Mandatory Voting
In Slate, Eric Weiner ponders Australia's mandatory voting system but fails to note what is, I think, the most persuasive consideration in favor of such a plan. The point is not merely that mandatory voting generates high levels of turnout (and thus some kind of fuzzy civic virtue points), but stable levels of turnout. Many of the least attractive elements of our election system derive from the fact that the composition of the actual electorate changes from year to year. Thus, both parties have reason to try and launch drives to register "their" voters. This, in turn, raises the specter of fraud. The specter of fraud, as we've been seeing, can be a useful tool in trying to prevent the other guy's supporters from voting. Negative advertising, meanwhile, is primarily useful as a way of suppressing the other side's turnout, and much of the most egregious policies and rhetoric you see in any campaign season are aimed at "motivating the base" rather than broadening a candidate's appeal.
In a mandatory voting system, none of that is useful. The electorate is the electorate and there's nothing a candidate can do to change that. Instead, he has to focus his efforts on trying to persuade people to back him. Voters who want to register a protest against the available options can vote for a third party or write someone in. What's more, the cost to citizens of being coerced into voting is quite trivial (it really isn't very hard or time-consuming). The main objection is simply the objection of principle -- it's wrong to coerce people into doing stuff. I don't find that persuasive in general, or in this case in particular, but many people do.
October 29, 2004 | Permalink
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Matt Yglesias points to an article about Australia's compulsory voting system and makes the additional point: In Slate, Eric Weiner ponders Australia's mandatory voting system but fails to note what is, I think, the most persuasive consideration in fav... [Read More]
Tracked on Oct 31, 2004 1:10:32 PM
Comments
Moreover, if the voter participation levels hold steady, political parties have less of an incentive to invent ballot measures engineered solely to turn out certain voters and turn away others.
The benefit to political discourse -- media coverage -- would be tremendous.
Posted by: Jose | Oct 29, 2004 2:38:20 PM
The main objection is simply the objection of principle -- it's wrong to coerce people into doing stuff. I don't find that persuasive in general, or in this case in particular, but many people do.
And the draft?
Posted by: Ugh | Oct 29, 2004 2:43:14 PM
What happens if you don't vote?
Posted by: praktike | Oct 29, 2004 2:44:05 PM
Do pollsters ever ask non-voters which Presidential candidate they are (however weakly) for? What does
the silent near majority think?
Also, since the game theoretic value of an individual votes is almost nothing, but democracy needs good turnout, I've always thought that civic duty is the best argument for voting. If voting is a civic duty just like paying taxes, it should be mandatory.
Posted by: Matt | Oct 29, 2004 2:45:56 PM
Good catch, MY. The turnout angle is, by itself, the strongest argument for compulsory voting (though I'm still not persuaded to try it here).
Maybe we should issue summonses to get voters to the polls.
Posted by: Grumpy | Oct 29, 2004 2:48:20 PM
I agree with your points, but, institutionalization of any form of government coercion should be approached with caution.
Posted by: foo | Oct 29, 2004 2:52:42 PM
Upon re-reading, this matter *is* noted in the Slate piece.
"...imagine our political parties freed from the burden of having to energize their base. Candidates could focus on converting voters, rather than trying to get them to the polls."
Your augmentation is appreciated.
Posted by: Grumpy | Oct 29, 2004 2:54:22 PM
What happens if you don't vote?
you're banished, of course.
Posted by: cleek | Oct 29, 2004 3:00:15 PM
This would also -- I will here assert without argumentation, as I have no time -- result in the selection of better officials.
Posted by: Realish | Oct 29, 2004 3:07:41 PM
praktike - from the linked Slate article: "Those who fail to vote risk a fine and, in rare cases, imprisonment."
It seems obvious to me that if someone doesn't want to vote he should have that right. Less obviously, if someone doesn't care enough to drag himself to the voting booth without fear of being fined then I don't care what he thinks.
