children should not mean that we intervene to stop it; should we intervene in families where conservative religious beliefs are preached? 1\n\n1 Hidden Hurt\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6333b9dde9e44ee3d48469ab3d0fa8e6", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Children in their mid-teens have many legitimate reasons to be out at night without adults. Many will have part-time jobs, for example in fast-food restaurants or delivering newspapers. Others will wish to participate in activities such as church groups, youth clubs or school trip. Whilst there are clauses for allowing such activity, the fear of not being believed would be a serious chilling effect on uptake. Requiring adults always to take them to and from such activities is unreasonable and will ensure that many never take place in the first place, either because adults are unwilling, or are unable to do so.1\n\n1. NYRA,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0f292b604b8c93f2380fcf13342eeba6", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews A number of alternative strategies exist which are likely to do more to reduce youth crime. For example, rather than a blanket curfew covering all young people, individual curfews could be imposed upon particular trouble-makers, perhaps involving electronic tagging, breaking up gangs without labelling an entire age-group as criminal. A Scottish scheme puts plenty of police officers on the streets at night with a brief to engage with young people, deterring crime while steering them towards a range of youth activities available at clubs set up by the local council.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "fd86b418b1d2d8174329fa6517edc8cc", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews are not enforceable even if they are well known by residents and anyone can report those breaking curfew. It simply means that young people are trying to avoid the police so that they do not get fined. The police are only ever likely to catch a small number of those who are violating the curfew resulting in there being little deterrence.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ec77f50bea5562839029b1062c2ef678", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews are largely ineffective in preventing crime. Curfews do not target the right times of day as most juvenile crime appears to take place between 3 p.m. and 8 p.m., after the end of school and before working parents return home, rather than in the hours covered by curfews. There are many reports providing evidence that juvenile curfews do not have a significant effect upon crime figures.\n\nIn addition, although society does have a problem with youth behaviour, although it is not as bad as the newspapers make out. What is often labelled anti-social behaviour today was considered normal for kids in the past – things like playing football in the street, going around in groups without an adult in charge, making a bit of noise sometimes, etc. We need to be careful to draw a line between things that some people don’t like, and actual crime.1\n\n1 Adams, 2010.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cd432a2d4a3d9cc72dacf18786c57288", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Positive engagement would be more effective than curfews.\n\nOther successful schemes aim to work individually with young troublemakers, in order to cut their reoffending rate, for example by requiring them to meet with victims of crime so that they understand the consequences of their actions, and by pairing them with trained mentors. Overall, governments need to ensure good educational opportunities and employment prospects in order to bring optimism to communities where youngsters feel that their futures are pretty hopeless.\n\nRather than trying to scare kids into good behaviour, why don’t we offer them a better life? Most areas with anti-social behaviour problems are poor, with bad schools, few jobs and little for kids to do with themselves. With little hope for the future, no wonder some kids go off the rails. So instead of threatening punishment, we should invest in better schools, places for kids to play and socialise, and the chance of a job.1\n\n1. The Observer, 2004\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "23dc4ab55891ca68e2410da6b67ebdf8", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews are ineffective.\n\nCurfews are not an effective solution to the problem of youth crime; research in the USA suggests that there is no link between areas that achieved a reduction in juvenile crime and areas with youth curfews. Paul McKeever, Chairman of the Police Federation in England and Wales points out that curfews are an unrealistic scheme: ‘It is fantasy to believe the police could impose an immediate sanction for somebody to stay in their home for four weeks without any kind of due process.’ 1Although some places did see a reduction in youth crime, this often had more to do with other strategies, such as zero-tolerance policing.\n\n1. McKeever, 2009\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6c08cfc59fd4085e42ec805711fd16e6", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews are counter-productive.\n\nImposing child curfews would actually be counter-productive, as it would increase juvenile offending by turning millions of generally law-abiding young people into criminals. The Executive director of D.C. Alliance of Youth Advocates argues that ‘\"This tells young people they're the problem, not part of the solution\".’ 1Already in the USA, more children are charged with curfew offences than with any other crime. Yet once children acquire a criminal record they cross a psychological boundary, making it much more likely that they will perceive themselves as criminal and have much less respect for the law in general, leading to more serious forms of offending. At the same time a criminal record harms their opportunities in employment and so increases the social deprivation and desperation which breed crime.\n\n1. Dvorak and Greenwell, 2006\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4a09be21e0dca46d41e6f9c569d6394b", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews also have an important role in the protection of vulnerable children\n\nThe use of child curfews can help to protect vulnerable children. Although responsible parents do not let young children out in the streets after dark, not all parents are responsible and inevitably their children suffer, both from crime and in accidents, and are likely to fall into bad habits. Sir Ian Blair former chief commissioner of the Metropolitan police argued that curfews were aimed at safeguarding youngsters and stopping gangs causing trouble.1 Society should ensure that such neglected children are returned home safely and that their parents are made to face up to their responsibilities.2\n\n1. Rosie Cowan, 2004,\n\n2. Ward, 2000,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3f42a7822a8076014ddc8b594403a723", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews It is best for children to be at home in the evening.\n\nThere is no good reason for children to be out unaccompanied late at night, so a curfew is not really a restriction upon their liberty. Where the child does have good reasons to be out they can be covered by the exceptions. They would be better off at home doing schoolwork, schools often set more than an hour a night which the children should be doing. The time would also be better spent interacting with the rest of their family.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "807effead8461f2a2ff4cffbe672f874", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews A curfew is practical.\n\nVery few children are going to be out late at night without an adult or very good reason. This helps make curfews enforceable as the police will be patrolling anyway, and any responsible adult can report children who are out after curfew. The curfew could therefore be for all young people, defined as those under the age of 18, beginning at 10pm on both weeknights and weekends and ending at sunrise, with the exceptions like those noted in the introduction. Curfew violations are punishable by fines and penalty assessments. In Los Angeles these total $675, and violations may also result in community service and driver's license restrictions. The amount can vary with Philadelphia only having a $250 fine. 1\n\n1. Findlaw\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e68723047d1976fbe1245ef0789bcd08", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews The main objective of curfews is usually crime prevention.\n\nYouth crime is a major and growing problem, often involving both drugs and violence. Particularly worrying is the rise of youth gangs who can terrorise urban areas and create a social climate in which criminality becomes a norm. Imposing youth curfews can help to solve these problems, as they keep young people off the street, and therefore out of trouble, and prevent them from congregating in the hours of darkness. Police in Philadelphia have found curfews effective in the prevention of gang violence: ‘the measure has been successful in helping to curb violent attacks by teen mobs that had severely injured several people in recent months, city officials said.’ 1\n\n1. Associated Press, 2011,\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ab91af64a96c131e5f21a778767e5665", "text": "crime policing punishment family minorities youth house would introduce child curfews Curfews are most effective when used a short-term aid to other policing measures.\n\nOther schemes aimed at reducing youth crime are highly effective but work best in conjunction with curfews. As the National Crime Prevention Council states: ‘A curfew alone won’t stop crime. More preventive measures, including recreational activities and job opportunities, are needed to reach out to young people and keep them from committing crimes.’ 1 In areas with a whole culture of lawlessness a curfew takes the basically law-abiding majority off the streets, allowing the police to engage with the most difficult element. Curfews are a tool in the struggle to improve lives in run-down areas; they often used for relatively short periods of a few weeks or months in order to bring a situation under control so that other measures can be put in place and given a chance to work.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
0106683eabd5069f478379e0bf8e0986	UAVs allow more care and safeguards before shooting. When engaging in covert operations it is essential that the right target is identified so that the correct target is eliminated. This is something that using UAVs allows as they are able to track their target, sometimes for days, before attacking. This means there is much more time for scrutiny of targets and possible collateral damage. This also means that there is plenty of room for the decisions to be made right at the top. Every person on the kill list gets discussed at a weekly meeting of more than 100 members of the US government’s security apparatus. President Obama himself signs off on strikes and can change the decision if the situation on the ground changes. Former National Security Advisor Jones says “Many times… at the 11th hour we waved off a mission simply because the target had people around them and we were able to loiter on station until they didn’t.” [1] While UAVs may be ‘unmanned’ they are certainly heavily monitored as each drone has 43 military personnel rotating in three shifts. They include seven joystick pilots, seven system operators, and five mission coordinators, there is also from the CIA 66 people, including 34 video crew members, and 18 intelligence analysts. [2] This means that there are a large number of eyeballs to make sure that the right person is being targeted, to check he is with as few others as possible before the strike. None of this would be possible with other forms of attack where the emphasis has to be on the speed of the operation. [1] Becker, Jo, and Shane, Scott, ‘Secret ‘Kill List’ Proves a Test of Obama’s Principles and Will’, The New York Times, 29 May 2012 . [2] Kaplan, Fred, ‘Who’s Afraid of the Kill List’, Slate, 15 June 2012.	[ { "docid": "9671337eee112b7c1e6f835e67575109", "text": "human rights politics terrorism house would use unmanned aerial vehicles strike This is incorrect; It makes the assumption that UAVs could not be used at all if they were not being used to attack targets. They could still be used in a surveillance role so providing the same amount of time to deliberate before striking in a different fashion, one that is appropriate to the situation.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "5a1b11d81ca73890591fbcb85a78f7fb", "text": "human rights politics terrorism house would use unmanned aerial vehicles strike It is wrong to simply make drones “a default strategy to be used anywhere”. Yes some of the time drones will be the right choice for catching terrorists and other militants but much of the time they won’t be. Instead of spurning institutions like the ISI and Pakistan’s Military we should be relying on them to fight extremism. This targeting of terrorists is happening in other countries sovereign territory. Their sovereignty should be respected wherever possible meaning that the Pakistanis, the Somalis and the Yemenis should be the ones who carry out these engagements.\n\nAgain here there is the difficulty of not knowing how many were killed in drone strikes (see counter to prop 1). We cannot compare other types of strikes unless we have more reliable figures. This is something that sending special forces in would help with; they would have much more accurate figures of who they kill and could check whether they really killed the person they were supposed to be targeting. This would prevent any attempt to inflate the kill count through including those they are not sure of as terrorists. [1]\n\n[1] Becker, Jo, and Shane, Scott, ‘Secret ‘Kill List’ Proves a Test of Obama’s Principles and Will’, The New York Times, 29 May 2012.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "534c1166fa98d43748a17acf8332e9c6", "text": "human rights politics terrorism house would use unmanned aerial vehicles strike Today most forms of conflict do not have much risk to western militaries. While the attacks were carried out from high in the sky NATO did not suffer a single loss in combat operations over Kosovo in 1999. [1] Moreover this lack of danger with UAVs is potentially immoral; we no longer have a war in which both sides are at risk rather a shooting range for drones to kill ‘terrorists’. Having at least some danger is needed as a restraint on the use of force. A good litmus test to use for the authorisation of lethal force would be whether the public would find the goals of the action worthwhile even if it did result in the loss of several soldiers.\n\n[1] Gallis, Paul E., ‘Kosovo: Lessons Learned from Operation Allied Force’, CRS Report for Congress, 19 November 1999, p.8\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6065d4669e685191b463a5a599c213f1", "text": "human rights politics terrorism house would use unmanned aerial vehicles strike Because drones are not on the ground and can’t check the identities of those who are killed there is no way of knowing if they really do cause less civilian casualties; what the proposition calls ‘collateral damage’. We also do not know what damage would be caused by other forms of attack on the same targets. It is however definitely open to question whether these attacks really do cause less civilian casualties. Local activists believe that around 3,000 people have been killed in Waziristan of whom only 185 were named al Qaeda operatives – a very poor ratio of 16 civilians for every al Qaeda man killed. [1] The Brookings institution meanwhile estimates that for every al Qaeda and Taliban militant killed there are ten civilian casualties. [2] If either of these estimates are anywhere near the mark then there are very large number of civilian casualties, much higher than proposition believes, and probably higher than other forms of strikes would cause.\n\n[1] Shackle, Samira, ‘Drones and the “bugsplats” they cause’, New Statesman, 13 June 2012.\n\n[2] Byman, Daniel L., ‘Do Targeted Killings Work?’, ForeignPolicy.com, 14 July 2009.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5b18d713075528c9a3ddc796c81cdbe8", "text": "human rights politics terrorism house would use unmanned aerial vehicles strike Getting special forces or allies on the ground is not always an option. In countries like Somalia and Yemen where there have been conflicts between factions the authorities will not always cooperate and even if they do they may not control the territory where the strike team would need to operate. There will also be many times where it is simply too dangerous to try and snatch someone. If that person is a danger they need to be stopped in the quickest way possible; and that will be by the use of the UAV that is already far above monitoring the target.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a5440d26949777630a6f78172f2ea1dc", "text": "human rights politics terrorism house would use unmanned aerial vehicles strike Any other nation seeking to take a precedent from the use of drones would have to be involved in a conflict against a terrorist organisation that poses a credible, clear, and present danger and not be able to fight those terrorists by other means. The situation in Pakistan, Yemen, and Somalia is in many ways unique in that these are states that have either failed or are near failure. As a result the sovereign government cannot be relied to combat terrorists on their own soil.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0af87988eb8b784fae14f9bda6eee6df", "text": "human rights politics terrorism house would use unmanned aerial vehicles strike This is a conflict situation, a war, pure and simple. While this is a new kind of conflict; when the opponent is a non-state actor states have to be able to strike at these groups that intend to attack them even when they are sheltering in other states. Such attacks should also not include the state where those groups are sheltering unless that state is supporting that group as was the case in Afghanistan.\n\nYes the distinction between civilian and combatant is blurred by this conflict but this is something that happens regardless of whether the United States uses UAVs. It is the terrorists themselves who through their horrific attacks by ‘civilians’ on civilian targets that strip away the distinction. The United States has to be able to respond with whatever method is most likely to prevent more of these terrorist attacks.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b7abdcabfeda9b13db4389a02e028b17", "text": "human rights politics terrorism house would use unmanned aerial vehicles strike It is absolutely not the case that UAVs will mean unnecessary attacks that would not otherwise be made; all the targets are checked by a large number of national security experts and the attacks are signed off by the President himself. The attacks are therefore taken very seriously by the administration. Moreover that the attacks are low cost is exactly what we want – the capability to strike our enemies without losses to ourselves or any collateral damage should be prized not shunned.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c23ba3779be229fbe1e31977b5b8ffa0", "text": "human rights politics terrorism house would use unmanned aerial vehicles strike UAVs are the best possible weapon for the job.\n\nWe need to eliminate terrorists somehow and UAVs are the best possible equipment with which to carry out this mission. All the other options either would result in significantly more casualties or would have other problems that would likely allow terrorists to escape.\n\nFirst there is the collateral damage that would be caused by using other alternatives to striking terrorists. Professor Plaw of the University of Massachusetts says that when terrorists were being confronted by the Pakistani Army, who were attacking at the behest of the United States, 46% of casualties were collateral damage. A similar number of 41% was the figure when Israel was targeting Hamas. [1] When compared to the 16 or 28% collateral damage figures for UAVs the choice should be easy.\n\nMoreover other options have other disadvantages. Sending a hit squad in to eliminate terrorists may mean little collateral damage but would cause a diplomatic crisis as it would be tantamount to invading another country. Using a missile or local support on the other hand significantly increases the chances of the target escaping. Pakistan’s ISI, military intelligence, has for example been accused of helping the Taliban – they could hardly be trusted to kill them. [2]\n\n[1] Shane, Scott, ‘The Moral Case for Drones’, The New York Times, 14 July 2012.\n\n[2] Perlez, Jane, ‘Pakistan Scorns U.S. Scolding on Terrorism’, The New York Times, 23 September 2011.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6cef93ca2313c1e0be023ee800a3af51", "text": "human rights politics terrorism house would use unmanned aerial vehicles strike UAVs cause less collateral damage.\n\nThere are only two things that really matter when targeting terrorists; is the terrorist eliminated, and is collateral damage kept to a minimum? In Pakistan there have been a total of 334 strikes by UAVs between 2004 and June 2012 with the total reported killed at 2496-3202 of which only 482-832 were civilians according to the Bureau of Investigative Journalism. [1] Moreover the number of civilians killed in strikes is falling; 28 percent of casualties in 2008 were civilians but by 2011 this had fallen to 16 percent [2] and this is a figure that is likely to continue falling as drones improve technologically making identification easier and making strikes more precise. These figures show that the United States in its use of drones is not only hitting a lot of terrorist targets and eliminating them but is causing very little collateral damage in comparison to the number of strikes made.\n\n[1] Woods, Chris, and Serle, Jack, ‘June Update – US covert actions in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalis’, The Bureau of Investigative Journalism, 2 July 2012.\n\n[2] Shane, Scott, ‘The Moral Case for Drones’, The New York Times, 14 July 2012.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "289f1218fa5e7cf78304a64037a68ad4", "text": "human rights politics terrorism house would use unmanned aerial vehicles strike Using UAVs prevents soldiers from being killed.\n\nTo put it bluntly any military or intelligence service wants to keep its own men safe while carrying out its missions; Unmanned Aerial Vehicles are the ultimate capability with which to manage this. No military or civilian personnel are going to be killed if the delivery vehicle is controlled from the United States. This means that unlike in other methods of attack the UAV can take its time even if it is at risk. In the war in Kosovo NATO air forces had to launch their attacks from 15,000 feet due to worries they would be shot down. [1] Attacking from such a height from a fast moving aeroplane makes missing the target much more likely.\n\n[1] Thomas, Timothy, ‘Kosovo and the Current Myth of Information Superiority’, Parameters, Spring 2000, pp.13-29.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "884bd9f38c786a1dc085a158f55a3f48", "text": "human rights politics terrorism house would use unmanned aerial vehicles strike The use of drones makes the use of force easier to sanction.\n\nUsing drones encourages the use of lethal force rather than alternatives. The reason for this is obvious – it is much easier to resort to violence if you know there is no risk to yourself. With the operators thousands of miles away in the United States the only risk of using drones is the loss of equipment. As Christof Heyns, the UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial killings, has said “The term 'targeted killing' is wrong because it suggests little violence has occurred. The collateral damage may be less than aerial bombardment, but because they eliminate the risk to soldiers they can be used more often.” [1]\n\nThe use of drones is also politically expedient in a way that otherwise the use of force would not be. Dennis Blair, the former director of national intelligence, points out that the strike campaign is dangerously seductive as it is “low cost, no U.S. casualties, gives the appearance of toughness… It plays well domestically, and it is unpopular only in other countries. Any damage it does to the national interest only shows up over the long term.” [2] The use of force therefore becomes the first choice not the option of last resort. Even those within the U.S. administration such as Secretary of state Clinton have worried about a drones-only approach that ignored other options and does not look at solving the larger problems. [3]\n\n[1] Bowcott, Owen, ‘Drone strikes threaten 50 years of international law, says UN rapporteur’, guardian.co.uk, 21 June 2012.\n\n[2] Becker, Jo, and Shane, Scott, ‘Secret ‘Kill List’ Proves a Test of Obama’s Principles and Will’, The New York Times, 29 May 2012, p.8\n\n[3] ibid, p.8\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "14ce6f003c098c1b14ce68162b2f8245", "text": "human rights politics terrorism house would use unmanned aerial vehicles strike The use of drones creates a precedent that other states may use.\n\nThe United States is the first state with a large number of drones and other unmanned military vehicles. It is also the first country to use them. This inevitably means that the US is creating the precedent for how they will be used in future. The United States is aware of this potential and President Obama’s counterterrorism adviser John Brennan has stated “Other nations also possess this technology, and many more nations are seeking it, and more will succeed in acquiring it. President Obama and those of us on his national security team are very mindful that as our nation uses this technology, we are establishing precedents that other nations may follow, and not all of those nations may — and not all of them will be nations that share our interests or the premium we put on protecting human life, including innocent civilians.” [1] This is exactly the problem; do we really want to live in a world where any country can carry out targeted killings of people who are in another nation? Such a world would have the ever present risk of a covert conflict becoming a much more open shooting war.\n\n[1] McNeal, Greg, ‘Is the U.S. Setting Precedents in its Drone Wars’, Forbes, 6 June 2012.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2815e45137e9a17f6caa7bd994dd89a5", "text": "human rights politics terrorism house would use unmanned aerial vehicles strike The use of drones means shoot to kill is the only option.\n\nUsing drones cuts down the options on the ground. A drone can only keep circling or go in for the attack; their only option is to kill a target or let them escape. Using ground forces; either your own, or in this case the Pakistani or Yemeni military, provides the third option of capturing the target. This is ethically a much better position for the United States to be in as it means that the terrorists can be given the option to surrender rather than simply being killed. This in turn would provide the benefit of allowing a trial helping to show the justice of the operation. Moreover these captured militants would likely be valuable intelligence assets who could be questioned which may well lead the intelligence services to other terrorists.\n\nFinally using drones is a very aggressive and provocative stance as it prevents any possibility of a peaceful resolution. The usage of drones immediately eliminates the possibility of negotiation because drones are remote from their operators. This means that drones are unlikely to be useful in the many situations that could be helped by any form of contact.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "141363446bc31e8ea45edd199d040975", "text": "human rights politics terrorism house would use unmanned aerial vehicles strike Using drones blurs the distinction between war and peace.\n\nThe use of drones further blurs the already worryingly indistinct line between a state of war and a state of peace. The drone attacks are taking place in countries where the United States does not have any legal authority. The United States is not officially at war with Pakistan, Yemen, or Somalia, yet has launched hundreds of attacks on these countries and their citizens. The assumption is that a state can be at war with a non-state actor such as a terrorist group and therefore is free to target them wherever this group may be found. This means that the US is prosecuting a war in which only it thinks it is at war while sovereign countries like Pakistan are targeted despite believing they are at peace. It is the use of drones that makes it easy to circumvent sovereignty and attack targets on another country’s soil so creating the ambiguity.\n\nEqually worryingly is the blurring of the distinction between civilian and combatant. Firstly the U.S. has decided to define any adult male in the target area as a terrorist when many are most likely nothing of the sort. [1] Secondly the Geneva conventions and their 1977 additions at their heart have the assumption that civilians cannot engage in a war – they are innocent bystanders. This however has been changed by the use of drones; it is a civilian agency, the CIA, which controls the drones and pulls the trigger. This makes the CIA combatants so breaking the obligation not to engage as soldiers. This means that U.S. civilians lose their protected status and the U.S. can’t complain if U.S. citizens are targeted in retaliation as the terrorists can no longer distinguish between those who are targeting them and those who are not. [2]\n\n[1] Hammond, Jeremy R., ‘The Immoral Case for Drones’, Foreign Policy Journal, 16 July 2012.\n\n[2] Hallinan, Conn, ‘CIA’s Drone Wars Blurs Distinction Between Military and Civilian Combatants’, Foreign Policy In Focus, 6 October 2011.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
