John Harper

This is a blog about competitive debating aimed at an introductory level with the intention of making information more widely available.

I do not currently update this blog, as I am now employed full-time teaching debating. More recent things I've written, both blog posts and training materials can be found on the National High School Debate League of China and Association for Global Debate websites.  

I am still happy to answer any questions about debating and give advice in either a personal or professional capacity.

Why have you started this blog? 

Partly because I want to raise the general level of competitive debating. I think one of the main reasons established debating societies do better is because they have access to better training resources. I also think debating, and the mindset behind it is a good and important thing to promote.

I started by forming a facebook group called the Communist Case File where people are encouraged to share useful resources and information. As it became larger I decided it would be useful to have an organised external resource where I could write more in depth materials.

On a personal level I enjoy writing and want to practice doing so in a public forum where I can get immediate feedback.

I like your stuff, can I: share it, print it, teach based on it, reproduce it? 

Short answer: Yes.

Technically everything on this site is  licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Which means I'm happy for you to share it provided you give credit and don't make money off it. However if you would like to pay me to licence existing material or produce additional material please get in touch.

How can I contact you? 

Easiest way is to  I'm also on various social networks.