Tournament: Glenbrooks | Round: 1 | Opponent: Dr Phillips BR | Judge: Jessica Skordal
I affirm the resolved: a just government ought to recognize the unconditional right of workers to strike.
Workers is defined by MacMillan as...
https://www.macmillandictionary.com/us/dictionary/american/worker
Framing
My value is morality, defined as the difference between right and wrong. The only way to be moral is by upholding autonomy. Prefer for these reasons:
1 Autonomy is a necessary part of a good life—Hassoun 15
Nicole Hassoun, Associate Professor of Philosophy at Birmingham University, comments in Arizona University’s 3rd International Conference on Philosophy:
“Human Rights, Needs, and Autonomy” University of Arizona, ATINER 3rd International Conference on Philosophy
2 Performability—Autonomy is a pre-requisite for people to pursue other desires and goals. Without autonomy, one cannot have the freedom of individual choice to try and obtain other desirable aspects of life. Moreover, regardless of what ethical principle is the best, people must be able to rationally choose that principle to obey it, which requires an expression of autonomy. This makes autonomy a pre-requisite to any other moral principle as well.
3 Reason—Autonomous reasoning is the only method by which people can determine their desires. However, since I am myself, I cannot determine the conclusions that another’s autonomous reasoning will bring them to. Thus, we must provide each person with the autonomy to pursue their ideas.
4 We must respect autonomy to truly value the worth of individuals—Edmundson 08
Robert Edmundson, Professor of Ethics at Washington University, illustrates in Key Ethical Principles:
Robert Edmundson. “Principle of Respect for Autonomy”. Key Ethical Principles. Scension. Professor of Ethics. Washington University in St. Louis. January 26th, 2008.
5 Universality—To limit the autonomy of another person is an inherent contradiction. By doing so, we are signifying our willingness to have our own autonomy limited by another. However, to limit another’s autonomy in the first place, we must use our own autonomy. Thus, for an action to be morally right, it must be able to be performed on or by all people.
6 Coercion and violence views people as a means to an end which justifies atrocities. Viewing people as ends in themselves is key to solving oppression—Farr 02
Arnold Farr (prof of phil @ UKentucky, focusing on German idealism, philosophy of race, postmodernism, psychoanalysis, and liberation philosophy). “Can a Philosophy of Race Afford to Abandon the Kantian Categorical Imperative?” JOURNAL of SOCIAL PHILOSOPHY, Vol. 33 No. 1, Spring 2002, 17–32.
Thus, the value criterion is upholding autonomy.
C1: Worker Freedom
1 Capitalists are using workers as a commodity and use coercive tactics to limit their freedom.
Gourevitch 18 Alex Gourevitch, July 2018, “A Radical Defense of the Right to Strike,” (Alex Gourevitch is an associate professor of political science at Brown University and the author of From Slavery To the Cooperative Commonwealth: Labor and Republican Liberty in the Nineteenth Century.) https://jacobinmag.com/2018/07/right-to-strike-freedom-civil-liberties-oppression
2 An unconditional right to strike allows workers to fight for their freedom. This right must be unconditional because limiting it threatens collective bargaining itself
Lim 19 Woojin Lim, December 11 2019, “The Right to Strike,” (Philosophy concentrator in Harvard Winthrop House.) https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2019/12/11/lim-right-to-strike/
3 This right to strike needs to include public sector workers.
Hiltzik 13 Michael Hiltzik, October 24 2013, “Why public employees should have the right to strikehttps://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-xpm-2013-oct-24-la-fi-mh-strike-20131024-story.html
4 Strikes also promote union membership.
Hodder et al 16 Andy Hodder/Mark Williams/John Kelly/Nick McCarthy, June 08 2016, “Does Strike Action stimulate trade union membership growth” (Andy Hodder is a Lecturer in Employment Relations at the University of Birmingham. Andy joined Birmingham Business School in September 2012 after completing a PhD at Keele University. Andy has conducted research on public sector union organizing and the relationship between young workers and trade unions.) https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/bjir.12188
5 Unions stand for the freedom of all workers.
EPI 17 Economic Policy Institute, August 24 2017, “Today’s labor unions give workers the power to improve their jobs and unrig the economy,” (The Economic Policy Institute is a 501 non-profit American, left-leaning think tank based in Washington, D.C., that carries out economic research and analyzes the economic impact of policies and proposals.) https://www.epi.org/press/todays-labor-unions-give-workers-the-power-to-improve-their-jobs-and-unrig-the-economy/
Reductions in workers’ wages and abuses of their rights are a limitation of autonomy because workers are forced to work under conditions which they did not reasonably agree to. When workers can’t quit because they need wages, employers can ignore their demands and exert their will over them. This is coercion by employers in the pursuit of increased wealth and control, meaning that it is not universalizable and is thus immoral.
An unconditional right to strike is the only way to guarantee workers a means of retaining their freedoms. It applies pressure on employers to provide workers with conditions that they fully comply with, which is a reclamation of their freedom and autonomy. Thus, voting Affirmative is the only moral option.