ee4935b9139c0482ca0029b4c7d87965	Decriminalisation will protect practitioners of sadomasochism The criminalisation of S&M removes legal protection from individuals who suffer an abuse of consent while submitting to sadistic practices. Where a dominant partner ignores safe words or pushes a session too far, the criminal status of S&M may lead to a victim being prosecuted alongside a perpetrator. Alternately, victims may be disincentivised from approaching the police altogether. Although it is not possible to be prosecuted for being the victim of a crime, individuals who are harmed during sadomasochistic sex many not be able to engage in a rational assessment of their own criminal liability. Even though laws against sadomasochistic acts pin liability only on the sadistic partner, they also serve to criminalize the act itself. Victims of abuses of consent may therefore become wary of informing the police that they have participated in such activity, for fear that they will be publicly stigmatized or subjected to police investigation themselves. The only time S&M can be problematic is when someone does not listen to their partner when they withdraw their consent and ask for the session to end. Individuals will not stop engaging in S&M simply because the state says so, but victims of over-aggressive partners will lose recourse or protection under the law if they try to approach the police about such an incident. Where an S&M session goes awry, victims of an abuse of consent will have to admit to engaging in a criminal act. In the same way prostitutes have no real protection from assault and rape due to the criminality of their acts, victims of assault and rape in S&M are no longer protected. The opposition may attempt to claim that there will be a clear distinction between a sadistic “criminal” and a submissive “victim” whenever a complaint is raised. This is not true. Many sadomasochistic relationships are based around fluctuating and interchangeable roles. Both partners may engage in sadistic acts at different times.	[ { "docid": "1a4b02541d238ec71be1aec7c412591c", "text": "th law law general religion house would decriminalise sadomasochism Victims of any form of crime, regardless of their life choices, are free to come to the police for protection and will be provided with the same protections as anyone else. The fact that people who commit crimes may feel less comfortable going to the police to avoid self-incrimination is not a reason to remove those laws.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "3932e8dec89f1fa5bf81a3c99c670280", "text": "th law law general religion house would decriminalise sadomasochism When less painful but equally effective variations on existing beauty treatments enter the market, they quickly assume a position of dominance. Women and men who want to enhance their physical appearance do not automatically seek out the most painful way of doing so.\n\nThe proposition conflates a means of achieving sexual gratification with the gratifying act itself. A masochist finds erotic pleasure in being subjected to pain, irrespective of the ultimate purpose of that pain. Likewise, a sadist will inflict pain to achieve pleasure, without feeling that his actions require further justification or purpose.\n\nA surgeon will design his procedures so that a patient will suffer an absolute minimum of pain and discomfort. A medical professional would likely be subjected to professional disciplinary measures if it were to become apparent that he derived gratification from the unavoidable pain sometimes endured by his patients. The consequences of a medical intervention sometimes mean that a patient will experience pain, but this is not evidence for the existence of underlying sadomasochistic motives.\n\nPut simply, individuals with more typical sets of sexual desires regard cosmetic treatments as a means of achieving gratification, not the end in itself. Pain and infirmity take on great significance when an individual decides whether he wants to undergo cosmetic enhancement. The psychological screening that cosmetic surgeons employ is likely to detect individuals for whom pain and sexual pleasure have become interchangeable.\n\nAs side opposition’s third point will demonstrate, states permit individuals to consent to dangerous cosmetic procedures precisely because the risks inherent in these practices can easily be subjected to third party scrutiny.\n\nCosmetic surgery and beauty products exist in public, and are open to regulation and oversight. The bedroom, the basement and the private members club are, by contrast, concealed and secretive.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "896afd93a888a4e80becee2dba326007", "text": "th law law general religion house would decriminalise sadomasochism The notion of consent cannot apply to a practice in which participants lack the ability to withdraw at any given time. Rape cases are easier to prosecute as it is clear and evident that the victim did not consent to the activity. The legalization of sadomasochism would create situations in which consent has been given beforehand but cannot be withdrawn during the activity.\n\nThere may be genuine confusion between participants in a situation where one party wishes to withdraw their consent but is unable due to the activities already underway. In that case, it would appear unreasonable to prosecute despite the victim’s anguish. To spare such horrible situations arising, the practice must remain illegal.\n\nFinally, a number of criminal cases, including the English case of R v Dica, have held that intentionally or recklessly exposing a partner to a sexually transmitted infection by refusing to wear a condom can be a criminally action. Where an individual is aware that certain sexual interactions carry a risk of harm, and he does not obtain his partner’s full and informed acknowledgment of that risk, in English law at least, he commits a crime [i] .\n\nIf a man forces sex on a woman who has rejected his advances on the basis that he will not wear a condom, a rape is committed. If a man deceives a woman into having unprotected sex by lying about his sexual health, the decision in R v Dica will hold him liable for any resulting harm.\n\n[i] R v Dica [2004] QB 1257\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "41bce2d7d77208b36e020f0958c4a016", "text": "th law law general religion house would decriminalise sadomasochism Every government has a duty to protect the moral and physical health of all its citizens. Firstly, the defining characteristic of sadomasochism is that it does harm to others. The activity has a victim. It is not a simple question of one individual being permitted to harm himself. Secondly, the fact of the victim’s consent is immaterial. The use of seatbelts is mandatory because citizens should not be allowed to risk their bodies for such a nugatory freedom. Citizens are allowed to lose or jeopardize their material assets through foolishness, since the assets are replaceable, or at least not critical to survival. Paternalism exists to protect people from themselves.\n\nAs noted below, governments are able to exercise varying degrees of regulation over potentially harmful activities according to the contexts that they occur in. Under these circumstances, the beneficial aspects of contact sports, risky performance arts and non-essential medical procedures can be balanced against the harms they might cause. Dangerous sporting activities invariably occur in public, are supervised by coaches and referees, and are subject to rule-sets agreed on by players and overseen by professional bodies. Under such circumstances, it is possible for the state to be satisfied that risk to the individual has been minimized as far as possible, and that there can be no confusion over which risks an individual consents to.\n\nWhere altercations on the sports field result in criminal prosecutions, much discussion is focused on the risks that the victim foresaw he would be exposed to. Hockey players have previously been held to have implicitly accepted the possibility that they might be deliberately struck with a hockey stick in the course of a match [i] . A recent English case ruled that a rugby player does not impliedly consent to run the risk that another player might bite and tear at his ear during a match [ii] .\n\n[i] R v Green (1971) 16 DLR 93d) 164\n\n[ii] R v Johnson (1986) 8 Cr App R (Sentencing) 343\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b8db9a301b2e30f514ab781d12452099", "text": "th law law general religion house would decriminalise sadomasochism The state has no right to decide what is “moral” or “immoral” for society. Each and every individual through their freedom of conscience is allowed to determine for themselves what a moral act would be as the government has no way of determining that with any certainty.\n\nMoreover, there is no evidence that suggests any link between S&M and propensity or escalation of criminality. Simply because someone enjoys the infliction or the feeling of pain does not mean that they will become a criminal who inflicts pain on other, un-consenting people in the future. Further, it could be argued that allowing people a consensual outlet for such urges reduces the probability that such escalation and criminality will occur.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "46644b65cb1947d26e989b4cc7434ae8", "text": "th law law general religion house would decriminalise sadomasochism It should first be observed that accidents and inadvertent harm can befall S&M practitioners irrespective of the level of caution that they exercise. It is unacceptable to require responsible adults to run the risk of prosecution whenever they engage in a consensual act of sexual expression.\n\nFurther, relationships, even sadomasochistic relationships, can break down and become acrimonious. There is a risk that an embittered partner who formerly consented to prohibited S&M activity might try to use that fact to blackmail or persecute his or her ex-lover.\n\nThe opposition state that the freedom to dissent from laws regulating one’s private conduct begins to break down when the number of people engaging in a “private” activity grows. Why should the freedom to engage in a particular sexual activity imply a trade off against the freedom to choose how many people we engage in that activity with? Interacting with multiple sexual partners is not, in itself, illegal in the majority of western liberal states, but it does not exclude other sexual fetishes, such as S&M. The opposition is disguising a further limitation on sexual freedom- the freedom to engage in group S&M- as a concession to liberalism.\n\nFinally, the awareness that a particular activity is proscribed can affect an individual’s ability to enjoy that activity. The pleasure inherent in free expression of sexual identity is compromised by the knowledge that discovery will lead to prosecution and stigmatization. As numerous accounts by those involved in the LGBT liberation movement have demonstrated, knowing that one’s sexuality is seen as something immoral and socially destructive is inhibiting and upsetting, even in private contexts.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "157d2f34d2b232ed8b27820efc252056", "text": "th law law general religion house would decriminalise sadomasochism Where should the line between sadomasochistc and “conventional” sexual activity be drawn? The English appeal case of R v Slingsby [i] concerned the accidental death of an individual who had consented to an inherently risky sexual act (the insertion of her partner’s fist into her anus) that was considered “vigorous” but not masochistic. As noted above, conventional sexual interaction is just as susceptible to subversion as S&M encounters, and can just as easily collapse into a non-consensual act.\n\nIn effect, “normal” sexual expression is as difficult to regulate, and as likely to incorporate violence (or “vigorous activity” as the judge in Slingsby would have it) and to cause harm, as sadomasochism. Society at large does not demand that all private sexual activity is as tightly regulated as professional sport, nor does it attempt to outlaw sexual activity. Instead, it is acknowledged that personal freedom outweighs the occasional harms that private sexual relationships produce. Existing legal safeguards are seen as providing victims of abusive conventional relationships with adequate protection and recompense.\n\nIndeed, the dangers that accompany conventional sex may be less obvious to the participants in a relationship than the dangers posed by a poorly tied knot or an inexpertly wielded crop. Sexually transmitted infections, concealed personality disorders, infidelity or jealous former partners all constitute significant and easily overlooked sources of harm.\n\n[i] R v Slingsby [1995] Crim LR 570\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e04f05fe0a5dd9b559407c29f255db0f", "text": "th law law general religion house would decriminalise sadomasochism Sadomasochism need not be rendered completely free of risk. It is sufficient that each participant is aware of the hazards and consents to them. Moreover, no government can legislate for the most reckless of its citizens. If an individual is so disturbed as to place a plastic bag over his head for the purpose of sexual stimulation, the contrary opinion of the law will not be a great deterrent. [i]\n\nNevertheless, Sadomasochism can be rendered relatively free of physical risk for its participants. ‘Safe words’ can be agreed in advance, and then announced to end an S&M session immediately. Where participants are restrained or prevented from speaking, movement signals or the dropping of a marble held in the hand can be used to indicate withdrawal of consent. This simple device ensures that participants continue to agree to the terms on which their encounters take place.\n\nIt is patronizing to assume that participants in S&M scenarios have not considered the possibility that expressions of pain and reluctance will be a regular occurrence during such activity. Deliberately quixotic ‘safe words’ and stop signals are used in order to avoid inadvertent abuses of consent.\n\n[i] Annette Houlihan, ‘When “No” means “Yes” and “Yes” means Harm: Gender, Sexuality and Sadomasochism Criminality’ (2011) 20 Tulane Journal of Law & Sexuality: A Review of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Legal Issues 31\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "401a8e0b1a7efafda7aaee06987a1841", "text": "th law law general religion house would decriminalise sadomasochism Sadomasochistic practices should be legal between informed, consenting adults.\n\nIt is sufficient for the decriminalization of sadomasochism that each participant is aware of the hazards inherent in the fetishes they will be exploring and consents to them. No law prohibits people from refusing to wear a condom during sexual intercourse, notwithstanding the peril of infection.\n\nFurthermore, all cases where an individual withdraws their consent for the activity can be arbitrated and prosecuted like every other situation of consensual sex where an individual withdraws consent and their partner does not respect that wish. The police and courts will investigate it in the same way and will prosecute those who commit rape under the guise of S&M just as they prosecute those who commit rape under the guise of consensual intercourse.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e9369992ed522401caf5870441b75942", "text": "th law law general religion house would decriminalise sadomasochism The criminalisation of sadomasochism infringes on individual liberty\n\nControl of one’s own body is the most fundamental of human rights. No government should be permitted to define how its citizens can express themselves. The distinction between the permissible and the impermissible should be drawn at the line of consent. This is not a novel distinction. Your property cannot be stolen from you if you agree to give it away. You have no legal remedy if your property is damaged by another with your consent, or if you damage it yourself. Why should there be a moral difference when this property is flesh and blood? Paternalism in this instance only protects those who do not want to be protected.\n\nThe prohibition of sadomasochism is simply inconsistent with the liberty that governments already permit their citizens to exercise to injure each other and themselves. When people are entitled to risk pain, serious injury, or even death in sporting activity, why should they not also be permitted to suffer some discomfort in consensual sexual activity? The same piercing of flesh which attracts criminal liability in a fetishistic context can be performed legally in a chemist’s shop or tattooist’s parlor. The distinction between the rugby scrum, the bungee tower and the bedroom is an arbitrary one.\n\nSome of the pleasure that is inherent in contact sports is derived from the adrenal thrill of flirting with injury. It is widely known that a significant proportion of individuals find jeopardy and danger as enjoyable as decadence. A sport purged of all risk would be unwatched and unplayed. Comparably, a corpus of law that did not acknowledge or protect the diversity of human sexual experience would needlessly limit individual sexual freedom, and would probably be ignored.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "11e4aacb2e90be512042a33ed9652c29", "text": "th law law general religion house would decriminalise sadomasochism Western ideals of beauty already permit individual to endure intense physical pain in order to achieve sexual gratification\n\nThe idealization of physical beauty within American and European culture has created a demand for increasingly interventionist forms of cosmetic enhancement. Women and men are prepared to pay hundreds of thousands of pounds to have their faces, breasts and genitals maimed and modified by surgeons, to have their skin bleached or their facial muscles temporarily paralyzed by “beauticians” and to be badgered, bullied and blackmailed into complying with restrictive diets and extensive regimes of physical exertion by domineering personal trainers. Except in the most extreme and obvious cases of emotional or psychological disturbance, adults are automatically assumed to be capable of consenting to these acts.\n\nFurther, the western ideal of physical beauty is closely associated with the cultural norms that influence and control sexual attraction, compatibility and enjoyment. The erotic is almost inextricably linked with the aesthetically idealized. The intense pain and extensive physical injuries that individuals endure in the pursuit of physical beauty are also endured in the pursuit of sexual gratification.\n\nThe risks inherent in invasive cosmetic treatments are poorly explained. The expense of these products and services and the pervasiveness of idealized physical forms combine to create parallel markets comprising cheaper, poorly regulated forms of “beauty enhancement”, including intensive tanning and skin bleaching lotions.\n\nThe ultimate objective of these physically painful and dangerous activities is sexual pleasure. Even if the heightening of sexual pleasure that results from physical modification is less direct than in a sadomasochistic encounter, many cosmetic surgery patients find the aesthetic pleasure attendant on successful surgery to be satisfying too.\n\nIt seems hypocritical and perverse for a supposedly liberal system of law to allow individuals who are openly pursuing a sexual objective to consent to the harms and risks of cosmetic surgery, while limiting the legality of sadomasochistic acts. Both activities have the same underlying purpose, and both produce dangerous externalities. Rational, consenting adults should have as much freedom to engage in S&M play as they currently have to submit to cosmetic surgery.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9e45600f55654ea1a75c949ee96c9879", "text": "th law law general religion house would decriminalise sadomasochism It is not possible to meaningfully consent to sadomasochistic sex\n\nMeaningful consent requires both that the person is informed and of age when consenting, but also requires the ability to withdraw consent at any point in time. Sadomasochism does not afford this crucial requisite of consent to the individual, and therefore no individual can legitimately and fully consent to the act.\n\nSafe words are ludicrously impractical. Their utility is dependent upon their actually being agreed and committed to memory in advance and their declaration being heeded by the individuals who are under the influence of intense sexual desire. The passive ‘victim’ might be subject to the physical constraints, characteristic of bondage, that make speech or even flight impossible. It might be difficult to distinguish between an injunction to cease and an exclamation of pain, which presumably is a relatively regular occurrence.\n\nEven where a number of individuals are able to demonstrate that their sadomasochistic encounters are conducted on a safe, regulated and consensual basis, it is not possible to give a concurrent guarantee that S&M is generally safe and cannot be used to perpetrate rape or abuse. The existence of a group of individuals able to interact safely in a sadomasochistic context does not mean that S&M does not present a risk to the wider population, nor that ordinary individuals are not excessively vulnerable to harm when engaged in S&M activities.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b37afd860e3555708d8114e0eb67c34b", "text": "th law law general religion house would decriminalise sadomasochism The right to privacy counterbalances the state's obligation to ban sadomasochistic sex\n\ny the proposition, those who want to engage in violent sexual activities will do so, irrespective of laws to the contrary. Without undermining core liberal concepts of privacy and freedom of association, the state will be unable to regulate private sexual interaction. This being the case, when is violent activity most likely to be detected and prosecuted under the status quo? When such acts become too visible, too public or too risky. When the bonds of trust and consent that (as the proposition has agreed) are so vital to a sadomasochistic relationship break down.\n\nLiberal principles of privacy and autonomy allow individuals to engage in consensual activities that may fall outside established boundaries of social acceptance. In this way individual liberty is satisfied, while the risk of others being exposed to harmful externalities is limited. In the words of the anthropologist and lawyer Sally Falk-Moore, “the law can only ever be a piecemeal intervention in the life of society” [i] .\n\nThe prosecution of a large and organized community of sadomasochistic homosexual men in the English criminal case of R v Brown was in part motivated by the distribution of video footage of their activities [ii] . Doubts were also raised at trial as to whether or not some of the relationships within the group were entirely free of coercion. Their activities had become too public, and the bond of consent between the sadistic and masochistic partners too attenuated for the group to remain concealed.\n\nIndividuals break the law, in minor and significant ways, all the time. Due to the legal protection of private life, due to an absence of coercion, due to a consensual relationship between a “perpetrator” and a “victim”, such breaches go entirely undetected. The general right to privacy balances out the obligation placed on the state to ensure that individuals who encounter abuse and exploitation within sadomasochistic relationships can be protected.\n\nThe protection afforded by privacy incentivizes individuals engaged in S&M activities to ensure that they follow the highest standards of safety and caution. Arguably, where “victims” have consented to being injured, but have then been forced to seek medical treatment due to their partner’s incompetence or lack of restraint, complaints to the police by doctors and nurses have helped to identify and halt reckless, negligent or dangerous sadomasochistic behavior.