Posted by: ostap | Oct 29, 2004 3:12:44 PM
you're banished, of course.
To where? Isn't Australia already some kind of penal colony?
Posted by: praktike | Oct 29, 2004 3:12:47 PM
Note that the law does *not* require anyone to vote -- the individual right to not vote, which can in some cases be an important one, is preserved.
The law simply requires that everyone show up at the pollbooth on election day -- as the article says, "They can deface their ballot or write in Skippy the Bush Kangaroo (Australia's version of Lassie)—or do nothing at all."
So the government coercion involved is quite a bit less onerous than the coercion we face in being required to do all kinds of things in the USA -- pay our taxes, get a driver's license, serve on juries, etc.
Let's remember the recent Steven Landsburg article in Slate, which argued that a rational, marginal-utility-maximizing individual should not vote, because the likelyhood that his or her vote will affect the outcome of the election is so small. This is a problem of collective action: it would good for group A if all of its members voted, because their candidate would be elected, but for any individual member of group A, there's no real incentive to vote. Fining non-voters would provide sufficient incentive to outweigh the relatively small costs of having to show up at a polling place on election day.
Posted by: Alex R | Oct 29, 2004 3:32:27 PM
"The main objection is simply the objection of principle -- it's wrong to coerce people into doing stuff. I don't find that persuasive in general, or in this case in particular, but many people do."
...And there were people who thought you were joking about "Democracy has only an instrumental value." I tried to tell them...
You will not pry this couch potato down to the middle-school with an army of participation-maddened democracy zealots. Unless I so will to contribute to the legitimization of a process I may not in any way accept, give me apathy or give me death.
Posted by: bob mcmanus | Oct 29, 2004 3:33:32 PM
Seems like a bad idea to compel people to vote considering many are politically disengaged. If you don't care or pay attention to politics, the only thing you'd have to go on are the most common spin/catch phrases of the campaigns: Bush is a scare-mongering religious nut-job out to exchange American blood for oil and kill our civil liberties. Kerry is an unpatriotic, spineless, snotty aristocratic flip-flopper that'll get this country blown up.
On Second thought, maybe those absurd caricatures are the way most of us view the candidates anyway.
Posted by: Chris | Oct 29, 2004 3:34:12 PM
re: banished
praktike... obviously you didn't see the South Park season premiere this week.
Posted by: Grumpy | Oct 29, 2004 3:34:38 PM
Isn't this less a case of mandatory voting but more a case of ease of registering ? In the UK > 90% of the adult population is registered to vote because it's easier to be registered than not. Each local council has a mandatory duty to keep an up to date electoral register. This is generally done by mailing a form to each household once a year or so with an prepaid envelope asking people to note any changes since the last update.
In the UK this generally results in a turnout at general elections of > 70%. 2001 was the lowest since 1918 as the turnout was only around 60%(due to lack of enthusiasm for any of the main parties) but that's still higher than any US pres election since 68.
Posted by: kenny | Oct 29, 2004 3:35:47 PM
I agree with Chris. People who stay home on election day are generally not that interested in politics, so forcing them to show up and vote is highly likely to make the electorate less informed, on average, than it already is. Which is saying a lot.
Posted by: david | Oct 29, 2004 3:38:58 PM
Hmm.. what about the issue that forcing stubbornly uninterested and uninformed citizens to vote is a gift to the ruling party? There has to be some percentage of people, however small, who hasn't even heard of the opposition party (I distinctly remember in early November 2000, an acquaintance asked me to remind him which one was the Republican again). Wouldn't these people be more likely to vote for the guy who they know is already in charge, simply because of name recognition? Or also because of the issue of 'the government says you have to vote, so best just vote for the government.' It works in Cuba and worked in Iraq. When someone coerces you to vote, they're implicitly coercing you to vote for -them-.
Posted by: neil | Oct 29, 2004 3:39:07 PM
There's more to the argument against mandatory voting laws than you allow.
