#14 - After the United Nations Security Council authorized

[kgalaraga93]

Hi,

This question was a little challenging for me to get through and understand. My basic interpretation of the passage was that the UNSC authorized the military to intervene in a country in order to make peace in that country, but one country's parliament in the UN who represented his nation condemned the prime minister of his own country for contributing military support to the action. But one parliament leader insists that just because they wanted resolution doesn't mean that they're unwilling to send military and contribute to the action. I see the paradox but don't understand why it exists, which makes it hard for me to come up with a prophase. Clarification for this question would be greatly appreciated, thank you so much.

Kim

[Robert Carroll]

Kim,

The paradox arises because the parliament supports the UN plan, yet the parliament condemned its prime minister for supporting that very same plan. If parliament liked the plan, why oppose the prime minister's support for it? It looks like parliament agrees on the end to be achieved by the UN plan but may disagree on the means chosen for achieving that end. If parliament has some reason to want the prime minister to obey certain formal requirements on committing personnel to the action, parliament may oppose the specific means chosen by the prime minister (or the very fact that it's the prime minister supporting the action) while not opposing the action itself.

Although it's outside the scope of the facts in the stimulus, you can imagine a similar situation in the law. A person could support a certain policy goal but believe it's the job of Congress, not a federal court, to achieve that goal - thus someone could condemn the Supreme Court for ruling in favor of a certain party even though that very same person condemning that actually agrees with the policy position of that party. This would be a situation where there is agreement over the substance of an action but disagreement over the process used to achieve that action.

The situation is similar enough in the stimulus that an analogous prephrase comes to mind - parliament liked what the prime minister was trying to do, but not the way the prime minister did it.

Robert Carroll

[kgalaraga93]

Thank you, great explanation!

[Allen Iverson]

I'm a little confused as to why E is an incorrect answer choice for this problem, could someone explain this for me?

[Dana D]

Hey Allen,

The paradox here is that the parliament in question condemned the prime minister for authorizing military intervention despite saying they support this plan. Why would they have an issue with it if they actually support the plan? Answer choice (B) explains this best, by saying the prime minister overstepped his authority - parliament thinks this is a good plan, but that the prime minister shouldn't have been the one to authorize it.

In comparison, answer choice (E) might somewhat address parliament's reasoning - maybe the public is against the intervention and parliament passed the resolution to reflect the public's wishes, even though parliament itself approves of the intervention. However, we aren't told how the public feels, so this answer choice is requiring more assumptions on our part than answer choice (B). The test asks us which answer choice most helps resolve the paradox, so (B) is a better answer choice than (E).

Hope that helps!

[testtaker5619]

Hi I have a question about how to eliminate answer choice A.

So the paradox/curious fact is that the parliament says they support the UN intervention but condemned their leader for committing their forces to it. I was torn between A and B.

My explanation for why A was correct is that it does indeed explain the paradox. Basically, it's saying "Parliament support the plan since it doesn't mean OUR guys have to go. They can't legally force us to send our troops. But since our PM committed to sending our troops now we're mad." Basically this answer provides an explanation for how you could support an action AND not want your troops committed, because you support the action in theory, not in actuality.

My explanation for why B was incorrect is that the PM actually didn't initiate a foreign military action, technically he just committed forces to a proposed plan. So Parliament still has the power to initiate the action - they could just say "well yeah you can promise whatever, but we have the actual power so this is meaningless."

Any thoughts?

[testtaker5619]

Hi I have a question about how to eliminate answer choice A.

So the paradox/curious fact is that the parliament says they support the UN intervention but condemned their leader for committing their forces to it. I was torn between A and B.

My explanation for why A was correct is that it does indeed explain the paradox. Basically, it's saying "Parliament support the plan since it doesn't mean OUR guys have to go. They can't legally force us to send our troops. But since our PM committed to sending our troops now we're mad." Basically this answer provides an explanation for how you could support an action AND not want your troops committed, because you support the action in theory, not in actuality.

My explanation for why B was incorrect is that the PM actually didn't initiate a foreign military action, technically he just promised to commit forces to a proposed plan. But leaders promise stuff that they don't follow up on all the time. So Parliament still has the power to initiate the action - they could just say "well yeah you can promise whatever, but we have the actual power so this is meaningless."

Any thoughts?

[Jeff Wren]

Hi testtaker,

This is a Resolve the Paradox question. For these questions, you are looking for an answer that explains how both sides of the seemingly contradictory or odd fact set can be true. You aren't trying to change the facts in the stimulus or disprove one side.

Here, when the second "fact" is given that most members of parliament supported the UN plan to create a coalition of armed forces intended to halt civil strife in a certain country, there is no reason to assume that this means "as long as we don't have to send our own troops." In fact, such a reading would be quite contrary to the statement at face value. It would be a little like claiming, "We support this cease fire agreement as long as we don't have to follow it."

The paradox here is that the parliament is in favor of the UN plan (including sending their own troops) but it still condemned the prime minister. Answer B resolves the discrepancy because it explains why the parliament condemned the prime minister for overstepping his or her authority even though the parliament was in favor of the plan itself. In other words, the parliament members are sternly reminding the prime minister that they decide whether or not to commit troops, not the prime minister, even if they agree with the prime minister's decision.