\n\nCorrectly and safely conducted, a sadomasochistic relationship need never enter the public domain, and need never be at risk of prosecution. However, without the existence of legal sanctions the state will have no power to intervene in high-risk or coercive S&M partnerships.\n\n[i] “Comparative Law in a Global Context: The Legal Systems of Asia and Africa”, Werner Menski, Cambridge University Press, 2006\n\n[ii] Annette Houlihan, ‘When “No” means “Yes” and “Yes” means Harm: Gender, Sexuality and Sadomasochism Criminality’ (2011) 20 Tulane Journal of Law & Sexuality: A Review of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Legal Issues 31\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d3276742f9195a2fca730fbffeeefc7d", "text": "th law law general religion house would decriminalise sadomasochism The pursuit of pain for the purpose of achieving pleasure is an immoral act\n\nNot only does the state have the right and obligation to uphold the morals of society and stop deviant behavior, but it also has an obligation to prevent escalation of deviance. Acts such as sadomasochism are good indicators of the propensity for escalation to further deviant acts.\n\nWith the passing of the Anti-Social Behaviour Act 2003 [i] in the UK, a legal precedent has been established where the government has the right and obligation to tackle minor deviant behavior as it can be a precursor to larger and more harmful deviance in the future. Even if S&M was “victim-less”, it demonstrates a propensity to inflict pain to gain pleasure and thus indicates high risk for developing a craving for infliction of pain of higher magnitude and scope in the future, which could be even more damaging to society.\n\n[i] Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003.\" legislation.gov.uk. The National Archives, n.d. Web. 20 Jun 2011. http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2003/38/contents\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8056e1bb614a74e040769fef61a29893", "text": "th law law general religion house would decriminalise sadomasochism The state permits individuals to risk harming themselves only where such risks can be independently scrutinised and regulated\n\nA distinction should be made between socially legitimatized recreational violence- such as rugby or boxing- and stigmatized recreational violence- such as S&M [i] . Rugby, ice hockey or motor racing must, of necessity, occur in public. Each of these events incorporates large numbers of competitors and is regulated by a referee. It is not possible for a Rugby player to be forced to play a match against his will, nor will he be prevented from leaving the field if he is injured or feels threatened. Indeed, referees can force players to withdraw if they believe they are at risk.\n\nWhere violent sports events take place without any form of official sanction or oversight, their size makes them easy to detect, and legal principles such as negligence and ineffective consent make them easy to prosecute.\n\nSociety permits violent public events such as rugby, while condemning violent private entertainments such as S&M partly because consent, capacity and safety are much easier to determine in a public context.\n\nIn short, individuals are allowed to consent to the risks inherent in participating in a rugby match because the state- and society at large- is satisfied that sufficient safeguards exist to ensure that players’ consent is informed – that the risks they will be exposed to are foreseeable. This level of control and accountability cannot be generally guaranteed within individuals’ private sexual relationships.\n\nAlthough S&M practices, when properly conducted, do not carry a risk of permanent harm and are not likely to result in non-consensual activity, oversight of participant’s behavior is simply not possible. Sexuality is inherently private and individual sexual acts are closed off from public discussion.\n\n[i] Farrugia, Paul, ‘The Consent Defence in Sport and Sadomasochism’ (1997) Auckland University Law Review, 8 (2), 472\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
f0929673dd32ebd29d69522360e71b30	The Ukrainian justice system is broken Justice for Yanukovych should be international simply because it would be a much better guarantor of a fair trial. The Ukrainian justice system is unfortunately corrupt, and at the behest of prosecutors; it has an amazing conviction rate of 99.8%. This is because judges are they are only appointed for five years then the government confirms tenure if it believes they have been voting the right way. Yulia Tymoshenko, an opponent of Yanukovych, was imprisoned for making a deal with President Putin to ensure gas supplies – something that was a humanitarian necessity to ensure Russia did not freeze Ukraine into submission. [1] [1] Robertson, Geoffrey, ‘Yulia Tymoshenko's trial was a travesty of justice’, The Guardian, 23 February 2014, http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/feb/23/ukraine-yulia-tymoshenko-travesty-justice-trail	[ { "docid": "3076c16e02178318fd7d168ce2dcc673", "text": "human rights international law house would send yanukovych hague International help would be available to ensure an impartial trial in the Ukraine. The OSCE has offered “an OSCE role as impartial witness and guarantor to the implementation of concrete steps agreed between the parties” which could also extend to any trial. [1] With other international organisations involved in gathering evidence and providing legal assistance there could be certainty of an impartial trial without having to go to the ICC.\n\n[1] Burkhalter, Didier, ‘OSCE Chair-in-Office welcomes Ukraine agreement’, osce.org, 21 February 2014, http://www.osce.org/cio/115559\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "1044e595e29f27c8b8a2427e60266a0c", "text": "human rights international law house would send yanukovych hague The ICC has itself said that “No country in the world has a right to ask the ICC to prosecute certain people” and highlighted that even after ratification “only the court’s prosecutor can decide whether there is sufficient ground for conducting an investigation”. Once ratified Ukraine may ask, but the ICC is not bound to prosecute him because of the request. [1]\n\n[1] ITAR-TASS, ‘Ukraine not able to prosecute Yanukovych through International Criminal Court’, en.itar-tass.com, 26 February 2014, http://en.itar-tass.com/world/720981\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4f3675b067ec4e014705b4532a4b8d57", "text": "human rights international law house would send yanukovych hague There is little evidence that Yanukovych still has much support anywhere in Ukraine. However an ICC trial could simply inflame the other side; those who have overthrown Yanukovych are likely to want a trial to take place as soon as possible (which may be a long time off considering he is in Russia) and want it to take place in the Ukraine. The ICC would almost certainly be willing to give in to popular opinion; previously in Libya the prosecutor did not act when it was clear that public opinion did not want an international trial of Saif Gadaffi. [1]\n\n[1] Kersten, 2014, http://opencanada.org/features/the-think-tank/comments/could-yanukovych-be-tried-at-the-icc/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "2785f53c31633a99c34eae102650e72e", "text": "human rights international law house would send yanukovych hague Simply committing murder, or imprisonment, or persecution is not enough to make a crime a crime against humanity. It must be “widespread or systematic”. A great many states are involved in individual killings or unjust imprisonments so there has to be a threshold for ICC intervention. Unfortunately this is undefined so it will be up to the prosecutor to decide whether these crimes meet that threshold. [1]\n\n[1] Kersten, 2014, http://opencanada.org/features/the-think-tank/comments/could-yanukovych-be-tried-at-the-icc/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ee8ce0c0c4c6a81734dad6dae7b1cfa5", "text": "human rights international law house would send yanukovych hague Even if the former President cannot be prosecuted at the ICC for his corruption there can still be investigations into his wealth, his assets can be frozen and the money found repatriated to Ukraine without specifically indicting him for corruption. Switzerland has already said that it is freezing any of Yanukovych’s assets in the country while the EU is considering an inquiry into his embezzlement. [1] Clearly there will be action taken against corruption even as Yanukovych is being tried for other more serious crimes.\n\n[1] Fraher, John, ‘Yanukovych to Appear in Russia Tomorrow as Swiss Freeze Assets’, Bloomberg, 27 February 2014, http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-02-27/yanukovych-to-appear-in-russia-tomorrow-as-swiss-freeze-assets.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "dad173fe91ffcd21b8f610793f37053e", "text": "human rights international law house would send yanukovych hague Slow might potentially be beneficial in this instance. It would mean that there is time for the worst of the scars of the protest, crackdown and change in power to heal so reducing the chance of any instability or violence when the outcome – whichever way it goes – is announced.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9fcaa4f41bee93cad98f64c65890dcb6", "text": "human rights international law house would send yanukovych hague The Ukraine is perfectly at liberty to decide that it wants its former president to be tried at the ICC rather than at home. The crimes may have taken place in Ukraine but the reasoning behind the need for the ICC is that some crimes – including crimes against humanity – are so great that they are the responsibility of all, they affect other nations. The Ukrainian people would see justice done just as well by it being carried out in The Hague as in Kiev.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7a640d5a668d8945672f4560df9182d4", "text": "human rights international law house would send yanukovych hague Clearly whether Yanukovych was directly responsible for the deaths and injuries by ordering assaults is something the prosecutor will need to investigate. It is likely that Yanukovych authorised attacks, there have already been leaks that he was planning to go much further with a large military “antiterrorist” operation to break up the protesters. [1] It seems almost certain that one of the three that the parliament voted to send to the ICC will be responsible for the deaths. It would be far better that the ICC were to be the one who decided who is directly responsible for what than an interim administration that has every reason to dislike Yanukovych and therefore influence the charges.\n\n[1] Robins-Early, Nick, ‘Ukraine’s President Yanukovych Planned Crackdown As He Fled Documents Show’, The Huffington Post, 25 February 2014, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/02/25/yanukovych-crackdown-documents_n_4854228.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7100234e1c0a35eaa7683ff3e23dc183", "text": "human rights international law house would send yanukovych hague Would mean Ukraine signing up to the ICC\n\nHaving the ICC prosecute Yanukovych currently faces a major difficulty; Ukraine has not ratified the Rome statute. [1] It is therefore outside the jurisdiction of the court. Technically this means the parliament can’t ask for ICC prosecution as there is no State Party to refer the situation to the prosecutor. [2] Clearly there is an easy solution to this; Ukraine should ratify the statute. This would have the benefit of reaffirming international criminal law, showing that it can be beneficial in a crisis, and increasing it as an accepted norm.\n\n[1] ICC, ‘The States Parties to the Rome Statute’, icc.cpi.int, accessed 28/2/2014, http://www.icc-cpi.int/en_menus/asp/states%20parties/Pages/the%20states%20parties%20to%20the%20rome%20statute.aspx\n\n[2] Rome Statute, Article 14\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "210f624d9327bdf6af016a24bc8ccb08", "text": "human rights international law house would send yanukovych hague Would prevent division\n\nJustice is about the past. But when prosecuting someone there also needs to be a thought for the present and the future of the country. In the case of prosecuting Yanukovych there could be serious consequences as he had support in one half of the country. Ukraine is a divided country with many in the East considering themselves to not be Ukrainian, and certainly look to Moscow not the EU. [1] The new administration has already abolish a law that made Russian a second language in the country so infringing the rights of many in the East. [2] Trying a former leader in Kiev would be similarly provocative to those who believe Yanukovych is still the legitimate president, or even those who may not agree with Yanukovych but dislike the westward movement even more. While it would be unlikely to cause conflict on its own the action would certainly be an aggravating factor if other actions against the east of the country are being taken.\n\n[1] Jamison, Alastair, ‘Can Ukraine Avoid an East-West Split and Bloody Civil War?’, NBCnews, 26 February 2014, http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/ukraine-crisis/can-ukraine-avoid-east-west-split-bloody-civil-war-n38911\n\n[2] RT, ‘Canceled language law in Ukraine sparks concern among Russian and EU diplomats’, RT.com, 27 February 2014, http://rt.com/news/minority-language-law-ukraine-035/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3b6ed4a5a782cf2c6071ec6c53f179db", "text": "human rights international law house would send yanukovych hague Yanukovych committed crimes against humanity\n\nEven before most of the violence by riot police in February some experts were suggesting that Yanukovych had committed crimes against humanity – crimes committed by a state against a civilian population. Professor Alexander J Motyl argued “The Yanukovych regime may already be guilty of “imprisonment or other severe deprivation of physical liberty in violation of fundamental rules of international law” and “persecution against any identifiable group or collectivity on political, racial, national, ethnic, cultural, religious, gender … or other grounds.”” [1] Now at the very least murder can be added to that count.\n\n[1] Moryl, 2014, http://www.worldaffairsjournal.org/blog/alexander-j-motyl/taking-yanukovych-international-criminal-court\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "22bd8a28e661d0c5206f3e1a1fe5802a", "text": "human rights international law house would send yanukovych hague Does Yanukovych really qualify for the ICC?\n\nIt is questionable whether Yanukovych’s crimes, as abhorrent as they may be, really qualify for the ICC. It is clear that he does not qualify for three of the four crimes the ICC charges; genocide, war crimes, and the crime of aggression (this is for attacking other states not your own people). This leaves crimes against humanity. Crimes against humanity can include murder when “committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack directed against any civilian population” [1] so the ICC will need to decide whether less than 100 dead is widespread and grave enough to justify the charge – and this is something that is up to the prosecutor. [2] Moreover as yet we don’t know if Yanukovych himself was directly responsible for ordering attacks on the protesters in the last couple of days before the fall of his government.\n\n[1] States Parties, ‘Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court’, icc-cpi.int, A/CONF.183/9 17 July 1998, http://www.icc-cpi.int/nr/rdonlyres/ea9aeff7-5752-4f84-be94-0a655eb30e16/0/rome_statute_english.pdf , Article 7\n\n[2] Kersten, 2014, http://opencanada.org/features/the-think-tank/comments/could-yanukovych-be-tried-at-the-icc/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c0b3460fb977cb7f298b79a4eb1b303a", "text": "human rights international law house would send yanukovych hague The ICC is slow\n\nhas resulted in a conviction is against Thomas Lubanga – the trial took eight years from arrest to conviction. [1] The option of trying Yanukovych in the Ukraine with outside help in the process is therefore a better idea. The Council of Europe’s Secretary General has already offered “legal… expertise… by the International Advisory Panel (IAP), which will oversee investigations into recent acts of violence. I expect the IAP to start its work in Ukraine as early as next week.” [2] The OSCE too will help “efforts to establish facts on acts of violence and human rights violations.” [3] Clearly the Ukraine would be in a good position to provide a free and fair trial for its former president that could bring justice much faster than the ICC while also showing justice being done in the right place.\n\n[1] Open Society Foundations Justice Initiative, ‘background’, lubangatrial.org, http://www.lubangatrial.org/background/\n\n[2] Jagland, Thorbjørn, ‘Secretary General Jagland welcomes the Agreement on the Settlement of the Crisis in Ukraine’, coe.int, 21 February 2014, http://www.coe.int/web/secretary-general/-/le-secretaire-general-jagland-salue-l%E2%80%99accord-sur-le-reglement-de-la-crise-en-ukraine\n\n[3] Burkhalter, 2014, http://www.osce.org/cio/115559\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "667d9799c462e41828301921e77e53f6", "text": "human rights international law house would send yanukovych hague Could not be tried for all his crimes\n\nThe International Criminal Court only tries a few international crimes. This means that other crimes that Yanukovych has committed that are not covered by ‘international criminal law’ cannot be prosecuted at the ICC. It is possible that not all the charges of violence against protesters may count as the crimes against humanity that the court can charge. Equally Yanukovych’s financial crimes cannot be prosecuted at the ICC. It was already known that Yanukovych became very rich as a result of corruption during his time as president but it is only now beginning to become clear how much corruption there was. Yatsenyuk the new Prime Minister “Over $20bn of gold reserve were embezzled. They took $37bn of loans that disappeared. Around $70bn was moved to offshore accounts from Ukraine's financial system in the last three years” with much of that money finding likely finding its way to Yanukovych or his friends. [1] Considering the hole in Ukraine’s finances it would be far better to pursue these crimes.\n\n[1] Walker, Shaun, and Grytsenko, Oksana, ‘Ukraine’s new leaders begin search for missing billions’, The Guardian, 27 February 2014, http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/27/ukraine-search-missing-billions-yanukovych-russia\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "28597422d045c1525c2357f509751238", "text": "human rights international law house would send yanukovych hague Should be tried at home\n\nThe ICC recognises that a case is inadmissible where “The case is being investigated or prosecuted by a state which has jurisdiction over it”. [1] The state of which Yanukovych is a national, and where the crimes took place has precedence. Ukraine therefore has first right to try Yanukovych, indeed the ICC will only act if Ukraine is unwilling or unable to do so itself. As the crimes he is alleged to have committed took place entirely in Ukraine, over Ukrainian issues he should be tried in Ukraine. This would allow the Ukrainian people to see justice done themselves rather than relying on others to do it for them.\n\n[1] States Parties, ‘Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court’, icc-cpi.int, A/CONF.183/9 17 July 1998, http://www.icc-cpi.int/nr/rdonlyres/ea9aeff7-5752-4f84-be94-0a655eb30e16/0/rome_statute_english.pdf , Article 17\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
ee668162d7416a8baab4a2810f55249f	The bully's intentions are irrelevant In criminal law, the establishment of culpability does not always depend on the intentions of the perpetrator. If, during a fight on a train platform, I shove someone and that person falls on the tracks and is killed by a train, I will be guilty of manslaughter, whether I intended to kill the person or not, because the harm caused by my actions is so great [1] . The same applies to bullying. Bullies try to hurt their victims through their actions, either physically or psychologically. Whether the bully intended for the victim to die or not, is irrelevant. The bully’s actions were responsible for the victim taking her own life. [1] Ashworth, Andrew. Principles of Criminal Law, Chapter 7.5. Oxford University Press. 2009.	[ { "docid": "3c6c13d4deaefa3e2e398b5cddf721df", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally There is a fundamental difference between someone’s actions directly resulting in another person’s death and the case of bullying. In the case of manslaughter, the victim never had a choice. The perpetrator is solely responsible for what happened. But some victims of bullying take a decision to kill themselves, while others do not. The bully cannot be held responsible for someone else’s decision and action, only for her own.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "7e27ed2adef89f16fa4ad29b5fad9302", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally The laws are inadequate because it is very hard to define bullying. Almost any act or gesture can constitute bullying depending the victim’s subjective experience of it. Criminalizing bullying would lead to criminalizing behaviour that would be considered normal by most standards.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "21fff1c1e1046ce8e9073349e2f48951", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally We should always focus on stopping the behaviour before it escalates to the point of the victim’s suicide. Bullies should be held to account early on. We shouldn’t wait until someone dies before they are punished. If victims know there will be early intervention, they will be far less likely to even consider suicide. If they know the bullies won’t be punished until after their death, it might even encourage some distraught victims to kill themselves in the hope of exact vengeance on their tormenters. Early intervention is a much better outcome for everyone.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d8e5f230fbaa6637fe4cb31d1504e771", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally The law should only punish people for their own actions, not those of others. It’s fine to punish bullies for their bullying behaviour, if it is against the law. But ‘bullycide’ implies the bully bears individual responsibility for the death of the victim, just like in the case of murder or manslaughter. But the bully did not pull the trigger, the victim did. While the bully may have intended to harm or berate the victim, she made no attempt on the victim’s life, and cannot be treated like a murderer, who intentionally took the life of another.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6a7818b099557f3c9c8c07ea2c276b09", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally Under this law, bullies would be held accountable for their own actions, not those of the victim. The law wouldn’t have to equate them with murderers, punish them as harshly, or suggest they bear sole and full responsibility for the victim’s death. But it would make it clear they bear some responsibility for the outcome, and that they should be punished for their role. If they are children, they can be prosecuted as juvenile offenders and given less harsh punishments, like community service.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "489e2d67fa8ce08ca7d66e0d20ae44ee", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally Prosecutions of bullies responsible for suicides, and improved safety in schools are not mutually exclusive goals. Programmes need to be set up that stop bullying early on, give victims support, and people to turn to when they are in need. Schools and their administrators can and should also be held accountable to their boards, and the community. But in those cases where tragedies still happen in spite of such measures, the culprits should be held to account.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "da6f74bca276a24fa1aa44fffe494d6f", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally Of course there will always be ambiguous cases. That is why we have trials, and rights for the defendant. The weight of the evidence presented in court should establish what degree of culpability, if any, the bullies had. If the prosecution does not have a solid case to present, it may even choose not to prosecute. But the law should be in place for those cases where it is needed.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cd494767ea847583b3a731aae2b5191f", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally We criminalize behaviour when it is truly harmful. Especially when it is so harmful that it leads to someone losing her life. Eye rolling and gossip are not harmful enough to be criminal offences. Nor would they be under this law. What would become a criminal offence would be the sustained and prolonged torment of another person to the point of pushing her to committing suicide, whatever forms that torment takes, whether it’s gay slurs, or physical threats and insults. It has also long been established that there are limits to the freedom of speech or expression we enjoy, if that can result in the direct harm of others. For example, we don’t allow people to incite violence against others.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e9d6c412c40eac8793866930b5f9cf90", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally Bullies are often children, most of them in their teens. However, they are at an age where they do know right from wrong and can, therefore, be held accountable for their actions. Neither their young age nor their own suffering can justify bearing responsibility for someone else’s death. Most criminal justice systems recognize that children are liable for their behaviour, by allowing children as young as 10, in the UK for example, to be charged with criminal offences. Their age and personal situation can, nevertheless, be taken into account in deciding what punishment they should receive (prison, community service, a fine, etc.). And there is no reason why rehabilitation and education cannot be part, or even the focus, of that punishment.