Rebuttal In Action

Example Round Background

For our example, we will be utilizing a debate from the Tournament of Champions, which is widely regarded as the most prestigious high school tournament in the US. The topic is Resolved: The United Nations should abolish permanent membership in its Security Council.
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Specifically, we will be analyzing the negative rebuttal to the affirmative case. Before going any further, please watch the speech and take notes on the arguments that the affirmative team makes. It will be helpful when we analyze responses. 

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Detailed Speech Outline

The affirmative team (Langley) argues that the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) is widely considered outdated and often criticized for being manipulated to serve the geopolitical interests of its five permanent members (P5).

To support the claim they cite Patrick (2023), who argues that the Council is frequently stuck in deadlock due to the veto power held by these members.

That's why the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR, 2024) warrants that the veto has prevented the UNSC from effectively responding to crises.

Their first contention is titled Africa

To establish uniqueness, Langley cites Schaefer (2023), who reports that UN peacekeeping troops facilitate peace and development but the Russian veto has stopped peacekeeping missions from coming to fruition.

They further this with Tull (2023) who asserts that African nations perceive peacekeeping as Western-dominated and tailored to the P5's interests. As a result, African states will continue to reject peacekeepers until they are granted a meaningful voice.

Langley then attempts to establish solvency with Murithi (2023), who argues that voting pro would give African nations a voice in the UNSC. They highlight that more than 60% of UNSC issues pertain to Africa, yet the continent lacks representation among the P5.

They rely on Hegre (2019), who quantifies that if the UN invested in Peacekeeping Operations, conflict could be reduced by two-thirds.

For empirechs, the affirmative cites Atta-Asamoah (2023) who claims military withdrawals lead to massive instability, with examples from Somalia, Mali, and the Democratic Republic of Congo illustrating this trend.

Their impact is saving millions of lives. Langley's Bhalla (2018) evidence laments that five million children in Africa have died from preventable diseases over the last 20 years due to armed conflict, while ACSS (2023) reports that 40 million Africans have been displaced by conflict.

Contention 2: Genocide

They highlight Nahory (2004), who argues P5 nations threaten to veto resolutions, weakening their effectiveness. For example, the U.S. and France prevented recognition of the Rwandan Genocide.

For solvency, Langley couples two pieces of evidence. Werner (2022) is cited to argue that reforming the UNSC could save millions of lives annually, while Kalantar (2010) emphasizes that removing the veto would enable preemptive conflict resolution.

Their impact is Genocide. Pigmon (2011) argues that in the 20th century alone, 60 to 120 million people fell victim to genocide.

The Link Chain

Now that we understand the case, we can try to break it up into uniqueness, claim, warrant, and impact. However, maintaining that rigid view could lead to some problems. For instance, contention one argues that by removing the veto there would be an increase in peacekeeping operations and that is what’s beneficial. While possible, the warrant here would have two parts and if we are to give a rebuttal we want to attack them separately. Instead, let’s view the constructive as links in a chain, which would look something like this. 

How To Break The Link Chain

If your goal was to break a chain so nobody could put it back together, how would you do it? You could break it in one place, that would mean all someone has to do is repair the singular link. The other option is to attack it at every possible link. In a debate round the latter is the way to go. 

Watch how the negative (Saratoga) does this against Langley’s case here:

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Due to the P5’s veto power, the UNSC is deadlocked and cannot act when conflicts arise. To begin with, Saratoga levies numerous responses against Langley’s overview:

The negative strategically sets the foundation for the rest of their speech by prioritizing their argument over the affirmative’s. This technique, known as weighing, emphasizes that even if the affirmative wins their entire case, the judge should still vote for the negative.

Next, they directly respond to the substance of Langley’s overview by presenting their own offensive overview. They argue that affirming the resolution would render UNSC resolutions non-binding and severely cut funding for peacekeeping operations. Essentially, they claim that removing the veto would make peacekeeping efforts nearly impossible. While technically responding to both contentions, the overview is more responsive to the first contention.

Saratoga provides three responses to the affirmative’s contention on Africa.

As you can see by the graphic Saratoga attacks nearly every part of the link chain meaning for Langley to win this contention they need to march through numerous responses before they ever regain access to it. Saratoga reads fewer responses on the second contention but still attacks it at numerous links.

In total, Saratoga read seven responses. Of these, four were offensive, two terminally defensive, and one mitigatory. Time-wise, the skew is even heavier towards the turns/offensive overviews. The lesson here is that you should read as many offensive arguments as possible and vary responses to attack different portions of the link chain.

Key Takeaways

• Arguments are link chains: Every argument has a chain of statements linked together to reach an impact.
• Rebuttal strategy: Each contention should have multiple responses to it, including defensive and offensive arguments.
• Evidence usage: Most rebuttal responses incorporate at least one piece of evidence. 

What's Next

In the next post, we will watch and analyze a real rebuttal.
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