American Debate Sediment 2: Punitive Judging

This is the second of a few pieces that I am working on to try to outline what I think are the biggest hurdles that Worlds debate development faces in the United States. It’s not an exhaustive list by any means, nor is it a list that I think is completely accurate.
Judging is hard work. I really don’t like it that much because it is exhausting. Doing it well all day is a real challenge for me, but when it’s good it is really good. The attention and care required are always paid back in the development of the debate students in later rounds. For students it’s becoming an essential part of my teaching of younger debaters to help them identify how a team creates victory out of almost nothing. 
Judging is a creative and developmental enterprise for me, but some judges I’ve worked with see it as a punitive exercise: They try to seek out the team that has made mistakes, messed up, or violated the rules in some way. These judges function like police – they look for infractions or violations of the “law.”
I remember winging on a panel 2 years ago at the Yale IV where the chair started the discussion, “The first thing we need to ask ourselves is: Did any team knife any other team?” After we decided there were no knives, the next question was, “Did any team not fulfill their role?” After about 10 minutes of this, we finally started discussing the quality of the argumentation. Another judge I was with wanted to give a team a 4 because “everyone knows” there is a “card out there” that 
The manufacture of knives and the seeking out of mistakes is a very comfortable way to judge, and one that is very common in many American debating formats. The trope of “I really like the argument, but you dropped this or that response,” or the dropping of another argument is enough to allow the judge to inhabit two worlds – the world of agreement and rejection at once, in a very pleasant way: “I agree with you, but the rules do not, and I must enforce the rules.” In this way, the judge removes herself entirely from the rather uncomfortable and more difficult position of saying that one argument was “better” than another one.
This is not the fault of the judge, nor is it really bad. This sediment comes from a format, or a system of formats that try to replicate and/or simulate a sphere of expertise. In expert spheres, people in decision making positions do this all the time. They say, “I am with you in principle, and against you in technical merit.” This happens in law, medicine, academia, and other such places. It is good training for those who wish to practice persuasion for expert fields.
We can see this also in the “tick box” judge – the judge who wants to give a team a 1 because, “They didn’t do anything wrong.” Sometimes this is articulated – as it has been to me a few times – because a team “did their job,” or “really fulfilled their role,” which puzzles me to no end. This is the other end of the “cop” judge, the one who wants to reward those who can follow the rules. 
But do we give a job to the person who has the correct margins on their resume? The person who filled in the application to the letter? It seems strange to not attend to content right away. It seems alien to not want to discuss content at all in evaluating debate performances.
 This is sediment that we must figure out how to remove from our Worlds experience. Why? Worlds debate, whether it planned to or not, has evolved to simulate a public sphere. The presence of a panel of judges simulates the discussion of the issues in a public before a decision is rendered. The need for arguments to sustain 8 different speeches also points to a format that doesn’t believe that there will be limited voices with access to the ear of the “public” involved in the discussion. This is practice that is tuned toward helping people persuade general audiences.  Both formats are desirable, but we must resist the urge to push all formats toward the form that makes us feel comfortable.
The discomfort of having to say, “I didn’t buy what you were saying” or “I didn’t understand what you were saying, so I dismissed it” would be unacceptable in a policy debate – the judge must be an expert, and if the judge misses an argument or doesn’t understand a technical issue, shame on them.  In a “natural language” format like Worlds, shame on the debater for not being clear enough or not explaining herself well enough to win. 
This explanation is measured with the ideal of the “reasonable person” standard, something derived from British law and applied to this debate game. The chair and the other judges must use it to temper their own potential expertise about an issue, or about debate in general, and render a decision that makes all the participants think about reaching general, intelligent audiences. The goal that a Worlds Grand Final should be a really engaging debate on a contentious issue is all the standard one needs. “Breaking the rules” is never a compelling case for anyone – in fact, it’s the opposite of establishing any position. 
How do we remove this sediment? I’ve had little luck in trying to get both of these judges to express their views on particular arguments in the debate. They feel, I think, that to express their own view of the argument is to “intervene” in the debate – code for letting your personal view or resonance with the arguments to trump the role of enforcer of good debating standards. 
Unfortunately, I lack the language at this point to explain to these judges that they have already intervened, that they will continue to do so, and that their intervention is what makes debate possible. This is based on the idea that the public, by virtue of their interest and care for the issue, must and will mutilate your argumentation. Fidelity to the proper, expert form of the argument – like scientific reasoning for example – is lost once that document wanders out into the public. Once there, people will mutilate it to make it make sense to them, or make it fit what they think.
This sediment will take a lot of time to wash away – many judges are simply incapable of making a decision without the rules being involved because of decades of training in the opposite direction. It is a big challenge, and I struggle with the proper language in which to frame it to these judges. There’s something strangely pleasurable about citing the relevant theory to make a decision instead of carefully comparing the articulation of a principled argument down a bench. 
Some might think that I am calling for less objectivity and therefore do not want a fair game. On the contrary, I do want less objectivity but only because throughout debate’s recent history in this country, fairness has been held above realism. And a game is only worth playing if it is fair to both the players and to the game itself. In short, there needs to be some risk to teach properly, and the risk is over-padded with fairness at the moment. There should be moments where your best arguments fail because they are “best arguments.” 
If you aren’t going to confront your limits in constructing persuasive discourse, when do you plan to do it? The judge who is not afraid to say an argument lacks quality – whatever that might be – is essential to this important moment of rhetorical development.