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "fc2f3edfdeced1049d7cdadd43f4daa2", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally The damage wrought by bullying is cumulative\n\nBullying is truly dangerous when it becomes persistent. Any one incident of it, while unpleasant, may be entirely tolerable for the victim. But being unrelentingly subjected to this treatment for months on end can make life truly unbearable and lead that person to suicide. In the case of Phoebe Prince, an Irish immigrant who was bullied at her US high school, she was called expletives, threatened, and even hit with a beverage container before she finally took her life [1] . She may have survived any one of those taunts, but it was their cumulative effect that was too much to bear. Conversely, punishing her bullies for any one act will fail to acknowledge the much greater extent of the overall harm. A different, special offence is needed to recognize the magnified level of harm caused by bullying.\n\n[1] Eckholm, Eric; Zezima, Katie. “Documents Detail a Girl’s Final Days of Bullying”. The New York Times. April 8, 2010. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/09/us/09bully.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3c9a2be8b1d1a8df5f53fd0610503a41", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally The law should always punish actions that inflict serious harm - whether physical or psychological\n\nBullying can inflict serious psychological harm on its victims, especially in the case of young people. It leads to low self-esteem, depression, and for some kids it leads to suicide [1] . Bullied children are almost 6 times more likely to think about or attempt suicide [2] . This phenomenon has been termed ‘bullycide’ and the law should recognize it. Many forms of behaviour that result in the death of another person are criminal, from murder to negligence. It is the duty of the law to brand such behaviour as unacceptable, deter future incidents, punish the perpetrators, and offer comfort to victims: in this case, the families of those who lost their life to bullying.\n\n[1] O'Moore, Mona, “Understanding School Bullying: A Guide for Parents & Teachers”, Veritas, 1, Dublin, 2010\n\n[2] Kim YS, Leventhal BL, Koh YJ, Boyce WT “Bullying Increased Suicide Risk: Prospective Study of Korean Adolescents”. Arch Suicide Res. Vol. 13, No. 1, pp15-30. 2009.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c8c294f12024f8e05b1f604e7c6a8d22", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally The current legal regime is not able to prevent or adequately punish bullying\n\nEven when bullies are sometimes prosecuted, they are charged with offences that constitute individual components of the bullying behaviour, like harassment, stalking, causing bodily harm [1] , or invasion of privacy [2] . But these offences were not designed with bullying in mind and fail to capture its overall impact and the harm it causes. While bullies may be charged with several of these offenses this will still not capture the kind of harm being done and would not be as effective as a specifically tailored offense. We need laws that recognize that harm and which punish those who inflict it adequately.\n\n[1] Eckholm, Erick. “Two Students Plead Guilty in Bullying of Teenager.” The New York Times. May 4, 2011. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/05/us/05bully.html\n\n[2] Foderaro, Lisa W. “Private Moment Made Public. Then a fatal Jump.” The New York Times. September 29. 2010. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/30/nyregion/30suicide.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6be8879cb88f8e12477543455269114f", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally Bullys are frequently as disturbed and victimised as those they target\n\nAccording to studies, bullies are often children who are plagued by their own problems: a troubled family situation, feeling of inadequacy, depression, or pressure to fit in [1] . Their bullying behaviour might just be a coping mechanism and a cry for help. These children might need as much support and care as those they bully. Putting them through the harrowing experience of a criminal trial, and potentially throwing them in prison will further damage them. Destroying one young life as retribution for another is a model of justice that should find no place in a compassionate society.\n\n[1] Carroll, Linda. ”Kids with ADHD may be more likely to bully”. MSNBC. 29 January 2008. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22813400/#.Tvmm8iNWoVc\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f189f87f1dc1b7be21e4b7caa4d7d9d2", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally Conduct offence\n\nDefining bullying would be nearly impossible. Spreading rumours, giving someone the silent treatment, inviting all your classmates but one to a party, expressing a religious belief about someone’s sexuality, eye rolling, making faces, these can all be hurtful and perceived as bullying [1] . Yet this is perfectly legal behaviour. Criminalizing bullying would amount to criminalizing these acts. They may be offensive, they may even be hurtful, but these gestures should never, ever constitute criminal behaviour in any society that is concerned with human rights, freedom of speech, and of expression. Throwing someone in prison for spreading rumours or eye rolls might be worthy of a totalitarian state, but not a liberal democracy.\n\n[1] Bolton, José, and Stan Graeve. No Room for Bullies: from the Classroom to Cyberspace. Boys Town Press. 2005.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f6178bb735dbc5f3764954412e4450fe", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally Making bullying a legal issues does not incentivise robust enforcement of anti bullying rules by schools\n\nSchools are educational establishments that parents trust to protect and educate their children. Teachers and school administrators are those who should be keeping a watchful eye on the students in their care and intervene before harm comes to them. If bullying occurs at school, then that school has failed in its duties. In fact, in cases where suicides occurred, it has often later come to light that a bullying culture was widely tolerated at the school, and that school staff that knew about it did nothing to prevent it, with tragic results [1] . To prosecute the bullies would shift responsibility from the woeful failure of the adults around them, who should have known better and done more than the children in their care.\n\n[1] Bazelon, Emily. “What Really Happened to Phoebe Prince? Entry 1”. Slate. July 20. 2010. http://www.slate.com/articles/life/bulle/features/2010/what_really_happe...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "55c53dd08bfd6c2f4c9facea4772e83e", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally Individuals should only be held responsible for the consequences of their own actions\n\nIn any free and democratic society, criminal law should only hold people accountable for the things they do, not for the actions of others. We are all autonomous, moral agents who make decisions and have to live with their consequences and the consequences of our actions. While it might be justified to punish bullies for their bullying behavior, if it breaks the law, we cannot hold them accountable for another person’s decision to commit suicide.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "fd3f071f4a7192858b4a3afa0e754fe2", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally It is difficult to make a direct, legally sound link between a bully's behaviour and a victim's suicide\n\nMany of the children and adolescents who take their own lives allegedly as a result of bullying have a far more complicated background. Some already struggle with depression, and have unstable family situations that make it hard to turn to their parents for help with their problems. Phoebe Prince, for example, was taking anti-depressants, was devastated by her parents’ divorce, was self harming, and had already attempted suicide after a break up. And that was long before she was allegedly bullied to death [1] . She was a very troubled young woman, and anything could have pushed her over the edge. It would be hard to find the bullies criminally responsible for her death.\n\n[1] Bazelon, Emily. “What Really Happened to Phoebe Prince? Entry 2”. Slate. July 20. 2010. http://www.slate.com/articles/life/bulle/features/2010/what_really_happe...\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
ab9a89b0dd752bc5c69d2c11ac9778b9	The law should always punish actions that inflict serious harm - whether physical or psychological Bullying can inflict serious psychological harm on its victims, especially in the case of young people. It leads to low self-esteem, depression, and for some kids it leads to suicide [1] . Bullied children are almost 6 times more likely to think about or attempt suicide [2] . This phenomenon has been termed ‘bullycide’ and the law should recognize it. Many forms of behaviour that result in the death of another person are criminal, from murder to negligence. It is the duty of the law to brand such behaviour as unacceptable, deter future incidents, punish the perpetrators, and offer comfort to victims: in this case, the families of those who lost their life to bullying. [1] O'Moore, Mona, “Understanding School Bullying: A Guide for Parents & Teachers”, Veritas, 1, Dublin, 2010 [2] Kim YS, Leventhal BL, Koh YJ, Boyce WT “Bullying Increased Suicide Risk: Prospective Study of Korean Adolescents”. Arch Suicide Res. Vol. 13, No. 1, pp15-30. 2009.	[ { "docid": "d8e5f230fbaa6637fe4cb31d1504e771", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally The law should only punish people for their own actions, not those of others. It’s fine to punish bullies for their bullying behaviour, if it is against the law. But ‘bullycide’ implies the bully bears individual responsibility for the death of the victim, just like in the case of murder or manslaughter. But the bully did not pull the trigger, the victim did. While the bully may have intended to harm or berate the victim, she made no attempt on the victim’s life, and cannot be treated like a murderer, who intentionally took the life of another.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "3c6c13d4deaefa3e2e398b5cddf721df", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally There is a fundamental difference between someone’s actions directly resulting in another person’s death and the case of bullying. In the case of manslaughter, the victim never had a choice. The perpetrator is solely responsible for what happened. But some victims of bullying take a decision to kill themselves, while others do not. The bully cannot be held responsible for someone else’s decision and action, only for her own.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7e27ed2adef89f16fa4ad29b5fad9302", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally The laws are inadequate because it is very hard to define bullying. Almost any act or gesture can constitute bullying depending the victim’s subjective experience of it. Criminalizing bullying would lead to criminalizing behaviour that would be considered normal by most standards.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "21fff1c1e1046ce8e9073349e2f48951", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally We should always focus on stopping the behaviour before it escalates to the point of the victim’s suicide. Bullies should be held to account early on. We shouldn’t wait until someone dies before they are punished. If victims know there will be early intervention, they will be far less likely to even consider suicide. If they know the bullies won’t be punished until after their death, it might even encourage some distraught victims to kill themselves in the hope of exact vengeance on their tormenters. Early intervention is a much better outcome for everyone.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6a7818b099557f3c9c8c07ea2c276b09", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally Under this law, bullies would be held accountable for their own actions, not those of the victim. The law wouldn’t have to equate them with murderers, punish them as harshly, or suggest they bear sole and full responsibility for the victim’s death. But it would make it clear they bear some responsibility for the outcome, and that they should be punished for their role. If they are children, they can be prosecuted as juvenile offenders and given less harsh punishments, like community service.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "489e2d67fa8ce08ca7d66e0d20ae44ee", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally Prosecutions of bullies responsible for suicides, and improved safety in schools are not mutually exclusive goals. Programmes need to be set up that stop bullying early on, give victims support, and people to turn to when they are in need. Schools and their administrators can and should also be held accountable to their boards, and the community. But in those cases where tragedies still happen in spite of such measures, the culprits should be held to account.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "da6f74bca276a24fa1aa44fffe494d6f", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally Of course there will always be ambiguous cases. That is why we have trials, and rights for the defendant. The weight of the evidence presented in court should establish what degree of culpability, if any, the bullies had. If the prosecution does not have a solid case to present, it may even choose not to prosecute. But the law should be in place for those cases where it is needed.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cd494767ea847583b3a731aae2b5191f", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally We criminalize behaviour when it is truly harmful. Especially when it is so harmful that it leads to someone losing her life. Eye rolling and gossip are not harmful enough to be criminal offences. Nor would they be under this law. What would become a criminal offence would be the sustained and prolonged torment of another person to the point of pushing her to committing suicide, whatever forms that torment takes, whether it’s gay slurs, or physical threats and insults. It has also long been established that there are limits to the freedom of speech or expression we enjoy, if that can result in the direct harm of others. For example, we don’t allow people to incite violence against others.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e9d6c412c40eac8793866930b5f9cf90", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally Bullies are often children, most of them in their teens. However, they are at an age where they do know right from wrong and can, therefore, be held accountable for their actions. Neither their young age nor their own suffering can justify bearing responsibility for someone else’s death. Most criminal justice systems recognize that children are liable for their behaviour, by allowing children as young as 10, in the UK for example, to be charged with criminal offences. Their age and personal situation can, nevertheless, be taken into account in deciding what punishment they should receive (prison, community service, a fine, etc.). And there is no reason why rehabilitation and education cannot be part, or even the focus, of that punishment.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8c83c537b0322839e8b0934e8aa53b81", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally The bully's intentions are irrelevant\n\nIn criminal law, the establishment of culpability does not always depend on the intentions of the perpetrator. If, during a fight on a train platform, I shove someone and that person falls on the tracks and is killed by a train, I will be guilty of manslaughter, whether I intended to kill the person or not, because the harm caused by my actions is so great [1] . The same applies to bullying. Bullies try to hurt their victims through their actions, either physically or psychologically. Whether the bully intended for the victim to die or not, is irrelevant. The bully’s actions were responsible for the victim taking her own life.\n\n[1] Ashworth, Andrew. Principles of Criminal Law, Chapter 7.5. Oxford University Press. 2009.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "fc2f3edfdeced1049d7cdadd43f4daa2", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally The damage wrought by bullying is cumulative\n\nBullying is truly dangerous when it becomes persistent. Any one incident of it, while unpleasant, may be entirely tolerable for the victim. But being unrelentingly subjected to this treatment for months on end can make life truly unbearable and lead that person to suicide. In the case of Phoebe Prince, an Irish immigrant who was bullied at her US high school, she was called expletives, threatened, and even hit with a beverage container before she finally took her life [1] . She may have survived any one of those taunts, but it was their cumulative effect that was too much to bear. Conversely, punishing her bullies for any one act will fail to acknowledge the much greater extent of the overall harm. A different, special offence is needed to recognize the magnified level of harm caused by bullying.\n\n[1] Eckholm, Eric; Zezima, Katie. “Documents Detail a Girl’s Final Days of Bullying”. The New York Times. April 8, 2010. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/09/us/09bully.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c8c294f12024f8e05b1f604e7c6a8d22", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally The current legal regime is not able to prevent or adequately punish bullying\n\nEven when bullies are sometimes prosecuted, they are charged with offences that constitute individual components of the bullying behaviour, like harassment, stalking, causing bodily harm [1] , or invasion of privacy [2] . But these offences were not designed with bullying in mind and fail to capture its overall impact and the harm it causes. While bullies may be charged with several of these offenses this will still not capture the kind of harm being done and would not be as effective as a specifically tailored offense. We need laws that recognize that harm and which punish those who inflict it adequately.\n\n[1] Eckholm, Erick. “Two Students Plead Guilty in Bullying of Teenager.” The New York Times. May 4, 2011. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/05/us/05bully.html\n\n[2] Foderaro, Lisa W. “Private Moment Made Public. Then a fatal Jump.” The New York Times. September 29. 2010. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/30/nyregion/30suicide.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6be8879cb88f8e12477543455269114f", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally Bullys are frequently as disturbed and victimised as those they target\n\nAccording to studies, bullies are often children who are plagued by their own problems: a troubled family situation, feeling of inadequacy, depression, or pressure to fit in [1] . Their bullying behaviour might just be a coping mechanism and a cry for help. These children might need as much support and care as those they bully. Putting them through the harrowing experience of a criminal trial, and potentially throwing them in prison will further damage them. Destroying one young life as retribution for another is a model of justice that should find no place in a compassionate society.\n\n[1] Carroll, Linda. ”Kids with ADHD may be more likely to bully”. MSNBC. 29 January 2008. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22813400/#.Tvmm8iNWoVc\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f189f87f1dc1b7be21e4b7caa4d7d9d2", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally Conduct offence\n\nDefining bullying would be nearly impossible. Spreading rumours, giving someone the silent treatment, inviting all your classmates but one to a party, expressing a religious belief about someone’s sexuality, eye rolling, making faces, these can all be hurtful and perceived as bullying [1] . Yet this is perfectly legal behaviour. Criminalizing bullying would amount to criminalizing these acts. They may be offensive, they may even be hurtful, but these gestures should never, ever constitute criminal behaviour in any society that is concerned with human rights, freedom of speech, and of expression. Throwing someone in prison for spreading rumours or eye rolls might be worthy of a totalitarian state, but not a liberal democracy.\n\n[1] Bolton, José, and Stan Graeve. No Room for Bullies: from the Classroom to Cyberspace. Boys Town Press. 2005.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f6178bb735dbc5f3764954412e4450fe", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally Making bullying a legal issues does not incentivise robust enforcement of anti bullying rules by schools\n\nSchools are educational establishments that parents trust to protect and educate their children. Teachers and school administrators are those who should be keeping a watchful eye on the students in their care and intervene before harm comes to them. If bullying occurs at school, then that school has failed in its duties. In fact, in cases where suicides occurred, it has often later come to light that a bullying culture was widely tolerated at the school, and that school staff that knew about it did nothing to prevent it, with tragic results [1] . To prosecute the bullies would shift responsibility from the woeful failure of the adults around them, who should have known better and done more than the children in their care.\n\n[1] Bazelon, Emily. “What Really Happened to Phoebe Prince? Entry 1”. Slate. July 20. 2010. http://www.slate.com/articles/life/bulle/features/2010/what_really_happe...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "55c53dd08bfd6c2f4c9facea4772e83e", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally Individuals should only be held responsible for the consequences of their own actions\n\nIn any free and democratic society, criminal law should only hold people accountable for the things they do, not for the actions of others. We are all autonomous, moral agents who make decisions and have to live with their consequences and the consequences of our actions. While it might be justified to punish bullies for their bullying behavior, if it breaks the law, we cannot hold them accountable for another person’s decision to commit suicide.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "fd3f071f4a7192858b4a3afa0e754fe2", "text": "ure education education general law law general house would hold students legally It is difficult to make a direct, legally sound link between a bully's behaviour and a victim's suicide\n\nMany of the children and adolescents who take their own lives allegedly as a result of bullying have a far more complicated background. Some already struggle with depression, and have unstable family situations that make it hard to turn to their parents for help with their problems. Phoebe Prince, for example, was taking anti-depressants, was devastated by her parents’ divorce, was self harming, and had already attempted suicide after a break up. And that was long before she was allegedly bullied to death [1] . She was a very troubled young woman, and anything could have pushed her over the edge. It would be hard to find the bullies criminally responsible for her death.\n\n[1] Bazelon, Emily. “What Really Happened to Phoebe Prince? Entry 2”. Slate. July 20. 2010. http://www.slate.com/articles/life/bulle/features/2010/what_really_happe...\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
