Logicality
Three issues must first be present in the affirmative case and are the main ideas or values to vote on for taking any action (in policy debate or in everyday life). They ask: What are we doing now (inherency stock issue)? What could we be doing differently (solvency stock issue)? What are the results of what we are doing now versus what we could be doing (significance stock issue)? The last stock issue, topicality, is procedural and unique to debate as it concerns how germane the plan (specifically, plan as stated) is to the given resolution.Components
The stock issues are: * Significance: This answers the "why" of debate. All advantages and disadvantages to the status quo (resulting from inherency) and of the plan (resulting from solvency) are evaluated under significance. A common equivocation is to confuse "significance" with the word "significantly" that appears in many resolutions. Significance is derived from judicious weighing between advantages and disadvantages, whereas significant policy changes are judged by how much the policy itself changed independently of how good or bad the effects or Solvency are. Policy debate does not assume determinism, but every effect or consequence has to be argued with evidence that those effects or consequences can or do occur. * Harms: Harms are a way of elucidating the problems or shortcomings of the status quo. Since they prove the "so, no" of continuing with the status quo, harms are closely related to, but not the same as, Significance. * Inherency: The actual situation and causes of the status quo. A case is "not inherent" when the status quo is already implementing the plan or solving the harms. Clearly, a solution that is new or different from the status quo is not warranted in such a case. Three common types of inherency are: :*Structural inherency: Laws or other barriers to the implementation of the plan or causes of harms :*Attitudinal inherency: Beliefs or attitudes which prevent the implementation of the plan or causing harms :*Existential inherency: The harms exist and ''Other Components
Other components have been advocated by advanced debaters and can be found during some tournament rounds of intercollegiate policy debate. These types of arguments or, sometimes, components of policy debate, can be linked to stock issues by good debaters. *Typicality: Is the Affirmative case or plan good enough for the resolution? If too generic, many other plans that could fall under the resolution could be run by the Negative, making Affirmative's Significance arguments nonunique or not significant enough. If too specific or complex, the atypicality of the Affirmative side is an extraordinary exception supporting the resolution which, while being straightforward, is difficult to support readily. Typicality is often used as an argument by either side to avoid clash on Topicality. The debate world's pet term for atypical plans is ''squirrelly'': squirrelly cases, squirrelly arguments, squirrelly variety of policy debate. *Specificity: Is the resolution and the Affirmative case correctly, neatly, or clearly specifying what is to be debated? A vague resolution is difficult for the Affirmative to support and, hence, difficult for the Negative to challenge, the problem of the "moving target" or "patch of fog" resolution or plan. For example, if the Affirmative claims that not going with the resolution will end in evil and the devil will appear, the Affirmative has not yet met the stock issue burden of specifying anything in particular unique or significant or inherent or justifiable about arguing for or against the supposedly anti-devil resolution; that would be a fight to the death rather than a debate. Another example. The Negative can argue that the wording in the resolution is imprecise and that there is better diction for the meaning as stated. If say, the resolution is to "significantly enhance the prospects of" some social-economic class, the unintended consequence of such a resolution allows for Affirmative plans to include prostitution, anarchy, human trafficking, and such vices. The Negative has to straightforwardly argue what the better diction is, for example, that the resolution is to "significantly enhance the economic standard of living of" some social-economic group of persons. *Grounds: Is the format, stock issue outline, or allowances within the debate round fair to both sides? Grounds is often argued by both sides that certain types of arguments unfairly overscope, overly limit, or overburdens one side's pool of arguments in favor of the other side. Many frowned upon experimental arguments lose debate grounds and are not encouraged by debate coaches and judges, because they detract from the educational value of the activity. Policy debate is organized, attentive, and formalized to a fair degree, with etiquette and usual expectations of good demeanor in speech. Arguments that diminish the value of debating are argued at the Grounds level of debate. For example, because the Affirmative usually runs a case and has to demonstrate stock issue burdens have been cleared, running a values-versus-virtue debate on the Negative to shift the debate's qualitative format and tone to Lincoln-Douglas steals ground from policy debate. Subversion is a high-level Grounds debate, often brought up by the Affirmative. The Affirmative is granted "good faith" in supporting the resolution at the beginning of the debate round. A Negative position that undermines that good faith without direct argumentation is considered subversive. Some examples: kritik is a subversion, homophobia and misogyny against sources cited is subversion, punditry creep or discursiveness is a subversion, provisional plans and tentative counterplans that need too many moving parts in place in order to work by not assuming fiat are also subversive, omniscience and speculative politicking is subversive. Negative subversion is difficult for the Affirmative to counter, in which the Negative can validly argue that changing the status quo is subversive, has dire unknown consequences, a form of Negative Inherency that seeks to preserve the underlying value of the resolution without the stated resolution itself, such as in clandestine operations byReferences
*Bates, Ben. (2002)