American Debate Sediment 2: Punitive Judging

This is the second of a few pieces that I am working on to try to outline what I think are the biggest hurdles that Worlds debate development faces in the United States. It’s not an exhaustive list by any means, nor is it a list that I think is completely accurate.
Judging is hard work. I really don’t like it that much because it is exhausting. Doing it well all day is a real challenge for me, but when it’s good it is really good. The attention and care required are always paid back in the development of the debate students in later rounds. For students it’s becoming an essential part of my teaching of younger debaters to help them identify how a team creates victory out of almost nothing. 
Judging is a creative and developmental enterprise for me, but some judges I’ve worked with see it as a punitive exercise: They try to seek out the team that has made mistakes, messed up, or violated the rules in some way. These judges function like police – they look for infractions or violations of the “law.”
I remember winging on a panel 2 years ago at the Yale IV where the chair started the discussion, “The first thing we need to ask ourselves is: Did any team knife any other team?” After we decided there were no knives, the next question was, “Did any team not fulfill their role?” After about 10 minutes of this, we finally started discussing the quality of the argumentation. Another judge I was with wanted to give a team a 4 because “everyone knows” there is a “card out there” that 
The manufacture of knives and the seeking out of mistakes is a very comfortable way to judge, and one that is very common in many American debating formats. The trope of “I really like the argument, but you dropped this or that response,” or the dropping of another argument is enough to allow the judge to inhabit two worlds – the world of agreement and rejection at once, in a very pleasant way: “I agree with you, but the rules do not, and I must enforce the rules.” In this way, the judge removes herself entirely from the rather uncomfortable and more difficult position of saying that one argument was “better” than another one.
This is not the fault of the judge, nor is it really bad. This sediment comes from a format, or a system of formats that try to replicate and/or simulate a sphere of expertise. In expert spheres, people in decision making positions do this all the time. They say, “I am with you in principle, and against you in technical merit.” This happens in law, medicine, academia, and other such places. It is good training for those who wish to practice persuasion for expert fields.
We can see this also in the “tick box” judge – the judge who wants to give a team a 1 because, “They didn’t do anything wrong.” Sometimes this is articulated – as it has been to me a few times – because a team “did their job,” or “really fulfilled their role,” which puzzles me to no end. This is the other end of the “cop” judge, the one who wants to reward those who can follow the rules. 
But do we give a job to the person who has the correct margins on their resume? The person who filled in the application to the letter? It seems strange to not attend to content right away. It seems alien to not want to discuss content at all in evaluating debate performances.
 This is sediment that we must figure out how to remove from our Worlds experience. Why? Worlds debate, whether it planned to or not, has evolved to simulate a public sphere. The presence of a panel of judges simulates the discussion of the issues in a public before a decision is rendered. The need for arguments to sustain 8 different speeches also points to a format that doesn’t believe that there will be limited voices with access to the ear of the “public” involved in the discussion. This is practice that is tuned toward helping people persuade general audiences.  Both formats are desirable, but we must resist the urge to push all formats toward the form that makes us feel comfortable.
The discomfort of having to say, “I didn’t buy what you were saying” or “I didn’t understand what you were saying, so I dismissed it” would be unacceptable in a policy debate – the judge must be an expert, and if the judge misses an argument or doesn’t understand a technical issue, shame on them.  In a “natural language” format like Worlds, shame on the debater for not being clear enough or not explaining herself well enough to win. 
This explanation is measured with the ideal of the “reasonable person” standard, something derived from British law and applied to this debate game. The chair and the other judges must use it to temper their own potential expertise about an issue, or about debate in general, and render a decision that makes all the participants think about reaching general, intelligent audiences. The goal that a Worlds Grand Final should be a really engaging debate on a contentious issue is all the standard one needs. “Breaking the rules” is never a compelling case for anyone – in fact, it’s the opposite of establishing any position. 
How do we remove this sediment? I’ve had little luck in trying to get both of these judges to express their views on particular arguments in the debate. They feel, I think, that to express their own view of the argument is to “intervene” in the debate – code for letting your personal view or resonance with the arguments to trump the role of enforcer of good debating standards. 
Unfortunately, I lack the language at this point to explain to these judges that they have already intervened, that they will continue to do so, and that their intervention is what makes debate possible. This is based on the idea that the public, by virtue of their interest and care for the issue, must and will mutilate your argumentation. Fidelity to the proper, expert form of the argument – like scientific reasoning for example – is lost once that document wanders out into the public. Once there, people will mutilate it to make it make sense to them, or make it fit what they think.
This sediment will take a lot of time to wash away – many judges are simply incapable of making a decision without the rules being involved because of decades of training in the opposite direction. It is a big challenge, and I struggle with the proper language in which to frame it to these judges. There’s something strangely pleasurable about citing the relevant theory to make a decision instead of carefully comparing the articulation of a principled argument down a bench. 
Some might think that I am calling for less objectivity and therefore do not want a fair game. On the contrary, I do want less objectivity but only because throughout debate’s recent history in this country, fairness has been held above realism. And a game is only worth playing if it is fair to both the players and to the game itself. In short, there needs to be some risk to teach properly, and the risk is over-padded with fairness at the moment. There should be moments where your best arguments fail because they are “best arguments.” 
If you aren’t going to confront your limits in constructing persuasive discourse, when do you plan to do it? The judge who is not afraid to say an argument lacks quality – whatever that might be – is essential to this important moment of rhetorical development.