13b15caa06c39981be39c089bef907d8	Immunity for politicians is an unjust double standard Every victim deserves to have the perpetrator of their suffering answer for their misdeeds. It is unjust that certain offenders would avoid retribution, and certain victims would be denied their day in court, simply because of a factor external to the commission of the crime. Even if the crime is not external to the criminal’s political role, the foundation of a free and fair justice system is that all individuals are treated alike, regardless of perceived importance. Hence, a wealthy philanthropist will not be spared from prosecution simply because they are a pillar of the community. Politicians should receive no greater reprieve.	[ { "docid": "3bddc564e47cd8816b0e6af1c0fc0913", "text": "law general punishment politics government house would grant politicians immunity The concept of retribution is a narrow and dubious foundation for justice. A modern, civilized legal system should not be geared around delivering payback on behalf of victims, but rather around advancing the best consequences for the future. For exactly this reason legal systems give several ways in which defendants can avoid punishment, even though they are technically guilty, if punishing them would have bad consequences; these include jury nullification and suspended sentences.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "0f3b15ac8099b3e3aa2d926ebcef7d6b", "text": "law general punishment politics government house would grant politicians immunity See argument above regarding other accountability mechanism. Jeopardizing future electoral success, harming one’s political party, and damage to one’s personal legacy are all meaningful checks on the behavior of politicians. To suggest that, in the absence of prosecutions, an under-used tool anyway, politicians will be able to abuse their station with impunity, is simply untrue.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "546c9c05db3bc5e722956aab352e7129", "text": "law general punishment politics government house would grant politicians immunity The difference between the harm to the office of a politician getting away with a crime and the harm from them being tried for that crime is that the trial is inherently public. Short of widespread corruption – the sort that would probably preclude prosecuting politicians anyway – it is unlikely that unpunished wrongdoing in an office will ever become public. A trial, by contrast, creates a media flashpoint that captures the public consciousness. Thus, even if the damage to the integrity of the office is greater per person in cases of unpunished crimes, the act of punishing the crime informs enough people to outweigh the fact that it may not do as much damage per capita.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "22e8206dddb2b18572ebab32be92b858", "text": "law general punishment politics government house would grant politicians immunity This is not necessarily true. A politician could be a brilliant diplomat who happens to commit a minor offence such as drink driving; very few indictable offences correlate directly with one’s ability to discharge the mandate of a political office. Historically, politicians have often had their secret vices, including the rumored drug habits of many 19th century politicians, that have not impeded the performance of their duties.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f1d71b9872e26a491c9881073de0a093", "text": "law general punishment politics government house would grant politicians immunity With regard to this issue, elections are unquestionably an effective alternative mechanism. The act of a politician in a liberal democracy holding on to office for another term, by definition, requires public assent. The citizenry has an out: don’t continue electing politicians who aren’t serving the public interest. Regardless, politicians already have a plethora of motives, both legitimate and self-serving, to hold on to public office; this doesn’t move the barometer on incentives to run. Most elections are at least modestly well contested precisely because many qualified candidates really want the position.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3d7aeeac0764fc39c45e2182c42ef5f4", "text": "law general punishment politics government house would grant politicians immunity No one doubts that politicians have to make morally difficult decisions, where sometimes every option is unpleasant. However, no one wants politicians to have an unrestricted ability to make ethical questionable decisions. That is exactly what immunity would deliver them. A politician who knows that they cannot be touched is incentivized and licensed to be much more brazen in their behavior when in office, and we want a bulwark against unrestricted rule-breaking. A state of affairs wherein politicians can sometimes be prosecuted creates the ideal amount of disincentive for politicians to break rules; they will do so only when there is a pressing need, and only to a moderate degree. Because of the plausible justifications for such acts, politicians need not fear prosecution in the overwhelming majority of cases. For instance, no official from either the UK or USA has been actually indicted with regard to highly-legally-dubious programs to torture detainees [1] [2] . Moreover, politicians are seldom prosecuted anyway, especially because they tend to belong to socioeconomic strata that punished less or not all compared to the rest of society. There is no legitimate need to give them more protection.\n\n[1] Ambinder, Marc, ‘CIA Officers Granted Immunity from Torture Prosecution’, The Atlantic, 16 April 2009, http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2009/04/cia-officers-granted-immunity-from-torture-prosecution-update/16268/ [Accessed September 9, 2011]\n\n[2] Human Rights Education Association, ‘Torture, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment’, hrea.org, http://www.hrea.org/index.php?doc_id=265 [Accessed September 9, 2011]\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8981eba42abc05e3d9198bae7928c364", "text": "law general punishment politics government house would grant politicians immunity Motivation does not matter. Almost every time someone presses criminal charges, it is for their own personal concerns (such as wanting retribution), rather than concern for the public good; that does not change the fact that if charges are laid, it is because the prosecuting authority has decided that, regardless of why the crime has come to their attention, the interest of society at large requires that the individual be prosecuted. If political motivations are what is needed for politicians to be held accountable, so be it. Even if this is a problem, it can be mitigated with sufficient oversight from an independent prosecuting authority.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "3333404d085ee80fbade4a956c9ed7c8", "text": "law general punishment politics government house would grant politicians immunity If we don’t want politicians hurting the dignity of the office, there is only one thing we can do: not elect politicians likely to commit crimes! Of course, this is often impossible to tell in advance, but the dilemma remains: a crime has been committed, and that hurts the dignity of the office no matter what action we take. One thing that’s worse than having an office’s holder raked over the coals is for them to get away with a behavior that otherwise warrants punishment. See discussion below under “hurts the image of the office.”\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4b32af78a44dee56609fa0aceaa0554c", "text": "law general punishment politics government house would grant politicians immunity These mechanisms are not immediate enough to put an immediate stop to an aberrant behavior. Impeachment proceedings take months at least; elections may be years away; and reputational damage is even more long-term. Moreover, these punishments are nowhere near a sufficient deterrent. If loss of one’s job, and damage to one’s public image were sufficient deterrents, we would not prosecute business leaders for insider trading, nor celebrities for drunk driving. The fact is that a criminal justice system which punishes everyone equally is not just fair; it’s also a practical method of achieving meaningful deterrence. Finally, even if we are willing to settle for one of these lesser punishments, the threat of a great punishment gives prosecutors leverage to strike deals with the politicians, such as offering not to prosecute in exchange for coming forward with the details of misdeeds.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "cb50d172b618d29dfc2f9464e0ffcdd7", "text": "law general punishment politics government house would grant politicians immunity Politicians have to divide their focus anyway. As the examples above concede, being a politician means being pulled in several different directions. Elections are particularly distracting, and in jurisdictions with fixed election cycles like the United States can make periods of up to a year prior to the election a write-off for getting real work done. Thus, personal liability is nothing special among the many concerns a politician has. In fact, accountability, of this direct type, and for serious offences, is probably more important than most of the things a politician is forced to consider, and at the very least deserves inclusion among them.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "00c96cb89d656fbdc5cd2ed2925700c8", "text": "law general punishment politics government house would grant politicians immunity Immunity creates a perverse incentive to hang on to their office as long as possible.\n\nProsecutorial immunity brings about a massive side-benefit to being in office. It is easy to get used to a life where minor indiscretions go regularly unpunished, as has happened with dignitaries holding diplomatic immunity. [1] Immunity from prosecution may spur a politician to seek reelection into their old age when they are significantly less effective at performing their duties. This is one reason why in the vast majority of democracies elected representatives, while far from poor, are not paid massive salaries; we don’t want people getting into politics for the wrong reasons.\n\n[1] Uhlig, Mark A., ‘Court Won’t Bar Return of Boy in Abuse Case to Zimbabwe’, The New York Times, 1 January 1988, http://www.nytimes.com/1988/01/01/nyregion/court-won-t-bar-return-of-boy-in-abuse-case-to-zimbabwe.html?pagewanted=print&src=pm [Accessed September 9, 2011]\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e78109d82b491716d790a1d5ddc780b6", "text": "law general punishment politics government house would grant politicians immunity Politicians who commit crimes are likely unfit to serve.\n\nThe sort of person who commits an offense has demonstrated irresponsibility and so is unworthy of the public trust. Would any reasonable citizen wanted to be represented by a domestic abuser, or have a fraudster manage the public treasury? While almost all people are capable of atonement and redemption, someone who commits crimes worthy of prosecution while in office ought to be immediately removed for the betterment of the state.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "d1a2b2a08f6577bcbfe11fc5ee0dfda5", "text": "law general punishment politics government house would grant politicians immunity Immunity for politicians hurts the image of their office\n\nFar from the worst PR for an office being that a holder of it is on trial, the worst possible public perception of a political institution is that it is wracked with corruption, with it not even theoretically possible to hold its members to account. Prosecuting politicians makes it clear that their office is not a den of impunity, and in the wake of a scandal, restoring public confidence in politicians to come. The public wants their politicians to be accountable and granting immunity harms accountability by denying an option.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "11a8dfb3adff6b44ce35bc1dc538c006", "text": "law general punishment politics government house would grant politicians immunity The ability to prosecute politicians is the ultimate protection against the abuse of power.\n\nIt is impossible to overstate the power that the threat of prosecution has to stay the hand of anyone, including a politician, from transgressing the laws of the state. In fact, we need more aggressive prosecution of politicians. Not a single person has been prosecuted for approval illegal torture or wiretapping. These are illegal actions actually happening which the populace, with only the blunt instrument of voting for or against a politician on the sum total of their policies, is unable to effectively influence. There is no greater deterrent that could be used against politicians.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "45d3ade6af28f631f3b3c3c58156e65c", "text": "law general punishment politics government house would grant politicians immunity Politicians should be able to make difficult decisions without fear that selecting one option will lead to their incarceration.\n\nBy the most popular definition, a state is the entity with the monopoly on the legitimate use of force within a defined territory. Politicians, as the government of that state, necessarily wield the institutions of that state force. This results in the tremendous responsibility of deciding when the overwhelming power of the state is exercised. This pertains to a variety of areas, such as police action against civil unrest, the interrogation of both alleged and convicted terrorists, and economic policies that subsidize industries with state resources. While it is certainly possible to brazenly abuse this power, in many cases politicians are presented with options which are, if at all illegal, marginally so, and made with the good faith interest of the nation at heart. There are even conceivable situations in which a politician may exercise options that are clearly illegal but serve an overwhelming state interest; consider an illegal raid on a private building in order to prevent a nuclear bomb from going off. While documented instances of policy-makers choosing not to act for a particular reason are rare, several senior CIA officials stated that they had become risk averse merely because the idea of prosecuting officials who made security policy had entered the public discourse. [1] We ought to place politicians in a situation where the only factor in their decision-making process is what serves the public interest, rather than having to weigh what they consider to be the right action against the chance it will lead to their incarceration. Attempting to avoid this through a limited system which allowed for the prosecution of apolitical crimes but immunity for political decisions would fail to accomplish the goals of prosecution of politicians, which is primarily to protect against political abuses of state power which threaten the rights of the citizenry.\n\n[1] Crawford, Robert, ‘Torture and the Ideology of National Security’ Global Dialogue, Vol.12 No.1, Winter/Spring 2010, (“A Risk-Averse CIA” subsection) http://www.worlddialogue.org/content.php?id=454 [Accessed 22 September 2011]\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "922540b2ff2389884ac0281b80422915", "text": "law general punishment politics government house would grant politicians immunity Prosecutions of politicians are often motivated by partisan concerns.\n\nAs noted above, the political life is steeped in difficult decisions, and some of these are bound to result in choices that are at least potentially illegal. The ability to prosecute politicians incentivizes political opponents to search out past actions by said politicians so as to immobilize them politically. Such prosecutions are therefore not motivated by concern for justice, nor are they conducive to a well-functioning, multipartisan political system wherein representatives seek to work together to achieve their political ends. In the most extreme cases, powerful politicians use prosecutions to immobilize their political opponents.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a60d0d49b030547c40e460f23d5b5f24", "text": "law general punishment politics government house would grant politicians immunity In the event of major abuses of power it should be the public that holds politicians to account.\n\nThe obvious benefit to prosecuting politicians is that it punishes – and thereby deters – corruption by politicians. However, this benefit can be achieved through other means. Firstly, many western liberal democracies have one form or another of removing a politician from office in the midst of their term, such as impeachment in the American system or a vote of no confidence against the government in the Westminster system. While defenders of immunity oppose impeachment as contrary to the principles outlined above (because of the effect that it may have on political duties), this is an option that remains in cases of gross misconduct. If the political will cannot be mobilized to remove a sitting politician, they are held accountable by the electorate to whom they must answer in the next election, and who will likely punish blatant misuse of political power. Even if the individual politician has reached a limit on their term of office, or does not seek reelection, they are still held in check by the damage that will be done to their party in the event of major misconduct on their part. Finally, most politicians are significantly concerned about their legacy, which is tarnished significantly by corruption even if they are never held legally accountable for it. While Nixon received a full pardon from his success, [1] his name has become synonymous with criminality and scandal: a fate most politicians wish to avoid.\n\n[1] Ford, Gerald R., Proclamation 4311, 8 September 1974, http://www.ford.utexas.edu/library/speeches/740061.htm [Accessed September 9, 2011]\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c4f5401e5f6adfe97f712e65aead56fb", "text": "law general punishment politics government house would grant politicians immunity Giving politicians’ immunity from prosecution allows them to focus on performing their duties\n\nThe premier reason that most states, even those that allow for the prosecution of politicians, abstain from prosecuting them while they hold office is that being a politician is a job that requires one’s undivided attention. Especially for the holders of prominent national-level offices, writing legislation, responding to crises under one’s purview, consulting one’s constituents, and engaging in campaign work often lead to politicians working an upwards of 12 hour day, every day. To expect politicians cope with all of these concerns will simultaneously constructing a defense against pending charges would be to abandon all hope of them serving their constituents effectively. We are rightly aggravated when politicians take extensive vacations or other extracurricular forays. [1] Being under indictment not only consumes even more of a politician’s time; the stress it causes will inevitably seep into what remaining time they do allocating to fulfilling their duties, further hindering their performance. The impeachment proceedings for Bill Clinton on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice were so intensive that they took tremendous resources away from not only the president himself, but all branches of the federal government for several months [2] , amidst serious domestic and foreign policy concerns such as the ongoing war in Kosovo.\n\n[1] Condon, George E. Jr., ‘The Long History of Criticizing Presidential Vacations’ The Atlantic, 18 August 2011, http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2011/08/the-long-tradition-of-criticizing-presidential-vacations/243819/ [Accessed September 9, 2011]\n\n[2] Linder, Douglas O., ‘The Impeachment Trial of President William Clinton’, UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI-KANSAS CITY (UMKC) SCHOOL OF LAW, 2005, http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/clinton/clintontrialaccount.html [Accessed September 19, 2011]\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "19896cf125933f304fee6c6ab4fd991a", "text": "law general punishment politics government house would grant politicians immunity Seeing a politician put on trial hurts the integrity of their office.\n\nIt does tremendous damage to the public perception of a given political position to see the holder of that position on trial for criminal acts. Politicians are important role models for the populace at large, and shining light on everyone one of their misdeeds is not conducive to them playing such a role. This hurts the ability of their successors who, though completely innocent, are stepping into an institution now tainted with the image of corruption or scandal. Finally, the very process of prosecution can be damaging to the country, as citizens on opposing sides of the political spectrum disagree over the legitimacy of charges. These effects all deal real damage to the political institutions necessary for the functioning of the state.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
1b37afdef97beb05d0033ae123995144	The ICC has an anti-African bias Every person indicted by the ICC so far has been an African, for events which occurred in Africa, all bar one case, the Libya situation (in which no trials have started and seem a long way off), are in sub-Saharan Africa. The ICC has not brought actions against anyone involved in conflict in Colombia, or for the conflict in Sri Lanka or for human rights abuses around the world. The ICC is simply selectively prosecuting.	[ { "docid": "f877b83bc975e12cf19ff56d1b9c982c", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw Almost all the cases involve self-reference – the only ones that did not are UN Security Council references, done in the same way as the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda were set up. The other case, Kenya, was set up when the ICC prosecutor used its power in the Rome Statute. This only occurred after the Kenyan parliament failed to implement the recommendations of the Waki Commission, which it set up.\n\nWhile horrible events occurred in Sri Lanka, the ICC does not have the ability to prosecute unless the case is referred to the court by the UN Security Council, or the Sri Lankan government, which is unlikely – it is not a kangaroo court that can make up jurisdiction to hear a case for political reasons [1] . Colombia is still being investigated [2] .\n\n[1] Rome Statute, Article 22\n\n[2] Office of the Prosecutor, Report in to Preliminary Examination Activities, 2013, http://www.icc-cpi.int/en_menus/icc/press%20and%20media/press%20releases/Documents/OTP%20Preliminary%20Examinations/OTP%20-%20Report%20%20Preliminary%20Examination%20Activities%202013.PDF\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "52a0c65a2b8d496c552f03db504174d0", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw Additional crimes in the remit of an African Criminal Court could cause more problems than they solve.\n\nDrug trafficking was rejected from the remit of the ICC [1] because it would overburden the court, which is intended to deal with international crimes. While the idea of prosecuting coups sounds good, in practice it would raise the same persecution complexes amongst leaders as the ICC does.\n\nAn AU court will also be subject to more local fractious politics and power struggles, rather than the bulk of the membership being from outside the region.\n\n[1] See , Kiefer, Heather, “Just Say No: The Case against Expanding the International Criminal Court’s Jurisdiction to Include Drug Trafficking”, Loyola of Los Angeles International and Comparative Law Review, 2009, http://digitalcommons.lmu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1646&context=ilr at p164\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5081562fe44a408c99a188b5ae2c2c76", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw Justice is more than just a road to peace; it is a goal of its own. [1]\n\nFor most African states this should not be a cause to leave the ICC as they are unaffected by ICC indictments affecting a peace process. Even for those whom it does affect it is only transitory until a solution is reached. Such concerns moreover could be better dealt with by ensuring that the ICC puts in place a mechanism that recognises that in some instances peace can come first.\n\n[1] Human Rights Watch, “Perceptions and realities: Kenya and the International Criminal Court”, hrw.org, 14 November 2011, http://www.hrw.org/news/2013/11/14/perceptions-and-realities-kenya-and-i...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a71c5b0b7a8b2c55033af861a2771c2b", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw The principle of complementarity means that the ICC is only a backstop court – it only takes on a case when a state is unwilling or unable to have it dealt with in its own national courts [1] .\n\nIf the ICC were a tool for external interference, it is solicited by the states in that most situations follow on from referrals by the domestic governments.\n\nReferrals by the UN Security Council can happen irrespective of if a state is a party (hence the Libya and Sudan situations) – just like the ad hoc tribunals for Yugoslavia and Rwanda were created in 1994. Regardless this will only happen with the assent of Russia and China so ensuring that referrals are not following a ‘western imperialist’ agenda.\n\n[1] Rome Statute, Article 17\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "bde15747be00bd32c0bee179dab0ceba", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw Impunity has occurred in some cases, due to the ICC system not leading to prosecutions, such as in Sri Lanka.\n\nAt any rate, the ICC is not needed – African courts can deal with individuals, not a foreign one.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "724eb68092090eb0eb43fc894a514486", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw Independent nations are capable of trying war crimes themselves.\n\nThe ICC is an unnecessary intrusion on national sovereignty. It should be up to each state to determine its own legal system as to how criminal matters should be prosecuted.\n\nThe principle of complementarity is no guarantee as it is up to the ICC itself to determine if the state is unable or unwilling, meaning it could take over a case for its own ends.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "12a2526a0858036c71b0c66dc3f6490e", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw Is justice something to be subjected to simple financial parameters?\n\nEven so, what is the ICC cheaper than? It may be cheaper than individual criminal tribunals like the ICTY and ICTR, but that assumes that such tribunals are desirable. It should be left up to individual states to bring action.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0961a5b3fad7924e87018ceb3f643f12", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw An African Criminal Court would be better\n\nInstead of the ICC structure, the African Union has proposed an African Criminal Court. An ACC could not only bring justice home to Africa, by creating a court which will not appear to African nations as being imposed by outsiders, but also be able to have additional remits to address other issues in Africa that the ICC does not have powers to deal with, such as coups, corruption and drug trafficking [1] . An African Criminal Court may also have a chance of being seen as more legitimate than the ICC, which had only 39% support in Kenya in July 2013 [2] .\n\n[1] IRIN, “Analysis: How Close is an African Criminal Court?”, IRIN (Integrated Regional Information Networks), 13 June 2012, http://www.irinnews.org/report/95633/analysis-how-close-is-an-african-cr...\n\n[2] Ipsos Synovate, “The ICC Issue and Raila’s Political Future”, Ipsos Synovate http://www.ipsos.co.ke/home/index.php/ipsos-kenya-news/21-the-icc-issue-and-raila-s-political-future\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c52c7599471449eab9acd3c25304533a", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw Tool for external interference.\n\nThe ICC creates a way that foreigners, and in particular the west with its tendency towards intervention, can remove and imprison African leaders [1] .\n\nUhuru Kenyatta, the President of Kenya, who has been indicted by the court, has referred to it as a “toy of declining imperialist powers” [2] .\n\nThe court is largely funded by Western countries, with the European Union providing over half the cost. So it should not be surprising if the west has a lot of power over the court. Moreover the west is dominant in the United Nations Security Council so potentially controls both the methods of referring a country to the ICC without its permission.\n\n[1] Monbiot, George “Imperialism didn’t end. These day’s it’s known as international law”, The Guardian, 30 April 2012, http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/apr/30/imperialism-didnt-e...\n\n[2] Kenyatta, Uhuru, “Uhuru: ICC is a toy of declining imperial powers”, CapitalFM Blogs, 12 October 2012, http://www.capitalfm.co.ke/eblog/2013/10/12/uhuru-icc-is-a-toy-of-declin...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a68f69cdcd1e33df1c1fde8cab9d9d9d", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw Detriment to peace process\n\nThe ICC has not been particularly effective in dealing with the situation in Uganda, the ICC prosecutions having been a distraction to local community reconciliation and leading to further violence [1] .\n\nSimilarly, the situation in Darfur has not been helped by ICC involvement, with mass destruction of villages by people already indicted by the International Criminal Court [2] . Due to his indictment, a diplomatic solution has become harder as Rome Statute signatories are under a legal duty to arrest Sudanese leader Omar al-Bashir, although many have just ignored this. [3]\n\n[1] Sinclair, Jessical, “The International Criminal Court in Uganda”, Undergraduate Transitional Justice Review, 2010, http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/undergradtjr/vol1/iss1/5\n\n[2] Human Rights Watch, “Sudan: Satellite images confirm villages destroyed”, hrw.org, June 18 2013, http://www.hrw.org/news/2013/06/18/sudan-satellite-images-confirm-villag...\n\n[3] Cooper, Belinda, “The ICC: The Politics of Criticism”, World Policy Journal, 4 December 2013, http://www.worldpolicy.org/blog/2013/12/04/icc-politics-criticism\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f97d650fd38f0a89504a5d675aa3dbff", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw ICC is cheaper\n\nAfrica bears little of the cost of the ICC – by far its largest contributions come from the European Union, and its member states.\n\nThis, coupled with the fact that the ICC is cheaper than the ad hoc tribunals due to economies of scale, means that justice can be delivered to war criminals and those who commit crimes against humanity in an affordable manner – saving resources for helping the victims.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8f21e116717182151bdbef8a34c20ebb", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw No impunity\n\nThe ICC means an end to impunity. It has meant that warlords such as Germain Katanga have been able to be prosecuted for things like using child soldiers, which are universally reviled.\n\nWhat the African Union leaders are simply advocating by withdrawal from the ICC is impunity for themselves. They see one of their own – Uhuru Kenyatta, who has to face very serious allegations over his part in the mayhem after the 2007 elections which killed over a thousand people – being prosecuted and then claim it is selective. The only selection going on is that those who do not have a case to answer are not being prosecuted.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "198af6548000cd153088050264670420", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw ICC necessary to provide fair trials\n\nDomestic legal systems will often suffer from a lack of judicial independence and potentially politicised prosecutions, and are also open to allegations of victors’ justice, or whitewashes by a judiciary biased towards the winners of the conflict.\n\nThe ICC, as an effective court and with an independent judiciary, provides a suitable and unbiased climate for these cases to be heard in. While it is difficult to give any former head of state a fair trial, it is even more so in cases involving states divided along ethnic and political fault lines where any conviction could be seen as one based on continuing hatreds rather than evidence and criminal procedure.\n\nIn addition, the principle of complementarity means African states can prosecute on their own if they wish.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
