How to Write a Position Paper

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How to Write a Position Paper
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Outline

• Basic Introduction of Position Paper
• A simple outline for a Position Paper
• Sample Position Paper
• References

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What is a Position Paper?
Definition Position Paper (???????) is an
essay detailing your countrys policies on the
topics being discussed in your committee.
Format one to one-and-a-half-page
Objectives Convince the audience that your
opinion is valid and worth listening to
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A Simple Outline for a Position Paper

• Paragraph 1------Introduction
• Take one side of the argument.
• (The audience knows where you stand.)
• A. Introduce the topic
• B. Provide background on your country and its
  current situation
• concerning the topic
• C. Assert your view of the issue
• Paragraph 2------Supporting information for
  domestic stand
• A. Your countrys policies with respect to the
  issue
• B. Quotes from your countrys leaders about the
  issue
• C. Statistics to back up your countrys position
  on the issue
• D. Actions taken by your government with regard
  to the issue

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A Simple Outline for a Position Paper
Paragraph 3------International supporting
information A. Conventions (??????) and
resolutions (??) that your country has signed or
ratified B. International organization actions
that your country supported or opposed C. How
the positions of other countries affect your
countrys position. (????????????????) Paragraph
4------Conclusion A. Restate your argument B.
Provide a plan of action
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Sample Position Paper--- Paragraph 1

• Committee Animal Committee
• Topic Do countries agree to whaling?
• Country New Zealand
• Delegates Clare, Sherry, Allen, Rita
• (Take one side)
• New Zealands current position in the
  International Whaling
• Commission (IWC) 1 firmly stands at the far right
  of the anti-
• whaling and it supports a moratorium on
  commercial whaling.
• However, this was not always the case. (Countrys
  background)
• In fact, since 1790s, New Zealand has begun
  running
• commercial whaling. By 1845 New Zealand had set
  up
• approximately 100 whaling stations. The advanced
  whale
• technique crashed a large amount of humpback
  stocks, which
• caused the sudden drop of the whale oil prices.
  Therefore, in
• 1964 commercial whaling in New Zealand brought to
  the end.

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Sample Position Paper--- Paragraph 2

• Through 1960s, government defined whaling largely
  as
• economic concern, and there was no domestic
  pressure to alter
• the view. In 1963, the Committee of Three2
  strongly
• recommended 50 years to halt to taking of blue
  whales to allow
• the species to recover. Despite comprehending
  that the urgent
• action was emergency to prevent the whales
  sliding to extinction,
• (Country action) New Zealands response was not
  directly
• concern the blue whale. Moreover, (Quote from
  countrys
• leader) New Zealand delegation advised a briefing
  that In the
• long-term, we were keeping open the possibility
  of exploiting this
• natural resources in the future in accordance
  with the
• Commissions guidelines. Finally, New Zealand
  withdrew from
• the IWC in 1968.

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Sample Position Paper--- Paragraph 3

• (International organization actions)
• Until 1970s, pressures from officials and NGO3s,
• Greenpeace4, and International Fund for Animal
  Welfare
• (IFAW) 5, the Environmental Investigation Agency
  (EIA) 6,
• and the growing level of public agitation against
  commercial
• whaling forced the New Zealand government to pay
  close
• attention to moral and ethical arguments to
  sustain its position.
• (Countrys action) In resuming membership of IWC
  in 1976,
• New Zealands government was now giving due
  consideration
• to measure of conservation. (Countrys policy) In
  1978, the
• Marine Mammals Protection Act was promulgated to
  protect
• all cetaceans and pinniped within the waters
  under New
• Zealands jurisdiction.

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Sample Position Paper---Paragraph 4

• Although New Zealands policy was accorded with
• scientific advice, she changed in 1979 owing to
• public pressure and its perception of the
• inadequacy of scientific advice. (International
• meeting) In 1991, at the meeting of IWC in
• Reykjavik, Iceland, the Cooke model for the
• Revised Management Procedure (RMP) 7 was
• agreed upon and accepted a sound mathematical
• basis for the management of whaling.

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Sample Position Paper---Paragraph 5

• (Restate countrys argument)
• The New Zealands government had finally
• embraced the entire Save the whales philosophy
• and their aim is to make sure that the greatest
• possible protection for cetaceans within the
• parameters of IWC, pursuing the goal of
• conserving Antarctic whale stocks to permit their
  
• rational use.
•  

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Sample Position Paper--- Annotation

• 1The International Whaling Commission (IWC) IWC
  was set up under the International Convention for
  the Regulation of Whaling which was signed in
  Washington DC on 2nd December 1946. The purpose
  of the Convention is to provide for the proper
  conservation of whale stocks and thus make
  possible the orderly development of the whaling
  industry. http//www.iwcoffice.org/index.htm
•   
• 2 Committee of Three Established by the IWC in
  1961, the Committee of Three Scientists,
  consisted of three scientists from countries not
  engaged in pelagic whaling, who had experience in
  population dynamics, Drs, D.G. Chapman. S.J. Holt
  and K.R. Allen. This Committee, later extended to
  four scientists, worked from 1961 to 1964 in
  close cooperation with the Scientific Committee
  of the IWC and provided advice on the state of
  baleen whale stocks in the southern hemisphere
  and the consequences to them of various actions
  which the Commission might take.
• 3Non-Government Organization (NGO)
• 4Greenpeace Greenpeace is an independent global
  campaigning organisation that acts to change
  attitudes and behaviour, to protect and conserve
  the environment. http//www.greenpeace.org/interna
  tional/
•  

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Sample Position Paper--- Annotation

• 5International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW)
  From the outset, the founders of the
  International Fund for Animal Welfare, or IFAW,
  rejected the notion that the interests of humans
  and animals were separate. Instead they embraced
  the understanding that the fate and future of
  harp seals-and all other animals on Earth-are
  inextricably linked to our own.
  http//www.ifaw.org/ifaw/general/default.aspx
•  
• 6Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) The
  Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) is an
  international campaigning organization committed
  to investigating and exposing environmental
  crime. http//www.eia-international.org/
•  
• 7RMP Revised Management Procedure. The RMP,
  developed by the IWC Scientific Committee and
  adopted by the Commission in 1994, is a risk
  averse method of calculating catch quotas even
  under conditions that may include biases in
  estimates of abundance, errors in assumed stock
  boundaries and changes in carrying capacity due
  to environmental changes. The RMP has yet to be
  implemented by the IWC.
•  

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References

• http//homepages.uhwo.hawaii.edu/writing/position
  .htm
• http//www.unausa.org/site/pp.asp?cfvKRI8MPJpFb
  457147
• Martin, w. 1999. ICR, from Whaling and
  Anti-whaling Movement
• Carter, A. 1990. For the Love of Dolphins. New
  Zealand Listener and TV Times.
• Duggan, S. 1991. New Zealanders. Pacific Way.
  3742-44.
• Lynch, K.M. 1996. New Zealand in the
  International Whaling
• Commission. M.A. Thesis, Victoria University,
  Wellington.