Expert Adjudicators or Extra Adjudicators

I was having coffee with a good friend of mine and colleague from the debating world recently, when the subject of debate theory came up. My colleague mused about how lucky American debaters were to have such a rich tradition of theory behind what they do.

At the time, I disagreed. I like BP/WUDC debating because ideally it acts atheoretically. The arguments occur in natural language, and the debate about “what counts” as an argument doesn’t happen beyond the point of calling out a fallacy, a weak warrant, or a fabrication. Argument theory as it exists in American debate formats relies extensively on argument theory as a block to arguments made, and therefore theoretical arguments (i.e. Your model is not a theoretically acceptable model because it does not specify which agent will enact the model) are as much the heart of the debate as the research, evidence, and disadvantages\advantages. In BP, arguments are not theoretically rejected per se, they are rejected upon the grounds of their persuasiveness.

Argumentation wise I still hold this view, but recent judging experiences and recent adjudications have me thinking that the adjudication system needs a method and a theoretical justification behind it.

Here are some things on my mind considering adjudication that debate scholars could and should address:

1. When, if ever, are solo judged rooms ok?
It seems to me that there are possible justifications for this, but I am not convinced by any of them as they all rely on the theory of “judge as expert in argumentation.” This theory is a carry over (hold over?) from American policy debate, a format that I believe operates under a theory of creating a forum to practice persuasion among simulated experts. BP on the other hand appears to operate under the idea of practicing persuasion for a simulated public. The loss of the simulated public change the game to a simulated expert appeal, with debaters practicing a narrowing of argumentation for the one specific adjudicator’s tastes instead of broadening appeal for a whole panel. This is distinct from American policy debate panels where you can go for 2 of the panel and ignore the outlier judge.

2. Is the purpose of paneled judging to reach consensus or to agree?
During a recent final round where I was a panelist, we went to adjudicate where the chair asked us for an initial idea as to who won. When we all said what we thought, he said “okay” and started to walk back in. I protested, saying we need to discuss the decision. The response was amusement. “Why talk if we all agree? Should we pretend to disagree?” I didn’t have a good response other than a gut feeling that simple agreement was not the telos of consensus judging. I think some work here using theories of deliberation, discussion and the re-articulation of argument in the public sphere might help us appreciate the consensus portion of the adjudication more than the agreement portion of the deliberation.

On the verso, what happens when there is no discussion, or a discussion that goes past each other? What happens when a wing refuses to accept the community norms? My situation as a chair was having a wing who refused to judge the debate on the community norm of “who was most persuasive?” He said it was a bad way he didn’t buy, and he was an argumentation expert. When I forced him to talk about persuasiveness, he couldn’t – he talked about their style in a superficial manner. What can be said or done about such a judge? It seems a body of theory would help bend this sort of judge to a more reasonable and more functional role within the BP community.

3. Are wing judges extra judges? Are chairs expert judges?
By now I suppose you realize I’m going to say no to both. But the scholarly potentials here are interesting. What if the role of the chair is not expert on debate, but discussion leader? I think the decision becomes a different one if that’s the function of the chair. If the function of the chair is to be expert, are they a technical one or one based upon experience? Either way will change the function of the adjudication.