364667e177451f5c722024723702fb29	ICC necessary to provide fair trials Domestic legal systems will often suffer from a lack of judicial independence and potentially politicised prosecutions, and are also open to allegations of victors’ justice, or whitewashes by a judiciary biased towards the winners of the conflict. The ICC, as an effective court and with an independent judiciary, provides a suitable and unbiased climate for these cases to be heard in. While it is difficult to give any former head of state a fair trial, it is even more so in cases involving states divided along ethnic and political fault lines where any conviction could be seen as one based on continuing hatreds rather than evidence and criminal procedure. In addition, the principle of complementarity means African states can prosecute on their own if they wish.	[ { "docid": "724eb68092090eb0eb43fc894a514486", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw Independent nations are capable of trying war crimes themselves.\n\nThe ICC is an unnecessary intrusion on national sovereignty. It should be up to each state to determine its own legal system as to how criminal matters should be prosecuted.\n\nThe principle of complementarity is no guarantee as it is up to the ICC itself to determine if the state is unable or unwilling, meaning it could take over a case for its own ends.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "bde15747be00bd32c0bee179dab0ceba", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw Impunity has occurred in some cases, due to the ICC system not leading to prosecutions, such as in Sri Lanka.\n\nAt any rate, the ICC is not needed – African courts can deal with individuals, not a foreign one.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "12a2526a0858036c71b0c66dc3f6490e", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw Is justice something to be subjected to simple financial parameters?\n\nEven so, what is the ICC cheaper than? It may be cheaper than individual criminal tribunals like the ICTY and ICTR, but that assumes that such tribunals are desirable. It should be left up to individual states to bring action.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "52a0c65a2b8d496c552f03db504174d0", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw Additional crimes in the remit of an African Criminal Court could cause more problems than they solve.\n\nDrug trafficking was rejected from the remit of the ICC [1] because it would overburden the court, which is intended to deal with international crimes. While the idea of prosecuting coups sounds good, in practice it would raise the same persecution complexes amongst leaders as the ICC does.\n\nAn AU court will also be subject to more local fractious politics and power struggles, rather than the bulk of the membership being from outside the region.\n\n[1] See , Kiefer, Heather, “Just Say No: The Case against Expanding the International Criminal Court’s Jurisdiction to Include Drug Trafficking”, Loyola of Los Angeles International and Comparative Law Review, 2009, http://digitalcommons.lmu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1646&context=ilr at p164\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5081562fe44a408c99a188b5ae2c2c76", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw Justice is more than just a road to peace; it is a goal of its own. [1]\n\nFor most African states this should not be a cause to leave the ICC as they are unaffected by ICC indictments affecting a peace process. Even for those whom it does affect it is only transitory until a solution is reached. Such concerns moreover could be better dealt with by ensuring that the ICC puts in place a mechanism that recognises that in some instances peace can come first.\n\n[1] Human Rights Watch, “Perceptions and realities: Kenya and the International Criminal Court”, hrw.org, 14 November 2011, http://www.hrw.org/news/2013/11/14/perceptions-and-realities-kenya-and-i...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a71c5b0b7a8b2c55033af861a2771c2b", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw The principle of complementarity means that the ICC is only a backstop court – it only takes on a case when a state is unwilling or unable to have it dealt with in its own national courts [1] .\n\nIf the ICC were a tool for external interference, it is solicited by the states in that most situations follow on from referrals by the domestic governments.\n\nReferrals by the UN Security Council can happen irrespective of if a state is a party (hence the Libya and Sudan situations) – just like the ad hoc tribunals for Yugoslavia and Rwanda were created in 1994. Regardless this will only happen with the assent of Russia and China so ensuring that referrals are not following a ‘western imperialist’ agenda.\n\n[1] Rome Statute, Article 17\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f877b83bc975e12cf19ff56d1b9c982c", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw Almost all the cases involve self-reference – the only ones that did not are UN Security Council references, done in the same way as the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda were set up. The other case, Kenya, was set up when the ICC prosecutor used its power in the Rome Statute. This only occurred after the Kenyan parliament failed to implement the recommendations of the Waki Commission, which it set up.\n\nWhile horrible events occurred in Sri Lanka, the ICC does not have the ability to prosecute unless the case is referred to the court by the UN Security Council, or the Sri Lankan government, which is unlikely – it is not a kangaroo court that can make up jurisdiction to hear a case for political reasons [1] . Colombia is still being investigated [2] .\n\n[1] Rome Statute, Article 22\n\n[2] Office of the Prosecutor, Report in to Preliminary Examination Activities, 2013, http://www.icc-cpi.int/en_menus/icc/press%20and%20media/press%20releases/Documents/OTP%20Preliminary%20Examinations/OTP%20-%20Report%20%20Preliminary%20Examination%20Activities%202013.PDF\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f97d650fd38f0a89504a5d675aa3dbff", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw ICC is cheaper\n\nAfrica bears little of the cost of the ICC – by far its largest contributions come from the European Union, and its member states.\n\nThis, coupled with the fact that the ICC is cheaper than the ad hoc tribunals due to economies of scale, means that justice can be delivered to war criminals and those who commit crimes against humanity in an affordable manner – saving resources for helping the victims.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8f21e116717182151bdbef8a34c20ebb", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw No impunity\n\nThe ICC means an end to impunity. It has meant that warlords such as Germain Katanga have been able to be prosecuted for things like using child soldiers, which are universally reviled.\n\nWhat the African Union leaders are simply advocating by withdrawal from the ICC is impunity for themselves. They see one of their own – Uhuru Kenyatta, who has to face very serious allegations over his part in the mayhem after the 2007 elections which killed over a thousand people – being prosecuted and then claim it is selective. The only selection going on is that those who do not have a case to answer are not being prosecuted.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0961a5b3fad7924e87018ceb3f643f12", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw An African Criminal Court would be better\n\nInstead of the ICC structure, the African Union has proposed an African Criminal Court. An ACC could not only bring justice home to Africa, by creating a court which will not appear to African nations as being imposed by outsiders, but also be able to have additional remits to address other issues in Africa that the ICC does not have powers to deal with, such as coups, corruption and drug trafficking [1] . An African Criminal Court may also have a chance of being seen as more legitimate than the ICC, which had only 39% support in Kenya in July 2013 [2] .\n\n[1] IRIN, “Analysis: How Close is an African Criminal Court?”, IRIN (Integrated Regional Information Networks), 13 June 2012, http://www.irinnews.org/report/95633/analysis-how-close-is-an-african-cr...\n\n[2] Ipsos Synovate, “The ICC Issue and Raila’s Political Future”, Ipsos Synovate http://www.ipsos.co.ke/home/index.php/ipsos-kenya-news/21-the-icc-issue-and-raila-s-political-future\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c52c7599471449eab9acd3c25304533a", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw Tool for external interference.\n\nThe ICC creates a way that foreigners, and in particular the west with its tendency towards intervention, can remove and imprison African leaders [1] .\n\nUhuru Kenyatta, the President of Kenya, who has been indicted by the court, has referred to it as a “toy of declining imperialist powers” [2] .\n\nThe court is largely funded by Western countries, with the European Union providing over half the cost. So it should not be surprising if the west has a lot of power over the court. Moreover the west is dominant in the United Nations Security Council so potentially controls both the methods of referring a country to the ICC without its permission.\n\n[1] Monbiot, George “Imperialism didn’t end. These day’s it’s known as international law”, The Guardian, 30 April 2012, http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/apr/30/imperialism-didnt-e...\n\n[2] Kenyatta, Uhuru, “Uhuru: ICC is a toy of declining imperial powers”, CapitalFM Blogs, 12 October 2012, http://www.capitalfm.co.ke/eblog/2013/10/12/uhuru-icc-is-a-toy-of-declin...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "316259e130b059adc242b23dff5e0fa5", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw The ICC has an anti-African bias\n\nEvery person indicted by the ICC so far has been an African, for events which occurred in Africa, all bar one case, the Libya situation (in which no trials have started and seem a long way off), are in sub-Saharan Africa.\n\nThe ICC has not brought actions against anyone involved in conflict in Colombia, or for the conflict in Sri Lanka or for human rights abuses around the world. The ICC is simply selectively prosecuting.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a68f69cdcd1e33df1c1fde8cab9d9d9d", "text": "rnational africa law international law house believes african states should withdraw Detriment to peace process\n\nThe ICC has not been particularly effective in dealing with the situation in Uganda, the ICC prosecutions having been a distraction to local community reconciliation and leading to further violence [1] .\n\nSimilarly, the situation in Darfur has not been helped by ICC involvement, with mass destruction of villages by people already indicted by the International Criminal Court [2] . Due to his indictment, a diplomatic solution has become harder as Rome Statute signatories are under a legal duty to arrest Sudanese leader Omar al-Bashir, although many have just ignored this. [3]\n\n[1] Sinclair, Jessical, “The International Criminal Court in Uganda”, Undergraduate Transitional Justice Review, 2010, http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/undergradtjr/vol1/iss1/5\n\n[2] Human Rights Watch, “Sudan: Satellite images confirm villages destroyed”, hrw.org, June 18 2013, http://www.hrw.org/news/2013/06/18/sudan-satellite-images-confirm-villag...\n\n[3] Cooper, Belinda, “The ICC: The Politics of Criticism”, World Policy Journal, 4 December 2013, http://www.worldpolicy.org/blog/2013/12/04/icc-politics-criticism\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
9d457778917d8b1060b043bf2dc5b885	Casinos create positive economic effects in the communities that host them Casinos can revive entire areas and regions. They create jobs and cause money to be spent on transport infrastructure. The jobs are not just in the casino itself. More jobs are created in hotels and other parts of the tourism industry. In an article for nwjob.com Sandra Miedema, ‘Snoqualmies’ employment coordinator is quoted saying that at any one time there are an average of 20 vacancies, from chefs to table dealers.1 In the United States commercial casinos employed more than 350,000 people in 2003.2 Casinos have helped to regenerate many places that previously had considerable poverty and social problems, e.g. Atlantic City, New Jersey5. 1 Libraryindex.com, ‘Casinos: The Effects of Casinos – Employment’ 2 Associated Press, Atlantic City to be transformed by 2012, November 20 2007	[ { "docid": "aa51c6b9a9124e2a1d44dc488c31b2d1", "text": "ure culture general law law general house would ban gambling The economic benefits of casinos are exaggerated.1 They generally only create low-paid jobs for local people – the casino companies usually bring in managers from elsewhere. The problems associated with casinos (e.g. crime, gambling addiction) outweigh the economic benefits. In any case, an immoral industry is not justified by the fact that it creates employment.\n\n1 John Warren Kind, \"The Business-Economic Impacts of Licensed Casino Gambling in West Virginia: Short-Term Gain but Long-Term Pain\", PBS, 1994\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "21e38015b0121f13fe55572c5e318fb9", "text": "ure culture general law law general house would ban gambling Gambling is a harmful activity and could have harmful effects on not only to individuals but also on their friends and family. Gamblers may win money from time to time, but in the long run, the house always wins. Why should governments allow an activity that helps their citizens lose the money they have worked so hard to earn? Surely it is the responsibility of the government to protect its citizens from harming themselves, just as harmful substances are illegal, gambling should also be illegal.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "499d87c360beb5ff33adabeb99a52e52", "text": "ure culture general law law general house would ban gambling Gambling is quite different from buying stocks and shares. With the stock market investors are buying a stake in an actual company. This share may rise or fall in value, but so can a house or artwork. In each case there is a real asset that is likely to hold its value in the long term, which isn’t the case with gambling. Company shares and bonds can even produce a regular income through dividend and interest payments. It is true that some forms of financial speculation are more like gambling – for example the derivatives market or short-selling, where the investor does not actually own the asset being traded. But these are not types of investment that ordinary people have much to do with. They are also the kinds of financial activity most to blame for the financial crisis, which suggests we need more government control, not less.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "faeacc6823478d5a4f0ebdf7dd6bb380", "text": "ure culture general law law general house would ban gambling Gambling is not impossible to ban, although it will not be easy such examples of states that have banned it show that it is possible and although illegal activity may arise from the ban this can also be stopped by though rules. If government did not ban activities where some may find a way around it, nothing would be banned at all.\n\nMaking an activity more difficult to pursue will still reduce the number of those who take it up. It is not impossible to put effective deterrent steps in place, such as the recent US ban on American banks processing credit card payments to internet gambling sites.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "dddba2b5b7c67ee9f44e592f4794d9f1", "text": "ure culture general law law general house would ban gambling Treatment programs can address the problems of those who are addicted, and many casinos offer “Self-Exclusion Programs”, where individuals can effectively “ban” themselves from casinos. This could be the initiative of either the gambler or their family or friends.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9e347157870e9ea3e6636827acc0bce4", "text": "ure culture general law law general house would ban gambling Gambling effects every person in the same way, everyone have the free will to decide to gamble and each may win or lose despite of their wealth or position in society, thus gambling cannot affect poor people to a greater extent. Gambling is only regressive because more poor people choose to gamble.\n\nGambling does also have good effects on all member of society- Gambling is often used to raise money for the state or good causes. Many governments tax gambling. Some even run their own lotteries. Charities use prize draws to raise funds. Because people will gamble anyway, the best that governments can do is to pass rules to make it safe and try to get some social good out of it. If the government uses the revenue to help people on lower-incomes, it is not necessarily true that taxes on gambling are regressive and target the poor.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e9094fecd7624a576bd4d4a804440a10", "text": "ure culture general law law general house would ban gambling People committing crimes should be prosecuted. The existence of criminals does not make nearby businesses (including casinos) immoral. It is perverse to punish people who just want to gamble (and not take drugs or use prostitutes) by taking away their chance to do so.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4514c21c2ed035c1ed26db1a0a065583", "text": "ure culture general law law general house would ban gambling Internet gambling is in fact less dangerous than normal gambling. It is free from the pressures to gamble that casinos can create through free food and entertainment, glitzy surroundings and peer pressure. And as children can’t get credit cards, they should not be able to gamble online anyway. Stolen credit cards can be used to commit fraud in any number of ways - online gambling is not a specific problem here. It is also in the interest of internet gambling sites to run a trustworthy, responsible business. Whatever they are looking for online, internet users choose trusted brands that have been around for a while. If a gambling site acts badly, for example by changing its odds unfairly, word will soon get around and no one will want to use it.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5329d518e665ac5796997b1d8fc49e44", "text": "ure culture general law law general house would ban gambling Unlike drugs, gambling is not physically or metabolically addictive. Most gamblers are not addicts, simply ordinary people who enjoy the excitement of a bet on a sporting event or card game. Only a small percentage of gamblers have an addiction. Many more get enjoyment from gambling without problems. The risks of gambling addiction are well known. People can make a conscious choice to start gambling, and are aware of the risks of addiction.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "0c7190bf8b93da17e8f1ef638cc91497", "text": "ure culture general law law general house would ban gambling There is no evidence that gambling makes people not care about others. People do not gamble because they expect to win lots of money. Most gamble as a form of entertainment. Also, there are many areas of life where success is not the result of merit or hard work. Someone born to well-off parents may get many advantages in life without merit or hard work. There are therefore no grounds for thinking that gambling promotes these undesirable values. The desire for wealth one that stems from society as a whole, not casinos.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "5af6d020f87caccedde1aad069df3aed", "text": "ure culture general law law general house would ban gambling It is impossible to effectively ban gambling\n\nWhen gambling has been banned, people have just found a way round the ban. They use internet sites based in other countries. A good example being the Ukraine, who in May 2009 made gambling illegal, this included internet gambling. By July 2009, over 500 illegal gambling operations were established, where 6,000 slot machines were confiscated and 216 criminal charges were made in connection to illegal gambling.1 This illustrates how banning gambling can creates a thriving underground market.\n\nIt is better to legalize and regulate online gambling than to drive gamblers to poorly-regulated foreign operators. Regulation can reduce the problems identified by the proposition. For example, online gamblers can be required to give personal details when registering (e.g. occupation, income). If this information suggests he or she is spending more than they can afford, the company can block their credit card.\n\n1 Kyiv Post, ‘Governmental checks expose over 500 facts of illegal operation of gambling establishments’, 20 July 2009.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "82750b88c11d82702e45b7043d1fe302", "text": "ure culture general law law general house would ban gambling Many activities directly comparable to gambling are already legal and regulated\n\nWhat is the difference between gambling and playing the stock market? In each case people are putting money at risk in the hope of a particular outcome. Gambling on horse-racing or games involves knowledge and expertise that can improve your chances of success. In the same way, trading in bonds, shares, currency or derivatives is a bet that your understanding of the economy is better than that of other investors. Why should one kind of online risk-taking be legal and the other not?\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "523e0bf5c662c8eff5e82e04524ad05b", "text": "ure culture general law law general house would ban gambling Gambling is simply a leisure pursuit\n\nPeople have free will and should be allowed to spend their money on which ever leisure pursuits they choose. Gamblers know that, overall, they are likely to lose money. They gamble because it is a leisure pursuit that they enjoy.\n\nThere is nothing irrational about this. Some people get an enjoyable thrill from the remote possibility that they might win a huge prize – even if he or she loses, they enjoy the experience. Some forms of gambling are highly sociable. For example, many people are involved in ‘social gambling’ and go to bingo halls (or equivalent) to spend time with friends, and some types of gambling are interlinked with other leisure pursuits such as horse racing.* Society accepts people spending money on other leisure pursuits with no material benefits (e.g. cinema tickets, watching sport) – gambling should not be any different. It is patronizing to suggest that people should not be able to choose how they spend their money or their leisure time.\n\n1 The General Education Centre of The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, ‘Report on A Study of Hong Kong People’s Participation in Gambling Activities’, Home Affairs Bureau, March 2002, p.4\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7b39e7d6093163fb81a875024786fc3e", "text": "ure culture general law law general house would ban gambling Gambling leads to the disintegration of families\n\nGambling can have a devastating effect on families. The most obvious effect is financial as one partner uses all their money on gambling the other needs to support the whole family or the gambler may even gamble away joint savings. Psychologically there is a relationship between gambling and various psychiatric and alcohol disorders. This is also an impact on friends, who do not want to be tied into supporting gambling financially or even just emotionally. Lesieur and Custer estimated that for each problem gambler there were 10-15 other people adversely impacted by the gambling of that person.1 As with drugs, it is harmful to the individual concerned and their family and friends, and it is better to ban gambling to stop people getting started in the first place.\n\n1 Shaw, Martha C. et al., ‘The Effect of Pathological Gambling on Families, Marriages , and Children’, CNS Spectrums, Vol. 12, No. 8, 2007, pp.615-622.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "46a068cf6f7692dcc1125258ad895afe", "text": "ure culture general law law general house would ban gambling Gambling affects poor people disproportionately\n\nPoor people are more likely to gamble, in the hope of getting rich. In 1999, the National Gambling Impact Commission in the United States found that 80 percent of gambling revenue came from lower-income households1. It is immoral for the state or charities to raise money by exploiting people’s stupidity and greed. Taxing gambling is a regressive tax (this means that the poor pay a greater proportion of their income in tax than the rich), and regressive taxation is deeply unfair. Gambling attracts people with little money who are desperate for a windfall. These are the people who can least afford to lose money.\n\n1 Mark Lange, The Gambling Scan on America’s Poor, Allnet.com, May 3 2007.