You're ignoring that not voting IS voting - it's a vote against the system. It's a vote against the electoral college, a vote against not getting off of work on election day, a vote against being forced into voting for two guys who you never had a hand in choosing. It's a vote against being ignored by the media and the politicians.
Make our government earn the votes the hard way - by bringing government to the people, so that the people are interested in voting. There are plenty of reforms for doing this.
If we have such a crappy voter turnout, ask why that is. If people are lazy and uninterested, do they have good reason to be? When people do see elections as important, such as this one, turnout rises. In my home county, as of a couple days ago, more people have already voted this election than in 2000.
Mandating voter turnout allows the government to ignore the dissatisfaction of the populace. Why campaign to people's interests if they have to vote anyway?
Posted by: Michael | Oct 29, 2004 3:49:14 PM
Poppycock. If people want to not vote/reject the system, they can either write-in a candidate or spoil their ballot, and in that case their opinion (or assertion of a non-opinion) will at least be noted.
Or are they just to lazy to spoil a ballot? in which case, I submit that it isn't principle that motivates them at all.
Posted by: Wrye | Oct 29, 2004 3:52:35 PM
On the other hand, Bush's perceived need to motivate his base helps restrain his dishonesty. It is the only thing that makes him say what he thinks. A problem in 2000 was that the American people were fundamentally mislead about the choice they were making because the Republican base was fired up by Clinton hatred.
That might conceivably happen again (if John Kerry turns out to be Jane Fonda in drag after all).
Often I don't agree at all that "much of the most egregious policies and rhetoric you see in any campaign season are aimed at "motivating the base"" but rather think that the need to motivate the Democrat base is the only thing that leads to any reasonable policy proposals at all.
Mandatory first past the post voting implies an even faster race to the middle.
Often the middl is at a very strange place. Recall the run up to the war in Iraq when the middle ranged from invade without UN approval to invade if UN approval was blocked only by vetos.
Posted by: Robert Waldmann | Oct 29, 2004 4:20:39 PM
Mandatory voting? That is the most unconstitutional and antiamerican fascist idea I've ever heard in my entire life.
Heil Big Brother Yglesias! FREEDOM IS COERCION! GENOCIDE IS PEACE! KERRY IS PATRIOT!
Posted by: Modern Crusader | Oct 29, 2004 4:32:27 PM
I'm not sure about madatory voting, but madatory voting registration seems like a good idea and certainly no more intrusive than filling out the tax form. Also, we could get rid of registrations being thrown away, challenges to voter registration, etc. This would also get rid of the fear that registering to vote will increase your likelyhood of jury duty.
Posted by: catfish | Oct 29, 2004 4:33:26 PM
"Less obviously, if someone doesn't care enough to drag himself to the voting booth without fear of being fined then I don't care what he thinks."
Precisely. I'm all for ease of registration, but if you don't care enough to vote, I don't care enough about your political opinion to make you vote. And I'm relatively sure that such completely uninformed people won't just 'spoil' the ballot. Many will vote for the person they have sort-of heard about.
Posted by: Sebastian Holsclaw | Oct 29, 2004 4:37:07 PM
In Slate, Eric Weiner ponders Australia's mandatory voting system but fails to note what is, I think, the most persuasive consideration in favor of such a plan. The point is not merely that mandatory voting generates high levels of turnout (and thus some kind of fuzzy civic virtue points), but stable levels of turnout.
So does not having elections at all. Stable turnout is fairly easy to achieve.
OTOH, abstention is a valid and useful form of political expression, even if it is seen as an abdication of civic duty, and it highlights a problem that leaders should respond to to preserve social order since high abstention rates single high disaffection.
So, there is no reason to suppress variability in turnout through coercion. Better to get an electoral system which actually produces a meaningful array of choices that more people can find acceptable options in, which is the real reason most democracies have both higher and more stable turnout than the US, rather than coercion -- which many also employ, to be sure.
Posted by: cmdicely | Oct 29, 2004 4:38:39 PM
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