Sample Public Forum Paper

The sudden rise of China in the past few decades has offered a very auspicious and unique chance for America to benefit from. It’s people’s unique talents, skills, and wants that give America an opportunity to benefit from that it has never seen before. Thus my partner and I affirm the resolution "On balance, the rise of China is beneficial to the interests of the United States." To start some definitions, On Balance as defined by the Collins English Dictionary is weighing up all the factors so the debate should be focused on which side has more benefits. The rise of China should be defined as any of the People’s Republic of China’s policies and actions post 1980s with the application of Deng Xiao Pingism as the PRC’s main period of economic and social growth happened at around this point so any arguments about China predating this period should be disregarded. American interests are defined as developments that could concretely affect the security or economic future of America and our citizens. Interests should be equated to National Security as it is the pursuit of all countries to maintain it, and National Security is defined by is the requirement to maintain the survival of the state through the use of economic power, diplomacy, power projection and political power so con side must prove that any harms done by China in these areas must outweigh the benefits. We look to National Security as America’s chief interest because it is the duty of all states to maintain National Security as provided by the Social Contract, so it is important to look at every contention for National Security in order to accurately evaluate the benefits and harms of each contention. Along with this, we observe that our opponents must provide solid empirical evidence for any harms the PRC does against America as any theoretical and unsupported harms skews the Judges ability to accurately weigh the round.

Contention 1, Inter-country travel between China and the U.S. benefits the