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f36eb015134720fa909b7272c606be8d", "text": "ure culture general law law general house would ban gambling Online gambling has increased the incidence of gambling addiction\n\nSomeone can become addicted very easily – they don’t even need to leave their home, and online gambling sites are available at all hours. This also means that they are gambling in private. They may therefore be less reluctant to wager very large sums they cannot afford. In the United States in 1999 the National Gambling Impact Study stated \"the high-speed instant gratification of Internet games and the high level of privacy they offer may exacerbate problem and pathological gambling\",1 and it is estimated that 75% of internet gamblers are problem gamblers, compared with 20% of those who visit casinos.\n\nIt is very hard to know the identity of an online gambler – there have been several cases of people (including children) using stolen credit cards to gamble online.\n\nOnline gambling sites can also get around government regulations that limit the dangers of betting. Because they can be legally sited anywhere in the world, they can pick countries with no rules to protect customers.\n\n1 Skolnik, Sam, High Stakes: the Rising Cost of America’s Gambling Addiction, Beacon Press, 2011, Chapter 5\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "28e4f5e582883797a73fd5f38ae3f798", "text": "ure culture general law law general house would ban gambling Gambling is associated with other forms of addiction and harmful behaviour\n\nGambling makes people concentrate of winning money. Religious leaders of all denominations see gambling as eroding family values1 because it implies that material goods should be valued above other things like friendships and families. It also sends out the message that success should not necessarily be the result of merit and effort. As a philosophy, ‘gambling culture’ is incredibly dangerous. Those in society who most need to self-improve, never do. Instead, they tie their hopes and dreams to the lottery. There may be the possibility of winning a big prize, but the overwhelming likelihood is that a gambler will lose money. Instead, governments should be promoting values like thrift, hard work and self-reliance rather than encouraging or even allowing gambling to promote its own negative values.\n\n1 Holahan, Catherine, ‘Online Gambling Still in the Cards’, Bloomberg Businessweek, 3 October 2006.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ce115f6c058573488173583e984fac29", "text": "ure culture general law law general house would ban gambling Gambling is addictive and psychologically harmful\n\nGambling can become a psychologically addictive behavior in some people. According to the Emotional Neuroscience Centre in Massachusetts, “Monetary reward in a gambling-like experiment produces brain activation very similar to that observed in a cocaine addict receiving an infusion of cocaine.”1 Because of this addictive nature, many people end up gambling to try to recover money they have already lost. This is known as ‘chasing losses’. It results in people staking more and more money, most of which they will lose, and sinking deeper and deeper into debt. People start to gamble without thinking that they will become addicted. Once that happens, it is often too late. A gambling addiction, in addition to the long term effects it has, can result in financial ruin in a few short hours.\n\n1 Johannes Hedwig, Hypersensitivity to Reward in Problem Gamblers, Biological Psychiatry, April 15 2010. .\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "40b832e5ede9144dd362722fc4f71814", "text": "ure culture general law law general house would ban gambling Casinos are often used to mask criminal activity\n\nCasinos are often associated with crime, particularly organized crime. When it comes to local crimes a study has found that only larceny(theft) liquor violations increased significantly with a small increase in prostitution.1 But comparing statistics probably does not show the real harm; drug dealers and prostitutes operate near casinos – they know that there are a large number of potential clients in the area. Moreover when a gambler is in debt and wishes to continue gambling due to its addictive nature, he or she often turns to loan sharks as no bank would lend to them. Casinos can therefore be devastating to neighborhoods. It would of course be wrong to assume all gamblers are criminals, although there is an increased possibility that gamblers in debt could turn to criminality through illegal borrowing. These loan sharks themselves usually have links to organized crime, in some cases are actually run by organized crime,2 and use brutal methods to reclaim their money. By banning gambling the opportunities for loan sharks to offer their services is greatly reduced due to a lesser amount of gamblers in debt, as are the opportunities for prostitutes therefore reducing criminal activity in the areas surrounding casinos.\n\n1 Stitt, Grant, et al., ‘Does the Presence of Casinos Increase Crime? An Examination of Casino and Control Communities’, Crime & Delinquency, Vol. 49, No. 2, April 2003, pp.253-284, P.279\n\n2 Jordan, Mary, ‘Mafia loan sharks making a killing’, Washington Post, 15 March 2009.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
a8367a1df98994dd97517e0631c1749f	China has viewed the last century and a half as non-stop efforts by Westerners to divide China. This looks like another. The last century and a half of relations between China and the West have from the Chinese perspective been one long period of national dismemberment. In 1842 the British took control of Hong Kong after the first Opium war, and after its sequel, China lost control of Shanghai and its own customs service. Efforts were made to sever Manchuria, Taiwan from China in the 20th, and Korea and Vietnam were fully removed from Chinese authority. As a consequence the Chinese are quite paranoid about outside efforts to divide Chinese territory, and support for the Tibetan Independence, due to the fact that the West has no clear interests in the region, is interpreted chiefly as an effort to divide and weaken China. [1] As a consequence, western condemnation tends to be counterproductive, leading to public sentiment in China turning far nastier towards legitimate Tibetan demands. These sorts of views on the part of the Chinese Public are far from unwarranted given the likely consequences of Tibetan independence, namely the creation of a Pro-Western, anti-Chinese state on their borders, and the Chinese are therefore likely to respond to future moves in favour of Tibetan independence the same way Americans would have reacted to Pro-Confederate moves on the part of Great Britain or France during the US Civil War. [1] II. Origins of So-Called ‘Tibetan Independence’, http://www.china.org.cn/e-white/tibet/9-2.htm	[ { "docid": "306b3a321b2b3f5be628e5152bf2edae", "text": "rnational asia international law house believes tibet should be independent state While of obvious interest, it is hard to see how Chinese opinion is of vital relevance to whether or not Tibet should enjoy independence. Serbian opinion was almost certainly overwhelmingly against Kosovar claims in 1998, and it can be assumed that Southern Sudanese Secession may have been less than popular on the streets of Khartoum than Juba.\n\nFurthermore, a large part of the reason for the reaction of the Chinese Public is that the Communist Party has consistently encouraged nationalist sentiment in an effort to deflect its own population from their lack of human and political rights. An independent Tibet would serve as a beacon of freedom in the region and might well inspire Chinese citizens to begin to make demands of their own for political and social freedoms.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "823b5f486354923344b43eba4b0af9a5", "text": "rnational asia international law house believes tibet should be independent state Such progress has been self-serving, with many of the economic gains made by Han Settlers. Secondly it has come at the cost of Tibetan culture and the very national identity that Tibetans hold dear.\n\nIt is also absurd to suggest that these gains would disappear upon independence. Tibet would likely seek to continue to trade with China, and if that is not possible, there would be opportunities to gain investment from India or the West. The benefits of such trade could then be used to help the Tibetans themselves rather than Han settlers. As Ten Zin Samphel, a leader of the Tibetan community in Britain remarks \"At the moment, the economic development is for the benefit of the Chinese… If Tibet were free, we could develop it ourselves.\" [1]\n\n[1] McGivering, Jill, ‘China’s quandary over Tibet’s future’, BBC News, 20 March 2008, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/7305558.stm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "4c53fc2845ce60a725f2fd3183fbb8f4", "text": "rnational asia international law house believes tibet should be independent state Simple geography makes a general conflict over Tibet unlikely. Located on some of the most mountainous terrain in the world, moving large armies would be next to impossible in the region, with the consequence that conflicts like the Sino-Indian war of 1962 were contained by the simple inability of the combatants to bring supplies and reinforcements to the front.\n\nMaking Tibet a neutral buffer state would simply exacerbate these challenges by denying the likely combatants a common border behind which to build up military infrastructure. It may well be that China and India would become rivals for influence in Lhasa, but this would be a diplomatic war of shadows rather than a physical one, just like the current competition for influence in Myanmar which is in a similar position, [1] and it would be a conflict which would provide Tibet with the opportunity to play the rivals off against each other in a way that would safeguard its independence as well as peace in the region.\n\n[1] Kuppuswamy, C.S., ‘MYANMAR: Sandwiched between China & India and gaining from both’, South Asia Analysis Group, 31 January 2008, Paper no. 2574, http://www.southasiaanalysis.org/%5Cpapers26%5Cpaper2574.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "1ded5a70a601be629857f86cb1b3d4ca", "text": "rnational asia international law house believes tibet should be independent state First of all it is worth noting that the Chinese settlers are themselves the product of deliberate campaign of cultural genocide on the part of the Chinese government. While individually they may be innocent, by their participation they have become targets. In this sense there is little difference between them and Israeli settlers in the West Bank or the former French settlers in Algeria.\n\nBut even granting that, there is no reason to assume this violence would continue if Tibet became independent and the major cause of conflict, namely the Chinese occupation, was removed as a major issue of contention. It could be expected that a new Tibetan government would have an incentive to avoid all of the harms outlined by the opposition.\n\nSymbolic of this is the Dalai Llama’s remarks that Tibet’s future is linked to China’s and that an independent Tibet would benefit from a close relationship with China.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e08617fd6d8508bbec664b890c823944", "text": "rnational asia international law house believes tibet should be independent state Migrations for economic reasons is part of the modern global economy. Tibet in 1950 was massively underdeveloped with very low literacy rates, and little modern economic infrastructure. Given the determination of the Chinese government to modernize Tibet, the importation of workers was vital. Educated Chinese were needed to run the administration in the absence of qualified local elites willing to work with them, while Chinese teachers were needed to run the schools. In turn, they brought their families, and a host of businesses followed.\n\nBy the same token, teaching Mandarin is not an issue. There are 6 million Tibetans surrounded by 1 billion Chinese who speak Mandarin, teaching the language of commerce is an effort to integrate the Tibetans.\n\nAnd integration is what the Chinese are after, as while no exact figures are published, it is overwhelmingly clear that Tibet is a net loser financially for them, and has been consistently since the 1950s. The costs of subsidizing a largely unemployed populous along with educational and infrastructure improvements has cost far more than the revenue coming in. If Tibet is a colony, China is not in it for the money. [1]\n\n[1] Coonan, Clifford, ‘Behind the façade of Chinese rule in Tibet’, The Intependent, 3 July 2010, http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/behind-the-facade-of-chines...\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "29f783b46c58a628006572ebef1a3136", "text": "rnational asia international law house believes tibet should be independent state Everything is comparative. The major reason why China does not face more serious domestic unrest is that its international and economic progress have allowed it to appeal to Chinese nationalism. Withdrawing from Tibet would be viewed as an act of weakness, one which would do far more to undermine the Communist party’s legitimacy and support base than remaining there.\n\nSecondly, attacks on China’s Human Rights record matter less and less each year as trade with the PRC becomes more and more valuable to the West. It barely affected the Olympics and increasingly it is viewed as an effort by the West to divide China.\n\nThirdly, the cost of the province has to be compared against the potential security risks an independent Tibet, especially one under anti-Chinese leadership, would pose to Chinese security.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "906903ff9c58948c56eca52b2f054631", "text": "rnational asia international law house believes tibet should be independent state On the contrary, this situation almost ensures that the Tibetans will become a puppet of one or another foreign power. Weak states almost invariably need allies to maintain their independence. An independent Tibet, especially one that has inherited the history of the last sixty years would likely be dominated by politicians who are militantly anti-Chinese, but would be too weak to defend itself against China. It would almost certainly become an Indian proxy, as its only hope of survival would be to attempt to gain the support of the United States and India against China.\n\nIn effect the creation of an independent Tibet, rather than avoiding conflict, would make it more pressing by moving the effective frontline hundreds of miles northward. Right now China and India may not like each other, but the Tibetan-Indian border is sufficiently mountainous as to make military action difficult if not impossible. By contrast, its northern border is much more easily crossed as the Chinese themselves showed in 1950. An independent Tibet would be a security threat to China and the region.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6fa1fac5ef0c810e292c0582b58fe246", "text": "rnational asia international law house believes tibet should be independent state In order for Tibet to have traditionally been viewed as part of the Chinese nation, there is no requirement that it have been under Chinese rule continuously. Like many other parts of “China”, it was ruled by China during times of imperial strength, and when governments weakened, so too did central authority. In this sense Tibet has a lot in common with Manchuria, another region that tended to drift towards autonomy during times of dynastic weakness.\n\nOne thing however has been clear – the variation in sovereignty in Tibet has been between autonomy and Chinese sovereignty. Even in the 9th century when Tibetan armies were outside the gates of the Tang Dynasty Capital of Chang’an, the Tibetans remained nominally the Emperor’s subjects as proclaimed by a monument from 823 stating “their territories be united as one”. [1]\n\nTibet’s independence between 1904/11 and 1950 was consistent with this cycle. Tibet gained autonomy when China weakened, and this autonomy was as much a product of British influence as it was of any Tibetan desires themselves. In 1950, with China reunited under a strong government, Chinese sovereignty returned. It was undoubtedly the case that the local elites who were displaced resented this change, just as their predecessors did the previous times throughout history when Chinese sovereignty was restored, but this does not justify independence, especially when Tibetan independence in the past has always been a product of the dual factors of Chinese weakness and the strength of foreign powers in the region, neither of which is operative right now.\n\n[1] China Daily, ‘From dynasty to republic’, 9 April 2008 http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2008-04/09/content_6601917.htm\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b1553aedae7d76473d4aeed599d3da06", "text": "rnational asia international law house believes tibet should be independent state Tibet is almost 50% Han Chinese and they dominate the economy. Expelling them would be catastrophic\n\nWhatever the reasons or the moral legitimacy behind the move, Tibet is a very different place today than it was in 1950. According to the 2000 census, 2.3 million of Tibet’s 7.3 Million citizens are Han Chinese, and if temporary residents are added the numbers nearly double.\n\nIn the event Tibet achieves independence it is likely that these Han residents will face discrimination if not open pogroms. Already they are a constant target of riots launched by Tibetan Nationalists, events that often end in the destruction of Han businesses and property.\n\nSuch an outcome would not only be morally abhorrent – it would also be catastrophic for Tibet’s economic and political position.\n\nThis minority plays a key role in the Tibetan economy, and their departure would create a vacuum that could lead to an economic collapse.\n\nFurthermore, any mistreatment of the Han Minority would likely push Chinese opinion, already of the view that the Tibetans are coddled according to Faread Zakaria, into support for military intervention.\n\nThe Economist’s James Miles remarked of the 2008 riots that \"What I saw was calculated targeted violence against an ethnic group, or I should say two ethnic groups, primarily ethnic Han Chinese living in Lhasa, but also members of the Muslim Hui minority in Lhasa.\" [1]\n\n[1] ‘Transcript: James Miles interview on Tibet’, CNN, 20 March 2008, http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/asiapcf/03/20/tibet.miles.interview/\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "e210c9125cf8f1cb3994ccf9733e58a1", "text": "rnational asia international law house believes tibet should be independent state Tibet could never be a viable independent state and would either become a Chinese puppet or a launching pad for American and Indian power against China.\n\nGiven the realities of geography, Tibet has little prospect of real independence. Landlocked, with few natural resources, and no clear way to get any resources it does have out, Tibet would be poor, and overshadowed by its much larger neighbours, China and India.\n\nIt would be faced with the choice of either becoming a prize to be fought over between those two powers or aligning itself with one or the other, most likely India given its difficult recent history over the last few decades.\n\nThe consequence would be that rather than giving the Tibetans greater freedom, independence would render them pawns, and rather than reducing tensions in the region, it would likely increase those between India, Pakistan and China. Tibet would be in the same position it was at the end of the 19th Century when it was a weak power at the mercy of the British and Chinese having to toe the line for whichever neighbour was stronger at the time.\n\nIts hard to see how the United States could avoid being drawn into such a geopolitical quagmire, with likely negative consequences for the Sino-American relationship as well. The US having played a key role in gaining freedom for Tibet could hardly stand aside if that freedom was threatened, and the Chinese in turn would view any US influence in a free Tibet as further evidence of the existence of an American hand behind the Tibetan Freedom Movement.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "979967e39d082f308b4d8aca3780ee55", "text": "rnational asia international law house believes tibet should be independent state Tibet has made enormous strides under Chinese rule\n\nContrary to the impressions forwarded by the proposition, Tibet has made enormous strides under Chinese rule. The urban population has increased seven-fold since 1950, [1] literacy has increased from the teens to being as high as 95%, [2] and the average life expectancy has increased from the low 30s to the 60s.\n\nFurthermore, with few natural resources and the economy in Han hands, there is a need for investment capital, and that capital can only come from China. Even the Dalai Llama acknowledged this in 2006, suggesting that a relationship with China similar to that between EU countries would be ideal. [3]\n\n[1] European Space Agency, ‘The Himalayan region’, esa.int, 18 February 2010, http://www.esa.int/esaMI/Eduspace_Environment_EN/SEM9VP0SAKF_2.html\n\n[2] Literacy rate among young people climbs in Tibet, People’s Daily Online, 31 July 2008, http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/90001/90776/90882/6464183.html\n\n[3] Liu, Melinda, ‘Fears and Tears’, Newsweek, 19 May 2008, http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2008/03/19/fears-and-tears.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "8dfb1145386763bd81851b2c78a05985", "text": "rnational asia international law house believes tibet should be independent state Tibetans are rapidly becoming a minority in their own country\n\nDue to systematic campaign of Sinocization, millions of Han Chinese have been encouraged to settle in Tibet, and with the support of the government they now dominate the economy and upper echelons of the administration. Demographically Tibetans are rapidly becoming a minority within their own country, and administratively this has already taken place.\n\nWhile short of open genocide, the intent of the Chinese government is quite clearly the elimination of the Tibetan people as a distinct national, cultural and linguistic group. Not only are they attempting to drown them through settlement, but Tibetan students are forced to learn Mandarin in the schools and are being taught that they are Chinese.\n\nWhile there may well have been past periods of Chinese sovereignty, the policies of the current Beijing government seem designed to produce an outcome far more permanent than those past efforts which respected Tibetan identity and culture.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a163f948fd3ddcc701422c0e180d8e49", "text": "rnational asia international law house believes tibet should be independent state An independent Tibet would serve as a buffer state between India and China, reducing the chances of a regional clash\n\nAn independent Tibet would serve a useful purpose as a neutral and demilitarized buffer state between India and China. Given the rising economic and military clout of both powers, a future conflict is becoming ever more likely, and they already fought one war against one another in 1962.\n\nAn independent Tibet would mean that the two nations would no longer have a common border, making their rivalry less practical and far less pressing. This would reduce military obligations for both, and prevent the Tibetans from being caught in the middle of a future conflict.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ba6647df9dc185f1e5626f18e7780b78", "text": "rnational asia international law house believes tibet should be independent state Tibet is a distinct nation with a distinct history that China illegally invaded\n\nTibet has a long history of independence going back more than 1500 years. Even in times of Chinese “domination”, Tibetans largely governed themselves independently of the small number of Chinese officials in Lhasa. [1]\n\nTibet at most was a tributary of China, and was no more part of it than Thailand, Myanmar or Korea. And from 1911 until 1950 it was entirely independent and conducted its foreign relations as such, for example remaining neutral in World War II despite both its neighbours the Republic of China and the British Empire being on the side of the Allies.\n\nTibet’s annexation by China occurred under the guns of 40,000 Chinese soldiers, and the precedent begun by the invasion stands as one of the few post-1945 cases in which the national principle was abandoned and the only one in which a fully independent state vanished from the map.\n\nWhen one notes that Tibetans have their own language, and a history that includes far more wars with the Chinese than examples of kinship, Chinese arguments of sovereignty have little bearing on the reality. [2]\n\n[1] van Walt, Michael C., ‘The legal status of Tibet’, Cultural Survival Quarterly (Vol. 12, 1988), http://www.freetibet.org/about/legal-status\n\n[2] Tsering, Lhasang, ‘India’s Tibet: A Case for Policy Review’, 17 March 2000, http://www.friendsoftibet.org/articles/india.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "a1e87ee3aa3a00797691cc408e25f7ea", "text": "rnational asia international law house believes tibet should be independent state Tibet presents an explosive domestic political issue for China which the latter would benefit from eliminating\n\nTibet, and the resistance Tibetans continue to show to Chinese rule presents a toxic domestic and international political problem that costs far more than it worth.\n\nDomestically, violence in Tibet is the most serious domestic disturbance facing the Chinese government, and the fact that there is nearly constant violence between Han Settlers and Tibetans forces the Chinese to alienate everyone in order to contain it. Furthermore, the economic and political disenfranchisement of the Tibetan people is an enormous domestic problem, as it has led to large numbers becoming unemployed and moving to other parts of China where they form an underclass.\n\nInternationally, the Tibetan issue keeps China’s Human Rights record in the news and almost torpedoed the 2008 Olympic games. Given that China is already losing money on the province, it may well be worth it for China to jettison it in order to gain much greater international benefits.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
