NC Justice K

Resolved: Just governments

ought to ensure food
security for their citizens

1NC Justice K
I negate

Definitions

Justice
"not just; lacking in justice or fairness" (dictionary.com)

Value: Security of rights.

The resolution puts us in a clear position where we are to
evaluate what to do when rights are placed in a position
of insecurity due to a government's actions or lack of
actions in relation to just concepts.

Contention 1
The use of the ideal of justice in the resolution fortifies
problems in the status quo. Justice is not an essential
human value rather it is birthed from language and
political structure.

Sub-point A
Justice is a tool deployed by power structures. Justice is in
no way inherent to people but rather a tool to subjugate
us to the whims of political power. This is best expressed
by
Michel Foucault (Noam Chomsky debates with Michel Foucault, Human
Nature: Justice versus Power, 1971,
http://www.chomsky.info/debates/1971xxxx.htm)
The idea of justice in itself is an idea which in effect has been
invented and put to work in different types of societies as an
instrument of a certain political and economic power or as a weapon
against that power

The idea of justice is dramatically different from what the

affirmative attempts to portray it as.
Foucault (cont.) explains
If justice is at stake in a struggle, then it is as an instrument of
power; it is not in the hope that finally one day, in this or another
society, people will be rewarded according to their merits, or
punished according to their faults. Rather than thinking of the social
struggle in terms of justice, one has to emphasize justice in terms
of the social struggle.

Our idea of justice is skewed, it is merely an objective of

and a tool used in the power struggle. Thus, whenever the
affirmative attempts to use this concept created by
society to vilify their actions that are only defined as just
by that same society they are self-defeating. In no way
can justice be used as a justification or means to make up
for where our current system is lacking since it is a direct
result of our current system.
Foucault

(cont.)

continues

one cant, however regrettable it may be, put forward these notions
to describe or justify a fight which should-and shall in principleoverthrow the very fundamentals of our society.

Sub-point B
Secondly, justice is used by those resisting the political
system as something they are deprived of and should
struggle for. This is bad in two ways: 1. with no set
definition of justice those resisting can use it to muster
support for a cause that is problematic. Thus the potential
is created for more harm. 2. If these people so gain
control they now have justice as a permanent tool to use
for future purposes. The affirmative's attempt to gain
justice for some aid deprived group only perpetuates its
use as tool of power in the present struggle.
Foucault (cont.) explains
The proletariat doesnt wage war against the ruling class because it
considers such a war to be just. The proletariat makes war with the
ruling class because, for the first time in history, it wants to take
power.

Thus, the affirmative is nothing more than reaffirmation of

the very justice granting/deprivation ability of the power
system.

Sub-point C
The biopolitical system uses justice as a gift to the
people. Justice is something to hold over citizens heads
to make them feel as though they are part of a special
group when they receive it. Justice is left, when use in the
political system, to be determined arbitrarily by that
system. In this way advocating justice is advocating its
arbitrary existence as determined by politics and culture
in general.
Foucault (cont.) goes on to further explain
these notions of human nature, of justice, of the realization of the
essence of human beings, are all notions and concepts which have
been formed within our civilization, within our type of knowledge
and our form of philosophy, and that as a result form part of our
class system

Contention 2
The harm of advocating justice. By advocating justice
there are multiple harms.

Sub-point A
First, it entrenches the political system that has to ability
to grant or deny justice arbitrarily, thereby creating the
very possibility for oppression in the first place. This
takes out all long term solvency as it'll create a perpetual
cycle of abuses followed by aid to correct it.

Sub-point B
Biopower justifies many evils. The second harm is that
justice advocacy increases the biopolitical systems
power. Biopower, as defined by
Foucault (History of Sexuality Vol. 1) is
an explosion of numerous and diverse techniques for achieving the
subjugations of bodies and the control of populations.

Justice is nothing more than another tool for the

subjugation of bodies. The problems with allowing this
system to continue are numerous.
Foucault (cont.) elaborates
genocide is indeed the dream of modern power, this is not because
of the recent return to the ancient right to kill; it is because power is
situated and exercised at the level of life, the species, the race, and
the large-scale phenomena of the population.

The state has been vested with the duty of protecting

citizen' lives at all levels and under the guise of things
like justice. In the case of the affirmative this happens
with "Food Security"-the provision of the literal
necessities for life. With this power, the state can use
these tools and take any action to achieve this duty. Thus
things such as genocide and severe rights violations are,
in fact, a very real threat.
Mark Duffield (Mark Duffield, Date, Carry on killing: Global governance,
humanitarianism and terror EconStor, a politics and international
relations professor at the University of Lancaster)
elaborates
Bio-politics, however, contains an intrinsic and fateful duality. As
well as fostering and promoting life it also has the power to
disallow it to the point of death. He goes on to elaborate; This
duality underlies the paradox of bio-politics: as states have assumed
responsibility for maintaining life, wars have become increasingly
more encompassing, devastating and genocidal for the populations
concerned.

This is literally the 1AC, they are taking responsibility for

fostering and promoting life and doing so via a very

specific tool of power, and thus also granting themselves

the ability to disallow to the point of death.

Contention 3
To solve back for this issue we need to resist the way
justice has been deployed.
Foucault (cont.) explains the importance of resistance
So resistance comes first, and resistance remains superior to the
other forces of the process; power relations are obliged to change
with the resistance. So I think that resistance is the main word, the
keyword, in this dynamic.

Rejecting the affirmative advocacy and their utilization of

justice in this round serves as an act of resistance that
both symbolically and literally rejects and role that justice
plays in the status quo. By rejecting this role of justice we
are reshaping the way we think about said concept and
help normalize a new ontology.
Now on to case.