Great Power Competition

NOVEMBER-DECEMBER PF
The Resolution

Resolved: The United States’ strategy of

Great Power Competition produces more
benefits than harms

United States

Great Power Competition

More
Resolution Notes

Not a Policy Action

Presumption is Con
It does imply GPC is the status quo
Framework

American First: To the United States

Cosmopolitan: To the World

Utilitarian
Deontological

Gender & Race

Securitization K/Rhetoric
Great Power
Competition
• Competition Between China and
US (generally military, can be economic &
technological)
• Represents a transition from post-Cold War
thinking
• Involves forward deployment of forces
• Involves strengthening alliances
• Involves nuclear and conventional force
modernization
Ever since the Department of Defense (DoD) published
its new National Defense Strategy in 2018, Great Power
Competition has become the new buzzword in military
and intelligence circles. Despite – but also because of –
the numerous government agencies and parties concerned
about Great Power Competition the term doesn’t have
an official definition yet.

Stavros Atlamazoglou, 2020

Current US Strategy

Containment
Decoupling
Examples
• Abandoning strategic ambiguity
• Strengthening the Quad (Australia,
India, Japan, US)
• AUKUS (Australia, UK, US)
• Europe (NATO expansion,
weapons, 2022 Strategic Concept)
IR Theories and
Approaches

Realism

Idealism/Liberalism

Constructivism
What Would a Realist
Say?
• GPR inevitable
• GP transitions risk war
• Offensive realist – deter (Colby, Charles
Kupchan)
• Defensive realist (maintain balance,
counterbalance)
(a) counterbalance (Mearshimer, Waltz)
(b) spheres of influence (Kissinger)

See: Offensive and Defensive Realism

What Would a
Liberal say?

• Liberal values will triumph

• International organizations
• GPC undermines
international organizations
What would a constructivist
say?

• The world is what we make it

• Perceptions of a China and Russia threats
create self-fulfilling prophecies
 The Pro

• China
• Russia
China -- Threat

• 2050 is China's 100 year

anniversary
• Economic and military
development produce a threat
(Colby)
• Decline means lash-out (Michael
Beckley)
• Xi
• (a) Seeks China
greatness/reunification
• (b)Seeks global dominance 
 China – Understanding Taiwan

Historical sources suggest that the island first came under full Chinese
control in the 17th Century when the Qing dynasty began administering it.
Then, in 1895, they gave up the island to Japan after losing the first Sino
Japanese war.
China took the island again in 1945 after Japan lost World War Two.
But a civil war erupted in mainland China between nationalist government
forces led by Chiang Kai-shek and Mao Zedong's Communist Party.
The communists won in 1949 and took control in Beijing.
Chiang Kai-shek and what was left of the nationalist party - known as the
Kuomintang - fled to Taiwan, where they ruled for the next several decades.
China points to this history to say that Taiwan was originally a Chinese
province. But the Taiwanese point to the same history to argue that they
were never part of the modern Chinese state that was first formed after the
revolution in 1911 - or the People's Republic of China that was established
under Mao in 1949.
China and Taiwan: A Really Simple Guide
Additional China

• Technology Competition
• Democracy Competition
• Cyber

Liberal International Order (LIO)

Transition wars (compete to prevent the
transition/Thucydides trap)
Russia Threat

• Ukraine threat
• Europe threat debatable
(a) Ukraine is unique
(b) Other former parts of Russia
© Russia's military is stinking
© Baltic states
(d) Eastern Europe
(e) Western Europe
Russia Threat
• Putin is nuts
• Theories
(a) Realist – pushed into corner
(b) Realist – seeks dominance
• Hybrid Warfare
• Grey Zone
Underlying Pro

• It's not up to the US, China and Russia

engaging in GPC
• Chian-Russia alliance
Additional Pro

• General conventional force modernization

• Alliances
• Nuclear modernization
• Alternatives (multilateralism,
multipolarity, offshore balancing) fail)
Con Sources
•Stephen Walt
•John Mearshimer
•Henry Kissinger
Core Con - Offense

• GPC creates a security dilemma

• GPC rhetoric generates a threat

• GPC collapses international cooperation

• GPC risks miscalculated war

• GPC risks accidental war

• GPC causes overstretch

• GPC trades-off with domestic programs

European Strategic Autonomy

Japan Prolif Good
South Korea Prolif Good

Kills international cooperation (climate)

China Con -- Offense

War with China over Taiwan

War in East Asia (SCS, Senkaku)
China Con -- Defense
Interdependence checks
China's actions are defensive

China's millitary relatively weak

Russia Con -- Offense

War with Russia over the Ukraine

Russia-China alliance
Russia-Iran alliance
Russia-Korea "alliance"

This is NATO's fault

Russia Con --
Defense
Russia's military is weak
Russia's military is not modern
No chance against NATO
Criticisms of IR
Theory

Racism
Gender
Securitization

Militarism K
Con "Trick" --
Hegemony Bad

US overstretched, will collapse;

makes our GPC strategy an
inevitable failure

GPC accelerates the decline while

causing lash-out

Batter to let an alternative

(multipolarity, multilat)
Additional Broad
Issues to Debate

NATO Good/Bad

European Strategic Autonomy

Good/Bad

Alliances Good Bad (previous

military bases good/bad debate
from Japan topic in PF as well as
HS and college policy topic)
Conceptual Thoughts

Generally About
China/Russia

Secondary issues to draw

contentions from: alliances;
nuclear weapons modernization
Strategy Thoughts

Pro has to prove it (presumption is Con)

It's the status quo

Uniqueness: Is it succeeding
Weighing Considerations
Magnitude
Scope
Time-Frame
Probability
Reversabilty
Ethics in IR/Racism
Additional
Terminology
r

Revisionist
Security Dilemma
Hard Power
Soft Power
Economic Powe
Hegemony
Retrenchment
Offshore Balancing
Isolationism

Bipolar
Multipolar
Proliferation
CCP
NATO
TNW

NPT