870bfd8ff3090790160e30dd91076747	Hate crime enhancements help prevent hate crimes The additional punishment given to hate crimes under enhancements can help deter people who hold hateful views from acting on them, as they fear going to prison for any amount of time, and so any additional punishment affects their risk calculation before they commit a hate crime. Moreover, increased punishments help prevent those who have perpetrated hate crimes from re-offending through rehabilitation in prison. In cases of crimes motivated by deep hatred, rehabilitation may require increased time and increased effort in order to provide criminals with the correct focus and concentration, and a longer sentence is necessary for this to happen. Hate is not an essential human trait, we are not born hating people, it is a learned factor that can be unlearned when correctly rehabilitated. Therefore hate crime enhancements are just because they help prevent hate crimes and help prevent hate crime recidivism.	[ { "docid": "fcf90bfde562f0c46c97c484cf1e75c5", "text": "crime policing punishment society minorities house believes hate crime enhancements It isn't necessarily true that hate crime enhancements really do deter hate crimes or help fight recidivism. Those committing hate crimes would face significant deterrents (in the form of legal sanctions, including prison time) for the crimes they commit even without the enhancements, so it seems unlikely that the addition of a few more years on their sentence, for example, would make a large difference to them when considering committing a crime. Moreover most hate crimes are based on irrational hatred and prejudice, and thus are unlikely to be rationally considered in a risk analysis as this argument supposes. In terms of rehabilitation, it should be noted that prisons are frequently places of racial and sectarian tension, with violent prison gangs built on ethnic and other identities, and thus hardly seem the place to counteract such prejudices.(4)\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "7f89e096df1ede646e7ba04be0177267", "text": "crime policing punishment society minorities house believes hate crime enhancements Much of this symbolism and “meaning” attributed to hate crimes is deeply subjective and open to (mis)interpretation, especially in a politicized environment where hatred against one group is perceived as being the “usual” motivation behind any crime by any individual from another community against that group, and where the idea of hatred motivating a crime against another community by a different individual (based on his own background) is treated with scepticism.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "6e1688bb091944eb128fd5cc9c593d41", "text": "crime policing punishment society minorities house believes hate crime enhancements Victims of violence may be prone to accusing their assailant of hate-motivated crimes. Victims frequently seek revenge, and hate crime laws create a very easy avenue for doing so. Thus hate crime enhancements may serve to fuel the fires of inter-community tensions as people perceive them as being used to exact communal vengeance.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "79e9590b127509a8c1009b33cbf9f1c9", "text": "crime policing punishment society minorities house believes hate crime enhancements This again assumes that there is no additional harm attached to the perpetrating of such a crime by an individual who holds these ideas, which there demonstrably is (though the inflicting of terror on one specific community). Moreover hate crimes themselves are a violation of the right to freedom of speech; a person does have the right to express themselves, but not in a way that would prevent others from exercising their own rights.\n\nA hate crime is the ultimate attempt to limit another's freedom of expression. A hate crime is an attempt to silence the very idea that a particular person has the right to exist or to live a particular lifestyle. Therefore, in order to uphold the first amendment, hate crime enhancements are not only just, but are in fact necessary.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "905f1b418a30f88ae4a6b9c8d2d70b75", "text": "crime policing punishment society minorities house believes hate crime enhancements In almost every case where hate crimes are committed, the communities involved already perceive themselves as distinct and opposed, mostly because they already believe that their communities have been sundered by structural inequalities and hate-motivated crimes. Simply ignoring hate crimes will not make these communities stop perceiving them. Rather, it could lead to some communities feeling that their concerns and grievances are not being properly addressed, and lead to more inter-community violence as they seek to ensure 'justice' is done by their own hands.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "b0a768d3ba1085524cb2a940e9be512b", "text": "crime policing punishment society minorities house believes hate crime enhancements This presupposes that hate crimes are equal in their effects to non-hate crimes, which they are not as hate crimes cause harms in terms of terror directed at, and felt only by, specific groups.\n\nMoreover, intent is considered in trials in many other circumstances, such as in differentiating between manslaughter (killing without intent to kill) and murder (killing with intent to kill), or when deciding whether a murder was premeditated or not. There is no reason to suppose intent cannot also be judged in possible hate crime cases.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7d8c92716b83c7a8e2067660af84a0f6", "text": "crime policing punishment society minorities house believes hate crime enhancements Hate crimes uniquely harm through terror\n\nHate crimes should be given a more severe penalty because the harm done to the victim and society is greater. Given that the intent of hate crimes is more malicious than simple premeditative murder; it is just to enhance hate crime laws to reflect stronger punishment. Hate crimes don't merely victimize the individual upon whom violence is inflicted, they also victimize a community or minority group that the hate crime was intended to terrorize. This is why hate crimes frequently include highly public acts such as lynchings in town squares, dragging hate crime victims behind cars along streets inhabited by certain communities, and graffiti on significant buildings -they are intended to send a message.\n\nHate crime-delivered messages limit the freedom of expression and group association of the victim community, thus violating their liberties. For this reason, hate crimes have more victims than other crimes, and subsequently deserver greater punishment. Moreover, as hate crimes are generally perpetrated against minority groups, and because these minority groups are always in a state of social disenfranchisement; it could be argued that hate crime enhancements are the state's way of attempting to arbitrate equality to minorities by compensating them with laws that will better favour their interests, thus forcibly \"balancing the scale\" of social equity.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "10855c988c42ebbc7d6bd04a3cc101cf", "text": "crime policing punishment society minorities house believes hate crime enhancements Hate crime enhancements can help emphasize tolerance and inter-community relations\n\nHate crime laws can teach society that hatred is highly condemnable and mould society into a streak away from racism, sexism, etc. Most governments have already taken this turn with the advent of segregation laws, discrimination laws, etc. To simply leave these issues unaddressed would be to make many communities, especially minority communities, feel that their grievances were ignored and that the state allowed discrimination and violence against them. Such feelings would further polarize communities against each other and make racial tensions and further hate crimes more likely.\n\nTherefore hate crime enhancements should be maintained as a way for the state to send a message that it desires tolerance and will not allow crimes based on prejudice to stand un-addressed.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "fe0be98c7d8bac3a06dc797aec4c6663", "text": "crime policing punishment society minorities house believes hate crime enhancements Hate crime enhancements are an attack on free speech\n\nHate crimes are crimes that are based on an idea that the perpetrator had prior to the crime. The crime itself is no different from any other crime except that it is punished more harshly. Why is this so? Because we are punishing an idea. All forms of violent crime, whether they are murders, rapes, or beatings are an expression of hatred toward another human being.\n\nTo add more punishment to a crime because it represents a particular kind of hate (an idea) is to unfairly distinguish between different violent acts and trivialize those violent acts that do not appear to be motivated by prejudice hate. This is unjust because the idea itself does not cause harm, and is in fact legal in most cases (with the exception of direct incitement to violence), as racist or prejudiced statements and ideas are not illegal in most western liberal democracies.\n\nWe allow extreme and prejudiced ideas to be legal because we recognise the value of free speech and open discourse in debating and discussing ideas, so as to best allow for progress in human thought. Hate crime enhancements constitute an attack on this as they make an individual liable for harsher punishments for his actions if he holds certain views, and thus the law unfairly discriminates against these particular viewpoints and not against others, and so hate crime enhancements are unjust.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "926bb084de53b4cf6d8cebdb3a546bfe", "text": "crime policing punishment society minorities house believes hate crime enhancements Hate crime enhancements cause inter-community tensions\n\nBy defining crimes as being committed by one group against another, rather than as being committed by individuals against their society, the labelling of crimes as “hate crimes” causes groups to feel persecuted by one another, and that this impression of persecution can incite a backlash and thus lead to an actual increase in crime.(1) These effects spread beyond the hate crimes themselves.\n\nBy prosecuting high-profile cases of white hate crimes against blacks, for example, it encourages blacks to see themselves as part of a distinct community different from the white community and whose relations are marked by crimes committed by one against the other. This is especially true when one community seems to perpetrate more hate crime (or at least more convictions thereof are secured) against another community than visa-versa.\n\nAn analysis of hate crime date from the USA examining how hate crimes against whites are viewed with respect to hate crimes against blacks has hypothesised that the prevailing view in the minds of the public is that the crime that whites are most likely to commit against blacks is a hate crime, and that it is hard for most Americans to envision a white person committing a crime against a black person for a different reason. The only white people who commit crimes against black people, goes the public belief, are racially prejudiced white extremists, and in contrast the very idea of hate crimes committed against whites is met with scepticism and disbelief.(2)\n\nThere have been several high-profile cases in the USA where some individuals have argued actual hate crimes against whites were not treated as such as a consequence of such public disbelief.(3) This can lead to an unjust situation where hate crime enhancements are (or are perceived as being) only applied “against” one community by another, despite hate crimes actually being committed by individuals within both communities against other individuals. Therefore hate crime enhancements are unjust.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "ea295912f9311da93900ac9dda0cf73b", "text": "crime policing punishment society minorities house believes hate crime enhancements Hate crime enhancements unfairly punish equal offences differently\n\nHate crime enhancements are unjust because they respond to two equal results (i.e. assault vs. racial mugging) with different punishments. We need to judge solely on the concrete actions of the aggressor in order to prevent punishments from being based on arbitrary judgements as to an offender’s “intent”, which can be very difficult to prove. Otherwise “intent” may be supposed or argued in cases where it did not exist, leading to perverse sentencing whereby a crime is punished more harshly despite the true absence of intent. There is a danger of unjustly branding someone as bigoted and punishing them excessively, e.g. for their involvement in a bar fight where the victim coincidentally belonged to a minority group.\n\nJuries might also be willing to make the logical leap that, because the aggressor was proved to hold bigoted views in general towards his victim's ethnic group, these views must have motivated his actions in this individual incident, despite the absence of any evidence linking the specific brawl in a bar to the aggressor's views. Therefore it is unjust to punish two crimes with equal effects differently on the highly subjective basis of “intent”, and thus hate crime enhancements are unjust.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana
3831518e14298b4e67d9fc54ba0eee88	The rationale for the BIAs is flawed The Bilateral Immunity Agreements that these states have entered in to undermine the court that these states have signed up to. BIAs invalidate the intention for the ICC that any person who is subject to the jurisdiction of the court (which only triggers when an individual is a citizen of a state that has ratified the Rome Statute, or in the territory of a Rome Statute state) and commits the horrific acts covered by the Rome Statute should be brought to trial by providing a get out clause for the powerful. A proliferation in BIAs could potentially render the ICC a court that can only try nationals of small states that do not have the leverage to get others to agree to BIAs, already the ICC is accused of bias in putting Africans on trial and ignoring the rest of the world, such agreements make this worse. [1] BIAs by one state, the United States, creates a precedent for other states to use and as they do so the field that is available for international criminal justice will become smaller and smaller. [1] Kersten, Mark, “African and the ICC: Some Unsolicited Advice”, Africa at LSE, 28 May 2013, http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/africaatlse/2013/05/28/africa-and-the-icc-some-unsolicited-advice/	[ { "docid": "75299c51db4dba14e5c2638e6da0b6b1", "text": "international law house would pull out article 98 agreements prevent us soldiers While they undermine the court, they are an inevitable quid pro quo of part of diplomatic relations with the US, the last remaining superpower. While impunity is not ideal, it is better than not signing and taking part in international criminal justice at all. Creating BIAs does not mean that the countries in question will absolve their own citizens of wrongdoing instead they are likely to be tried at home and in some cases may still be handed over to the ICC.\n", "title": "" } ]	[ { "docid": "f5281c316329b45a6ee3ff3c83a58f26", "text": "international law house would pull out article 98 agreements prevent us soldiers The United States is not under any form of responsibility to other states to provide them with military and other aid. Aid has always been provided with strings attached to those whose receipt of aid is considered beneficial. It is within the purview of the US to decide who they give aid to, based on their own priorities. This is simply part of the diplomatic process. If the US wishes to provide aid to countries that sign up to treaties then this is its right, it is perfectly normal to provide a sweetener to encourage states to sign up while punishing those that don’t.\n\nThis then is a good reason why these European states should not pull out of their BIAs. To do so would mean losing the financial benefits being provided. At the same time it would also show that these states are not to be trusted when they sign up to international agreements.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "091638ee4a31f600d0f01b5bd05f74cf", "text": "international law house would pull out article 98 agreements prevent us soldiers The text of the Rome Statute is clear. Article 98(2) is unspecific as to the variety of international agreements that it covers, unlike the narrower Article 98(1) covering diplomatic immunity.\n\nArticle 98 Agreements are a tool that is a legitimate method of the US ensuring that US citizens are not subject to trial and punishment by a court which the United States is not a part of. This would run against the principle that a treaty only affects states that have signed and ratified it, rather than any others.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "678e8d900537028f62981ddc18d28bc1", "text": "international law house would pull out article 98 agreements prevent us soldiers The Rome Statute itself does not bind any state to be put on trial – it binds individuals. Individuals violating the criminal law of a state (the Rome Statute also integrating the international criminal law in to the national criminal law) have always been subject to trial and punishment by that state, barring cases of diplomatic immunity or other separate cases. This is nothing new – the Rome Statute respects the sovereignty of a nation within its territory. If anything, it is the use of coercive tactics by a state to give its citizens immunity from the ordinary law that is the violation of national sovereignty.\n\nEven without the BIAs it would only be possible to prosecute Americans if they commit an international crime in the jurisdiction of another state. When this occurs due to the principle of territoriality it has traditionally been the case that the state upon whose territory the act was committed is able to try those who committed the act. It is not a violation of sovereignty to allow the ICC rather than the other state the right to bring the defendant to trial.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "998591681fa6b1868de7d722ee09bc78", "text": "international law house would pull out article 98 agreements prevent us soldiers Theoretical impunity is still impunity. The concept that any entity should be given special treatment by the law runs contrary to principles of the rule of law. If such immunity is not going to be needed then there is very little reason for the agreements in the first place and there should be little objection to getting rid of them.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "7f06465cc11a24599ab2c6d4c0917559", "text": "international law house would pull out article 98 agreements prevent us soldiers The US is not focusing on encouraging existing NATO members to withdraw from the ICC. Existing NATO members are not subject to the aid-cutting provisions of US law (before and after the Presidential waiver was created), neither are major non-NATO allies – indeed, all EU member states in NATO are ICC members, with the exception of Romania none have signed an Article 98 agreement.\n\nMuch of the US antagonism to the ICC came during the Bush administration, when the ICC was an unproven organization in its infancy.\n\nSince then, US Policy towards the ICC has softened, as can be evidenced by the US voting in favour of referring the situation in Libya to the ICC (compared to abstaining in the referral of Darfur), so it would be unlikely to do much harm to bilateral relations if other states were to expand their co-operation. No EU member state other than Romania has entered in to an Article 98 Agreement with the US. [1]\n\n[1] Barbour, The International Criminal Court, 2010\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9b8ad222f5177efb06b64930d417b605", "text": "international law house would pull out article 98 agreements prevent us soldiers The BIAs were only granted following bully tactics from the United States\n\nThe United States has been accused of using bullying tactics in the pursuit of gaining Article 98 Agreements by, amongst others, Human Rights Watch [1] .\n\nThis has included significant reductions in non-military, development aid, including to countries such as South Africa, the Bahamas [2] and Peru [3] , as well as making threats to accession to NATO in the case of Croatia. [4]\n\nBy signing up to Article 98 Agreements, European nations help contribute to a climate where smaller nations can also be strong-armed in to harming the International Criminal Court by signing them, even if they were not subject to blackmailed in to it themselves.\n\n[1] Roth, Kenneth, “Letter to the US Secretary of State Colin Powell on Bully Tactics against the International Criminal Court”, Human Rights Watch, 2003 http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2003/06/29/letter-colin-powell-us-bully-tactics-against-international-criminal-court\n\n[2] Roth, Letter to Colin Powell, 2003\n\n[3] Keppler, Elise, “The United States and the International Criminal Court: The Bush Administration’s Approach and a Way Forward Under the Obama Administration”, Berkeley Journal of International Law, 2009, 2, p12, http://bjil.typepad.com/Keppler_forPDF_[RC][1].pdf\n\n[4] Roth, Letter to Colin Powell, 2003\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "f9ca732effe8db5312b4115ddae03df7", "text": "international law house would pull out article 98 agreements prevent us soldiers The BIAs are at best bad faith compliance, and worst a blatant violation of the Rome Statute\n\nThe European states have signed and ratified the ICC Statute and should honour it, to do otherwise makes a mockery of the ICC which those states supported throughout its genesis and at least claim to continue to support.\n\nArticle 98(2) was only intended to be a factor where there are other agreements such as status of forces agreements (an agreement entered in to between two states, one having military forces in the other voluntarily, such as British troops in Germany). It was not meant as a broad-brush way for states being able to grant selective immunity to citizens of non-member states who have committed genocide or crimes against humanity inside the jurisdiction of an ICC member state.\n\nSigning an Article 98 Agreement is at best accepting foreign instigation of the abuse of process of a treaty. At worst it is accepting an illegal attempt at circumventing the treaty.\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c514be39e2d80251422a0d9b49486bd6", "text": "international law house would pull out article 98 agreements prevent us soldiers Withdrawal from Article 98 agreements would hamper relations with the US\n\nMany of the states in Europe that have signed up to BIA’s are applicant to NATO which leaves them in a difficult position when it comes to withdrawing from such a treaty. While NATO members are exempt from the punitive provisions aimed at states who do not have Article 98 agreements, in order to join NATO the state will need the support of the United States. Such support will be less forthcoming if that country has abandoned an agreement with the United States such as a BIA. Linking issues is not unusual in international relations whether it is linking multiple issues in a single larger negotiation or blocking progress in joining an organisation as a result of a single issue. Perhaps the best example of this occurring is Turkey and the EU where Turkey’s membership has been held up by its dispute with Cyprus over the northern half of the island. [1]\n\nEven if the United States were to allow an application to NATO to proceed despite the abandonment of their bilateral treaty relations will surely be damaged. No state is going to welcome another state unilaterally withdrawing from a treaty they have signed. The Eastern European states value their relationship with the United States due to that country’s commitment to their independence and support during the early 1990s as the soviet bloc broke up. It would not make sense for these small independent countries to risk relations with the world’s most powerful statements over an agreement which is unlikely to ever have a practical relevance.\n\n[1] Rinke, Andreas, and Solaker, Gulsen, “Cyprus remains stumbling block in Turkey’s EU ambition: Merkel”, Reuters, 25 February 2013, http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/02/25/us-germany-turkey-eu-idUSBRE91O10L20130225\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "9aff4b58453e5d9894959cbead15cdaa", "text": "international law house would pull out article 98 agreements prevent us soldiers Article 98 Agreements are a crucial tool in maintaining American national sovereignty\n\nAs a key part of its national sovereignty, the US should not be required to have its citizens subject to the ICC if it does not ratify the treaty itself of its own choice. It is an accepted principle, as enshrined in Article 34 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, [1] that a treaty only binds the states that have consented to it. Binding citizens of states who are not parties, who may be acting under the orders of a state arm, such as a military, when in the territory of state parties, violates that state’s sovereignty. There have been attempts to put US soldiers on trial. Italy for example put Mario Lozano on trial for the killing of an Italian agent in Iraq, the US maintained he was doing his job at a checkpoint and provided warnings while the Italians considered it murder. In this case the United States was able to refuse to hand the soldier over but BIA’s ensure that such actions will not be a concern whenever troops are deployed abroad. [2]\n\nBilateral Immunity Agreements are a legitimate tool to ensure that this key principle is protected in the case of the International Criminal Court – this has no bearing on the nations that desire to be part of the International Criminal Court.\n\n[1] United Nations. Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, 23 May 1969, http://untreaty.un.org/ilc/texts/instruments/english/conventions/1_1_1969.pdf\n\n[2] “Controversial Trial Opens in Rome: Italy Tries US Soldier For Iraq Murder”, Spiegel Online, 17 April 2007, http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/controversial-trial-opens-in-rome-italy-tries-us-soldier-for-iraq-murder-a-477738.html\n", "title": "" }, { "docid": "c95eb96e31f9ef122a3b5e436e31e22c", "text": "international law house would pull out article 98 agreements prevent us soldiers Article 98 Agreements are unlikely to be needed\n\nThe prospect of an Article 98 Agreement actually being relied on is slim. It would require the International Criminal Court to prosecute an American for a crime against humanity, or genocide, that takes place in ICC member state. There is next to no chance of the UN Security Council referring a case against America to the ICC as the US has a veto as a permanent member.\n\nThe ICC already makes only a highly limited number of prosecutions per year, in obvious cases, and so far all of these have been focused on the developing world. While Article 98 agreements may be unsavoury, the chance of them actually being used to grant someone impunity is low.\n", "title": "" } ]	arguana

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