As far as wings go, I think most people accept the idea that wings are chairs in training. This is a fantastic charitable attitude that I think does not exist outside of this format. The strike system in American policy has eliminated the idea of judge training, as well as the idea that rhetors should alter their message for audiences.

A strike system (this means choosing adjudicators that will not hear you during a tournament) is a move more toward a truth-seeking or positivist format of debating. However, some say should be given to debaters about the variety of judges that will hear them. After all, in rhetorical situations, many rhetors select whom they address and do not speak to all or everyone. Perelman even points out keenly that philosophers who claim to be addressing the universal are imagining that category based upon the best critical qualities of thought of their era.

The wing system theoretically addresses this problem by putting judges in the chair that are “trusted” which mean, I think, are consistent with the best sorts of judging of the era. They are to act as expert in some ways, but through guiding the discussion and making sure all wings are heard. Another theory might be that the chair can persuade the wings as to his or her credibility, so the panel is more like a simulated segment of the public, rallied to vote in one way or another by an enthusiastic citizen. And I’m sure there are other models that might be instructive to pursue.

Unfortunately there is no theory to support all of this yet, and often panelists are thought of extra judges. Panels of 3 are common, when a panel of 5 would be more justified. A 3 person panel indicates the need for a split in a solo, expert based decision process without consensus. Rounds are run with a solo judge under the assumption that it will be just the same as if there were wings. But I like so many other chairs know that many times a wing has caught some detail that makes me re think my orientation to the debate. This is an invaluable element of the debate, key to the format, and a backing of some scholarly work on the theory of BP debating would make it easier and more consistent, especially among Americans where the tradition of expert, professional scholar-coaches is bending WUDC format away from the elements that make it unique and pedagogically vibrant.

Cork Worlds Reflections 1 – Consensus Judging

The judges assemble as the pairing scrolls by.
So today I just uploaded to facebook all my pictures from Cork. And I caught up on some email and other things. A pretty throw away day, except I picked up lunch for my wife and dropped it off on campus for her, which gave me a chance to go by the library and get a book I need for syllabus crafting, which should start tonight/tomorrow.

My AC adapter for my rechargeable battery station is fried so that sucks. Time for a trip to radio shack.

So here’s my first reflection on Worlds now that I’ve had a day or so to think about it – Consensus judging is really no consensus at all. It’s judge training/indoctrination worked in as a part of the system.

The attitude I got from many judges here and there through the tournament was that chairs are the decision makers, and they are there to gently show the wing judges how the round should be judged. They are the ones empowered to demonstrate to the wing judges how a round should properly be judged.

Now of course, wings can outvote a chair if there are enough of them to overrule the chair’s decision. The slang for this is “rolling” the chair. And discussions I had with people who rolled or were rolled indicated that it is at the least an insult to the chair, and most likely seen as some sort of punishable move. In the end, the wings are supposed to agree with the chair.

I find this pretty fascinating because on the one hand I absolutely love the idea of a built-in judge training system that uses real tournament experience to improve the abilities of the judge. On the other hand, it’s easy for it to fall into politics or into bad indoctrination – as one chair said to me after a debate when I was asking about this sort of stuff, “I’m a chair: I know how these things should be judged, wings don’t.” The danger here is a move to an expertise based judge system – like policy debate – where the judges are blamed for the failure of a team to win because they can’t take a good flow or don’t understand the arguments.

I like BP/WUDC style because the onus is more on the teams as of now to adapt and be “persuasive” – a key word for judges that I spoke to in Cork. The consensus judging system can certainly help keep it this way, as long as some element of diversity is left in the judging system and not squeezed out by persuasive Chairs who could possibly end up pushing a univocal, technical view of debate judging worldwide. The cultural/regional differences in how debate is viewed are incredibly important for the pedagogy of debate, throughout the entire history of rhetoric.

I like the educational potential of consensus judging, but not the indoctrination/persuader model of the Chair. Instead, I like the model of the Chair as “Socrates” – questioning each and every decision from the wings to make sure they have fairly accounted for each and every argument in the debate, and really have given each team their due in the course of the debate. When I serve as Chair here and there, I notice that a lot of the top half of the debate is oversimplified often times (even by me because, hey, that was a long time ago once you are finishing up the Opp Whip speech). I usually use the discussion period to make sure that we are fairly representing the arguments of the first tables. Under a Socratic paradigm, the chair makes sure that the wings are listening carefully, and learning how to evaluate arguments in the round with as little personal bias as possible.

So I wonder – what is the role of the chair in a consensus system? Is it to convince the other judges that he or she is right? Is it to hear the views of the wings and construct a decision that satisfies all adjudicators? Or is it to serve as a Socratic gadfly to the wing judges, questioning and probing their assumptions about the debate, making sure that the decision is defensible from all skeptical sides?