The 1AC’s use of economic crisis demonstrates the drive to maintain the system of neoliberalism intact. Their advantage claims are twisted to serve this end and the plan only further diminishes opposition and revolution

A key function of organic intellectuals is to respond to crises. To remain hegemonic, organic intellectuals must develop policy responses that are seen to mitigate problems, while leaving the core system intact. Otherwise, the bloc is left open to competition from counterhegemonic forces. This is precisely how neoliberalism overthrew Keynesianism in the 1970s, and how Keynesianism itself overthrew the laissez-faire order of the early 20th century. It is therefore instructive to analyze the Dialogue’s output in times of crisis. One example is the Dialogue-sponsored report Washington Contentious released in 2000 during the midst of the Argentinean financial crisis. The group’s Latin directors (to say nothing of the report writers themselves) would have been keenly aware of the crisis of legitimacy this event entailed—a crisis which could disrupt the accumulation circuits in which they were integrated. It is therefore unsurprising that the social dislocations caused by the crisis—soaring unemployment, public debt, severe poverty, and the annihilation of local savings—compelled the authors to propose limited Keynesian interventions, including an enhanced social safety net, food stamps, unemployment insurance, expanded public schooling, and progressive taxation (Birdsall & de la Torre, 2001). Yet interestingly, and in keeping with Truitt’s (2000) account, these limited reforms continue to be couched in a broader, over-arching continued support for neoliberal economics. According to the report (Birdsall & de la Torre, 2000), the limited Keynesian reforms proposed cannot be deficit financed, even in times of crisis, as “fiscal indiscipline . . . has high costs for the poor” (p. 22) The Dialogue thereby recommends that capital flight be mitigated through “market-supplied insurance” (p. 35) and the maintenance of government “stabilization funds” (p. 36). Banks and governments would have to build countercyclical provisions in times of high credit growth, thereby providing countercyclical liquidity Countries should also be given automatic “access to international lines of credit” in times of crisis (ibid.). Stability can be improved through a further “internationalizing [of] the banking system,” as the “entry of first-rate foreign banks can rapidly enhance the domestic banking system’s stability and resiliency” (p. 37). Finally, stability can be further enhanced through “continuing efforts to diversify trade and increase foreign direct investment, including negotiating multilateral, regional, and bilateral agreements” (ibid.). As policy responses, these recommendations are extraordinary. The immediate cause of the crisis was capital flight facilitated by financial deregulation and the elimination of capital controls. In the similar East Asian crisis of 1998, Malaysia ignored IMF advice and imposed capital controls to great success, while those nations that followed IMF dictates suffered greatly (Harvey, 2005). Yet capital controls would undermine regimes of flexible accumulation dependent on unrestricted capital flows. The Dialogue thereby rejects controls, simply advising that governments and banks hold enough money to ensure that the impact of capital flight is lessened in times of crisis. This is to be achieved through new insurance mechanisms and access to lines of credit—both of which will presumably be supplied by the same global financial firms that helped instigate the crisis in the first place, or possibly from the IFIs that originally imposed neoliberal reforms. Finally, the Dialogue’s cure for instability is not less, but more neoliberal financial and trade deregulation and integration. Another example is the 2009 report A Second Chance: U.S. Policy in the Americas, prepared for U.S. policy makers in the wake of the 2008 global financial-economic crisis (IAD). Aware that the crisis represents a further blow to regional neoliberal legitimacy, the report openly concedes that “popular frustration may lead to diminished support for democracy and markets” throughout both North and Latin America. Also, the report endorses a familiar suite of policy measures designed to placate Latin American publics, once again demonstrating which concessions are necessary to generate a transnational elite rolling consensus. The report (2009) advises the United States to restore its credibility on democracy and human rights; normalize relations with Cuba; help its regional partners in “confronting crime, violence, and drugs”; and reform immigration policy. However, the underlying thrust of proposed economic policies continues to be broadly neoliberal. Admitting that support for “new trade initiatives will not be a priority for either the United States or most Latin American nations in the coming period,” the report (IAD, 2009) recommends that the United States quickly “gain congressional ratification of the already negotiated and signed free trade agreements with Colombia and Panama,” while preserving “hemisphere-wide free trade” as a “critical long-term goal” (p. 10). On a similar note, the United States is urged to “avoid protectionist measures that would reduce Latin American access to U.S. markets and investments” (p. 9). Furthermore, the United States must “help ensure Latin America’s continuing access to necessary credit and capital” by “mobiliz[ing] support for an expansion of the resources and programs of . . . the Inter-American Development Bank, World Bank, IMF, and Andean Development Corporation” (p. 7). Three of the 4 IFIs mentioned are direct funders of the Dialogue, and all have worked to implement neoliberal reforms that laid the groundwork for the financial bubbles that caused the current crisis. No mention is made of the enhancement and/or support for the proposed “Bank of the South.” Only the traditional financial institutions of neoliberalism hold the key to global financial stability. “There is no alternative” (p. 7).