Parliamentary Debate Strategy

Each speech in a parli round has a specific set of strategic goals. These goals differ substantially between speeches: while the primary goal of the MG is to ensure the Gov side has responded to every argument the LOC has made, responding to every argument the MOC and LOR make in the PMR is a quick way to lose a round.

The first three speeches have fairly simple objectives:

• The PMC seeks to present a compelling case. Occasionally, the PMC will choose to preemptively respond ("preempt/spike") neg arguments, but this generally is less strategic then spending more time developing the Gov case, as a strong Gov case can be leveraged to beat most neg arguments.
• The LOC seeks to present compelling offense against the aff (the plan in a policy round) and respond to the Gov case. In some cases, these two goals will overlap: a LOC composed entirely of link turns is both a response to the Gov case and offense against the aff. However, more defensive responses to the Gov case must be accompanied by independent offense (i.e. disadvantages or case turns). In general, a 5 minute/3 minute split between Opp case and Gov case positions tends to strike a good balance between covering the aff and presenting one's own arguments, but the exact balance depends on the round. Common pitfalls in the LOC include spending too much time on defense on the Gov case, which leaves the Opp without a viable strategy in the latter half of the debate; ignoring Gov arguments entirely, which allows a well-constructed Gov case to win immediately through weighing; and conceding the Gov case when reading an a priori position, which gives the MG an unnecessary amount of ground and locks the MO into a very narrow collapse strategy.
• The MG seeks to maximize the ways the PMR can win the round. Practically speaking, this first means responding to every LOC argument on the Gov case, as any conceded argument can leave the PMR without any offense if the Opp spends a substantial amount of time on it in the MO and LOR. Just as importantly, the MG must respond to each Opp position (i.e. if the Opp reads a disadvantage, the MG doesn't need to respond to every argument made, but must contest the story of the disadvantage in some way, or expect to lose on weighing in the MO). The exact time allocation of this speech is largely driven by the LOC's time allocation, but at least the first minute of this speech should always be extending the Gov case.

The latter three speeches are more focused on choosing, extending, and weighing arguments ("collapsing") than presenting new arguments. Because of this, they tend to be more strategically complex (particularly in the MO/PMR) but require less efficiency than the MG/LOC, which is why most debaters debate either LO/MG or MO/PMR (the PMC depends more on prep ability than in-round ability, and the LOR is a strange speech with less immediate impact on the debate than any other). Many of the specific strategic necessities presented above are a function of the way that the latter 3 speeches play out.

• The only new arguments that generally may be presented in the last two speeches are weighing arguments (arguments about the comparative importance of different arguments, particularly impact stories.) Because of this, both teams will generally try to get far ahead on one set of impacts before their rebuttal speech, and then use the rebuttal to justify why that impact comes first.
• The MO and LOR together are referred to as the neg "block," because they represent an uninterrupted 12 minutes of Opp speaking time. Because the PMR gets the last word, the Opp must be massively ahead at the end of the "block." The easiest way to do this is a combination of weighing and exploiting the time differential between the MG and the block. Because the MG is the only opportunity the Gov has to respond to the Opp case, the LOC can read arguments with the potential to win the round. The MG is forced to respond to all of them and extend the Gov case, meaning it can't spend more than about 2 minutes on any one of these arguments. The block is then free to spend the majority of its 12 minutes responding to those 2 minutes of responses, extending their original arguments, and making weighing arguments as to why those arguments are most important. This is referred to as the block collapse, because the Opp case collapses from many arguments to one argument.

While the exact time allocation of the block is quite variable from round to round, a typical block will spend the first ~4 minutes of the MO winning the argument they are collapsing to, the next ~2 minutes responding to the aff, and the final ~2 minutes making weighing arguments. The LOR will then spend ~30 seconds on overviews, ~2 minutes on weighing, and ~90 seconds preempting the PMR. This time allocation strikes a good balance between convincingly winning one argument (and why that argument comes first) and denying the PMR other easy ways out.

The PMR has no set time allocation. The PMR's task is to explain why a. the aff is winning offense somewhere and b. the neg's collapse is irrelevant (e.g. the neg's collapse is incorrect, the neg's collapse is outweighed by the aff offense, the neg's collapse is nonunique) . Depending on the round, one part of this burden may be dramatically more difficult than the other. However, almost every PMR should read at least one weighing argument, as otherwise the judge will typically find it difficult to ignore the neg's arguments about why their arguments are the most important in the round.

Golden Turns

The PMR may only read new arguments if they're a. weighing arguments or b. responses to new arguments read in the MO. Weighing arguments cannot win a round in a vacuum, because they're fundamentally comparative: the Gov must still be winning the argument they claim is more important than the Opp's arguments. Similarly, new responses to defensive MO arguments can only grant the Gov access to the argument the MO was responding to, not fabricate new offense. However, if the MO reads new offense, the PMR has the ability to read new turns in response. These turns are referred to as "Golden Turns" because the Neg has no opportunity to respond to them. Therefore, even weak arguments can justify a Gov ballot: if the MO reads a new argument about the Gov exacerbating climate change, the PMR argument that climate change is good because it unlocks farmland in Siberia which is necessary to feed 10 billion people can win the round if climate change has not been brought up before. Therefore, the MO should generally avoid reading new offense, preferring instead to exploit the extremely favorable time tradeoff with the MG.

MG theory and similar strategies are attempts by the Gov to force all Opp responses to begin in the MO, granting the Gov access to golden turns on every single response. The strategic implications of this are beyond the scope of this curriculum.